The winter passed by quickly like all the other ones, with only a few interesting things happening like me creating and granting knowledge to a few inscriptors, and a trial stone house being completed by CG1.

This, of course, allowed me to bypass stone housing, and gave me further insight into how to make and design such houses, and after a bit of going through my knowledge, I was able to come up with a better design than what we’d done with this experimental house, that would need to be destroyed as it wasn’t really built well and may prove dangerous to any inhabitants.

The new family house I had in mind would have a stone foundation, a stone fireplace and a chimney, but other than that, it’d be built with half-timbering, meaning that first a timber frame would be constructed, and then it’d be filled with stone.

Of course this would require quite a bit of stone, around 10 tons of it to be exact for a single house, which was... a lot. But not an amount that couldn’t be mined in a few days.

The main problem would be the masonry, but that could be solved with simply throwing more men at the problem.

And, not counting the time required for masonry and mining of the stones, 35 construction workers could build one of these houses in 3 weeks, the same amount of time that our current houses take to build.

And, also, by the end of winter, we had grown to 288 people, 8 of which I made just to fill the barracks the CG4 made from combining 2 houses inside the first wall, and renovating them into a barracks fit for 20 people, which I filled with members of our current military, which was composed of 17 regulars, 2 squires, and 1 knight.

Then, I made 10 into construction workers, and made them join CG4, 4 of them into quarry miners, 8 into masons, 4 into inscribers, and another 5 into officials which would help me run this town, and any future ones.

We had 1 farming official, which would be the one paying the farmers for their harvest, take account of our food supply, and sell it to the cooks. Another one who was in charge of paying wages to all of the government workers, another two who were in charge of the mines, the quarry, and the smelters, and the last one was in charge of the exploration of the world.

And yes, this exploration was charged with colonial intentions.

But, in my defence, there are no other sapiens in this world other than the 288 people in my empire, so, no, you cannot compare me to people like Columbus and the people who gave him the power to inflict pain on innocent people for profit.

I am morally correct in my colonialism.

Anyways, other than combing 2 houses into one and turning it into a barracks, CG4 had also renovated the treasury building, which had all of our money and paper as I couldn’t be bothered to make a proper storage for them, and another one of the houses into an armoury.

And I had moved into one of the family homes myself, and moved one of the ministers into the other one.

And about my old hut, it was gone. I didn’t bother renovating it to cramp more people into the inner wall as we wanted civilians out of the inner wall, not more of them to be in it.

We’d also have to slowly start moving the people still living in the huts into proper houses too! But housing for them would be build by CG4, whose workers were helping CG2 and 3 as the farmers had returned to their field for a few weeks, and some of the farmers would be gone for longer than normal as we’d need to leave 80 Hectares of farmland fallow this year, lest we destroy them slowly.

Now is there anything left that I should talk about... ah, yes, how the soldiers are distributed.

The squires and Jonathanne each take 2 soldiers with them and guard either the mines or the quarry, so 9 soldiers go to just defending our outpost, and another 5, who are under the exploration official, are sent on exploration missions.

Which leaves us with 6 soldiers at home, 4 of which patrol around the town, with the other 2 defending the treasury and the armoury, which are next to each other.

And that’s everything that has happened so far, I think.

The only other thing you need to know is that I am not rushing to complete Side Arms, but the inscriptors are working on magical weaponry, and their inscriptions should make the swords they are working on more durable, and sharper, but no flaming swords for now as that’d be too expensive to make right now, and would take a few months to make by a few inscriptors.

After a few days after the first permanent exploration party set off, I suddenly completed a secret quest that I rather wished I hadn’t.

*ding*

Secret Quest First Dungeon completed! Rewards, 10 Exp + 1 Research Point have been granted in the Empire

“Well, that’s... concerning.” I muttered, and thought about how far the dungeon they discovered must be, as they had gone down stream for their first exploration, and if my calculations are correct, they should be around 90 kilometres away from the town.

Which was... far, but also, they had been ordered to simply follow the river for a week, and then return.

So, this discovery of their made me wonder what they had found, and if it was worth it to even worry about it.

“...It’s probably nothing to worry about though, as most dungeons produce only a few tier 2s, and no tier 3s. If its anything to worry about, they’ll return here in a few days, if not, they’ll talk about it when they return after a week...

“I should probably keep my eye on the population counter for today though.”

Then, on my 1.105th day in the new world, the exploration team returned, and their discoveries were not that interesting.

As they went south, they only saw forests, grasslands, and a few hills here and there, and a few more rivers joining this one down stream to create a bigger river which continued for further than they went.

