fics I read

February 2nd 2016 Gemworld 5:00 PM EDT

The next morning Barbie talked to her dad and sent him the way of the house, and after a teary goodbye to her old man headed out with Cherry to do recon on the nearby forest. With Cherry's ghostly abilities they should be able to get some top notch spying done if they found any villages or anything nearby. Plus Cherry would be able to keep an eye on Barbie and keep her safe. Part of the reason I added the whole 'or through inaction allow her to come to harm' clause in their orders. The two of them would look out for each other.

Once they were gone though Zee and I went out searching for more materials for merging. H rank stuff was decent income, and with all the shit we gathered I'd actually made it back to twenty five thousand again. Mostly stones and plants, it wasn't like the every single thing was H rank, but this place was an obvious treasure trove of uncollected mats that no one had been around to pickup. Or maybe this place was so magical stuff like this was literally trash. Either way I would have plenty of materials for merging.

Barbie and I had discussed what to do. With my limitations (which admittedly were mostly made up) we decided going big was a bad call. We didn't need one huge powerful building. We needed like a dozen or two reasonably nice ones like the cottage. Rather than build up a castle first thing and proclaim myself a lord we were planning to create a village to draw in workers. Then we could have them help with gathering materials and performing labor, cutting down the time needed to gather the things for my castle.

Because I WAS going to get a castle. It was like...the one thing I wanted most here. Princess pussy and a castle were like the biggest check marks I needed. First thing we needed though was to find out if there were actually PEOPLE. Strega had offered to do a life sense spell, but she'd warned me given the magic strength of all the animals and plants there was almost no way the results would be reliable. So that left me here waiting for the girls before we started on the village, tearing up trees and shit was time consuming so we didn't want to do it if we didn't have to.

Which left me with Zee and Strega. "So, can the two of you tell me a bit about your magic? I know Strega uses blood magic, and Zee you talk backwards. Why the huge difference in style?" I knew Zee was homo magi, but I was curious if her style was exclusive to the species or if I could learn it too. Granted blood magic would work fine for me with my advantages, but it seemed stupid not to learn both, especially with Zee having a much higher ranking than Strega did as a sorceress.

Sadly that didn't seem in the cards. Zee shrugged and waved off the question. "Genetics. My magic is inherited, hers she learned the hard way. I'd actually be impressed at how much she's accomplished if she didn't literally murder people to fuel her spells. I mean, you can use the backwards talking as a focus, magic is pretty flexible. Any language or structure can be used as a focus as long as you can visualize it. More developed magical systems have the advantage of streamlining and generations of entrenched belief though."

I nodded in understanding. It was a shame to be locked out of learning it, but honestly with my vitality it wasn't that big of a deal. Luckily I didn't have time to stew on it, because my girls had officially arrived back as we were talking. Cherry and Barbie came out the forest looking tired but unhurt. I assumed Cherry had used a ton of power to look so exhausted, which was a great sign as far as I was concerned. If she needed to use her ghost abilities or even her thief powers they must have found some people worth hiding from. Or animals I guessed, but I could use those too.

I gave them a lazy wave as they stepped into view. "Hey ladies, good to have you back. I trust you had a productive trip?" I was excited to learn exactly where the hell we were, and maybe to get a map of this place that I could use to plot a heading for a good place to start my faction and hopefully get the attention of the Amethyst bloodline. I imagined knowing where the fuck we were would help. I kind of hoped the purple trees were a good sign, but a part of me knew that was just an objectively bad metric to base an assumption on.

Barbie, who looked even more tired and twice as annoyed as Cherry came over and plopped down with her back against the tree next to me. "Yes. We managed to find some locals. This place is in the middle of two nearby villages. Luckily these people speak English for some reason. We spent a few hours waiting nearby and collecting info on the local community. Our clothes aren't really suited for the area so we didn't actually engage."

She paused to take a breath and Cherry cut in snugly. "This place is the Emerald dominion. As far as we can tell it's pretty much dead center in terms of location. The Amethyst lands are directly below us. Given your plan the placement isn't bad, but we would want to head south a bit before we set up. Putting ourselves on the Amethyst border will increase our reputation in that area faster. Otherwise we have to try to get a meeting and then convince the princess. Makes more sense to acquire some value first, maybe even let her come to us."

I popped to my feet. "Good enough for me. Barbie, I assume you have some basic idea where to start? Because I'm ready to get going." I frowned and looked at the cottage. "Although...Zee can you and Strega ward that thing? I don't want someone getting into it after we leave, and honestly it might be a good idea to have some kind of backup base if we need it." The sorceress nodded and, contrary to my expectations, simply made a few motions and muttered a few words and the whole place vanished.

I blinked at her and she just shrugged. "I put concealment spells on that tree you had me enchant remember? They're part of the house now, I just had to activate them." That was convenient, I just shrugged, ready and excited to go. I turned to Barbie. "Don't suppose you managed to get a map while you were there?" I'd sent Cherry with her specifically to make sure they did snag something like a map if they found one. Her thieving powers should have made it easy enough, and running around without one would be pretty stupid.

She huffed but nodded at Cherry, who smugly withdrew a rolled up piece of paper. It was stiffer than normal paper, closer to parchment. She passed it to me and I unrolled it, stopping cold when I saw what was on it. "You've got to be fucking kidding me." They both shrugged, looking a little sheepish. I rolled my eyes and glared down at that map...which was of a giant fucking island continent in the shape of a godsdamned skull. Seriously, we were in the nose region right now and would be heading down towards the teeth.

