While the Queen and the archbishop wondered about what happened to the newly-minted King that issued a foolish challenge, I paused to think.
Everything slled of a hack. Why would the System give a {King} title when I was female? Why would it make "human" royalty when I was an Eleon? It didn't add up and it had that engineered feel. I knew my truce with the gods was just that. A truce. They were still trying to find ways to get rid of .
I tried to get rid of the burden of being the King.
WARNING: Renouncing the title will remove all your Royalty-related perks and Skills. The detailed list is as follows...
Royalty (very rare).Elven Royalty (very rare).Royal Geas (ultra-rare). .Improved Royal Geas (ultra-rare).Royal Order (ultra-rare).Human Royalty (very rare).
Do you still want to proceed?
And it listed exactly that. All my Royalty-related perks and Skills, including the elven ones. Was that their intent? To trap in this Kingdom? I answered no to the prompt.
I needed so answers from the Gods, and my closest source of godly information was the Archbishop there. However, this trap ca with a lure of twelve perks, and I intended to use each one of them. The Human Perk system was broken. You thought of an idea, and the System either gave you what you wanted or the closest alternative.
- Your attempt at obtaining Improved Curse Breaker (ultra rare) Failed. You got another related perk of a lower rarity.
You purchased this perk: Suppress Curse (rare): Once per day, you can ignore one of your curses for 1 hour.
- Your attempt at obtaining Vorpal Claws (ultra rare) Failed. You got another related perk of a lower rarity.
You purchased this perk: Maim [Claws] (rare): When scoring a critical hit with your claws, the target loses control of a limb for 1 minute.
- Your attempt at obtaining Vorpal Claws (ultra rare) Failed. You cannot try again until you obtain more Human Perks.
You purchased this perk: Detect Soul (very rare): Add half your Soul score to Mind to perceive hidden creatures or souls.
You purchased this perk: Improved Tree Stride (very rare): Increase the distance and precision of your tree strides by 50%.
You purchased this perk: Chiric Transformation (ultra-rare): You can mix parts of several forms with great control.
You purchased this perk: Large Animal Shapes (very rare): You can transform into large animals as well as other sizes.
You purchased this perk: Quality Crafting (rare): When making an item you've made one hundred or more of, Increase the chances of higher quality.
You purchased this perk: Echolocation (very rare): You can determine the shape and position of tangible creatures and objects through emission and capture of ultrasonic sounds. Requires the ability to vocalize and listen to sounds.
You purchased this perk: Consolidated Psyche (very rare): Add half your Ego score to Endurance to determine HP
You purchased this perk: Magical Soul (very rare): Add half your Magic score to Soul to determine SP
You purchased this perk: Enchanted Health (rare): Add half your Magic score to Endurance to determine HP
- Your attempt at obtaining God Slayer (RESTRICTED) Failed. You got another related perk of a lower rarity.
You purchased this perk: Favored Enemy [Demigod] (ultra rare): Treat all your combat and furtivity Skills as one rank above when fighting against demigods.
I needed to reveal myself and I couldn't show Rosewise's face. I'd obtained {Chiric Transformation} exactly for that. I took Alloralla's form, swapped her elven head with Apricot's, the chest with Lily's, and the skin with Silverstreak's pale brown. I also used Silverstreak's nose because it was bigger. That would give a tall, diaphanous, androgynous form that would hardly be considered male but didn't sound like a female one either. The hair was straight and dark black.
With the form in mind, I wove a darkness spell to cover my brief flash of nudity after the transformation and donned the general's gothic plate armor over my fae silk bodysuit. A wind spell would lower the pitch of my voice to a tenor. The last touches were to set my title to {KIng} and my level to ninety-three.
"Kneel before your rightful King!" I issued a {Royal Order}.
The Queen had a lot of Charisma, but she realized what it ant. Her firstborn was dead, his wager and realm lost. She fell on a knee with a plea.
"Please, Your Majesty. Spare my other children. On behalf of them, I renounce to our rights as Royalty."
I waved a hand, channeling Ainz Ooal Gown. "Granted. May you be stripped of your perks and Skills. You may remove yourself and your children from the palace with whichever retainers remain loyal to your family even without a title. You can take your jewelry and any other article that personally belonged to you. Do not steal from . That's a {Royal Geas} on you and your children."
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
And since she was my rightful subject, I paid the lower cost of five SP per point of Soul.
"Archbishop. I wish to speak with your patron," Once again that ntal gymnastics to think of soone else and skirt the curse. In this case, the patron of the whole Kingdom was the King.
The priest started to pray. Then he said, "Bundeus has declared. You are to rule this place until the day you die, my liege. Should you bring prosperity to the land, you'll be granted a boon. Should you fail, he'll strip you of your Royal perks."
The "God of Butts" was butting and shitting all over my life. Repeatedly. I'd have to think about counterasures for the gods. I bet they wouldn't like it. They had it coming.
"Were those the words conveyed to you?"
"Yes, sire. Word-by-word."
"Until the day this one that life of mine ends?"
"Yes."
So that was why Bundeus made King. He thought of putting a leash on . The Royal perks were among the most powerful I had.
Well, he was in for a surprise.
"How will this prosperity be asured?"
The priest prayed and answered, "Through the happiness of the people living in the land."
"asured when I die?"
"Yes."
Why did he want to burden with such a job? What were his intentions? I didn't think it was just to make one shitty kingdom less shitty. I followed with a ton of questions and demanded Bundeus bundled his proposal into a set of perks and curses sent to via System offer, like in previous lives. I couldn't trust his vague words, but I knew the System strived for fairness. This is what I got.
