Two weeks later we found out that they were on their way. I hadn't had a throne built, but had something else planned to show off my power.
We watched as Jircniv went through the whole song and dance he did in the series. His obvious mental breakdown well underway and it was hilarious to watch. He was freaking out over how we could just change the weather with a wave of our hands. It was even more fun to watch him just give up when Fleuder told him about how powerful the death knights are. He had this glassy eyed look like the world could be on fire and he would just sit back and watch it all burn.
Albedo and Demiurge went over everything again with everyone present. We had most everyone who was a member of the tomb here in order to break Jircniv and his followers even more than they already were.
When Jircniv came into the throne room he saw the lines of creatures and didn't pause a step until he reached near the throne and looked up only to freeze when he saw Ainz and me. Ainz was obviously because he was an undead. I however was having my own fun, though Ainz was a bit against it.
I was sitting on Shaltear while wore a cape and a dress shirt that was unbuttoned on the chest. The cape fluttered unnaturally like there was a wind that nobody else could feel. My chest was bare and well sculpted while shining from the few scales that were polished with a stone that caused them to glow. I had used the same stone on my horns and it caused me to let off a radiant glow. My hair was let out behind me and looked like water in the middle of the night. My eyes were letting out a bright glow of unfathomable power. Even my pants and boots looked like they had been made to be perfect for me.
I had used my clothes with the highest charm boosts and upped my charm to a freakishly high level. I even used a dragon skill to make me look heroic for a couple of hours. It wasn't anything more than pure cosmetics, but I had to admit that I would have sex with me. I would bang me so hard, and so would literally every girl in the room other than Albedo, mostly because she was insane already and only wanted Ainz. Even most of the men were reacting to me, not that I had any interest in them. The only people who weren't reacting were the ones who wouldn't look up from the ground.
Everyone ignored Shaltear who was panting from being so excited and focused on me and Ainz. I could already tell from how stiff he was being that he would be yelling at me if he could.
Ainz did the whole my subordinate did wrong, your subordinate did wrong, we're going to be busy and don't have time to punish you, lets just move on. It ended up the same as in the book with Jircniv asking to be a part of the things we were going to be doing, the differences were that he introduced me as the other leader of the tomb and claimed that we were brother kings who had ruled our kingdom side by side.
I was made out to be the god of nature, life, physical power, light, and all things that fall under those things.
Ainz was the god of desolate places, death, magical power, darkness, and all things that fall under those.
Another thing that was different was when I walked up to Leinas Rockbruise after Ainz said his bit to make Jircniv want to join him. Everyone turned to stare at us and she looked up at me in a mixture of horror and admiration. I then slowly reached up and removed her face covering, those around us from the empire all let out sounds of disgust and shock at the sight of her face being disfigured by pustules that let out little rivulets of pus.
"Why do you hide your face from me?" I asked her while looking into her pained eyes. The sounds and looks of disgust and pity from her comrades caused her more pain than any knife wound could.
"Because I see how others look at me, I see the looks of disgust and hatred and I hear how they mock me. It is better to hide my face and not have to listen to others mock me." She answered honestly.
I just smiled at her and activated a dragon ability that would remove curses and heal damage before running my hand across her cursed face and watched it fall off wherever I touched like wax that had hardened. Her damaged parts fell off onto the floor to reveal skin and a face that matched the one on the other side. The others all watched in shock and awe as she became a beautiful woman. "I think you look beautiful as you are, after all beauty is only skin deep." I then went back to Shaltear and sat down on her while all of the empires men including Fleuder and Jircniv stared at Leinas in shock. She pulled out a hand mirror and moved her hair to look at her healed face before crying and kneeling down on the floor where she refused to be removed.
I had to tell her that she was free to go wherever she wanted before she was willing to move and all she did was move to stand behind me, which of course caused Jircniv to frown deeply, but he didn't say anything about her choice. He already knew that this was going to happen the moment I healed her face.
I let Sonya teach her after the meeting and had to stay behind to talk to Ainz in private.
"What the hell was that Alex?" Ainz asked in irritation.
"That was me adding depth to your story, most people would hear of two brother kings and would always wonder about which of them to go to or would think that we were constantly fighting each other. Obviously they would think that you would be an evil undead who wants to kill them all. This way you will have the support of magicians and anyone involved in death. It will give you the support you need to not be hunted down as the enemy of the living."
