Jack and Mai are riding Sleipner back to Dragon – Phoenix village, it was an eventful day for Jack as he took over 4 kobold villages today without any rest. He feels light-headed as his body feels exhausted and weak from all the exertion but proud of all he's done including meeting Mai and Leah even though he originally had to suffer a loss of blood.

Looking down at Mai still resting on his arm, he is unable to feel her weight at all as though she doesn’t exist making it much easier to carry her. Dragon – Phoenix village isn’t far from where the kobold villages were so he is able to quickly see the town bringing another smile to his face, this whole village is his, if he wants to destroy or build a building then that will get done right away.

The village just has a few simple buildings but very clearly, it’s the start of a big village that will upgrade into a town before too long with a main street wide enough to fit 12 carriages across. Soon they will start to build out of stone instead of primarily wood making the village have a longer lasting impression than it currently gives.

Jack has only visited a few small villages and a single large town thus doesn’t know much about architecture within this world but that doesn’t mean he will simply follow what everyone else is doing. He wants to draw inspiration from the real world but Australia has a ridiculous amount of suburban sprawl, Jacks vision for his Empire involves providing the basic requirements for living for free.

Housing, food, water, education, health care, transportation, power and safety will be provided by the Empire for free to all its residents. The empire will not restrict people’s individual freedoms and they are free to start industry offering goods and services the Empire doesn’t provide, provided it does not infringe upon another’s rights. There will not even be restrictions on religion but that’s complicated because Gods seem to actually exist within this world, if the God is willing to submit to the Empire and work for it, it’ll be fine but if they work against it then it won’t be welcome.

These are all problems that Jack has thought about over time but he’s not an expert at policy making or even politics in general. He is creating an Empire, an emperor should have officials to give a directive to and they implement his command, Hilda and Bane are currently the people to handle these matters but there will be more people including those from the real world.

Jack sits upon Sleipner in silence as he starts to consider the future, an Empire isn’t just internal matters. It is also about combating external threats as this world favours conquest instead of diplomacy, currently the biggest threats would be the system towns but they don’t seem to act out of conquest and only have an army for defensive purposes.

That’s surely to change as player factions develop and get stronger, conquest might be the favoured method of this world but in the real-world diplomacy and most importantly, money can bring about the same result for much less effort. Jack starts to feel some pressure from the real-world elements and vows to do some better research next time he goes back to find out what’s going on with other player factions.

Jack just silently trots through the town in contemplation, not noticing all of the labourers that stop work and give him attention as he passes by, they don’t feel dispirited they’re just glad that they were able to see their leader. Finally, he comes before the familiar white tent that he can call his palace, dismounting Sleipner with great difficulty trying to hold the sleeping girl that has no care in the world.

Mai notices the change in position, yawning and taking a quick look at her surroundings but finding nothing interesting she stands up instead of hanging off Jack before taking another yawn rubbing her face against his arm and opening her mouth up in preparation to take another bite. Jack quickly removes his arm from the little girl’s bite range giving the wound she previously created a rub looking at her with annoyance.

“Next time you want to bite make sure you ask” Jack tells her, pointing his finger at her while wiggling it. Mai just pouts and puts the finger that he’s is pointing with, into her mouth sucking on it slightly. Jack is startled by this and wants to remove his finger from this girl’s mouth but she takes a hold of his finger by giving it a bite, using her tongue to lick up all the droplets of blood from his finger.

“Oww, can you stop it?” Jack doesn’t feel pain from this, it just feels really weird having a girl that looks as young as Mai sucking on his finger running her tongue along it while trying to consume his blood.

Not getting anywhere he tries a different approach, “If you ask me instead of taking what you want, maybe you’ll get more in the future and won’t make me hate you” upon finishing, Mai lets go of his finger which is now covered with blood.

“You hate me?” Mai asks with a pitiful expression, looking towards Jack as though his words are the most important thing to her in the world.

“No, but I hate girls that don’t listen to me” Jack responds and adds, “You need to ask me next time because you don’t need it all the time”

“I dooooo need it”

“You only met me today and you have eaten things that don’t have my blood in it right?”

“Yes but..” Mai tries to speak but is interrupted by Jack.

“No buts, you need to ask next time or I’ll get Leah to take you away and we’ll never meet again”

Mai is about to open her mouth to speak but upon seeing Jack’s stern expression she keeps her mouth shut and just pouts with her lips while looking away, Jack finally feels like he got somewhere with the girl and walks into the tent.

The white tent retains that ethereal feeling but something is different within the tent, there’s a massive hole in the roof and one of the sides. There’s a bright white glowing flame with a person’s figure in the centre of it, Jack is unable to see who it is but can feel a sense of familiarity with the flame and the person within it.

He can feel the concentration that the person within the flame is having and deciding that it’s probably Jessica who is cultivating, he decides to quietly leave the tent with Mai who is mesmerised by the flame and wants to get closer to it for some reason, Jack tries to drag her away but she works free and gets slightly closer.

