I close my eyes while the dragon groans loudly inside of me. He does not look forward to having to deal with a puny noble and his inflated ego. "Did we bite off more than we can chew?" I slowly ask, feeling drowsy just from thinking about this "friendly talk."

Yunia gives my shoulder a light pimp slap and retorts with such a snooty elven tone that it actually gets me hard, "Oh, please, Wolfy. Imperial royals are leeches who abuse the fact that they're related to past emperors to intimidate others. You hold more influence in your draconic cock than they do with their whole, inferior, human bodies."

"Hey…!" Ciel cries out.

"You know what I mean…" Yunia tries to deflect.

"Is this a trap?" Lina asks out loud to stop the two from starting to bicker.

"Information gathering again," Alissa calmly answers.

And Yunia agrees, "Don't believe for one second that he's friendly. This Cleinias is our enemy, and he's just playing around with us, having us 'dance' with him just to see how we react."

"But why does he dislike us? Is he related to Katasko?" I sternly question.

"We can ask the officials at the embassy for what they know about him."

"Can he mess with Wolfy for humiliating his son?" Hana worriedly asks. She knows all too well the lengths that some nobles will go to just to get revenge for perceived wounds to their pride.

Ciel assuredly interjects, "Only if he wants a Mark. We have Templars that witnessed his provocation, and if we want to ask for a favor, I bet we could easily convince the Seekers of Truth to mediate."

Lina's Trivia: A Mark is the Templar way of saying that someone is on the naughty list, and if they continue with that behavior, they'll be getting a visit from the Punishers. Lower nobles and the commoners often rely on the Mark to protect them from bullying.

"He might ask for a rematch, now with enchantments allowed since he didn't use any before," Yunia points out.

My annoyance flares, making me groan out loud. I'm not one for duels, and I only challenged Alki-Alki at first because he was being a dickhead. I'm not a "you insulted my pride, so suffer for it" kind of dragon, but rather "you're too puny and insignificant for me to care." I only really get serious if someone actually threatens me.

"The invite also specifically refers to only you, Wolfy," she adds, a sympathetic smile growing on her pretty, red lips.

"I'll need mental support, please," I dryly request.

"Always," Alissa diligently replies.

"He might be a Decien, but don't let him intimidate you," Yunia encourages me.

Lina's Trivia: Decien is an imperial title that awards one thousand free imperial soldiers, but our Lordsguard is already twice as large as that.

It's just knights that we're lacking…

We go silent, and the girls start to comfort me, but then Hana turns around to take a look at our stone platform. The orb she was using is still there, though now, it isn't glowing. The psychedelic colors are all gone except for a small amount of light-brown elemental pseudo-mana, and it's slowly sinking into the platform as it absorbs the magically conjured stone.

"It used to absorb things faster, though… " She mumbles absentmindedly and decides to fly over there.

Once she gets her hand on the sinking orb, she notices that it's now extremely heavy.

I order the golems to help her out, and they bring the orb back to us.

Lina immediately notices that it isn't made of weak, magical glass anymore, so I put on [Jewel Appraisal] and use [Appraisal Eyes] on it.

Item Info

Material 'Diamond' Quality '100' Enchantments 'Irregular mana absorption enchantment; irregular elemental conjuration enchantment' Anomalies 'Highly irregular magical anomaly deeply ingrained within the item' ??? '???'

Lina guesses that it was previously made of poorly-conjured glass, which is why it was so fragile, but now, this thing can be called a proper Artifact.

"What do you think the last entry is about?" I question her.

"'Origin Insights,' but it requires either very high 'Wisdom' or historical knowledge, so something from the Dawn of Mankind would be unreasonably difficult to fully appraise."

My 'Wisdom' is twenty, which is damn high, so who would even be able to fully appraise this…?

"We can ask around at the temple," Ciel suggests.

Sure.

"What's up with all the 'irregular' stuff?" Roxanne curiously asks as she stares intensely at the diamond orb, as if just that would be enough to decode its secrets.

"That's just how Artifacts are," Yunia indifferently answers, and Lina nods in agreement.

We won't actually know what an Artifact does until we try it, but this one doesn't actually seem to be any different from the other orbs, it's just far sturdier.

Hana tries it out, and yes, it still works the same way, just slower and with less efficiency.

And Lina scholarly explains, "The previous material was more magical, so it had better compatibility with enchantments, but because it's 'irregular,' it's more chaotic and actually damaging to the jewel."

"I see a Symbol, can I go eat it?" Aoi suddenly asks, her tone as innocent as ever.

I smile kindly at her and nod. It's time to end our little break and continue exploring this dungeon.

We land before our guides, and I unleash my [Sexual Charm] on Penelope with a handsome smirk.

