World Keeper

Chapter 427: The Brightest Future

Following the fall of the Council, the power balance within Fyor underwent a rather drastic shift. The remaining Council members were relieved of their command and forced to live in the other layers, while others had evidence of crimes brought against them. These few faced trials to determine their fates.

No longer were any floors within Fyor forced to subject to an external government. Rather, the established nations of Fyor assisted each floor in creating their own system by which to rule. Even the dreadful twentieth floor, the cave of massive insects, was given a governing body to take control of its few cities. These nations then formed alliances with one another and entered negotiations for beneficial trade agreements.

As for the first floor of Fyor? The floor which had been eternally off-limits to normal citizens? The leaders of the various governing bodies debated on what should be done with this area. Given the strategic significance of it, they could not simply turn what had once been the Council into a residential zone.

Instead, they opted to begin remodeling the Council floor as a military base. With how important the central spire was to the rest of the world, it seemed only logical to defend it as much as they could. This would be a rather long construction project, as it was a very large task to undertake.

Yet, for the average citizen, there was hardly any impact felt from this change. Many only came to realize what was happening after they received the system prompt, alerting them that they were no longer ‘citizens’ of the Council of Fyor. Then, a few days later, they received their new kingdom.

Perhaps the place that had changed the most over these days was not Fyor itself, but rather Spica. After all, the Legion of Allied Worlds had made it perfectly clear that they would not take sides in this battle. More importantly, by showing that they would harshly reprimand their own people for breaking this oath, the leaders of both nations truly realized that this was their own battle to fight.

Thanks to this knowledge, Demacry became far more assertive in their march. While they still held the same policies towards the soldiers and civilians, they no longer waited for so long between their marches. Immediately after the news hit, they set out to claim a coastal province on another of Solace’s continents. This would serve as their foothold in this land.

“It’s okay, auntie!” A young unicorn centauress called out, wearing a black dress. Her equine hide was black with purple markings, and she waved towards another centaur, one which had a silver crown atop her head. “I should be back soon, don’t worry.”

“Of course, princess.” The queen bowed politely to the Eternal Princess, smiling and waving to bid her farewell.

Alme Dien had been making her rounds, letting the centaur kings and queens know that she would be gone for a while. Her father was taking her to a new land, but she wanted to assure them that she would be back soon. This was her last stop, the last person she had to visit before she could make her journey.

Now, as she ran out through the city’s gates, over a tall and grassy hill, she saw her father standing there. He offered her a small nod and a gentle smile, extending his hand for her to grasp it. When she did, the two of them vanished, shrouded in a golden mist.

The next thing Alme knew, she could hear the gentle rushing of water. She found herself standing upon an island with her father, water surrounding them on almost all sides. “This is it, Alme.” Tryval spoke in a kind tone. “This is Sher Dien.”

Alme’s voice caught in her throat when she heard the name of this world, her eyes going wide. Her father had yet to tell her the name of the world he would take her to, saying that it should be kept as a surprise. She let out a small sniffle, shuffling closer to lean her body against Tryval’s. “I love it, daddy. But… where are all of the people?”

Tryval laughed lightly at that, reaching down to ruffle Alme’s hair. “This is a world of connected islands. Our people are out there, we need only find them. However, do you remember your mission?”

Alme gave a confident nod of her head. “I’ll do it. I’ll show you that I can keep them safe.”

Given the logic behind the monster spawning system, monsters would spawn at up to double the level of the strongest individual in an area. As Alme was undoubtedly the single most powerful mortal of Sher Dien, that meant that they could spawn up to double her level.

Thankfully, Dale didn’t wish for the centaurs to be completely wiped out. As such, he only bought the first tier of monsters, which had a lower level limit. Even if the system allowed monsters to spawn up to twice Alme’s level, that would only take effect if there were such monsters available.

Even so, while these monsters could not threaten Alme, they were creatures of nightmare to the average centaur. Thus, Alme had been given a mission from Tryval. She would become the first queen of his world, and protect these people.

For so long, she had been the Eternal Princess, the child who had lived longer than any elf. She had acted as an advisor to generations of kings and queens, but had always refused to take the role herself. Now, she had been given a choice. She wished to experience her father’s own world, and was allowed to do so from the very dawn of it… but only if she acted as its queen until such time as her protection was unneeded.

In all honesty, the decision was one of the easiest she had made in a long time. For the first time in so long, she would be able to be genuinely helpful to her father. She could watch his world grow firsthand, be a part of its history…

“So, daddy, what am I going to eat?” Alme asked in an innocent tone, causing Tryval’s eye to twitch slightly. Alme’s body needed far more sustenance than these low level creatures could provide, unless she ate them in massive quantities.

More importantly, Tryval couldn’t simply bring her food every day from the other worlds to eat. Just the time needed to acquire the food, even if he used his divine powers, would slow down this world’s progression drastically.

The thought of teaching Alme how to change into the Perfect Self did cross his mind. However, it was impossible for him to accept that. Not before she had been thoroughly trained to perform the energy fusion. There was too much risk of her simply dying in the process.

As he thought more about it, an idea came to mind. “I’m going to teach you a technique. It will only work on those of considerably lower level than yourself, but will allow you to siphon off small portions of ki from those in the area. Until the monsters are strong enough to feed you, we’ll be using this method.”

