I spent an hour with Harold and Terry, giving them my opinion about the more practical concerns about the new migration, but I only limited myself to strategic aspects.

"Maybe you should stay to greet the arrivals, sir," Harold suggested. "That way, they'll feel… more confident."

I shook my head. "No, that we can't afford," I said. "I'm the only one that can create Radiant Flame equipment. We can't afford to split my time. Terry and Logan will have to do as the show of force."

"M-me, sir," Terry stammered in shock.

I gave him a reassuring smile. "Yes, you," I said. "Both Logan and you did excellently during the siege and cleansing of the dungeon. You have not only the achievements necessary, but also the looks to achieve it."

"I don't -- I can't," Terry stammered.

"Actually, you do," Harold replied once I gave him a pointed glare. "After the battle, your armor has the perfect balance between impressive and intimidating," he said. "The scratches give it some character, not to mention your growing reputation."

"Really? But I'm just a farmer?"

"Magic helps," Harold said. "It's intimidating."

"Perfect," I said. "With the dragon guard as support, you should be able to handle most of the new arrivals. I doubt we would have many arrivals above level fifty."

Harold nodded. "Yes, sir. Anyone over fifty would just move to a city rather than stay in a town during the war. As long as Rosie keeps the spies away, most of the arrivals will be below level ten, with occasional level twenty-five."

"Perfect," I said, letting my smile widen. "It means I could focus on the dungeon."

"Should I arrange for Rebecca and farmer corps to return to the dungeon, sir," Terry asked. "They can start reinforcing the fire dungeon as well."

"Not yet," I replied. "I want to stabilize the dungeons first before I reinforce the dungeons. Also, I want to observe the dungeon for at least a night, making sure there's no problem in the process. I can escape if there's a collapse, but I can't evacuate hundreds."

He nodded. "If that's the case, I have an idea, sir."

"Go ahead," I said.

"Can we grow a circle of decay plants between the first and second defensive rings," he questioned.

"You want to give me a permanent advantage in decay tools, copying what I did with the cannons during the battle?" I asked.

He nodded. "I believe it's a good precaution."

"Good initiative, do it," I said, agreeing with his idea. "Hopefully, it won't be used, but having a reliable inner defense could be critical if Drakka decides to push their luck."

Or, if Asterion decided that our loyalty needed to be shown more directly during an active war, but I didn't vocalize that thought. No need to scare them that much. "Anything else, sir?" Harold asked.

"No, that's all for now. I trust you to take initiative in case of any tactical problems," I said. They went away.

I could have returned to the dungeon immediately, but I did not. Instead, I walked around, showing myself to the workers, occasionally helping a few blacksmiths with their tricky problems. Not for long, spending only a few minutes, but even that was enough to shore up the morale.

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It seemed their general worship toward me was even stronger after I had dealt with the two Ascended. Maybe they didn't understand the full implication of their power, but they had watched those two chase our army relentlessly, only for them to fall to my blade.

Ahead of me, I watched Liam and his team examine the armored carriers damaged during the battle, brainstorming about the design choices. During that discussion, I stayed away, trusting them to handle the operation with ease.

Even the test versions had performed in an exemplary manner, after all.

Interestingly, Spencer had joined them, discussing the finer points of gear structure. I didn't interrupt him either, as he was somewhat demoralized after his failures in awakening the Intelligence variant. Intellectually, it had been just a few days since he started, and failure was to be expected, but people were right when they said there was no harm without comparison.

Watching most of my students make great progress clearly unsettled him somewhat, putting him under pressure. I trusted him to handle it, so I didn't interrupt their work.

Once I finished the tour, I returned to the dungeon, examining my warped mystic annexation from inside once again to make sure my absence didn't break anything.

The good news was that it did not. Actually, the dominance of decay was even stronger. The reason, I just needed to focus a second to detect. There was no mysterious darkness energy flowing to the fire dungeon, and without it, the dungeon's recovery process was hampered even with decay dungeon providing some mana.

"It probably means I can't delay opening the dungeon entrance for long," I commented. Luckily, the arrival of the others was actually an opportunity for it. The arrival of a few thousand people, even if they were limited to Farmers and other production classes, would mean extending into a second location was an acceptable risk.

We just needed to find a nice defensible location, preferably with some environmental mana.

However, that was the full extent of my plans for the moment. I had no plans to extend my forces before I understood the full implications of the war between the two forces; not only how long it would last, but how much it would affect us. That way, I would know whether to prioritize an easy escape route, or a second defensive bulwark.

"Back to forging," I muttered in frustration, creating more and more shells that would ruin the day of anyone who was yet to ascend, making sure any follow-up attack would end up even more devastating.

While I was making those plans, I kept an eye on the dungeon, making sure the annexation didn't come with nasty complications. Luckily, there were no sudden raids, destabilizing walls, or monster invasions. Clearly, without heretics pushing, things were more than stable.

I even took the risk of visiting the fifth floor of the fire dungeon, the obsidian plains broken by occasional rivers of lava. "A good place to set up an experimental forge," I muttered even as I examined the area, too hot even with my endurance. "Maybe even a tank workshop and a wind tunnel."

The last part sent shivers through me, but I ignored it. My complicated relationship with heights wasn't a good enough reason to slow down the tech development. Instead, I surveyed the landscape and killed a few lizards before returning, leaving the other activities like searching for metal veins to my subordinates. Find this сhаptеr's sоurсе оn

It was a better time allocation.

With that, I returned to my forge, and focused on my practical work. With the war on the horizon, having more resources was far more optimal than the alternative.

"Speaking of mass production," I muttered as I suddenly opened a portal to the second floor, where we still had the old production line for the fire metal, where I created piles of low-quality Radiant Flame metal before leaving the rest of the work to the hundreds of smithing apprentices.

That way, they could create the necessary cannon shells and other low-grade material as needed without my constant intervention, leaving me to focus on higher-grade arrows and melee weapons.

Before I annexed the fire dungeon, I didn't even think about trying such a mass-production method, knowing that I couldn't solve the material bottleneck … which, luckily was not a problem. The fire dungeon was an excellent source to handle it.

Just like that, the night turned morning once again, the passing time enough for me to create a small mountain of high-grade ammunition. I even spent some time practicing spell casting, figuring out a way to directly cast Radiant Flame attacks and spells.

Nothing too impressive, just a few mana slashes and simple spell bolts, but enough to expand my strategic options significantly. Facing an ascended, I would have more options to break through their protective aura.

We were ready for the war. Just in time, as just after dawn, I had received another warning, alerting me to another irregularity.

I moved to the surface once more, ready for another fight…