The early hours of the morning passed like any other day.

Alexander swept his sword in fluid motions. The breeze brushed past his hair as the sun shone upon his face vibrantly.

He finished his morning exercises and walked into the dining hall.

His usual routine was to train at an early hour, wash himself afterwards and then finally eat his first meal of the day.

He slept early and woke early, he was diligent in this regard.

This morning however he found something different awaited him in the hall.

The space was virtually empty, which was odd in and of itself, and then he found Amelia, one of the authority figures he’d come to know, laying slumped over on a table.

Beside her sat Rapture, her disciple in name, though you would not know it from looking as the way he was patting her back so gently, and with an inscrutable expression besides, he looked more the caretaker than she did.

The only word he could think of that suitably fit this sight was “surreal”.

“What’s wrong with her?” Alexander asked as he approached the duo.

“No idea,” Said Rapture, “She already smelled of alcohol when she barged into my room crying her eyes out and shook me awake in the early hours of the morning.”

“That sort of thing happen often?” Alexander said with a frankly baffled expression on his face. Such behaviour was really not proper for one of Amelia’s station.

“I’ve seen her like this once before...when my Mom died,” Said the boy with a worried tone.

Alexander’s smile faded away. He turned to look around the hall. Indeed, they were alone here, too much so.

Something had happened, something big enough to cause the whole manor to be shaken.

He turned to his gaze Amelia’s way. He was curious, he had to know what was going on, what had happened, but he struggled to take the step that would wake her. He was, after all, not tactless.

“Leave her be,” An older man’s voice called out to the two boys. Thus they turned their heads to find Rudolph, their senior, walking into the hall. “My sister has long been one to drown her sorrows in drink, do not bother her.”

“Sorrows, huh? Then something is going on around here?” Alexander concluded as he crossed his arms with a stern expression. He faced Rudolph, who could only shrug, and decided to ask him flat out what the reason for all this was. “What’s happened?”

“Our Lady, Nymph of Venus, died,” Rudolph replied, and so Alexander’s eyes opened wide.

The young lad looked towards Amelia once again and could not help but wonder how his fiance, how Rusalka, was handling such a bitter loss.

He could not imagine she took it too well at all.

“Where is Ru?” He said in a hurried tone.

Rudolph faced the young man silently.

The first thing that Alexander worried about when he’d heard this news was his fiance, her emotions. Being that girl’s mentor, if Rudolph was so tactless as to call this whole matter a test, then the man himself felt that the boy before him would have passed with a standing ovation.

“She is in her room...but she has no desire to be seen by others at this time,” He replied. He then reached into his coat and tossed a key Alexander’s way.

The youth snatched it from the air, rusty chain and all, and then stared at it as it dangled there.

“Then why give me this?” He asked, but Rudolph only shrugged at him.

The Scholar refused to answer in any way, shape or form. That in itself was actually something of an answer to the boy’s question.

“I see,” Alexander said as he spun the chain and closed his fist to seize the dangling key. “Well I guess I’d be a rather lousy husband if I didn’t at least try and talk to her, wouldn’t I?”

The lad stepped forward without hesitation and then passed the older man by. He left only those words behind as he walked towards the stairway.

Rudolph thought he was doomed to fail but regardless he applauded the young man for his spirit.

The scholar then walked over towards the centre of the hall and sat down across from Rapture and Amelia.

“My sister has troubled you twice now, from what I hear,” He said in an apologetic tone.

“It’s no problem,” Rapture replied. The boy genuinely thought so too, for although it troubled him to see Amelia like this, and it did affect his opinion for her, it was the second time he’d had to take care of her now, he was aware it was just the way she was.

Rudolph then turned his gaze full of sorrow and sympathy towards his younger sister.

She was their Enforcer, a person who was charged with spying, assassination and other things of that sort, all for the sake of maintaining order within the city’s walls.

Dissenters who sparked upheaval as well as traitors and criminals, “dangerous elements” who hadn’t actually done anything but might cause trouble, all of these would be exterminated so efficiently that the bodies would never be discovered.

Order was perfectly maintained because she carried out this duty, but it did take a toll on her. For while there were those who could thrive in this profession she did not number among them.

Amelia’s current self was the result of years of guilt and sorrow, she was given the job of Enforcer because the war proved she was good at it, certainly not because she enjoyed it.

More men and women had likely died at her hand than she’d ever be comfortable to confess. She hated herself more than anything else, one could say that she endured regardless, but in truth she really wasn’t managing it all that well.

