The food Freya cooked disappeared into my stomach. The hunger I felt after a long workout and a week without food was enormous. After eating, I quickly showered and dressed with weapons. I brought out my new Sadist's whip. As I pulled it out of the system, I shivered in excitement to use it.
It was a spiked sword. It was a metal whip that spiked out at every millimeter, and It looked like a four-sided sword how close the spikes were. Something came to my notice that I hadn't noticed before. There were special enchantments that seemed hidden. I put energy into them, and they activated. Each spike base had an enchantment. It was a show of creativity on hurting your enemies. I didn't know what most of those enchantments were, but I felt the power in it with my energy added. This Whip was dangerous to anyone hit by it, to say the least. The smile on my face grew as I used pressed the release on the handle. It unleashed, and I was in love with this weapon.
That was the only way to describe this feeling. This was the perfect weapon for someone like me. The power that this weapon was in my hands was amazing. Anyone hit by it would be too focused on other things after being hit. I needed to try it on something. I looked to the east, thinking of my gang. The smile on my face darkened, though. I knew If I used this in gang fights, it would stand out too much. This was a weapon easily recognized. Its sadistic nature would alert anyone who I was. I could either use it in the open or in the darkness, not both. This disappointed me. I had enemies I could use it on, but I couldn't risk discovery.
I decided I would only use this with my main identity. I could find a different weapon for the darkness. I nodded and put it in the special sheath the system provided. The enchantments calmed down with my energy leaving the weapon. This made it look unassuming on my side. I finished getting ready to go out. I needed to get some things done.
I stepped out of the room, ready to go out, and left the store. I looked outside, and It was mid-afternoon. I nodded to myself as I ignored the Duchess and Marchioness who were waiting for me. They brought someone else, and I was too busy to deal with them as they were not important at the moment. Toys like them can wait. I moved towards the warehouse I ordered. I moved quickly without drawing attention to myself. It didn't take long before I appeared outside a heavily under construction fence. It was the privacy fence that I had told them to build. It looked sturdy and would do its job. The Gate hadn't been installed yet, but it was wide for a large carriage to enter. The small gap between the building worked for it. I nodded as I entered, happy with the work the contractors had done. The building looked in much better shape than It had before I went into meditation.
Perfect, the outside was right and ready to go with the finish of the fencing. I opened the door, and the foreman seemed to have been alerted to my presence. He frowned, looking at me before smiling. I then realized that I had been reported as an intruder.
"AH!" He happily exclaimed. "You are here. There are several things we would like to discuss before we implement." He told me, and I started various discussions with him. I pointed things out that were not how they were supposed to be. The conversation took hours as some of the contractors went home for the day. It was only the foreman and myself remaining.
"I am delighted with the progress. Can we speed it up a bit more, though?" I asked, and the Foremans smiling face turned to a frown.
"We have already slowed down other projects to complete this one with great haste. At this point, putting more people to work isn't going to help any. IF I put a night crew on it, I don't think it will work. Many of the things you ask for take a person watching over them to make sure it comes outright. Or, to be franker. I don't trust my night crews to get it right. When it came to the outside, it was easier. The things you have ordered, though, for the inside take a more firm hand. If I put a night crew on this, it will slow progress, not increase it.
I looked at him with a frown before nodding. "Okay. It makes sense I will not tell you how to do your job. I am asking for good quick work. You are on schedule, so I have nothing to complain about. I need these facilities to start working on some contracts with some nobility. Without them, it would take way over the time my contracts stipulate. That doesn't matter as long as you are on schedule, though."
"Mistress, I can only say that we will do our best. The things you have asked for are being completed as fast and to the best of our ability. You are putting a lot of gold into this for us not to. I look forward to the next time we come so that you can see an even better progression than this time." He finished with a smile. I nodded at him knowing this was a professional that knew his business. I would not pressure him anymore if he weren't a professional, though. My smile turned into thoughts of what I would do to him if he lied.
A visible shiver went down the Foremans back as I shook his hand and left him to close the warehouse. I noticed a crew working on the privacy fence around the warehouse. He was doing his best, I thought. He really didn't want to betray my expectations on that, though. I walked back home, knowing it was late, and a proper sleep would do me an infinite amount of good right now. Meditation can keep you up indefinitely, but it never replaced sleep. Sleep was a full rest of the mind, and a rested mind did amazing things.
When I awoke the next day with a rested mind, I smiled. The birds were chirping in the world around me, and I let go of my toy that was in my arms. The world and its noises were more open to me, and my mood was fantastic. I got out of bed without thought and disrobed as I went into our backyard to start to work out. As my power grew, I needed to move slower and slower for the energy to grow. The longer it took, the more it integrated with my body. The Movements from one stance of the dance to the next needed more and more time. This allowed energy to work more on each cell of my body as it moved around within me. This was a slow process that required constant training to increase progress. When I advanced to the B-rank, this process broke through a major bottleneck and moved at an even slower rate.
It was a complicated process where when you start; you look like you are actually dancing. It is simple and easy to see each step of the move. The energy moves faster because each cell cant take as much energy. As a person advances with energy, each cell can absorb more and more energy. Each dance's stance and movement bring the energy to another part of the body that it wasn't before. When the entire dance routine was done was when you usually ran out of energy. As you grew stronger with energy that meant your energy stores grew with it. To finish the routine, you need to slow down along with your power since, to maximize efficiency, you were out of energy at the end of the routine. The slower the movements with energy during training, the more powerful the user.