The only upside was the mountain ranges were clearly marked, so we could use them for a heading. I turned to Zee. "Can you fly up and get a bead on the mountains on this map? Keep yourself cloaked, we don't know what might be up there." That got a nod and a few muttered words, causing her to fade to near invisibility. She zipped up and was gone for a few minutes. I watched the sky carefully, not wanting any surprises, but luckily nothing noticed her after her cloaking spell. She was back in about five minutes with our heading and we set off.

We walked for probably a few hours, wanting to get further toward Amethyst but not to leave the forest. The trees were going to be a huge source of versatility for us. Finally we made it far enough that we could see the Amethyst plains in the distance. The trees had gotten deeper purple as we walked, and I wondered if they really were colored in such a way as to be based on location. Finally I stopped us. "Alright everyone. Time to start pulling up trees. We have some work to do here."

Waylon, Sally, and I were the main workhorses, given our strength, and we officially got started on the preparations. Barbie was shockingly helpful with this part. "Alright, you guys need to pull up the trees completely, roots and all. We're going to have to till all this land before we put the houses down. It'll save us a ton of time setting up farms later. Farming is big business in the villages we saw, so we're going to need to make sure anyone who makes their way over has a plot of land they can use to grow."

Farming seemed like a good idea. I had some ideas about creating houses connected to the land they were on, making the whole thing a farm that could hopefully give a magical upgrade to the whole plants thing. Plus seeds were preobably low enough rank that I could mass merge some crops for them to grow. I was pretty excited about this whole thing. I'd always loved kingdom building sims, and making my own village and growing it into a powerful faction sounded fucking awesome.

Pulling up the trees was tougher here, the root systems seemed thicker for some reason, but I was an F ranked superhuman, plus Waylon assumed his were-croc form and could literally grab one in each hand and rip them up given how huge he was. Between the two of us and Sallys titan strength we managed to get everything torn up in a few hours. We saved the trees to use as materials and got to work tilling. That was less difficult because in his terror croc form Waylon was so big his claws could be used as a plow.

Finally we finished everything off and built another shelter a bit off from the massive empty plot of land we had designated for the houses, which I then upgraded to G rank the same as the last one. We used the same materials so we ended up with the same cottage, though that might also be because it was what I was aiming for. Finally we settled in for some food. I'd managed to collect some fruit and berries while I was stockpiling materials, and my appraisal told me what was safe to eat, so we had plenty of food.

As we sat down to eat I gave everyone a nod. "Alright folks. That seems like everything we need to do for tonight. I think Barbie has some ground work she's hoping we can get done before we start construction, but barring that I think its safe to say that Lord Village is officially underway." Honestly I'd have liked to set up plumbing, but I was pretty sure I could merge a plumbing system for the whole village if we got the pipes and stuff so I wasn't worried about it.

Everyone looked pretty psyched about the idea, and I was glad I wasn't the only one. It would have sucked to put up with whining about wanting to go home while I was trying to build my village, but everyone seemed pretty cool with the vacation, so that was a load off my mind. I looked around at the clearing we made and couldn't wait to get started. I made a mental note to ask Crassus for some advice here too, this seemed like his wheelhouse. I had a feeling this was going to be where my system really showed its worth.

February 3rd 2016 Gemworld 10:00 AM EDT

I didn't get up at sunrise to start working, because I wasn't a fucking actual farmer. While I was pretty pumped about the whole kingdom building aspect of the village I also had zero interest in becoming a responsible leader. I'd leave the politics and shit to Cherry and Barbie, the guarding to Waylon and Sally, and the magic to Zee and Strega. I had a pretty solid lineup to take care of any annoying responsibility things while I designed cool shit and lorded my power over everyone...and maybe fucked some farm girls with big tits, because really, some things shouldn't be missed out on.

Still, by the time I got up Barbie had finished prepping the land for the big undertaking, so I didn't even have to wait, and I specifically laid out all my ingredients to check over what I was working with. I turned to Zee. "Alright, so as per usual we have trees for the base, but I don't think I'll be having you enchant these. I think I'm going to try merging some of the materials with plots of land, then merging the trees together into a hut, then merging the hut and land together into a farm." We'd even tracked down a few I ranked ingredients last night before bed.

I also made up some bullshit about resting between tries, because I wanted Barbie to think my whole power limit thing was legit. I wanted the whole points thing to be a secret from everyone. It was one more ace in the hole that people couldn't exploit to fuck with me. If they didn't know about the points they were free to either assume I could merge shit when I couldn't, or assume I was out of tries for the day when I still had points left to use. Either way information was a commodity that should be strictly controlled. Regardless, first up was the land plots, so I wanted to check what I had available.

[Appraisal function activated. Treasure detected. Life Apple- I rank. An apple filled with life energy, grown from a life apple tree these delicious fruits are hardy and resilient and can often be found miles from their point of origin after being carried by birds or forest creature. A single bite will replenish the energy expended after mild exercise, and life apples have a harmonious effect on lifespan and quality of life.]

It was perfect for growing things. I was kind of hoping for an orchard, but honestly I figured even a tree would be a bit too much for an H rank. I was content to merge it with the plot of land we sectioned off for this farm and hopefully get some kind of special soil or something. Though admittedly the soil here was already pretty amazing, and while it wasn't exactly I ranked on its own, the plot definitely was.

