The children looked equal parts horrified and fascinated by Karl's arrival. That was true power, he simply walked into their safe space and made demands.

Not threats.

Threats implied that he needed some level of cooperation. He simply issued orders and expected that they would understand why they needed to follow them.

However, the older ones noticed the implications of his calm explanations. Everyone was dead. Fully half the Clan should have been in the bunkers, unless they came out to fight later in the battle, or they had tried to flee and had been caught.

If three quarters of the Clan was dead, not everyone in a bunker was safe.

But he could walk through bunker walls that were made of Supreme Ranked stone. If he could walk through a wall that would keep the average Immortal out for days, what defence did they have that would stop him?

Instead of arguing, they silently followed their guardian out into the city, only to find that there was no more city. Or at least, not the Clan compound.

Everything was destroyed, the buildings were little more than rubble, and in some cases, not even rubble was left.

They had been obliterated beyond the point where the pieces could be identified.

"My associates have gone to collect the other survivors, but if you would be so good as to inform us where the treasury was hidden, we can leave with our share and let you bring them out of their hiding holes.

I'm certain that method will cause much less trauma than letting a Blood Destruction Spider dig them out of their hiding holes." Karl suggested.

Clan Leader Nerissa landed behind him with Allie once they noticed that he was talking with someone willing to help. Either that, or he was about to do something so horrible that they needed to be on hand to stop him.

"Ladies, this helpful cleric has offered to guide you to the hidden treasury, so that the New Home can collect their dues and return home." Karl explained.

"Oh, that is wonderful.

Today has seen far too much senseless death.

But before we go looking for the treasury, there is one thing that has been bothering me since the first attack. We know that it was triggered before the Templars Clan Leader wanted because of an incident between his members and ours.

But he was planning it. Why?"

The cleric looked nervous and stammered for a moment, before one of the young dragonkin, a boy of about eight years old, stepped in front of her protectively.

"It wasn't her fault! The Clan Leader wanted to expand to a new branch, but all the territory was claimed. So, the Elders made a plan, and decided that the New Home, with their losers from the mortal worlds, was the weakest target in the region."

Nerissa gave him a vicious smile, then her expression softened and she shrugged.

"Well, he was wrong. Now, do you know where they hid the treasury? The law is that if you lose a challenge like this one, you lose a fifth of your Clan's wealth and your Clan is disbanded."

The boy looked startled that they didn't intend to take everything. But he nodded, intently focused on making these strangers go away.

It wasn't his stuff they wanted anyhow.

"I know where they put it. My mentor was the warehouse Elder. Or maybe is? He didn't come back from the first attack, but we didn't get much news before they told us to start packing"

Nerissa nodded. If he was waiting for an Elder to return, he would be waiting a long time. But the Clan had been disbanded, the best thing was to sort the remaining resources and have them all move on to look for a new Clan to take them in.

In some cases, the winner would take the members of the other, absorbing them into their numbers to strengthen the Clan. But Nerissa had no intentions of doing that.

For one, Gralpedrin didn't have much going for it as a city, it wasn't in a great spot, and the resources in the area weren't much different than what the New Home could get in their own territory.

So, there wasn't any great advantage, and New Home hadn't lost enough members to need to do a mass recruitment.

Plus, they still had another stop after this one.

The Condim Commanders' remaining members had paid the fifth when she arrived at their gates. They had one of the newly advanced Supremes from the Almeixei Sect as their representative, so they were clearly intending to reform as a new Clan on the old location, with a new Clan Leader.

That was allowed, and they had paid their dues without argument.

But she hadn't had a chance to get to the Hyperion Sect yet, and they were right on the edge of the New Home's territory. That one they might absorb some survivors from.

The young man and the cleric led them to another warehouse, where they found Cara sitting outside the vault door in a folding chair, waiting for them.

"You didn't clear the place out, did you?" Nerissa asked.

"Of course not. Do I look like that sort of person to you?"

"The Legendary dragon stopped you, didn't he?"

"He cast something on me that stopped me from shifting planes to move inside

the loot warehouse." Cara confirmed.

Dana laughed as she saw how well the Clan Leader knew the badger.

She hadn't even questioned the fact that Cara knew what was inside, or that she had tried to get inside, she had gone straight to guessing who had the influence to stop her from looting the place anyhow.

Or, at the very least, picking out a few of the shiniest objects for herself.

Cara wasn't actually greedy, she just liked shiny things. And new things. And tasty things. But she didn't collect more than one of each thing, unless it was food or another consumable product.