In the room was Princess Andrit, the dragon responsible for my current state of exile from my home. The Demon King Azeroth was also present, looking irritated, but subdued. Ahren bowed quickly, closing the door behind me as if sealing my fate.
“Welcome, take a seat.” Andrit said, prompting an exasperated look, and a raised eyebrow from Azeroth. It was clear there was some kind of social dominance game being played here.
I decided to throw my own bid into the dominance game, by preempting her as I sat.
“Hello Andrit, what do you want?”
Her eyes flashed in annoyance. “That’s Princess Andrit to you.”
I shrugged. “You made it quite clear I’m no longer a citizen of the empire when you banished me. That means I no longer owe you fealty.”
I hadn’t decided until that moment how I felt about what had happened, but her demeanor had decided things for me.
“Wrong. I never released you from either citizenship, or your oaths of fealty. I merely banished you from certain parts of the empire.”
I cocked my head at her. “Certain parts? You mean the whole thing right?”
She shrugged. “Certainly you don’t think the planar travel spell is just for show? We may reside on your original world, but it is not the only one that holds our empire. In fact, that is what I am here to discuss today.”
I blinked in surprise, and looked at Azeroth. He could only look at me with resignation, and sigh.
“In fact” she continued, “I have come here to reaffirm your citizenship, and compensate you for your recent troubles. I am looking to make you a noble.”
My mouth hung open in shock. That was definitely not what I had expected from her. “You see, great swaths of unclaimed land have recently become… available here on this world. Land others cannot hope to hold.” She said, looking pointedly at Azeroth. “As such, and as the highest ranking imperial resident of this land, you are by default elevated to rulership according to imperial law. You are hereby ordered to claim a plot of land the approximate size of a duchy, plant our flag on it, and construct a settlement. To that end, we will of course supply you with settlers, resources, and a small garrison to aid with construction, and defense. You will be charged with developing, and maintaining the land according to imperial law. When the initial settlement has been constructed, I will return with emissaries to discuss import/export agreements, and other such matters.”
“And if I say no?”
She blinked in surprise as if the thought hadn’t even occurred to her, and took a moment to consider before she replied.
“Then we will choose someone else, and we will also extend your banishment to this world, sending you somewhere less… hospitable.”
I’m not ashamed to say that I paled slightly. It was hard to imagine a world less hospitable than the one where I had been eaten by giant ants, assaulted by an immortal cannibal, and traveled through a seemingly endless wasteland for months.
I sighed. “Fine, I accept.”
She smiled brightly at me as if her face was made of sunshine. “Lovely. Now, we have this map here where me and Azeroth have already defined several different parcels of land for you to choose from.” She said, pulling a sheaf of paper from a table behind her. “Do give the matter sufficient consideration before you make your decision.”
I looked at the map. It was an obvious choice. “That one.” I said, pointing to the former site of the final battle with the ants.
“Oh? Do tell why you choose this site? I want to be sure you make an… informed decision.”
I got the sense it wasn’t the site she had wanted me to choose, but then she could have just told me where to go, and I would have had little choice. I scrambled for some kind of logical answer outside of my own personal relation to the location. “It’s centrally located, so someday it might be an important trading hub, especially if we have some kind of active trade with the empire. It’s also where we lured the ants to finish them, meaning there are spoils of war, and resources to be had there. Not to mention, Amy used a lot of holy magic there that seemed like it was making the ground more fertile before I got pulled away.”
Andrit seemed surprised. “Those are certainly excellent points. Very well, you have my blessing. Please, take this beacon.” She handed me a heavy metal sphere. I couldn’t quite identify the type of metal, and didn’t have access to itemancy to determine anything else about the object. “This will allow us to pinpoint your location when you are ready to receive shipments of people, and supplies. With that, I believe we have concluded all matters of import here.” Her demeanor suddenly changed to one of boredom. “You have one month to reach the site of your new duchy, at which point we will begin sending shipments whether you are there or not. Farewell.”
