Continuing our efforts to accrue resources before the Anchor upgraded, Shaeula and I continued our push to the south. Again, there was little resistance of note, though we did run into a rather large Territory of orcs, the Japanese-type similar to those that Kondou had commanded. Initially I thought to try and talk to them, making a useful alliance, but this was quickly stymied by the rather stereotypical reaction the piggish brutes had on seeing Shaeula.

In their excitement, they were in no mood to listen or negotiate, and at that point I decided that orcs were unlikely to be welcome in my forces. Shaeula took it further of course, her pinwheels humming as her bluesteel cables quickly reaped their lives, blood and severed body parts scattering everywhere before fading into welcome ether. I had joined in, testing my new earth elemental abilities fully, and with hurled projectiles of rock and vicious stone spikes that ripped from the ground, we subdued them, leaving no survivors.

Most of our forces, other than the few needed to protect the Anchor and our vassal Territory, were all hard at work expanding in various directions, and a steady stream of ether was flooding in as the countdown to the finished upgrade ticked lower and lower. I was eventually rewarded with another level-up as well, climbing to level forty-five. It was certainly a slog, I had to kill a lot of enemies, but since most of them were clearly no match for us, I suppose I should be grateful that I got any experience at all.

Turning to Shaeula, who was retrieving another Etherite she had spotted, I spoke. “So, want to head back? There’s only a couple of astral hours left before we are done.”

She nodded. “Very well-well. I can hardly wait until we can finally rest easy, knowing we have-have defences protecting our Territory.”

“Yeah, no kidding.” I laughed, as we headed back north, passing swathes of buildings and cramped alleyways that we had purged of undead, monstrous rats and swarms of vile bugs. “We’ve had some really tense times.”

As we reminisced about the many furious battles we had endured over the past few weeks, we quickly arrived, to be greeted by a third Kamaitachi, who greeted us politely.

“Princess, welcome back-back.” he grinned. This one was easily identifiable as it had a white splotch in its fur across the shoulder. He wasn’t one I had personally killed, but one that Grulgor’s trolls had slain prior to me meeting Shaeula. And thanks to Kin Restoration and power draining slowly from the both of us, he had been revived. In addition, the slain musician, as well as a few other weaselkin, had also been brought back. Now only four balls of faintly glowing light remained circling Shaeula, her last Kamaitachi among them.

“I have returned.” She agreed. “Has there been any-any trouble?”

“None-none.” The Kamaitachi shook his head. “Our borders have been quiet.”

Leaving Shaeula to finish talking to her freshly-restored Kin, I entered the spatial distortion, the dungeon, where my Anchor lurked. The halo of ether around it and the Silo was blinding, and the amount was noticeably greater than I had expected. I guess everyone has been working hard. Damn, this is really exciting. As I watched the remaining time tick below an hour, I ran through my plans one final time. I know what I want to do, though… I guess if we get any new options at Rank 3, I might have to make some changes to the plan…

Shaeula joined me, her Kamaitachi and a few weaselkin we had left behind in tow. She glanced at the fiercely glowing silver pillar that was the Anchor with some interest. It had grown thicker again, now as wide around as Shaeula was, and the base was expanding.

“It is growing quite-quite large. The surface seems rough now as well.” She observed, reaching out a hand to the Anchor, only to pull it back with a yelp as the surging energies stung her. Sucking on her fingers, she looked at me as if daring me to laugh, but I was too clever to do that. It was rather funny though.

“Yeah, the smooth silver has changed.” I agreed, now that I looked more closely. A series of shallow fissures ran through the silver, and there were slightly raised portions too. “It… it kind of looks like bark, doesn’t it?” I mused.

Shaeula let out another yelp, this time covering her eyes. She had used her Mystic Eyes to observe, and the light had momentarily blinded her. Wiping at her watering orbs, she looked at me accusatorially. I’m still not going to laugh.

“This Anchor is trying to pick a fight-fight with me.” She pouted. “Still, for a moment I could see-see a connection, a silvery spire rising into the Lower Astral. Perhaps higher. It seemed to be pulling down ether from above.”

