"Good morning, Seedlings!" The sheep instructor started as she gazed upon the class, "Thank you all for placing your temples yesterday. I know that you may have questions regarding its purpose, but rest assured that they will all be answered. Starting today, after a year of waiting, I will finally be able to tell you all the details regarding the competition!"

A round of cheers erupted from the lecture hall.

We had all been left in the dark for so long. No matter how nervous some might be, there was no way it could triumph over the excitement of finally getting some more information.

"To reiterate what has already been revealed, during the battle preparation phase, Seedlings can attack another ruler. Those who choose not to attack risk leaving themselves open for an invasion by a competitor. Each Seedling can only invade or be invaded by one ruler per battle phase and in the case that multiple rulers try to attack the same Seedling, the ruler who sent in the request first will get priority. As you can imagine, if someone is attacked prior to putting in a request to invade another Seedling, they will be stuck on the defensive for that said battle phase. There is the option to attack a random Seedling and those who find themselves without a partner will not be punished.

Your schedule during this time will be as follows: from 7 am to 10 am you will be here in class. After that is your battle preparation phase lasting until 1 pm which marks the beginning of the battling phase. The battling phase will conclude at 7 pm, giving you six hours of heavenly time, or 250 years in mortal time, to earn as many points as possible. The remainder of the day, 7 pm to 7 am will be your free time.

At 12 p.m., you will be permitted to choose an Oracle to lead your advanced lifeforms. Rulers can communicate with their lifeforms freely, although there are serious restrictions on what can be said along with extreme punishments if a Seedling violates these regulations. I will review the details regarding these rules during tomorrow's class for those who do not remember.

Oracles themselves will be key pieces to a successful attack or defense. Since they are given a portion of their ruler's divinity, they have strength many times stronger than their counterparts and a heightened lifespan capable of lasting them throughout the entirety of the battle phase."

A few murmurs began to spread around the class.

This was mainly all old information. After waiting for so long, the creatures in the lecture hall were starting to grow impatient with the recap. Clearly, the sheep instructor was able to sense this.

"I can tell that you are all anxiously waiting for something new, so I will take a break from the Oracle talk and skip to something a bit newer. Points will be awarded to Seedlings depending on how they perform in the competitions. Of course, the criteria to earn these points vary on whether you are attacking or defending. A Seedling can earn a maximum of three points during a single battle phase, and after its conclusion, they will get a Tier I, II, or III reward upon success, each corresponding to their respective points. Sadly, I will need to keep what these points are used for a secret. Now, if a Seedling were to be defeated, a punishment would be assigned to them also varying between Tier I, II, and III, along with a reduction of their respective points. I would highly recommend avoiding these punishments."

The instructor paused letting this information sink in.

I was expecting some sort of reward system- it wouldn't really be a competition without one. A punishment system on the other hand...

A cold sweat dripped down my back as I thought of the possibilities.

Yeah... I might need to be a bit more cautious from now on.

I didn't even need her warning to know that they should be avoided- I was certain that the punishments wouldn't be directed solely at me, but rather my humans would be the victims.

The sheep instructor began talking again after a few moments had passed.

"As you all know, you have just placed a temple on your realm. The most important thing for you to do if you are defending is to protect it; the loss of a temple is an automatic Tier I punishment at a minimum. It does not need to be said that those attacking will prioritize its destruction."

Another round of groans and complaints came from some of the creatures, presumably those who were uncautious and placed the temple down in a precarious position.

It looked like my guess was right.

I was thankful to my past self for making such a perfect spot to put it. Separated by two mountain ranges, a huge river, and placed upon a massive plateau on the exact opposite side of the continent from where creatures would invade, it would be an understatement to say its placement was ideal.

Yet again, the instructor ignored their complaints and continued her speech.

"Now, I am sure many of you are wondering how to get the Tier II and Tier III rewards. It is simple," She paused, an eerie grin emerging on her face, "You will need to kill as many advanced lifeforms as possible."

Silence descended onto the classroom.

-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-

The class wrapped up after the sheep instructor went into more detail regarding the importance of Oracles as well as the exact percentages needed to reach the various reward criteria- those being 33%, 50%, and 66% killed for Tier I, II, and III respectively.

Julia was quite a bit shaken up after hearing how murderous the competition would be and although I held her shaking hand to comfort her during the lecture, it would be a lie to say I was perfectly fine myself. I prepared myself for such a reveal, yet I was really hoping this scenario would not be the case.

It had only been a day since I added my first humans and I was already extremely attached to them. The same went for Julia who quickly left class to go check on them, leaving me sitting in the lecture hall alone. I asked Mr. Flippers to keep an eye on my realm while I was here, so he stayed behind. Apparently the little guy also enjoyed watching my babies run around on the screen.

Unlike the other creatures who immediately went back to their domains, I was less in a rush to get back since I knew the penguin was looking after everything. I took advantage of the peace to think about my plan.

I've been a complete menace to the other creatures over the past year to bait them into attacking me... now I'm starting to regret it.

I was putting my humans at a much greater risk than needed. Despite being fairly confident regarding the natural defenses I created, I was still terrified at the thought of an army plowing through the continent before my humans had any time to properly develop weapons to counter them.

The red clawy boy will definitely attack first which should spare them an extra thousand years... but will that be enough?

Unlike the lizardmen who would pretty much be powerless against my arctic invader buffer zone, I could not be so confident about other creatures that may invade. Though small in number, there definitely were a few more geared towards colder climates that could give me trouble early on.

With a sigh, I stood up getting ready to head back to my domain. There was no point regretting my past actions- the damage was already done.

