"The ship does appear to still be in good condition and we have enough energy to make the travel back. I'm going toward this planet, start the long range scan Rodney" Said Sheppard professionally.
"We are getting a lot of data, but there are wide differences with what Janus found" answered McKay with some surprise in his voice. "This is the same habitable planet, the sun is also the same, more or less ten thousands years, but I'm also finding multiple powerfull energy sources. There are also several unkown particules and radiations, we already have so much that the whole reading is a mess."
As the planet grew bigger in the windshield, more and more information were scanned and automaticaly displayed. Daniel and Mitchell took place in the cockpit behind McKay and Sheppard and started to read at the same time.
"At least we definetly found something" said Daniel with excitement "We should keep scanning while approching and try to make sense of those informations. I can't wait to see how has evolved this planet from the mostly wild fauna that Janus described. According to his records, even if there were intelligent creatures on the planet, there wasn't any organized societies".
"There are two continents divided by a huge ocean, I see a simple and stable meteorogical system and ... a nice atmosphere that should be good for us. The life signs detector is definitively starting to pick things up" listed McKay, before starting to frown and checking the ships instruments "Woaw, if those energy readings are correct, they are increasingly puzzling; the amounts seem enormous, but I can't figure out the type of it. I've never seen anything like that".
"As in ... not electrical?" asked Colonel Cameron curiously.
"Not electrical, not gravitational, not hyperspatial, not zero point or anything else that I know of. Those readings looks like doodlings from a madman!" Answered McKay with an angry voice.
"I'd say we found what magic look like on a scanner" said Sheppard " I'm activating the cloacking but, besides that, what should we do?"
"We'll keep scanning in case something looks hostile or able to detect us, besides that I'm not sure if we should check the inhabitants or the energy" Cameron wondered out loud "Perhaps approach from a blind spot over the ocean, then check the biggests overlaps between energy and population, it would be the fastest and clearer way to figure out what is going on out there".
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After an uneventful atmospheric entry, the jumper cruised over the ocean for some time. It was decided that they would first check, the smallest, but according to the scanners, more relevant continent. The life signs detected were numering in the tens of million, although it couldn't be established precisely of which species and the energy readings where almost exclusively located on this side of the planet.
When finaly they reached the land, like in their precendent explorations, all members of the fantasy expedition were relieved to find a comparable world to what they knew; Trees, birds, rivers and pretty much all the normal things that they already found all over the universe during their missions. It's only besides this point that they started to notice some significant differences.
After only an hour flying over the land, the team already observed many strange things; small settlements of various known and unknown species, humans, what appeared to be a kind of lizardmen, other various beast-like humanoids and the weirdest discovery so far, they all seemed to work with ... skeletons. They just started observing a farm being attented by humans and undeads, when they crossed path with something they were looking for. A dragon flyng high in the sky, ignoring everything and pretty much also being ignored by the ground creatures.
The white dragon that they decided to observe and follow for almost thirty minutes did no reacted to their presence nor gave any indication that he could sense them.
"This guy is way bigger than Darell, good thing that the cloak is working". Said Vala, halfway inside the cockpit and leaning on Mitchell. "I'm sure he could eat the whole ship in just a couple of bites!"
"So you don't want us to stop it to check if it has a good deal for you? I'm willing to bet that the stuff it's carrying in it's satchells is valuable" mocked the colonel pushing her back in the passenger compartment.
"Don't be ridiculous, when dealing with something that strong, you have to first gather intelligence and then approach it when you already know what will be an interesting deal for everybody. The smartest move, if possible, is to find out something they desperately need."
"Look over there" said Daniel looking on the other side of the ship's windshield "There's something I'd like to check".
"The road ?" asked Sheppard "It pretty much look the same we already crossed several times".
"No, on the road. It looks like a caravan or a convoy" answered the archeologist.
"Okay, let's check" said Sheppard. He left the dragon on it's way and turned the ship in the direction of the distant movement.
At the speed they were going, it only took a few moment before the ground group came in sight. They could see several huge chariot like vehicles, which were surprisingly drawn by nightmarish creatures. Another discovery was that the convoy was manned by twenty heavily armored men.
"There's a lot to say at this range of scan" started McKay "Wathever are those creatures, they are emitting much more 'magic' that the dragon. I can't say if they, let's say, have more of it or if they are 'magical' in nature, whereas the dragon is a normal creature that can use magic" the scientist continued to check his data before adding "I can also see that what they are carrying is very interesting, there are litteraly tons of metal in those vehicles. Copper, iron, platinum and even ... refined trinium. There are even other things the computer can't identify! It doesn't make any sense for a civilization which is still using charriots !"
"You might be right about those creatures being magic, I have a hard time imagining an evolved user of any form of energy being used as a draught animal. At least we never saw that. Perhaps there are ways to tame them or there is a symbiotic relation between species that explains it, but usually the drafter is submited to the draftee" said Daniel fascinated by the weird creature. "Wait, these guys have unusual body proportion, are they dwarfs ?".
As the newly self promoted heroic fantasy expert, Teal'C made a precision "This is unnusual for this underground species to dwelves on the surface. They might be doing commerce but their society is renown for it's warriors, they might be waging war somewhere".
"I'd like to try establishing contact with them, if they are merchant or at least travelers, it's reasonnable to assume they know how things work around here" asked Daniel to Cameron.
