Chapter 771: Sovereignty Over Everything (Patreon)

“Good evening,” Luke said. “It’s time for our routine interrogation.”

The tree branches responded to his will through [Plant Manipulation]. Buried in the orcs’ bodies, they tightened, drawing fresh screams before injecting a paralytic toxin. The pain remained, sharp and vicious, but now the two could barely struggle.

The flower in Luke’s hand still didn’t have a name. Luke treated it as just another tool. Hidden at its tip was a thorn created with [Thorn Mutation], thin enough to serve as a needle. Through the stem, he could inject whatever liquid he needed. Poison, toxin, stimulant. Anything he could produce by biologically modifying the rose.

“Tell me something useful.”

The orc on the left groaned, his eyes twitching from the pain, and began to mutter. “Orc General... wants something... Orc General wants something...”

“I know that.”

“Something powerful... General Ruax... was supposed to lead us. But he disappeared... before the battle.”

“I know.”

“Ruax disappeared... General wants something... something powerful...”

Then he went right back to repeating himself like a broken record.

Luke had already wrung everything he could out of those two over the past few weeks. He knew the Orc Lord was searching for some kind of weapon, something that could help him defeat the Orc King. He knew General Ruax had been supposed to lead the attack before mysteriously disappearing. He also knew the Orc King’s faction seemed to be after the same weapon, or at the very least trying to stop the Lord from finding it.

Unfortunately, what he knew about the Orc King’s side was still far too limited.

“When did you awaken? And where?”

“Don’t know when I was... awakened,” muttered the orc from the Lord’s faction. “There was darkness... then I appeared.”

They used “awakening” for what Luke understood to be the moment they became sentient. The orc on the right, who belonged to the Orc King’s faction, struggled harder before answering.

“I was... in the forest... then I awakened. Came to these lands... by ship.”

“This whole thing where you awaken brand-new orcs is pretty damn convenient if you want to keep secrets,” Luke said. “You just obey whoever’s above you.”

Thin, sharpened branches remained lodged inside the orcs’ heads. They didn’t move, and they didn’t need to.

“Do you remember who awakened you?”

“No,” they answered together.

Luke sighed. Same names. Same story. Same gaps. No contradictions. Nothing they hadn’t already told him. He really had gotten everything out of them.

“Well, that was productive.”

The orcs stared at him, but Luke was already thinking about something else. By piecing together fragments from different orcs, he’d managed to form a clearer picture.

Luke walked over to another orc trapped in a web and drove his kukri into its head.

[You have slain an Orc Soldier - Lvl 53]

[+21 Soul Energy absorbed]

His eyes settled on the rank in the notification. A high-ranking orc promoted a mindless one. The mindless orc awakened and became a Soldier. Luke had only put the theory together a week ago, but gaining access to the noble authority granted by his Dark Lord title had reinforced it.

That has to be it.

The process reminded him of the power boost he had given the goblins. That’s probably how both the Orc Lord and the Orc King built their armies. Maybe orcs with the General title can do the same thing and create soldiers.

Once he fit that piece into the puzzle, everything else started to make sense. So wherever these orcs came from, they have actual orc societies inside kingdoms while mindless orcs roam around outside like wild animals? What a weird place.

Luke looked at Norn. “Hey, Norn. You can eat them.”

“With pleasure, Boss!”

The spider practically sang the words as she lunged forward. She devoured the orcs enthusiastically. Eating them strengthened her in two ways: it gave her experience points, and it fueled her absorption ability, which had a chance of letting her inherit some of the power of the monsters she consumed. Orcs filled with different toxins were basically a seasoned meal.

As a [Warrior], Norn had also awakened a new Soldier Skill.

[Boss, Watch This! (Rare)]: In the presence of the Dark Lord, the Arachnid Fae is overcome by a fierce urge to prove her worth. Driven by loyalty and the desire to make her Boss proud, her physical attacks gain increased strength and impact. The effect intensifies when she carries out a direct order, protects the Dark Lord, or fights an enemy he has personally declared. The stronger her determination to earn his recognition, the more brutal her offense becomes.

The skill fit the spider perfectly. The process of turning a [Soldier] into a [Warrior] wasn’t entirely under Luke’s control. Even if he had more [Warrior] slots available, the candidate still had to meet certain requirements. They had to fight for him, prove their loyalty, and genuinely come to admire the Dark Lord.

Luke had wanted to use his first slot on Norn anyway, but it was still interesting that she was the only [Soldier] who met every requirement.

