[Year 12 Month 8: 3 months have passed]

  The past three months have been busy.

  When Osbert and the scouting party found the dungeon, he set the totem outside and proceeded in. Personally, I was concerned that he would push himself or the others too far. I also knew he was growing older, and the levels would keep him in his prime longer.

  Didn’t mean I wasn’t relieved when they exited the dungeon in one piece.

  To both help with the party’s recovery and establish a stronger, more permanent foothold, I summoned one of my Secondary Obelisks near the entrance. One thing that bothered me was that the mana upkeep had dramatically increased with distance.

  With the Obelisk placed, I let Nobu know to set up a small camp at the dungeon entrance. I didn’t think the population could support much more than a small outpost, but I was positive that with the help of my wards, the number of guards needed would be minimal.

  Speaking of wards, I had placed three Obelisks in Gorn Village, with my main body being in the village; most of the populated area was already covered. I did make sure it was completely hidden, though, as I wanted to separate the outpost from the village.

  Considering the church's attempted purging of the beast-kin, I felt that hiding was the best form of offense.

  While the party that founded the dungeon had been in the village, I doubted that after a year of travel, they would know the precise location.

  Within a month of placing the Outpost obelisk, the Beast-kin had been able to construct some fortifications and basic structures.

  When Astrid came to visit the new area, she immediately pointed out a flaw.

  Looking around the small area that had been cleared for construction, she put her hands on her hips. “There isn’t enough space. Dungeons attract way more attention than you think. Especially a Tier 3”

  According to her, a Tier 3 dungeon had several floors with a large variety of ‘summons.’ The first few floors were normally lower level, with the deeper floors rapidly increasing in difficulty, which means that groups of different experience and level could take on varying difficulties.

  It was obvious she had more knowledge of commerce, and as such, I told Nobu she was to be in charge of the outpost. While Astrid protested at first, she quickly gave in and took over the construction process.

  Within a week, she had the people the village could spare working to clear out the nearby trees for building materials. I did what I could to help, using totems to boost the workers’ energy and keeping them in tip-top shape for as long as possible.

  Gotta love delegation.

  Next on the agenda was a complaint that Sahil brought to my attention. She had quickly burned through available minerals, and while I had a little more stashed away, I had to place down a few more pillars dedicated to minerals.

  Finally, I checked in on Salfi. Recently, she had been quite busy prepping for her class day and was trying to upgrade whatever skills she could get. Since the beast-kin arrived, she had been training with Osbert and the more skilled warriors.

  Having optimized what I could, I marked the village chiefs and the trustworthy guards. While I had full faith that the beast-kin would keep pretty much any secret, with how negatively Astrid reacted, I felt it was best to keep it under wraps for now. Maybe later I could give out the marks more, but not now.

  [Blessed: 345 -> 334]

  [Marked: 1 -> 12]

  [Year 12 Month 8: 3 months have passed]

  [You have gained a level]

  [You are level 21]

  This was the first level that wasn’t caused by death. The few marked were the people most often in the dungeon, which meant that as they fought through the floors, I would slowly gain more experience.

  A few of the beast-kin had also reached the level 25 mark, and for whatever reason, some had their classes evolve while others didn’t get offers. Systems weren’t equal. In my opinion, I believe their class hadn’t hit the proper requirements, instead of lacking anything. Most people on this planet didn’t seem to hit the level 25 mark anyway, so none of the beast-kin had more information on the topic.

  Adventurers seem to be a bit higher-level on average. The group that found the dungeon was likely a recently assembled team, which would explain their lack of prowess or levels when in comparison to the chiefs.

  [Blessed: 334 -> Blessed: 338]

  With it being close to a year since the beast-kin resettled Gorn village, there were a few new residents that I made sure to have blessed as soon as possible.

  Spring had arrived, and with it so did a few requests to place down more pillars that would boost production. They were preparing for an influx of demand, as the adventurer caravan was expected in about half a year. Even with the boosted agriculture speed

  [Year 13 Month 0: 4 months have passed]

  [You have gained 1 level]

  [Sanctuary has upgraded]

  [The range of the Sanctuary skill has expanded. May only be used by the Primary Obelisk.]

  Astrid had done a lot of work on the outpost, which had been lovingly named Runehold, as the rune-covered obelisks emitted a slight glow at night. While she gained a couple of levels from the administration tasks, the [Shopkeeper] class didn’t have a ton of overlap with city management, which meant there was a loss of experience.

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  It was unfortunate, but she had also told me she was aiming for an evolution more suited to her new life. Both her child and Penelope’s had also grown old enough that they didn’t need to be constantly around, and while they still spent most of their time with their children, the maintenance time had decreased.

  Runehold had expanded quite a bit, and while it would certainly require more work to maintain a full society, it would be functional with Gorn village able to support it for now. Eventually, Astrid intended for Runehold to have its own farms, but without more farmers, it was going to have to wait.

  Curiously, there was a trickle of people who had found ways to get there ahead of time. These were aspiring merchants who were looking to establish an advantage over those who would come later. When they arrived to find the entrance somewhat developed, many were surprised, but took the news in stride. It meant less work for them after all.

  Astrid provided each merchant with a plot of land near the dungeon entrance, no monsters could exit the dungeons, and adventurers would naturally congregate, making the area prime for market stalls and commerce. Combining her knowledge of commerce and some help from the Beast-kin Chiefs, the outpost was quite organized.

  I had wanted to see if I could also go into the dungeon, but anytime I had someone take a totem in it would immediately vanish.

  It wasn’t optimal, but dungeons were a sealed box of mysteries.

  [Year 13 Month 1: 1 month has passed]

  The caravan came early, and they were not happy to find someone had gotten there first.

