After the horns blew, the massive gates of his kingdom's walls began to open. The portcullis raised and the drawbridge had come down. The front of the merchant caravan had begun to set off. In short time, the caravan had reached the woodline of the wilds. Damien took his grand staff out of his inventory. He thought about what he wanted to do first. He willed his earth magic to clear a 100 ft wide path of a dirt road and hardened it with stone using earth magic. Damien then pushed the trees to the sides of his road from their roots. This wasn't an issue. Damien used the earth to move the trees completely. He had done things differently this time by packing the trees close together next to the road so that they could decrease the visibility of anyone attempting to locate the road from the ground and the air. Using his minimap Damien cleared a path in this manner straight through the forest until he exited the woodline with his magic. He sent a mental command to speed up the caravan since they would be traveling on flat roads the rest of the way to the first village. If they travel at top speeds, they should be there by nightfall based on Damiens estimation. The entire caravan moved at midspeed down the sparsely used dirt road. Damien stepped out of his carriage, gave the order to keep the carriages moving and he waited until the last carriage was out of the tree line. Damien went a short ways into the treelines and created a stone wall and gate. He sent the mental command to have patrols on the roads and to watch the new outer gate.

Allen began prepping Damien as best he could in these situations These villages that they were going through are run by families nobels of major houses of the kingdom. The first one was the second son of a baron, the viscount’s grandson in the next village, and the final noble village was the 4th son of a duke. I know nothing of these nobles. Only that there are still village leaders in the first 2 villages but the third for whatever reason is run directly by the dukes son. Noble usually does not want to get in the middle of running a city so the situation is very strange. They spoke about the villages and the cities like this until they got into the eyesight of the first village Allen called Tropes. As the caravan got closer to the town, a group of 6 soldiers on horseback rode out to meet them whenever the caravan was hundreds of feet away from the 12 foot wooden wall of the village. “Halt! I am Captian Guro and you are attempting to enter a village protected by the empire of Algeria. Who are you and where have you come from? I have never heard that coat of arms in this kingdom.” The man tried to sound confident but looking at two soldiers in full plate with large bastard swords on their back and weapons all over their bodies had shaken him. At this time, Allen had stepped out of the carriage and bowed. “I am an adviser to Lord Donte Sorlen of the far away Kingdom of Namera. We are foreigners here on a peacekeeping mission to announce ourselves to the lords and kings of this land and to meet with them. We are also, traveling with a merchant caravan from our land, to sell the foreign goods of our lands to the south. I am sure the good people of these lands would greatly profit from our visit.”

As he said, this he took out a small sack that had jingling sound when it moved and tossed the sack to the captain. The captain deftly caught the sack and opened it. He went wide eyed, but hurridly caught himself. “I am sure a peaceful group like yourselves come here out of goodwill. Welcome to the village of Trope. I will be your escort into the village. Although, I am not sure that all of your carriages will fit inside our village,” the captain said.

“It is fine captain. Thank you for your hospitality we will have housing in place. I only ask that you let us drive our caravan through your village to the other side. We will only be passing through our goal is to reach the major cities of this land with most of our wares, but we will give the villagers a chance to buy some of our goods. Our Lord will be staying in your village though. Do you have an Inn that you recommend?” Allen asked.

“Yes, the Speedy Cow is the best inn in town in town and has the finest guest rooms for nobels, should head in there to rest for the evening.”

“Thank you, captain. I will put in a fine word for you to any of the leadership that I run into. Your dedication and professionalism have been exemplary” Allen said as he turned to head back inside of the carriage.

The captain sat straighter in his saddle and puffed out his chest a bit. “Thank you, Lord Sorlen and Adviser Allen.” The captain signaled to his men to turn around and the caravan continued into the village.

Damien watched the entire exchange through the front window of the carriage. Allen had come back inside, sat down and sighed.

“So, will we have to bribe our way into every village and city?” Damien asked.

“Is money an issue with us?” Allen asked in response.

