Gacha Kingdom Building

Elizabeth is acclimating to her role as our battery... I mean, support. There's room for improvement in there since she's still unable to make complete use of her abilities in this role, but she's been doing fine for the most part, and she takes a lot of care to not harm our efforts.

Maybe it was the sight of someone as strong as Elizabeth struggling that made Anna realize there was no problem in asking me for help with her problem to handle her own strength.

I hope my advice helps her too, but as far as I can tell, she only needs a change of perspective and some chances to get used to her strength instead of always controlling it all the time.

Since we have Elizabeth with us and she works as well as any mana recovery potions, we are unafraid of going to the deepest parts of the floor, where most encounters require us to do our best without sparing anything. If our mana seems close to running out, we just get a recharge, and as for energy, we can always stop for a while to recover it.

But there are a few risks in doing so... even though the strength of the monsters was somewhat predictable thanks to our understanding of the path we were on, we can never be sure about their number, and with the dungeon being incredibly interconnected, it's easy for us to end up surrounded on all sides.

Once a situation like this occurs, we usually divide the frontline or have one of our mages clear a path for us. However, this time Anna decided to take on all opponents on our back by herself.

I was a bit doubtful of the results since their numbers were close to a dozen, and their levels were higher than hers, so I secretly asked Elizabeth to cast a barrier on her, just in case.

But in the end, there was no need for that...

Fighting one or multiple opponents at once was hardly a problem for her when they all had close to the same strength.

When they clashed, she made quick work of them. It was incredibly overpowering, and it made for a surreal sight when a bunch of monsters fell to the ground, looking up at her.

Her actions left the girls puzzled. It was no surprise that this would happen though, she has been holding back quite a bit for a while now, so even she probably didn't know that her power went that far.

Ellie: "This could have been a good chance for them, but they haven't moved..."

Miwen: "Anyone new?"

Ellie: "No... just five still..."

Ever since we passed by the settlement where the gate that leads to the forest resides, Mia, Ellie, and I noticed a group following us. We made sure to pass the word around without raising a fuss, and we've been exploring while keeping in mind that their group might attack us.

It was quite irritating since we had to leave at least one person idle to intercept them every time... I didn't think they would actually attack us without numerical advantage, but just to be sure, I told the girls to not hold back. This should prevent any rogue wannabe hero from doing something reckless.

It would also give them exactly what I believe they were coming here for... Information. As long as they felt like they were getting enough, the chances of them doing something dangerous should fall drastically.

What's more, showing off a bit of our power here should leave us in a better position for negotiations later, and would give us more credibility when we propose that we do what they are currently failing to do.

The fact that Anna is now showing that, not only our mages, but our frontline is also incredibly capable is just a happy coincidence on top of it all, so I hope they relay this information well.

Miwen: "I think we did enough for now... shall we go for lunch? We might even have some new friends joining us."

Claire: "That's quite optimistic... somehow, I doubt it..."

I see no reason why they wouldn't want to get along... If they just look past the self-proclaimed evil witch, the literal demoness, the pyromaniac destroying their forest, and the girl easily overpowering dozens of monsters alone, they would see that we're a very friendly bunch.

To invite them for our picnic, I headed their way, but they somewhat betrayed my expectations as instead, they decided to retreat and then quickly returned to their world.

Perhaps the fact that we were taking the exact same path as they did to follow us, without any deviation, scared them a bit... I can understand why they might've thought this was a provocation, but to be fair, between soon-to-be friends, this would only count as a playful prank.

Miwen: "Did you memorize their scent?"

Mia: "Yeah."

See? If they were serious about running away from us, they would try a bit harder to hide their tracks. This sloppy job could only mean that they wanted us to identify them later.

A clear indication that they wanted to meet again.

The only other alternative would be that their team of spies isn't that good, but a nation confronting others on their border would surely be ready for war and possess highly-trained teams...

Unless they aren't as prepared for war as they seem.

Licia: "Hm... but aren't they at war already?"

Miwen: "...that's debatable. Right now, they are only having skirmishes on their border."

Licia: "But they told us yesterday that the elves violated the treaty..."

Elizabeth: "While that might be true, it doesn't paint the full picture. Elves live for a long time, and when making these kinds of treaties, they love to use vague language so that they can then twist in their favor when dealing with generations that weren't there to debate it... Isn't that right, miss?"

Ellie: "U-um... I guess?"

One of the advantages of living for so long... With enough time, the reasons and the context for a document might start fading or changing. Normally, you can fill the gaps with some common sense, or update it every now and then to best reflect the current circumstances, but it's an active job, and it's impossible to predict every single problem that poor language can have in every single document.

With all the time in their hands, it's just a matter of finding a good opportunity to exploit the flaws that are bound to go unnoticed or forgotten.