“Wait that’s not enough time to-” I stopped talking as she disappeared, along with the chair she had been sitting in, and a chunk of the floor. Whereas from the inside it had always seemed as if a band of darkness enveloped me in a sphere, from the outside, the planar travel spell just seemed to make her fade from existence.
Azeroth sighed, and I jumped, having forgotten he was there. “Damn dragons. Like I told you before, they have a reputation for being conniving, and meddlesome. Now they have an excuse to involve themselves here. I’m sure that’s what they were really after in the end.”
I shrugged. “Why would they want to? The only thing here is you guys, and no offense, but you don’t exactly have a lot of spare wealth or anything.
“You’ve never taken a close look at the map have you? There’s another continent twice the size of this one across the ocean. It’s ruled by a loose collection of petty kingdoms who all theoretically belong to an empire, though the empire itself is largely toothless. We’ve never really had much dealings with them, given how far away they are, but I’ve heard the dragons have been trying to sink their claws into it for centuries. You see dragons love gold, but my brethren don’t value it at all. They use a kind of paper currency instead. The dragons see it as a source of untapped wealth they could add to their hoards if only they could gain some kind of political power. That’s the rumor I’ve heard anyway. It’s hard to say with dragons.”
I nodded. It made a certain kind of sense. I decided to take a more diplomatic approach to the situation than the dragons apparently had. “Well, if you need anything let me know. Once my settlement gets going, I’ll apparently be in a position to help you out. I’d rather be a better neighbor than they are.”
Azeroth nodded as I opened the door, following Ahren to my next destination.
Chapter 3
Despite my expectations, the people of the city didn’t seem to care that much about the death of the ants. Perhaps, it was because their lives hadn’t changed in any substantive way. During the limited time I spent in Apocola, the people were neither more happy nor less than they had been on my previous visit. I felt guilty for expecting praise, but at the same time, I was nonplussed by the utter lack of interest in my actions. Hadn’t I saved them from a slow genocide?
The main recompense for my actions came in the form of fish. I was so tired of fish, but I was fully aware that even this much was taken from the mouths of the starving. It was enough to last me the months journey to the mountain. At least, I hoped I could make it there in a month. Last time, the journey had taken about a month and a half, though I knew it would likely go faster this time since we wouldn’t be stopping to fight periodically.
For her part, Izzy decided to treat the journey as a training exercise for me. She remained stealthed for the duration of my time in the city, but the moment I was out of sight, she reappeared. Her face was impassive, but I thought I detected a hint of amusement in her eyes.
“We’re going to have to find something to keep ourselves occupied for the next month, and I know just how to do it.” My mind immediately went into the gutter, but I didn’t say anything. “One word: Calisthenics.”
I groaned. “Do I haaavveee tooooo?”
; “Silly master, of course you do.”
“Who’s the master here again?” I muttered, but she only stared at me, keeping her face perfectly neutral, while her eyes screamed amusement.
I sighed, but accepted my lot. Over the next month I jogged, and sprinted for large portions of the journey until I could maintain a decent jogging pace for several hours without stopping. It was a grueling pace, but the upside was that a month and a half journey turned into two days shy of a month.
When we arrived at the site of my new duchy, the landscape had changed drastically. Where before there had been a wasteland, mixed with churned battlefield, now there was a peaceful-looking meadow full of flowers. There wasn’t an ant in sight, but luckily there were people. My people.
“Hey! Dee! Amy!” I called out, yelling at them from where I could see them standing in the meadow. I saw Dee shade her eyes against the sun, before forming wings of flame to fly to us. Her short blonde hair contrasted with coffee brown eyes, which I appreciated for upward of a second before I noticed her trajectory. Rather than landing nearby, she hurtled toward me, turning off her wings just before impact. The result was a loud thud, and a lot of pain as she made excited noises.
