Randel and Syl arrive in front of the closest black cube, the most common entrance point from the Ellipsia Citadel Fast Travel Orbs. Usually, a visiting party would be guided through a number of checkpoints and surveillance levels before accessing the long-term storage areas of the fortress. While this takes quite a while, the more time-consuming part is getting on the waitlist to be guided in. For an average Lord, this may take months, or even up to a year. That would be if you have a storage box already and are just trying to access it. Beginning the process to rent a space could take years or even decades to be accepted and reviewed to make it on the list. Just a few years is not long to wait when most of the storage cubes here have lasted longer than most of the workers that man the security checkpoints—hundreds of thousands of years. Though, the schedule for picking up this package is much more urgent. Randel scans the entrance platform that the two of them step onto, and once their ether transport orb dissipates, the slow walk toward hundreds of doors with guards in front of them begins. His heart rate increases as more standard default welcoming messages and instructions on how to enter the Citadel ring through his mind. A majority of the guards lined up in front of the one-kilometer-tall black door are very familiar Demonic Servant Avatars, yet he steers clear from trying to enter one of those doors. While some may lead him near the location he's heading, a majority are mostly demon-owned entrances and only lead to private facilities and demon-only storage rooms he wants no part of. The old guard doesn't budge, but Randel nods and moves his hand up toward the guard. "I believe my card should have all of my waitlist information documented. We're here to pick up some crafting items left in long-term storage." Beneath the black access card he hands the guard, there is a fragment of medium-quality ether crystal. While the majority of Lords in this zone of the Upper Realm cannot successfully absorb a highly refined piece of Ether , it is still worth a large amount when sold to the right buyer—especially here in the Fortress. The 1.0 Medium Quality Ether Crystal Ember brought into this Realm is roughly worth 1,000,000 Low Quality Ether. Of course, that would be highly dependent on the buyer and circumstances of the sale. A lower-grade avatar without the proper commands in place would never be able to contain even a fraction of a crystal that is being traded in physical form for that very reason. Even so, it can be traded for bulk orders of worlds. For Orcs, a common use case is buying pure crystallized mana to send down to the lower realm to attempt forcefully raising the Class Rating on current worlds over the course of a few tens of thousands of years. At the very least, it can be traded directly for low-quality ether to the demonic guards that come and go from the Fortress to the Grand Citadel. Everyone knows questionable business is done here, but the automated surveillance system rarely punishes those that break the rules. As long as one keeps their transactions under the radar and not breaking any major regulations, it will all be ignored. Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation. The old guard allows the crystal to fall into his ether storage upon grabbing the access card and pretending to scan it, then nods. "Looks like you're right on time." The guard presses an action in his system interface, gives the card back, and then steps aside to allow the massive door to open up slowly. Along the hundreds of doors on the side of this single cube floating in the sky, this is the only door opening; though no one cares to turn a head. Business as usual is going on in the Fortress. Randel then refreshes his memory of the map Torvak showed him as well, with the half-dozen security checkpoints along the way, with specific other guards that will guide him where to go once he shows them this card and gives them their share of ether. The two Red Ogres smile, but the High Orc's expression doesn't change at all. As the two disappear into the darkness of the Fortress to complete their task, the doors shut, and the guard stands in front as its guardian, staring off into the endless green clouds, just as it has for the last 64,000 years. Although the two Red Ogres have been nervous and sweating through their entire stay in the Fortress—walking deeper and deeper into the dark hallways, waiting rooms, and strange zones of the massive structure in the sky—they make it down to the long-term storage room in 3 days with a single medium-quality ether fragment left to spare. It is roughly 1/12th the size of the original crystal Torvak received, still a small fortune. The last guard opens the black stone door of their storage unit where this access card brings them, and then they are left alone in silence. The walls of this small cramped room are lined with tightly sealed storage containers. They're stacked up to the ceiling, so there's at least a few hundred of them, but the room is just a few meters taller than the Red Ogres. It'd be impossible for Torvak to even stand up in a room . Syl breaks out in nervous laughter, and she can't believe it's finally over. "I'm never taking a bodyguard job for an illegal human again... no wonder Torvak was overpaying..." Both of them are still reflexively shivering as the cold vibrations that had been slowing down their mental processes and system speed while inside the Fortress finally fade away. Then, Randel pulls out the last fragment from his storage and tosses it up and down in the air. "I don't think we'll ever have to. This will be enough to keep us living in luxury for the rest of our lives." Both of them smile and stare off toward Ellipsia. Though, it seems the two can't catch a break... Syl looks upward and whispers. "I haven't seen one of those in a few years." Just as their nerves were beginning to calm down, a massive ripple of dark green divine energy covers the sky. It's incredibly thick, easily thousands of kilometers wide, and its edges look like melted mirrors, as the intensity of a wave bends the fabric of the Upper Realm itself. Its length is impossible to estimate, as it most likely doesn't even have a definitive size and goes on indefinitely to the edges of this curved realm in space. In fact, it is a wave that doesn't even come from within this zone of the Upper Realm to begin with. Like the wind of a hurricane, waves like these are naturally occurring disasters that randomly strike. There is nothing to do but watch it come. Randel yells to reinforce this point. "Brace yourself. I've never faced a Realm Wave while off of Ellipsia..." The two go from holding hands, enjoying the view of peaceful endless clouds, to shielding each other and turning their backs to the wave while getting to their knees in the fast travel orb that moves forward to take it head-on. An eerie creaking sound bends reality around the orb, but their forward momentum doesn't slow. Unsurprisingly, the intensity and chaotic gravity waves ripple through the fast travel orb. The two Red Ogres watch their bodies bend in strange directions they didn't know were possible, and their perception of time becomes slightly broken as well. However, less than 4 full seconds pass until the wave washes through them and continues its way to the Fortress and throughout the rest of the Upper Realm. The two riders do not get up from their braced positions just yet... as they know it is guaranteed that all waves come in twos. Most commonly, the second will strike within a few minutes. However, there are times when it takes far longer—days, weeks, months, even years. Just 16 minutes pass, and on the horizon, another enormous gravity-bending wave ripples through the Upper Realm. More confident in the fact that they survived the first one, Randel and Syl aren't shaking in fear. Though, they still hold their breath as it passes. Once the second wave rattles their minds, the Red Ogres lie on their backs in the center of the fast travel orb as it continues to make its way back to Ellipsia, and Randel responds while holding the medium-quality ether fragment in the air within both of their sights. He grasps the small containment case, and they chuckle to themselves as their danger has passed. However, the danger of a Realm Wave isn't exactly that it has physically destructive properties... It's that it will distort the relative rate of passing time. While just 16 minutes passed between waves here in the green zone, time has certainly moved differently in the zones above, as well as below in the Lower Realm...