He wasn't lying about sending clones.
He still would send them.
Their job would be simple: guard the party from shadows, hold the perimeter, and preserve the return route.
Neo planned those backups the way a commander rigs redundancies.
Still, he wanted these people with him for the retrieval, because he needed them to grow, and their abilities were truly top tier.
He snapped his fingers and a slender ray of pale light entered each person's mind like a key slipping into a lock.
"Use that spell when you enter the Site," he said. "It'll protect you from Berserker Elementals."
He paused, watching faces register the instructions, then added, "As for Earth, I'll leave a clone here. If the Alliance reaches this location, the clone will trigger the transfer of Earth into my Cosmos. Until then, it won't touch anything."
No one had a chance to object before Neo stepped back and vanished.
He left the room with the same abruptness he used for almost everything.
