Mistral was… overwhelming. Well, not quite overwhelming because Percy had been born and raised in New York, but it was a lot nonetheless.
More than eight million people lived in New York City. Just over one hundred million lived in Mistral.
The scale was a little different.
It was hard to grasp, Percy thought as he walked through the city gates. The crime families here didn't bother shaking people down as they entered the city; they had too much money to care about something like that. Percy kept walking through the bevy of bustling streets, head almost perpetually looking towards the sky.
Well aware he looked like a tourist, he quickly drew his gaze back to the dank street he walked on, ignoring the buildings spanning up thousands of feet up the mountain on his sides.
Down here at the foot of the mountains that made up the city of Mistral there were more rats than people. Homeless littered the streets, and even the best off wore t-shirts with a wide assortment of holes and stains.
Millions seemed to live down at the cramped foot of the mountains, and it was incredibly crowded. Of those that actually had shelter, so many were stacked into one building complex that Percy was sure it was more crowded than any place on earth. He was amazed that they actually managed to feed everyone, even if barely. How was it possible for such a poor area to have such a large population? It didn't make sense to him.
Percy sighed and shook his head, beginning to make his way along the pathways to the better parts of the city.
The name Shiro had given him, Heather Shields, belonged to a huntress living about halfway up the mountain, and Percy was supposed to stay with her for the night, so he had a long way to walk today.
He tried to enjoy the atmosphere of the city on his walk, but that seemed almost impossible. Shantys were falling to pieces around him and dozens of homeless littered every alleyway. Even as Percy got further up the mountain to more livable conditions it was hardly ideal, rancid apartment complexes which barely had flowing water, markets where you were more likely to find flies laying eggs on your fruit than not — Mistral this far down was not a great place to live.
Even as he neared the area where Shiro's contact lived most houses had boarded up windows, and there wasn't a working light to be seen. Weren't huntsmen and huntresses supposed to be rich? There were about three dozen in Mistral, a country with more than a hundred million people, and they were a highly sought after people. One skilled huntsman could serve as an entire division of soldiers. To be living in these conditions despite that? Maybe Windpath wasn't so bad off compared to Mistral, despite its many flaws.
Percy walked up to the one floor house he had been told to look for. Its roof was slightly caving in and like the rest of the street the windows were boarded up. Percy hesitantly knocked, momentarily wondering if he had the wrong place. But a few moments later, a man in his early twenties came to the door. He was dressed in robes Percy might expect to find in east Asia, and he seemed weary but hardened, as if he had been caught in a slump his entire life.
"Ah, Percy, right? Heather told me we could expect you sometime today. Please, come in. I'm Lan, her fiance, it's nice to meet you." he bowed, and Percy bowed back.
He still wasn't quite used to Mistral customs, but he got the general gist that it was some sort of hodgepodge of every country on earth. Further north tended to be more Greek, west was more Norse, and east was more Chinese. It was strange to someone who had come from Earth, but it's just how things are in Mistral.
"Nice to meet you as well." Percy greeted, stepping into the small house.
"Can I get you anything? Tea? Water?" he offered.
Percy smiled slightly. "Water would be great, thank you."
Percy waited awkwardly in silence as Lan poured him a glass of water, accepting it gratefully and taking a few swigs of the cold liquid. He'd been walking for the better part of the day now and the cold water was heaven sent.
"So..." Percy trailed off. "Do you know when Heather is planning on getting back?" He asked sheepishly. He didn't know if Lan knew why Percy was here, and he wasn't about to start a fight between the two.
Lan sighed, leaning up against the singular wooden counter they had in the kitchen. "She was hoping to be here today, but she was called away to a village west of here by Lionheart."
Percy raised an eyebrow. "You make it sound like she doesn't have a choice."
Lan's frown deepened. "She doesn't. She works as an active, professional huntress which means she goes where Lionheart wants her to go, whenever he wants her to go. To say no means she doesn't get paid, which is obviously not an option." Lan sent a glance around the ragged house.
Percy frowned. "Can't she just go save a village and get paid by them? It feels like a huntresse's services would be more valuable than that."
Lan snorted. "You must be from Vale. They're the only ones that do it that way. Mistral banned that, says it leads to corruption and would bankrupt the locals of whichever village needed saving which, granted, is more or less true. If you're acting in a huntsman capacity — killing grimm, saving people — it's illegal to take money from anyone other than the government."
"That's one way to do things I suppose. What about the others? Atlas and Vacuo, I mean."
"Well, Atlas has its hunters in its military, but if you want to do some freelance work it's not necessarily frowned upon. The only problem is that Atlas is so good at protecting its people that you'd have to go far and wide to reach a village that needs help so much it's willing to pay a huntsman's wages. Vacuo?" He took a moment to chuckle. "Nobody has any idea. They haven't had a coherent government in decades. As far as I'm aware when you go through Shade you're left to do whatever you want and figure out how to survive on your own."
