Roland
As Roland watched the two men fight, he felt really small. They were outside the new capital, next to a large lake about 500 kilometers away from the center of the continent, and Shadow thought it would only be a couple minutes until the System recognized him as ruler of the planet, so almost his entire government in the area were in attendance, some 10,000+ people. But no one was looking at him.
Skies above, even Roland wasn’t paying any attention to the upcoming event.
Guardian and his new subordinate, who Shadow referred to as Dragon, were fighting over the lake, Guardian using a bastard sword and Dragon using a spear, and they were moving faster than almost anyone among his government could follow.
Roland, who had the highest perception of any of the natives present, could only see their movements because he was sufficiently far enough away, and he would instantly die if he were to face either one of them.
The new man, apparently one of the invaders who’d been betrayed by his people, was huge, even slightly bigger than Guardian, with the lighter skin tone which Hirans would have associated with slaves pre-integration. Given his indigo reptilian eyes and short lavender hair, however, no one would confuse the living force of nature for a native.
Unlike Guardian or Shadow, he obviously had a combat focused class, with a powerful attack skill, a powerful defensive skill, and a very impressive boosting skill he seemed to be using all the time, but the biggest advantage he had over Guardian was his movement skill. It allowed him to move around in three dimensions with ease, both under the lake and through the sky, so, with the longer reach of his weapon, he was dominating the pace of the fight.
He wasn’t winning, however. As Dragon moved around in three dimensions and attacked, Guardian ran around the center of the lake, freezing the water below him with every step due to a pair of runes hovering around his feet, and he somehow dodged or deflected every single attack from Dragon, even with his much less elegant movement.
Guardian obviously had a large advantage in stats, even with Dragon boosting himself the entire time, but, to Roland at least, it was obvious Guardian was much weaker when it came to martial skill. He was just able to predict all of Dragon’s attacks and his Spirit stat was high enough his reaction speed was faster than Dragon’s.
If Guardian didn’t use any skills at all, it might be an even fight. Even though Guardian had many, many Law Larvae at early and middle grade, Dragon seemed to have three Law Larvae which could match him, and he was much more skilled with using his Laws, each of his three Laws—one which emphasized speed, one which emphasized defense, and one which emphasized attack—was perfectly suited for combat. But, while Guardian for some reason wasn’t using his telekinesis skill, he seemed to have two domain skills and they covered the entire lake.
One based on qi and the other mana, they appeared to allow Guardian to draw runic magic anywhere, and Guardian was using them to draw five to six powerful attack spells every second. These spells—mostly variations of wind blades powered by both qi and mana—were often created and launched in such a way at least a few of them weren’t dodgeable, forcing Dragon to use his defensive skill and Law. Given the difference in stats, however, they often still did damage even through Dragon’s defense, and the man was already covered with his own blood.
“Alright, that’s time!” Shadow yelled at the two from beside him, using the Universal Standard language Roland had recently gotten good enough to converse in, and the fast moving warriors stopped, Dragon landing on the ice created by Guardian. The two then ran toward them and Roland realized why Guardian hadn’t been using any psyforce techniques as, when Guardian used Telekinesis to speed up his movements, he was over three times faster than Dragon, even with the latter’s perfect combination of Law and movement skill.
“What do you think?” Shadow asked Dragon when he arrived, pointing at Guardian, no one but Roland and Uliana in the immediate area able to understand what they were saying.
“He’s incorporated his new sensing skills into his fighting style well and his bladework has improved to the point it is no longer a liability, but his sustain could still use quite a bit of improvement. He’s over reliant on his Territory greatly speeding up his resource regeneration at the moment and he has a tendency to overuse Laws he's trying to improve rather than those he's best at, which is great for practice but not for a real fight. Otherwise, under the condition he can’t use any psyforce techniques, he'll probably be able to beat me about fifty percent of the time with a few more weeks of training.”
Roland was confused, as Dragon’s words implied he’d been winning the fight which had just happened, and that hadn’t seemed the case. But then Guardian made some runes which gathered water from the lake and submerged both him and Dragon before sending the water back into the lake along with all the dirt and blood on their bodies, and Roland saw there wasn’t a scratch on Dragon while there were quite a few on Guardian.
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Dragon seemed to be a Vitality specialist and light injuries would mean almost nothing to him.
He also looked a bit annoyed about being submerged without warning, but he didn’t say anything.
As Roland was wondering if he’d ever get as strong as either of the two he felt something shift. It was like an earthquake, only, instead of the world shaking physically, it was shaking metaphysically instead, Roland’s magical senses going crazy for a few seconds.
