Chapter 129 – Insert

"Old Man. Gimme your densest mana."

After quickly forming the enchantments in the suit, Dream then needed to integrated Riddick's mana directly. This would ensure that his spells would work as they were designed for his mana, not Dream's.

"Ok. Just be careful."

"Whoah"

After Riddick began streaming liquid mana and Dream grabbed a hold of it, he suddenly felt how different it was.

Riddick's mana was not only extremely destructive, but incredibly hard to control. Dream had to really stress himself to even guide it over to the suit.

"What the hell happened to your mana?!"

"It was a part of my advancement. I'm honestly surprised you're able to control it at all."

"Well the only reason I can is because of my own advancement."

As Dream spoke and controlled the mana, he could see a few notifications stream down his vision.

<[Arcana] has leveled up!>

<[Arcana] has leveled up!>

'Two levels. Nice.'

[I'm analyzing this mana. It's not normal mana.]

'Is it just because of a skill?'

[No. In fact, I don't know if I can call this mana. It's some other kind of energy. Whenever your own mana interacts with it, it becomes agitated and dissipates.]

'It destroys normal mana?'

[No. It'll wipe your signature from your mana and almost explode it. Basically, if his spell and another were to clash, the other spell of equal mana would be obliterated while his would just lose a bit of power.]

'So his mana is like a negative while mine is a positive.'

[Pretty much.]

'Interesting. So I'm guessing his mana won't react well with mine inside the suit.'

[Definitely not. But what we can do is enchant this suit entirely with his mana. He's got enough. It'll just be tiring for you.]

'Then we'll do that.'

Dream focused back on the suit. 

"Change of plan. I've gotta redo the entire enchantment."

"Why?"

"Because your mana doesn't like mine. It won't mix. So you need to supply me with as much mana as I need to enchant the whole thing."

"That's fine."

"Then keep it coming."

Saying that, Dream began pulling his mana from the suit and inserting it into the globe network. Using that mana, he would manipulate Riddick's and lay the enchantments using his mana.

Though moving his mana and enchanting with it is entirely different. To enchant, Dream needed to use much more energy than he normally would. And on only the first enchantment, he could feel the strain.

"Damn. I haven't felt this since I recovered..."

"Felt what?"

"The strain on my soul."

"You're straining your soul. Then stop! Why are you pushing yourself so hard?"

"What do you mean stop? It's strain but it's not that bad yet."

"You shouldn't be straining your soul at all."

"Well I do it all the time. That's why I pass out for so long."

"Wait, I thought you passed out because of mana exhaustion?"

"Psh. Mana exhaustion? Even if I empty out my tanks I'm able to keep moving mana. It's when I move mana hundreds of times more than my own pool that I feel pressure. When the pressure builds up enough, I get tired and pass out to recover."

"...How have you not died?"

"Good question. Anyway, let me concentrate for a bit. This'll be difficult."

Saying so, Dream buckled down and kept slowly laying enchantments. Riddick just kept supplying mana as he was told. Though even after a while when Riddick's reserves started to deplete, Dream still hadn't stopped enchanting.

"Good god, Boy. How much mana can you handle?"

"Huuhhh... Much more than this. Your mana is just incredibly hard to control. I'm almost done."

And half an hour later, Dream finally finished. When he did, he took out a chair and plopped down.

"Ahh! That was hard!"

"...I bet."

"Well, the suit is done now. Go ahead and try it."

"Ok....How?"

"Hang on. Wiki, go to your master."

"Of course."

The suit, which was invisible due to the particles being small, conglomerated and flowed over Riddick's skin. When it finished, Riddick began receiving a tutorial on the functions of the suit.

"...Interesting."

"It's got everything you want and more. It's armoring abilities are the best I can give, it's got stealth, a bit of mana assistance, and flight boosting. All you have to do is run mana into it to employ the functions you want."

"I see that. Can I take it outside?"

"Not unless you wanna die."

"Die? Why's that?"

"You still need to breathe, and space has no air. Plus it's not very hospitable to organics with all the radiation. Though you might be fine against the radiation. So mainly just the lack of air."

