After guilt tripping some of my people and then have a goddess cheer me up after I fucked up horribly was what lead to the boom of industrialization. Even with about 100 people on hand, I began a really important project that led me to take control over the ocean and naturally all of the Mrentoni here.

After I stopped moping after I almost caused cultural genocide I got back into action really quickly.

First and foremost, before I cause another confliction between the cultural heritage of the Mrentoni and my human upbringing I set in motion many laws for the young Mrentoni. This ranged from laws about schooling and what should be taught. I stressed that our cultural pride should be driven in first, then behavior should be molded by the parents. Respect from the Honor hierarchy first, then equality second.

Equality doesn’t work when there is a ruling elite, even if they are benevolent and think about their people. The upbringing laws were now set in motion. Although I feel like dictating how people are taught is wrong but it’s necessary if I want my people to be educated, not prone to violence and that they care about necessary traditions.

That way, although I limit the freedom of choice from the people, they grow up to be a loyal and meritocratic ideologically. Great for leading an empire to my whims since they trust the leaders because they set that honor to them and they trust each other since they treat people like they would treat themselves.

Bad apples are naturally going to appear. No, they are almost certainly going to be there, not everything can be utopian but this is close enough. Essentially, I placed the building blocks for an Egalitarian Meritocracy where everyone has a chance to be a leader, given that they produce enough results to their own people.

I thought that I would need to take it slowly and build myself through the different technological ages but even I didn’t foresee a technological boom that came simply because I had the knowledge from Earth and that many easy to harvest materials are all beside Halamar. Really bloody lucky.

After setting the groundwork for what would become an unshakable government that would never have a revolution nor is under any civil conflict I began working with the science division to make the first engine.

Moruna told me to not rush since I am already ahead of everyone else. Come to think of it, she didn’t tell me where they are. Is there another Champion on Orinah? Whatever, I'm ahead, that should be enough.

Since my next goal was to unite the Mrentoni I needed a way to get around. An Engine is necessary to create a vehicle that will move underwater quickly. Meena and her crew got my details on what I need and I told them to find a solution.

Now I wait. I have done what I could. I’m no scientist so I cannot help, only give them the basics.

So, I ruled where I had to and taught Zarhan and Garran many things about politics. I told the most trusted people about me being immortal and Panara getting that gift as well. Now I told them that I will pretend to become old and die eventually but still actually be around in secret. They are tasked to find trustworthy Mrentoni under our rule to be their successors.

Zarhan and Garran who became the best of friends understood my reasoning. Meena already knew so she complied as well. Stalra was a weird bloke. He agreed to find a successor like everyone else but he seemed awfully envious of something. We never clicked together but I left him alone and he left me alone. However, I always seem to catch him sorrowfully glancing in my direction occasionally and I don’t know why.

Panara eventually agreed to become a ghost like me when it would be time for us to pass away. I promised her that when we eventually find a way to disguise her she can roam freely as she used to.

Time passes. With nothing to do but give vague descriptions of what I want to Meena and her crew and make diplomatic moves on the Boiran’s time has slowly passed.

Not many things happened for an entire year. My baby girl was born. Panara gave birth to Erika, as I named her. The sweet bundle of bliss has livened up our boring lives to unprecedented heights. With her pregnancy out of the way, Panara made herself known in the Coliseum that was built a month prior to Erika’s birth.

With her mother was smashing fish like there was no tomorrow and destroying all challengers single-handedly I had Erika all to myself. She had her mother's look. Rather she was almost identical to her mother save for her personality. She was a copy of me. Daring and curious as I was, she challenged me to many things when she first started to talk. She even challenged me to a fight. I showed her no mercy and destroyed her with tickles. What a cute little ball of bliss. She grew fast, like all Mrentoni in six months she was walking among us and building up her own honor.

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Time sure goes by fast when you spend it on what you like. She doesn’t start square one as most Mrentoni do when it comes to honor. She, being my daughter got some leeway in that regard. I personally taught her since her mother liked to be away at times and I basically stayed indoors like a NEET. Panara wasn’t that heartless to make me teach Erika. Rather the twin-like pair loved to have fought together, something that Panara passed onto her personality. With me giving her tips from the army I had, and her natural disposition to fighting, she was rather unmatched. Only me, Panara and a few others were able to best her in combat.

What a cute little ball of violence.