“No.”

“Then most likely, yes.”

Damien's first impression of these people wasn't very high and they haven’t even passed the gate. His second bad impression came once they did pass the gate entrance. He was reminded of village Alto all over again. The people were looked starved or homeless. Or had untrusting eyes that seemed like they wanted to steal everything that they saw. Selene must have been thinking the same thing because her fist had clinched. She has really developed an angry streak. Or maybe she's always been like this. Either way, at least she gets angry at injustice. “We have to help these people.” She said. Damien just nodded he completely agreed. “We will. I need to figure out where the coin is going in this town because it damn sure isn’t going to the people. I’ll at least feed as many as I can today. If I have to, I’ll take these people back to Sorlen village if they want to come. I’ll try to be cordial, but if anyone gets in my way, let’s just say they won’t be still there too long if they do,” Damien responded. Selene just nodded and calmed and sat back in her seat, seemingly satisfied with the answer. She completely expected Lord Sorlen to take care of the issue. Selene was dressed in a close fitting blood red ballroom gown that would have been worn on earth. It had with a slit on the side up to her right thigh on reveling her legs. Her top revealed the top of her fairly large bosom. She was wearing the tiara Damien had made for her with a large green jewel that matched her eyes and she added a red rose for touch in her hair. She had some red 2 inch heels that depending on the light changed to emerald green. Needless to say, she was stunning.

“Selene I was going to give this to you later, but now is good as time as any.” Damien gave her a metal short staff with a large emerald green jewel on the top of it. Inside of the emerald was a mage stone with its own mana core. Damien enchanted the shaft of the with enchantment all of the spells that he had currently, even his new portal spell. She just had to use her will and intent and the staff would perform the desired effect. The shaft of the staff was made from some of the mithril he had grabbed from the mountain. It looked like a taller walking stick for him but it was a perfect sized staff. When he told Selene about the enchantment, she held the staff like a newborn baby, stroking the emerald. What's with people petting their staves, he thought? He wrote the names of the spells on the staff so she would know what to cast. Saying the spells over and over in her head, Selene's eyes glossed over while she got lost in her fantasies she had of herself and this mythical item she held in her hands. Damien had his own staff out. Hopefully, these staves would deter attackers or thieves.

Damien passed through an inner gate and instantly noticed that this part of town was far more upscale than the other 3/4ths of the city. The caravan had kept going straight while Damiens carriage had gone on a side road to the recommended inn. Damien's carriage stopped in front of the inn. One of the staff members of the inn ran out and held their carriage door open. Damien stepped out of the carriage and held out his hand to let Selene down out of the carriage. The gate captain waved and asked that they remember his name when speaking to nobles, after they had stopped. He then had turned around to go back out of this secondary gate, most likely to get back to his post. Damien told Allen to take the carriage back to the caravan and that they would meet him there tomorrow. Damien and Selene walked into the Blue painted inn made of stone and wood. The inn smelled of ale, cooked meat, and spices. The inside of the inn had plain look to it similar to a traditional tavern that you would see in any midevil RPG or fantasy novel. There were was a strange ape-like beast with fangs skull was hung above the bar. There were wooden round tables surround chairs with white sheets covering the chairs. Giant wooden kegs behind the bar which held ale or cider. An unlit stone fireplace was at the wall at the end of the room. There were stairs leading up to one of the 3 floors in the inn. Damien hadn't seen many building with more than one or two stories. Upon entering the inn all the eyes were ogling at the two newcomers that walked into the building. The place obviously does not get many newcomers in this village. Especially ones with such an extravagant entourage. Once the two of them sat down the waiter hurried to their table. He was a Chubby balding man with rosey colored cheeks. He wore in a black shirt and black pants with brown boots.

"Well hello Lord and Lady, thank you for gracing the finest establishment in all of Tropes with your presence. Might I add, that I have never seen such fine clothes in all my years serving this location. Might I inquire where you two are from?” The overly curious man asked.

