"Then we follow your example," Fabian said at last, straightening his coat as though neat fabric could restore dignity after what they had just witnessed. His fingers trembled only once before he hid them behind his back. "Tell me honestly, Karl. Do you think the governments know the System has a personality of its own?"
Karl folded his arms and considered the question. "Hard to say. If they do know, they are keeping silent. If they do not know, then they are still fumbling in the dark like the rest of humanity." His gaze swept across the room. "Either way, we are not permitted to speak of it, so speculation gains us little."
The elders around the table exchanged uneasy looks. Men and women who had preserved bloodlines, estates, and secret crafts for generations now looked like students after their first scolding. It was not fear of death that unsettled them. It was the realization that something existed above every throne, every corporation, and every army.
Vernik Roth cleared his throat. "That is exactly what bothers me. Why are we forbidden from telling outsiders? No one would believe us, why keep silent at all?"
Karl answered without hesitation. "Because people fear what they cannot understand. If they hear there is an unseen intelligence above nations and kings, many will panic. Others will worship it blindly. Some fools will challenge it. None of those outcomes help humanity grow." He tapped the table once. "The System seeks progress. Disorder delays progress."
A murmur of agreement moved around the chamber.
"It has no reason to hate us," Karl continued. "We need not fear it as an enemy. But we should respect it as one respects fire, the sea, or the sky. Powerful things do not need malice to destroy the careless."
That line sank deep. Even the younger heirs standing behind their elders stopped pretending to be aloof.
Fabian exhaled slowly. "Then we waste no more time. I propose we mirror the Sonneberg family. We establish factions, gather points, and prepare before the first Trial ends. If contracts truly exist that can bind loyalty and secure our knowledge, then delay is stupidity."
This time, the agreement was immediate. Heads nodded all around the table.
Some families had survived plagues. Others had survived wars, revolutions, and modern bureaucracy. None intended to be wiped out now because they were too proud to adapt.
Vernik was first to stand. "Excellent meeting. Terrifying meeting. Productive meeting." He grabbed his cloak in one swift motion. "Now, if you will excuse me, I must return home and discover where I can squeeze more points from the world."
Without waiting for a reply, he strode toward the exit at a pace unbecoming of a dignified patriarch.
The others followed almost instantly.
One matriarch was already dictating orders to her stunned junior before she reached the door. Another elder muttered about recruiting apprentices. A third was calculating how best to persuade his elders to take to the battlefield.
The younger generation stared blankly for several heartbeats, still processing what had happened. Then they scrambled after their elders like ducklings chasing a panicked flock.
Within moments, the once-crowded hall was nearly empty.
Fabian remained behind, rubbing his temples. "Every time your family appears, Karl, my life becomes more troublesome."
Karl grinned. "You're welcome."
Then, instead of using the door like any civilized person, he leaped onto a pillar, caught a beam overhead, and vanished into the rafters.
Arin followed with the ease of someone climbing stairs.
From below came Fabian's furious shout.
"WHY CAN'T YOU PEOPLE USE DOORS LIKE NORMAL HUMANS?!"
Their laughter echoed long after they were gone.
A week passed.
During that week, the army advanced another one hundred and forty kilometers. The pace stunned nearly everyone involved. Analysts who had predicted months of attrition quietly rewrote their estimates. Commanders who had begged for reserves suddenly found themselves with momentum.
At the current rate, many believed they would reach the enemy portal within another week.
Even more significant was the closing of the battlefield's side pockets.
The great ravine that slashed diagonally across the warfront had trapped enormous goblin forces on isolated flanks. Those trapped masses were finally exterminated after brutal clearing operations, freeing nearly two billion soldiers who had been tied down containing them.
Those troops were immediately redeployed toward the central push.
The timing could not have been better.
Though humanity possessed resurrection, it did not erase exhaustion, trauma, or temporary manpower loss. Roughly two billion soldiers had already died at least once during the campaign. Many returned shaken, slower, or reluctant to rejoin the line immediately.
Fresh bodies still mattered.
The Marshals welcomed the reinforcements like rain after a drought.
Yet troop numbers were only part of the reason the offensive accelerated.
The greater cause was stranger.
The trade families had awakened.
