While I am listening to Stella talking about her previous life to Lucia, I go and check the development of my future monsters.

First, the squirrel. It is still pregnant and resting in its den, good. I have made it so sufficient amounts of food sources are available near its den and all the predators are forbidden to go after it, I don’t want to risk losing my experiment to such a trivial thing as a hungry owl, after all, it would be such a waste of efforts. The life sign growing inside its belly is feeling a little different than normal squirrel pregnancies. It looks a bit like a bat's pregnancy. Since the father is a bat, I think it is something to be expected.

Secondly, the rats. They are very pregnant and all of them are resting too. The security measures for these ones are weaker than for the squirrel and to my surprise, it seems that the other rats are taking a lot of care of these females. I have seen rats taking care of each other. It doesn’t happen quite often, but it is more frequent than for most of the other kinds of rodents I own. Except for the females I am using for my experiments, the other rats act with some kind of deference, which is quite a strange sight to see. I think that since the rats I’m using have been passively living in my domain for a few generations now, they may have gotten a feeble grasp of my intentions, without a need for me to intervene. I have only put a few security measures here, nothing about bringing food to the pregnant rats and even less about washing their fur once a day, each day, as the other rats are doing.

Anyway, those pregnant rats are farther into their pregnancy than they should be. It's only been three days since I’ve meddled in their pregnancies, but they are looking like they are going to give birth tomorrow. Usually, it takes three weeks for a mother rat to bear children, but it seems to only take four days for the manipulated rats. It’s good, if the baby rats are in good health, it will mean I’ll never run out of rats to populate my Domain. It also means I’ll be able to apply the same changes to all the other mammals in my Domain to speed their population growth too.

Thirdly, I select a batch of just fertilized eggs from different kinds of birds, bugs, reptiles, fishes and crabs living in my Domain and I infuse my mana into them. I want them to grow faster and get stronger than their normal counterparts. It’s easy, it’s one of the first manipulations I have ever done.

After that, while the girls are in their bath, I take a look at the Marms.

The procession coming to pray in front of the ‘Goddess’ statue is still several days from its destination and is actually making a stop for the night. I see they have put two of their own on guard duty. It is useless since there are no more pirates on the island and the biggest predator roaming the forest is an old fox. The Marms may be small compared to most other sapient species, but they have nothing to fear inside the forest. Even then, it is still a good idea to have sentries looking for danger.

In their village, I can see that the group of wandering and traumatized children is slowly opening itself to the adults. They still sleep by themselves and spend the day away from the adults, but they no longer actively avoid them, like they have been doing since just after the attack.

The reparations of the village will soon be finished and actually, everyone can already sleep with a roof over their head. I notice that one of the women is ready to give birth and will do so in the next days. I am eager to see if the child will be passively claimed by me through the ambient mana or if I will have to do it myself. No matter what, I will claim the child before it is able to resist and I will mold its mind to my liking.

I also peep at a young couple taking a bath together. It is not out of perversion, but rather more out of curiosity. They are putting some plants in the water and are using soap to rub each other's fur. It makes me realize I didn’t put soap in the bathhouse. But since it is not a raw material and I don’t yet know how to make it, I can’t do it anyway. But I at least could have added some plants to the baths. I quickly add the soapweed to the Citizen's part of the building and leave some false privacy to the couple, I am always present in all areas I have claimed, but I don’t need to actively peep. Furthermore, the explosion of raw mana when a sapient being experiences climax is the second tastiest kind of mana, the first being a violent death.

After growing the small addition to the bathhouse, I see the only current user of the facility, Franziska, reaching for one of the freshly grown herbs. She sniffs at it and starts rubbing her skin with it. It may not be soap, but it is at least better than just plain water and she seems to relax even more thanks to the flowers.

On the following morning, I see Jack’s team gathering in front of the Maze entrance. They didn’t dive for the last two days, but none of the other teams of wannabe adventurers managed to reach the second floor till now. Although they are getting closer.

Soon they encounter the first group of rats and they quickly dispose of it. I take a look at Franziska, who is looking at her arms and her legs, amazed by the effortlessness and the fluidity of her moves. The others have not yet noticed that she has changed, but they will at some point, most likely even before the end of the day.

As the group of aspiring adventurers travel around the first floor and fight more and more of the creatures wandering there. The group is handling the floor with more ease each time they come in. This time they quickly go to the stairs to the second floor and enter the safe room at the bottom of the stairs. There they take a break and tend to the small injuries they received on the first floor.

“Show me your injuries, I will bandage them.” Says Charles to Franziska. While I look at their exchange, I don’t think she will be able to hide the fact that she is my Citizen much longer.

She looks at him and shakes her head.