"I see."

Riddick went quiet for a bit, thinking about things.

"So...How are preparations coming?"

"Good. I've got some more things I want to build, but for the most part, we just need to wait some more. My drones and those suits are still poking around, watching everything. I've also been receiving data from your wife."

"Wife?"

"Selene. She's been passing intelligence on different enchantments, different people to watch out for, all kinds of things. It's helpful, but only time will give us the best assurance. I'm also enacting different things with those suits to psychologically train the people around them."

"Train?"

"I'm having them gradually activate stealth, making them disappear from everyone's senses. At first they'll wonder what's going on. But after finding nothing, they'll just not pay attention to it anymore. So when the day comes for them to disappear again, we'll be able to better avoid suspicion."

"Hmm..."

"But there's one problem that Selene let me know about. The connection between her and Raoul. That'll be the biggest pickle we have to get around."

"Right. I had forgotten about that. If he senses anything going on with that connection, he'll know."

"Which is why I'm planning to act fast. When the opportunity comes, Selene and your daughters are going to make a beeline for me and my ship. It's why I focused heavily on their suits' flight abilities. Once they get to my ship, we anchor them down and go full throttle away from the city and into space."

"Space? You mean here?"

"Yes. Like how it is for you, space is a very threatening place for life. Raoul is no different. While he might be able to follow us, he won't be able to breathe while doing so. Not to mention the expansive pressure in his body from the liquids trying to escape. He wouldn't explode, but he'll have many problems even being here, not to mention fighting you. That combined with the absurd speeds my new ship can go would ensure our escape."

"...That's brilliant."

"I know. I'm quite the genius, aren't I?"

"So the most dangerous part is before they get to your ship."

"Exactly. While I do have measures for should he react fast enough, I don't know his power well enough to guarantee escape in that situation. And if we fail once, there won't be a next time for a long while."

"I know. But I want you to ensure me one thing."

"What's that?"

"If you have the girls and I get stuck fighting, I want you to prioritize getting them out."

"If you're thinking I'm just going to leave you, then you should know that I have plans against that. I've made multiple ships, meaning even if we only leave one at a time, we can all escape. So if you get stuck, then yes, I'll send them away. But I'm still able to help you. I'm not making the stupid mistake of only having one ride out."

"...Fine. But can you even interfere in my battle?"

"I may have weapons in mind that can. You just worry about your part. You go in only when I say."

"Even if he discovers you?"

"Yup. I've got some powerful weapons that can keep him off me for potentially long enough to escape. But if you go in then you're going to get stuck and the situation will become much worse. So I won't send you in unless absolutely necessary. You need to trust my judgment on that."

"...I will."

"Thank you. Now I have more things to build, but you don't really have anything else other than to wait. So instead of wasting time, I recommend go fighting some demons and getting used to your new power. Though don't do anything that'll get you killed like fighting two class 4's. You should just stick to class 3's. In fact, if you want to bring Idona along with you I can send you back to the Spire."

"Hmm, I'll just go alone. I've got things of my own I can test."

"Alright. If you have anything you want to know about while out and about, your suit, Wiki, can answer questions. It can do pretty much everything, so just request things of it. I'll give you a ship you can take around places."

"Ok. I'll go now."

"Sure."

Saying bye, Riddick walked off and boarded a ship, flying back down to the planet. Dream sighed in exhaustion.

"That enchanting took a lot out of me. I'll sleep for a bit. Wake me if anything changes."

[Ok. Have a nice sleep.]

Saying that, Sophia helped Dream fall asleep. He was soon unconscious in his chair.

............

........

....

Over the next week, Dream was holed up in the station making weapons and devices.

After thinking about it more, he decided to make a few more railgun platforms, putting the total to 8. All of them were sent down in different positions near the United Empire.

After that, he began going down a list of things he had ideas for. The first of which were support weapons.

