There wasn't much to do on that island except relax. I didn't really do much of anything except relax.

There were a lot of fun activities. I decided I would do some, but I wanted a private booking, which would be free, like always.

I spent a few years in the forest, not doing much, really. I spent another few years in the mountains. Another few in the oceans. A few doing a mix of things.

Before I knew it, the vacation was over.

After the vacation was over, I went back to the grind. I made a schedule for how I would grind most efficiently. For eleven years, I would grind personal power. What I would grind would be whatever I needed most, which was mostly levels, and of course, the transcendence. The next eleven years would be dedicated to the Empire, with me conquering new lands. The final two years would be a vacation.

I was essentially making my days 365 times longer. I was conquering ten or so galaxies every "day." I decided that the 24-year day would be called a yed.

I really wasn't doing much. For the next eight or nine yeds, I just followed that rhythm. I hadn't leveled up yet, but the Empire was expanding nicely. I had also conquered two civilizations. One was a civilisation of humans that controlled a star system without magic. The other was a civilization of beings called halmans. Halmans were born at level 30, and were basically brutes. 10,000 base in all physical stats, but only 5 in mental stats and 10 in perception. Those mentally crippled idiots were usually just doing brute work in empires. A normal empire worked like this:

An emperor would be a superior race, that had a good Truth to make their race stronger. Nobles would be similar. Mages who did all the magical groundwork would be elves. Physical workers would be halmans. The thinkers, planners, and inventors, all the smart people, besides Emperors, would be namuhs. Humans would do anything. The superior race oversaw all those commoners. More ranks, for small divisions, like Sentinel, could be added, but I mostly just assigned a level 35 to oversee each galaxy. Of course, my great word was the law, but when I wasn't in that galaxy, the level 35 was supposed to govern the galaxy, although all major changes had to be run through me.

There were level 30s on each planet, who could, if need be, call me or a noble, in case of some absurd event, like level 55 worms that ate stars, so we could destroy the infestation. It had actually happened before.

So once, in the old empire, there was this level 49 spatial-aspected planet called Hamhar. It one day broke through to level 50, and a new kind of monster appeared.

They were these level 55 worms that ate stars. No one was watching, so the infestation got out of hand. For the next few centuries, the worms feasted, destroying an entire galaxy, with level 80 worms sometimes spawning. Once the worms managed to eat a level 95 planet, the capital of the Zol province, the most prosperous province in the empire (besides the emperor's province), the crown knew something was off. The emperor himself had to intervene to eradicate those worms.

Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

After that, a system was created where a level 80 (which was lowered to 75 by the corrupt emperor) guarded planets.

That system was mandatory in all provinces. I wasn't about to have a worm disaster on my hands.

Many nobles had also used the schedule I created.

I then took a break. For the 250th Sasomac day, a pure arcanite statue of me was being unfurled where I had been teleported to Earth.

After that, a special dinner would take place at the hospital, which had been turned into a palace.

As I got there, the statue was nowhere in sight. I figured it would be shipped to the spot.

The food was being cooked by the level 48 chef-yes, the level 45 chef had reached level 48.

I went to the throne. There were eight thrones. Seven were made of gold and wool. The highest throne was made of arcanite, with a gold frame. The wool, with it being yellow on the other thrones, was red. It was embellished with diamonds, rubies, sapphires, and topazes. It also had Greatite armrests. There was a constant flux of mana going through it that would increase my power. There was quite a bit of health and stamina carried by the mana, too.

There was also a tiny bit of essence in there. I was absorbing all the essence, but more kept coming.

All seven nobles stood and spoke in unison.

"We, the humble denizens of the Great Sasomac Empire, give our lives to our great lord, our great Emperor. We shall not say his name, but know that he is truly the greatest Emperor. We shall lay down our lives for his mere entertainment. Today, a celebratory feast is being held in honor of the 250th anniversary of the great day he reached diamond-category. With this, we shall feast."

A Greatite table floated up in front of me. Nobles got a large arcanite table for all seven of them, and commoners got a wood bench and wood table. It was mandatory to attend this feast, as it was an official celebration of the great Emperor.

The food was good.

I ate the most. 1/3 of the food was for me, 1/3 was for nobles, and 1/3 was for commoners.

After that was done, I got back the routine. Grind levels, grind planets, and then take a vacation.

Level 75 was a slog because every 10 exp you earned, you only earned one, as essence would auto-compress at diamond section. A new diamond section had a factor of 10. A level 80 had a factor of 15. A level 90 had a factor of 25. As things didn't change, a level 100 had a factor of 35. One mana from a level 100 was worth 10^35 mana from a level 1.

A level 150 had a compression factor of 85, meaning that they could basically fit all my essence in a fraction of a unit of essence. That effect was what made level gaps in late-diamond section insurmountable. It also made leveling up against level 70-80 monsters a living hell.

After killing many thousand level 70 monsters, I'd only get a single experience point. Monster essence was mostly absorbed by the planet too. Killing a level 80 only gave me a few scant thousand exp.

Whoever had designed that system knew that we lived forever, but made grinding a living hell. I decided I would make the system live in hell once I reached level 150, the system's level. Yes, the gap in power from level 149 to 150 was gigantic. To a level 150, level 149s' were mere cannon fodder. They could almost obliterate a level 149 with a thought.

So I would ascend to level 151 and be the system's system. It was an idiot for making grinding hell for me, the great Emperor of the great Sasomac Empire.

And I needed good subjects. So, I put the shoes back in the shoebox. I put all nobles in their level-up boxes for a century.

And I would grind hard. I'd kill the level 85 bosses I usually avoided.

It was time to make every single idiot pay for being an idiot.