Daz patiently listened to Crosius talk for a solid twenty-minutes. The elderly man seemed to enjoy speaking, or perhaps the sound of his own voice, but regardless, he had explained to Daz the answer to his two initially-rhetorical questions.
In different universes, basic laws worked differently. As an example, the laws of Laniakea - the universe that Earth resided in - didn't allow the hard metal substance that was ten times stronger than even carbon-steel, to be naturally formed. While it could exist in Laniakea, it could not be naturally formed.
However, in other universes, the story was very different. In essence, adamantium and adamantine were essentially the same thing, but with microscopic differences and wildly different formation rules.
One primarily came from the universe Darundum, while the other was exclusively farmed in the universe of Fel'raw - a pocket universe even smaller than Earth which was apparently owned by a super company under the system's management.
As for Sandy's buildings showing up on Fort Skip's status, Crosius had simply stated that this was solely due to Sandy buying a personal system upgrade which treated all of his buildings as system-made or system-purchased ones.
Daz stroked his jawline thoughtfully. "System upgrade, huh? Speaking of which, system, can you clean up the statuses for my bases and cities? It's honestly a lot of information to take in all at once in its current format."
Confirmed. The desired system upgrade [Territory Status Professional Overhaul] exists. It costs 25,000 merit points.
"Cheap enough considering how useful the statuses are. Buy it and confirm the purchase, please, system," Daz requested politely.
Confirmed. The system upgrade [Territory Status Professional Overhaul] has now been implemented for the host.
The total balance of the host is now: 169,088,244 [-25,000].
"Thanks, show me Fort Skip's status again, please. I'd like to see how it differs now," Daz requested and was promptly shown Fort Skip's information once more.
[Fort Skip] B-Rank Average Base Base Name: Fort Skip Base Owner: Daz Base Type: Castle Base Size: Average Base Stats Health: 500,000/500,000 Offence: 20,000(32,000) Security: 15,000(25,500) Defense: 15,000(30,000) Citizens: 743 Base Facilities
(Think about a listed facility size for specific information)
Tiny Small Little Below Average Average New Facilities
(Think about a listed new facility for specific information) None.
Daz nodded. "Okay, that's a lot better. Far easier on the eyes if I just wanna check the citizen count, which is certainly helpful."
Crosius didn't comment on how his lord was talking to himself. He had lived a long life and served many lords during it, so he was more than accustomed to even stranger habits than simply mumbling one's thoughts aloud.
"Your Grace, shall that be all you need of me right now? I hate to leave your side, but a lot of requests have suddenly started being issued. This is a fairly normal thing to happen after a system-held auction, but regardless, the current on-duty advisors are struggling somewhat to keep up with those requests on top of the new ones from the base's recent arrivals," Crosius explained as he craned his head in a perfect bow, making his long beard flutter about loosely.
Daz shook his head. "That's fine," he said as he reached into his pocket and took out his last remaining tangible auction prize besides his Fruit of Limitless Evolution - the City Creation Token. "I need to use this anyway, I just came here to think a little. The throne's very relaxing."
Crosius smiled warmly like how an elderly man might to his grandchild. "I'm more than pleased that it's to your liking. In fact, that throne, Your Grace, was commissioned by me, oh, how long ago was it now? Regardless, its creator enchanted it to clear one's mind, naturally, to make acting as a lord all that little bit easier. As for the materials, my, oh my, what an ordeal it was to commission those! I still reme-"
"Maybe another time, Crosius. Your advisors are waiting for your help, right?" Daz interrupted. He really didn't want to listen to the wise old advisor ramble on about a glorified chair for half an hour.
This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
Crosius coughed to clear his throat and he then stroked his beard in a sagely manner. "Ahem, right you are, Your Grace. Please, stay safe as you use that, and, I bid you farewell."
"Yeah, later," Daz replied before he left the audience hall, the keep, Fort Skip, and finally, Waterford.
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Now twenty-miles away from Waterford, Daz stood next to an abandoned highway as he looked at the rolling fields in front of him.
"This spot should be good enough. It's close to Waterford, but it's also on the way to Middletown. Sure, Middletown's still really far away, but at least it's better than a random position for a new city," Daz said to himself.
Reika floated down from his halo and positioned herself on his shoulder. 'Why does that matter? Are you not planning to buy a teleportation station for Waterford? Why does the distance between the cities matter in that case? We do not understand.'
"I'm gonna tax the usage of the teleporters. Tax and restrict. If I don't, they'll be too easy to exploit. Since I'm doing that, if I can make transport between the three cities easier, I don't see why I wouldn't," Daz explained.
Reika held her chin for a few seconds before she shook her head. 'We do not understand. We regret asking,' she said before she returned to her de-facto bed.
Daz smiled faintly. "I thought you'd know about this sort of stuff considering that you were the daughter of a ruler of an entire continent when you were alive," Daz said casually.
The soul of the demon princess sulked. 'Father delegated that stuff to his vassals, and even when he did directly manage it, we were a sheltered princess, so we only knew what the maids told us, which was minimal at best, not that it ever interested us.'
"You didn't care what your father was doing?" Daz asked.
