Vivena woke up with a start and Isako immediately calmed her down. There was no reason to freak out. They didn’t restrain or take her items. It was a good sign but she wasn’t out of the woods yet.

Where do I stand? Did you overhear anything important?

They know what happened here.

“I see you’re awake,” Haruka stepped into the room.

His presence almost gave Vivena a panic attack. She didn’t sense Haruka there!

I cannot sense him! Isako said with alarm. He must have advanced to another spirit stage!

“Your spirit is stronger,” Vivena said, fishing for information. “If I didn’t see you there, I wouldn’t know you’re here.”

Haruka nodded, taking a seat on the bed next to Vivena.

“It’s called the Superior stage.” He didn’t say anything else on the subject.

This means he is able to see your profile, Isako said. This includes skills and techniques but likely without details. Talents cannot be seen.

It wasn’t the end of the world, but neither was it ideal. She hadn’t acquired any new spells apart from[Flight] since parting ways with Haruka and others at the Capital but now he knew it for certain removing any possibility of a bluff.

How much stronger does the Superior stage make him?

Even without solid control, his spiritual aura will be strong enough to knock you out.

Knock me out… I guess I need to get to the Elevated stage sooner than later.

Strengthening the spirit core wasn’t the first thing that came to mind while thinking about getting stronger. Levelling up was such an obvious route for most and maxing out attributes seemed like unnecessary hassle. But during her time with Haruka and Keynes, Vivena was able to see firsthand how powerful a spiritual energy could be. If Haruka being on the same Level as her could simply knock her out with his spiritual aura alone, then Vivena could no longer postpone her advancement. She knew she was close, she just needed a chance to get there.

And that might be a problem here. She didn’t know what they were going to do with her knowing about the dominion. It had to be played out perfectly.

“What now?”

Haruka didn’t reply until Vivena looked at him.

“I don’t know, Vivena. I think the unity of tribes has come to an end. The Capita is…”

“I meant me,” she said and Haruka trailed off.

“Ah, that.” Haruka’s expression shifted to one of resignation. “Well, Aestar’s pretty upset about Lumo and guards. He wants to punish you.”

Vivena expected something and yet hearing that they wanted to punish her felt strangely out of place. What kind of punishment do they even imagine to incur on Vivena? Haruka admitted himself that the tribes had lost their unity, and likely their tribal law. However, the fact that she was still ‘free’ wasn’t without importance and meaning here. She just needed to figure out how it translated into a bigger picture. So instead of asking about the punishment, she asked a different question.

“What about you, Haruka? Do you agree with him?” It was a gamble and Vivena didn’t like the odds. She was aware that she’d done it to herself and if she failed at establishing her dominion, she’d be the one to blame. The decision to do it here and now had been reckless. If her mobile phone hadn’t died, she’d have contacted her parents and asked them to come here.

“I … honestly don’t know. We were attacked in the Capital by the king’s guards after we’d parted ways with you. We’ve killed them… you know? We’ve lost our way.”

That was a surprise but then it wasn’t. The Cult of Shaper and Shaper himself were in the Capital at the time of the monster's attack, not to mention Keynes’s decision to start another outbreak… Could it all be connected? Keynes and Shaper went back to Geneva so there was a strong possibility of these two working together.

“Is everything alright? You look like you have seen a ghost.”

She realised how tense her expression must look like at that moment so she relaxed. She considered telling Haruka about Shaper but decided against it. She didn’t want to invite questions she was not ready to answer yet.

“It’s nothing.” She sidestepped the subject and asked. “So, what are we going to do now?”

Haruka glanced at her, seeing through her but he didn’t admonish her attempt at changing the topic. He stood up, walked to the door then turned around and faced her.

“Do you really plan to hunt down Keynes?”

“I plan to stop him from dooming our planet.”

“Bill told us how do you plan to use the dominion to become stronger. I have to admit that I am intrigued by your idea.”

It was unexpected but welcomed. She wasn’t sure where she stood with Haruka but it seemed that he leaned toward her side, which was a very good sign, nonetheless, she didn’t think that this Aestar would simply accept Vivena’s lack of responsibility for killing the tribesmen.

