Nick waited on top of a building in the Outer City.
There wasn't much for him to do anymore.
Everything had already been taken care of, and he had already said his goodbyes to the few people who were still relevant to him.
Some people from Sky Dream.
A couple of the Specialists from the city.
The Heroes.
From time to time, Nick looked down at the city.
'I changed things,' he thought. 'This is the city that I always wanted to see.'
Yet, whenever he thought about these things, he also felt empty.
In the beginning, he still felt a bit of achievement and excitement.
But now, it wasn't very impactful anymore.
Yes, he had changed the lives of thousands of people for the better, but when compared to the mountain of guilt and shame, this wasn't much.
10,000 people.
Nick had helped 10,000 people.
But to get to his goal of one million people, he needed to improve another 99 cities.
One percent.
All of his work over the last five years only dealt with one percent of his guilt.
It was so much.
Nevertheless, he wouldn't stop.
He would continue.
Nick lifted his head as he noticed four distant figures coming closer in the sky.
'They're here,' Nick thought as he stood up.
All of the melancholy and aimlessness vanished from Nick in an instant, and his determined gaze instantly returned.
This wasn't just a mask he put on.
He actually immediately felt significantly better.
The four people stopped in the sky above Crimson City and looked at it for a while.
They were inspecting its composition and analyzing what the citizens were doing.
Nick had to wait almost five minutes until they came down to him.
Nick recognized one of them, but he had never seen the other three.
"Simon," Nick said respectfully with a nod.
Simon Francium looked back.
"Nick," he said with a neutral tone.
Surprisingly, his neutral tone wasn't really distant.
It was truly just neutral, which was different from the last time they had talked.
Back then, Simon's neutrality had been a sign of distance, but now, it wasn't.
It was a sign of uncertainty.
He wasn't sure if he should like or dislike Nick.
Naturally, he hadn't forgotten what Nick had done, and he still thought he was a monster.
Yet, the things he had seen in the last five minutes were unbelievable.
Simon remembered the time Nick had shown him around, and things looked very different back then.
For example, there were barely any malnourished people left.
Sure, the average height of many people was pretty low since they used to be malnourished while growing up, but they definitely were no longer malnourished.
In fact, a ton of them were fat.
That was actually a normal development.
When somebody who was used to hunger for a while suddenly got access to a lot of food, they often started to gain weight very quickly.
For these kinds of people, eating was a feeling of safety, and everyone desired to feel safe.
Yet, such a massive change was basically unprecedented in such a short time frame.
In order to change the fundamental health of the city to such a degree, one would need decades.
But only five years had passed.
"Let me do the introductions," Simon said after a while, stepping to the side.
"This is Marvin Marvel," Simon said as he pointed to an old man with long grey hair. "He is a Protector working under the Technician as city manager. He and his team create all of the laws the Governors of the cities have to follow."
'Marvin Marvel? That's a name,' Nick thought.
Marvin Marvel held out his hand for Nick, and the two shook hands. "Marvin is fine," he said in a calm but professional tone.
"Greetings, my name is Nick Dusk, and I'm the Liaison for Crimson City," Nick answered.
Marvin nodded and stepped back before Simon gestured to the next person. It was a middle-aged man with black hair who had a sharp gaze. It almost felt like the person could immediately discern what someone was thinking. "This is Leopold Junfan. He is a very experienced Agent who specializes in city studies."
"Leopold is fine," Leopold said as he shook Nick's hand.
Nick also quickly introduced himself before Simon went to the last person.
The last person was a young man with beautiful white hair. His clothing and style exuded an aura of cleanliness and freshness.
"This is Mentos Nomen. He is the Governor of Sky Water City, one of the biggest and most successful cities in the world," Simon said.
"Just address me as Mentos," Mentos said with a wide smile as he shook Nick's hand.
Nick introduced himself one last time.
"Welcome to Crimson City," he told everyone.
"It is quite a beautiful city," Mentos said with a smile that didn't reach his eyes. "It looks like you're taking good care of it."