The soul shook her head. 'No. At that time, all we wanted was a true friend and love of any kind to ease our loneliness. Father provided neither, so while we always hoped he'd care for us, we paid very little attention to him in the last few years before our death.'
Daz's face returned to being neutral. "You and I are more similar than you'd initially assume, it would seem," he muttered as he took out the City Creation Token.
Ignoring his emotion-laced whisper out of consideration for his feelings, Reika asked, 'What city will you build?'
Daz masterfully twirled the token between his fingers as he replied, "I have a few ideas. One is to make a city dedicated to producing something highly valued by the more powerful people out in space that have been living with the system for a long time, like Big Bo."
He started walking forwards towards the centre of a particular field. "Another idea is to make a city designed to house insanely powerful androids or robots or something to take advantage of the free ten-thousand citizens the system will provide."
After a short pause, he continued listing his ideas. "Another thought I had was to make a city that can move. Kinda like a floating fortress or something."
He sighed very softly as he stopped moving. "My last idea was to do all three, but the system already told me I can't. One major concept, that's all that's allowed."
Reika put a hand on her chin while the other supported her elbow. 'Hmm... Doesn't the first one sound dangerous? Won't it paint a big red target on Earth once the tests end? We are not smart, we admit, but we are also not stupid.'
Daz shrugged. "We'll have a target anyway, is the way I see it. Solely from the fact that Earth has so many evolved individuals, there's also my father's existence. It's easy to forget since he didn't really make much of a show during the auction, but he still almost interfered with the system."
'Hmm... That is true. What do your instincts tell you?' the soul asked curiously.
Daz shook his head once again. "That's why I'm torn. My instincts aren't reacting, meaning that each of the three options holds an equal amount of pros and cons."
'We see. Why don't you throw your unlucky dice? One and two for the flying fortress, three and four for the powerful citizens, five and six for the production city. Whichever one it lands on, you ignore. Do that again but with only two ideas in mind each with three numbers, then choose the loser. Easy, right?' Reika suggested with a proud smile on her face.
Daz looked mildly surprised for a moment before he grinned. "You can be really smart sometimes. I hadn't even considered using the dice to roll away the wrong choices. Good idea."
'Hmmpf! Of course our idea is fantastic! We are a genius, after all, Insolent Fool!' Reika puffed arrogantly.
Daz chuckled softly. 'Didn't you just say that you weren't very intelligent? Now you're a genius? Still, that was a good idea, so I'll let her bask in her pride,' he thought as he reached into his inner shirt pocket and pulled out Altros' Unlucky Dice Set.
As soon as he picked up one of the dice inside of it and rolled it with Reika's idea in mind, his luck plummeted to the heavy negatives just like when he had summoned the third king of the Astral Crystal Plane, Melophadite.
Once the dice had landed, Daz pushed some grass out of the way to see what number it had landed on. "A three, huh? So I shouldn't go for powerful citizens? Really? I was kinda expecting that one to be the right decision, honestly," Daz said to himself as he picked up the dice again.
At that moment, it started raining heavily. Looking up, Daz muttered, "I guess my luck is affecting the real world now as well? That makes sense. I was only in a training room before, so there wasn't much to affect in there."
He ignored the weighty droplets of rain that continued to shower him and his floating gem companions as he rolled the dice once again.
"A six this time... So I guess I should get a flying city?" At this point, it had started to hail large blocks of ice, but Daz still paid no attention to any of that.
He sat on the grass and held his chin. "Hmm... Let's reroll a few times with different hopes about these ideas in mind."
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Twelve rolls later and three lightning strikes to the head, Daz now had his conclusive answer. "So flying city it is."
He returned the dice to its box then tucked it away in his pocket. Almost immediately, his luck returned to its base amount of one-thousand now that the dice's intended purpose was over.
The rain, hail, thunderstorm, and heavy winds, all stopped at once, returning the bright sun and the beautiful blue skies to Daz's vision.
"What a dangerous item, this box. I wonder if I'd have died from those lightning bolts if I wasn't dependent on my lifeforce now?" Daz asked rhetorically as he, once again, grabbed the City Creation Token from within his front pocket.
"Well, anyway, System, Please use this token for me," Daz requested politely.
Confirmed. Using [City Creation Token.]
The token left Daz's hand and began spinning as it rose into the air. With a bright flash of light, it shattered into an uncountable amount of fragments.
[City Creation Token] successfully used. Please specify one main theme for the city.
"A moving fortress, preferably a flying one," Daz answered without any hesitation.
Confirmed. Please select 2 building types, the system shall add them to the city along with the (forced) [Gravitation Distortion Crystal Sphere], the (forced) [Manual Hyperial Laser Defense System], and the (forced) [Pironic Encased Bubble Shield].
"Oh?" Daz raised an eyebrow. "I get to choose some building types? Well then, a bank and a command centre-slash-place for me to run the city from, I suppose. Like my keep at Fort Skip."
Confirmed. Adding the buildings [Midechhe Travelling Bank] and [Grand City Hall].
After that notification, Daz and Reika watched in awe as an unbelievably large structure suddenly came into existence piece by piece as if it was being rendered into reality.