The other notable thing was that the Boiran’s discovered more deposits of Emmeraude around another river they found, so we had no lack of that any time soon.

Speaking of the Boiran’s, Morren was quite happy with the rubber we provided. They similarly used it everywhere and generally grew their fuck-off massive fort into something bigger. I still don’t understand how they are doing it. Do they die if they don’t build or something?

We introduced them to some more technical concepts we have developed and they grew alongside us. Even though giving an ally this much would be deemed stupid by many, I had to keep our flank friendly with us as they hold the key for trading with the mainland races and give us protection from the same mainland. They themselves wouldn’t want to betray us. We hold power underwater and the resources we exploit cannot be harvested by them in this day and age.

The Mrentoni and Harnashaa relationship were also growing. Some of our fellow Mrentoni are actively praising myself and the other councilors so the Harnashaa seemed to have grown interested in us. Some traders bring word that they wish to meet in person. But that wouldn’t happen for quite a while since they promised to come after winter subsides which is itself about halfway done wintering.

Similarly, to the research and production of the engine, I happened to drop the idea of suits to the science division. Rubber can hold itself together under pressure so using it underwater and on land could prove beneficial as it could alleviate some of our weaknesses.

The engine itself was hard to produce given we are underwater. This whole underwater business really slowed down some of our discoveries. Water can really mess things up sometimes. The engine itself is trying to use Emmeraude as a conductor of heat to transfer it into kinetic energy. Meena explained that my idea of basing the engine on Inferno Stalks really helped and this prototype is what her team and herself made. It looked clunky, crude and even sickly in some areas but to me, it proved that it can be done.

The way it worked was that the Inferno Stalks are fed water through a regulator pipe that gives it the food it needs to emit its lustering heat. The heat is controlled by switches that control the amount of heat that escapes into the Emmeraude piping. That heat is then burning a form of fuel to create pressurized steam which powers turbines. Confusing, yes. Working, maybe. The system works, however, the conversion is garbage, to say the least. The turbines move but slowly and don’t generate much power and thus the engine only creates a small amount of force that makes something move. The engine itself when left in the vacuum that is water moved slowly.

A working prototype is better than nothing so I told them they did a good job and need to find a way to increase the efficiency of the engine. Electricity is impossible underwater so Kinetic energy is what we could do realistically.

With the prototype tested and sent back to the drawing board, I had to get the forging team to finish something for me. We all used pickaxes to mine the rock, clay and the rubber but I proposed the concept of a drill to them. A hand-held drill that would be much more effective in mining. Naturally, these sweat torn muscle masses loved the idea and got to work on it and called me in to see if they did a good job.

Walking into the foundry that like everything in Halamar grew to accommodate new innovations and people. The Mrentoni inside all greeted me and presented their drill to me.

Never doubt a master's hand. It’s almost identical to what I drew it like. A drill that will pierce the heavens! Something like that. The drill itself is attached to a small handle and is powered by hand moving the other handle in circles made the drill twist and drive through anything. Testing it out on some rock showed great results. The rubber grip made the drill easy to handle and not accidentally let go off. Really a perfect drill.

I instructed them to produce more and send them to the mining teams around Halamar. More progress made for the future. Skipping entire levels of progress to the most optimal one sure speeds things up accordingly. With the lack of farming since we don’t eat plants, we could focus less on hunting since the big berthas are massive already and a few could keep us going for some time.

The domestication of Big Berthas still had no progress so I shelved that project to get the engine up and running. We need one key step to domesticate them but we can’t find it.

All that was now left was to count the treasury. Recently, with trading our goods we made quite a profit of Carnash that was circulated between the Boirans and us from the Harnashaa. I considered to use the Carnash soon to buy some land of the Boirans and set up a small village for ourselves but I still need much more and Morren isn’t too keen on that idea.

The Boirans still have some healthy speculation from us being too close since all we do is eat meat and we generally overpower them. He is just paranoid since we have had a healthy trading relationship for quite a while now.

The final thing that I need to do before I can stop being active in our projects around Halamar is to set up a new name for what we shall call ourselves. A national spirit and set up our own flag. The final part to set up this kingdom would be necessary in order to bring the numerous Chieftan's under the rule of the council.

I have a name in mind in fact. Something that encompasses our identity and speaks volumes of our temperament.

Holaria.