Aria was on the other side of the continent when she got the same system window that everyone on the planet received.

  “The first annual Lord’s Conference will begin in 72 hours.”

  “Lord’s and their party will be teleported when it begins.”

  “The conference is to vote on system changes.”

  “The conference will be led by the Planetary Paragon.”

  It had been about a day since the monster horde event had ended, she had not participated wanting to enter this far western safe zone after the event was over. This safe zone was known on this half of the continent for having impossibly strong people. The surrounding safe zone leadership were worried that they would be taken over by the people of this safe zone. So far she had quickly passed through three other safe zones and had not met anyone strong enough to challenge her, but she was hoping that this one would prove fruitful.

  Walking through the main town, she didn’t get a sense of any fighters, but there was something off about the place. Everyone seemed down and walked around while staring at the ground, she couldn’t make sense of it until she tried to enter the central district. This area was walled off from the rest of the town and had about a dozen tall buildings in it. Aria walked right through the archway past a couple guards who weren’t paying attention, the people walking around in here were of high spirits and had their heads held high. The center building had more guards and these three guys were paying attention and she could tell they were strong, not strong enough to threaten her but strong enough to make it fun.

  “Hold it missy, you're not allowed in here.” said one of the guards.

  “You have two options, go get the lord of this zone so I can talk to him or I go through you and find them myself.” Aria said with a haughty tone in her voice.

  “Why would Lord Jasmine want to talk to you? How did you even get into this part of the city?” Another guard asked.

  “My name is Aria. Tell your lord I wish to discuss the Lord’s conference.” She didn’t want to give details to these guards or discuss anything about Eli in public. There wasn’t a particular reason to keep it quiet, she had asked around in the safe zones closer to where his town was and it seemed that travel between them was rare so information about each was not widely known. But she was betting that the lord here would know some information and even if they hadn’t heard of him yet, they would want to know anything they could about who would be leading the conference.

  The two guards that had already spoken huffed and were getting ready to attempt to kick her out when the third guard stopped them and took them aside. Aria waited patiently in the doorway while they whispered about what they were going to do with her. She was surprised that they were actually whispering quietly enough that she couldn’t hear them even though they were only 20 feet away. What she was able to hear was them chuckling to themselves and glancing in her direction with unsavory looks in their eyes. She guessed that the guard in charge was your typical male middle-management type who relished the chance to flaunt his small amount of power and authority.

  The lead guard walked towards her, “Alright miss Aria, I can send one of my guys to inform the lord you are here,” he paused and smiled at her, “for a price.”

  “Oh, and what price would that be?” Aria asked skeptically. She knew she wasn’t as attractive as she used to be, even though she could barely remember what she used to look like. With sickly pale skin, a skinny frame, short blonde dirty hair, and a manic look in her eyes, she knew she wasn’t going to win any beauty pageants but she still had a pretty face with youthful features. At worst, she would hurt them, at best she convinces them to do it without hurting them.

  “Well, you can buy me a drink at the lord's bar across the street.” The guard leader said.

  “That doesn’t work for me, I may not be allowed to kill you, but I can hurt you. Now, tell the lord I’m here or get out of the way.” Aria said that last part loudly hoping some more people would notice. The three guards surrounded her and got ready to fight when a fourth person showed up.

  “What is all this noise," a sultry female voice said from further inside the building, “I hope you three aren’t causing trouble again.” All three of them froze and looked worried, they took a step back and in an odd move stood behind Aria keeping her in between them and the newcomer.

  “It was nothing Miss Adeline, This girl was trying to see the lord and we were telling her to leave.” The guard leader tried to explain but his voice got softer as he talked under Adeline’s piercing glare. Aria decided that this was taking too long, the conference had just been announced and she had to convince this lord to take her along. Surely going to the conference, experiencing the world's strongest and talking to them, would help her figure out who she was. Part of her wanted to just make a shelter in the middle of the wilderness and live her life in peace, however, she just could not shake the fear she had of Eli. That fear motivated her more than anything else, it's what kept her from completely losing her marbles after her imprisonment, and it's what is motivating her now.

  “I don’t have time for this, show me to the lord here or get out of my way!” Aria yelled.

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  Adeline looked her up and down slowly, “Alright, but I need your word that you will speak to her with respect. Jasmine has done a lot for us and won’t tolerate disrespect.”

  Aria raised her right hand, “I swear on my Deity, that I will speak with respect to your lord.” Her hand glowed purple with magic which turned into a purple chain tattoo wrapping around her hand all the way down to her elbow. A system window accompanied it.

  “You have sworn an oath to a deity.”

  “If your oath is broken your deity will own your soul.”

  “Only the deity can undo the oath.”