Thanks to Ellie's words and the way I see her, somehow I ended up picturing all the elves as a way more victimized race in my head than they actually are. I don't doubt Ellie for a minute, but this situation is making it clear that they are more than capable of fighting back.

I suppose this is true for everyone though...

Miwen: "If their treaty specified something dumb like the elven territory only going as far as the forest... then they only need to make the forest bigger. They aren't technically infringing on anything and they can claim that they just defended their territory. Hell, they might even be able to stand on a moral high ground built on sheer bullshit."

Elizabeth: "Not to mention, if they manage to surround the cities, they can cut their trade routes and effectively put them under siege without firing a single shot at the cities. When it comes to peace talks, they just have to offer the cities back under the guarantee that the dungeon gate will remain within the forest."

Correct... they would essentially over-acquire territory to ensure that the deal they wanted from the beginning seems like a good, reasonable option. They might also only deal with one of the nations, essentially forcing the other to concede right after...

It's not without its flaws though... right now, they must be banking on this not escalating into a complete war. Probably the reason why they aren't coming out of the woods to fight either... if no soldier can be identified, they can just excuse it as the people living on the border defending it by themselves.

While they might be able to argue their case with other countries, it would be naive to expect that other leaders won't see through this facade. Then again, with the armies of two countries struggling against them, it might just make for a good opportunity for well-meaning neighbors to interfere.

Ellie: "...You are scary..."

Miwen: "Elizabeth, you're scaring my citizens."

Elizabeth: "I'm very sorry, Your Majesty. I shall reflect on my behavior."

Ellie: "...I meant you too..."

While she was suffering from all the bullying going on against her on our part, Ellie didn't fail to notice the small shake coming from the trees.

In advance, she told us that something was about to come, and Beatrice confirmed it was a proper spell by analyzing the flow of mana. The target was our group, and the size and power were way more than anything they had done previously.

Since the forest had not advanced at all, it was probable that they stored a lot of mana with this occasion in mind.

Hardly a second after we prepared ourselves, the trees came focused solely on our direction, ignoring the rest of the plains, as if a raging wave, consuming and changing the scenery in its way.

Once they hit the Demon Queen's barrier, they continued in their path, surrounding us completely in a few seconds, showing a level that we hadn't seen before.

With their encirclement completed, the woods continued hitting the barrier from the front, but they also started to attack from all sides, to the point where I even started worrying if Elizabeth was capable of handling it.

Miwen: "Will your barrier last?"

Elizabeth: "It will break. I have a few others set up, but if it's a continuous attack, they might get me in the downtime between creating and deploying barriers."

Miwen: "...I see. Claire. Give her some breathing room."

Upon hearing my words, she sank her sword into the ground and a second dome, one made of flames surrounded Elizabeth's barrier.

Then, the flames started coming down, concentrating into a ring...

Claire slowly expanded this ring and pillars of fire erupted every time she did it. They towered over the trees and looked like they wanted to attack the sky itself. Using this magic, she managed to push back the trees and prevented them from reaching Elizabeth's barrier, giving her ample time to redeploy new ones.

If we wanted to, we could even advance if need be, but eventually, the forest stopped fighting against Claire's magic, and under my orders, she also stopped her fire ring.

Mia: "50 men in front of us... a few familiar ones."

Miwen: "...That's tough...I didn't prepare enough sandwiches for everyone..."

And Claire doubted they would join us for lunch...

Perhaps thinking our carefree attitude was just amateurism, they took the opportunity to surround us and a hail of arrows and magic came in our direction.

Even while recharging Claire, this wasn't a big deal for Elizabeth to handle. Their numbers were a bit of a threat, but I knew she could take them on by herself if she really wanted to.

The problem is that I don't want to hurt them for now...

It was a good opportunity to see how Elizabeth would behave though, so I purposefully refrained from giving any commands.

The girls were a bit confused, but in the end, Elizabeth didn't take action by herself and just maintained the barrier, so I took charge of our next steps.

Miwen: "...Bea, you're able to see them, right? Can you fix their feet on the ground for a while?"

Bea: "They are spending quite a lot of mana... I believe it's doable."

By surrounding us with the forest, they had completely hidden us from everything else. I was hoping that they would have this chance to come and talk, or at least ask us a few questions, but their attacks didn't show any intention of that, so perhaps they needed some more incentives.

Without being able to launch any strong spells and with Bea having a portable recharger, these guys became unable to break free from the earth binding them, and a bit of desperation started to take hold of their hearts.

This feeling was only strengthened after she forcefully brought all of them close to Elizabeth's barrier and Claire received the go-ahead to burn down every tree surrounding us.

Now, they couldn't hide anywhere else. So, in this hopeless situation, I decided to instill a bit more fear into them.

It won't be good for me if they don't take the threat we represent seriously enough.

Miwen: "Not so tough out in the open, huh?"