When I asked them about the dungeon though, they couldn’t even answer where it was, or if they had even encountered one.

“So, it was just a normal dungeon...” I thought, which was to be expected, but still it made me calmer.

Then, I asked them if they had found any spots of interest, but they hadn’t found anything that was different from what they’d seen here. So, no interesting places to send settlers to, but that means any place is good as anywhere else.

There were a few people that were fine with settling outside the walls of the town, or to an elsewhere entirely, so I shouldn’t have a hard time finding people that are interested in starting villages, or hamlets.

I only need to decide on a spot to send them, and give them supplies and building materials to make their first few houses, then they’d become their own community with some trade between the capitol and them.

Repeat this for another few thousand times, and I’d have a vast empire.

The only problem is where should I send people to, and when...

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

A week after they had returned, the exploration group had started another foray to north, and a week after that, the farmers were done with their fields, and had returned to the construction groups.

And, more interestingly, a few of the farmers, who already had homes, wanted to move near their fields as coming and going from their homes inside the wall took a lot of time—which they could’ve easily used to take further care of their farms instead.

After talking a bit more with the farmers, I sent CG4 to start constructing houses on the other side of the river instead of inside the walls.

We had about a dozen farmers who wanted to move closer to their fields, so working with them, we should be able to build all the houses they need before summer ends.

Though it won’t be a proper village, I’ll still count it as one!

Another week later, the exploration group returned from their foray towards the north, and they found mountains!

I mean... I don’t know if there are ore deposits there, but hey, it’s a new terrain! So, I’ll take it!

Returning from the north, now the exploration group would take another 2 forays towards east and west, and then they’d start exploring our surrounding more thoroughly.

Then a few more weeks later, I stopped taking houses away from people in the inner wall, not because of an out cry or anything, just because we no longer needed them.

I’d be asking more to leave the inner wall in the future, or paying them to do so, as I wanted to have that fantasy palace that was directly in the middle of the town.

But I just didn’t need them to leave for now.

Then days continued to pass, and at day 1.240, which was only a month away from the end of winter, I completed a quest I was waiting for.

*ding*

Quest Magical Weaponry completed! Rewards, 20 Exp + 1 Research Point

have been granted in the Empire System!

Then I went to visit the inscribers, who had been developing their skills for the past few hundred days, and had managed to finally inscribe 10 swords.

After talking to them for a bit, I took one of the swords, and started inspecting it.

The inscriptions on the sword only improved their durability and sharpness like I said before, and the main source of mana for the swords were small finger sized mana stones that were inside the sword hilt.

And looking at the sword, I traced my hands over the inscriptions on their surfaces.

“Marvelous...” I thought to myself, and after congratulating the inscribers once more, I left.

Their job now would be to just continue improving and inscribing various tools, and improving their craft by coming up with new inscriptions, and ways to inscribe things.

And perhaps they’d come up with how to cast spells all by their own?

...Probably not, but I had something more important to think about right now, and that was the 3 research points in my empire system, and the 20 people who had started their own village.

And no, I wasn’t talking about the group of farmers that were building themselves homes, 23 people had asked for my blessing 2 months ago, at the start of summer, and had set up shop a few kilometres north of where we were.

I was, of course, sending them supplies to get them started, and had appointed a mayor to them, but they were doing well for a village right now.

And I was honestly ready to send the soldiers in case there were any monsters that needed to be dealt with.

But it seemed that they were doing well right now, and the only thing I’d need to do from now on was to just watch them.

Anyways, onto the 3 research points I had on hand, and the two researches I had my eyes on...

Emperor Skill Grant Title – Allows you to grant titles and fiefs to individuals that’ve caught your eye. The titles range from basic noble titles, like Mayor and Knight, to more advanced ones, such as Duke and grand duke, and, if you are feeling spicy, king and queen. The titles have requirements that need to be met to be granted, but also provide boons upon those who have them.

Titles can be passed down to only 1 blood related heir, if there are no blood related heirs, the title will not be passed down to anyone. – Costs 3 Research Points

Divine Inscriptions – An information packet about divine inscriptions. Will lead to more researches. – Costs 1 Research Point

I wanted to get the skill grant title, to give Jonathanne and Jacque, the mayor of the village, actual titles and the boost Rae was talking about, but Rae had also told me a bit about what Divine Inscriptions would lead to, and I was honestly quite interested in the “Altar Of Life” she talked about.

Altar of life was basically a transportable version of my skill, Create Homunculi, but it could be used by people other than me, allowing me to just hand them out to villages and towns and allow them to unnaturally grow as well, but... did I need it right now?