He thought to himself how much it hurt him as her brother to watch her suffer so. The blood on her hands should’ve filled him with disgust but instead it pained him with sorrow.

The man shook his head and poured himself a glass one fifth the way full with the contents of the last bottle that Amelia simply could not finish.

He ignored Rapture’s pleading look and decided he too should have a drink or two. Rapture, upon seeing that, performed what might well be the first facepalm of his entire life.

“Has anyone told you why I married into this city?” Rudolph asked Rapture, who in turn sent him a frowning gaze. The boy wondered why the man was bringing that up now.

“Amy said you did it for her sake, she complained you were coddling her,” He replied.

“Indeed,” Rudolph bitterly replied, “Me and Amy were not born in Mars or Venus, you see, contrary to what people say. We belonged to a Bronze Class Settlement in Mars’ territory.”

Rapture looked towards the tired Rudolph with a confused expression for a time, but then it turned stern. He could not help but recall what he’d been told of the Bronze Class Settlements and what life was like in them.

Those towns were often small with few residents, from the low tens to several hundreds overall, a far cry from Venus City’s ten thousand estimated.

The larger one of them was the more likely they were to have a few Silver Class stood among their number, but there were certainly no Gold or Platinum Class in them normally. Therefore, how had Platinums like Rudolph and Amy been born into one?

“We were but mere urchins, lowest of even the Bronze Class,” Rudolph said with a grin as he saw through the boy’s bafflement. Indeed, he and Amy had not been born Platinum Class, the meaning of that was very significant.

The boy still remembered that day vividly in his mind, the day Rognir empowered him. Rudolph grinned as he told him, “Our story is the same.”

Indeed, back then, Rudolph, himself a mere boy, had met a god

“Our little town was home to about forty people. I sat in an old hut and watched as our neighbour invaded us. They numbered thrice our number. We surrendered quickly enough. The men who weren’t stupid were recruited, the women were invited over...or seized.” Rapture’s heart felt a tinge of sympathy, however, Rudolph simply shrugged it aside.

“That’s a common sight amongst the Bronze Class Settlements. Those that are well off can secure a fertile place to become farmers or something, but even they’ll be attacked by others seeking the land. The Silver Class Settlements governing them might make a deal with the land’s current owner, but its up to them whether to protect you or not. Each Bronze Class Settlement wants to become a Silver Class one, you see, and they all go about it by absorbing their neighbours, securing good land and inviting Silver Class, especially Silver Class women, to join them.”

Rapture’s sense of sympathy faded, it was replaced soon after with curiosity. Why do all this? What does it merit?

“Why do they want so badly to become Silver Class Settlements?”

“A few reasons,” Rudolph said with a frustrated tone.

Frankly, he did not wish to have to explain all of this common knowledge, especially when he was in the middle of a story of his own.

“The first reason, I guess, is that nobody will dare to mess with you anymore. The Silver Class Settlements are all directly backed by the Gold Class Settlement ruling the region. Bronze Class Settlements are negligible, Silver Class ones trample them as often as back them, especially if their’s a risk of them becoming a Silver Class Settlement themselves and challenging their claim to the land. For this reason, a Bronze Class Settlement that’s far removed from the position of any pre-existing Silver Class Settlement has a much greater chance of not getting stamped out.”

Rapture nodded his head. All of this made some degree of sense. Some Bronze Class Settlements sought safety from a contract with the Silver Class governing them, others chose to go it alone and fight to become a Silver Class themselves. Either way, it was an uneasy, uncertain life.

“The second reason, is pure ambition,” Rudolph said with a shrug of indifference, “Plenty of Silver Class Settlements have ambitious leaders. For now their power is kept checked by the Gold Class Settlement above them. We “recruit” from them if their numbers bolster, we allow skirmishes between them for whatever reasons. However, if a Gold Class Settlement were to be wiped out, then the Silver Class Settlements would swoop in like flies to a carcass. They’d invite any survivors of the fallen overlord to join them, especially the Gold Class women, and they’d fight amongst each other for the now empty throne.”

Rudolph took a sip from his cup before pondering how alike the classes all were in this regard. The Bronze Class Settlements often rose into Silver Class ones this same way, and presuming, someday, if Jupiter were to fall...he dared not imagine the conflict that’d cause.

He could only laugh at such a thought however. Their enemies in Alfheim would seize that chance to invade and purge them long before a successor to Jupiter popped up, there would be no victor.