[Appraisal function activated. Treasure detected. Hearthsoil plot- I rank. A plot of well tilled magic soil containing the native mystical energy of the land of Gemworld. Nutrient rich and excellent for growing crops of all types.]

It wasn't exactly super soil, but it was a good solid base, and once I merged the apple and the soil I could hopefully get something that would enhance growth speed. It certainly fit with the life and vitality thing. I'd considered just merging it with my blood, but I felt like chaos was a bad element to introduce to magic plant growth. The last thing we needed was crops that blew up or turned people into ferrets or something. I tossed the apple into the dirt, triggering the merge and smiling as it dissolved into a wave of light that rolled over the soil. A quick appraisal after told me what I had.

[Appraisal function activated. Treasure detected. Lifehearth soil plot- H rank. A life infused plot of soil that enhances the growth speed and heartiness of all crops that it yields. All harvested crops are also exactly 32.45% more delicious and provide double the nutrients.]

That brought me up short. Thirty two point four five percent more delicious? That was...weird. How did you even quantify that? I shook the thought away. It wasn't important, for not I had the plot of land cordoned off, so now I needed to create a shack to merge into it so I could make a farm. I had Waylon drag out two of the trees and set them next to each other. I figured I should have enough influence over the merge to decide on a basic shape, and a really barebones wooden shack should be fine.

[Appraisal function activated. Treasure detected. Gemsap shack- H rank. A small shack made from sturdy reliable wood. Small and unfurnished but functional.]

The thing showed up built right in the spot I merged the trees, and despite being pretty ramshackle (most of the ranking came from the material I was pretty sure) it was close enough to the plot of soil for me to be able to trigger the final merge. In total the whole thing was going to be twelve hundred points. I'd had twenty five thousand one hundred fifty points before after collecting the I ranks last night which put me at twenty three thousand nine hundred and fifty points. The light from the merge blanketed the whole area until it finally cleared to reveal what I'd been hoping for.

[Appraisal function activated. Treasure detected. Lifehearth farmstead- G rank. A small farmhouse on a plot of nutrient rich land. Increased crop yield, growth times, and nutrition. All crops are 50% more hearty and delicious, and spoil half as fast when kept in storage in the farmhouse.]

The house was small and homey, not much tinier than the cottage but a bit less impressive. It was clear the rank of the place was mainly from the farm aspect, but still, it was perfect. I had enough plots for eleven more of these, and despite having to wait for a bit before the next one I was positive that the village was going to be perfect for farming. I also had several other buildings in mind for the new town, things like a forge, a town hall, a butcher shop, and at least four or five other things that would make the town infinitely more appealing to newcomers.

When I was done I laid around for a few hours pretending to be exhausted. I'd told Barbie I could only use my power to that extent once a day, but I figured a few hours would be enough. She would just assume I exaggerated, which was fine as long as she still believed there was a time component. After a few hours of boredom and wishing I could nap I finally got up and started sifting through my I ranked materials again to look for what I'd use one the next plot.

I'd already used up the only life apple I'd found but honestly I didn't mind. As good as the results were I wanted to try a few other things. The farms would be more useful if I didn't have just one effect on them. More varied plots of land would be a bigger draw. Increased growing time was good but I was sure I could mix in a specific crop and maybe get better results. Something a bit more focused. I appraised all the crops I found, looking for something that would be worth trying.

[Appraisal function activated. Treasure detected. Moon berry- I rank. A delicious fruit native to the emerald forest, and a delicacy throughout all of gemworld. Known for making exquisite pies and juices, the moon berry is one the the emerald forests main exports.]

I'd actually tried one of these. I'd found a bush with a few of them left. Hands down one of the best things I'd ever tasted. Kind of like a mix of blackberry and sweet cream all in one fruit. I merged this one with another plot, but where before I'd focused on soil quality, this time I focused on creating an actual berry orchard. Unlike the fruit tree, the bush itself had been H rank, so I was able to start the growing process at least.

[Appraisal function activated. Treasure detected. Immature Moon Berry Orchard- H rank. An orchard of delicious berries at the beginning of their life. Slightly increased speed of moon berry growth, and a one hundred percent increase in deliciousness.]

I followed the same procedure as before. Merging the two trees into the shack and then the shack into the orchard plot, bringing down to twenty two thousand seven hundred and fifty. The bright glow once again swallowed the sight of the plot of land and blocked out everything before slowly fading, revealing a similar but different farm to before. The actual house was bigger, and the bushes were already grown and bearing fruit, which we would absolutely need to pick.

[Appraisal function activated. Treasure detected. Moon Berry Orchard Farmstead- G rank. A dedicated farm where moon berries are raised. Moon berries from this farm always grow to optimal ripeness and stop as well as improving their deliciousness by a hundred and fifty percent. The moon berry's normal one month growth cycle is shortened to a week, and the storage inside the farmstead can keep moon berries at perfect ripeness indefinitely with no spoiling.]

I whooped with joy. "Hey guys come over here!" I made my way to the nearest bush and plucked one of the moon berries, popping it in my mouth and moaning in happiness. The explosion of sweet flavor on my tongue was absolutely fantastic. The original moon berries had been good, but the best parts of this one had been perfectly highlighted. It wasn't like a new food or anything, more like I'd found a one in a million berry that was the perfect example of what one of these should taste like. Popping another one I enjoyed exactly the same sensation.