Then the System messages arrived.
Congratulations!
You have been recognized as Sovereign of the planet Hira!
Your Territory New Raphaiya has disappeared and you now rule over the entire planet.
Then came the System messages about the status of his new Territory.
Hira (F++ rank planet)
The planet Hira, Territory of Lord Roland Raphaiya.
Lord: Roland Raphaiya
Overlord: Heavenly Spark Soul King
Benefits to humanoid population:
Qi, Mana, and Psyforce regeneration +6.25%
Qi, Mana, and Psyforce regeneration +6.25% further when in the rain
Affinity for all Laws +12.5%
There was a pause for a few seconds, then more System messages came.
The Apocalypse Style Integration of Hira is now over and the natives have achieved full victory.
Granting rewards based on contribution!
Rank 1: Shadow (All Stats +180, 1 medium System boon)
Rank 2: Roland Raphaiya (All Stats +24, 1 minor System boon)
Rank 3: Kimor Tal (Base Stats +3)
Rank 4: Geric Tal (Base Stats +2)
All stats have increased by +24 and you may choose one minor System boon.
“I would recommend increasing your Prodigy of the Blade racial ability with your boon, as you should be able to increase the other one on your own soon anyway,” Shadow said from his side, fully able to see all his System messages.
“And what will you be doing with yours?” Roland asked as he did as suggested, it having been what he was leaning toward in the first place.
“For what comes next, what I need most is stats, especially Luck, so I’ll be increasing all my stats by a further 144.”
With Shadow also choosing her boon, the System notifications then continued.
Rewards based on contribution done.
As Sovereign, you gain three separate rewards.
1. Interplanetary Teleportation Platform: You have 3 standard days to choose a location where the System will create a teleportation platform connected to the Universal Teleportation Network, which will allow those you grant access the ability to teleport off world
2. Status of Planetary Lord: Your Lord skill will be increased from Rare grade to Epic grade with the advancement pathway of your choice
3. Token of Trial (F rank): A System-bound token you may either take for yourself or grant to another cultivator, it will allow the cultivator to participate in the next Trial Tower. The Trial Tower is a test for F ranks which is run by the System every six years with valuable prizes the further you climb. The next Trial Tower test is in 24 standard days. No cultivators with E rank races or higher are allowed.
As agreed on earlier, Roland first granted the Token of Trial to Shadow. Then he chose to upgrade his Lord skill to the Epic grade Servant Lord skill, which strengthened the connection between him and Guardian, allowing for telepathic communication across galaxies and, in the future, even further as Guardian grew in power. More important, however, it also allowed telepathic communication with Shadow, as she was Guardian’s chamberlain.
Then, finally, he chose the location of the teleportation platform to be right where they were standing and a stone platform just appeared in front of them, about the size where six people could comfortably stand on it, though it looked like nothing more than a stone octagonal platform, no runes or any of the internal workings visible, at least not with his detection skills.
Guardian, on the other hand, seemed able to see inside the platform somehow as he started talking to Shadow excitedly about how it worked, everything going above Roland’s head.
“Roland, thank you for your work.” Shadow patted him on the back. “You now have a bit more than 70 years to prepare yourself for what is to come in the wider world.”
She then passed him an information orb and just a brief look at the information inside made Roland’s heart start to beat faster.
“I was lucky.” Shadow smiled at him. “There was a random orb in the Shadow Thief’s inheritance that happened to have the Raindrop Ranger class’s advancement paths up to C rank and the Shadow Thief let me copy the information. I also got a suitable cultivation technique for you and I managed to negotiate for a set of more common cultivation techniques and the class paths for most common and uncommon classes with simple requirements.
“All of that is in that orb and you can use it as Hira's inheritance.”
Roland was excited and he wanted to ask if there was anything more he could receive from the Shadow Thief, but what Shadow said next dashed his hopes. “I can't get any more resources until I hit D rank and I have to do so before Hira reintegrates with the universe or else the inheritance will implode in on itself. Sorry.
“Also, don’t let anyone head into the inheritance. The entrance is guarded by five E rank golems and they’ll kill anyone who tries.”
“Thanks for your patronage, Shadow.”
Shadow just nodded at him, as did Guardian, and then, seeing the other two do so, Dragon followed suit. Then the three of them disappeared. Shadow vanished from everyone’s senses, Guardian launched himself into the sky with Telekinesis, and Dragon ran into the sky like he was walking on the ground.