As I took my time gathering the corpses of the monsters to appraise their value, I was able to properly assess their levels. I didn’t go out of my way to do this earlier, because I didn’t want to distract myself when I had to focus on outputting as much damage as I possibly could.
Of the monsters, most were in the level range of one hundred and eighty, with a few of the twin-headed wyverns reaching up to two hundred. The highest level monster, the Three-Headed Poison Hydra, was only two hundred and twenty. Even so, this was by no means an easy challenge for players, who would have had to keep up a steady stream of damage the entire time.
Not to mention, most players in this situation wouldn’t have their own respawn stone yet. One death would send them all the way back to the last city that they stopped in before entering their new realms. Part of me had to wonder how many people would actually manage to complete this trial.
That said, the hydra’s body was incredibly valuable for me. Not because of its monetary cost, but because of its use as a material for my blood familiar. Unfortunately, there was only a single hydra, so I wasn’t able to share it with Diane.
I allowed my blood familiar to consume the hydra, while I myself worked on dismantling the other monsters. The large wolves from the forest were… underwhelming to say the least. They didn’t have any special skills, and each corpse was only worth one and a half gold. I only kept their hides, planning to use them to create some basic furnishings for Fallcry.
The spiders were worth about twice as much, but that still didn’t amount to all that much for the inventory space they’d consume. Still, I managed to gather about a hundred of them, with some of them evolving in the process.
Finally, it was the two-headed wyverns. Each of these were worth about ten gold before any enhancement, so I gathered up as many as I could. If Diane managed to sell everything I collected, maybe we could earn another eight platinum or so?
Once I was done processing everything, I returned to Fallcry and began working on construction. Bella had made her way back while I was working, and had a few of the villagers following behind her. Each of them carried a large tree over one shoulder, looking as if the weight didn’t both them. “Sorry, but I asked if they could bring these…” Bella explained. “I thought it would help with your construction work.
I nodded my head, thankful for the assistance. There weren’t any resource-generating buildings in the management menu, so everything had to be found locally. That said, there was a Resource Dungeon ticket available for purchase. For fifty platinum pieces. Even if we sold all of those whale corpses together with what I just got, we wouldn’t have enough for that.
Let’s see… I’ll need to reserve space to have a general store, a blacksmith, a tailor, a butcher, and a carpenter. Ennolf would no doubt want a restaurant. That’s six buildings reserved for the business district, though I’ll definitely need more later. I’ll also need a building to turn into a skill shop and dungeon management office. I thought to myself, listing off the various necessary structures.
Thankfully, I already created blueprints for most of these as part of my preparations to establish this kingdom, so it was just a matter of getting it all built. Then, using the rest of the free space, I made residential buildings and roads, knowing that I would likely still need to expand the city once Ennolf’s people moved in.
As I was working, Aetra had come over to watch the progress, seeming interested in how I was able to rapidly construct so many buildings. Looking at the stone structures, which were visibly more stable than the wooden huts they had in their village, she actually looked tempted. Seeing this, I gave a slight smile. “If you’d like, I can help you remodel your village. It shouldn’t take very long.” I offered, and she lowered her head in thought.
“I’ll discuss it with my people. I doubt many would refuse having a more secure and comfortable home.” She said with a nod. “Though, I doubt that we have anything of value to offer you in exchange.”
“That’s fine. Consider it my way of apologizing for putting your village in danger to begin with.” When I said that, the elder lowered her head again, but soon gave another nod. After that, she turned to leave
With her gone, the only ones left to watch were Diane and Bella, so I began constructing our own home near the center of Fallcry. Although we didn’t strictly need a large house, I felt that this would be more symbolic than anything, so I made it the largest house in the city. It had three floors, and nearly two dozen empty rooms that could be repurposed for things like offices.
Once I was done, Bella and Diane walked inside to explore, while I decided to check in on Ella. Out of all the players I knew, she was the only one that had the qualifications to challenge the position of King, even if she had to fight another nine star trait holder first.
Looking at my friends list, Ella wasn’t currently online, so I just messaged her Chosen. How is everything going? Has your player decided if she wants to start her own kingdom or not?
She has. Ella responded simply, before elaborating. She already fought in the Kingmaker Challenge, so she is just considering what plane she wants to settle in.
Kingmaker Challenge…? Although I could guess what that term meant, it was my first time hearing it.
It’s this arena that players set up near the rift in Elmberg. Anyone with a nine star trait could go there to look for a challenger. After you told her that new skill you showed her could become the ultimate fire skill, she trained it nonstop for over a month, and asked me to train it when she wasn’t online. Using that skill, she defeated her challenger, and our trait upgraded to Lord of Flames. Now, in addition to learning through watching, we can use fire skills at no cost.
I let out a low whistle when I read that. I had assumed Ella’s evolution would be something along those lines. If she decides to settle down in Chimeris, let me know. It’d be nice to have a friendly face nearby.
