MIRRORED

Seven different flames flickered in the air in front of sweat-stricken Lynne as he waved fingers around lightly, causing nearby herbs and ingredients to appear. Borrowing from the various books in the Tower, he began concocting pills and potions just two days ago and had already filled a small room he was staying at. Parsia had brought back a small hill of things, so Lynne busied himself while only taking time off to eat and sleep.

Outside, planning is slowly being finished. The main ‘floor’ of the city will be around the Tower itself, where a circular palace is going to be built. For that reason, ‘little turtle’ had scattered about the jungle toward the post-mountainous range, clearing up the land around the Tower itself. Palace itself will be similar to Edgemaw in design, retaining ring-like fashion, except on much smaller scale.

Surrounding the palace itself will be the Kingdom’s central city, and the rest will sprawl outward. Lynne had removed himself from the equation when it came to building and planning as he had no experience in the matter, and decided instead to focus all of his time on concocting for the moment, after which he’ll also make some basic Spell Arts to accommodate the ones Principal brought over.

“Ah, I remember there was a meeting an hour from now,” he mumbled as he finished up concocting Rank 10 Blood Restoring Pill. Most of the pills he concocted were Rank 10, with only a few going up as, held as special rewards. “I should probably attend and see how things are going. Could use some rest too… uh, I guess I could bring over a few pouches of pills and hand out some rewards as well. Nobody wants to work for free.”

An hour later, he left his private chambers in the Tower and flew out to the designated spot in the temporary headquarters of the Kingdom. It was a simple, stone temple-like building on the northern side of the Tower, and had only a single room: one meant for the large-scale meetings. When he entered, he was greeted with almost twenty people, some of which he didn’t even recognize. Like the girl sitting next to Parsia, her hands wrapped around him so tightly Lynne feared the poor guy might explode.

“… my wife.” Parsia said, his smile beam of pride when he spotted Lynne’s gaze.

“…”

“I’ll explain later…”

“Alright,” Lynne said nonchalantly as he sat on the top seat. On his right was exactly Parsia and his wife, with the seat next to them being occupied by Gru. On his left was Thalia who was fast asleep, with the rest of the initial planners sitting down the rectangular, stone table: the Commander who had returned yesterday with additional 20,000 people, Chief Trios who had taken up the spot of reigning in young ones into the army, Utta who had, alongside Liz-boy, managed to reign in almost ninety percent of Beastkin up north and had even managed to integrate some into the building a special Beastkin city on the southern side of the Tower, Joana, the woman who was responsible for bringing in builders and establishing various, initial guilds, and even the Goblin King who still appeared as nervous as ever. “How are you guys?”

“… uh… like, are we tired, or how are plans proceeding?” Joana asked.

“A-are you tired, obviously, ha ha, that’s what I meant of course!” Lynne exclaimed after brief pause. “I’m a loving, kind King; the most important thing to me is the health of my subjects!” Uuuh, he totally doesn’t give a crap!

“We’re fine,” the Commander, though, didn’t really care; for him, King was a ruler, not a friend. “Most of the things are proceeding according to our initial estimates.”

“Most of the things?” Lynne asked, arching his brow.

“Yes,” the Commander nodded. “Some groups are… uh, taking their time,” Nice cover! “Because, well, they… uh…”

“… just say it…” Lynne said.

“They haven’t been paid.”

“Oh, that!” Lynne exclaimed as if he remembered something. “As for the food and water, I remembered we are a-okay for the time being, and, well, silver and gold don’t have much monetary value as we haven’t established the market yet, so I spent the past two days concocting some basic pills and potions. I concocted one hundred of each, so you can just give them choice. I’ll be concocting more, and you can coordinate with the Principal here,” he pointed at the familiar, smiling, elderly face. “And reward the interested ones with some basic Spell Arts.” he then flickered his sleeve, causing the entire rectangular table to be filled with small bottles each containing ten pills. When people saw the sheer number, and remembered the ‘two days’, they were momentarily shocked silly.

The real issue, though, was when they actually inspected the types of pills. For the time being, the entire room was silent, broken only by the outside chatter, causing Lynne to wonder whether Rank 10 pills were perhaps too weak.

“W-what the fuck!!” the Commander, surprisingly, was the first one to lose his cool. “Th-this is Rank 10 Prim Jade Pill, said to have ability to remove all scars – external and internal – permanently, and enhance skin toughness!!! W-what the hell is this rare thing doing here?! And why is there hundred of it?!”

“T-this is Rank 10 Bloodroot Pill. It can enhance one’s vitality to the point of basically giving an old person an extra life! H-how…” Joana muttered.

“This is Rank 10 Mana Void Pill. It can…”

“This is Rank 10 Spellcrafter Pill…”

“THIS!!” the Principal suddenly shouted, actually jumping out of his chair, his breathing ragged. “I-it’s Rank 11 Pill… Celestial Cleansing…”

“R-rank 11?!!” all eyes suddenly moved onto Lynne, and he realized that the pills weren’t of low quality, but quite the opposite. Aah, I figure. I never learned the conventional alchemy, so all pills for me are just… pills…

“Ly—I mean, my King,” Chief Trios stuttered. “Y-you mean you… you concocted all of this?!”

“Aah, look guys, I know I’m talented beyond belief, but it’s time to stop looking like a bunch of kids who’ve seen naked woman for the first time,” Lynne said casually. “I may have overdone it with the quality, but it’s fine. Just let them know that this won’t be a standard of rewards, and that this is just encouragement. For the next batch, I’ll lower the quality to roughly Rank 5, and perhaps twice refined. Oh, since I’ll eventually let you guys know, I may as well do it now seeing as you’re all so shocked you’re practically shitting yourselves, but the three highest contributors will each receive Rank 13 Pills, with the top one receiving twice refined one. There will also be some additional rewards, so make sure to spread this news, so that the people will work harder.” he then took another glance and seeing as everyone was still unable to utter a sound, he got up and moved toward the exit.