Before the meeting, many of them had participated only enough to avoid criticism. They healed, repaired, crafted, and fought when convenient, but their true passion remained their private arts. The front lines were noisy, crude places. Not ideal for perfectionists.
After the meeting, that changed overnight.
The Le Maingre family, famed for generations of swordsmanship, sent not their students but their old masters.
White-haired men and women stepped onto the battlefield with plain expressions and weathered blades. Then they proceeded to carve through goblin ranks like gardeners trimming weeds.
Witnesses reported one elderly woman clearing a trench line so quickly that soldiers behind her had to run to keep up.
They fought for a few hours each day, then retired to tea, stretching, and complaining about posture.
Their point income was absurd.
The Silverwater family did the same with spears.
They moved in disciplined lines, thrusting with such precision that goblins dropped before realizing they had been struck. One commander swore he saw an old man pin three enemies in place with a single flowing combination before asking politely if anyone had oil for spear maintenance.
No one laughed.
Then came the Roth family.
The ancient smiths suddenly opened market stalls near major camps and began selling mana-metal weapons for eye-watering prices in points. Swords, spearheads, arrowheads, knives, armor fittings—everything vanished the moment it was displayed.
Buyers cursed the prices while paying immediately.
Roth accountants smiled like saints who had found religion in greed.
But if one family confused the world most, it was the Bingen family.
Doctors, surgeons, herbalists, battlefield medics—everyone knew them as healers.
So when they began launching catapults full of spinning shuriken into goblin formations, people assumed exhaustion had finally driven them mad.
Then the goblins started dying in heaps.
The trick was elegant.
Each shuriken had mana-metal edges but ordinary metal bodies, conserving expensive resources. Normally that would reduce penetration once resistance built. But the Bingen family had coated the edges in swift-acting poison.
A shallow cut was enough.
Soon goblin ranks collapsed under storms of spinning steel.
The Bingens earned points from healing soldiers, selling toxins, consulting command, and killing enemies all at once.
Economists called it vertical integration.
Everyone else called it shameless.
Naturally, the great houses took notice.
Representatives began visiting patriarchs and matriarchs across the front, asking why the trade families had suddenly become so aggressive.
The answers were maddeningly consistent.
"We cannot say."
"You should gather more points."
"You are already late."
That was all.
For old powers skilled in reading signals, it was enough.
The great houses intensified their own offensives immediately.
Elite retainers entered the field. Reserved resources were released. Hidden stockpiles were opened. Ancient rivalries were suspended in favor of slaughtering goblins faster than competitors.
Corporations noticed next.
If noble houses and old families were spending points recklessly, then profit—or something greater than profit—must be involved.
So corporate armies, private contractors, and industrial guilds surged forward as well.
Then the rest of the world followed.
Because if there was one universal truth, it was this:
When capitalists run toward danger, everyone assumes treasure lies there.
Thus the entire human war machine lurched into overdrive.
Marshal headquarters could scarcely believe their reports.
Supply lines strained but held. Casualties rose, but so did kills. Entire sectors advanced ahead of schedule. Flanking wings moved especially fast, tightening the noose around goblin territory.
And every kilometer gained reduced the enemy's living space.
That mattered.
Because despite killing nearly fifteen billion goblins, humanity still faced seas of them deeper inland.
The ravine itself was slowly filling with corpses, dirt, shattered gear, and collapsed siegeworks. In some places, soldiers now crossed stretches that had once been open abyss.
No one liked thinking about what formed the ground beneath their boots.
Still, one mystery troubled the Marshals and every think tank assisting them.
Where was the final goblin defense line?
Scouts expected forests turned into traps, fortified ridges, hidden reserves, and prepared killing fields. Yet sector after sector was strangely barren.
No grand stand.
No sacred last forest.
No desperate counterwall.
They searched maps, reports, and reconnaissance again and again.
Had intelligence failed?
Had the goblins abandoned strategy?
Had they prepared some hidden ambush near the portal itself?
No one realized the truth.
Humanity had already passed the goblins' final forest days ago.
The goblins had eaten it.
They stripped bark, roots, leaves, sap, and seeds. Then the dead trees toppled where they stood, were hauled backward in endless caravans, and shipped to the heartland.
There, far from the front, goblin laborers were using the stolen timber to build splendid houses for their emperor.
While humanity prepared for a final battle, the goblin nobility had been busy decorating.