“Elders.” Leonel smiled as though he hadn’t just been talking about destroying them all. It seemed he had already gained the two face nature of a politician.

Leonel didn’t see it this way, though. As long as Valiant Heart didn’t get in his way, there wouldn’t be any need for them to lock horns.

Of course… He was planning on aiding their mortal enemies for what must have been several millennia already. So, maybe his thinking was still a bit green, albeit more forceful than it had been in the past. Even Aina couldn’t help but give him a side eye.

“I see that the shop is still going strong even after so long.” Magnaril tried to open the conversation up with some small talk.

Leonel nodded in return. “My partners from the former Polished Glass Faction have improved greatly in my absence. I’m quite proud of them.”

Leonel had left Kaela and the others without much guidance or instruction, not expecting his departure to actually be for so long. He had never thought that they would end up grasping the opportunity and growing so much in his absence, especially Kaela.

Long before he left and before even building BLACKSTAR, Leonel had given the group material and information they needed to greatly improve their Crafting. However, in the end, an opportunity was just an opportunity. Often times, people even took such things for granted to the point of squandering their chance entirely.

But Kaela, Rum, Madia and the others most definitely hadn’t. In fact, their improvement even impressed Leonel.

Leonel knew that he needed strength to achieve his goals. But, his foundation couldn’t be built without a layer of trust, respect and loyalty first.

Though they were weak, this group had more than proven to him just what kind of people they were. And to Leonel, this was far more rare than just an individual with talent or power would be.

So… he had already given them even more resources and knowledge. As far as he was concerned, they were his people now.

The group exchanged some more pleasantries, something that would have been weird to any outside observer. It seemed as though they were having a talk of equals rather than a talk between seniors and juniors. But, at this point, the elders had no choice.

Let alone what they had seen from Aina in the past couple years, Valiant Heart had practically been turned upside down in their absence.

The longer Raylion spent away, the more and more backlash his system received. The Freshmen seemed to only become more and more enraged with each passing day. As the pressure from outside sources also increased, no small number of people had withdrawn from the organization entirely.

Hearing such talks, Leonel could only rub his nose lightly, pretending to be completely oblivious despite knowing that he probably had the largest hand in all of this. But, was it really his fault? Who asked Raylion to piss him off?

The moment Raylion had given that speech, Leonel had laid down the ground work to cause the collapse of his system. Unfortunately for Valiant Heart, though, before he could rein things back in short of their collapse, he became trapped in another world for two years. The result was seeds he had lay years ago growing and festering to the point the situation could hardly be handled with any sort of ease.

Of course, the only ones who knew that Leonel had intentionally done such a thing, causing an uprising amongst the freshmen against their seniors, were Leonel and Aina. So, feigning ignorance was quite easy despite the fact Leonel felt a little bad.

‘Forget it, things are better this way. The weaker they are, the less inclination they’ll have to get in my way… It’s either that or they’ll react like cornered beasts. Hopefully it’s the former and not the latter.’

Since the elders didn’t want to have such a talk out in the open, they eventually chose to go to a nearby restaurant. Leonel still had a rule up that only a single Fifth Dimensional entity could enter his shop at once and he didn’t feel like changing it quite yet.

Not long later, the group sat down. Once again, Magnaril took the lead. Maybe because they believed her familiarity with Aina would help, she seemed to always be the one who headed their talks. As for the others, they were clearly here purely for support.

“I will get right to the point.” Magnaril spoke after a deep breath. “Valiant Heart is in trouble and we’ve reached a point where the strength of our elders isn’t enough to stave it off.

“As things stand now, Valiant Heart still has the strongest Fifth Dimensional experts in our quadrant. The problem is that this is hardly meaningful if multiple choose to target us at once. The power of a few will never be able to match up to the power of the many.

“By paying a price, Valiant Heart has been able to receive the support of a neutral third party. However, after mediation, the only chance we have to protect our territory with be our Gathering.

“Unfortunately, because you all were stuck in the Zone for two years, we’ve been forced to make concessions to buy more time and have thus been forced into an even deeper corner. The odds are even more unfavorable for us now than they were before.”

Leonel listened to this from start to finish, not interrupting.

“The Gathering will be exceptionally dangerous, so dangerous that we have chosen not to make it mandatory any longer. We cannot guarantee the lives or deaths of any of our students. We as teachers cannot take the burden of this choice from you. But, we still hope that you will choose to fight by Valiant Heart’s side.

“Toward this end, we would be willing to give you no small amount of compensation…

“What do you say? Will you fight with us?”