Elias spent the morning after the siege cancelling religions.
There were seven.
Myrddin displayed them on the medical-room wall while Elias sat shirtless beneath a heating pad, his ribs bound and his left shoulder purple from impact.
"The Church of the First Magus has approximately forty-six thousand registered followers," Myrddin said.
"Cancel it."
"I do not possess authority to dissolve religious organisations."
"Send them a message."
"Content?"
"Stop."
"Only 'Stop'?"
"Yes."
"The First Light of Vale has twelve thousand members."
"Stop."
"The Children of the Open Hand-"
"Stop."
Catherine entered with tea.
"You're enjoying this."
"I would rather be stabbed."
"You nearly were."
"Exactly."
She handed him the mug Lucy had bought: FIRST TOWER RESEARCH DIRECTOR, which was not his title and had never been his title.
"You know telling cults to stop doesn't normally work?"
"It establishes my position."
"Your position is on half the world's screens."
The Concordance title had done something Elias's decades of internet notoriety never managed.
It made him official.
Not official in the British sense.
Worse.
Official in a framework every awakened human could perceive. The words FIRST MAGUS OF EARTH appeared beside his verified identity in external trade interfaces. He had received eleven million direct contact requests overnight.
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Most were filtered.
A few were disturbing.
Three governments offered him citizenship. Two offered cabinet-level positions. One offered control of an entire research ministry. Four corporations proposed exclusive employment contracts. Thirty-one external organisations made commercial offers.
Nine magical schools from established civilisations invited him to study. One offered an honorary professorship despite the fact Elias could not read its language. And an external religious body had sent a formal inquiry asking whether he intended to claim divinity.
Elias replied no.
It sent back a nine-page form requesting clarification.
He ignored it.
What mattered was the data. The title had exposed several details about the claim mechanism. Concordance recognition was based on demonstrated action, not declared status. A government could not simply call someone Archmage and make it true. The framework watched.
Measured.
Categorised.
That was deeply invasive. It was also extraordinarily useful. Elias had begun testing it. He asked Myrddin to compare public title changes against observed behaviour.
Patterns emerged.
People could earn recognised designations through repeated acts. A Japanese paramedic became a Field Lifebinder after performing dozens of magically assisted rescues. A Kenyan engineer received Grid Shaper after stabilising a regional power network using adapted rune plates. A criminal in the United States acquired the title Bone Collector. Nobody knew exactly what he had done.
The FBI appeared interested. Titles did not necessarily grant power. They sometimes coincided with it. The distinction mattered. The CTL was less a game system than a translation and credential layer laid over a reality already changing beneath it.
Elias wrote that sentence in the public archive. The internet shortened it to:
THE SYSTEM IS LINKEDIN FOR WIZARDS.
He regretted teaching anyone anything. At noon, Harcourt arrived with Vane's preliminary interrogation report.
"He isn't talking."
"He talked constantly before integration."
"Now he wants a lawyer."
"Promising sign of recovered sanity."
Harcourt sat.
"His followers are scattered. Some surrendered. Some ran. We found contracts on several of them."
Elias looked up.
"Alien?"
"Indirect."
She handed him a tablet.
Employment agreements.
Supply agreements.
Security equipment leases. All routed through human shell companies created after integration. At the end of the chain sat a service provider partially owned by Veylan Frontier Resources.
"They funded him."
"Not directly enough to prove."
"What did they get?"
"The contract language refers to future access rights and local stabilisation services."
Elias read the clause.
If Vane captured the convergence, a management company obtained a sixty-year lease over extraction operations.
"He was going to give them Vale-One."
"Probably."
"Did he know?"
"We don't know."
Elias considered Silas.
Vane despised aliens almost as much as governments. He believed magic belonged to those who dared claim it. Would he knowingly sell the convergence?
Maybe.
Fanatics became surprisingly practical around logistics. Or perhaps the contracts had been buried beneath layers of translation and CTL recommendations. Either possibility was useful.
"I want to talk to him."
"No."
"Why?"
"Because he tried to kill you yesterday."
"That's why."
"Absolutely not."
Elias sighed.
"Then ask him whether his interface recommended the contract. Exact wording."
Harcourt paused.
"Why?"
"Because I want to know if the CTL only translates agreements or actively recommends them."
Her face changed.
"That would matter."
"Yes."
"I'll ask."
She stood.
"And one other thing."
"What?"
"The Prime Minister wants you in London."
"No."
"I knew you'd say that."
"Then why ask?"
"He asked me to."
"Send him here."
Harcourt stared at him.
Elias sipped his tea.
"What?"
"You really have adapted to the apocalypse."
"I was difficult before it."