Jessica within the flame can sense fluctuations around her and her concentration slips, heat can be felt in the surrounding area the familiar, incredible heat that has a piercing chilliness that cuts straight to the bone. The flame almost instantly dissipates after the heat spreads through the area, luckily before anything catches on fire.

Jessica is seated with her legs crossed looking at the two new people within the tent, her expression is excited upon seeing Jack but quickly turns cold as she looks upon Mai, she recognises Mai from the Luan bird’s vision but she’s much smaller than what she thought. She looks like an 8-year-old girl wearing leaves instead of clothes, her dark green her looks odd yet somewhat enchanting but her eyes are filled with inquisitiveness and no maliciousness so Jessica isn’t sure how to feel about this girl, her thoughts start to race wondering if Jack likes girls this young or she saw wrongly with the luan birds.

Jack wants to ask what’s going on but before he can get any words out, Mai speaks up “Elder Sister, why don’t you have clothes on? Does he always keep his wives without any clothes on?” she asks.

Jessica’s face almost immediately goes crimson as she tries to hide herself with her hands, Leah suddenly appears before Mai grabbing her hand, “Quick let’s get out of here away from this perverted man” she says quickly wanting to drag Mai away.

Jessica has another change of expression upon seeing Leah appear, this woman is much prettier than what she saw via the luan birds, her black hair with a purple tinge, her purple robes and beautiful appearance make her incredibly beautiful, Jessica feels threatened by her and speaks up, “So what if he does?” she asks Mai but speaking towards Leah.

Jessica puts on a cold expression as she removes her hands and proudly displays her body towards the group of people, Jack just scratches his head unable to speak up while Leah blushes and Mai starts to giggle upon seeing the reactions between Jessica and Leah. This lasts for a few moments with neither woman backing down, Jack decides to diffuse the situation slightly.

“Umm, I don’t really care if she does go around naked, in fact I like it a lot but there’s a massive hole in the roof and wall over there” he points towards the roof and wall holes, “There’s also a few too many men around here so it’s not that private” Jack tries to explain in a joking manner.

Jessica turns to look at the big hole in the wall that she didn’t see before, luckily there’s a wall there blocking the view from the main road but there are some gaps in the wall. She crouches to cover herself up before trying to find some spare clothes, Leah also turns around to face away from Jack and Jessica.

Leah’s face is also bright crimson but for another reason, her thoughts are starting to get excited over the prospects of Jack forcing her to go naked and having his way with her, she gets lost in her perverted thoughts not caring about what happens in the room anymore.

Mai upon seeing Jessica trying to look around as if she’s looking for clothes goes over to hand Jessica some large leaves that appeared from nowhere. Jessica takes them from Mai and covers her important areas up, causing Jack to start laughing hard as he’s reminded of the last time Jessica was forced to be naked, she had to run around with leaves on for a good portion of the day.

His laughing causes everyone to draw back from their fantasies and finally everyone is back to normal, Jessica easily finds some appropriate clothing and Leah is drawn out of her fantasies, her vision towards Jack is complicated and she can feel some heat within her body whenever their eyes meet but she forcefully suppresses it.

Jack leaves the tent for a moment to tell people to prepare something to repair the tent while Jessica sorts out a new method to contain the little chick, the bag that it usually sleeps within has burnt up. The little chick has changed slightly after that period of cultivation and has quite a few white and yellow feathers on it, mostly just down feathers making it appear fluffy but it no longer appears like a sack of skin.

“What kind of little baby bird is that?” Mai asks Jessica.

“I don’t know but it seems to like fire” Jessica responds, Leah upon hearing this, frowns because all of the birds that like fire should have been extinct in this world for some time. She looks at the little chick, she can feel the phoenix qi coming from it and Jessica when a call comes from the sky, it’s the red and blue luan birds leaving a majestic trail of red and blue as they fly above the village.

Leah can easily see the luan birds and racks her mind trying to remember where these birds were previously mentioned, suddenly it comes to her. The red and blue luan birds were considered the messengers of the old Phoenix Empress, they never left her side unless they were given an important task, usually acting as the precursor to war.

Mai wants to play with the little chick and sends a vine towards it as if probing it like a snake, the chick almost immediately gets annoyed at the vine approaching it and sends out a zap of phoenix flame qi causing the vine to almost immediately disintegrate. Mai starts to rub the stub of the burnt off vine looking at the chick annoyed, Jessica puts the chick within her bosom where it is able to stick its head out and still watch the surroundings.

Leah feels suspicious about all of these auspicious signs, she feels like she needs to do some research about this area so she speaks a few words to the group, “I’ll be back soon, I have to check something” before disappearing leaving Jack, Jessica and Mai within the tent unable to reply.

Jessica looks at Jack and feels her heart speeding up, she wants to leap into his arms and prove that she is just as worthy as any of the other girls he will meet. Jack can feel the uneasiness in Jessica’s eyes, he steps over to her and gives her a big hug.

Jessica is wrapped up in Jack’s big arms and feels very secure, taking in his familiar body odour as she feels like she can just melt into this hug. Her mind settles down as she considers how silly her reactions earlier were, it doesn’t matter how many women he gets because she will always have a special place in his heart.