Although he had the railgun platforms, they were on the ground and couldn't be as mobile as he wanted. Plus, they couldn't be fired very fast. In their situation, if a volley was ineffective, they wouldn't have time for another. So Dream decided to develop some aircraft that would carry their own railguns.

For this, he actually adopted the design of the AC-130 gunship. But instead of gunpowder weapons, he used railguns. 

Each gunship had two heavy railguns, two light, and two rapid fire. And not being cheap, he decided to make 10 of these aircraft.

One thing to note about these aircraft though was that because of their reactor-based systems and lack of people, this aircraft was very mobile and very powerful. Although he did have to sacrifice some maximum power for the railguns, they would be able to output continuous high power fire. 

And not stopping at that, he also made some smaller aircraft. Specifically, drones. These he designed to be much smaller and they would only carry one rapid fire railgun. In fact, the aircraft was a reactor, engines, gun, and that was pretty much it. It looked really weird, like a flying box, but after some aesthetic changes, it was fine. These little ships were extremely fast and maneuverable, maybe even more so than him. 

All of the aircraft would be able to operate in the air and in space. They were also totally driven by AI and Sophia, so there were no problems with controlling them.

After making all those, Dream focused back on himself and designed a new weapon he had thought of. 

Since he had reactor technology that could be scaled down, he decided to make a gun for himself. Though it wouldn't be as over the top of anything on the aircraft or platforms, he had one thing to boost it. Flux.

With Sophia's help, Dream designed a flux-railgun hybrid weapon that would be powered by a wearable reactor carried by Aegis. Though the gun would have to be connected to the reactor, it would be compact and he would be able to fire it. And after Sophia had done the calculations, she found that it would launch projectiles many times faster than his regular flux guns.

The only downside to this gun was that he would only be able to have one. The main reason was the fact that he would only be wearing one reactor and the cost of materials for this gun, which were some of his best. But because he splurged on it, its power was more than adequate so he didn't need another.

After he made all these, he made a few contingencies, some even involving Riddick's help, that would be used in worst cases. Well, every situation in which they would have to fight Raoul was the worst, but these were those cases where he got into a fight with Raoul. These were things that he dumped tons of mana into and pre-armed, and they would definitely do plenty of damage. 

So when he was done with all his weapons and preparations after the first week, he moved onto the next stage of his plan. And this part required him to insert into the United Empire.

Since he was going to be the one pulling them out, not only did he need to be there, but he needed to be familiar with the surroundings and their escape route. While the machines could collect intelligence for him, his own collection was still the best.

"Alright Old Man. I'll be in touch."

"Be careful."

"Relax. I could sneak up on you and Idona up to 6 feet before you noticed something. As long as I don't go near any class 4's, I'll be fine."

"...Very well."

"Then I'll be off."

Dream hung up the communication and looked down. Currently he was in the sky about 2 miles away from the United Empire.

The Capital city of the United Empire was absolutely massive. Not only were there massive buildings built on trees and inside hills, but the castle in the center of the city was even bigger than the floating castle above the Mountain. Overall, Sophia estimated a population of 60 million just within this city, which covered even more land than the Los Angeles that he remembered.

[The girls are within the castle in the center, as are all the other class 4's. You should just be able to make your way straight there and begin looking around.]

"Alright."

With a nod, Dream flew off within the borders of the city. His stealth was totally activated and he kept close to the top of the buildings.

After crossing several miles, he finally began to approach the castle. He gradually slowed down and took in the monumental building that filled his entire view.

"This isn't simply a castle, it's like its own city."

Inside, Dream could detect buildings of their own and hundreds of thousands of different spaces. These constructions went up into the sky and down into the ground, allowing another few million people to easily live here.

Dream made his way in and entered this royal, isolated city. Right when he did, he could see thousands of animals roaming around every which way in the air and on ground. He made his way up to the top of the castle where the population was less dense so he didn't run into anyone.

Since his suits had already scouted much of this castle, he already knew which way to go to get to the girls. He made his way over to one section of the castle that was level with the ground and found several buildings, all of which were luxurious.

[The girls are right there. In that villa. But there's an aura floating around the place. It must be Raoul.]