Jun turned the book over once in his hands, then looked at Red Eye.
"My uncle gave it to me," he said, stepping away from the edge and moving past her toward the stairs,"It's old and belongs to our family, apparently. The cover pages are gone, so I don't actually know what it is."
Red Eye said nothing. Jun headed down, and without any instruction, the Red Eye suit quietly folded itself around him as he descended. Below, Omnis was already back at the maps and standing with a small group of people, tracing routes and marking areas across the spread of parchment on the table. The discussion was focused, practical, the kind of conversation that happens when people are trying to turn incomplete information into usable plans.
Then one of the men stepped slightly apart from the group and said, "Omnis, The shelter's owner is asking for you."
Omnis spent a few minutes in that conversation, said what needed to be said, and then moved on. He found Ruhi where he expected to and the moment he approached, she came to meet him, her expression carrying the particular weight of someone who has been waiting to deliver news they're not entirely sure how to frame.
"A letter came," she said.
Omnis looked at her.
Ruhi continued,"Master, the letter says that three months from now, after the solar eclipse, there will be a battle. Every shelter is required to participate. Each shelter must send a minimum of 37 participants and no upper limit. Shelters that don't comply will be destroyed."
Omnis was quiet for a moment. Then he said,"Call a meeting. Bring all the shelter's group leaders."
One of the men nearby spoke up and some of the group leaders were currently out on hunts and exploration runs, and getting them back would take time.
Ruhi stepped in smoothly: "Fine, Gather whoever is here now and send word to the rest and tell them to come and report me when they return."
The meeting convened some time later. Thirty-seven group leaders were present in the room, along with Ruhi leading her own group and Omnis at the head of his.
Ruhi opened without preamble,"We're here because a battle is coming, and every group in this shelter will need to contribute participants. As many as possible and this isn't optional."
The questions came quickly aby Selection criteria, Weapons, and expected Timeline.
Omnis answered directly. "The timeline is whatever we have between now and the solar eclipse and that's our preparation window. Weapons are what we already use here. Nothing from Elysira functions in Icolis, so we work with what this place gives us. As for selection who anyone above three thousand power points is eligible to participate."
The silence that followed lasted only a few seconds, but it had weight. Someone repeated it quietly, almost to themselves: Three thousand power points. A few leaders exchanged glances. Expressions tightened across the room.
One man spoke up Omnis… three thousand is a high bar. My group has maybe three people in that range. Another said his group had one. A third admitted they hadn't broken past twenty-three hundred yet. The tension in the room thickened quietly.
Ruhi glanced at Omnis. He was sitting completely still, his expression unreadable. Then he spoke,"We don't have another option. Participation isn't a choice, it's a requirement."
He let that land, then continued, "And I'm not standing above this. Even in my own group, only two people are currently at that level."
Ruhi followed, "The real issue isn't how many of us are there right now. It's that each fight will be individual. Everyone participates on their own terms."
One of the leaders asked what that meant for shelter members who ended up facing each other as opponents.
Ruhi's answer was straightforward. "When survival requires something, that's what happens."
Another leader raised the practical concern that preparation time was limited, and nobody had a clear picture of which areas had the highest alien density for efficient power point farming.
Omnis gestured toward the maps on the table,"That's what the next three months are for. We use this time to prepare to all of us and by the end of it, we'll have enough participants to meet the requirement and then some."
He paused, then added that cross-group training would help everyone improve faster before the fight. One of the leaders pushed back on that, saying it would be better to let each group handle their own preparation independently. The room didn't argue the point either way.
Ruhi moved the conversation forward,"Fine, prepare however works best for your group. But everyone needs to come back and register at the Arena when the time comes. Names have to be submitted for selection."
She then addressed the resource question directly,"If it comes to it, we'll put the shelter's entire budget toward getting as many people above three thousand as quickly as possible. Anyone already there do whatever you need to do, but you will participate when the time comes."
A leader asked about the registration deadline. Ruhi said the timing hadn't been announced yet, but the moment it was, everyone would be informed.
Omnis added simply, "Make sure I know when it's confirmed."
Ruhi then outlined the financial adjustments for the preparation period. The standard hunt tax would drop from five percent to two percent until the battle concluded and the shelter would absorb the difference and provide full support in the meantime. However, she was clear that this wasn't a permanent change. Once the fight was over, the rate would increase to seven percent temporarily to recover what had been spent. For non-shelter members, the entry fee would increase by fifty power points above the current rate. The discussion continued from there, practical and detailed, leaders raising specifics and Ruhi working through each one with the same measured clarity she'd brought to everything else.
Then, in the middle of it, a man came and leaned close to Omnis, speaking quietly into his ear.