Well, if I’d have to, I’d duel him. Having Haruka on my side should be enough to keep others from helping Aestar.

Vivena and Haruka talked for almost an hour. Vivena explained to him what the dominion meant and how it’d help her become the strongest person in the world. It was a bit of a shock for Haruka to learn how strong her Talent truly was. Haruka’s Talent was mediocre in comparison. It was the Sleight of Hand but it didn’t matter to her. He had a drive and desire to get stronger, something she needed and admired.

Their conversation was interrupted by Bill as others wanted to talk to her. It was time to deal with the consequences of her reckless decisions.

***

“No, you cannot get out of this without punishment,” Aestar said, his eyes unyieldingly staring at Vivena. “They were innocent people.”

She knew that an argument with this guy was pointless.

“What can I do to repay them?”

“You must give the dominion away,” he said without hesitation. “It doesn’t belong to you.”

“I’ve killed the boss and received the Orb of Dominion. I’ve activated it here. I have the sole access to the dominion’s menu. I don’t see how it doesn’t belong to me.”

Vivena decided to not avoid confrontation with Aestar. Isako had warned her that he was the second degree Perfect State ascender, which meant he was strong, although his spirit was lousy. If she’d managed to advance to the Elevated stage by now, she would have had no doubts going against this guy.

“The dominion boss belonged to the Capital and my parents. The kill should be theirs. Now, without them here, I am the next in line so the dominion belongs to me.”

“If you want the dominion so badly, you’ll have to fight me. If you can defeat me, I’ll hand over the ownership of the dominion to you.”

“Fine,” he snapped. “Let’s do it now.”

“Aester,” Bill’s mother said. “Reconsider this.”

Without looking at her, he replied, “Stay out of this, servant.”

“Watch your tongue, boy.” Hawthorne stepped forward Aestar. “We aren’t servants any longer and you are an heir to nothing but the ruin of a city. Not that you can even convince any tribe to bend their knee before you after the disaster in the Capital.”

Aestar clenched his fists, shivering with anger. Everyone looked ready to uncoil. But then, the moment of rage passed and Aestar spun and strode away without a word, leaving the village.

“That was close,” Bill said. “I think would’ve trouble with him, father.”

“I know,” Hawthorne admitted. “But he forgot himself there.”

“It wasn’t his fault. He’s been raised this way,” Aurora said then she looked at Vivena. “We’re leaving you be. I don’t have any interest in antagonising you, Vivena Sael.”

“So you know who I am.”

“Your family is one of the most powerful families in the world. Although I'd never heard about you before, your surname is enough to think twice about crossing you. That said, I am a little confused as to why you’ve established your dominion here instead of the territories controlled by your family.”

That’s because I wanted the world to fear me, not my surname. She didn’t tell Aurora that though. She didn’t trust the woman or her husband who had betrayed her and Keynes already.

“Who said it isn’t my family territory now?”

“So this is truly the end of the World Reserve.” A hint of a sly smile crept on the woman’s face. Before she turned to go, she added. “Take good care of my son.”

Hawthorne stood for a moment, while his wife was walking away. He was conflicted and from the silence, Vivena concluded that others knew why.

“For all it’s worth, I am sorry,” he said. “If you ever meet Keynes Kid. Tell him I regret my part in Bonolo’s plan.”

Vivena didn’t reply. Hawthorne didn’t linger and hastily left to catch up with his wife.

Haruka, Bill and Pandora turned to Vivena

“Where do we start?”

***

Except for Vivena, Haruka, Bill and Pandora, only seventeen tribesmen remained in Vivena’s dominion, including the two guys who had defended the gate with her. The rest fled the dominion afraid of another monster’s attack.

With only a handful of people, work seemed to never end but to everyone’s credit, no one complained.

Before the end of the first week, they all fell into a rhythm. Bill took the role of a cook and he was amazing at it. Not only was their food delicious but also energising and kept everyone in good shape. He also found out that the meat of rift and dominion monsters was different, raising many interesting questions.

