Chapter 276: Chapter 276 – Development – Part 2.
[Current location: Empire Capital City – Empiric Castle]
"So.... So far everything is okay?" – asked emperor Gustav Warmin The Third, as he and the leader of the vampires of the vampires, Korwan Von Kurwiad, had a private meeting in the emperor office.
"Well... When it comes to that dungeon.... Everything seems fine." – said Korwan.
"It not doing anything remotely illegal or stuff that would go against the contract."
"Porai who is also working with that dungeon master called Thauma, is also saying that he is a ’good boy’."
"..."
"So... No problem?" – asked Gustav.
"Nope." – replied the vampire.
"However, she also said that it seems Thauma was instructed to not tell anything regarding Ariava and Thauma’s relationship."
"That what she is getting at."
"As for the secret deal.... It seems that Thauma may not even be aware of anything."
"..."
"So the golem maybe just a pawn?" – asked Gustav.
"It is still unknown." – replied Korwan.
(Several months went by after the contract was signed... And everything was going extremely well.) – thought Korwan.
(Not only that, but Ariava herself is doing her work.... Heck! She already prevented the war from happening and taken down the terrorist leader before they could make their public appearance!)
(Not only that, she discovered one of the main reasons why these terrorist had so much weapons.)
"Miorio kingdom." = said Korwan.
"They are the ones that provided those weapons."
"They were known for their weapon making skills.... But to provide that huge number of weapons wasn’t something normal."
"But, they managed to obtain a new vein.... Extremely rich one in various form of metals."
"Meaning, that they had obtained way to have some ’spare weapons’ that nobody would realize that had disappeared."
"..."
"Still, the terrorist are good as gone." – said the emperor.
"We can hunt them down without Ariava’s help anymore.... But again, these bastards were so willing to provide so much weapons... Yeb. There is no point in even wondering about this."
"They will try do something stupid again."
"Well, Ariava said that she will deal with the mine, in order to make look like natural disaster, so we will get more time...."
"Still.... The other nations are still trying to pull something."
"Really? Is that what your agents are saying?" – asked the annoyed emperor.
"Yeah...." – replied pissed off vampire.
"..."
"Still... There is good chance that we may have the Warmur kingdom back off." – said Korwan.
"According to my agents, the king of that nation apparently doesn’t want to wage war anymore.... But the nobles are putting way too much pressure."
"So, if we were to somehow get rid of the nobles, the war we want to avoid would end up being completely dealt with?" – asked the emperor.
"Well, yes... But how do we the nobles who are somewhat in power, just disappear without causing way too much commotion?" – asked vampire.
"..."
*Sigh*
"Nope.... We can’t." – replied emperor in annoyance.
(So does that mean we have to relay on Ariava even more?) – thought Gustav as he held his head.
"..."
(She is effective... And extremely good.... But none of still don’t know what she is truly playing here at.)
(.... Still.... Fuck me.)
(We have really no choice but to depend on her.)
(HECK! SHE HAD ALREAEDY DONE SO MUCH!)
(But again.... It is HER!)
(We have her somewhat "under leash", because of the bound contract.... But still...)
"..."
"..."
"We really haven’t changed anything regarding her, did we?" – asked emperor with tired expression.
"Unfortunately, no." – replied the vampire.
"Still, she bought us time, which we can use to fully stabilize our empire."
"However, before that happens, we need to use her as much as possible."
"...You do you know what you are talking about right now, yes?" – asked the emperor.
"Playing with fire? Yeah! I fucking get it!" – said the vampire.
"But we cannot deal with all the trouble at once.... We have no choice, but to relay on her regarding that."
"...And there is also another worrying thing."
"The spies from other nations were trying to get to the golem’s territory."
"We had our people try and gaining some information out of them.... And we found out that they were just hired thugs, some were even wanted bandits."
"They apparently came from the Miorio kingdom.... But did the Miorio kingdom really hired them?"
"That is the problem that we didn’t had a direct confirmation."
"..."
"And things are bound to get more annoying soon."
"The golem is expanding its forces and is slowly obtaining enough golems to control the territory....And after the control end up being fully established, we will start getting those free golems... And that may end up being a trigger."
"..."
"Well, it was quiet obvious." – replied the emperor who knew instantly what the vampire would say.
"Ariava may had saved us from the wars, but that dungeon of hers may end up being cause for a war to start off as well...."
"So, before the time is up, we need to focus on fully restoring the control over the empire."
(Still... The problem is regarding the contract.) – thought the emperor.
(Once the empire becomes peaceful enough for the set amount of time, Ariava will be freed from the contract.)
(And it is not like we can sabotage our own empire in order to keep her around for longer, since she had written that in the contract.)
[If the party A causes a specific trouble, a trouble causing deliberately disability or causing the chaos by the unprovoked war caused by the empire that each point focuses on the exploiting the party C, the party C can break off her part of the contract that involves her forcefully helping out the party A and also punish the party A for its crimes. The stop of the support does not mean that the contract between the party A and B will be stopped nor it means that the party C cannot act like the moderator between the specific problems. But, if the party C wishes for it, they can forfeit their right to be mediator, if they are had been forced to forceful break off their part of the contract, if the two parties A and B wishes for it, or when the party C already fullfeed all of their duties and time span of 1 year had passed after completing their duties.]
