The night fell over the bustling village of Elaneth. The square was lit with the crackling noises of a bonfire, the villagers all gathered around it. The elven ladies had already cooked part of the meal using the few rations that remained. The delivery from the minions of Luna arrived with a large number of fruits and fishes, including, but not limited to, apples, berries, nuts, coconuts, and Red Salmon, trout, catfishes and so on.

To impress their wives, the warriors who'd gone on the wolves' backs also came in with a huge variety of flowers. In turn, they received a flurry of kisses and hugs from their ladies.

He must say, as a long-running virgin, he kinda felt jealous. Though, it was a rather nice thing to see. The warriors had been through a lot after all.

He continued to observe them from atop his roots. It felt kinda disturbing, sitting on your own body with a different body. On the bright side, not everything that happened to him was strange — something better was about to arrive, because he had instructed the elders, his first order to them, to bring as much alcohol as they could.

And their responses were full of smiles.

Naevhara and Elhem had spoken, with a particularly evil grin. "My lord, rest at ease, we'd bring you the finest wines our village has to offer!"

He'd felt uneasy at their evil grins — who mentioned bringing wines with such a devious expression? He wondered what those old bones were cooking.

The crackle of burning wood on the bonfire was soon drowned out as the howls of wolves came from everywhere. Xuan looked in the direction of the biggest mana fluctuations. And sure enough, it was Luna carrying Phaeron, with something particularly large in her mouth.

She and her pack burst forth from the leaves and bushes, before all of them streamed into the village. Xuan was almost about to flicker in front of Luna and tell her not to storm into the village like that. But thankfully, she herself had enough self-awareness not to do that.

"Everyone, stop here!" She howled out, the wolves around her instantly halting in place. Phaeron saw the moment as a chance to climb back down. "Now, let me go ahead and show this to my lord!" She said, before pushing and kicking her paws at the ground, shooting forward like a homing missile.

Quite the dog he had, huh. An exasperated sigh escaped him; he stood up from his roots.

To his left, Elhem and Naevhara were coming through with a crate full of alcohol. Xuan's eyes widened at the trajectory of Luna's flight path, and the crate.

"Luna, stop!" He yelled out before space-flickering to the crates.

"Huh?" She said in confusion, her body still barreling forward.

He immediately space-flickered the cart away, not getting enough time to wrap Naevhara and Elhem in the spell.

"Phew, glad to know you're safe!" He said to the bottles.

Behind him, Luna crashed down. Dust and debris flew everywhere, alongside the cracking sound of bones and pitiful moans of elders.

He looked back with one eye closed, almost feeling their pain. Elhelm was sprawled on the ground, and above him lay a flat Naevhara. Both were almost semi-unconscious. Given a few more seconds, they probably would be.

He flickered to the medics' area, grabbed some bottles of peach juice, before flickering back in front of the two broken elders. He fed both of them personally, holding the bottles to their mouths. The two elders sipped down with hands shaking as if they'd been struck by lightning.

Then again, getting dunked on by Luna was probably worse than getting hit by lightning.

While he fed these elders back to health, Luna was purring beside him — or the wolf equivalent of it. She pawed at his back for attention.

"Wait a second," he said to the wolf.

In front, the sounds of bones locking back into place came, the small cuts on the elders' bodies rapidly receding, giving way to fully recovered skin and muscles.

Both of the elders soon stood up, with Naevhara clutching his head.

"What even was that…" Naevhara asked.

"First, without complaints, receive my apologies!" He lowered his head in guilt.

"W-What for?" Elhelm gave a confused look, before the answer dawned on him.

"Yeah, I had no choice but to prioritize the bottles' safety."

Naevhara gave him a nod. "It's understandable."

Elhelm followed. "Indeed, we could be healed with peach juices, but not those bottles."

They gave an outlandishly exaggerated laugh together, before Elhem and Naevhara went towards the square with the crates.

Taking a breath of relief, he faced Luna — and man, did he wish he hadn't. The first thing he saw after turning to her was the dead face of a goat.

"You, what are you showing me!" He felt his soul crawl back before his body followed.

Luna's tail wagging, though, intensified.

"I've caught a level two hundred mountain goat."

Looking closely at it, the dead beast didn't have a flick of spirit particles. Instead it was full of mana.

"Is it not a spirit born?"

Luna shook her head. "No, my lord, it's a magic born."

"The difference?"

"They can be eaten!"

"Spirit Borns can't be eaten?"

For some reason, that had Luna dropping the prey from her maw involuntarily and retreating several feet back from him, her eyes going wide from what he presumed was fear.

I guess not.

After giving Luna her well-deserved praise, and some scolding — where she'd again slathered him with saliva — he used some freshly conjured water and cleaned himself, before drying up with some conjured wind. It was wise to join feasts with a clean body after all.

On that note, Luna was also going to join. In fact, she'd already gone off to hand the huge goat over to the elven ladies.

She jumped back to him again, caressing her head on his thigh.

He looked at her with a bright smile. "Luna, let's get you cleaned up too."

Her look turned from one of joy to horror as she tried to run away.

"You're going nowhere," he said calmly.

She'd bathed him in saliva several times — it was about time she herself took some baths. He tapped on his wood mana, conjuring up several vines. They burst forth from the ground, wrapping around Luna from all sides.