Windere Territory Awareness (very rare): You know where the boundaries of Windere are. You also know who is a subject or not, unless they are disguised. This is a Royal Perk.
Windere Happiness Awareness (very rare): You can sense the general happiness of the citizens of Windere. You can also sense if you are failing or not in your Quest. This is a Royal Perk.
Windere Developnt (curse, unique). You are cursed with the developnt of Windere. Should you fail to reach a happiness threshold, all Royal Perks and Skills will be removed upon death.
Quest: Windere Developnt.
You are tasked with ruling and improving the happiness of Windere. Should you succeed, the curse will be removed and Bundeus will grant you one unique perk of your choice. If you fail, you'll be stripped of all Royal Skills and Perks.
Windere was a small Kingdom. Two cities, seven villages, one Dungeon access - I wasn't convinced they were separate Dungeons - the whole country was smaller than half of Rhode Island. The population's happiness was low. If I died now, I'd fail the quest. Unrest and the threat of war were the biggest problems. My antics at the military headquarters were still unknown but they would also be a huge hit to the happiness score. The population was around a couple hundred thousand people. Mostly humans. Their combination of fertility, industriousness, and the exclusive Perk acquisition system led to a big advantage for humans when compared to other species.
I knew instinctually that if I annexed a territory, that territory would beco part of Windere and the people living there would count against my population. Honestly, it was a pretty shitty quest unless I cheated.
The cheat was a simple one. I had no idea when Rosewise would die but she could technically live hundreds of years. I could trigger my own death at any ti using my other perks, even take out one of the curses in the process. But the only way I could guarantee happiness was if the population was the smallest possible. And composed of less fickle people than humans.
Honesty, humans are chaotic, greedy, and whimsical. The RPG gas never got that right, being anthropocentric and setting humans in the middle of the spectrum. Therefore, to complete the quest shoved on by the God of Humans, I would expel all humans from the country.
This place would allow only beast-kin, eleons, and elves to live within its borders. But unless I was willing to commit genocide again - I wasn't - I had to take it slowly. First, as Machiavelli said, I needed to entertain the minor powers so they butted heads with the greater, cull the greater powers so they weren't a threat, and block all foreign powers from getting a foothold.
I sent a royal summons to all nobles of Windere. They were to attend court within one week or face severe sanctions. I'd already killed several of their scions at the military headquarters. Couriers were sent to their estates.
I caught the forr Queen and family as they left the castle and adjusted their geas. They were forbidden from spreading rumors or denigrating facts about my rule. I also stressed that it was under pain of death for the whole family, should one of them break the geas.
Finally, I gathered all the castle staff and placed them all under a geas to serve loyally to their best ability. Their Soul Attribute was so low geasing them was basically free.
With that done, I slinked out and returned to the Eleon village.
I spent two days in the village. Halyle was finally hired as my daddy's apprentice and that let him have more ti to bake a ton of bread for . He confessed he didn't know why I needed that much bread but I couldn't tell him. His fruit and honey bread would be my comfort food for many lives to co.
I went around asking the eleons how they felt about the current kingdom. Most didn't care so long they were left alone, but so resented them for collecting taxes and not offering protection. My next question was only for the elders. I asked if they would follow if I wanted to forge a nation for the Eleons and other likeminded races. From the way Lorna and Eric treated when they discovered I was the Were-kin Matriarch, I knew I could count on the beast-kin for my new nation.
Kick the humans out, annex the Eleon territories, release and rescue the beast-kin, as most of them were enslaved. Kick the shit out of the neighboring Kingdoms. That was my plan.
But I wasn't alone in this life. I had people that relied on even though they could very well strike out on their own, given that the lowest level among them was in the early sixties. I sat with Lorna, Eric, and Kazuyran and explained to them what happened. I used my {Suppress Curse} for the first ti to allow to speak normally about gods.
At first, the cat-kin siblings didn't believe, until I showed them my {King} title and used {Royal Order} on them. The dark elf [Assassin] had not a shred of doubt. In act, I could see in his eyes he was ready to take on so contracts to put the nobility in their place.
Then Lorna broke all the tension. She hugged and asked, with a tone that could be either serious or mocking, "So, do I get to be a [Queen], my liege?"
I laughed. "Are you sure? I've been one, and it is all work, work, work, a bit of luxury, and no fun. When you wear the crown, everyone is your problem."
"A bit of luxury? If a bit of luxury is that elven bed, I'm in," She said.
Sotis they spin by happenstance, sotis by predetermined events. And in others, by levity. But they are unstoppable, whichever forces make the wheels of fate spin.
"I hereby declare Lorna my wife, Queen of Windere," I said.
A surprised cat-kin girl scread in surprise and jumped on her feet. With trembling lips, she said, "I can't believe it."
{Appraise} showed she had the title.
{Queen}
Level 63
Only then I rembered Lorna had no option to turn off her title display. Anyone that used {Appraise} on her would see the title.
"We need to take you to Windere now, Your Majesty," I said. "You are no longer safe in this country. Kazuyran?"
"Yes, sire?" He replied with a smirk.
"Maybe we should fire all the servants. Pay each of them a gold coin as a severance bonus. We are all moving to Windare, after all. Now that Lorna is a {Queen}, she can't stay here anymore."
Damn. That title blunder moves my tiline forward.
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