Barbie came over, whistling as she saw the orchard. I passed her a berry and she popped it in her mouth, moaning slightly as she bit down. "Oh gods, that is good. What is that?" She grabbed another handful off the bush, starting to pop them in her mouth consistently, obviously hoping for more of the things and enjoying every second. She stared at the rest of the orchard hungrily. "How many of these can we grow? Because I want to eat a few more and I don't want to put a dent in our supply."

I rolled my eyes. "The yield time for the moon berry is normally a month, but our orchard grows them to maturity once a week. They're fairly scarce on bushes as berries go, about a hundred per bush, and we have twenty of them on the plot. We can also store them in the farm and they wont go bad or start to wilt. I'd prefer if you didn't single handedly demolish our entire crop though, since we should probably try to actually SELL these at some point. They're a local delicacy. We just need someone to live here and actually harvest them."

I hadn't considered that the orchard might be too effective. No actual farmer would have anything to do here. It was literally just a nice house where you had to pick berries sometimes. I figured I could give it to some sexy local girl and then come over and fuck her all the time. Maybe a nice busty milf if I could find one. My dreams were shattered however when Barbie bolted to the door, opened it, shouted "Dibs!" And then slammed it behind her.

I rolled my eyes at her nonsense, but she WAS going to be running the damn village. Having a low stress farming gig would make her seem like more of an authority to the locals and also not get in the way of the actual day to day. I narrowed my eyes at the door but eventually sighed and left, but not before yelling. "You better make sure those all go into the storage room so there's room for more! And don't eat them all!" I grabbed another handful myself as I left, they were really good. Still, two down ten to go, and then I had more buildings to start on.

February 5th 2016 Gemworld 6:00 PM EDT

I spread the rest of the farms out over the span of a few days. Rest or not I didn't want Barbie knowing how much I could do in a single afternoon. It also gave me time to search around for some more I ranked materials, and even a few new H ranked items. I was officially down to fifteen thousand points even after the new additions though, a full ten of the damn farms had seriously cut into my total.

Despite that I wasn't upset about how things had gone. I'd worked with Zee to find another ten life apples to use as bases. Despite how delicious the moon berries were I realized I knew jack shit about what crops worked here or how they functioned in the economy, and while having a signature crop like the berries was a great call, the rest of the farms would work better if I let the actual farmers pick what they were supposed to be growing, albeit with some input. Plus Barbie had to do almost nothing for the berry orchard, and the last thing I needed were a bunch of fucking bored farmers getting underfoot.

Now that I'd finished all the farms though, it was time to get to work on the rest of the town. If I wanted to draw people in, a bunch of farms sitting in the woods wasn't going to be enough. I needed an actual town, with things like blacksmiths and tanners and butchers. In order to make room we had to clear more forest, so I had Waylon and Sally tear up more trees to make room. Luckily these weren't plots of farm land so I didn't need to worry about tilling, Waylon just stomped the ground flat and moved on.

Despite that, this was infinitely more complex than the farm because of the lack of involved land. I needed to individually tailor each building to its specific purpose and it needed to be perfectly balanced. Since it was going to involve a bunch of things being on fire and lighting things on fire seemed hard to screw up I decided to go with the forge as my first specialized building in the new village. Of course, if I had something at F rank and enough points I could always merge the whole place into an E rank village and get all that stuff added automatically, but I had neither of those things, so I would have to make do.

The ability to merge a group or large amount of something was an incredible one, and something I hadn't even considered until recently, but most larger residential areas were fairly high ranked by virtue of size and complexity, so you needed a similarly high ranked artifact or area, which took its own chunk of points to manage. Building the village one building at a time was harder and more time consuming, but it was also cheaper, which was what we needed at the moment. Not to mention it would bring in residents some of who I could Brand or put to work for more points.

In order to get started with this, the first thing I needed was to create the same old shack. I merged the I rank trees as usual, leaving the thing sitting on the flat packed earth. I didn't plan to merge them together because the land under it wouldn't effect the forge. My second step was to create the forge itself. Merging a metal box with some flames was unlikely to be a viable path to that, so I dug specifically went looking for some J ranked materials so I could have a few more variables to work with. Luckily even this place had garbage mats if you looked for them, and I was able to track down a few things I could use.

To solve the issue I gathered together as many J ranked items as possible, and tried to fashion a makeshift forge of my own to start with. A chunk of metal I beat into an anvil shape with my bare hands, a pile of broken sticks, and a box I made out of beaten rock to hold the flames and build up heat. Then I merged the box of burning sticks and the anvil together make a new item. After the light faded all that was left was a large square furnace made of stacked bricks with a metal platform for heating and pounding metal.

[Appraisal function activated. Treasure detected. Rudimentary furnace- I rank. A stone hearth for the heating and shaping of metal. Sturdy but basic.]

It wasn't exactly beautiful, but it didn't need to be. I'd made it basic so I could have more options. I searched my I rank materials until I found a particularly interesting flower I'd picked up while I'd been out searching the forests. It had seemed almost useless, but it was absurdly pretty so I decided to bring it back with me, though its nature made it a nightmare to transport.

[Appraisal function activated. Treasure detected. Violetblaze Lily- I rank. A purple flower that burns with an ever present purifying flame. Despite the lack of usable functions the violetblaze lily is famed for its beauty and symbolism, and is often given by lovers to symbolize the enduring burn of their feelings for their partner.]

I obviously wasn't planning to give it to one of my girls, though Barbie did like purple. I didn't do random spontaneous gift giving. But this particular item was the perfect addition to my new furnace. I focused and merged the two objects together. There was a flash of light, and when the glare faded the new furnace was there. The stone making it up was black and shining, and the flame blazed up the same purple as the lily had. The rocks had even restructured into a tower shape to create a build in chimney.