It's been 3 hours, so that's... 125 years that passed since I checked my domain. Hopefully they made at least some sort of progress.

Just as I was about to return to my domain, I heard a voice call out to me from the hall.

"Look at you. The competition has not even started yet and you are already shaking in fear. How pathetic."

I turned around at the provocation and was unfortunately greeted by a smug-looking Levon standing in the doorway.

"Oh... it's claw boy,"

"What did you just call me!?"

"It's nothing," I stood up disregarding him, "I'm sure you miss me and would love to talk, but I have other stuff I need to be doing. I don't have time to play with you right now."

"You dare-"

The salamander caught his tongue and held his composure.

"Trying to run away so soon, are you? It seems you already know your fate. The second this competition starts, your whole realm will be cut by my hands," Levon taunted while brandishing his claw.

"... Claw boy threatens with his claw- how original. Look, it's been a year, isn't it time you get another trope? I'm getting tired of this," I rubbed my eyes and let out a fake yawn to mock him further.

He was practically fuming at this point.

"I. Will. Kill. Every. Last. One. Of. Your. Lifeforms," He growled.

Before the lizard could react, my fist stopped an inch away from his face leaving a gust of air brushing past him.

"... You won't do jack. You'd be nothing more than a stain on the wall if I was allowed to kill you," I spat.

The lizard stared blankly for a moment, but quickly covered his shock with a smirk- my fist still hovering in front of his face.

"Truly pathetic," Levon looked at me with an expression full of mockery, "Look forward to the Tier III punishment... if there is even a single human left to receive it, that is."

I could only glare in return and pulled away my first. No matter how much I wanted to punch him, there was no way I'd be able to get away with it- not to mention I had way too much to lose at the moment. It was close, but the satisfaction of knocking his teeth out wouldn't outweigh the punishment that came with it.

"I'll see you day one, you freaking lizard. [Return to domain]."

The lecture hall vanished from my sight and I was left standing in a familiar black space.

"... I can't believe I actually got worked up over his stupid taunts," I muttered in disbelief.

Now that I had my tiny humans to watch over, I couldn't do anything stupid. If I had actually punched Levon, I was confident something terrible would have happened to them. Then again, I would have never gotten so angry at the lizard if it wasn't for their existence.

It's only been a day, yet these people are my greatest pride and my biggest weakness.

A large sigh escaped my lips as I calmed myself down.

Seriously, I'm starting to wonder what the point of getting so strong was when I can't even use my strength. Maybe I should somehow get him into the arena...

My thoughts about squishing the reptile were eventually cut short by the squawk from a penguin. I glanced up and saw Mr. Flippers looking down on me from the balcony of his massive ice palace.

"Hey, Mr. Flippers! How's the weather up there?"

"Squawk?"

"... Yeah I kind of assumed so."

It was honestly very impressive how his project turned out; the palace took up over half of the domain and its spires hugged the 100ft high ceiling. Even considering how he had nothing else to do the past year, it still seemed like he built the thing in a record amount of time.

Of course, Mr. Flippers wanted to do the thing himself, but after realizing how difficult it was, he eventually waddled over and had me help with the detailing and with the tougher areas that he could not reach. 

As for why the tiny penguin needed a palace fifty times his size... I had absolutely no idea, but he seemed to enjoy it and it gave him something to do during the past year.

"So, did I miss anything while I was in class?"

The penguin pointed his flipper at the screen. My eyes followed his motion and I spotted what looked like a weird bundle of branches at the side of the temple.

What the heck are my babies doing?

I made my way over to my desk and zoomed in on the branches. Underneath, I spotted a few small humans huddling together.

"Yes!" I jumped out of my seat in excitement, "They finally started!"

"Squawk?"

"What do you mean 'what'? Can't you see- they finally built their first house!"

Perhaps it was due to my caution in the plateau's placement, but it had taken a bit longer than I expected for them to finally start construction. Shelter was not a super vital need there with the mild winter. Although it was much more comfortable not being exposed to the elements, the temperatures rarely got to the point where it would be dangerous to stay outdoors.

It was clearly a small start, but it was a start nonetheless. It would only be a matter of time before they discovered more effective ways to build.

"Squawk squawk..."

"... Don't be mean to them, they're learning."

"Squawk squawk squawk."

"You can't expect them to build a palace already! That's just unrealistic."

"Squawk!"

"What does you being a penguin have to do with anything?"

"..."

I ignored his jealous glares and began scouting my realm.

Their population is roughly 16,000 now... so that's just over a 0.04% annual growth rate.

Frankly speaking, it wasn't bad at all; if the growth held constant there would be around 650,000 people by the time the competition started.

The humans were bound to spread outside the plateau long before that happened.

Considering the size of the plateau and the extremely inefficient resource management of the early humans, they would start running low on food once their population reached roughly 50,000. The humans were already starting to get a bit strained in the densely populated area around the temple with mushrooms becoming rare and cherries being eaten the moment they fell. 

Those closer to the big lake on the right side of the plateau were still eating well. Some even started fishing! After throwing a small piece of a cherry into the water, they would wait until a fish swam up and then jump into the water to catch it with their hands.

Although impressive how fast they discovered this skill, the fish population would most likely not be enough to support the now thousands of humans in the area.

It won't be much longer...

The introduction of humans to the rest of the continent was imminent.

Hello :D ! I'm so happy, I've finally had a bit of spare time, so I am writing again!! I just wanted to give a huge 'thank you' to you all for all of the support every week- you guys have no idea how much it means to me T.T ! Next chapter starts my absolute favorite arc of the series so far~ hopefully you guys enjoy it as much as I do :D . Enjoy~ /author]