"Wow! So cool!" They were dumbfounded by the advanced items around them. They were beautiful yet deadly at the same time.
The Sticks contained powerful magic which is very handy for those without magic at all. "By the way what are the cards for?" Sapphire pointed towards some blank cards with some basic features.
"Ah, those would be Pactio Cards, the ones with the intricate designs are Clow Cards. They mostly serve to make our aesthetic appeal look better." Naturally Nathaniel had to explain every question they had.
"Then the glowing green stuff?" "Mutagen. They are unpredictable and also unavailable." Nathaniel quickly replied to Graham's question.
One by one he was bombarded with questions from the ever curious royals. "Oh, by the way boss, what do we do with the crystal?" Walter was worried as the crystal was very powerful.
"The crystal is our merchandise besides even if one wanted to steal it they couldn't due to me being connected to it." I had my own plans for the crystal itself.
Since it could grant powers I could use it in place of the Glowing Fishes and Devil Fruits.
"Okay, your highnesses if you could please just stay right here." They were hesitant at first but eventually came forward. I smiled and yelled out in Japanese.
"Born from hope and despair. Awaken! Potential Breakthrough." I posed folly as a light radiated from my palm.
Slashing through the air I opened my fist thrusting the light towards them. A miniature shockwave resounded and they fell down with a pleasant expression.
"Um, what was that about?" Walter and the others felt second hand embarrassment as they saw their boss moving weirdly.
Even Rude had a strange expression on his face. "Sorry for being embarrassing! You guys just don't understand my art of posing coolly."
I harrumphed feeling upset by how his own employees found his actions embarrassing.
"Maybe I'll have you guys take over Athena's job and clean out the farm. "No." An instantaneous reply, not only that it was also a simultaneous reply.
They must be totally against cleaning after the cattle. I wonder how I should punish them then?
....
Meanwhile in the chambers of Princess Tia.
"Tetson, you say they all snuck out?" Tia was very frustrated since her siblings had left without her.
"Yes, we had used magic to track their location. They are currently at the forest however for some strange reason the location keeps shifting from one place to another. I suspect that the cause of this would be due to the rare Spatial Magic."
Tetson had followed them and called on the other guards loyal to Princess Tia to keep an eye on them.
"Very well, bring the maids in I must get dressed. I shall see for myself what they are up to."
Hearing this Tetson gulped, he had another piece of information that the Princess would surely want to know.
However he realised that it could lead to something far disastrous if he did tell her.
But he couldn't lie to her. He was loyal to Tia, he would do anything to keep her happy. "Your Highness, wait! I have received a report that a familiar aura had been found among your siblings."
Tia stopped midway and turned around to listen to him. Tetson gulped in fear and reluctance could be heard in his voice. "L-Lord Rude had been discovered. They are with Lord Rude, which means that the Genie is there as well."
Tia's eyes widened and her eyes glowed brightly. She had been waiting for this exact moment.
The day where she could meet her beloved Rude once more. "Wait for me, Rude." A forlorn expression softened her excitement and calmed her down.
A strange presence was looming, misfortune was certain to befall on them.
....
Nathaniel scrutinised the royals as he walked in front of the First Prince. "Regal Linguist. Words mean everything as well as your diction. To overturn debates and call facts as fiction."
Next in line was Prince Ren. "Unbound Soarer. To soar into the sky, the heavens I shall breach. Tear a hole into space and reach."
The last of the Princes, Graham. "Reversed Insomnia. Dreams of the day when night has arrived. And dreams of the night bringing great strife."
Moving on to Princess Rose. "Counterfeit Paradise. A boundless world of an endless valley. A deceitful wish results in a fake reality."
Sapphire was next. "Reflected Mirage. An inverted reality; a never ending lie. My fake smile devoid of all life."
And last but not least, Diane. "Lucid Insight. Seeing through the glasses of time, of an ancient past. A peaceful world that never lasts."
These poems subtly summarised the true power they had obtained. The royals however were taken aback and were confused on why Nathaniel had decided to recite poetry.
"If I remember correctly the fruits over there also give you powers, correct?" Crow was wondering why Nathaniel didn't just give them a fruit instead.
"Devil Fruits are a rare commodity. Only one type can exist at a time. They are hard to cultivate as well." He had figured that they would ask him this, he just expected them to ask earlier than this.