[Appraisal function activated. Treasure detected. Violetblaze furnace- H rank. An ever burning furnace specialized in purifying raw metals. In need of no fuel or stoking, the violetblaze furnace is a marvel of mystical construction, presenting a perfect workstation for a smith, be they an experienced hand or an untrained novice.]

That sounded pretty promising, but I wouldn't see exactly how it would end up until I tried again. I merged the furnace with the shack, happy with the materials and psyched to see what came of it. The furnace and shack once again vanished in a massive surge of light, recombining and shifting together. The light expanded as usual and then faded away, revealing a brand new building.

[Appraisal function activated. Treasure detected. Forge of the Violet Lily- G rank. A beautiful and elegant forge created for the craftsman of Lord Village. Stocked with an ever burning furnace and a series of tools made for smithing, this forge is made for either an experienced master smith or a novice learning their craft. Metals worked in the forge are fifty percent easier to work before cooling, and twice as easy to purify.]

I let out a low whistle as I opened the door, stepping inside to check out what the new building was like. Aside from the furnace, there was a high quality work bench made from black stone and metal. The floor was set with hexagonal tiles made of the same black stone as the bench and furnace, and tools hung on the wall, as well as a chest set in the corner with a large stockpile of metal ingots. The chest seemed to only open when I willed it to, and I didn't recognize the ingots, so I decided to just go ahead and appraise them too, figuring they must at least be decent.

[Appraisal function activated. Treasure detected. Violetsteel ingot- I. A mystical steel ingot purified with Forge of the Violet Lily, and steeping in its magical flame. Violetsteel has be strengthened and purified by the sorcerous fire, giving it an unusual degree of magical conductivity, making it perfect for weapons or foci.]

There was a hundred ingots of the stuff (two rows, ten bricks wide and five tall) in the giant stone chest, which I assumed was going to be really helpful and save us tons of time once we got a smith out here. The tools were likewise I ranked, probably because of the quantity, but there seemed to be variations of everything. I ranked was pretty decent mortal quality anyway, so probably a bit better than your average peasant, mystical or otherwise, ever got to work with. This place would definitely draw in a hell of a smith.

I stepped back outside, closing the door and noting the absolutely lack of change in temperature. I hadn't noticed it, but the black stone of the floors absorbed and dispersed the heat in the air, making every surface pleasantly warm but not hot to touch, but leaving the air itself with the same chill. I had the impression the blacksmith themself could tweak that, heating the anvil or turning that feature off if needed. To my surprise, the construction had drawn Waylon and Sally over. I grinned at the pair. "Don't suppose one of you conveniently a master smithing hobbyist?"

Waylon shook his head. Sally seemed...contemplative. "No. But I feel like I might be good at it? With someone to teach me. Once you get somebody here I might give it a try. I think it might be a Titan thing." She was staring raptly at the building, seeming fascinated if somewhat disturbed by her own reaction before she physically shook the thought away. "Anyway, nice digs boss, bet that will bring in someone talented. I would think smithing would be a big deal here, given the whole medieval world thing."

I wasn't entirely sure this place WAS medieval, we'd only seen a bit of it, but the forest was at least, based on the description I got from my girls. She was right that this was going to be a big draw. Besides, despite the lack of smithing acumen she was going to play a part. They all were. "Once we get a blacksmith who can work the forge I'm going to have you all set up a town guard. You're going to be responsible for training them, given your advanced combat mastery. Barbie will help where she can but she's going to be doing politics shit so it'll mostly be on you. You good with that?"

To my surprise she actually looked thrilled. "That sounds like a blast. With how strong I am I'll have to hold back, and I might need to borrow my man for battle demonstrations, but hell yeah I can work with that. I have formal combat training I can pass on, though I don't really know how to use weapons, so Barbie will need to work out a training routine for that at least." I suspected she hadn't felt useful before now, because she looked excited for the challenge, which worked out well for me.

She dragged Waylon away, chattering happily about practice drills, and I added potential guards to the list of people we needed to pick up when we finally made it to the village. I debated stopping by the moon berry farm to let Barbie know about the progress, but I wasn't nearly done, so I decided to just go take a nap. I could let her know what I ended up with when I was finished.

I headed back to the cottage, which I was definitely upgrading once I started getting an income of points, and dropped down into the bed. While I wasn't really tired given my immense stamina, I was mentally a bit tuckered out from all the concentration. I closed my eyes, trying to focus on calming my breathing so I would be able to sleep. As my consciousness slipped away I considered my options for the hundredth time, still torn on what to make. Maybe a bank where everyone could drop off materials they found to increase my points. Yeah, that was going to be next on the list.

February 6th 2016 Gemworld 6:00 PM EDT

I considered just grinding out the rest of the buildings from the village, but in the end I was getting stir crazy just doing merges all day. Even Zee's constant attempts to drag me off for a quick suck session got old after a while. I was, at heart, a city boy, and this wilderness bullshit wasn't for me. In the spirit of getting out and DOING something, I decided to head to the nearest village to looks for some farmers and a blacksmith. If I could get this place running it would be a bit more lively, plus the whole creating buildings out of nothing trick would probably get a few of them in the mood to work for me.