Pandora focused on maxing out her last attribute and mostly stayed outside of the dominion, hunting the monsters and bringing their remnants to the village. Not that they had issues with food with two and then three rifts inside the dominion, but Haruka welcomed excess monster's parts and dabbled a bit in item crafting. What he did was rather crude and not even close to what his uncle Hadr had done but Haruka was in the Superior stage, which equipped him with better tools to craft items.

Vivena, on the other hand, was all over the place. She helped with the reinforcement of the walls as they needed higher and sturdier walls because now and then dominion monsters attacked the village, and with repurposing the buildings they didn’t use. She had in mind a complete revamp of the village but not without serious manpower and resources.

In fact, she’d be able to do it with resources alone as her dominion offered something truly marvellous: the buildings menu. It gave her the ability to transform her dominion in any way she wished. The only issue was the cost. She didn’t think even her entire family would be able to afford the cost of rebuilding the village without any extravagant options and the dominion had plenty of these: a poison fountain; a shield; a camouflage field; or a dungeon.

Once the moment of exhilaration was over and her mood returned to normalcy, she got a good look at the menu and the System. She found that dominion wasn’t the only way of claiming a piece of land.

Territory was the other one but the process of claiming territory was unclear. She learned about the differences between territory and dominion. Cost of buildings and dungeons was much cheaper through territory but only dominion offered so many buffs and debuffs, and ability to influence rifts within dominion with the owner’s affinity. Speaking of buffs, she activated 3 buffs over the month. To get more buffs or debuffs she needed to meet some prerequisites she wasn’t aware of.

5% increased recovery of stamina. 2% increased recovery of health and mana. Increased mental clarity if there are less than a 100 dwellers inside the dominion.

The last buff was Haruka’s idea and it helped them stay focused between delves or during brainstorming. With the second rift reward, they had 3 rifts to delve. Two were Level 3 and common rarity and mostly were used by the tribesmen to Level them up. The champion rift opened a long time ago by Keynes was the true source of Vivena confidence about the future.

All three rifts acquired poison affinity and their rewards had a high chance of dropping items and spells with poison affinity, which was Vivena’s plan. Only the champion rift was affected difficulty-wise as monsters inside received new poison-oriented skills. The two common ones were unaffected in this regard as common monsters didn’t possess any skills.

They pulled out many interesting items and skills from the rifts. And they already made plans to add more rifts to the dominion to increase yield of items and skills with poison affinity.

Unfortunately for them, the frequency of dominion monster attacks decreased by the third week to the point that neither Vivena nor Haruka managed to place in the top 100. The weekly rankings were growing more competitive as well with a higher threshold of the top 100. Even Vivena’s monthly rank 3 was in jeopardy. They realised that the number of dominions around the world increased and more ascenders were fighting the dominion monsters now. There was nothing they could do without leaving the dominion and they didn’t want to do that with all their projects picking up speed.

Then things got interesting as they got a visitor.

***

“My name is Zendar Enoch. I’m a poison specialist and I’d like to join your dominion.”

Vivena slowly descended from the air. She was now in the Elevated stage but a long way to Level 5. Nonetheless, with her arsenal of poison skills and items, she was unbothered by the man’s Level 5.

“How did you find us?”

“In the System, your dominion is set to public and open.”

Isako, please, fill me in.

Oh, that is right. Each dominion and territory is listed in the System, unless set to secret.

Vivena glanced at the list of the dominions. In the first table, the monster dominions were listed and there were 121 of them at varying ranks. The next table showed ascender dominions that were set to public. Among 27 dominions only 7 were open. The other 20 had their locations undisclosed.

Vivena almost changed the status to closed when she stopped herself. She was not going to hide from the world. No, she’d never shy away from a challenge.

Haruka joined her a moment later. Without [Flight] it took him a little longer to get here.

“Why should I accept you?”

“I wish to learn everything there is about poisons,” he replied, then quickly added. “Also brought gifts.”

She didn’t see why she shouldn’t give the man a chance. After all, gathering people like her was what she wanted.

The next day, the monthly ranking concluded and they were utterly shocked.

Keynes Kid ranked first in the weekly ranking for that period and managed to get 3rd place in the monthly ranking, pushing Vivena to rank 5.

“What the hell did he do? He wasn’t there yesterday.”