"I suppose we're now allowed to explore this area?" I politely ask, making sure that they understand I'm talking to both of them since I don't want to antagonize Nikolas further.

Lolo throws her floppy ear behind her back and crosses her arms in a sassy stance as she remarks, "Now we can actually help you with our knowledge because this area is full of hazards, but I have a feeling that you can just ignore most of them, anyway."

Hana replies in kind, "Well, we can all use [Fly], so…"

Lolo slowly nods. "Yeah, I think I'm already becoming desensitized to how eccentric you all are."

But the black wolf dude interrupts our flirting by asking a question with the "Charisma" of a rock, "So, where do you want to go?"

I politely answer, "Anywhere with monsters for us to gather Experience."

He nods. "Then let's go."

And Kyora moans while she stretches, "Oh, finally. I was getting tired of just standing around."

But before we leave, I want to make myself look cool for a bit.

I press and hold the nature elemental button in my mind, then I begin molding it to my will. After a good minute, I have a carriage-shaped elemental ready.

I turn back to them and smirk, then I press the mental button while I snap my fingers, "You're welcome to use this carriage if you don't feel like walking."

Lolo actually shows a small smile as she stares at the carriage, so I consider this a small success already.

Nature elementals are far more flexible than earth elementals, so the carriage shouldn't shake much if we don't go too fast.

Roxanne stays in the carriage like the lazy demon she is, and just to make a point, our guides choose to walk.

We'd like to inspect the suspiciously low clouds, but both of our guides explain that they're just like wild tesla coils that shock anything with a soul, so everyone but Hana gives it a hard pass.

Nikolas quickly shows his expertise by guiding us around anything remotely toxic/poisonous/venomous, which is basically all of nature here, animals included.

Penelope's specialty is spotting hidden monsters and animals, of which, there are surprisingly a lot. Like how we can easily create underground bunkers with [Earth Magic], the Symbols manipulate the elements to hide within them for sleep or to soak up the elemental mana like a damn plant.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

Their hiding spots are pretty far from each other, further than even Alissa's [Sense Soul] range, so Lolo's expertise is essential for us to plot the most monster-dense path for us to take.

The animals here are surprisingly vicious, too, and they all have an elemental theme, but what's most impressive is that they're incredibly similar to modern monsters, which implies that they're the source concept that the monsters were originally based on.

We see the Zinotue, an electric tiger; the Burkanolf, a fire wolf; Wysarie, a feathered wyvern, though only the animal version can use Wind-attuned magic; Giant Turtles with stone carapaces; and Cloud Snakes that can solidify into ice. All of these are animals instead of monsters.

We don't get too far into the valley, though, as lunchtime soon comes, and since our guides are adventurers, fine meals would be lost on them, so I decide to show them the wonders of hamburgers.

We stop by a spring of clear, non-toxic water that continues down the valley and further on merges with the stream of lava, creating a misty zone that ends at a large pillar of magical ice, which has turned the molten rock into obsidian.

The complete lack of trees and other tall plants makes this view oddly barren, reminding me a bit of the cold alpine tundras of Earth.

A flaming meteor lights up the sky, which is still completely white, not even blue, making it seem even more barren than the landscape below it.

"There were no stars until the Age of Oppression began, so nobody cared about the sky," Lina cryptically shares, and I give her a head pat while we sit at the table.

Kyora sniffs the air and notices the delicious aroma of fried hamburgers, which activates her instincts. She almost leaps onto her seat and exclaims, "Thanks for the food!" Then starts devouring her food.

But Poppy just stares at her sandwich and frowns. "This is unexpected," the cute little girl flatly states.

Alonso rolls his eyes and quietly grumbles, "You don't need cutlery."

She slowly turns to him, and her frown deepens in worry. "I-… hands…?" She quietly hisses, sounding exasperated.

"Yes, your hands will be fine," Timas calmly reassures her and gives her little hand a squeeze.

She puckers her red lips, but none of her husbands or wife want to talk about her concerns, so she eventually gives in.

The surprisingly fastidious little girl uses a [Clean] magical tool on her hands and hesitantly grabs the hamburger, then she grimaces when a small amount of liquid fat reaches her fingers.

"Damn, this is pretty good," wolf man grunts as he wolfs down his food in clear contrast to her.

Lolo gives Yunia a curious look, and her brown eyebrows shoot up high on her forehead when the elven queen unhesitatingly begins eating her greasy hamburger.

Then I show them how to use purple not-ketchup, black not-barbecue sauce, and not-mustard to enhance the flavors.

"Eh, sweet," Kyora immediately dismisses the first two sauces.

"Hm~, sweet…!" Alonso has the exact opposite reaction.

"Shouldn't something this sugary be… quite expensive?" Lolo hesitantly questions.