“I’ll get back to concocting and whatnot,” he said. “I leave the rest in your capable hands.” nobody spoke for nearly ten minutes after he had left, and only then did some of them even restore their breathing.

“This…” Gru muttered. “I knew Boss was awesome, but holy shit!” Parsia and Ayya had actually passed out the moment the entire table was filled with bottles of pills, as they’ve never seen such a fantasy-like sight before in their lives. Thalia hadn’t woken up throughout the entire thing, on the other hand.

“That kid…” Principal muttered, smiling bitterly.

“H-how the hell does he expect us to handle Rank 10 and 11 Pills?! Just this table alone is already worth more than the entire Kingdom back on the mainland!” someone added.

“Okay,” as the first one to lose his cool, the Commander was also the first to restore it. “For the time being, we won’t distribute Rank 11 Pills. Lynne will probably keep concocting Rank 10 until everyone has gotten at least one, so we’ll save Rank 11 as special rewards. As for the Rank 10, we’ll distribute them to the hard workers and spread the news to encourage the slackers, while I’ll have one of my men work in unison with the Principal in regards for the Spell Arts.”

“We should build some form of contribution points system,” Joana proposed as she stroked her chin. “However, it would require substantial manpower to execute, and will have to be divided into different job, and summed by different standards.”

“Can you do it?” Chief Trios asked.

“Hmm,” Joana nodded after short pondering. “I’ll borrow roughly a hundred or so people and establish something with them. Until then, we can just go on the rough estimates of the current Leaders.”

“I’ll have soldiers go out and hunt some basic beasts,” the Commander said. “And slowly establish the types in the nearest vicinity, giving each different amount of points based on difficulty.”

“Hm, good,” Joana nodded. “As the school will be among the first to be built, I’ll have to ask Principal to oversee it and make the proper arangements.”

“I shall.” the Principal nodded.

“Utta, Chief,” she then turned to the only two Beastkin on the council. “Spread the news amongst the Beastkin, and have them build at least primitive city as quickly as possible. For at least five or so years, the Kingdom will basically be a single city, but as we have roughly 220,000 humans, and almost 100,000 Beastkin, we’ll have to make it a fucking gigantic.”

“What about the South?” Gru asked.

“Lynne had told us to ignore south for the time being,” the Commander said. “And it’s the most guarded region at the moment anyway, so there’s no point in thinking about it. We should probably establish some basic trade routes for the influx of basic goods, as our reserves can’t last forever though.”

“I’ll leave that to Jenny and her group,” Joana said. “Alright, let’s first handle these rewards, and we’ll meet up tomorrow at the same time to discuss things further.”

* * *

In front of a large, active volcano that was constantly spitting out fireballs, what used to be a makeshift encampment turned into a bustling city hidden within the trees. From 200 men or so, the numbers grew to nearly 10,000 at the moment, with more incoming every day. The surroundings were filled to brim with stealth formations and arrays, so much so that not even those with the Gift of the Divine Eye could pierce through it.

At the very center of the city was a small building atop the thick and tall oak tree, from which chatter never ceased. Yunchi and Teros were among ten or so people currently discussing the received news: the Tower’s surroundings had completely changed, and are being blocked by similar formations that surround their own city.

“Could it be that they learned of our plans?” someone from the group proposed.

“Impossible,” Yunchi said immediately, her voice full of confidence in her words. “If that were the case, they’d have simply moved the Tower elsewhere as they used to do before. From the looks of it, the little queen had managed to convince the little turtle to finally leave its shell.”

“What should we do?” Teros asked.

“It doesn’t impede our plans,” Yunchi replied. “Keep drilling, keep trying to infiltrate without being found out, keep laying down formations and building moving arrays. Other forces should be gathering here soon,” she added, her eyes narrowing slightly. “And the Faithful should already be within the Tower’s massive formation. If you can, contact one of them and buy out the information.”

“Yes, Miss.”

“Patriarch should be leaving his secluded meditation in two months at most,” she added. “By then, all our preparations must be complete. All other leaders of the Alliance have already been informed and have given their support. Go now. Just make sure to keep me updated.”

“Yes, Miss!” soon, everyone but her and Teros left the small room.

“What do you think, Teros? What’s her play?” Yunchi asked, a hint of anxiety flashing through her eyes.

“I don’t think she’s certain we’ll attack,” Teros said in a low tone. “But, considering the last time we met, she must expect some form of retaliation. However, I don’t think that’s enough for her to get so defensive.”

“True,” Yunchi added. “And she doesn’t know the full circle of our Alliance, so she’s probably certain in numerical advantage of Divine Mages. In the end, that’s what truly matters in the massive war.”

“… Young Miss…”

“What is it?” Yunchi felt hesitation in his voice, with even his eyes avoiding hers.

“Could it… could it be that she met up with him?”

“Him? Oh, you mean Lynne?” a murderous glint flashed through her eyes as an image of a young boy appeared in her mind. “Possibly… but why all these theatrics then just for him? She could have just sent him to the Clan.”

“… ah, I don’t know. Let’s hope we manage to learn the inside story, to lessen the number of surprises we’ll face.”

“… aye, let’s hope…”

Throughout the realms, thousands upon thousands beasts and people alike were slowly moving inside the shadows, but all eyes regardless were focused on the small corner of a small, insignificant realm. Greed, confusion, murderous desire, pity, many complex emotions flashed through the eyes of the observers, while all, nonetheless, began expecting the end culmination of a quickly fabricated conflict, that wasn’t supposed to take place just yet.