Start of year three. I was Earl Leon Fia Bartfort with the role as Holfort's liaison with Alzer, Alzer's double Sacred Guardian, captain of the Saintess Guard, the Temple's pope, potential prime minister, etc. All unwanted.

In addition to all of this, I was apparently called the coffee czar due to my business's hand in creating a caffeine addiction that only my products could solve. The etiquette teacher was never quite the same after he became my number one customer.

Note to self, question if Luxion had been spiking my coffee with cocaine. The caffeine withdrawals seemed too severe in New Humans. Also, never let Angie or my children drink the stuff. Maybe coffee was just cocaine to New Humans.

Back to the major problem at hand. Enough was enough. I was in too many positions. It was ironically going to be this fact that would allow me to at least drop one of my positions. One could not be tied to so many factions with any meaningful loyalty. Surely the royal family would not tolerate the Temple having such influence over the kingdom's liaison with Alzer nor have the church's pope have the ability to dictate policy as the prime minister. It was one thing if the two planned to merge, but the Holfort family wasn't the one merging with the Temple.

I was simply too much of a threat to the established royal family as I was now.

As such, Plan Quit would have me shed some of my duties. I would simply go and highlight that I should not be allowed to hold so many roles and quit for some, likely the prime minister and Alzer liaison roles since I had asked to become pope.

It really should have been so obvious. I had already run into the issue with being a religious figure for Alzer and being a candidate for prime minister. Seriously, what was I smoking to have thought asking for a promotion would have led to my demotion.

After pronouncing my intentions to leave some of my roles to the royal court, I waited for the deliberation. Judging from the side nobles' whispers, they agreed with the notion and thought it was a wise decision. It was hard to tell if they were sincere or just trying to rebalance the political balance by neutralizing me. Didn't matter. It would serve me in the end.

After some time, the King stood up and walked down the steps towards me. He placed a hand on my shoulder.

"Young Bartfort, you are indeed every bit as noble and wise as your ancestor once was," Roland said with magnanimous flair.

That fucker made me a founding heir! Not on par, like Julius had made me, but he made the Bartfort name an official part of the founding families! My court rank was also updated to lower rank two (the same rank as my father-in-law!)

Roland had several lost documents that indicated that Lea Bartfort was not only the unknown party member of the founding families but also the party leader. His disappearance was attributed to a mishap on a solo journey to aid refugees coming to Holfort's newly established kingdom.

I would've called bullshit had it not been for the fact Dad confirmed the events with his own set of documents.

A result of my family's ascendency was that they no longer saw my involvement in both the government and the Temple as a conflict of interest. Because I became the equivalent of one of the five love interests in the game, my involvement with the Temple was now acceptable if I wedded Livia.

Oh yeah, I was now engaged to Livia to help bind the Saintess to the founding families. Claimed that it was destiny that the missing heir brought the Saintess to light. The rumors about me needing to implant my sacred seed in her holy chamber were at an all time high.

Angie didn't take the situation sitting down. She seduced Livia. After all, Livia wouldn't cuck her if she also was in a relationship with Angie.

Surprisingly, Livia hinted that Angie had not been that far off in terms of her anxieties regarding her. Livia, despite her assurances that she wasn't trying to get into my pants previously, had very much wanted to steal me from Angie. Imagined eloping with me and having a baker's dozen worth of kids. Of course that was in the past now that Livia also loved Angie.

The only reason I didn't worry about being cucked was because I knew Angie would never leave me. The threesomes were also very convincing since Angie refused to have carnal relationships with Livia unless I was involved.

As nice as my relationship was, it was highly distracting. I needed to focus on Plan Redistribution.

Plan Redistribution would have my focus go back to my assets. I needed to drop the religious angle lest Yumeria or Noelle somehow gets involved as Sacred Priestesses.

Plan Redistribution required me to redistribute my wealth. Get to the source of my problems. The reason why I had been made baron had been because my assets were too high. If I lowered it enough, it stood to reason that I could also reduce my rank.

I also had the perfect excuse. Excessive piety from a newly established pope. Too much of a bleeding heart. It would also establish that I was too soft for such lofty ranks and roles. It would lower resistance against calls for my demotion.

As such, I found myself gifting my rural friends many assets I had accrued over time. And because I was such a good friend, I also helped manage their new assets for them. No need to accidentally cause them problems because they didn't know how to manage their newfound wealth.

I was a faction leader now. The Bartfort family was now rolling in alliances and vassals. I hadn't asked for any of that, but my friends saw it as an opportunity to be connected to a founding heir. To have their voices heard in the royal court using my status.

They abused my friendship to climb the social ladder.

Traitors! None of you understand me! How dare you take my charity and get me promoted!

What's worse was that there were so many abused rural nobles that I had the largest faction in Holfort now. My family had approximately 33% of the kingdom acting as vassals and allies. More if we decided to include the Redgrave family and the founding families. 66% if we included everyone that was officially supported them.

What was I going to do! I'm a simple rural noble at heart! What was I to do with the largest Holfort faction?!

I needed to get rid of my faction. I'll ruin my friends' marriage opportunities. They still needed to get engaged.

Let's see how lucky they'll get when I get rid of all the Kingdom's slaves either the through conquest or ownership with Plan Slave.

"So what did the letter say, Master?" Cleare asked me.

"I've been promoted to marquess," I said in a dead tone.

So many of the demi-human colonies had been found either planning to wipe out the humans and/or conspiring with foreign countries. Yumeria's colony had been planning to kill all the humans using weird chimaeras in Cleare's facilities. Miauler's colony had been found conspiring with the Principality. While many died, we limited it to those who actively sought our downfall, which was mostly the males of each specie.

All in all, I was hailed as a hero of the kingdom by removing the destabilizing elements. The surviving demi-humans praised me as a merciful demon lord for not going completely genocidal. My popularity with my faction was at an all time high since I got rid of the demi-humans in a manner that the girls couldn't complain.

On top of all that, I was promoted to marquess due to my martial prowess in subduing so many colonies.

"So what will you do now, Master," Luxion asked me.

"Plan Truth."

"Is that where you just ask to be demoted?"

"Yes. Surely Roland will give me a demotion. Last time I was promoted because I presented my case as a noble gesture. Surely he'll demote me if I'm explicit about what I want. It's not like we are on bad terms. I would even say we are on good terms since he screwed over that one teacher for me."

"... would you put money on that?"

"No."

"So? What was his response?"

"Roland is a massive troll. He said he'll go out of his way to spin any situation into my favor and get me promoted. After all, if he has to deal with the tedium of the royal court, so do I."

"So he's just you."

"Yeah, pretty much."

"A dick?"

"Yeah, pretty much."

AN

1) Only two chapters at most left. Honestly struggling because of the letter restrictions. I also feel like there were so many missed opportunities because of the letter restrictions.

2) Angelica has found the solution to her problems. Seduce the potential seductress. She won't cuck Angelica is she loves Angelica.

3) Olivia's natural instinct to steal taken men is showing. Also, it explains why Angelica had such trust issues with her in this fic.

4) Kyle did not get exterminated and is currently serving Marie. Speaking of Marie, I don't know what to do with her. I'm not even sure if I want her to be in a monogamous relationship or in a reverse harem.

Review Response

Alewar: Not a bad idea for plan r.

Batman1988: Nah, she seduces Leon's harem.