  When we noticed them approaching, we made sure most of the Beast-kin were out of sight and had them head back to Gorn village.

  Double-checking the anti-detection field was working to hide Gorn, I focused on the conversation between Astrid and the caravan leader, who had gone out to negotiate with the new arrivals.

  The caravan leader was a portly man, short in stature, and with a sleezy looking mustache. “-We were told it was unsettled.” He spoke with anger in his voice. “These expansion expeditions cost the Adventurer’s Guild quite a high price.”

  Astrid raised her hands in a calming manner, “Unfortunantly we are already here, and as you can see,” she gestured to the early arrivals. “Others have already begun to join.”

  The man haughtily grumbled, “Not like you could stop us from taking over. Why should I not order the adventurers to attack? There is no one here to guard this settlement in the first place!” What a bastard.

  I activated the anti-detection field, specifically targeting the man and his expedition. Let's see how they like that.

  I had experimented with the ability and found that if I had enough mana flowing into the field, or had enough stacked, it would mess with people’s perception, even if they knew it existed, and they would find themselves turned around.

  For now, I didn’t want to use the rest of the slots for this, so I just temporarily sent more mana through the Runehold obelisk.

  Having watched a settlement disappear before his eyes, the man’s jaw dropped. “Ho-how?”

  Astrid merely laughed and walked inside the barrier, the anti-detection fields not considering her hostile.

  Once she had returned to a small house, she had set up a quaint office, and she spoke to me. “Gol? How long can you maintain your skill?”

  I checked my reserves, “Several days. Maybe a few more if I turn off some other pillars.”

  She waved me off, turning back to the paperwork that had begun to accumulate as the established merchants had various requests. “That is long enough; they will give in by then.”

  Once again, I confirmed the Beast-kin had snuck back to Gorn safely. I do not want the church to come through here.

  [Year 13 Month 1: Continued]

  It was the third day after the fields went up in which the expedition group caved.

  If it had been any other location, it wouldn’t have been a major deal, but dungeons only had one entrance, and despite their best attempts to get around the wards, no one could get through.

  There had been several nights when I watched in bemusement as several adventurers had been confused by the fields. In their eyes, they would take a step forward but walk back, or if they closed their eyes and walked forward, they would end up turning around.

  In fact, some of the inhabitants of Runehold had taken up bets, curious about how far the attempted saboteurs would be able to make it before they gave up.

  When they gave in to the demands of Runehold’s administration–basically just Astrid and a few others–I was both happy and sad that my amusement had given up their attempts.

  The only close call was when several adventurers that were probably a little higher level than Osbert managed to make some decent headway, their levels letting them last considerably longer. When this happened, I had to place a few more pillars. I had some to spare, but quickly retrieved them; they were more useful as emergency response tools.

  Higher-level individuals could probably just walk through without noticing a thing; there are probably skills for it, too.

  Alas, the caravan didn’t have either.

  When they requested entrance on the third day, they were required to cede their claim to the town by Astrid. If it had not been for the long journey back and the amount of money already invested in the trip, I doubt they would have agreed.

  The requirements they had were to be given a large plot of land to build a branch office, and required Astrid to create a charter that promised the guild a council seat when it was established.

  Astrid and I were happy to go with these demands, as we had already intended to do both. A council would be good for the day-to-day management of the city, as I didn’t want to reveal myself to the greater world so soon.

  With the outpost now legally ours, some of the people who tagged along with the caravan split off and joined Runehold’s workforce, while the people who were actually hired by the adventurers' guild began constructing their office on a ready plot of land.

  As Astrid was busy finalizing the documents, I focused back on Gorn village and its inhabitants.

  Penelope is taking care of her child, Saldi wouldn’t know, and Osbert is in the dungeon… who has a few minutes… Ah

  Nobu was free, having just ended his training session.

  “Nobu? Can you tell me about our surroundings?

  With Runehold established, it was probably not a bad idea for me to ask about the nearby countries; all I knew was that we were technically a part of a small kingdom on the edge of what amounted to no man’s land.

  He looked confused at my question, hesitantly he spoke, “Well… Gorn Village is surrounded by woods, and there are several-”

  “Ah, I mean on a global scale. Tell me about the world.”

  Nobu blinked. “Now that’s a big question, Gol.”

  “I know, but any information would help, especially as my influence grows.”

  He nodded deliberately, “True. Well. Don’t expect a scholar’s lecture, I’m not exactly the best versed in politics.”

  Finding a comfortable seat, he sat down and let out a breath. “Where to begin? Well. For one, we are in the Kingdom of Loria, a pretty small kingdom with several neighbors. While the king’s men normally ignore the outskirts, the outpost will probably attract some attention, so expect something like that…”

  During our conversation, I picked up several things. For one, the planet’s name was Trendal, and we were on the continent that was the largest of the three. Nobu called it Avarin, though he admitted other countries had their own names for it.

  While it was the largest of the three, Nobu explained that the populations were rather dense, as most of Avarin’s space was taken up by the Wildlands. The ambient mana was naturally denser here, and while that meant magical or unique objects were more common, the wildlife was much higher leveled.

  With Gorn sitting on the edge of the Wildlands, the animals weren’t too crazy, with the Dire Bear Nobu killed being one of the more dangerous creatures. If we were even a week's walk further into the region, the lowest level would be level 30, with a few higher-level monsters ruling large territories.

  While Nobu had heard rumors that the kingdom’s boarding the Wilds were wanting to expand inwards, he personally thought it was more talk than anything else, as the kingdoms had to worry about the Vexus every fifteen years or so.

  By the time he had finished answering my question to the best of his abilities, I noticed there were several villagers waiting for him to be available; as such, I let him return to his duties.