Percy hummed. "That's interesting. I'll have to wait to talk to Heather. You mentioned she's on a mission, but do you have any idea when she'll be back?"
Lan shrugged. "Earliest she could have been back was earlier today. Latest is she never comes back. That's a huntsman's work for you. Hopefully she'll be back soon, but you can make yourself at home until then."
Percy shot him back a smile. "Thanks. I think I'm gonna go explore, since this is my first time being in the big city. I should be back in a couple hours."
Lan just nodded. "Enjoy your exploration."
Percy nodded back at the man and ducked out of the house, content to go explore.
Deciding to see the areas he hadn't quite seen yet, Percy continued to walk up the mountain. Soon enough he got to areas which more or less rivalled middle class America. People had houses with actual windows and working water. Local grocery stores provided food of decent quality and overall, life was alright.
Percy was only surprised that he had to walk three fourths up Mistral to find such livable conditions.
Percy stopped in the middle of a sidewalk, taking a moment to absorb the atmosphere. The colored trees and blue sky were vibrant and calming, at this level, and Percy could look down towards where he had come from, and wince at the dreary colors of the levels below. Reminded where he was, he looked up above him where the mountain of Mistral still towered above him for thousands of feet.
Large temples, villas, palaces, and other grand structures colored the skyline up the rocky cliffs, shows of exorbitant wealth shown in the porcelain and gold linings of buildings.
Percy narrowed his eyes, focusing on the largest palaces near the tip of the mountain. Soon. Soon he would meet the crime lords of Mistral and deal with them. He would decide whether they deserved the carrot or the stick, whether they could be worked with, or if Mistral would go the way of Windpath. For now, he turned back and headed back to his host's house for the night, eager to get things moving in this city.
Shiro's friend was waiting for him when he got back to the house. Heather was leaning up against the doorway to her house when Percy got back, looking just the slightest bit haggard.
Heather, like almost every other huntsman Percy was quickly learning, was dressed uniquely. She had flowing yellow combat robes which leapt off of an almost monk like attire. On her back was a sheathed long sword, and resting on her arm was a bare yellow metal shield.
Heather noticed him approaching and perked up. "You must be Percy." She offered her hand to shake, and Percy took it, not at all surprised at the callouses that littered her hand. "Shiro told me you'd be coming to see me. Can I get you something to eat?"
Percy smiled abashedly, just noticing that his stomach was feeling quite empty. He hadn't eaten since he had finished off his rations earlier in the day, and he was quite hungry.
"That sounds great, actually. Thank you."
Heather nodded. "I have some stew cooking that should be almost finished. Apparently I just missed you leaving. Did you get a good look at the city, at least?" she asked, turning to walk into her house.
Percy nodded, following behind her. "I think so. It's… not in great shape."
Heather sighed. "No, it's not. Mistral has been in decline since we ran out of things to conquer. Of course, our king decided that the only way to stop our decline was war, so he pressed for war with Vale and Vacuo, a war which we lost, as I'm sure you're aware."
Percy raised an eyebrow. "Actually, no. I'm from a small village just west of Windpath, I didn't exactly get a traditional education. Shiro's never mentioned why the country is in such a bad state, mostly just because of crime."
Heather shook her head, walking over to a counter and pouring out a pitcher. "Tea?"
Percy shook his head, "Water, please. I'm not much for tea." She shrugged, moving to pour him some water.
"Crime is more of a byproduct of the decline of Mistral than anything. As I said before Mistral had been declining for a while, but we were still the most powerful nation. We had — and still have — the largest population, the most resources. Back then we were still the richest country as well, and had the strongest military. After we lost, it only hastened the decline of Mistral, and the king was removed. Don't get me wrong, the king of Vale was far more merciful than he could have been, but he still forced a democratic system on a state which had had a king for thousands of years. It didn't go well. Influential families made money however they could to hold onto their power, and now a century later we're left with the mess that is Mistral."
Percy frowned, taking a seat at her table and noticing that Lan wasn't here anymore.
She seemed to see that his gaze lingered on the empty seat. "Lan works nights. It's how we make the ends meet." she sighed, setting down a bowl full of stew, a loaf of bread, and a glass of water in front of him before sitting herself.
"Right, speaking of which…" Percy trailed off.
"You're here to offer me a job, right? Shiro didn't elaborate any more than that, just that you had an offer for me." she said, beginning to rip apart her own loaf of bread and dip it in her stew.
Percy chuckled. "Yeah, I might look a little young, but —"
"You're from one of the families, aren't you? Nobody your age has the money to hire a huntress unless they are. You have the looks, too. Black hair, green eyes, bronze skin. Alexandros family?" she guessed.
Percy raised an eyebrow at her. "No, actually. I don't belong to a family. I told you, I was raised in a village west of Windpath."