"Meanwhile I may look like some sort of amazing god of goodness and light, but we both know that I am much more hard hearted and willing to kill compared to you. Nature is constantly growing through competition and the strong eating the weak. This will make the things I do reasonable. I will rule through strength and you can rule through morals and rules. It'll work out for both of us and will take off some work from your shoulders.
"You are willing to go in this round about way to save as many lives as you can so you can rule like a peaceful and loving king, whereas I would simply show people with force that they can't stop me and then let them have a good life under me."
"We are very different, but we both have the same idea for an end goal. I just figured that this way it will be a little bit easier on you since I already know how badly this is all affecting you. Not to mention that this way there will be a few less deaths you will have on your way to being a ruler. Not that there won't be any, just less."
"What do you mean?" Ainz asked me. "I never felt like ruling over the world, I just wanted to find any of our allies who might have ended up here with us and live peacefully."
"You should understand that we are slowly becoming our avatars, as it stands we will eventually reach a point that we become one and the same. You have probably noticed that you no longer feel anything by killing and that you don't feel the same ways about things as you did before. You are probably are more analytical about things and you probably rationalize this to yourself by saying something like it is your brain still viewing this as a game." Ainz jerked up to stare at me.
"What about you?" He asked quietly.
"My sex drive has gone through the roof, I often feel aggressive when others try to encroach on my territory and I seem to be having a ridiculous amount of pride and arrogance. I had most of those before this, but it is like all of those habits got notched up to ten. I also have found myself waking up with an urge to go spy on others for no apparent reason, which is probably the Otherman part of me."
"I see, well this is a very serious problem. Undead are well known for hating the living and liches are known for locking themselves in for centuries to research and do experiments."
"And Dragons are known for hoarding and being lazy playboys. Actually that doesn't really sound like a problem to me." I laughed.
"Maybe not for you, but I can't let this continue, what if I lose who I am?" Ainz said starting to panic.
"Calm down man." I told him with a grin. "All you need to do to solve this is just do a race change. Sure it'll weaken you and you'll basically become some weak ass punk, but you'll be able to keep your usual thought process and sensibilities. For what that's worth."
"You're right Alex, we do have a few things that would allow me to change my race if I need to. Just make sure that if you notice me going to far down the undead path that you tell me so I can do the race change before it is too late." Ainz said while calming down a bit.
"Will do buddy, but you do realize that if you become human again that it means that you will have human needs again. Like hunger, thirst, tiredness, and lust. Albedo is definitely going to rape you if you are to weak to stop her. Not to mention that your physical stats will be beyond abysmal due to going all in on the undead magic caster build. She might actually rape you to death, that would be funny as hell." I laughed loudly.
"Oh god, what am I going to do about her?" Ainz said while putting his head in his hands in despair.
"Personally I would tell you to get over yourself." I told him with a serious look that made him look at me in shock. "You have a beautiful woman who would literally die at your command and loves you from the bottom of her heart. Sure she is Tabula's creation and she only loves you because you added it in her coding, but so what. Have you seen me being all wishy washy about sleeping with anyone. I literally slept with Shaltear the very first day we were here and she is very much happy about that. We might be in a new world with a bunch of beings that have been programmed to be loyal to us, but that doesn't mean that they don't have their own opinions on things. If they truly had a problem with something they would show it in some way. So stop being so hard on yourself and denying yourself the happiness that you both want. Don't even try to deny it since I can tell how much you like Albedo, just accept her when you can and let her be happy. Even if you can't bring yourself to forgive yourself for altering her back then just view it as your punishment by making her happy."
"I, I'll try." Ainz said softly.
"That is all anyone can do buddy, and remember that if she or any of the others have any issue with anything you do they will let you know in one way or another, just take it in stride and try to find out the reason why they do the things they do, maybe you'll find out something about them you didn't know before. After all, we didn't write out their personalities for everything."
"That is a very interesting thought Alex, and thank you for giving me advice. I'll definitely think about it."
"You do that man." I told him as I patted him on the shoulder. "I have a new pet to break in and you need to get prepared to be an uncle." I said while walking away.
"I what now?" Ainz yelled out in shock before the throne rooms door closed behind me and I teleported to my room where I saw Sonya, Shaltear, Leinas, and Lupusregina all lying on my bed naked and playing with each other.
"It sure is good to be me." I said with a smile before getting naked and joining in.