“Come on, don’t be shy.” He insists.

“Hrmf.” She makes, moving her arms and trying to shoo him away.

“I can see the blood on your clothes.”

“Hrmf.” She shrugs.

“So, all the blood I’m seeing on your sleeves is from rats or what do you want to say?” He raises an eyebrow.

“Humpf.” She nods.

“If you say so. But don’t complain about it later, if an infection settles in.” He shrugs and turns away, leaving her.

“You should tell them that you’ve become my Citizen.” I tell her directly in her mind.

“I’ll do it when I’ll do it.” She thinks louder than her usual thoughts, allowing me to easily hear it.

“If that is your wish, but don’t wait too much. You’ve been seen entering the Citizen part of the bathhouse.”

“What?” She suddenly raises her head. “And you’re only telling me now?”

“They didn’t see you directly, but they know it’s someone small and strong, and since you’re the only Dwarf here it’s pretty easy to make the link.”

“Shit.”

“Did you really think no one would notice the changes in your body? You’re not as tired compared to the previous you, furthermore you have almost no injuries from the first floor and those you have are healing faster.”

“Hrmpf.”

“And, it’s the same for your stuff. Do you honestly think no one will notice you’re receiving better quality loot? Especially when I’ll give you your weapons and armors.”

“I thought I would have more time.”

“Since your first weapon is in a chest on this floor, as well as a small helmet fitting your head, you should talk to the rest of the group as soon as possible. Imagine their reaction if they learn it from someone else.”

“Fine. I’ll do it later. Stop pestering me already.”

During this small exchange, Grundy started meditating in front of the stone tablet. As the general instructions on meditation are still written on it, anyone who reaches this room can follow them and become one of my Citizen, if they can implement my directions. I listen to the conversation of the others and understand that they are still wary of the implications of being a Citizen, I need to make it more appealing.

While Franziska starts to meditate too, I focus my attention on Grundy and raise the quantity and the quality of the mana in the air around him. After an hour of meditation from Grundy, there is a faint modulation in his mana that starts to resemble my own. He is almost ready, but the last part of the process is the hardest. It was far easier with Franziska, since she already knew how to meditate. It took her only a few hours, while he has already been trying it for three days.

Half an hour later the group is gathered in front of the door leading to the rest of the second floor, ready to go.

I move my attention to the upper part of my town. It is time for me to make the second of my facilities. The gymnasium. It is placed quite far away from the bathhouses.

I raise walls in an ovoid fashion. It is a wide area that I already prepared for this construction. The perimeter is a running track with five lanes enabling five persons to run side by side, it is bordered by multiple rows of seats so that people can rest on them or simply watch what is happening on the field of the gymnasium. Inside the track I install a bunch racks with different kind of weapons, ranging from classical swords over halberds to warhammers, tonfas, and khukuri. All the blades are dulled as to prevent severe cuts, but they still leave bruises, with whom I can’t help them. I also install a large number of wooden dummies for practice.

Joined to the main building I raise a secondary one, which is specialized for throwing and other ranged weapons. I put all kinds of bows I know in there, different sizes of javelins, throwing knives, throwing stars and other weapons used to fight in the distance. I install several kinds of targets, some in the form of animals and other in humanoid forms, on each of them I highlight the vital areas. The building has enough room to allow up to twenty people to practice at the same time.

Those places are only made to train, they are not some kind of armory for the people to take weapons from. Also, I plan to systematically destroy any weapon that is taken out of the gymnasium. Hey, I am willing to let everybody train, but I won’t arm people for free. If they want weapons, they have to buy them, make them or earn them in the Maze. Also, I didn’t know I had so much knowledge about weapons until I started making them. I am guessing part of the knowledge is from me and part of it comes from the pirates I drowned during their invasion.

I raise the third building, adjoined to the other two. This one is for another kind of training, mental training to be exact. Simply put, I increase the quantity and quality of the mana in this particular building and cover the ground with smooth stones. I put an octogonal pillar in the middle of the circular room, and on each side of it, I write the instructions for meditation in order to become a Citizen. The ambient mana in this room may be of better quality than around the town, but it is still lacking when compared to the safe room at the beginning of the Maze’s second floor.

The space between the three buildings is a cloakroom. The lockers can’t be completely locked unless you are a Citizen, so if you want to keep your possessions for yourself, you either have to keep an eye on them, or you have to become a Citizen. The second part of the cloakroom is the showers where you can wash away the sweat one accumulated working out. The trick in the showers is that if you are not a Citizen, you only have cold water, if you want a warmer shower, you need to either walk all the way to the bathhouses or be a Citizen. I know that the Citizens’ advantages here are not really impressive, but it is an accumulation of small things to convince people to become Citizens.