Heather hummed, seeming unconcerned that her guess was wrong.
"Windpath… Windpath. You're that Perseus, guy, aren't you? The name Percy works well enough as a disguise, I guess, but you might want to try something that doesn't sound so similar."
Percy rolled his eyes. "Percy isn't a cover name, it's a nickname. Perseus is my full name, but I only use it for business."
"Alright, Percy, what can I do for you?"
"That's where the job offer comes in. I need somewhere to start here in Mistral, and Shiro says I can trust you."
Heather held herself back from laughing, swallowing another spoonful of stew. "You want to expand to Mistral? You have no idea what you're getting into, do you? You killed everyone in Windpath to get your way, right? That won't be enough here. Assuming you could eliminate the great families — which you can't, by the way — lesser families would just pop up to replace them, and you can't eliminate Mistral's entire upper class. You need more than brawns and the will to kill to succeed here."
"I'm willing to give it a try. They told me the same in Windpath, and while I understand this is a bit of a different level, I have a bit of a talent for making impossible odds not so daunting."
Heather rolled her eyes. "I'm sorry, but it's a no. And you should reconsider it, too. The families quibble but they won't hesitate to come together and end you if they see you as a threat. The families will have a hard time killing me, but you and Lan are fair game, and I'm not putting him in harm's way like that."
Percy sighed and nodded sadly. "I understand. I don't intend to put you or your fiance in unnecessary danger. I'll be out of your hair come morning, if that's alright."
Heather's face softened. "Yes, of course. You're free to stay the night. For what it's worth I do wish you luck. I've heard what you're doing with Windpath, and we need that kind of change around here."
Percy smiled, and took a bite out of the flavorful stew before speaking again.
"Enough about that, then. I'm quite interested in the history of Mistral, considering how little I know about it, and you seemed quite passionate about it. Would you mind telling me some more?"
Heather hummed, setting her spoon back into her empty bowl. "Well, Mistral started as one of many nations on the continent. For a long time, they mostly lived in peace. There were some squabbles, and there were even one or two sieges, but overall the continent was at peace. And then Mistral decided that they wanted more. They conquered, and then when they found out how easily they could almost double their resources, conquered some more. Dozens of different nations fell to Mistral. Their artifacts and history brought to the great library, and their populations displaced to live in the city of Mistral. Their land was stripped away from them and used to mine resources.
"Eventually our conquest caught up with us. The empire was too large to maintain, and we slowly lost our grip on our territories. Without anywhere else on the continent to conquer, our war based society slowly declined. For hundreds of years we had relied on the newest conquest to flood our shops with new goods, and it suddenly stopped. As I mentioned before, our king decided to fix this by going to war with Vale. After the great war we tried competing with the Schnees in dust mining, but like everyone else the Mistral Trade company — the government owned trade company — was driven out of business."
"Wait." Percy raised a hand. "The Schnees are the only ones who mine dust?"
Heather rolled her eyes. "Okay, maybe not the only one, but pretty damn close. 99% of the market, happy?"
Percy leaned back into his chair and rested his head on a hand. Heather misunderstood his question. He wasn't being a smartass about technicalities, he was genuinely asking.
99%?!
Percy had thought about the utility of dust before. It was dozens of industries on earth rolled into one. Oil, gas, every other combustible material or fossil fuel. Comparing it to earth, dust replaced solar panels and wind farms, geothermal vents and every other source of energy. It kept every single home on a planet with hundreds of millions running, it kept Atlas afloat, and replaced both gunpowder and every explosive on earth. It even replaced batteries, dust batteries being the main form of battery on remnant.
Dust was dozens of trillion dollar industries rolled into one. The most valuable commodities on earth, which nations had fought for time and time again, and it was one, singular material.
And it was controlled by one company?!
In history class, Percy learned that Rockefeller had been the richest person to exist in modern history when he controlled ninety percent of US oil refineries.
Refining 90% of the US's oil alone made Rockefeller the richest person on earth. The SDC controlled 99% of all dust, in all of remnant. They didn't just refine it, they mined it, refined it, and sold it.
How absurdly rich were the Schnees?
They had to be making more money than was physically possible to spend, it was just inconceivable to someone like Percy what the size of such a company would be. If he thought he was making a lot of money now, he was a speck of sand next to the desert of the SDC.
Percy shook his head, trying to gain some semblance of focus back. He just knew one thing.
If he wanted a chance at taking on Salem, he needed a piece of that pie.
Ayyy.
Sorry for the small update today, this was a good place to stop. As a sorry for blue balling you, I'll be updating next week. This totally has nothing to do with the fact that I had a sudden inspiration to write a good 5k words in the last few days.
Also, to the people that ask me when the next chapter is gonna be — come on. I put it at the end of every update, and on my profile. How are you gonna ask me that.
Here's the link to the discord again, come hang out.
discord .gg/QUydXb7
Next Chapter October 17