(She made sure we cannot exploit her beyond the set goals that were already established.) – thought Gustav.
(Still... The fact remains that once the empire becomes "peaceful" and "stable" for the set amount of time, the contract will no longer bind her.)
(The contract does states that she cannot harm us in any way in the span of at least 5 years, unless provoke in justified way.)
(But.... There is also this part.)
["If party C is removed from their job as mediator, because of the betrayal of the party A, the protection period will not be granted.]
(There is a loop here.)
(If WE were to break the contract in the way that would result in the self-sabotage, she could break free form the contract and then straight up attack us.)
"..."
"Tell me honestly." – said Gustav.
"Do we stand a chance, if we were to become enemies with Ariava?"
"Or is there anyway we could possible prepare for it?"
"..."
"Truth to be told? I don’t have fucking idea." – replied Korwan.
"If anything, I don’t think it is possible for us to fight back."
"How would we obtain any weapon that can deal with her?"
"Or how would we recruit somebody who as strong as Ariava on our side."
"But then again, we would have possible new danger on our hands."
"There is also the thing regarding her possible watching us in some way.... So, you know.... We even prepare for anything, and she could get a wind of this.... And you know what would happened next."
"In short."
"We are fucked." – said both men as they realized that they situation has still not changed, and they still at the mercy of Ariava.
<<According to Porai, the empire stabilization rate is going great.>>
<<She told me, that one of the main problems that the empire was facing, the too sudden birth, is somewhat starting to get properly managed, and soon, it should be perfectly gone, to the point the empire wouldn’t be facing a annihilation caused by their self-instability.>>
<<As for the war?>>
<<Well, Ariava apparently is buying even more time, which is nice.>>
<<So yeah.....>>
<<....>>
<<Wow... This is weird.>>
<<I mean, I did kept myself hidden for over the entire year, but forcing my golems out of sight and only getting rid off few people that gotten inside of the forest, forcing me to eliminate them.... Which did later brough on problem when the last group of people that I’ve had eliminated were adventurers.... And that caused the adventurer’s guild to investigate the forest, which in turn caused me to get discovered.>>
<<Still.... This "peace".... It is still... Extremely weird, even to this day.>>
<<I mean, I know that several months went by since the contract was established.... But still....>>
<<It feels.... "Wrong"?>>
<<I mean, Ariava herself said that it may not felt... "Unearned".>>
<<And... Fuck... I mean, I get that it is good! That this is perfect!>>
<<I’ve NEVER! AND I MEAN EVER HAD THIS LEVEL OF FREEDOM BEFORE!>>
<<I’M HAPPY!>>
<<I’M OVERJOYED!>>
<<I CAN WHATEVER I WANT AND NOBODY WILL COME TO MURDER ME!>>
<<I CAN TAKE MY TIME, DOING THINGS THAT I COULDN’T DO BEFORE!>>
<<...>>
<<Still... I know the future isn’t perfect.>>
<<And that I still need to work.>>
<<But again, this "peace" is allowing my dungeon to grow as the astonishing rate.>>
<<Not only all of the researches and training were progressing at the steady and unbothered pace.>>
<<The development of the dungeon was also going great.>>
<<And most important, the army of the golems.>>
<<The quality of the new generations of the golems is noticeable superior compare to the previous models.>>
<<Not only that! But many of the more powerful golems are not only using the black iron, BUT! They are also using the superior mana crystals as materials for their cores!>>
<<Speed, strength, endurance! Not only their bodies, but their weapons are much higher quality!>>
<<And there is also those golems.>>
<<The alarm golems.>>
<<A new type of golems that Porai helped me in creating.>>
<<These golems utilizes the mana detection technology that Porai taught me how to make.>>
<<However, the real problem was with adding these to the golems.>>
<<Simple put, I needed to have them "understand" how it works.>>
<<Porai herself didn’t directly helped me in any of these.>>
<<She said that for the golemancy, the only way to truly improve is to make things yourself.>>
<<You can get help, but you need to do it yourself and understand it.>>
<<She isn’t wrong.>>
<<The same goes with crafting, you need to understand it and make it with your own hands.>>
<<Be it alchemy or blacksmithing.>>
<<You need to do it with your own two hands in order to understand somethings.>>
<<Anyway, I’ve learned how to make mana detection tools.>>
<<They are not perfect or anything.>>
<<When it comes to these tools, there are 2 things.>>
<<The range and the reading.>>
<<The range part is pretty much self-expiatory, it refers to the range of the device.>>
<<However, the second one, the reading, it is about ability to "detect" the mana.>>
<<As mentioned before, people and monsters can use skills to hide their presence.>>
<<Meaning, that the stealth skills can still somewhat be used to bypass the detection of these special tools or the power of the detection skills.>>
<<So, depending on how strong the "reading" is, it can either not work at all at the opponent who uses the stealth skill, or may able to detect them, even when they are using stealth skill.>>
<<Right now, I focused on the reading above the detection, since the enemy may definitely try going past golems with superior stealth skills.>>
<<The Mevon territory, which I’ve had obtained, it is a territory somewhat average sized territory, maybe bit less if we compare it to the neighboring territories, the Mevon territory is clearly smaller than them.... So maybe medium-small size? Maybe you can call....>>
