Mel's office seemed smaller than I remembered, but to be fair, there  were more of us this time. She slumped into her chair with a groan. She  put a hand over her red mask in despair, like she was trying to rub the  bridge of her nose but couldn't reach. "This is such a mess. All I  wanted was to kick Cicero out of the leadership position and replace him  with someone less backstabby." Her eyes flicked to Abel, but she didn't  say what she'd obviously been thinking: that if Cicero was gone he  wouldn't have to stay away for his brother's own safety.

Abel  rolled his eyes. "Revenant, Mel. You used to be smarted than this. No  one approaching you to undermine the power structure of the circus is  someone with good intentions. You lay down with dags, you get up with  fleas." His voice was reproving, but I could tell he was very carefully  avoiding any implications that she'd done this for him. He knew it was  well as the rest of us, he just wasn't stupid enough to try to make her  admit it.

"I'll neuter you like a dog." Mel snapped.She  hurled a fireball at him, which he dispersed rather than deflecting it.  He made a casual motion, snapping his fingers once, and the small but  powerful ball of flame just...collapsed. I blinked, staring in shock as I  tried to puzzle out how he'd done that. I'd seen a slight shimmer in  the air around the flame orb, but I had no clue what he'd actually done.  Still, whatever it was it had become obvious that he wasn't in the mood  to humor her anymore, and Mel acknowledged that by getting serious.

She  cleared her throat in embarrassment at having misread the situation. "I  mean, sorry, yeah. I screwed up." Her voice sounded genuinely contrite  and she let her head thunk down on the desk. "I didn't mean to bring  these assholes to our door. I just hated seeing him every day, strolling  around like he's some big hero that everyone should respect." The desk  cracked under her hands, scorch marks scoring the wood as her fingers  raked toward the edge like molted claws.

Abel stared at  her in shock. "I...I didn't realize it was that bad between you two. I  mean, I knew you'd be angry at him, but I figured you would get past it.  You were so close when we were younger." He sounded bewildered, his  serious mood melting away in the face of a confusion so deep it almost  sounded like hurt. "What could he have done to make you hate him this  much? Did he hurt you?"

"Did he-" Mel's head snapped up,  her orange eyes boring into Abel furiously. "Did he HURT me? He took  away the one person I loved most in the world, you frigid asshole. Or  course he hurt me. He was the reason you left, the reason you abandoned  me. I couldn't hate YOU for it. I could never hate you, especially not  when I knew you were just doing what you'd always done, bending over  backwards to accommodate him. I don't care what you intended or how you  viewed it. He stole you from me. I despise him."

Abel  looked horrified. "That's not what happened. I left to protect all of  you. Sure, his ambition would have drawn a target on us, but my own  abilities were almost as bad all on their own. I was making waves, and  people would have come calling to find out if I was really as good as  the rumors said. It was safer for everyone if I just faded into the  background. Cicero gave me a good excuse, but I couldn't have stayed in  any case. Independents can make it into the Titan Twenty, but we can't  afford to be on top. The wrong sort of people were starting to get upset  about my power."

"You think I cared?" Mel spat. "That I  wouldn't have gone with you? You didn't even ask. You just walked away.  You didn't even say goodbye in person. You just left me a fucking note. I  never thought I'd see the day that Abel Castleton slunk off into the  dark like a coward." He flinched when she said that, like she'd  physically struck him with the word, and I had to marvel that one  poisonous comment could hurt him when even that F-ranker had been unable  to leave a scratch.

I cleared my throat, and Mel wheeled  to glare at me, but I glared right back. "Listen, you guys have stuff to  sort through, I get that, but can we maybe save the romance novel drama  for when we aren't dealing with a probable war with an E-rank faction?  Because we have some possible options, but they won't do us much good if  this whole fucking place is already burning down by the time we can  enact them because you decided Abel needed to be yelled at." I paused as  Callie gave me a disapproving look and rolled my eyes. "Not that you  shouldn't have your conversation. But just maybe save it til after the  meeting."

You-" Mel hissed, her orange eyes blazing.  "Might have a point." She let out a long sigh, the exhalation stealing  the tension from her body like it was taking literal wind out of sails.  "Now isn't the time for this, no matter how urgent it feels to me. We  won't survive a war with Sanctuary Hall. Even with the deed in hand, the  defenses here won't hold back the kind of force someone that  influential can throw at us. Even lower end E-ranked factions might shy  away from the protections in place, but anyone with that much money and  power, not to mention access to unlimited healing, can just throw people  at us until they get through." Her eyes fixed on me. "What options do  you have? You mentioned a possible plan."