Since I wanted to spend some more time getting her onboard I decided to leave everyone but Barbie at the village site and take my redhead to do some recruiting. We headed off down the path she'd made sure to mark out, but as we walked it became quickly obvious that she wasn't feeling talkative. She stalked ahead of me, and while her tight little apple bottom bouncing in the dress she was still wearing from the party was a pleasant sight, I eventually decided to bit the bullet and just ask what had her annoyed. "Something bothering you Barbie?"

Given that my first girl was the single most obstinate human being on the planet, she couldn't possibly make it that easy for me. "No, why do you ask?" Her tone was even and her eyes were pinned forward, but I saw her muscles clench up in frustration, her reactions easily visible to my enhanced senses. "I mean, it's not like you've done anything for me to be upset about since we got here. Hell, we've barely spent any time together at all." Her voice was casual with forced lightness, but I wasn't an idiot. I got the message.

I reached out and grabbed her wrist, yanking her back and pulling her tight against me. She wriggled around a bit, but not enough to be considered struggling. After a second of that she just looked away, pouting. "Barbara." Using her full name made her flinch a bit, since I usually didn't and she looked up at me cautiously. "If you want attention I'm going to need you to mention it. This isn't Gotham. i have zero spare time. You think I don't want to bend you over a table every ten minutes until you pass out? We have other shit to do. I'm always happy to fuck you, but you'll need to make some effort too."

She snarled at me, blue eyes flashing. "SHE doesn't need to make an effort. I want time with you and I need to schedule it but that fat tittied whore needs her gaping cunt of a face stuffed and you'll happily nut down her desperate little throat with no provocation. I guess not having watermelons down my dress means I'm not a priority." She tried to pull away and stalk off into the forest but despite her having a legitimate reason to be annoyed I was pretty much done with her shit. I yanked her dress up pulled her panties down and slapped her pale little ass hard enough to cause a crack.

She squeaked and tried to wriggle, but I held her in place and spanked her tight little ass, and then held her pinned against my chest as I spoke evenly in her ear. "Enough. I'm done with your constant sniping and bitching about Zee. If you had asked me about it I'd have told you my cum supercharges her magic, though you probably already know that. But this isn't about that. This is about you being a little brat constantly and sniping and being passive aggressive to the other girls. When we were back home it was kind of cute, but now we're in a hostile environment and you're still pulling this petty shit."

Rather than reacting by getting all moany and sexual like I'd expected, Barbie started...crying. I let her go like I'd been burned, not at all comfortable with whatever the fuck this was, but the tears were more frustration and hurt than anything else, as evidence by her next words. "You're supposed to be MINE. She takes everything. She took Dick away, and now she's taking you and it isn't fair! I was just getting used to that whore Charise trying to steal your attention, but she's a fucking psycho so I could deal with that, but why did you have to start fucking HER. I hate her!"

She hauled back and punched a tree off to one side angrily, and I winced because she was just human and there was no way that hadn't at least cracked a bone. Still, I waited for a second to process this before I responded. This seemed...important. I needed to handle this carefully. I was good at manipulating people, but it was harder to keep track of bullshit emotions when you were standing in the crossfire of them. I had to take a minute to decide how to handle this development.

On the one hand, I could go with the old standby of comforting lies, but since Barbie was sticking around the whole 'oh, no baby you're the only girl for me' strategy seemed unlikely to pan out. I wasn't committing to one pussy in my newly minted medieval village, that sounded like a recipe for severe annoyance. I was definitely going to enjoy being a lord in reality as well as name, and she wasn't interrupting that. That left me in the unenviable position of needing to tell her something...true. Or at least truth adjacent.

The problem was I had no clue what the fuck I should say. She was going to see me with other girls, that wasn't going to change, and I needed her to get with the fucking program. So I guessed I needed more information. "So...it bothers you because you think she's hotter than you? Because she isn't. You're both sexy in your own way. Honestly I'm getting sick of the blowjobs myself, if I could quit I would." I didn't mention that I'd prefer to stuff my dick up Zatanna's fat ass, both because it was fun and because it was more efficient, because that didn't seem like it would be helpful to share.

Blowjobs were quick and not too distracting, and see was a total suck slut anyway so she was thrilled with the process, but I hadn't shoved my dick in anything but her mouth in days. She screamed in frustration, kicking a nearby tree. "I just don't want her to keep being BETTER than me! She's taller and bustier and she has that smoky whore voice and that fat jiggly ass and her long silky hair and every guy I meet is obsessed with getting in her dirty little pussy so bad I can fucking SMELL it!" She was practically panting at this point, and I just sat there and stared.

I waited until she was done and held up my hands, partially our of confusion and partially to show I meant no offense by my next statement. "I'm not obsessed with fucking Zatanna, though I'm starting to think YOU might be." She looked about ready to lunge at me so I pivoted away from her almost sexual jealousy of the magic user, to a safer topic. "Not the point, the point is sure, she has good points, but so do you. You're brilliant, and sexy, and you're one of the best fucks I've ever had. I'm not fucking replacing you Barbie, I'm just a greedy asshole who wants it all. You need to stop losing your fucking mind whenever I show interest in another girl. I always made it clear we weren't exclusive."

Left unsaid was the implication that I absolutely would not be keeping her around if I had to deal with this shit. Not that I'd lose such a great asset, but I would banish her to go do admin shit out of my face and only call her for updates and fucking. She seemed to get that from my tone because her eyes went wide and she looked a little worried. She bit her lip, looking upset. "I...I can try." She looked up at me shyly. "If I'm bad again will you...will you spank me more daddy? I think it really helped."

