Dimensional Descent

James' clenched his jaw, taking a strong gulp as though he was forcing his heart back down.

"... He's still the same, directing everyone around like he already knows what they'll do," James mumbled.

Aina smiled in understanding. Let alone James and the others, there were too many things that Leonel didn't explain even to her. If James took offense to this, there wasn't really much she could do, she would just have to reveal their other trump cards ahead of time. The trouble with that, though, was that it would make the Heir Wars far more difficult.

However, at that moment, James smiled.

"Do you know what they call a quarterback's tight end in football?" James looked Aina in the eyes, his tears somewhat glistening but quickly evaporating away beneath a fiery blaze.

Aina blinked before her smile brightened. "The ultimate safety blanket."

She had been following Leonel's games for years and had never missed a single one. Not only did she know all the rules of the game, when it came to the intricacies and the culture around it, she probably dwarfed even some of the players themselves.

When James heard this his head raised to the skies and he erupted with a laughter that drowned out even the cries of the Brazingers. It boomed with a vibrant carefreeness, surging like a rising ocean tide and drowning out everything.

With a leap, he soared into the skies, his foot landing on an energy shield platform that he shot like a canon off of, soaring over the battle between Maia and Galaeron with the confidence of a man who felt he could have participated in it if he so chose.

Aina watched this with a smile. It was a little white lie, and considering how well James knew Leonel, he probably knew this as well. But as Leonel's Queen, there were some things that she felt she had to do for him.

Leonel had many brothers, but he had only ever had one best friend, and there was a reason for that. Some relationships couldn't be forced, and some were too perfect to need to be.

Leonel had set the probability of James making an appearance at 30%. He felt that the Cloud Race would be a bar that he wouldn't allow himself to cross, and he was correct about that.

But Aina felt like he wanted that percentage to be much higher, not for any other reason than that was what he wanted for the man who he had once called friend.

Aina could feel that Leonel was becoming more distant from the world, more detached, more indifferent. Even when his brothers had returned to his side, they had been separated for so many years that it was difficult to reaffirm that connection to the same level, and that was honestly because they were missing the glue that had kept them together in the first place.

James seemed like an unruly, wild card with barely half a brain in him, but he was probably the person who understood Leonel the most outside of Aina herself, and maybe even in comparison to Aina, he knew more.

At the same time, James and Leonel were more similar than it seemed. Just considering their fathers... with how much Leonel loved his own, if Velasco had the same approach to life that Governor Duke Bennett had, how far would Leonel be from just being a second James?

The two of them were the most similar in the things that meant the most, the more dissimilar in, ironically, what was also the most important.

Since these two brutes wouldn't take the steps to fix their relationship on their own, it would just have to be up to her.

Aina smiled to herself, watching James dive into the battle and almost immediately force Elorin into a retreat.

**

Leonel had no idea what Aina had done, but at the moment he was too frustrated to care.

He felt like he had traveled everywhere possible, but he couldn't seem to gather up enough territories. No random treasure or beast territories were spawning, and even after a lot of walking, there didn't seem to be any other participants waiting.

He had come across one barrier, but it blocked him from entry. He had come across such a thing before, so he just assumed correctly that there was likely a battle going on within.

Now, he had finally found another, and it was once again blocked.

There seemed to only be one conclusion: there were just three contestants left, while he had been fighting Coldar everyone else but them had been wiped out.

Leonel shook his head. 'How unlucky...

If things were like this that meant that he would have to go into this final confrontation while stuck at the Silver Grade, and given the fact there were only two contestants left, whoever came out victorious would almost certainly have a Gold Grade spear.

Taking a breath and exhaling, Leonel retreated to his territory then used the orb to lock his barriers down. If he was going to enter this final battle at a disadvantage he would definitely do it at 100%.

What Leonel didn't realize was how truly unlucky he was.

Of the six strongest competitors, he had actually fought four of them and would now be fighting the fifth.

However, due to his actions, everyone else was unlucky as well.

Because he had sped up the timeline of the tribulation so greatly, less territories had spawned, and as a result whereas in the past there would be multiple with Gold Grade evaluations, this time around, there would only be one if Leonel lost this battle, and only two if he did manage to gain victory.

Leonel collapsed into a pile of soft grass and closed his eyes, taking the first sleep he had in as long as he could remember. He wasn't even sure exactly how long he had been in this tribulation.

This sleep would turn out to be invaluable. They say the sleep consolidated everything one had learned during the day, and now... Leonel was consolidating weeks of training while entering a single deep sleep.