That evening, after dinner, Luke went to Angie’s room. He needed to talk to her. Out of everyone close to him, Angie was different. It wasn’t that Luke didn’t trust Charlie. Angie was simply smarter than he was, and Luke knew better than to pretend otherwise. That was why he’d decided to share his ideas and goals with her.

As they talked, Angie offered suggestions for how the residents should progress. Among their first priorities, they decided to focus on Joseph and Cecilia. One was a blacksmith, the other a craftswoman. Both could become important to the territory’s growth.

“So consider this official, Angie. I need your help with all of it.”

Leveling up the Kingdom Core fast enough wasn’t going to be easy.

“Ever since I talked to Artemis, I’ve been thinking about some of the things she said. Even the advice she buried inside jokes.”

The Goddess was clever. She couldn’t tell Luke much outright, but she always found a way to slip something useful into a joke or casual comment.

“This continent we’re trapped on is a shark tank. And the truth is, I probably won’t be able to gain access to the Teleportation Array.”

He had already accepted that. “The system dropped me on a continent far away from everyone I know. Far from America, far from the New World. On a planet that’s probably ten times bigger than Jupiter.”

He couldn’t rely on luck or wait for outside help. Luke was alone here, and even Artemis couldn’t truly help him.

“But I’ve got an opportunity here. This place can become a refuge for me. For the people I care about.”

For Allison. For Elizabeth. For many others.

“I can’t let the other Monarchs gain access to this continent through the Teleportation Array. That’d be like handing out my location and inviting everyone to invade. And with all of us fighting for control of the planet, plenty of them are going to try exactly that.”

Angie watched him in silence for a few seconds. “So what do you intend to do, my lord?”

Luke didn’t hesitate.

“I’m taking the continent.”

Angie’s expression didn’t change. “All of it?”

“All of it.”

She considered that for a moment. “Sovereignty.”

“Yeah.”

Luke leaned back. “I can’t let another kingdom control the Teleportation Array. I can’t let anyone else get their hands on it. They’re trapped in this shark tank just like I am, and some of them might have Divine Orders pushing them to take the Array, bring in allies from other continents, and start carving up this continent for themselves.”

He paused. “Conquering a continent and turning its people into Worshipers isn’t just some god’s vanity project. It gives them real power in the system.”

Those “credits” Artemis kept mentioning were a pretty obvious clue.

“I need my kingdom to grow big enough to swallow the others. That’s why I need your help. I need that brain of yours on this, Angie.”

It was the only path forward.

Angie didn’t bother pretending to be modest. She immediately started organizing ideas, setting objectives, and breaking down everything she had learned during her time in Rosemark’s capital.

She didn’t sugarcoat anything. “People are cheaper to rule when they think joining you was their idea.”

Luke looked at her.

Angie continued, “And people are easier to keep loyal when joining us actually improves their lives.”

Angie moved on. “We need a complete picture of this continent’s political landscape. How many kingdoms there are, how powerful each one is, the size of their armies, and the levels of their strongest individuals.”

Everything was on the table: domination, control, imprisonment if necessary, even manipulating entire populations if that was what survival demanded.

The system had done Luke a favor by dropping him into a shark tank where he had a fairer shot against the other Monarchs. That didn’t mean victory. It only meant the system had put him in an environment appropriate for his current level.

“We also need more citizens,” Angie continued. “A lot more.”

“For every five citizens, monster or human, I get one slot that lets me turn a monster into a soldier.”

“Then absorbing every human village in this forest would give us a significant advantage,” she said. “Once that’s done, we expand outward and absorb the rest.”

If Luke wanted to checkmate the continent and claim sovereignty over it, being the strongest Monarch alone wouldn’t be enough. He needed the strongest kingdom, the strongest army, and a power structure no one could tear down.

“We can work with that,” Angie said. “Do you have a target?”

“I do. Ten thousand citizens in seven months. I need that many so I can do the Kings of the New Era quest.”

Were the odds bad? Probably. But that wasn’t anything new. Luke almost never had the odds in his favor, and he’d still walked away alive from situations that should have killed him. He was going to that damn meeting. He was going to see Elizabeth Moon again. And by then, he was going to have a kingdom worth a damn.

Angie pulled another sheet of paper toward her. Neither of them slept that night.

By morning, Luke was back in Norn’s cave.

“Hey, Boss!” the spider said excitedly. “Norn is learning lots of new moves. Look at this!”

She began showing off new attack patterns while Luke made his way through the cave beside a small floating green sphere. Illyra. At the end of the path, the roots began to move, slowly at first, then with enough force to make the entire cave tremble.

“Hey, Boss! Watch out!”

Chunks of stone broke loose from the ceiling. The Great Tree itself seemed to shudder from within.