“You guys are back! It’s been so boring ever since we finished the last of the ants! We didn’t want to leave though, cause we didn’t know where you went. Where did you go? Why did you disappear? Ohhh was it-” I held up my hand to stop her, letting out a sound somewhere between a laugh, and a bark of pain. She helped me to my feet as I spoke.
“We met the XP requirement faster than we expected, but only Izzy was in range for the spell. When Andrit sent us back, she sent us to some random spot rather than sending us back to the fight. Not sure why.”
Dee nodded sagely as Amy landed nearby, folding her wings of light back into her body as they faded. Her long red hair pooled over her ample chest as her green eyes looked on bemusedly.
“Hello Rowan, it’s good to see you.”
“You too. What happened with the ants?”
“Well, I have good news, and bad news. The good news is, we seem to have cleared all the ants that were present. The bad news is the beacon was broken during a final push by the horde. It’s hard to say whether we killed all of the queens, and there could be eggs out there ready to hatch which might be able to rebuild.”
I nodded grimly. We had dealt a significant blow to the ants, but I suspected that on sheer numbers alone, odds were good there were survivors. Any remaining queens could likely rebuild the ant empire within a matter of years, and it would be back to playing whack-a-mole with ant colonies. Theoretically, we could just repeat what we had done before, but now there would be civilians to worry about, and a marching ant horde would easily overrun a new duchy with only a small garrison of imperial troops. It was a difficult situation, but one I could put off until later.
“Oh,I need to tell you something.” I explained the situation of my new duchy to my item spirits and saw mixed reactions. Dee shrugged, not particularly interested in, or impressed by the trappings of nobility. Amy nodded, and said “my lord” whimsically. Izzy remained impassive, but she already knew. Between the lackluster response to my killing the genocidal ants, and the ambivalence to my new title, I felt dramatically underappreciated.
We set up the beacon on the newly created plains next to an entrance of the former ant mountain. Initially, I thought it made more sense to put the beacon on the natural plateau on the top of the mountain, but I was overruled when my companions pointed out that transporting goods would be time consuming and difficult. After that, all that was left was to wait.
Two days passed before the first shipments, and personnel arrived. I spent that time practicing magic with Amy, and though I still didn’t have the mana reserves to accomplish anything overly complex, I still picked up several useful spells. I was worried when I discovered that despite reconnecting with her, I was still cut off from my Itemancy powers. Likewise, she was unable to return to the amulet, raising a number of important existential questions.For all intents, and purposes, I was estranged from the only thing that had made me special. It was disconcerting to say the least.
The first shipment came with little fanfare. Suddenly, Andrit appeared, along with a collection of men bound in iron chains, and a set of unlabeled boxes. As soon as I saw them, I stepped forward.
“Hello Andrit, why are these people in chains?”
She smiled brightly as she spoke. “You see, we put a great deal of thought into who would best suit your fledgling duchy, and we arrived at a simply marvellous solution. Your land shall henceforth be a penal colony.” I opened my mouth to protest, but she held up her hand. “Oh, don’t worry, we won’t send anyone convicted of violent crimes, so you need not fear that. There are a number of other criminals though, whose skills or demeanors, while not violent, mean we cannot afford to release them back into the population. From now on, we will send such special cases to you until you have established enough of a foothold to consider the land properly settled. Think of it as a kind of trial run for your new duchy.”
I sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose between an index finger, and thumb. “Anything else I should know?” I asked after a moment.
“I don’t believe any of these men have experience as farmers, but we have provided a selection of different seed-stocks to use. You’ll find some that are useful as food sources, while others are more intended to be cash crops should you find the time to grow them. In a moment, we will send through some building supplies, and that will be all you hear from us for some time. Do be sure you take the appropriate precautions. You have no means to contact us. If you run out of food, then you are out, and so be it. Good luck!”
Andrit waved as she faded from view due to the plane-shifting spell. I stood staring at the empty space for a moment, not sure what to do next, but the sound of rattling chains woke me from my stupor.