I mean, I have quite the nice population growth going on right now, and after I build another granary this winter and make a few dozen more farmers, I should have no problems with food as well.

And the only settlement I have other than the capitol is a nearby village, that is still being set up, so... is there a reason to try and overcharge population growth?

But on the other hand, this is also the right moment where I should try and overcharge population growth as I am just now starting to expand properly, and this year I only have 1 village, next year I’ll have 3, the next 7.

So, giving them the opportunity to grow like the capitol does should be a good idea... no?

“...Yeah... if I want to take over the planet, I need more people, and overcharging the population now, will allow me to have more people in the future...” I muttered, and moved my hand onto divine inscriptions, which revealed another 2 researches to me, other than granting me the said divine inscriptions.

Blessing Altar Of Life – Grants you the knowledge of how to construct an Altar Of Life, which can be used by Homunculi to create new Homunculi without the need for nasty stuff. Has the same limitations as your Emperor Skill Create Homunculi. – Costs 2 Research Points.

Blessing Altar Of Classes – Grants you the knowledge of how to construct an Altar Of Classes, which can be used by other Homunculi to grant themselves a class. There are other limitations placed upon other Homunculi, but most of the other limitations are same—like the inability to grant more than one class to themselves, and forgetting the knowledge gained if they do so. – Costs 2 Research Points.

Knowing what I was here for, I researched Altar Of Life too, and my mind flooded with knowledge on how to construct the altar.

But there was a problem I was seeing with this, and it was the fact that, these altars would allow for an infinite number of Homunculi to be created from them...

“...Rae, can I rig the altars of life to have a set number of Homunculi they can create?”

“Hmm... yes, you should be able to do that, but if you rig them to let’s say create 30 Homunculi, they’ll only be able to create 30 Homunculi, and then they’ll be destroyed. No yearly regeneration or something like that. But... why want that?

“You are aware that you’ll have to constantly supply your towns and villages with new altars every few months, right?” Rae said, confused to why I would want such a thing which was... fair.

I mean, the only reason I wanted this research was to overcharge my population growth, so it didn’t make sense for me to limit the maximum number of homunculi a single altar could summon, right?

Well, that’s where you, and Rae, are wrong.

“Well, it’s just that... I don’t trust people to not exploit the altars that I give them.”

“Exploit them? How?”

“I mean... a homunculi can be created by any organic matter, yes?”

“...Yeah? So what?”

“Now, imagine that you are in the frontiers with your friends and family, people that you’ve known for your whole life. But there is a problem, you do not have any food, and don’t have any way to get any food.

“So, your only options are to starve to death, cannibalise one of the people you are closest to, or just gather a few branches from the ground, and have some fresh meat to eat in a few hours!”

“...I see where you are going with this, but isn’t this a bit... farfetched?”

“Absolutely! But I’ve lived with humans my whole life, and though I was a human supremacist in my past life, as humans were the only species I had known, I also saw first hand how vile people get while desperate, so I have no doubt people would sacrifice others that they don’t know to save themselves, and their family.

“And that’s not my only concern either, these altars are basically an infinite workforce—a recyclable workforce. You only need to force people into the mines, wait for them to die, get their corpses, throw in a bit of greenery, and voila! You’ve got an immortal workforce that can suffer forever for your gain!”

“...I think you are still being farfetched, but I do see your point.”

“Well then, how easily would it be for me to rig the altars to create only a set number of people? And yes, before you ask, I am going to guard them, extensively, and only nobles will have access to them, and all of them will have to go through me.”

“...Why are you saying the obvious to me? How many times do I have to tell you that, while I may look like a human child, I am anything but so!”

“Oh, I would never call you dumb.”

“...I can remember vividly you doing so.”

“Well... that was in the past.”

“You acted like I was dumb literally 10 seconds ago.”

“What can I say? I am a changed man!”

Rae then rolled her eyes, and another blessing appeared my system window, and clicking on it, I saw a step-by-step guide on how to make an altar of life, and how to rig it to only allow for a certain number of people to be summoned through it.

This thing totally could be mass produced, as the inscriptions on it could be copied even if people didn’t know what their meaning was.

“...Maybe deciding to rig them was a bad idea... I mean these things are going to take a lot of time to make, and even more to rig...”

“Don’t worry, my priests will help you!”

“...And what makes you think I’ll trust them to not make their own altars in secret and sell them?” I asked Rae, sceptical.

“Don’t worry, I’ll just smite them if they do!” She then said, with a weird smile on her face, and I wasn’t sure if it was supposed to somehow make me feel better, or if it was just her being a sadistic little brat... but oh well, I guess I’ll have to trust her for this one.