Damien scanned the room and spotted all of the men and women in the room who were mostly well dressed in fine tailored trousers shirts, boots, and dresses. The women stared at Selene with venom and envy. The men looked at Damien much the same. Damien looked back at the Host. “I am Lord Sorlen of the country of Nemara, traveling with a merchant caravan from my lands to promote peace between our lands. We are just stopping through this village on our way to the city. Please be sure to check out our wares just outside of the east gate of your village. I am sure you will find very rare items at amazing prices.” Damien took out a gold coin and handed it to the man.

“We will take a bottle of your finest wine, two glasses, and two of your signature dishes. Keep the change.” The man thanked them happily and walked to the back room of the inn and disappeared from sight to go give their order to the cook. Damien and Selene sat quietly and waited on their drinks. One of the men staring at them, gave an ugly look and stood up and walked over to Damien's table. By the look on his face, he looked to be quite intoxicated. He rudely spoke to Selene as though Damien was not there. The smell of heavy drinking was coming off of his breath and clothes.

“Hello my lady, I am the son of Baron Carrion, Bradley, your beauty is second to none and I would love to have you join my table for the evening. Why don't you come enjoy the rest of your evening with someone who isn't your lesser.”

Selene frowned at the man, “The fact that you would speak to me without acknowledging my lord first lets me know the nobels of this village has less tact than, I would have thought upon first sight. I gladly decline. I don’t sit nor stand in the presence of MY LORDs lessers." Selene looked the man up and down and continued, "Why have a pebble when I can have an emerald", she said. The jewels on her crown head shone brightly in the light and she leaned her staff with its large emerald in his direction.

Then the man turned red with uncontained fury, "You wench! You dare speak to the nobility of this land this way!”

“You heard the woman. You come over and have showed nothing but disrespect and then have the gall to demand respect it? Based on what? Your title? Your status may be a noble, your worth is less than a dog. You are right Selene I thought I was dining with worthwhile company, but it seems these so called nobles have caused me to lose my appetite.

" They are obviously trying to overcompensate for what they are clearly lacking.” Selene responded.

“Selene lets go.” They stood to leave but were stopped by the spoiled noble.

“Did I say that you can leave?!?!”

“I don’t think that I asked you.” The Dukes men stood up and 5 men surrounded them both.

“So what do you hope to accomplish now?” Damien asked.

“You foreigners will bow to the nobility of this country, or die. What say you, foreigner?

”I say, we will be leaving out of this inn tonight and you better hope that when the betters of the father of a weak son of a baron hear that his son ruined the title of his house by being an entitled brat and threatening a foreign lord on a peacekeeping mission, that brat will be disowned if not killed. So, I’ll ask what say YOU?”

“I say that foreigners will not leave here alive to say a thing. We will kill you and leave with this beauty and have our way with her!” “Selene try not to kill anyone,” Damien said.

“Yes my lord.”

“Kill them," the baron's son said.

All of the noble thugs drew daggers. Selene blurred from her spot and was in front of one of the men in a blink of an eye. The man only had seconds for his mind to register what was happening and in those seconds, Selene punched the mans wrist holding the dagger. There was a loud crack and the man screamed grabbing his broken wrist. She then punched him in the gut sending him flying across the room, coughing up blood from his mouth as he fell through some tables. She ducked below another swing sensing the thugs presence with her enhanced senses, Selene dodged a dagger slash aimed at her back. The man overextended and she uppercut him in the chin breaking his jaw and knocking out many of the man’s teeth, the man crumpling to the ground like a sack of bricks. The third man behind Damien tried to go for a killing blow on him but Selene intercepted him by leaping from her previous spot grabbed and grabbed the staff in Damiens hand and using it as a pole she swung her body around it kicking the man behind him into the wall leaving the man imprinted into the wall. The last two men came to her at the same time. The men fought well together and complemented each other by aiming at different weak points. They minds well have been moving in water for Selene. She was just moving too fast for ordinary men. After a short exchange of blow with her dodging all of the men attacks, she done toying with these men. She feinted a punch and quickly ducked down and spin kicked both of the men's legs so hard and fast that she snapped both of their femurs, knees, and ankles like twigs. Both of the men screamed from the pain and Damien smashed his staff between both men’s eyes to stop the noise, then turned to the Barons son.