After all he was a shop owner. He needed to sell many things in order to make a living. "Then, can we buy one? Ah but first I would like to see what kind of powers would be given." The store owner nodded and asked Beltram to bring the birdcage.
Inside the birdcage was a small blue bird with yellow accents on its feathers. The underside of its wings were pitch black and its dark blue chest had small specks of white.
He carefully took it out and whispered to Lydia to hold out a cup. Nathaniel smiled and started to squeeze.
The bluebird started to chirp in ecstasy. The pleasure was intense to the point of being addictive.
The royals were intrigued about the pale blue juice dripping down, however they were horrified knowing the origins of it.
They watched Nathaniel with frenzied stares as he gulped the juice down. "Needs a little ice." Was all he said.
"So that power came from those Devil Fruits? It is indeed true to its name being such a demonic ability." Ren had never seen such atrocious powers before.
He also realised that if Nathaniel wanted to they could very well end up the same way as the bird.
"Ah, I have a question." Nathaniel replied to Crow with a nod. "Do you have any means of creating soldiers? Such as puppets or golems?" What Crow happened to be lacking was more manpower.
Even though he had his own military over half of them had been greatly injured and some even died during an expedition by assassins from another country.
Their real target was the prince however Crow had already figured this might happen and went incognito as a travelling merchant leading them off the trail.
Now he needed soldiers more than ever due to the assassins becoming even more bolder every day.
"Oh, that's right. I have the perfect thing. Remember the mutagen?" Crow nodded, the rest followed Nathaniel.
"Well my android Athena is in charge of perfecting it. In addition she had created a few humans to test it on."
The group had arrived inside a massive lab. Side by side one could see naked men curled up into balls inside a glass pod.
They were artificial humans born from the DNA of Nathaniel himself.
Due to the difference in genetics the humans of Nathaniel's world were more used to easily assimilating Mutagen.
He had no idea why but he just figured it was because there was no impurities in it, whilst the blood of humans from this world were of a magical nature hence it is unusable since magic is hard to master.
Especially for androids with no magic power at all. When dealing with anything with Mana one would need magic to counter or absorb it.
In the middle of the room Athena was wearing a floral kimono. However there was one eye catching feature about her.
She was half-cheetah. She had eaten a Zoan type Devil Fruit that granted her the ability to transform into a cheetah.
The others were taken aback by her appearance especially the royals. Due to her robotic nature she had utilised jet propulsion from her calves to enhance her speed.
Wheels could be seen on her foot that gave her control over her running. With her robotic nature and emotion powered source giving her a Devil Fruit reinforced her overall strength.
Although now that she was basically living she was very susceptible to illness and disease.
But I doubt she would die off easily since she isn't even human in the first place. More importantly the magic from her source could even strengthen her immune system making her into a super creature.
She did need to eat normal food though. "Ah, Master I was about to start the experiment."
Athena had already known that we were coming due to her great sense of smell and hearing.
"I am combining planarian flatworms and water bears together. Want to watch?"
I nodded and we all looked towards the
white room. A giant glass tank of water and an overwhelming amount of brown flat creatures squirmed around the bottom.
I pressed some buttons on the computer and added a strain of mutated gene that causes the pituitary gland to secrete tons of growth hormones.
At first the gigantism was caused by tumours however through the combined power of technology and magic I had figured out how to force the pituitary gland to secrete it without any side effects.
The fruit borne from my research had allowed me to add the forced secretion into the cells of a rat.
In an attempt to adapt to certain conditions the cells would activate allowing them to gradually grow in mass.
Through selective processing the gene went from being able to adapt to certain conditions growing in size to being able to regrow tissues and muscles in the body.
So far the gene only allows it to regenerate skin cells, blood and tissues but that will not be a problem due to the physiology of water bears and planarians.
The planarians themselves have a similar characteristic in their species however the gene that was added could possibly become more potent when mixed with the genes of the tardigrades.
More importantly new ones could be created through the amazing indestructible nature of tardigrades.
The ooze dropped in the tank glowing brightly. Nothing changed but seven minutes later a giant blob wriggled it's way up.
It was a terrifying scene. A two metre tall brown creature with several fat legs crawled out.
It opened its jaws revealing a flower like mouth. Thousands upon thousands of sharp teeth lined up on the black gums.
Steam profusely emitted from its body, slime sloshed off its body falling to the floor. The slime had corrosive effects melting a hole through it.
The experiment was a success!