“Oi bruv. Kin ye git these off now?”
I turned to face the speaker. “She didn’t happen to leave the key did she?”
He shook his head. “Nah, she’s too ‘igh n mighty to be kin’ to sich lowly folk.”
I sighed. “Figures.” I motioned to Dee, and borrowed her sword. “I like your accent by the way. Where’s it from?”
He brightened. “Oh, thanks I picked it up during a trip to Milesia. It’s definitely one of my favorites. It adds flair to situations.”
I was taken aback by the sudden change in tone, and loss of accent. “So what were you in prison for?” I asked, as I began sawing at the manacle.
“Oh, a mix of things. Identity theft, fraud, conspiracy. I once talked my way into a bank vault and cleaned it out too, though that got thrown out of court because it’s not a crime if they let you take it.”
He smiled widely at me, and winced as the sword finally sliced through the manacle.
“Oy bruv, watch the goods. That ‘and is a right precious treasure of mine that is.”
Given that his skin hadn’t even been cut, I rolled my eyes at him, and began working on the other hand. “What should I call you?”
“Hmmmm let me think of a good one. Oh, I know, call me Jory Mcaulliffe. That’s a good strong Milesian name, right bruv?”
“I wouldn’t know, but if that’s what you want to be called.” I said, as the second manacle snapped. Jory shrugged and smiled rakishly as he stepped back, rubbing his wrists.
I moved to the next person in line. “Hello, what’s your name?” I asked, as I began working on his manacles.
“Carey Riggenheim, your lordship.” He said, clearly nervous. “I’m in for tax evasion.”
“And they sent you here for that?” I asked, pausing my work momentarily to absorb the information.
“Yes, well, I was the accountant for a rather notorious crime family. I for one am actually rather happy to be here. The documents I had on me when I was taken got several members of the family arrested, and I was waiting for the day when they decided to make an example of me.”
The first manacle popped off as he finished speaking, and I began on the second.
“Fair enough Carey. How would you like to be in charge of logistics for the moment? I could use someone to organize and catalogue the supplies.” The second manacle broke as I said this, and the man bowed.
“Yes milord.” I noticed as he walked toward the pile that it had grown significantly larger. Clearly more supplies had been delivered while I focused on my new subjects.
The process of removing the bindings ended up taking around fifteen minutes, and suddenly I had twenty-two underlings to do my bidding. Insofar as they were willing to. Carey was certainly an outlier in terms of motivation, but when I reminded them what Andrit had said about food, they begrudgingly set to work. Somehow, I wasn’t optimistic about our future as a duchy.
Chapter 4
The days turned into weeks as we set about building, and planting. After some effort, Amy managed to renew her bond with her amulet, both restoring her connection to her true body, and reenabling my own access to itemancy. It was an unexpected relief. Just for the sake of it, I opened my itemancy menu to examine the amulet.
Name: “Amy”
Type: Amulet
Durability: ∞ (Or close enough anyway)
Special Attributes: Ensouled
Exp: 750,592
Traits:
-Select to Expand List
The editorial addition to my item screen was somewhat concerning, but there was no way to tell if it came from some outside force, or my subconscious. I was also loathe to spend any of her XP. With the ants gone, and our surroundings a desolate wasteland, I didn’t foresee any consistent source of XP income in the near future. Along with Dee and Amy, I was reunited with Larry the map spirit, and my collection of stone soldiers. I call them this because I had literally made them out of random stones I had found on the ant mountain. It turned out they were good for more than soldiering, as I was able to make them into excellent farmers. They worked tirelessly on the fields, and seemed quite content with their labor. This was good, as nobody else had any idea how to farm properly. For their part, my new citizens had a tendency to only work when coerced, or if it was something they were doing anyway. They were also all men; leading to several altercations where my item spirits had vigorous responses to overly aggressive male attention.
The Itemancer 2 Page 2