The colonel, chief of the team, thought about it. The problem was that these creatures pulling chariots looked simply way too dangerous for a first contact. After they had observed what looked like regular people, even if they were aliens and from unkown species, these monsters were in total contrast. Although the dragon was impressive, the smaller creatures used to pull merchandise gave of a feeling of maliciousness and imminent doom. Wondering how much looks could be deceptive in his experience, he still had to make a choice. "Let's not rush with our first contact for once. SG teams have kind of a bad track record when it comes to intercating with a new species and I'd rather not put ourselves directly in reach of something like those ... monster horses"
"We have a limited amount of time, the more we'll wait the less we'll understand before we have to go back" added the archeologist trying to convince him "the sooner we make a contact, the sooner we can find a way to communicate and figure out what we should and shouldn't do".
"Still though, I'd rather make a cautious and discreet contact without this level of threat in the vicinity" decided Cameron "Let's follow this road for the moment, there are humans here, so if we can find a big enough city, we should be able to mingle a minimum and investigate, before we draw unwanted attention on us".
"From the planetary scan we made I think this road leads to the biggest population center of the whole continent if not the planet, as well as some of these major energy sources" told McKay as a sceptic remark "If you want to avoid dangerous creatures, I'd say we will definitively find those there".
"If we really have an opportunity to observe locals interact, at least we might have a better chance of understanding the ways and cutstoms. I'm not sure if it'll work but yes, if the human population is indeed large enough and we can figure out the language, we could make a good first contact after some observation while not attracting too much attention. It would be a nice change from the usual: firefight, jail, torture" said Daniel.
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Following the road, large enough to be qualified a highway, the exploration team saw an increasing and diverse traffic; several caravan going both ways managed by more and more various species, small groups of peoples of all shapes and form, bands of medieval like combattants and the closer they got to their destination, the more often they sighted monstruous 'undeads' for a lack of a better word.
They observed these 'undeads' regularly since they started exploring this world. Sometimes they crossed path with others on the road and usually it mainly consisted of ignoring each other while performing their respective tasks. They seemed to be in charge of a very wide spectrum of tasks around here. The smaller and weakest ones were used to plow fields or cut down trees, some were used as draught animals, but as the jumper approched more densely populated lands, much bigger and scarier ones appeared to be patrolling. They saw several feet tall dark monster, mostly carying shields and swords, groups of hoverings shapes encompassed in dark mist and even what could only be decribed as a skeletal dragon.
None amongst the team was really sure what to make of all the lifeless creatures they've seen so far. Their thoughts on these undeads were no more than mere guesses and reflexions at this stage. The theories that each of them proposed so far, seemed unconclusive and incomplete; It could be that they were a great pre industrial tool available thanks to magic, they could also be the proof of a tyranical power controlling everybody by fear and death, a natural phenomenon or disaster and maybe even a mystical damnation depriving living beings of their flesh.
After some more travel, a city large enough for several million inhabitants, at least according to the jumper's life detector, came into sight. From afar, the city looked like a wide and spread out mix of several different architectures. In the center of it could be seen higher constructions, particularly a giant tower of almost a thousand five hundred feet high, so black that it seemed to absorb light.
As they approched this impressive city, they saw that most of it consisted of a much more traditionnal medieval set of buildings made of wood and stone. The area was swarming with life, people coming and leaving in an almost uninterrupted traffic on several of the road going in different directions, constructions at varying stages were underway pretty much everywhere they could see and the scenery gave off a general feeling that this was a very busy town.
Now that the ship came close enough to see details of the city, they made what they felt was a major finding. They discovered that the place was littered with massive statues of differents sizes and colors, almost all of them depicting the same undead in various poses evoking nobility or even holiness. They also noticed what appeared to be the local flag, dozens of huge scarlet banners were bearing the same golden symbol. None of them ever saw it or could guess what it was and some were seeing a sword with wings, while others saw monsters looking down something.
"This tower is impressive, I've never seen this kind of architecture and it clearly doesn't match the rest of the city. Also, we can still see some previous delimitaion, with traditionnel medieval construction, several concentric walls and small stone fortifications." Observed Daniel "This city is amazing, the civilization we found is obviously thriving and is even perhaps enterring a golden age"
"I can't lock the scanners on this tower" said McKay "Something is actively blocking us and I can't get any information about it ... wait, a huge source of energy is approching fast !"
Before the pilot or anyone could react, a flying humanoid form came straigt towards the jumper and stopped at a couple of feet from them.
A small person, clad in a strange red armor and with pure white wings was staring at them. With long white hair flowing from the helmet ,the shape of the armor and the gracefull features of a pale young woman, it was obvious that she was a female. More curiously, she was hovering in front of them without her wings flapping and she was loosely holding a strange device reminding of a spear.
Surprised by what was the first possible indication that they could be seen or detected so far, the whole crew froze for a brief moment.
From the door openned between the jumper compartments, Vala made small movements and they all understood; the flying knight's bright red eyes were following her with a widening smirk.
"She can see us" whispered Vala .
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Hello everybody, thanks for reading so far :)
Now that the Overlord side of things is starting to appear I can make a few precisions. You can probably guess that it's been a few years that, in this story, the Overlord saga came to an end and according to me, surprise ... Ainz Ooal Gown came on top of it xD
The setting will be mostly based on the books (14 so far) and what would, in my vision of it, pretty much look like a victory from Nazarick over the New World. I'll also try to keep things as much as possible close to canon, while attempting to limit to a minimum the unavoidable awkwardness of a crossover between those two widely different universe and I hope you will enjoy it.