“Wha-what?” Was all the man could say. “Well, you were talking about killing me and taking the blood Queen here to do what, again?”

“I-I think th-there was a misunderstanding, m-my-lord.”

“I don’t think there was any misunderstanding at all. I do think there was an international incident that will be reported if I ever see you again. If I see you again I will kill you myself on principle. Remember what my princess can do. Then think about what the man can do that trained her. Your city is surrounded by over a hundred men who are far stronger this. Now, get out of my sight.” The shaking man, scrambled out of the door, tripping and falling over himself trying to move his legs faster than his feet can carry himself. “Well, Selene you have certainly improved. I’m very proud of you.” Selene just smiled at the praise. “Thank you, my Lord. Although, I struggled not to kill anyone. I have a reputation to keep, you know.”

Damien laughed, “That's true my Blood Queen. Well anyways that whole situation worked out, we now have free reign over the city today. Let's go back to the outer city and back to the people in need."

The duo walked into the city center and entered the square. Using his map Damien waited until there was a break in the people entering and exiting the square. When he had a bit of room, he summoned a couple trees from his inventory. While the trees were being held in the air by his invisible tethers, he channeled his will through his staff and made some stands with transmutation magic with a massive log. He then transmuted thousands of various fruits, and vegetables with the rest of the log. He then took out another tree and a couple of hundred skinned animals and made a few thousand skinned 3 eye pigs and stored them all inside of his inventory at the same time. Damien took out a gold coin and diamond channeled his earth and fire magic manipulation to made a ring with a diamond embedded into it. He needed this to act as a fake spacial ring so that he could explain pulling things out of thin air. He wasn't sure if there were storage rings in this world but then he could act as though he created it. He is an archmage, bordering on becoming a sorcerer. Lastly, Damien conjured a fountain with a statue of the werewolf Damien had killed and it spurted fresh water out of its mouth. With an enchantment of his water magic, Damien used a purify spell to keep fresh clean water to prevent poisoning of the water or other obstructions getting in the fountain. He also put a water enchantment that kept a constant stream of water pouring out and a pool that would never overflow. He was finished with his preparations and need the people to come. Damien projected his voice with his wind magic, “Come one and all free food, water, and coin!” At that Selene, grabbed Damien’s arm. “My Lord! Do you just plan to GIVE away all of the coin?" She exclaimed to Damien.

I thought that was the reasoning for this expedition.” Just then Damien forgot to let Selene know that part of the plan.

“I’m sorry for keeping you out of the loop, Selene. The real reason for this expedition was to gain followers and for me to learn about all the lands first hand and what we may be up against in the future. Remember some will take that world notice as a direct threat to them even though I had no plans to threaten anyones reign. Followers are the most important part. I will need people to make the village grow into a city. I need people to build the city when I am not around and be trained so that they can protect themselves. I need to be able to make sure children have safe places to live and a safe bed to sleep at night. I just want my people to prosper and live free and not oppressed just because of their social status. Not living under the rule of tyrants just because they were born with power they hadn't earned.” Just as Damien finished his statement the first groups of people began entering the square. Quite a few had heard his words and many of the people began to slowly approach with loud whispers. The group of people began as a trickle and turned into a massive crowd after a few minutes. The people were much more outspoken now. Many gathered around the new fountain asking when and where it had come from. They also began to notice the stalls with food on them. Many people here wide eyed and some visibly drooling as though they hadn't seen this much food in years. Many people had already began instantly filling up containers in a hurry and looking around as though they would be harmed if caught. “Damien projected his voice once again, ”Do not fear. I have called you here to thsis square and have placed this fountain and this food here for your benefit and a show of goodwill! I know many of you are skeptical and many are wondering if there is a hidden objective to giving you all of this. I will admit there is!" At that he heard many groans and sighs. He heard someone say that Damien only needed slaves and concubines.