Chimeris? I don’t remember that being in the list of known destinations for the Elmberg portal. When I read that, I blinked. Did the portals not all connect to the same list of destinations? If they didn’t, that meant that a lot more potential areas had opened up than I initially believed.
Well, let me know when she settles on something. There might still be a connection. Though, just a warning, you’ll want to take a few platinum with you when you start your first village, in order to buy a mailbox and a bank.
There was a brief pause, before Ella thanked me for the information. It was reassuring to know that she had trained Fire Shaping to the point where she could use it to defeat another nine star trait holder. Maybe she had even trained it all the way to Fire Intent-X? If I ended up seeing her again sometime soon, I’d need to show her the Fire Clone skill, too. Or… I began typing out a message to Ella, explaining the process of how I created the Fire Clone skill, as well as information about the likely lower ranked version, what I believed should be Fire Shadow.
If it was Ella, surely she’d be interested in this skill. Sure enough, she sent me another round of thanks, promising that she would work on the skill to surprise her player when she next logged on.
With that out of the way, I turned in for the day. It would take time for Ennolf’s group to arrive, and I couldn’t exactly leave with the girls while Fallcry had no other inhabitants.
The next day, Aetra came to me to deliver the verdict of her people, who accepted the offer for village reconstruction. This was a rather simple matter, I just needed to have them remove anything that they didn’t want to lose from the buildings, after which I demolished them, and then made new ones where they once stood. With about forty houses, and a few other buildings like the village wall and guard towers, it took me two hours in total to completely rebuild their village.
Just as I was beginning to head back, planning to make a road connecting the two villages, a message appeared in front of me. ‘Aetra Village’, with its population of just over a hundred and fifty people, was requesting to join my nation. I looked back, seeing Aetra standing not far away.
“Ah, so it worked?” She asked, smiling knowingly. “This was the consensus of the village, as well. If you can truly offer us the benefits you promised when we first met, then it would be better to fully join your side, as opposed to simply being neighbors. There were some who disagreed, but the majority ruled in favor after watching you work.”
I blinked, surprised, but nodded my head and accepted them. “In that case, feel free to send people over to Fallcry. If I have any skills that can be of assistance to them, I’ll give them some simple quests to start training.” I promised, before turning and making my way back, clearing a road as I walked. It was only half a dozen kilometers between the two settlements, but a proper road felt like it made things more official.
The following day, more than a dozen warriors arrived in Fallcry, and I began teaching them basic skills. For those that used a bow, I taught them Ki Arrow and Bow Proficiency. For those that used a spear, I taught them Shadow Spear and Power Attack. And, for good measure, I taught everyone Dull Pain, as you could never go wrong having a healing skill.
At the same time, Aetra began to teach Diane more about the magic that the chimerae were familiar with. Although my expectations for their ritual magic was quite high, it turned out to be a modified version of Diane’s own Rune Writer skill. By drawing various runes, they performed a ritual in the same way that I would channel a skill when casting.
While this didn’t inherently help much, they were able to supply her with a list of runes that they knew of, some of which weren’t yet in Diane’s collection. Supplied with this new information, Diane devoted herself to training her Rune Writer skill, eager to see what its master evolution would look like.
Finally, that left Bella. Perhaps because she had been affected by the previous monster waves, she began training far more intensely than before. Whenever she wasn’t eating or sleeping, I would often find her near the border of the forest, firing her bow at the trees to practice her skills.
Watching her practice, I could tell at a glance that she had come to the same level as myself in her Empty Bow Proficiency. Given that I rarely used that skill anymore, she was naturally bound to reach the mastery rank in that skill before me. She would even join the hunting parties from the village, wanting to test her skills on live targets.
It wasn’t until three days later that I saw my first other player arriving. The one approaching was a lone orc woman, standing two meters tall and with dark red skin. Despite her muscular frame, she carried a staff in one hand, her body draped in a black robe.
It was Bella who first spotted this orc woman, quickly alerting me through a private message. When I went out to look from the fortress walls, she was just at the edge of the horizon and walking at a slow pace. However, once she spotted me on the wall, she tapped her staff on the ground, and disappeared in a burst of black and white light, appearing next to me. “You couldn’t have made this place a little closer to the rift?” She asked in a gruff tone, chuckling.
I stepped back in surprise, preparing for a possible fight. “Who are you?” I asked, and she blinked.
“Ah, did he not say I was coming? I’m Sarah, a friend of Ennolf’s. I’m here to handle the migration.” When she said that, I blinked, thinking back to an old conversation I had with Ennolf. He had mentioned that they took in a female orc mage that had a talent for spatial magic.
“Are you able to jump across planes?” I asked in surprise, and Sarah shrugged.
“Don’t know. Haven’t tried it yet! It took me all day just to get this far. Teleportation magic has a high mana burden, so I need to take it easy between casts. That’s why Ennolf suggested I come first, since the benefit from joining you should make it easier for me to bring the others, even if I need to do it in a more roundabout way.” She explained with a wide grin. As she did, I noticed the population of the city of Fallcry tick up from three to four.