Alme’s brow furrowed a bit at that. “Will that not hurt the people I take from?”

Tryval chuckled, ruffling Alme’s hair once again. “I wouldn’t ask you to do that. No, it will only take a small amount from each person. They will likely notice that their ki isn’t completely full if they look at their information, but it will not be enough of a difference to cause any problems. By the time that they are strong enough that the technique won’t affect them, the monsters spawning should be able to sustain you.”

I let out a small sigh of relief when I saw that the matter of Alme’s food had been taken care of. There were a number of routes that could be taken, so I wasn’t too incredibly worried about that, but it was still something to keep an eye out for. Given Alme’s presence in the world, I couldn’t risk buying more advanced monster packages, or she would be unable to keep the people safe.

Glancing at the time, I noticed that it was time for the next match. Soon, the system prompt appeared before me, informing me that I would be playing defense this time. Even more… I recognized the name of my opponent…

“Really?” Aurivy called out in disbelief from next to me. “We just got done with our fight with him, didn’t we?”

“That’s right.” I nodded, seeing the name Vanity appear on the information window. The world had a rather twisted sense of humor to put us up against him right away after our last match ended. And since I was on the defending team, the round wouldn’t be skipped if I advanced.

Everyone, we’re moving the plan forward. I sent the message to the others in the pantheon. If we had been on the attacking team, that meant that we could simply wait until the last minute to advance, and earn a free skip. However, as part of the defense, there was only a benefit to advancing early. Tubrock, Keliope, is Lorek ready?

As I awaited their replies, I went ahead and opened the interface from my position on the couch, preparing to join Lorek with the other worlds if they gave the confirmation. Aye, lad! We’re just shy of bein’ a rank one world. Once we join the others, and start sharin’ progress, Lorek should jump in power in no time!

What the dwarf said! Keliope followed up Tubrock’s comment with a laugh. The dwarves of Lorek that got left behind still aren’t doing great, but we’re working on that. As long as the gate gets dropped somewhere we can reach it soon, advancing won’t be an issue for us.

I gave a small nod, choosing to place the Fairy Gate of Lorek in the center of Mokar, the port city of the ursa. Here, they would be able to see it as a gift from the gods, while at the same time the city’s golems would be able to act as defenses for the gate.

However, as soon as I hit the button to join, I was struck with a surprising revelation. The option to merge laws appeared in front of me. Originally, I had been planning to deny the merge for Lorek on the same principle that I denied it for Spica. However…

Until now, I had been imagining that I had two options. I could either merge the laws of a new world with Earth, or leave them entirely separate. It had simply never occurred to me that I would be able to create multiple groups of worlds in this manner.

And now that I had that option, I had to give it some serious thought. While the profound laws of Lorek may conflict too heavily with Earth’s group, and cause some issues ranging from bad to terrible, the same could not be said for merging with Spica.

Both worlds held stars as the primary source of power. With Spica, stars emit mana, allowing spells to be powered. And in Lorek, they emit ki. Terra, you might not be able to answer this question. If you can, however, I really need an answer.

You want to know whether or not the energies created by the stars in Lorek and Spica will merge into chakra or violently collide and explode, destroying every star in the sky.

Yes.Yes, that is exactly what I want to know. I nodded my head in confirmation. If merging the two laws would literally cause every star in both universes to go supernova, then there was no way I could make that decision. Similarly, if the energy automatically merged to become chakra, that would impede the progress of cultivation and destroy the foundation of magic.

Thankfully, it’s nothing that extreme. Terra spoke up, causing me to let out a sigh of relief. Both systems state that stars generate one type of energy. However, neither of them state that stars can only generate either ki or mana, or that all stars must generate the same kind.

Since that is the case, stars will be randomly chosen and assigned either ki or mana. Rarely, there will be those that generate chakra.

That took a rather heavy burden off my mind, causing me to nod. At the same time, I began running through different possibilities for effects the merge might have. What about energy storms in space? With ki and mana clashing in the deep void, it’s possible that they will create storms of energy that wander aimlessly through space.

Oh? Terra seemed surprised when I brought that up. Well, that is certainly a possibility, yes. However, you don’t need to worry about those storms attacking any planets. According to Ryone’s system, mana will be stopped at the upper atmosphere until it is specifically called down. So, even if a spatial storm did approach Lorek or Spica, it would be halted as soon as it reached the atmosphere.

Of course, this only worked under the premise that we don’t merge them with another set of laws that would allow the mana to reach down to the surface of the world itself. I gave a small nod, sending a message to Ryone. Ryone, I’m going to advance time by one year. I want you to have everyone prepare. In one year, there will be another merge, this one specifically targeting Spica.

At that time, it’s possible that any magic items will have their functionality affected. It is also possible that ki users will be affected. I’d like you to ask that exactly one year from now, any ki users purge as much of their ki as possible, and magic items are temporarily turned offline for one hour.

This was the most that I could do to prepare them. Then, I sent the same message to Tubrock and Keliope. Although the stars most important to Lorek’s cultivators were those inside their own body, I had to get them to prepare as much as I could. Only after I had done so, and allowed that year to quickly pass, did I hit the big red button.