Jack wants to say something to Jessica to let her know that she will always be special to him, they haven’t spent much time together but he no longer feels like he can live his life without her in it someway, she was a piece of his life that he was always missing but didn’t realise it. The other people may be important for the game world or the empire but she will be special to only him.

He wants to speak these reassuring words but doesn’t know how to bring it out so they just hold their hug for several moments, Mai is bored from just watching these two hug she starts to quietly walk out of the tent to see what other interesting things there are in the area when a piercing howl can be heard from the distance.

The massive howl echoes through the whole area causing all the other wolves to howl in response as they rush into the distance towards the howling, Jack lets go of the hug that Jessica doesn’t want to but she knows that he has to go check this out, taking a final deep breath of his body odour she steps away from him and turns to Mai.

“Missy, you need to learn some manners if you’re going to spend time here, Jack needs to go do some stuff so you have to listen to me” Jessica says while trying to sound tough. Mai ignores her and wants to leave the tent when Jack speaks up too, “If you want anymore of my blood you better listen to her!” he says sternly causing Mai’s footsteps to pause.

Mai gives an angry look towards Jack while she takes a seat indicating that she’s listening, Jack gives Jessica a shrug indicating that he doesn’t know what to do with her as he rushes out of the tent, jumping onto Sleipner and into the distance towards the howls.

“Are you mating with him? I think my sister wants to mate with him, what’s mating?” Mai asks several questions quickly to Jessica; she knows that her sister Leah gets flustered when asking these questions and upon seeing Jessica’s face turn red know that she succeeded in doing the same so continues to ask similar questions.

Jack is currently racing towards where Fafnir fell asleep several days ago, many of the wolves are racing towards the same area excited ignoring Jack on the horse as though he means nothing and they’re going to greet their newly awakened king.

He comes upon the area that the wolves are gathering, they’re circling around a giant beast covered by a beam of dark light that disappears into the sky, many of the wolves are howling but they suddenly stop when the light beam disappears revealing that’s in the centre of it.

It’s a gigantic jet-black wolf with two heads, it is releasing an aura of nobility and aggressiveness indicating that this truly is a king of all wolves. The lower wolves are all crawling on their bellies showing submission including the goblin rider wolves who should be a separate species.

The gigantic wolf looks coldly down upon all the other wolves, all of them showing submission pleasing it but upon seeing Jack sitting atop Sleipner, the giant wolf body glows and shrinks, the second head disappearing while the wolf returns to the familiar appearance of Fafnir when he first met Jack.

Ignoring all the wolves still showing submission, Fafnir runs up to Jack who is still seated upon Sleipner who isn’t willing to let Fafnir jump up on him. Jack gives Sleipner a stroke before jumping down and letting Fafnir jump into his arms like a puppy.

“Finally, you’re awake, those wolves have been annoying the goblins so you need to reign them in” Jack says to Fafnir while stroking it like a dog, his fur has become a lot softer than before. Jack brings up the system information:

[Two-headed Hellfire Wolf High King]

Level: Stage 0-9

Grade: SS

Stats: Strength: 16, Intelligence: 14, Agility: 18, Constitution: 12

Skills: Wolf King’s Might (strikes fear into any wolf and makes them submit), Bloodthirsty Bite, Hellfire Flare, Hellfire Wall.

Description: A common grey wolf that has evolved into a King class through absorbing the blood essence of many different creatures. It has further evolved upon absorbing massive amounts of dragon Qi and flesh of numerous creatures during a moment of life and death.

Jack is excited by these changes, letting go of Fafnir and rushing over to the den that Fafnir is associated with, there’s a chance that it has upgraded. Upon reaching the area the den was placed, he is able to see that it has indeed changed, it’s now has a red and black stripe on it.

[Den – Hellfire Wolf]: (Advanced 9000/15000), Grade: White, Description: The Den of Hellfire Wolves, spawns 4-6 Hellfire Wolves per day.

Jack is even further excited by this change as it means they’ll have a massive increase in their village firepower and with Fafnir awake, they don’t need to worry about the wolves becoming out of control again. Jack spends some time just playing with Fafnir, Sleipner and some of the wolves before heading back to the village refreshed but exhausted after a long day.

The sun is finally setting after the exciting day and Jack retires into the tent allowing other people to handle everything, the hole in the tent is repaired while Jessica is trying to explain something while incredibly flustered. Jack leaves them alone and starts to make some plans, in the morning the kobolds should arrive and Fafnir’s increase in strength should help their military immensely.

They need to obtain a massive amount of experience for the village to upgrade, they need more population but Jack is hoping that Albert will be able to help with that. Jack will send most of the kobolds to the mining village as there will be some of them unhappy about submitting to him, newly spawned ones from the re-established kobold villages will be totally loyal to the empire unless public opinion decreases.

However, Jack doesn't forget the treasure inside the crevice, whether it's below the strange hole or in the strange hole he'll get those kobolds to find a better way to get down there. There are so many things he has to prepare for when preparing this village as well, he can sense a headache forming but looking at Jessica he thinks it's all worth it because she has nothing better, he needs to do all of this for her.