Mark of the Witch

18

^^ Stone Giant King ^^

Much of the following year breezed by me, passing with little to no permanence in my mind, as a seemingly endless stream of griefers attempted to destroy the city, repetitively, every single time they respawned, but they never made it past the square and the observation system, which killed them the moment they began to cause problems; thus, I was able to focus on what really mattered: conquering the Factions, securing the borders, and turning the entire wasteland south of the new 'Capital', the newly-minted 'Glass City', into a collection of magically-crafted terrariums, of sorts. Using the concept of turning atmospheric mana and water into a semi-natural growth chemical, turning the dusty badlands slowly but surely into a blossoming expanse of fruit trees and crop fields, as far as they eye could see. The badlands was flat, with heavy winds, so just crop fields would've been ruined, but with thousands of groves of trees creating an artificial forest, they blocked the wind from reaching the crops, also providing clean and fresh air and fruit of various types in various seasons.

My purpose? To turn the 'Turnip Sea Kingdom' into a Bread Basket, and become a worldwide economic powerhouse by dominating the trade in this region and exporting a majority of our food goods. Our population wasn't actually that large, so we didn't have to worry about starving, even without these new fields, so they really were an Unnecessary Surplus, perfect for Trade. With the added Mana being collected from the entire badlands (and all the rest of the unclaimed land in the entire Kingdom, because why not use it if we have it,) it was more than enough to power the defensive measures of the Wall that was being built, as well as the massive fleet of ships that now flew the Wanderer's Guild's Flag, spreading out around the world like seeds in the wind, my Kingdom was officially open for business, and with the massive overhaul I'd made to the governance and tax system of the kingdom, I'd effectively privatized corruption, in the sense that only 'Accepted' forms of corruption were allowed, such as the Spies that I knew nothing about, and their activities in stealing goods from other countries, or poaching the best blacksmiths and artists and mathematicians and so on and so forth, essentially making of my kingdom the same as Rome before it's first proper expansion: I wanted my country to spread the concept of Democratic Meritocracy far and wide, and while I was at it, I saw no reason to be boorish, so Art was of course given it's due respect.

My attempt at recreating the Age of Enlightenment and the Renaissance started off with a bang, as I introduced basic science, (downgraded to the Technological Level of the Age of Discovery, due to my attempts to not play God and the many advantages and limitations a magical world had over Earth, such as the availability of Near-Infinite Energy removing the need for a Coal or Oil Age,) then followed up with medicine, (slightly better, around the early 1940's, due to the existence of magical healing,) chemistry, (specifically fermentation, but other stuff as well, adding onto the earlier technological advances,) and Political Theory and Philosophy, which I made sure to hammer into the heads of the Nobles of my Kingdom, beating them into submission with an understanding of Noblesse Oblige and a very clear message that any noble who proved not to be worthy of their station would be removed and replaced, just like any other government employee. That's what Nobles were, after all: they weren't CEO's I had to negotiate with, they were my representatives, and I could choose to fire them however and whenever I liked! They'd forgotten that, or perhaps had never been taught it, and had treated their past leaders as mere opponents, like a low-budget game of thrones, but with Lizard-People instead of Dragons.

That was another rather interesting discovery: the Woods to the South which contained the Green Tower also contained a marshland wherein a humanoid species of lizard-people lived, called 'Draconians' or 'Scaled Ones', as well as your standard Elves and Fairies, who were all apparently Available Player Races, but only if you did a loooooong series of quests to get that privilege, and even then you had to start over from the beginning in one of their Starter Villages. Some Players had already managed it, which I suppose made sense with two and a half years of gameplay, but their Factions were non-hostile and open to Trade, so I had no issues with them yet; Henry had actually managed to become a Half-Elf, as a Druid's Apprentice, which didn't have all the perks of a High Elf, (smaller increase to Mana, no Spirit Summoning, no spontaneous archery skills,) but it did increase your Reputation sharply in all Druidic Circles, -of which there were several hundred, all around the world,- and thus it was the perfect investment of time for any self-respecting Druid in the game.