<<I’ve got curios about my territory size and asked Porai for the info, and apparently, the Mevon territory is somewhat larger than average small territory, but it cannot be called a medium sized territory... So, medium-small sized seems to be a correct term?>>
<<I’m getting side tracked.>>
<<Anyway, this territory have 1 single city and several villages... Although, "villages" in past, since many to these days still lay in ruins after my rampage.>>
<<However, Porai said that it would be for the best, if I have set amount of golems in each of these villages, both the destroyed ones and still standing ones.>>
<<And there is also that place.>>
<<The city.>>
<<The problem is... I don’t know what to do with it.>>
<<I mean... I COULD use it!>>
<<I’ve even asked Ariava what she think about it and she said that it would be for the best if the city would be left behind, since it could be used later on.>>
<<However, it is also a "thorn" in my side, since I cannot just leave this large settlement completely unoccupied.>>
<<I still can’t manage this territory properly, so I will need to have a large number of golems be there.>>
<<I will also need to create several outposts that are meant to strengthen the security in few different key areas of the territories, allowing my control to be full in my clutches.>>
<<Still, it won’t be long.>>
<<The number of the golems had increased to the point that the control over this territory is already practically mine.>>
<<Still, the fact remains that the golems are being born way slower than before.>>
<<And before anybody ask, "Why? You have the freedom!">>
<<The stronger monsters takes way longer to fully manifest.>>
<<I make stronger and more special golems, it takes way more time for them to manifest.>>
<<But then again, the stronger the golems are, the more miasma I will obtain from their full manifestation.>>
<<Still, my dungeons is always to the brim full with golems. Whenever one is manifested, they are instantly kicked out and the brand-new golem is getting constructed in their place.>>
<<Because of that, I still have a LOT of leftover miasma.>>
<<I’ve tried experimenting a bit with beast monsters after we had obtained sometime.... But.... Well.... How the hell do I deal with them?>>
<<I mean, I did tried taming in the past the beast monsters and I did thought somewhat recently about using these beast monsters to somewhat benefit this territory... Which were both ideas that I’ve had given up on.>>
<<The beasts that I’ve created with the dungeon were used only for experiments after they were manifested.>>
<<Still, even though I’ve given up on both of these things, maybe it doesn’t mean that there are still no uses for these beasts? I’ve asked Ariava about this via communication device when she had sometime. I’ve asked, what she would think about the beast monsters....And well... Things weren’t looking good.>>
<<Ariava said that it would be nice if I had a taming type skill, which would allow me to somewhat command these beasts and making them bit more loyal.>>
<<Or maybe even obtaining the [Beast Tamer] class. She said that if I would want to do that, I would have to obtain those kind of classes and skills.... However, there was also a problem.>>
<<It would be a LOT of beast type monsters, meaning that I would have to have somewhat powerful taming abilities as well as ability to control large amount of beasts at the same time... But again, I can’t fully control them, even when they are tamed and not only that, Porai said that the monsters can break lose from the tamed status.>>
<<However, I’ve decided to give up on this.>>
<<I would need to make a specialized environment for these beasts golems and it would cost both money and time to manage, if I want to even think about having ANY ability to even use these beast monsters... Which I currently lack too much.>>
<<So I’ve given up on the beasts, again.>>
<<It really looks like this beast nature that my dungeon possess is pretty much completely useless... Huh......>>
<<...>>
<<I mean, again, even if I were to tame these monsters and make them completely loyal....>>
<<...>>
<<No.>>
<<I mean, what can I even use them for?>>
<<Moving carriages?>>
<<I can create golems that can do that without rest.>>
<<They wouldn’t.....>>
<<...>
<<Wow.>>
<<I mean, I really can’t see anything I can use them for beside the experiments.... Harvesting materials maybe? But wouldn’t that piss them off and have them rebel against me? I mean, I would be murdering them and ripping them apart for their materials alone.>>
<<...>>
<<Ah fuck it. Forget about it completely! When everything is over and have I solid amount of time on my hand, I can try thinking about it again!>>
<<Anyway, back to the growth.... Well, things were still repeating for the days and weeks.>>
<<As we gotten deeper into our research and evolution of the golems, the dungeon produced more and more monsters while at the same time growing, creating more space, which was then used to create more monsters.>>
<<And then finally, it happened.>>
<<It look long amount of time, but it was finally here.>>
<<The minimal threshold number of golems.>>
<<I have finally obtained the necessary amounts of golems to manage the Mevon territory.>>
<<With this, the Mevon territory is now truly mine!>>
<<And with it, the first stage of the expansion has been fulfilled.>>
<<And now.... It is the time for the second stage.>>
<<The construction.>>
<<I can finally start began the preparations for the construction of the fortress city.>>
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