"It's mostly because a lot of it is newly built," Nick said.
"Oh? What's the reason for such a sudden renovation?" Mentos asked.
Nick already guessed that Mentos wasn't here to be nice.
His demeanor had given Nick bad vibes since the start.
It was also obvious why Mentos asked such a question.
Renovating such a huge part of the city in such a short timeframe was unnecessarily costly.
The only reason for doing that would be to impress the judges, and Nick couldn't possibly admit that without taking a big hit on his credibility.
"I can actually answer that," Simon interjected.
"Oh?" Mentos uttered with fake interest, hiding his annoyance.
"The Crimson Sea destroyed a huge part of the city something like 15 years ago, and the city just recently managed to rebuild. The last time I was here, construction had just finished," Simon explained.
"Oh, that explains things. Thanks," Mentos answered.
"But that big part to the west is new," Simon added. "What happened there?"
"I noticed that as well," Marvin said as he cross-referenced the city's shape with the maps stored in the headquarters. "About six square kilometers of city were added to the west. Nick, what was your motive behind this expansion?"
"Housing, jobs, and security for our resources," Nick said. "The majority of the added city is fields, which exist to harvest carbon for our steel. Additionally…"
Nick talked about the reason for the expansion for a couple of minutes.
"Why use that much steel just to include these fields in the city?" Mentos asked innocently. "A couple of Extractors should be enough to defend the fields."
"Jobs," Nick answered. "If the fields are inside the city, they are safe, and normal people can easily enter and exit. More jobs mean less unemployment. Additionally, it opens a completely new branch for the people. Carbon harvester is a completely new job that normal people can do that hasn't existed before."
Then, Nick talked about jobs, housing, and economics for a couple of minutes.
"A waste in the short-term," Leopold commented coldly from the side, "but a good investment in the long-term. The city's carbon is unassailable and renewable. What about the iron?"
"The plan I drafted for the future includes building a big underground tunnel towards our iron mine, which is around four kilometers to the southwest," Nick answered.
"And the light?" Mentos asked immediately.
"Artificial light is very easy and cheap in Crimson City," Nick answered before talking about Sky Dream and their two light Specters.
"And what if something happens with Sky Dream?" Mentos asked. "You are opening yourself up, giving them a vulnerable point to attack."
"They would never do that," Nick said with full confidence.
Mentos did his best to suppress his snort of disdain. "You can count yourself lucky if you haven't experienced a revolt within the last five years."
"Oh, people tried," Nick said. "I had plenty of attempts, but those are in the past. They wouldn't dare to try another one."
Mentos just looked at Nick with an unimpressed gaze. "You're overconfident."
Nick just looked into Mentos' eyes. "There are 100 Newbies, 210 Johns, 65 Veterans, 25 Experts, 10 Specialists, and 5 Heroes working directly in the government. All of them work under the Governor and me. We own a third of all Experts, a third of all Specialists, and every single Hero. Even if all of Crimson City banded together, they wouldn't win, and they all know that."
"Revolution is suicide."
This took the four people by surprise.
That was… a lot!
"Right, the Aides," Marvin added from the side. "I remember overlooking the creation of this new position."
Leopold also nodded from the side. Naturally, he had read up on Crimson City before coming here.
"You are trying to keep that many Heroes under the same banner in the city?" Mentos asked with skepticism. "That sounds very risky."
"Why?" Nick asked.
"Because all of them have proven time and time again that they can use every opening to get ahead in life. Even if it means stepping over corpses and breaking the rules," Mentos said.
Nick nodded. "Because they are selfish, right?" he asked.
"That's your way of phrasing it," Mentos said.
"So, because they are selfish," Nick repeated, but this time not as a question.
"Their selfishness is the very reason why they won't revolt," Nick said.
Mentos raised an eyebrow.
"They want to become stronger. They want to be Agents and Protectors. They want that more than anything."
At that point, Marvin interjected. "And the position of Aide ties their future prospects to the health and reputation of the city and the Governor."
Nick nodded. "Exactly."