“Keh-keh-keh. Yes, it is quite fascinating, is it not?” Ixitt spoke up from behind us, his own contraption of whirring lenses on his face rapidly changing which glass he was looking through as he studied the Anchor. He must have come in while we were distracted. At my inquiring gaze he shrugged. “Keh-heh. You did not expect me to miss this opportunity, did, keh-keh, you? I need to compare this to the initial formation of an Anchor, keh-keh. So far, I am not disappointed.”

Shaeula sniffed pointedly, clearly offended that Ixitt could discover anything that she could not. Still, Ixitt only coughed more and laughed harder, taking no offense. “Worry not, keh-keh-KEH, princess. I can but see the same, keh, as you.” Some of the lenses were of a smoked, dark glass, and these were in front of his eyes, muting the glow. “It, keh, connects somewhere higher indeed.”

As the timer ticked down to the last few minutes the intensifying glow spread out, significantly more vivid than any previous upgrade. The pressure was uncomfortable, the air dense with ether. Only Shaeula, Ixitt and I now remained, our other troops having withdrawn.

“Keh-keh. Princess, your eyes. Use them to observe him at the moment of, keh-keh, completion.” He suddenly said, having an epiphany. Shaeula looked at me, questioning, and I nodded.

“Sure, why not. It can’t hurt. Anyway, final minute.”

As I watched the counter tick down, Ixitt was using various instruments to examine the Anchor, while Shaeula was looking at me, her eyes glowing brilliantly, her amber merging with the rainbow glow of the ether around us. I could feel myself flushing as she stared at me, and she grinned wickedly, perhaps enjoying the turnabout from earlier.

“Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven…” I counted down. “… Two. One.” At that moment the glow collapsed in on itself, the anchor simultaneously growing and twisting, and I was overwhelmed by a cascade of information, burning silvery letters flooding my vision. As I absorbed the information within, I could barely hear Ixitt cackling and Shaeula asking me if I was well. Nodding vaguely to reassure her, I checked the words before they faded….

Your Territory Anchor has been upgraded to Rank 3. This greatly increases the control you have over your Territory and weakens intruders. Your Territory has fully adapted to the Boundary.

You have control of some areas of the Material that overlap with your Territory. In these areas, ether density will increase, and some ether will leak down to the Material. You Territory can exert limited authority over these Material areas.

The area covered by your Territory has expanded to 10,000 metres and its defensive strength has increased. Defensive Emplacements will exert further additional offensive power.

You will draw more ether from your Territory, and may now construct an additional eight Ether Spires. Your buildings can be upgraded further. Caps on most buildings have been relaxed. You can now construct or upgrade three buildings at once.

You may now uproot buildings and move them within your Territory, at a small cost of ether. If the Anchor is uprooted all Territory functions will be suspended until it is replanted. Special Rank buildings may not be uprooted.

You may construct Anchor Spires. These upgrades are grown from your Anchor. You may currently construct three Anchor Spires, each of which can be upgraded to a maximum Rank of 3.

You have gained in strength. Your level has increased from forty-five to forty-seven.

Wow, this is a lot to take in. In addition to the surge of strength I felt as ether condensed within me, I felt the weight of my Territory expanding suddenly and significantly. All of Kondou’s old Territory, barring the area I had ceded to my vassal, in addition to the areas we had cleared during our expansion and hunts for ether, was suddenly under my control, and the feeling of my mind encompassing it all made me stagger, momentarily pained, my head aching fiercely.

“Are you-you sure you are well?” Shaeula asked again, catching my arm and steadying me. Blinking away the remains of silver that fogged my vision, I nodded, ruffling her hair reassuringly.

“When the Anchor upgraded, for a moment, I saw-saw…” she trailed off, unsure of how to explain it.

“Yeah, I’m fine. I just jumped a couple of levels, and at the same time our Territory massively expanded. I think we just got probably five or six times what we already held added in one go. It was hard, mentally. The pain is diminishing though.”

As she smiled, relieved, I asked her about what she had seen, and she frowned. “For just-just a moment, it seemed to me that your right wrist…” she tapped it gently. “… was connected to the Anchor, and something passed between you-you and it, carried up into the light. Some sort of prismatic string, shining bright. Now-now when I look though, I can only see what I always see.”

“What do you see?” I asked, curious, realising we had never talked about it.

