Altura

I sighed as I sat down at a table. After the conversation with the King had ended, I had returned to going through the list of candidates, attempting to screen their number. The process was being objectively tedious.

And then a ring, quite literally, fell onto the paper. Shortly after, a note arrived.

The ‘warehouse’ at Cilanthra has been dealt with. The ring that should accompany this note is a Spatial storage device that contains the wealth stored within that ‘warehouse’. The slaves held within have also been routed to your valley, you are to facilitate their reassimilation into society. This is a royal order.

The royal inquisition has also suffered a change in leadership due to its dealings with the organization. I must, sadly, inform you that no action shall be taken against the Shadow Prince directly, doing so would be tantamount to declaring war on the Confederacy, something the Jade Sect would be happy to aid them in doing.

However, I have gained the Jade Sect’s support in cornering and removing the organization from our combined territories. Though I have no doubt that this endeavor will fail, it is my hope that any success it has will be a move towards peace among the two nations. To that end, an envoy of the Sect will be arriving in a few weeks to collect the painting. It is apparently a valuable mural from the time of the Sect’s founding.

I would also like to ask you to convey to the royal archives, within the next two weeks, a name for your duchy. The archives currently hold no record of its existence, and that is a travesty I wish to have corrected post-haste.

[Royal Seal]

And there was that. I now had a Spatial Ring. Now was there anyone that would bet me any amount of gold that this ring was activated by sending Qi into it? No takers? Well, guess I’ll just have to see the insides for myself then. I could think of a name later.

I sent a bit of Qi into the ring, letting it seep into the apparatus, And there it was! The ring contained several ‘mountains’ of stuff. Perhaps because I wasn’t a real Xianxia MC, I hadn’t received literal mountains. It was just a few big piles of stuff.

First, there was a pile of gold. A self-explanatory pile that likely held millions of gold. Then there were the Spirit Stones. Another self-explanatory pile, considerably shorter, but it likely held more wealth.

Besides that stood what I called the ‘miscellaneous’ pile. It consisted of odds and ends, things I had no doubt were useful magical items, I could see a few communicators in there after all, but I had no idea what most of them were.

Then there were the clothes. From ‘scandalous’ and barely covering to a full court dress with a corset. I hated corsets. It was best that all of the socially acceptable portions of this pile be donated. I was sure there were plenty of people that would love some clothes.

Behind that, towering over the pile of clothes, stood the food pile. The way it was stored was clearly supernatural, forming a pyramid shape floating in the air, assuring that none of the food touched each other.

But it did leave me with a problem, the food would likely spoil in a few days. The ring might have a food saving feature, but I did not know that for sure. And risking it would be foolish. It was a lot of food, enough to feed the entire City.

“Excuse me, your grace.” Hagril said, knocking on the door.

“Yes, Hagril?” I asked back, straightening up.

“General Aswelth has returned from his foray into the tunnel and wishes to meet you.” Halgril replied. Huh. That was fast.

“Send him in.” I replied.

Aswelth entered the room and bowed to me, saying, “I fear that the tunnel has been forcefully caved in, your grace. I was able to push through the rubble all the way to Cilanthra, but found myself blocked there. I believe an extremely powerful individual has shaped the walls there recently, preventing me from doing so.”

“Yes. The King just contacted me and informed me that he has ‘dealt with’ the slavers. Apparently, we will be responsible for rehabilitating the slaves. Of course, we also receive the rewards from the raid.” I said, handing Aswelth the ring.

Aswelth gave me a weird look as he held the ring, presumably sending Qi into it. “That is a bountiful harvest, your grace, but if it is not too invasive a question, why have you not bonded with the ring yet?”

“Bonded?” I asked back, I had no idea what bonded was. Given the context, however, it was likely similar to how Spatial Rings were ‘bonded’ to people, so only they could access them.

“Have you not received the notification, your grace?” Aswelth asked. Ah, notifications. I suppose I should unarchive them.