The next day I went back to the Romeus empire and went over how things were going. The lich had done a good job of following my plans and had even altered things as needed. He was a very skilled worker and the economy was starting to show signs of improvement. I had started to trade goods with the empire and had even started to import some things that I didn't have in my empire. I only needed to add a few things here and there in order to make the lives of my citizens better. Sewer systems weren't even a thing in any place other than the royal capitals of humanoid countries. The beastmen would usually go wherever and only the nobles would use chamber pots to show that they were special. It was gross and I planned to have public and private bathrooms become a thing.
The people were still a little bit wary of each other, but they each made good use of each others strong points. The beastmen were very skilled in the physical sense, but they were almost magically inept. It was very rare for any of them to have a spellcaster. Not to mention that it was almost impossible for them to travel outside of the country to the human countries. The only place they could go to was the wild lands to the south which was almost a borderline wasteland or farther east to the ocean. Humans would enslave or outright kill beastmen, not that it was any different for the beastmen towards humans.
I got a report concerning the next place I was planning to conquer, the Great Minotaur Nation. It told me that they were technologically strong with everyone living there, excepting humans who were considered as slaves or livestock, capable of battle. They were a very powerful warrior race with a bunch of skills for combat and a temper to go with it. It wasn't uncommon for minotaurs to go into a blind rage and attack people over the slightest insult. They were however relatively calm the rest of the time and were known to meander along in thought all day long if they were allowed to do so. It was a 0 to 100 issue.
I was then handed a weapon that was the secret weapon created by the minotaur sage for his people, and it made me laugh so hard I fell out of my seat. It was a fricken rifle. That idiot had somehow managed to create gunpowder and made an actual rifle. I was sure that they also had some bombs hidden away.
The beastmen commonwealth that was to their northeast had created an army of golems to attack them and had apparently reported having their fighters killed from a distance when the minotaurs pointed their sticks at them and that once they had pushed closer their golems would explode into pieces because the minotaurs had thrown burning rocks at them.
To anyone else these reports wouldn't make sense and would seem to be tall tales of a madman, but I now knew what was going on. I also knew how to conquer them.
I just got up and went to conquer them then and there. It wasn't even that hard. I went to their capital and followed a scientist that went in and out of the most heavily guarded place in the capital and I copied him. It let me read his memories and I found out that he was a researcher who was studying how to make gunpowder, apparently the actual formula was kept in a secret spot that only the king knew of, but the king had unfortunately died from one of his generals flying into a rage. The king had been getting older and was about ready to step down to let his son take over, but it wasn't the son that the general supported. The general had used a horn to impale the king in his heart while the king was trying to restrain him and the king had died instantly without telling anyone where the formula was hidden.
All the researchers had to go on was their memory of what was in the formula, but not the actual amounts. This was an issue since it was rarely used or restocked unless there was a war going on. They didn't start to think of restocking until they had that fight with the golems.
I snuck into their armory where they kept 99% of all their weaponry and led a long line of gunpowder leading outside. I was almost caught by one of the guards, but I simply smiled at him and threw a torch on top of the trail of gunpowder before turning and running at the guard. I kicked him in the chest and sent him flying before I ran for the gate and rushing off into the night.
Minotaurs are apparently pretty dang sturdy. If I don't use ki to penetrate them they won't suffer nearly as much damage as a human would.
I heard a huge explosion from behind me as I ran before I hid in an alley. There were a number of other explosions and the sound of a siren going off as chaos happened all over the place.
For the next two days there was people flipping out over anything and everything. The number of fights increased by a lot and corpses started to show up everywhere. I of course had my own hand in that since I would occasionally have a minotaur who would mistake me for a human and try to eat me. It seemed that the minotaurs still had issues with eating humans when nobody was around to catch them for it.
After the third day I saw that the military presence was a lot stronger than the previous days and figured it was time to go deal with the royalty.
I went up to the castle punching minotaur guards left and right, without ki of course, and I kicked open the door. The doors went flying off their hinges and landed on the ground with a loud thud.
"I'm the one who blew up your weapons stores and I'm here to take over your country. I'll kill anyone who fights against me. Now surrender or die." I yelled this out with my hands on my hips with a huge smile. I received enough bullets to make an action movie star nod in approval. I of course had ki and a dragon hardening skill going full strength and didn't take any damage from the attack, but the minotaurs didn't know that. So I just stood there until they were done and then I said." Are you finished yet? If you want I'll stand here all day."