Damien heard the people's complaints and hurried to reassure them. " I would only ask two things of you, first is that you all consider moving into my village full time. I am looking for all of the lame, sick, and hungry! There is an overabundance of food, housing, and safety in my village and I am only missing people. I only request one thing and that is, to swear a blood oath to protect Sorlen Village, its interests, and its people. That must be done at the gate before entering. I will give everyone two gold for coming here and taking my words under consideration and spread the word far and wide! The food and drink is all free also.“ With hearing they would be receiving 2 gold PER PERSON, the people began to crowd the stands, the people were in utter disbelief. That was a couple of years worth of wages in this village!

He summoned 12 large sacks of fruits and vegetables. He summoned a long table behind himself and started summoning tens the giant boar behind himself. He asked if any of the villagers were any good at cutting meats and about 20 stepped forward. The then gave them all alloy daggers from his inventory and instructed them to begin cutting large slabs of boar meat that Damien began laying out.

“This is all on good faith no one will have to pay for anything! All I need is for you all to line into 5 lines up! There is enough for all. All I ask is that you consider my offer while you wait. I am also a healer. Those with sicknesses and injuries let me know so that my associate and I can heal your wounds.”

The people hurriedly lined up and Damien, Selene and few more villagers came and handed out fruits and vegetables to their fellow villagers. Damien has also had sacs of gold coins out and handing them out 2 at a time. Damien was mass healing tens and tens of people at a time. Healing old wound, blindness, broken limbs, illness of every kind. Many people were thanking and crying towards them for saving themselves or their families. Many of them were asking where did they need to go to reach his city. Damien told them where they needed to go and that all they had to do was wait for Damien’s caravan to return and they could go with him. Damien did this for hours until night fell. Apparently, the event turned into a celebration and kegs of beer were brought out. Damien paid a small sack of gold coins for the kegs. Damien knew it was too much, he was overwhelmed by their thoughtfulness. A bonfire was made and cooked meat, vegetables, and spices were added to it. Music arrived shortly after the kegs of ale and people dance and partied. All was well until Damien stumbled on a particular conversation of a few men who were drunk. “...The arch m-mage *hiccup* tyat we all received that notice all in our heads, is worth 100 platinum for his death or info leading to his capture from the king. Damien was the archmage’s name. He challenged the kings throne. We all kk-now the king has wiped out whole villages for less. He sent the notice to all overt t-the kingdom if we received the message way out her There will be patrols on every road.”

The men continued to talk but Damien stopped listening. Damien instantly regretted telling the people to spread the word of his village. He had no idea what repercussions these action could have on his village. Damien needed more followers immediately. He had to build a bigger army or he was done for. He was definitely not ready to take on a kingdom yet. He just didn't have the numbers. Yes, he could handle an army, maybe, but what about the villagers? He didn’t know how long he could keep his power a secret. He also didn’t know if there was a way to detect his power. Damien looked at his staff and quickly put in in his inventory, it brought too much attention. Although he knew the people had seen him with it, it just made him feel a bit more secure. Damien quickly gathered Selene and began to leave. Many people stopped and thanked him over and over. Many told him that they will leave here and begin heading west immediately. Damien sent a mental request to the gate guards to only let in anyone who swears a blood oath. He also sent a message to the builder to begin to build temporary housing to prepare for any new arrivals. After that Damien and Selene walked back to the caravan. Damien would have to trust that the word of what happened here would spread to the other cities and kingdoms. Selene kept quiet because she had seen that her Lord was lost in thought. Damien was thinking about him being surrounded by 10,000 mages and them burning him to a crispt under millions of degrees of hellfire as he walked out of the eastern gate of the city towards the bonfires of his camping soldiers in the distance.