I was pretty sure she'd just be so mindnumbingly horny that she confused sexual gratification with affection, but I was totally fine with that dynamic so I just smiled and nodded. I opened my arms and she hurled herself into them. "Of course I can. I'll slap that sweet little ass bright red if you start getting naughty again." I wasn't sure this would fix her being a jealous lunatic anytime soon, but I mean...pavlovian conditioning worked on dogs. If I just fucked a smile on her face when she was good and spanked her when she was bad it would have to do SOMETHING.

Once again I lamented how fucking annoying it was forming long term attachments to people. Luckily Barbie was calming down. She'd clearly been feeling like she wasn't an asset to me, and once I reassured her she was useful she had perked right up. People needed to feel like they had value or they got insecure, and I'd been neglecting my role as her owner or whatever the term was by not making sure she knew she was useful. This was one of those lessons dad had to translate for me from the usual psychobabble.

Psychology talked a lot about people feeling appreciated and valued but those were just other words for feeling useful. All insecurity boiled down to fear of abandonment. If Barbie thought I didn't think she was useful she had no reason to expect me to keep her around. By making sure she knew I found her necessary she could be sure I wasn't going to get rid of her, which is what the whole thing was about in the first place.

The issue was that usually when I used this technique on people I WAS going to get rid of them, and I wasn't really sure how to continually reassure someone who kept backsliding like Barbie did. I couldn't imagine the CONSTANT need for validation and approval she seemed to demonstrate, but she was actually fairly intelligent and the sex was good so I guessed I could put up with it. Still, this method of training her seemed like it might cut down on some of the annoying neediness so that was good.

We resumed our trek, and despite not actually having sex Barbie seemed to positively glow with happiness as she bounded along in front of me. She still wasn't talking much, but it was a positive cheerful silence. That had been much easier than I expected. I made a mental note to try to figure out some more valid long term training methods, because the lack of disposability was seriously fucking with my game. I also made a note of how descriptive Barbie had been about Zee's body. Her insecurity was pretty much another form of obsession and I was pretty sure getting her attached to Zee would yield positive results.

Plus I wanted to see Zee shove that fat ass in her face and smother the mouthy redhead with it while I was inside her...but who said education couldn't be fun? All of this would have to wait however, until we got back. For now my redhead was placated and I was on my way to pick up some villagers for my newest project. I needed eleven farmers and a blacksmith. if some of those farmers were women or had wives or daughters with big fat milk maid tits, that would just be an added bonus. It was important to love your work.

February 6th 2016 Gemworld 8:00 PM EDT

We made pretty good time getting to the village. I considered stopping to fuck Barbie, but I had a better idea for getting her off and keeping her happy. It would have to wait until later. Due to that we didn't linger on the way to the village and we got there in just two hours, which I considered a win. Once we did, we didn't go into the main square or even walk through the outskirts of the town, but stopped outside at the edge of the forest to hunker down and watch. "So, tell me what I need to know about this specific village. Cherry did some recon when you were here right?"

I'd gotten overarching facts from them about culture and population, but if I was going to be taking people from here I needed the nitty gritty. Who was in charge, who was an outcast, who was secretly banging someone else's husband/wife. I need leverage. The village, which I'd been informed by Barbie was called Bridhall, was average sized and unassuming, which was a polite way of saying it looked like shit. The houses were badly constructed, the crops looked limp, and the only source of obvious water was an old shitty well in the middle of the town.

Barbie was looking just as disgusted as I was, as a consummate city girl, and someone who had been helping me plan and construct Lord Village, this medieval shithole was hands down the weaker settlement. I was positive she wouldn't mind helping me get some of these people to defect. It took her a second to shake off her distaste at the comparison and respond. "Oh, um, yeah, we looked into things. I wouldn't say we necessarily learned everything, we only staked the place out for a few hours, but with...Cherry's." She made a disgusted face at having to use the nickname. "Recon, we picked up enough."

I assumed they had. Barbie was basically a trained spymaster, and Cherry wasn't far behind. If the two of them couldn't get the goods on a dinky little backwater like this with literal ghost powers at their disposal I was going to have to rethink their competence. Time constraints were fine, but these people were literal peasants, their information security couldn't be that great. Luckily I suspected Barbie was just downplaying what they picked up, she seemed like the type not to think a good job was good enough.

She blew an errant lock of hair out of her face nervously as she took in my impatient stare. She let out a long breath. "Right. Ok, we did see the mayor. His name is Manka, big guy with a beard. He's...not great. Pretty sure he's having sex with at least two of the daughters of the local farm owners and one of the wives. We only actually SAW him fucking one of them, but he groped the other two when no one was looking. We're pretty sure they're doing it for favors, since he personally brings the water they use for their crops, and those three houses got an extra bucket."

That wasn't a shock, if you were in charge of a medieval village I imagine you wouldn't have much to do, an leveraging that job for good pussy was just common sense. It was actually pretty smart that he controlled the water output for the whole village, and I wondered how he made them agree to that. Probably by making sure he appeared to distribute it evenly. Neutral third party or whatever. Still, that was good info to have. "They have a blacksmith here?" I knew one of the villages did but I hadn't asked which one.

Barbie smiled smugly. "Of course. Why else would I pick this one. The Blacksmith's name is Levka. He actually seems like a nice guy. He's about sixty, or at least looks it, medieval cultures tended to age faster, but this is another world so maybe he's ten thousand who the hell knows. Regardless, he and his wife are kind of like the town parents. I saw him waive the fees for several horseshoe jobs, and give out a few pieces of bread to hungry families. If we can get him onboard I'm guessing the others will be much more likely to come along."