Nikolas grunts and rolls his red eyes.

I grab the bowl of ketchup and begin, "The fruit that this sauce-…"

"Fruit?" Yunia haughtily interrupts, sounding a bit offended.

"Fruit…?" Lolo repeats with an amused smile.

I narrow my eyes in annoyance and grumble, "Alright, what is it, then?"

"Tomafingers are just vegetables," Yunia slowly explains, delighting herself in pronouncing that abomination of a name.

I wet my lips and calmly continue, "We don't need to use a lot of sugar because the vegetable that this sauce is primarily made of is actually quite sweet already, but the High Forest produces a lot of sugar, so even this amount isn't expensive."

Timas politely interjects, "For you. If you don't live in the High Forest, white sugar is still a luxury."

I smile back and reply in kind, "I wish to one day lift the restrictions on exports to allow more elven products to spread throughout the realm."

But nobody has anything to add about that since they have no knowledge of elven politics.

"So, how did you two learn about this place?" Alissa expertly moves the conversation forward.

Lolo throws a coy glance at Nikolas as she bashfully reminisces, "We were just kids running around the Labyrinth, trying our luck to score it big when we saw that ominous elevator."

Roxanne's orgasmic voice echoes inside my mind as she passionately begs, "They're childhood friends! NTR him! NTR him! Please, Wolfy!"

The other girls aren't proud to admit that Roxanne's cries have awakened something depraved within them.

Thankfully, Nikolas immediately continues the story. "I broke my arm trying to block a Symbol's attack, and we immediately ran away," he reluctantly shares the unpleasant memory.

She almost touches her ear with a greasy hand but stops herself midway and then rests both of them over her lap in a girlish posture. "But we were stupid and came back, this time with spears."

They glance at each other, and a smile creeps onto his lips as he adds, "Which the Symbols immediately stole and tried to use to turn us into roasted wereanimal on a stick."

And the bunny girl excitedly rocks from one side to the other on her chair, making her long ears wave about. "But this place just kept calling to us, so we tried again and again, just the two of us, until we finally got past the 'tests.'"

Then his smile turns wistful as he looks around. "And that unlocked this beautiful landscape, full of hidden dangers and exciting things to find."

"Are there any ruins?" Lina asks with barely contained excitement.

"There are. We can guide you there," Lolo kindly answers.

Once our lunch is over, we move on again and enter a forest of ice and obsidian pillars, all shaped awfully similar to humanoids. A few Symbols are hiding inside them, but both Alissa and Lolo can easily spot them, so we have no trouble here.

The valley starts opening up into a swampy area that's quite toxic, but Nikolas quickly guides us around the hazardous areas while Roxanne has everyone drink antidotes just in case.

I shouldn't wait too long to meet with Cleinias, so I open a [Gate] back to the embassy and request whatever information we have on the dude.

After the maids give me a quick wash (and I leave the youngest red in the face, in awe at the size of my cock), they give me the diplomat's report on Cleinias.

He's a decrepit old man involved with a human supremacist faction. He's over 200 years old, way past the age that he should remain as the head of his family since his body is failing quite badly, so others are questioning whether or not he's becoming senile.

Known to be talkative and scheming, his allies are all humans, and almost exclusively imperials, while most of his opponents are wereanimal imperials as he's not been known to involve himself much with matters outside the Mainland. The diplomat guesses that his agenda is imperial assimilation of all territories, but lopsided towards the human side.

The supremacists aren't actually "kill all non-humans" because we were all created by the same God, but they do believe that since humans were the first, they're also the "most important," or "original," or "superior," or any other similar concept. They're in favor of anything that leads to non-humans being treated as second-class citizens while humans hoard all positions of power.

Considering how Ciel is the only human in my harem, I don't think we'll see eye to eye.

"I'm certain that he's someone high up in Katasko," Yunia affirms.

And Alissa adds, "But I don't think the people who tried to recruit us were powerful like him. Their attempts were too feeble."

I sigh and nod as the maids help me put on my best, tight, elven vest and pants, then I head out.

To get to Cleinias' home is simple. I take an [Eternal Gate] to the Throne, then I pass through an ID check and take another portal to the higher levels, which are above the clouds.

The kaleidoscopic hall I exit into is similar to the one at the middle levels. It's very wide and tall, but the colorful, patterned tiles show the heraldry of the royal families, and the stained glass windows depict the history of each of the Emperor's wives.

And the big dick has a lot of wives…

The most striking thing is how different the racial distribution is from the lower levels. It's almost all olive-skinned human imperials, with a few weredogs, werecats, and dragonkin here and there. The Emperor's harem is actually much more diverse than the people here. In fact, there doesn't seem to be any humans in it.

I cross the hall, ignoring the stalls of insanely expensive goods, and take a cage-like elevator to Cleinias' mansion.