The user would soon look like they are standing still how long it will take when they train in their routine. I could see why some experts said in the adventurer academy that closing oneself off was normal. Soon these exercises would take days. Then it would turn to weeks. This was the downside to this training. I had no mentor after a B rank level. I would need to find someone I could learn from or get information about the advancement. I moved my mind back to the movements focusing even more on the slow dance.
When I finished, I saw Stacy looking at me with shining eyes all over my body. I frowned at her, and she still took my sweaty body in. When she asked for the first time to orgasm in chastity, I decided to make her think twice about the second orgasm in chastity. That brought a smile to my face since it already been a week. I know she was a sopping mess of sexual energy at the moment. I could feel it radiate from her as she stared at me with eyes wanting to worship my body.
I moved to the shower ignoring her. I had things to catch up and do today. Freya was in the kitchen, making a large amount of food as I passed. I smiled, thinking about the good food I was about to have. I cleaned myself up and got ready to go out. I put my new whip into the inventory where I could reach it but not have it visible. I was finished getting dressed when the food was ready.
I ate and hid in a cloak, moving towards my gang. I kept my profile small, and I felt eyes on me as I left. This unsettled me. My instinct spoke to me that those eyes were filled with hate. The hatred radiating off those eyes made me want to kill the person now before becoming a problem. I was about to move to find the person when they stopped watching me and disappeared into the city. I stopped and looked for them for a second unable to find the person. I gave up quickly and started to move towards the gang.
Soon I got inside with no one noticing. The gang headquarters was the same, only with more furniture around. I didn't find Cassandra right away, so I moved to the meeting room and waited. It was only a couple of hours before she entered. When she did, she was startled. Her eyes narrowed on me, and she went back out, calling for Carl. Carl entered minutes later as Cassandra told members to stay out of the meeting room. I frowned, but the report was necessary.
When Carl and Cassandra finished, I sat there with a stony face looking at them. "Report," I commanded.
Cassandra was looking at me funny before starting up. The situation wasn't great for the gang. We had lost a little territory in the docks. The movement of the guards stayed kept the movement of other gangs to a minimum. The other gangs were looking at us with blood lust eyes. Our members were not as strong, with a minimal amount of strong people. This was due to Cassandra keeping back Carl's trained men. I listened to the movements the enemies were taking, realizing none of them were allying with each other. I sighed in relief that the worst didn't come.
The report continued with minor and major movements of the players involved in the docks. Our other territories remained steadfast with barely any movement. That worried me. Most of our members were now in the Docks area due to this. It felt like they were gearing up for something. I trusted my instinct. "Cassandra," I started after the report, "Increase intelligence outside the docks to our north. I think the various gangs there will not be sitting idle there. This wouldn't make sense since the guards are much thinner there. My thoughts are they are deciding who gets what before they attack. This way, they can make those territories theirs before we can regroup. We need to delay without losing too much territory. A successful invasion would ruin morale and make people think we are growing weak." I paused, thinking some more.
"We need to kill someone to dissuade them. We have been on the defensive the entire time since we have taken over. This has emboldened our enemies to think we are weaker than we are. Carl, this task is for you. Cassandra will pick the target, and you two will destroy it with our main forces. I want no one to think we are weak after this attack. I want it to be fast and swift. I want their entire territory under our name. This will scare them into pausing on all fronts. We have shown restraint. Time to make them think the waters are deeper than they appear." I finished. Cassandra's eyes shone with happiness. I could hear from her reports she wanted to retaliate. The fact that she held back for so long must have annoyed her.
"Carl, leave now and start choosing members to do this in secrecy. Cassandra, we need to talk more." Carl left with a nod and a simple "Yes, Mistress," before leaving the room. Cassandra looked at me for a moment.
"This is about the necromancer guild, isn't it?" She asked.
"You are not an idiot," I said. I choose her for her intelligence; it would be a travesty if she weren't. "The Necromancer guild sent a fucking zombie after me. This is fine. I believe that I failed that test. I did not know that Undead invokes an adverse reaction in one's instinct. I will admit my fault. Whatever the guild thinks they can do, though, they are wrong. My first question is... Are they still trading with us?"
"Yes, Mistress. They are demanding a lower price, though. This I have stopped and told them without orders, I will not be doing so. They are slowly lowering the amount they order, although I know their appetite wants more, not less. They want the order from you to lower the price before purchasing more." I nodded along. They thought they were in a position of power now. They thought I was scared of them. This wasn't ideal, but I will wake them up with a simple order to Cassandra.
"Good, They need to be woken up. I will have a second meeting with them. I will not ask them for it. They will come begging for it." I told Cassandra's narrowing eyes. "We will increase the price of each corpse. Compounding, let us say, ten percent a week. It should take no more than two weeks for them to come asking for another meeting. We will wait for another week after that before scheduling. This time tell them they better bring someone who can represent them." I stood up, knowing the main things I needed to do were done. "Oh, One other thing. If they try to test me again, they will not be coming back."
I walked out of the room with Cassandra smiling behind me. That vicious smile of a person winning a game of chess. Cassandra was a high functioning sociopath. She was my high functioning sociopath. I needed to wield her like the weapon she was. I knew she was happy about today's orders.
With that out of the way, I moved across the city back to my apartment. I stayed in the shadows and noticed the person I wanted to see waiting at the apartment door as I went up the stairs after entering the building.
"Sherry, come on in," I told her as I entered the apartment with her trailing behind me. This was going to be an interesting day, I thought.
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