“It is a series of orbs within your subtle body, forming a bracelet around your wrist. It-it is connected to your chakras, though it appears to do nothing tangible. It does pull in some aether, though. But when we were connected, our souls together, I felt… no. No.” she shook her head in denial. “It seems to be doing no harm. I am always-always watching you carefully, after all.”

“I don’t doubt it.” I assured her. “Still… the wrist is where Exposition-san did something to me long ago which started me on this path. And when I use the Examination skills, I can feel that it comes from there.”

“Well, your chakra network was terrible when we first met-met.” She mused. “Now that my chirurgery has grown stronger, perhaps I can solve this mystery…”

“Keh-keh. Do we have time for this?” Ixitt broke in. “It is, keh, fascinating indeed, and I would, keh-keh, love to share my own findings. But for now… you have work to do, keh, do you not?”

He’s right. The mystery of the bracelet of silver Exposition-san implanted within me can wait, though I suspect it is simply the medium for my gift. If Shaeula says it isn’t harmful then that is good enough for me. More importantly… “Well, the fact we can move buildings is huge. I hadn’t planned for that…” I said, trailing off as I observed the new Anchor. “Uproot, huh? It definitely looks like a tree-trunk now, if one shorn of most of its branches.”

The shaft was definitely rough and bark-like, and the three protuberances from before had grown more branch-like, each ending in a ring to hold something. Likely an Anchor Spire. The base of the Anchor was a lumpy tangle, and again the texture of the silver was reminiscent of something natural.

“Well, since we have the leisure to move our Anchor, I’d like to take it to the shrine. It’s a much more defensible position, and it would make sense to have it at the place that we live.”

“I agree.” Shaeula nodded, and with that…

The minute I willed it to move to the centre of the shrine, the pillar rose into the air, the base revealing that it indeed was a mass of coiled roots, glittering a dull silver, yet sparkling with little flashes of multicoloured ether. As it soared out through the dungeon that had formed around it and began to move at walking pace towards our destination, I couldn’t help but admire it.

So, about a metre per second, the shrine is a bit under a kilometre away, so… fifteen minutes or so? The ether used was only a bit under a thousand as well. As we followed it, making sure to keep the Anchor under our protection, more and more of the residents hurried over to see what the fuss was. As they joined us it formed a procession, with an almost festive atmosphere. Shaeula, trailing the anchor regally, was definitely enjoying herself.

“So, now we can move things around, I suggest we focus our buildings around three points.” I began. “The shrine and Anchor, of course, but we also defend your old Territory, and the graveyard with the Rhyming tree. That way we can gather wind, earth and darkness, as well as have Ether Spires in places of the best ether density we have access to. I guess we should probably add a fourth spot, and stick some Emplacements up by Hisuikomushi shrine as well.”

“That makes sense.” Shaeula agreed as we approached the shrine. Her maids were waiting there, looking at the flying Anchor with wide eyes. Azuki was similarly perplexed, while Hyacinth was looking at it with an ecstatic expression, hugging herself and blushing. Yeah, she’s a pervert like always…

The Anchor descended to the ground next to the shrine building, and the silvery roots uncoiled, digging into the soil and bedrock, shaking the hill. For a moment the Anchor glowed fiercely, and then it was set, the Territory coming back to life.

“An impressive sight.” Ulfuric observed, and Ixitt agreed.

“In that case, the first thing we need to do is organise our buildings. We have one damaged Defensive Emplacement, so…” I put that in the first queue for repairs, which would take a little while.

“We have the following buildings, not counting our immovable ones, the Rank 2 Special Kobold Den, The Rank 4 Special Kobold Mine, Rank 3 Special Dark Rhyming Tree, and the Rank 3 Special Faerie Ring Gate…” I scanned over my Territory details. “Six Ether Spires at Rank 2, Two Defensive Emplacements (one with Sniper), a Throne Of Heroes, a Rank 2 Barracks and Rank 2 Spawning Spire, Rank 3 Silo, Rank 2 Elemental Silo, Rank 2 Warehouse, a Treasury, and lastly, a Rank 2 Armoury.” After refreshing my memory, I shrugged. “You know, it doesn’t seem like a lot when I list it like that. We spent ages struggling to upgrade the Territory instead. Still, with the extra build queue, we can make progress.”