All of them looked beyond pissed and one of the biggest minotaurs I had ever seen stood up and grabbed a double headed axe that looked like it was the size of a small table and swung it up and down onto my head in an attempt to cut me in half. I just stepped to the side and kicked him in the stomach with ki. He blocked it with his axe but he still flew across the room and landed in a heap before spitting up blood and passing out. His axe was laying next to me with the edge bent from where it had blocked a portion of my foot. The guy was actually pretty skilled. He had noticed my dodge and had moved his axe fast enough to block part of my blow. It was probably the only reason he wasn't blown to pieces.
I kicked his axe up onto my shoulder after stomping it straight again and held it easily in one hand. "Anyone else?" I asked them with a smirk.
They all looked back and forth between me and the minotaur I had just kicked and sat back down in defeat before looking at an older minotaur sitting at the head of the table.
"You have already shown that we are not able to kill you with our weapons as is. Not to mention that right now you have two thirds of the entire nations leaders in one room while not a one of us has a weapon that would be able to kill you. We have lost most of the weapons stores that the minotaur sage had left in our care and it is only a matter of time before one of the other nations realize that we no longer have our superior weaponry. I believe we have no choice but to surrender. I only ask that if you must kill to solidify your rule that you only take our heads and let our families and our people go unharmed."
The minotaur's in the room all bowed down their heads as if they were waiting for me to lift the axe and take their heads.
"It looks like the rumors about minotaur's being easily angered into a blind rage was overexaggerated." I said with a grin while I slammed the axe into the ground and caused the minotaur's to jump a bit.
"I believe that with a king like you around I don't need to kill anyone, or at least not if they are able to think like you do."
"I see." He said while sitting up. I could just about hear the sighs of relief from the bunch of stoic minotaur's.
"I am the emperor of the Romeus empire to the south of your nation. We are an empire that allows all creatures of intelligence to live freely with a very strict set of laws. My laws are few, but they are of the utmost importance."
1 Do not kill unless it is in defense of yourself or another.
2 Do not hinder or bind unless it is necessary to do so.
3 Do not lie, cheat, or steal in any honest dealings.
4. Do not harm others mentally, physically, or spiritually unless necessary.
5. Treat other members of our nation as your friends.
"This is the few laws of my nation, they are very simple and are very easy to follow."
"They are indeed, how do you enforce such laws?" The minotaur king asked me with honest curiosity.
"I have many skilled individuals who work alongside my brother, they are able to read a persons soul and mind to find out the truth. It might be a bit invasive, but if it is found that the person who was read is innocent they will receive a good amount of money for their troubles and the accuser will not only be read, but they will also be punished harshly."
"That is indeed a good way to keep people in line." The minotaur king nodded. "What plans do you have for this nation?"
"I plan to have your nation disbanded and combined with my own. You will be added to my group of advisors while your generals may join my military or police force as they wish. If they wish to resign and retire that will also be fine. I will go over your countries current information and reassign people or add people as needed. As my country does not condone slavery of any kind outside of war slaves I would have all of the humans released and sent to my previous capital to be taught and reintegrated into society. I will of course be reimbursing the slaves owners, but should they decide to fight this ruling I will assume their last words were over my cold dead body, which will be made a reality. I don't wish for bloodshed, but that doesn't mean that I won't resort to it if needed."
"Very well." The minotaur king said as he removed his crown and got down on one knee. "I, as the king of the Great Minotaur Nation, do hereby relinquish my right of rulership to the emperor of the Romeus empire. I do hereby relinquish any and all rights of my bloodline to the throne and do hereby swear to serve the ruler of the Romeus empire until I am dead or relieved of duty." The others in the room looked unhappy, but they all understood that there wasn't a choice.
He then handed me his crown which I put on and said. "I will make sure to rule your people in the same way as I rule my own, with a just and firm mind and hand so that all may prosper together."
The other minotaur's in the room all got down on one knee and raised their weapons before presenting me their handles. "We do hereby swear to serve the emperor until our deaths or until we are relieved of duty." They all called out. The only one who didn't do the swearing ceremony was the minotaur I had kicked since he was knocked out.
The guards who I had been knocking around had seen and heard all of the conversation and kneeled down as well to release a booming. "We serve the emperor, long live the emperor."
I told them all thank you and other pleasantries before asking some guards to get the wounded taken care of and to spread the word.