The view up here above the clouds is impressive. The east is full of dark thunder clouds while the west looks like an idyllic grassland out of a fairy tale.

Are isekai novels modern fairy tales?

People believe that either the Throne or the Emperor himself controls the weather around here, and that's why there are no regular thunderstorms in the capital like there are in the rest of the Thunderplains.

After a mere minute, the stone-faced elevator operator announces that we've arrived, so I turn around and observe the stupidly tall, but not particularly wide white mansion in front of me. It seems to be three-storied, but imperial mansions usually have such high ceilings that they could have easily fit twice the number of floors in the same overall height.

An old, beardless, gentle-looking imperial man with small oval glasses is waiting at the door to the elevator, and once my eyes fall upon him, he bows deeply and politely requests, "Lord Ryder, I'm Sebastian. We've been expecting you. This way, if you please."

I hum, and he ends his bow, then he waits for me to approach before he turns around and walks towards the mansion.

I want my own Sebastian. Can I get a female version? A… Sebastienne? Sebastiana…? Meh… The truth is, Poosh is all I need.

We cross the wide brick street that spirals up the Throne, then we enter the mansion's grounds, and I immediately feel the annoying sensation of having my [Gate] blocked. I just ignore it and observe my surroundings, but I quickly notice that there's a conspicuous lack of green decorations, the architect preferring dozens of springs, a few gazebos, and two large dancing squares instead of anything alive.

Then we enter the mansion proper and walk across a wide floor of dark-blue tiles with colorful jewels encrusted all over them, making it look like a rainbow-colored night sky, but halfway through, I notice that the jewels are actually dragon scales.

None of them are from a Symbol of Might, so I don't feel anything but the faint latent magic in them. There's most likely no deeper meaning to it since everyone loves to decorate their stuff with pretty dragon scales.

Sebastian takes me to a side wing, then stops at the door to a comfy, carpeted room with warm tea and cookies.

"I'll inform Decien Alkibiades that you've arrived. Please wait here. You can call for a servant by using this enchantment," Sebastian announces and touches a large yellow gem embedded in the wall, then he bows and leaves after I nod.

I'm neither hungry nor feeling like drinking poison, so I just sit down and wait.

An hour later, I start to get quite irritated.

"Yes, he's deliberately making you wait as a show of power," Yunia slowly affirms, seething just like I am.

While the girls are having fun exploring in the dungeon, I'm forced to sit here and wait like a fool.

"I'm sorry, Wolfy," Alissa guiltily apologizes.

"You don't have to apologize. Just have fun for me," I immediately retort.

I start pressing the "drop [Gate] coordinate" button inside my mind out of impatience. It's kind of weird feeling the coordinate "slide away" for a meter before disappearing. It's just like how [Dead Zone] pushes away my "targeting" for projectile spells.

Just out of curiosity, I put on [Sense Soul] and make a mental map of this place. Surprisingly, most of the mansion seems empty except for a small human on the third floor working away while sitting, who I assume is Cleinias, and a group of humans moving around inside a room, which I assume is the kitchen.

There's something weird about this mansion, tho…

Since there's nobody around to stop me, I decide to explore a bit, but I quickly realize that there's not much to see.

Guest rooms, ballrooms, indoor pools, storage rooms, empty rooms, libraries, and a creepy room full of statues, none of which particularly interests me. Dozens of portraits of similar-looking imperial men and a few women line the corridors, the previous heads of the family, and I admire the hotness of the women for a bit. I also pass by some heraldry here and there, but it seems like the Alkibiades family hasn't done anything particularly noteworthy in its entire history.

The lack of sexual stuff is surprising, or maybe I'm just biased.

Then I notice that my [Gate] coordinates are all sliding towards one room in particular, a library near the center of the mansion.

Suddenly, I feel a familiar "itch" inside my head, practically begging me to enter the library, and I immediately move to do so, my mood completely shifted from boredom to serious determination.

One of the Gods wants me there, and I need to know why.

I enter the small library and follow the "coordinate" as it slides towards a book-filled wall, but when I stop before it, I don't know what else to do.

I stare at the books, and even the girls help me out, but none of us find anything noteworthy.

What the fuck do you want me to do…?

The "itch" grows stronger, urging me to follow the coordinate as it slides into the wall, so I do my best, pressing my body against it…

Then I put the coordinate down one more time, and it sticks. Out of the entire mansion, there's a single, one centimetri cubed spot where the [Gate] scrubber doesn't work.

The fuck…?

Then I turn around and almost squeal in surprise as I see Sebastian just standing at the doorway, staring intensely at me.

"Decien Alkibiades will see you now," he announces, his tone completely devoid of emotion, then he turns around and starts walking without waiting for my response.