“Indeed. We took a risk, and it did not-not disappoint.” Shaeula crowed, puffing out her chest. “So, how will we deploy these buildings?”

“First… I was hoping we could move the Throne of Heroes.” I asked. “It’s too critical to us to have it away from the most defended area of our Territory. I know that it is yours, and you cherish your original Territory, but…” I stopped as she pushed a finger against my lips, silencing me.

“Fool. It has sentimental value, true, but my Territory is wherever you-you are now. Move it as you wish.”

“Great. And we have to spread our Ether Spires too. But first, we get eight more…” It wasn’t just the Ether Spires we could build more of. In addition, we could build a second Throne of Heroes, as well as more of other of the specialised buildings. Relaxed caps, huh? “Time to use the power of pay-to-win!” one by one I queued in Ether Spires, and then rush-built them. The cost was effectively doubled from 12,000 ether to 24,000, but it saved eight astral days of build time, and meant we could balance our Spires placement effectively.

“So, fourteen spires. Five here, five at your old Territory, and four by the Rhyming Tree. We have to move a few, but that gives us maximum elemental gains, as well as the best ether density we can pull from. I’ll split the Rank 2 ones up, so two at each location.”

With that done, I moved the main Silo, along with the Elemental one and the other storage buildings to the shrine. I then rush-built two more Rank 1 Silos, paired with Rank 1 Elemental Silos at the cost of 5,200 ether. Spending is addictive. Still, getting the basics done is vital.

“I see-see.” Shaeula mused, as I set them up in her old Territory and by the Rhyming Tree. “We can now at least store some dark and earth energies.”

“Yeah, and we’ll also move the Barracks and Spawning Spire. The Warehouse too. And the Defensive Emplacements. We’ll consolidate all these around the shrine and Anchor for now, so that only resource-gathering options are exposed elsewhere, for now anyway.”

“We will need-need greater defences.” Shaeula posited. “I have no wish to be as vulnerable again.”

“Yeah, I intend to have at least four Emplacements at each of the four key locations, though we have some other stuff to sort out first. Before that though, let’s check out the Anchor Spires, I’m curious.”

Shaeula nodded, and using her Throne of Heroes-given access to the build queues, she scanned them with me. Right, 10,000 ether and five astral days each for Rank 1. There were a little over twenty options, with more not-yet available. Scanning through them I couldn’t help but whistle. These are good! REALLY good.

“It seems our gamble has paid off.” Shaeula smirked. “Although with my Fortune supporting you, there should be no-no surprise at that.”

“Yeah, having Anchor Spires is a huge advantage over those that don’t.” I agreed. “They are all so good, it’s hard to choose. But the best ones seem to be these. Build Queue Spire, Ether Density Spire, Ether Spire Enhancement Spire, Territory Expansion Spire, Barrier Enhancement Spire, and Defensive Emplacement Enhancement Spire. Screw it. I know what the first option should be.”

I quickly added the Build Queue Spire to an open slot at the cost of 10,000 ether. Its description was This Anchor Spire opens up an additional Build Queue. At Rank 1 you can construct Rank 1 Anchor Spires, or Rank 1 and 2 normal buildings.

Shaeula raised an eyebrow at me, wondering perhaps why I didn’t choose one of the others first, but I explained. “It may seem like ether is the problem, and yeah, I get it, we need as much ether as we can get, but once buildings start reaching higher ranks the real bottleneck is time. An extra build queue allows us to work on longer-term projects, or race through lots of smaller buildings. In mobile gacha games, people spend a fortune on stuff like this. Resources can always be gained, but time is finite.”

As the remaining buildings were shuffled around to the positions we wanted, it was time to take stock. “We need to work out just how much ether we have to work with. I’ve spent a bit over forty thousand already. Fetch all the Etherites. I know they likely have uses, but for now… time to get building!”

We had roughly 210,000 ether remaining, which was way more than I expected after spending 42,000. But then Shaeula and I had rampaged liberally, bringing in a lot over the last few days, and everyone else had been equally motivated, clearing whatever enemies they could. I then broke down the Etherites we had gathered, in addition to the ones the Kobolds had found in their mines, taking my total to just above a quarter of a million. Which is just what I need for the upgrade…

With a feeling of loss, I watched as my Silo was sucked dry of ether. Seeing my pain, Shaeula patted my back gently. “At least-least we still have the box of Etherites my useless brother brought.” She consoled me, and I hugged her, feeling her warmth. “Yeah, easy come, easy go. Besides, this building is far more important than money.”