I nodded. "Well,  the beginnings of one. We're members of the Beast Lord Garden. I'm  pretty sure we can get them to intervene. Melinda is an E-ranker  herself, and Travis, her partner, is the same. Having two members at  that level makes them a terrifying force to reckon with. I bet even the  Peace Lord won't screw with them." I had no idea if that was true,  actually, but even if it wasn't I refused to let the other candidate win  this after all the bullshit she put me through. I'd bring Burning Fist  into the loop for an alliance if I had to.

Mel looked  skeptical. "I mean. If you're members it can't have been for long. How  exactly are you planning to convince a force that large to move? I'm  sure they like you fine, but you might be underestimating the motivation  of a faction to help out a low rank member. Hell, they might just  forbid you from taking part in this mess at all. It's what I would do in  that position." I could tell she was trying to be polite, which at  least meant she was taking us seriously as allies if nothing else. I  could work with that.

I looked to Callie, who gave me a  supportive smile. She was in charge usually, but this involved who to  tell about my abilities and she'd already told me that was my call. This  was my show until Melinda had officially accepted the offer. I turned  back to Mel and gave a serious nod. "We have some assurance of getting  them involved. I can't go into details but we have leverage. Assuming we  can get them on board though, how is this going to work? It's not like  they'll be sending their E-rankers down here. Hell even any more  F-rankers would probably destabilize the entire structure of the WCP."

Abel  was the one who answered that. "They'll swarm G-rankers. If there were  more factions involved there are alternate methods to take, but it would  become a huge mess pretty quickly. The large factions have access to  huge reserves of G-ranked Ascendants. The F-rankers might engage in  F-district, but that won't effect us here, and E-district forbids  outright battle. Too destructive and hard to clean up. Having an extra  E-ranker would put a ton of pressure on them to avoid tipping this into a  full on brawl in one of the dark districts though."

"Dark  districts?" I asked with confusion. "Not sure I've heard that term  before. What are those?" We hadn't exactly memorized every corner of the  WCP. G-district was pretty much our main base of operations at our  current level, and any place higher would essentially be suicide for  people at our level.

Abel grimaced. "The dark districts  aren't level restricted. The large forces sometimes use them for proxy  battles, but for the most part they're a place for desperate Ascendants  to try to accrue reputation by mixing with higher level enemies. Rank  doesn't matter there, it's just a free for all when anyone can show up.  Even some E-rankers have been seen there, though usually only the  craziest and most powerful will risk it. If an E-ranker dies their whole  faction takes a hit and can even collapse, so letting them see combat  is a huge risk. Everyone will avoid that situation if possible, but  having an extra E-ranker will definitely help."

"Except we  don't." Said Benny. We all looked at him. "Don't forget how we got into  this mess. Mr. Jack-tastic is in town because he hit E-rank. That means  they have a second E-ranked fighter too. Albeit a much newer and weaker  one." I cursed silently. I had forgotten that. The Jerks had become so  low priority in the face of this whole convoluted mess that I'd let them  slip my mind completely.

I  turned to Callie. "What are the chances M-Jack will be a legit threat to  Melinda and Travis. I know next to nothing about how he fights or what  he can do. Is this something we have to worry about?" Honestly the Peace  Lord alone sounded terrifying, and the two on one aspect was the main  reason I'd been confident in Melinda winning. That weird conceptual  peace ability sounded hellish in a fight.

Thankfully,  Callie shook her head. "No. In fact, Melinda is the worst possible  matchup for someone like him. His ability manifests in a manner similar  to summoning beasts, though it isn't exactly the same. Melinda should be  able to handle him easily enough, especially given how recently he hit  E-rank." That was a relief. Honestly she was right, even if the other  candidate had been pumping no one but him every day, those points  wouldn't be enough to put a dent in the E-rank, and I knew she hadn't  been doing that anyway since she was working with the Peace Lord  primarily.

This  would stay at our level for now, and I'd do everything possible to keep  it that way. With Abel and Mel on our side we would be at a huge  advantage in the G-ranks, and keeping the fight at that level would help  us train and improve anyway. I had a long way to go before I was  satisfied that I was strong enough to hit F-rank. I didn't want to end  up some stat heavy joke who didn't have any combat ability when push  came to shove.

Before  any of that happened though, we had other things to do. It was time to  do something I'd been worried about since I got my power. I'd trusted my  friends and used my abilities as best I could, but I'd never really  leaned into the true strength of a Wishmaster. Connections. Everyone  wanted wishes, and almost as much as the ability to grant them, having  people to pay for them and put them to use was an important aspect of  what I could do. It was time to take the plunge and trust someone more  powerful than me with my secret. I just hoped I'd picked the right  person. Even if I had though, I had a feeling things were going to start  getting complicated.