Knowing very well what fate awaited them now that they had been essentially captured by enemies they tried so hard to attack, it became incredibly hard for them to hide their anxiety and nervousness.

Still, upon hearing my words, the man in front of me immediately spit in my face. It was met by Elizabeth's barrier anyway, but I did respect the courage.

Elven Soldier: "You're one to talk. Come out so we can teach you a-"

Miwen: "I'll have you know that the only one who can take me for an idiot is my lovely fiancee. Now, what do you think we should do with him?"

Anna: "Eh? You're asking me? I dunno..."

Bringing Anna along was deliberate. This guy is one of the familiar ones that Mia had talked about.

Which means he saw Anna's little display back there. Even though it was a bluff, he should be well aware that if she wanted to kill him right now, there was little that he could do.

Miwen: "Well... I suppose you didn't manage to hurt anyone, so I don't mind letting you go. Oh, but if you wanna talk, be sure to approach us in a more friendly manner, yeah?"

We needed to let them go before the soldiers of the cities noticed we had them captive, or this might damage our relations with them, and fighting the three forces combined would be too much even for Elizabeth.

Still, now more elves knew the extent of our power and how hopeless it was to try and fight back against us, so the pressure on their leaders was bound to increase.

They also saw that we were willing to resolve this peacefully, even though we could surely bring them down if we wanted to, so their curiosity and interest must have been piqued.

Our actions must be incredibly odd from their perspective. They must've confirmed that we didn't come from their settlement, so they know we aren't from this world, and thus, have no stakes in this fight.

Not only that, for reasons unknown to them, we seem eager to fight back against the forest advances, while also being reasonable enough to not hurt anyone while doing so. What's more, my intent on talking to them should have been made clear.

If there's anyone with a brain on their side, I'm quite sure they will come to talk with us soon...

For the time being, we had made enough of a scene. Bea and Elizabeth confirmed that there wasn't enough mana in the air for them to advance anymore, and if I had to guess, right now, they must've been talking about what to do.

As such, I decided to head back home to give them the time they might need. We also ended up getting 2 level-ups thanks to the dungeon raid and made around $3000.

Once we got home, it was time for me to face the most difficult battle that the day had yet to offer.

I had already taken a bath with all of the easy ones, and while Elizabeth and Anna surprised me a bit, I knew the biggest challenge would be Beatrice.

Out of everyone in the kingdom, her body is the most irresistible, and yet, it's the one I had to resist the most. A cruel joke fate had prepared for me.

With the orders in place, plus Elizabeth watching for her use of Arcanum, she has been quite behaved.

We both were aware that the bath would present her the best chance to try and entice me again if she wanted to keep going with that strategy.

Like Anna and Elizabeth before her, she didn't bother keeping any piece of cloth to hide her body and entered the bath stark naked. And as I expected, just the sight of her stripping was enough to get me excited.

Once inside, we actually didn't do anything lewd for quite a while, and for the most part, it proceeded as a normal bath.

Eventually, though, she asked me if I wasn't going to do anything.

Miwen: "What do you mean?"

Beatrice: "It's just the two of us... and I'm all yours, so... why not indulge yourself?"

I couldn't exploit the same weakness as last time, so this was a dangerous proposal. Still, if I wanted her to remember her position, I had to use every opportunity to show her body and her heart that she couldn't win against me.

Miwen: "...Hands on the wall. Point your ass my way."

Beatrice: "Heh~ But there's something I need to do before that..."

She got on her knees in front of me, and the curves of her body became way more accentuated as I saw it from above.

Without wasting any time, she grabbed my dick and had it embraced in the warmth of her mouth.

While her skill is nowhere near Anna and Licia's, it was still good enough to make me cum, even more so when I had the image of her completely submissive body as she did her best to service me with care and love.

And I couldn't notice that. Unlike other times, she wasn't trying to appeal to me with her sexiness, there was an honest feeling in her effort.

Miwen: "...What are you doing?"

Beatrice: "guAh... hah... sucking... you..."

Miwen: "You know what I mean."

This was way different from what I was expecting, so I couldn't help but question her intent.

Beatrice: "Thanks to you... I ended up remembering a few things... not all of them good but... all of them important nonetheless... this is how I decided to show my gratitude, so..."

Miwen: "...I see... I guess I misjudged you, I thought you were going to your usual scheme."

Beatrice: "Don't get me wrong. I'm still making you addicted today. The last time was just a fluke..."

True to her words, once I came to her mouth, we went back to a fierce battle that lasted longer than my session with Anna.

Even though I knew it was getting late, Beatrice refused to let me go until she was satisfied, which took way more time than last time as she didn't want to give in until the end no matter how much I filled her.

Thankfully the time limit came in clutch as Mia threatened to take down the door if we didn't step out.

While this one ended in a draw, I knew I was going to have to fight more through the night, so my standing soldier almost raised the white flag.