Throne of Heroes Rank 2 – This building empowers the Chosen Heroes of the Territory Ruler, granting them multiple benefits. At Rank 2 an additional two Chosen Heroes can be selected. They can exert greater control over the Territory, allowing access to the Territory build queues and other more significant features. They will gain a slightly larger boost to all of their statistics, which is greater within the Territory proper, and have a maximum level of fifteen. They are also more likely to develop new special abilities. They can also manifest a material body, or an astral body, if they do not possess the ability to do this.

At a quarter of a million ether and fifty days to build it was quite the investment. Still, I was leaning heavily on Shaeula, so giving her access to ten more levels would be a huge boost, and more significantly, I could appoint and empower two more Heroes, who would be capable of joining us in the Material if needed.

Shaeula was happy that I relied on her, and that I was rewarding her by strengthening her still further. After some more hugging and a rather pleasant exchange of kisses, we parted, and began shattering Etherites, the small number of green ones offering significant quantities of ether. So it’s around a hundred for a red, give or take. Twice that for an orange. Yellows give four times that, or somewhere around eight hundred to a thousand. And greens… yeah, between six and ten thousand. So a blue would be… Grieving that in the end Shaeraggo was unable to bring us a blue Etherite, we continued clearing out the box until everything was broken down.

“Well, I take-take it back. My brother was not entirely useless.” She declared. Once the box had been emptied, our stock of ether was around 130,000. A bit more than we had hoped. The Trial of Three had been gruelling indeed, but we had gained a lot from it. It puts is ahead of other Candidates that didn’t have such a lucky break…

“Okay, so we have two priorities. Firstly… we need to upgrade the eight new Spires to Rank 2. That’s 7,500 a pop, or 22,500 for an instant build. So, we fall short. In addition, I really want to plant a Boundary To Material Connection where we intend to do our training.

Boundary To Material Connection Rank 1 – This Connection allows an area of your Territory that you have full ownership of in the Material that is connected to a Boundary area that you also control to be supplied with energy, pulling ether and aether from the Astral and dispersing it. The amount of energy supplied depends on the Connection Rank, and you can allow this energy to remain free in the Material, gradually saturating it, or use it to power certain feats, though they will be weakened on the Material. At Rank 1 this affects a maximum area of 20 metres in radius.

“At Rank 1 it is 8,000 ether and four days. Rank 2 the radius increases to 100 metres and the effect and speed of dispersal slightly increases. Though that is 32,000 and sixteen days. Okay, calculation time…”

Shaeula waited patiently as I went through everything. Hyacinth brought us more of her fruit juice, which we took gratefully, but I shut out her ramblings and ran the numbers. 60,000 for eight Ether Spires to Rank 2 at forty days total. If I speed-build the Rank 1 Boundary To Material Connection that’s 16,000, and 32,000 for the Rank 2… a total of 108,000… It was doable, and I’d have enough left to rush-build a spire, but was saving five days in one queue worth fifteen thousand ether at the moment?

Not when I have two more Anchor Spires to build, as well as… “Fine. We’ll keep a bit of cash in reserve.” I rush-built the Boundary To Material Connection at Rank 1 where the centre of our training facility would be. 20 metres in radius didn’t cover all of it, but even so, when it was increased to 100 metres that would be better.

“All right… my queues look like this.” The first queue had the Build Queue Spire at five days, the second had the Throne of Heroes Rank 2 at fifty days, and the last held eight Ether Spire Rank 2’s, and then a Boundary To Material Connection Rank 2, at a total of fifty-six days. We had twenty-two thousand ether remaining, and in five days I would have two build queues to play with.

“All right, I think we are done for now.” I declared, mentally drained by the effort of deciding between a multitude of things I wanted. “Time to set out the next stage of our expansion plans.”

Beside me Shaeula nodded, and followed by her two scowling maids and the extremely energetic Hyacinth, I gathered everyone together at the shrine to debate our future direction…