She filled me in on a few other dynamics that were useful. A farmer who was skimming water from his neighbors a cup at a time, a tailor who looked suspiciously like the young son of the town's only baker, and about a dozen examples of gossip and talking behind the backs of other people that PROBABLY wouldn't be worth much, but were interesting to hear nonetheless. When she was done I was just staring at her, dumbfounded. "You got all this in only a few hours? What do they do just sit around and talk all day?"

The shrug she gave in response was fairly casual. "These people have zero enjoyment in their lives. They spend every day growing food so they can survive. The only social interaction they get is with their families or some illicit shit they get upto behind their spouses back. This is basically a suburb on steroids in terms of how soulcrushing it is, and the dynamics in those places are dysfunctional as hell. I'm honestly shocked that these people are as well adjusted as they are. I didn't see any serial killers or cannibals, and I gave it even odds. Though granted it HAS only been a day."

That...made way too much sense actually. Bored people did crazy shit to feel alive. If I'd lived in this town growing up I'd have fucked every woman I could get time alone with by now, or taken over the village and tried to go to war against the next closest settlement. Put in that light it was pretty reasonable that this place was basically a medieval soap opera. I was kind of looking forward to what the courts the nobles had were like.

Regardless, we had plenty of recon to do to identify the people we wanted. Bridhall was a reasonably large village compared to mine, even if it was tiny in its totality. About twenty farms surrounded the core portion of the village, which had maybe fifty poorly constructed houses. It was bigger by far than Lord Village, but we could only really use some of the farmers at the moment. While it might be possible to put up some quick houses for cheap, it would ultimately screw up our obviously superior vibe, which would be our biggest crowd pleaser.

Instead we needed to remain small and elite for now, which meant taking the most successful farmers. We could get a decent idea about which those were from the quality of their fields, and with a combination of appraisal and observations made by Barbie in the past we should be able to weed out the best eleven of the farmers to bring back to work our fields. With that in mind we waited for night to finish falling and then headed out into the fields separately. I sent Barbie to do some scouting so I could appraise in peace, and after twenty minutes or so we met back up to compare notes.

When we stopped in the middle of one of the fields I looked around carefully, checking to see if anyone was out and about. Since there was no one I decided to go ahead, but I kept my voice low. Something about the night made me feel like we should whisper, even if there wasn't a real reason. "Alright, I've been looking around, and I think I found the people we need. Just to double check though, give me your list. If you don't know names just point out the house and we can go from there."

She gave the run down on her people, and while I agreed, I still scowled at the list. She just rolled her eyes. "Seriously?" I gave her a quizzical look, raising my eyebrow, and she just laughed. "You're sulking because all the farmers are men who either have no wives or daughters or have ones that are too old. We only have eleven farms, we can't afford to pick specific farmers because you want to get your dick wet."

Despite the fact that she was right I was still annoyed, mostly because she sounded so damn triumphant about it. Still, I wasn't the type to shoot myself in the foot for nothing. The girls could take care of my sex drive easily enough, she was right about limited output. Not to mention that not only would the farmers be able to go out and get shit for me, the produce they grew should count for points as well, so I wanted the best farmers I could find. Sure the plots could do most of the heavy lifting, but the better they were the less it needed to do.

Contrary to my personal preference though, we decided not to approach them now. Granted the farmers might be easier to convince individually, since they wouldn't have to deal with pressure from their mayor or their neighbors to stay put, but there were benefits to approaching them in the daylight too. Aside from making them feel more comfortable with us by approaching when they were more receptive to visitors, it also introduced an element of competition to the decision of who got to come to Lord Village.

Our farms were premium products, especially compared to the ones in this shithole. If we begged and pleaded with people to come to our village, not only would it establish the exact opposite of the dynamic a leader should have, it would also cheapen the appeal of what we were offering. These people were medieval peasants, they should be chomping at the bit to live in my town, and the best way to make that happen was to make it clear from the get go that only the lucky few would be accepted.

People valued things that they had to fight for or put effort into much more than things that were handed to them. The farms were already going to make growing crops much easier, but if we made that feel like a privilege that they had to earn it would go from being a potential crutch to a gift we gave them, and help establish even stronger motivation for them to remain useful to us. The easiest way to do that was to turn it into a competition, there was no faster way to make someone want something than to tell them they might not be good enough to have it.

Making this happen wouldn't even be that difficult. These people were bored, uneducated, and generally miserable from what Barbie had told me. We were dressed like nobles (well, dressed in fancy ass formal wear anyway which was close enough) and that alone would give us massive credibility. We were also well spoken and attractive which again, would weigh in our favor. If I couldn't manipulate a bunch of stupid farmers under these conditions I might as well change my last name.

Once I hammered out a plan, we headed home. It was a two hour walk with no heading, but once I knew the way my superior strength meant I could pick Barbie up and run it. Lifestorm wyrmkin could literally go all night, and I managed to get us back in thirty minutes at top speed. Once that was done I headed to sleep, planning out what we were going to do tomorrow to make sure we could get everyone we needed onboard. While there were many options for establishing our value, Barbie had already handed me the easiest, and it was already a priority of ours anyway. As I drifted off, I cemented my strategy for the next day. Our first order of business? We needed to get ourselves a blacksmith.