Chapter 71: 74. Distraction Part 1

It is currently an hour before sunset. The sky is still bright, but now with slightly orange streaks. The moon is out tonight. It looks like a large circle of light-red blood in the sky.

Unlike the moon on Earth that Ajax and Shaula are familiar with, Omicron's moon doesn't have any massive crater marks. Since it has no blemishes, some in history used to view it as a portal to a land of fire where trees of flesh stand and oceans of blood flow, a primeval hell where the demons originate.

Others believed that so long as the moon hung in the sky, the demons would never be eliminated from Omicron.

Today, the red light of the moon lands upon the statue marchers and the guards as well as the people surrounding them. Since the old man had made his first speech, there are now over 700 mostly demihuman protesters in the crowd who are angered by today’s march.

However, the square has gotten more precarious as the hours passed. More and more human statue march sympathizers appeared since that speech. Their number is now over 900. Those on the side of the marchers (yet not part of their organization) wander around in a tense atmosphere, holding their ground.

They are mainly waiting for the statue march to conclude, but some provoke racially charged confrontations against the demihumans protesters. Fights break out every few minutes and people are in need of medical attention. Some walk around stopping fights while others walk around administering healing magic.

At sunset, if the statue remains standing the marchers have "won". At that point, the one who built the statue would dismantle it in a special ritual. The symbolism is ostensibly to demonstrate the hero represented by the statue returning to Osva's side upon their deaths.

In previous marches, if the statue were to be destroyed prior to sunset, it would be used to show inadequacy on the part of the marchers. The march itself would be seen as a failure even to their own organization.

The marchers always set up their march like this in order to properly satisfy themselves and their sympathizers, while also drawing counter protesters who felt like they could meaningfully affect the outcome. More word of mouth spreading about the march by both marchers, their sympathizers and the counter protesters would also create notoriety for their organization.

With that notoriety, the wealthy commoners, the news organizations and maybe even the nobility would notice their cause. The statue marchers always marched with a mission that could actually be failed and one that did occasionally fail, though less often than one would assume.

If the march wasn’t planned like this, it would just be a group of fools being really annoying with no real purpose to their walking around besides aimless aggrievement. By adding the ritualistic element, the symbolism, they successfully tied their cause to the glorification of Osva himself. 

Even if the more sensible, less overtly racist human commoners were annoyed by their marching around, they could not find fault with their devoutness. This is a way the human-run news organizations of Tritol are able to spin their marches as not a demonstration of pure racism but a “controversial” religious ritual dedicated to Osva's glorification.

Of course, most saw through the dog whistle anyways.

The statue of the 33rd divinity still stands tall. It gleams brilliantly at this time. There is an extremely minuscule chance that it will be dismantled or destroyed before it's supposed to be. The brute force destructive magic required to shatter it is not something a group of demihumans could muster. There is no chance they have their own crystal mage on their side either.

This is the difference between previous marches as well. At earlier marches throughout the year, the march would not end in a very public area like Maz square. It would instead end in one of Tritol's public parks or another similarly unpaved area. An earth mage among their ranks would volunteer to construct their statue out of soil, rock and dirt from the park floor.

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Sometimes, they would need to hire a professional earth mage to get involved as well. Their dirt, rock and soil statues were much more likely to be destroyed before they were supposed to be unlike today’s diamond statue.

Furthermore, they did not have to displace any ground either, instead fabricating the statue out of thin air and returning it to the air upon the march’s conclusion. Ending at a place like a public park would also result in less of a spectacle taking place than ending it here in Maz square. 

Today however, there are likely multiple journalists already walking among the crowd talking about how violent the demihuman protesters are, how peaceful the human ones are, weaving a narrative as they wish it to be. Today’s march has been quite a blessing for the marchers. A truly powerful crystal mage today made a lot of difference.

This crystal mage stands next to his diamond statue. He is glad it turned out well, properly fashioned while being quite stylized. His mask covers his face so no one can tell his identity. However, his eyes are still barely visible, covered up by crosshatched fabric over the eye holes of his mask.

If someone were to look close enough, they might notice that his irises are light violet.

His name is Quinn Tritol. He is Baron Liri's half brother.

Two men in crimson armor walk towards him and stand beside him. They wait for him to acknowledge them before speaking. Both of them have small badges in the center of their chest plates.

One badge depicts the side profile of an antlered lintrose stag with bright red antlers. The antlers have two branches and the lintrose, a deer-like creature, has sky blue skin. The other badge depicts a similar lintrose stag, but with single branched, black antlers.

These are badges referring to a special position among the city guards of Tritol. All city guards within the city have the same type of magical armor with their own personal weapons. The only way to tell guards apart by rank is by the badge on their chest.

Most other city guards at this gathering have badges depicting a blue skinned Miella head with black eyes. A few of them have badges depicting a blue orda shell viewed from above. It looks just like a turtle shell.

Only these two have badges depicting lintroses.

The crystal mage speaks, acknowledging their presences.

"Have you learned anything about that old draconid, Captain?" He asks slightly impatiently.

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