‘System, unarchive notifications.’

Notifications unarchived

Qi gained!

Thirty-one Early Plantling Stage attackers killed: 600 Qi gained. Qi gain heavily reduced due to limited aid from allies.

Twenty-three Mid-Plantling Stage attackers killed: 900 Qi gained. Qi gain heavily reduced due to limited aid from allies.

Thirteen Late-Plantling Stage attackers killed: 1300 Qi gained. Qi gain heavily reduced due to limited aid from allies.

Total Qi: 2800

Present Qi: (5910+2800/9600) = (8710/9600) Qi. Level up requirement has not been reached.

Organization founded!

Unnamed Educational Institution.

Qi gained!

+300 Qi

Present Qi: (5610+300/9600) = (5910/9600) Qi. Level up requirement has not been reached.

Spatial Ring detected!

Bonding request detected!

Allow bond? Yes/No.

Yes, System. I thought as another window appeared before me.

Bond complete! Ring currently holds:

13 million units of gold. Due to uniform shape, the ‘gold coin’ has been determined to be a standard unit.

3 million units of Spirit Stones of varying quality.

3700 magic items. Functionalities vary.

3100 units of clothing. Size and shape vary.

One hundred Quintals of food items. Quality, rate of degradation and taste vary.

A nifty little breakdown. But what did worry me was the earlier notifications. Sixty-seven Plantlings? That was not a small force. The organization may have been more serious about this war stuff than I had presumed. And they would certainly be furious about this loss of manpower.

Hmm, I wonder if the System knew if food degraded within the ring. System, does food decompose within the ring?

Affirmative.

All the conditions necessary for degradation are present within the ring.

So I did need to do something about the food. Actually, did we have enough houses for people?

“Aswelth, do we have enough housing for all of the slaves?” I asked.

“I have been meaning to talk to you about this, your grace, we do not, in fact, have enough housing for even the miners.” Aswelth replied. Uh oh. “At the moment they have been sharing homes, and seem happy to do so, but I suggest that we do something to fix the situation.”

“Well, I think that means that you need to work with any Earth attuned in the guard to set up some housing. I shall set up the Administrative Wing in the meanwhile. This influx can serve as a test of capability for the applicants. I shall be watching, of course.” I replied. I had decided that since I had just received plenty of gold, hiring all thirty was an option.

Aswelth looked at me with a judging look before moving towards the door. “I just detected a large number of humans enter the valley There are a few thousand slaves, your grace.. I think it would be best to greet the slaves first before I begin building houses.”

“Yes, and I will start rounding the applicants up.” I replied as I followed him out the door. A few thousand slaves was too much. As soon as I was out, I took to the air, Aswelth doing the same. Racing across the City, I knocked on each of the applicants doors and asked them to meet me at the gate of the Roalt Mansion.

Thankfully, the City was small enough that it only took a few minutes for the applicants to come. The fact that they were all members of the guard and ran helped.

“Ok everyone. All thirty of you have been selected for the Administrative Wing. At the moment, a few thousand freed slaves are approaching the City. I will be hosting a feast to commemorate their arrival while General Aswelth builds their houses. Now your job is to document each of these freed slaves’ identity, their past location, any family members they would wish for us to contact, any affiliations and their profession.”

“Remember, depending on how things go, these freed slaves could be citizens of this duchy for a long time. It is quite likely that many will never leave, quite a few, I suspect, have no remaining families. During the feast, each of you are to organize a registration booth. Each of you is to document the details given in a System Note that will later be compiled into a single note by me. If you have not done so, then please think-System, activate Note SubSystem to activate the SubSystem.”

‘Remember, this test will decide whether you become permanent members of the Wing. While all thirty of you may be hired, I can decide that any one of you is not a good fit for the Wing. Now, it is best that we head for the city gate. Work awaits us.” I said as I rushed towards the City Gate.