“I haven’t opened this passage in a long time,” Illyra said.

A long tunnel opened before them, descending into the depths. It was too narrow for Norn, so Luke followed Illyra alone.

For a while, he walked. Then he ran.

The spiraling descent seemed endless until, far ahead, a light finally appeared. When Luke emerged from the tunnel, he saw something glowing overhead.

“The sun...?”

It wasn’t the sun. It was the cavern ceiling. Except this wasn’t a cavern. It was a world.

“The Underworld...” Luke murmured. “It really is a world.”

An enormous plain of green grass stretched out before him. A forest stood farther ahead, mountains rose beyond it, and the open space stretched all the way to the horizon. Everywhere Luke looked, there was distance. Depth. Life.

“Damn, the conspiracy nuts were right, Luke,” Artemis said. “I think we found the Hollow Earth.”

“This is the Underworld,” Illyra said.

Only then did Luke realize the passage they had emerged from was inside a tree. “And what exactly is down here?” Luke asked.

“Wild lands. Extremely powerful creatures. Entire kingdoms of beasts, insects, and other races,” the spirit replied.

A deafening sound rolled across the distance, somewhere between a roar and a warning. Illyra hesitated for a moment.

“Oh, and... some of the beasts here are quite large.”

Luke stared out at the land before him. A treasure chest full of experience points.

“Excellent.”

***

Princess Noelle Serin Roses sat in the council chamber of Rosehall Palace, watching and learning from the nobles, the advisers, and her three older brothers: Sebastian, Nikolai, and Vincent.

“According to the reports, the orc problem in Nyvma has been resolved,” Vincent said.

A group of military messengers from Veyra had brought the news. They had come from Striders, and the capital had even authorized troops to be dispatched, but the problem had been dealt with before that became necessary. They were only orcs, after all.

It would have been far more concerning if the Duchy of Ironwing had been behind it. The kingdom’s traitors had been at war with her father’s kingdom for at least ten years, ever since the Duke betrayed Rosemark.

“Those orcs were interesting enough when it looked like they might become Duskridge or Solvar’s problem,” one of the nobles remarked. “But the fact that they ended up heading toward our borders is curious.”

Noelle waited for an opening in the conversation. It almost passed before she forced herself to speak.

“I read the reports,” she said. “And it looks like one man single-handedly turned the battle around.”

Several pairs of eyes shifted toward her. Now everything depended on how her brothers reacted.

“Probably one of those Lost Foreigners,” Vincent said.

Noelle breathed an inward sigh of relief. They’d actually listened.

The nobles tended to follow her brothers’ lead. Noelle was only sixteen and didn’t even have a class yet. Her brothers had decades on her, and they were Rank D. They had the prestige and power she lacked.

“That would explain this man’s strength,” Vincent continued. “If there were someone around here capable of flying, we’d already know about them.”

Vincent was the smartest person Noelle knew, the mind of the kingdom. He was so dangerous in that regard that even Nikolai avoided clashing with him openly. After all, if Nikolai was going to lose, he preferred that no one knew about it.

Nikolai sat at the head of the table. Although all three of her brothers shared power, he looked the most at home there.

“It’s very likely he’s one of the Lost Foreigners,” Nikolai agreed.

That was the name given to the people who had been teleported to this continent over the past few months, people who had somehow ended up outside their original kingdoms because of an error during the integration. A few powerful foreigners had appeared. Most were Rank E, but there had been three confirmed cases of Rank D individuals. That was enough to draw their attention.

“Send word to the Baron of Nyvma,” Nikolai ordered. “He is to contact this Lost Foreigner and try to recruit him to Rosemark before another kingdom does.”

Marlow was allied with Rosemark, so they were unlikely to make a move on their own. Besides, they were too small to compete for him.

“Solvar is a large and proud nation,” Vincent said. “They wouldn’t normally try to recruit him, but with Garen Voss as a witness, he may be able to influence King Solren.”

“At least it doesn’t appear to be a move by the Empire,” another noble said.

The Empire was a problem, and not just for Rosemark.

“This integration between worlds has finally ended after a century,” Nikolai said. “My grandfather would have considered that reason enough for a festival. Instead, we’re still dealing with an enemy inside our own lands. The Duchy.”

Of her three brothers, Nikolai was the least diplomatic in Noelle’s eyes. To him, “no” was not an acceptable answer, and he hated anyone who tried to make him swallow one.

“And if this man refuses to be recruited?” one noble asked. “What should I tell Baron Vossel to do?”

“Nothing,” Nikolai replied.

The room grew a little quieter.

“If that man becomes a problem for us, we’ll become a problem for him.”

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