“You can go, Marches; I wish to rest. For now, I leave the city in your hands… If there is anyone who dares resist, kill them immediately.”
Louie closed his eyes while lying on the mountain of gold. The master-slave contract they had signed meant that Marches’ loyalty was guaranteed, and even some of his thoughts were made known to Louie. Louie could definitely trust him.
“Yes, great master!”
Marches bowed. Dragons loved to slumber, and in fact, they spent the majority of their lives doing so. He just hoped that this would be a brief nap and not a rest that lasted several years.
“Manage the city well, and maybe I’ll reward you if I’m in a good mood.”
Louie opened an eye and stared at the mage while he spoke in a majestic tone.
As for what the reward was, Louie did not say anything at all. He would let this man’s imagination stew for a bit.
“It is my honor to serve you. How could I dare covet the Great Master’s grace?”
Marches was flustered. Shivering with excitement he forced himself to keep a solemn and respectful expression.
‘Lord God of Magic! A dragon, a member of a species famed for its greed is actually willing to reward its servant?! Is this really a dragon? This can’t be real, right!! Are primordial dragons really that different?!’
Marches roared inwardly, skeptical of Louie’s promise.
“I will give you what you deserve…… Now go. Do not let anyone disturb my sleep, or approach this vicinity without my permission. Fail, and I will make sure your last breath is a painful one.”
Louie spat out a column of flame as he spoke in a low voice.
“Please rest assured, Great Master. No one would dare interrupt your rest.”
Marches hurriedly bowed his body and slowly retreated from this hall.
After Marches left, Louie began to think up his next plan of action.
The city needed development. But if he was going to do it, it needed to be done well.
After spending seven years in high school and university altogether, Louie felt he was in a much better position to decide how to develop the city than the natives. This was despite his lack of management experience.
The development could not be haphazard. It had to be structured and with a grand vision in mind.
The original Central City had changed owners many times over millennia. But no matter which race captured the city, they would often only use it as a frontline strategic outpost.
Since the city was easy to defend, it did not have many troops within it. Properly stationed, a few thousand soldiers could repel small armies. And even if an enemy launched a major offensive, Central City’s location meant sending in reinforcements was quite simple for most powers. Every conflict centered around it would involve powerful legendary rank warriors, and some stories even mentioned demigods getting involved.
Regardless, one thing was certain. And that was that each battle would leave countless casualties.
This time Louie had easily captured the city since he caught the Theocracy by surprise. The Theocracy might have been vigilant against elves, beastmen, and other enemies, but an unaccounted-for demigod primordial dragon was an extreme anomaly. Before they could gain their bearings the city was lost.
For the various races, Dragon City’s strategic value was irresistible. To carefully protect it they made sure to heavily restrict traffic from other races.
Louie, however, was different. He was only a single individual, and this was his only territory. The land of dragons was tens of thousands of miles away, and he had no interest in it.
Thus the city would become his outpost.
“This is located at the junction of several forces. With this territory and enough time, I can pull in members of the various races through commerce.”
Louie thought with great enthusiasm.
Although he could use the elves to help him guard the city, it belonged to him in the end, and he would not let them dominate it. If he did then the humans would likely be unwilling to stand idly by, and it could also be construed as him allying himself with the elves.
The only person to benefit from this would be the elf queen.
In Louie’s plan, there could only be one owner of the city: him. Whether it was the humans, beastmen, elves, and even other dragons, they needed to obey his orders!
And so he intended to gather money so that he could do anything he wanted. With his identity, other powers would be unlikely to covet his territory. He would use this to his advantage and bully them as much as possible.
“It’s time to develop capitalism!!”
Louie decided upon a cultural invasion. By introducing the tenets of capitalism he would gain a cultural and economic advantage over his foes, putting him a step before everyone else.
Of course, in this world where individuals could conquer countries by themselves, the prerequisite to doing so successfully and maintaining control was that an individual wielded enough strength.
‘Are you there, Intelligent Brain!’
[I am, host!]
‘You can perform the first life evolution on me now, right?’
[You can start at any time, host!]
‘In that case, let’s start. I need to raise my base level of power in my normal state. After that, we can return to Earth and I can think up a way to solve this food crisis.’
Louie spoke telepathically to the intelligent brain. Immediately afterward he felt a cool sensation, like cold water running down his skin, all over his body. He moaned in comfort.
At the same time, magic power surged like a tidal wave and converged on Louie. It made no clear disturbance on the physical world around it, but the waves it gave off would be obvious to any person of significant magical skill.
The archmage Marches looked back and saw that the center of the vortex was where the dragon lay. He shook his head and sighed, “A single nap and it causes such a huge commotion…That’s too crazy..”
At the same time, the legendary rank powerhouses all over the world were also looking at this place.