"Four hundred?" Iral repeated in disbelief. "In one day? Unreal. I almost want to say it's impressive, but even I have some decency, which may come as a surprise to you. Not that I feel any sympathy for those dead, it's just a lot of blood to spill over nothing. I'm amazed that they even returned after losses like that, but I suppose greed knows no bounds and Terrans were never known for their intellect anyhow," he continued, with the number still in his head and trying to picture that many people dying in a single day. He almost wanted to call him a liar because of how ridiculous it sounded, but he's seen enough of Jupiter's behavior to know that he wasn't exaggerating. "Four hundred," he said again. "I probably won't have a kill count of half that in my entire life. I wouldn't be proud of it either way. I enjoy fighting-- the killing is just an annoying side effect. Unless I want them dead, of course. And there are a lot I want dead."

Jupiter went on to say that he doesn't know what ever became of his family since his being captured and Iral shook his head in a way that indicated that he understood what it was like. "So you're here for defending yourself. That makes sense," he said, knowing that it was his turn to tell him why he was there as courtesy, even though he didn't ask. He stared at the ground for a bit and grunted, unable to figure out where to start or how much to say. Iral was there ultimately because he met defeat and he wasn't accustomed to experiencing it, especially in the manner that he did. "Well... unlike me, a lot of my people have powers that involve using their minds. They have waged war among each other since Vulban's inception and after a while they got really damn good at it. This isn't unique to other planets, but when you have an entire planet of people who are excellent in using abilities based on the will of their own minds, warfare becomes much more complicated than being stronger than the other person. For the record, warfare didn't bother me. I was born in it and I thrived in it. But it bothered many other people, so somehow the idea that we could collectively surrender the content of our minds to a single source in order to prevent war from ever occurring again caught traction.

I didn't want that and anybody with a brain didn't want it, but those that wanted it outnumbered the ones who didn't, so all those against it were forced into hiding. There were many resistance organizations that formed, but for a long time none were worthy of having me be a part of, so I wandered alone and caused trouble to the best of my ability to prevent the plan from ever coming to fruition. Eventually, I heard about an organization that might be worth looking into. They were led by an 18 year old girl who was more powerful and talented than anyone I had ever met. She was clearly a prodigy and I respected her for that, so I joined. Talented or not, she was still young and inexperienced, so I acted as an adviser and essentially a second-in-command. We succeeded in countless operations and did plenty of good. However, one day we didn't. She got herself killed and I wasn't anywhere near to do anything to prevent it. I was took command and I was more angry than I ever remember being. So I led a small group of soldiers to the headquarters of some of our top adversaries," Iral paused and looked as though he wanted to punch somebody in the mouth. "And it was a bad idea. We fucked up. I fucked up. I was acting on rage and it got my men killed and myself captured. They hated me so much that they would rather have me tortured in this prison than have me killed on the spot to make sure I wouldn't stop them from turning the entire planet into a dictatorship."

Iral released a long, frustrated sigh and looked Jupiter right in the eyes. "So that's my story. I don't belong here. As we speak, the freedom of my people are being taken away and they don't even care. And, more importantly, somebody needs to be avenged. I can't wait to see the look on their faces to see me back on Vulban. The sooner the better."