CHAPTER 369: CHAPTER 369: THE WOLF CASTE

The Arkship, chamber world of the lions.

The Chamber World which had once been an empty place had completely changed.

No longer was the place just a simple expanse of wavy plains.

Now, Pyramids of different sizes littered the place, arranged in different abstract positions.

There seemed to be no clear arrangement pattern as these Pyramids seemed to have been built however they wanted.

But that wasn’t the case.

The distance between the two pyramids was nothing less than a kilometer. This was a standard rule the royals had set to prevent conflict and it served as the only pillar of decorum within the chamber world.

Lions might be social creatures, but they were also fiercely territorial. Keeping a distance of one thousand meters was enough to maintain moderate self-respect.

That said, this didn’t mean that conflict was entirely absent in this place. No, conflict happened quite often, just not for reasons that could easily escalate into a full-blown internal war.

Some of the pyramids were small, barely over one hundred meters wide. Some were much larger than that.

The pyramids had different designs depending on the owner.

Currently, different lions go about their lives. Some walked together, taking a casual stroll down the wide paths in between pyramid dens.

Some were busy sleeping, especially the male pride leaders. They mostly slept around in their pyramids or browsed the public chat room of the lion system.

A few lions who could fly like the fire lions and the air lions glided through the air, going to where they were needed.

This was a place for lions and lions only, no other creature was allowed in here, not even Marcus who held a higher position among the other caste leaders.

When Kael had discovered the arkship and taken control of it, there had been some chambers that weren’t meant for habitation.

Some of these chambers were meant for a wide range of things like parking magic shuttles, mobile factories, engine chambers, and so on.

Two of these chambers had been library chambers and they had more info orbs than the library of the Iron Blood Pyramid.

One of the library chambers was non-exclusive, all creatures within the arkship could visit it and tap from its knowledge. The second library chamber was much smaller but had info orbs of higher quality.

The second library chamber was exclusively meant for the lions only, just like the lion chamber world.

It was from this library chamber that the lions were able to learn about different things concerning their heritage.

The library chamber had been stocked with a variety of info orbs containing core topics. The knowledge within ranged from basic culture and certain languages of different civilizations to complex scientific and technological aspects.

A good amount of the info orbs contained information on fusing magic and basic technology to achieve different things.

It was from some of these info orbs that the lions learned how to build standard pyramid dens that populated the lion chamber world.

Truly, education changes a lot of things.

A lot of capable lions and lionesses have already educated themselves on things like basic magic shuttle construction, cannon refining, and small armaments creation.

They weren’t as barbaric as before.

If one checked, they would see that most of the humanoid lions now wore clothes made of durable fabric that faded away when they transformed into their true forms.

"Mother, when will you be less busy," a little humanoid child asked solemnly as he walked beside his mother.

He had a head full of grey hair and eyes filled with wisdom and understanding. In between his two eyes was a small slit, indicating the presence of a closed third eye.

Beside him, Priya walked calmly with a thoughtful expression on her face. Her hand and his hand were clasped together as she led him onward.

Pyramid dens of different designs could be seen in the distance and ahead of them was the wall. At the bottom of this wall was the metal door-gate leading into the command chamber.

It would take them a couple of minutes to get there on foot.

"Very soon, we just need to make sure everything is working perfectly..." Priya said absent-mindedly.

"But mother, why can’t you do with the rebels what you did to the wolf caste. Surely, that would make your work easier," The little boy said.

Priya shook her head as she snapped out of her absent-minded state and brought her thoughts back to her son, "No dear, the wolves worked because they are wolves.

Elephants and wolves are not the same and different approaches are required,"

Priya was talking about the not-so-recent success of the lion regime concerning the wolf caste. They had succeeded in adding almost every wolf in Eridoria to the Vassal Record.

Meaning that all the wolves of Eridoria were now subjects of the King. It was a significant military force that could not be ignored.

The wolf caste made everything easier for the lions, from conquering to basic patrol operations.

When it came to the wolf caste, Priya had not needed to do much restructuring herself. The wolves already had a pack mentality and would follow the perceived strongest of the pack.

The wolves had a loyalty issue where they would probably die fighting if their pack leaders refused to join the wolf caste. But this also made it easier for the lions as all they needed to do was suppress the leader and the rest would follow.

A lot of times, they either killed and replaced the former pack leader, or they had the leader submit to the regime and lead his pack to join the wolf caste.

This was what made it so easy to tame the wolves. Out of all the predators, they were the least troublesome and also had the highest loyalty to the lions.

And because of this, the wolves were generally treated better than other races. At least, they weren’t bossed around like the others.

When it came to tributes, the wolves gave almost nothing besides their combat services.

They were very much exempt from paying the living tribute and in return, their loyalty to the crown remained unshakable as well as their willingness to do the lion’s dirty work.

But the wolves had to be kept well-fed and were allowed to hunt indiscriminately, another privilege they got for being so loyal.

Most times, the lions would just turn a blind eye to any complaints related to the wolves.

For sure, if anyone wanted to completely destroy the lion regime from within, they had to first take care of the wolf caste. That was not something that could be easily achieved without fierce retaliation.

Priya’s son assumed that if it had worked for the wolves, it would work for the elephants and everyone else.

But that was not so, he was too young and naive.

Even the lions who all pledged allegiance to the golden lion were not completely loyal. However, their instincts and desires aligned with the vision and benefits the king offered.

Incentives also played a big role. The lion system was the biggest incentive and prison that made sure that the lions had no reason to betray Kael.

For them, leaving Kael’s fold was no different from a wife leaving her rich husband for her broke lover boy. It sounded romantic but was just plain stupidity.

If they wanted to control the elephants, it wouldn’t be easy. The King’s court was already considering taking some drastic measures that could cause a lot of casualties.

Priya had been thinking of a strategy that would be effective in subjugating the elephants, a method of control that would prevent them from rebelling at every chance they get.

She was one of the parties that were against the drastic measures that Kael and the others were proposing. They wanted to wipe out the elephant race from the map.

But they had given Priya and others who still held sentiment for the elephant race a chance to come up with something to deal with them.

Priya didn’t want the elephant race to go extinct, she felt that they would still hold some usefulness in the future.

No one could blame Kael for proposing immediate genocide, the elephants had caused a lot of problems for him.

They were the biggest factor hindering his world domination.

As soon as Priya’s method or any other method was approved and worked well, Kael would consider reining back his hand.

But if Priya’s method did not work, then drastic measures would have to be implemented.

"My strategy is simple, hopefully, it works," Priya said.

"Mother..." The little boy was about to continue talking but was interrupted by a figure suddenly appearing.

"Auntie Priya!" Ozia exclaimed as he stepped out of the spatial distortion. He looked downcast as though he had just experienced something so dreadful.

Three more little humanoids then appeared beside Ozia.

"Ozia, Alyrat, Wei, Jeremiah," Priya was slightly surprised.

Ozia stepped forward and bowed slightly, "Aunt Priya, please, where is father?" He asked.