"My minions! Save me!" Was the last she said before getting turned into a wet, shriveled wolf.

With that taken care of, both of them returned to the square.

The feast began in earnest as the twelve moons rose high in the sky. It wasn't until today that he saw Elhem take to the stage — with two hands flung up, he broke into a rhythmic, free dance; the hesitating villagers followed in his footsteps.

While Xuan remained around the area with the most food, he picked up a chunky, soft chicken leg. Or at least it looked like one. He'd seen these birds and they were less like chickens and more like turkeys. Either way, the piece was glistening with fats and juices. He brought the piece to his mouth, licking off the savory juices, before plunging his teeth into the tender meat and yanking it off the bone. A single munch, and it sent shivers down his spine.

"Aha!" He moaned in pleasure. And rightly so — he hadn't enjoyed any food since as far back as he could remember. The fact that he hadn't craved it as much as he should have was mainly because he had almost forgotten the taste of these things.

Now though, not even the Gods of this world could stop him from devouring all these foods.

His feast continued while he watched the wonderful dances of the elves. Especially the womenfolk — they had an almost seductive charm to their movements. Though the word 'seductive' itself might not have been fitting, but in front of these clearly seductive foods, that was the only word he could think of.

He picked up another leg, but this time from a bird which was the rarer of the village's fowl. They were called the Estri Fowl, with feathers dark as night itself. He bit into it, but unlike the previous one, this one's flavor didn't burst forth.

He chewed on it for a bit, and like fine wine, with each passing nanosecond and bite, the flavors calcified, until all he could do was keep chewing on it.

It was good that his jaws didn't tire no matter how much he chewed. A fine benefit to having a not-so-human vessel.

He munched on them until satisfied. Then leaned back in his chair, spreading his arms wide, stretching his muscles. His stomach felt pretty full. And if he were still human, he'd probably already be feeling kinda sleepy.

"Ah, what a feast that was," he said, looking over all the food he'd eaten bare. "Maybe being the lord isn't so bad, especially if I get to enjoy these daily!" He turned to the special drinks, the booze. "Now as a palate cleanser —"

A tug from behind stopped him, shifting his body over — he found Luna's paws on his clothes.

With a huge chunk of meat in her maw…

"Master, eat this too!" She said with glittery eyes.

The meat in her mouth weighed at least ten kilograms. And that was only the exposed half untouched by her saliva.

"L-Luna," he stuttered. "I think you should eat it."

She didn't say anything; instead she brought the meat closer to his mouth. He gave a sigh — it wasn't in him to refuse people, especially one who was so enthusiastic about pleasing him. Maybe the system should be more generous and give him some spells to deal with these situations.

[…]

Maybe the system wasn't so generous after all. Either way, he'd have to eat it, otherwise she was going to feed him herself.

He extended a hand and ripped off a small chunk. Licking the sides of it, it tasted almost buttery. He went for a bite and immediately stood up.

"It's amazing!"

"Isn't it!?" She jumped in joy.

The night continued on as Akupara and the turtles finished their remaining work and joined in. Without worrying about expenses or numbers, Xuan took on and devoured all the meat and bottles of alcohol he could, while Akupara gathered the whole village — children and adults alike — telling them of the Legends of the Heroes of the Lost Age.

….

The next day, Xuan woke up without a headache. After emptying multiple bottles of super-aged alcohol last night, the last thing he'd expected was to wake up with a clear head.

"Well, I suppose it's the benefit of not being human anymore…"

He probably should've been better off *not* saying that out loud. He jumped off the wooden bed and it creaked.

Wait.

He looked back and around himself. He was in an exceptionally decorated room, with furniture of wood and stone, and a well-tiled floor.

"What the hell — did I sleep and walk to another country or something?"

Thankfully, before he could think up anything negative, someone knocked on his door.

"May I come in, my lord."

It was Akupara's voice, and Xuan's heart immediately felt lighter upon hearing it. He stood up from the bed, wearing a robe which was beside him.

"Yeah, come in, Akupa."

The door opened, but instead of the turtle coming in by himself, a cart of food rolled through with various kinds, excluding meat. He could see a variety of fruits, along with some dessert and custard made of what seemed like goat milk.

He eyed Akupa. "Where'd you get goat milk from?"

He was certain the village contained only a few goats, which too had been slaughtered for meat to feed the warriors during the tide.

Akupara's eyes seemed to grow irritated at the question, his hands clenched tight.

"It was the wolves' work — they've brought in several live kids of the magic-born goat they'd killed." He looked away from the floor and right at him. "Though my lord must not worry; we, the turtlemen, have crafted several more housings, kitchens, and such too!"

So there was a competition going on between these two groups. Either way, hard work needed to be praised and rewarded.

"Good work, Akupara."

The turtle lowered his head as if being crowned. "This one is delighted by the lord's praise!"

So, he was a lord now. And a lord just couldn't reward his people — especially such hardworking ones — with empty words. But asking him what he'd like wasn't going anywhere. So it was better to ask his people, if possible, using a proxy.

"Well, join me, Akupa. After breakfast, we're going to begin modifying the spirit borns."

The old man resisted joining him for breakfast, but that wasn't anything a few lordly words couldn't fix.

Also, it was about time I looked at all the spells I've accumulated.