  “What was that?” Adeline asked with a very sudden look of intrigue on her face.

  “Oath magic, I think… that's never happened before.” Aria replied with her own curiosity obvious on her face.

  “Follow me, she is definitely going to want to meet you.” Adeline brought Aria up some stairs and into a large open room with tables up against the walls and cushions and pillows laying flat in the middle. In the center sitting cross-legged was a woman that Aria immediately recognized as someone strong but couldn’t place why. She was a small woman, barely over five feet tall, tan skin and black long hair, if she had to guess, Aria would say that she was middle-eastern. She was wearing system store underwear and cloth wraps to cover her chest. The woman was conversing with two other women but stopped when Aria came into the room, she looked to be in her late thirties but with body upgrades there was no telling for sure.

  “Adeline, it’s not like you to bring strays here, what is going on?” Lord Jasmine asked.

  “This girl is desperate to speak with you about the system announced conference. She has used oath magic as proof that her intentions are only to speak in a respectful manner.” Adeline responded.

  “Come sit girl, everyone else may leave.” She said, and everyone left them alone in the room. Aria got closer and put her armor in her inventory and was just wearing shorts and a simple shirt when she sat down a couple feet in front of her.

  “I’ll start,” Aria said and Jasmine nodded. “I have information…”

  Jasmine held up a hand to stop her, “You know who the paragon is,” then she closed her eyes to concentrate. Aria felt her try to enter her mind, she guessed that it had something to do with her will skill. Unfortunately for Jasmine, her will was not nearly strong enough to get inside, Aria had spent a millennia inside her own head with a tiny fragment of Eli as a roommate. Nothing was getting in short of Eli himself, so she just pushed an image of TV static at Jasmine’s attempt. “You are stronger than you look, girl.”

  “My name is Aria,” she held up her right hand. “I have sworn to treat you with respect, it would be rude to not return the courtesy.”

  “Very well Aria, what information do you have? Their name? Their face?”

  “I know all about them, and I’ll tell you everything at the conference.”

  “And I’m just supposed to trust you on that, take you with me with no proof that it will be any help. We don’t even know how many people we get to bring or how long we will be gone. You are asking me to handicap myself based on your word that it will benefit me.” Jasmine sounded more curious than upset at the request.

  Aria tapped her chin for a second in thought, then answered, “yes.” then she quickly added, “And I’ll need some nice clothes as well.”

  “I am inclined to believe you, but if I’m going to leave behind a close friend then I need something to go on so they know there is a reason I brought you instead of them. What about your oath magic, can you tell me about that?”

  “Well, I don’t know much about it except the system windows that came up when I did it.” Aria opened the windows and mentally chose to have them appear in front of her. “I didn’t know that swearing on my deity would even do anything like this, but here we are.” She held out her hand again and was looking it over while talking.

  Jasmine was perplexed by this girl. She was strong and seemed competent at first but then she made a blunder by showing the system windows and by her word choice. The part that she couldn’t figure out is if this was part of the plan and there was more going on here than she realized. She probably knew that she would ask about the oath magic, and that showing her the windows it gave her a lot of credibility, but was she really smart enough to play this kind of game? From what Jasmine could tell right now the odds were about 50/50 that she was being played, there were just too many questions about deities and how much this girl was involved with them.

  “Could I make an oath on your deity as well? Or do I have to have a relationship with them first?” Jasmine asked, trying and failing to keep the weariness out of her voice. It was much harder for her to keep her emotional displays in check when she couldn’t read or alter the mind of the person she was talking to. She may not have all of her tricks here, but she saw a path forward to her benefit and was going to walk that knife's edge. Oath magic was her ticket to a whole safe zone of compulsory loyalty.

  “I’m not sure, like I said I don’t know much about it. I don’t think it would hurt to try.” Aria then explained exactly how she had done it.

  Jasmine raised her right hand, “I swear on my deity that I will not stand up for the next 60 seconds.” Nothing happened. “Did I do it wrong?”

  “Well, no, but I don’t think you have a deity, try wording it as my deity and have it have something to do with me. Something simple.” Aria suggested.

  Jasmine looked into Aria’s eyes, “I swear on your deity that I will not harm you for the next 60 seconds.” her right hand glowed purple, then a much smaller chain wrapped around her hand like a purple tattoo and the glow stopped and some system windows appeared which she shared with Aria.

  “You have sworn an oath to another’s deity.”

  “If you break that oath, the deity can claim your soul.”

  “This oath has a timer and will be canceled when the time runs out.”

  “Well, that works wonderfully.” Jasmine said, “Now I just need to meet this deity of yours, or are there other ones I can find?”

  “I only know of one, and I can introduce you, but you have to take me to the conference first.”

  “Aria, I think we are going to be very good friends.”