As Aki shifted through his stats, he couldn't help but think that he should look for someone to do the editing at this point. While he still wasn't strong enough to just straight up kill a god after the last two jobs (Avenger and Arcane fighter), he was pretty sure he was close. The only 'Irregular' he really considered a benchmark was Kora, but to begin with she was a sword woman, and although his stats had began to catch up recently, his skills had started to stagnate.
It was amazing how it'd not actually happened before, it was also quite bad that he'd only capped so 'few' jobs through this time of war.
Deciding he'd spend some time honing his skills while waiting for his chance at consuming an actual god, Aki selected 'Spartan' and 'Monster lover', the later of which actually capped itself immediately thanks to his lovely wives and the pile of achievements he never got because they'd been deffered.
He sometimes wondered if he should try to change races and get levels in it, just so he could use all those achievements he didn't even know he'd completed.
It was quite the itch, knowing whatever reward they gave was just lying there, probably behind a glowing red button with a exclamation mark in the center.
He'd been unable to learn how to make homunculi however, so such things were still in the list of 'very dangerous shit for later'. Automatons were also viable soul containers, but their demerits were just too many. One of which being no more normal sex. Unless he developed a quantum network space, but this part of the system simply didn't have those. No matter what kind of warp drive he patched up, it'd still be decades to the closest access point.
Magic without physics behind it had plenty of things it couldn't accomplish, and Aki had never been studious enough to get all the necessary knowledge before dying to retrieve it through his mind.
Time relativety and space warping theory were there, but how to build anything that would make such even remotely relevant...
The best he'd be able to do was get everyone banned and ejected out of system territory if something like that ever became necessary.
Seeing that this line of thought lead him nowhere however, the words of his bloated wife repeated themselves in his mind.
"Don't do cosmic shit before or after the baby is born." She'd told him with a very serious face.
With some luck he'd not need to in the few days till the estimated birth of his son. He'd promised not to do the appraisal of his status before he was actually born, but their baby boy was pretty much as strong as an adult man as far as he could see, so whatever he had in there was only going to be a plus really.
Hell, eight gods had already blessed him, namely the god of cats, the god of humans, of life, records, magic, justice, wind and shadow. As the child of someone with so many connections and the first of his species he had that many rights.
So it was probably alright to just relax, put the heaviest barbells he had on a metal pole and do ten thousand swings.
*****
As a result of the war, the territory of Moonlith grew by more than 50%, and since Aki had reached a soft cap on his reliable man power, that ment many nobles had to be introduced to his land so it could actually work.
Considering how Sera was an orc, Mari was on vacation since some time ago and Aki said it'd be a great exercise of her new duties, Xera was the one porting over. She was taking a demon assistant to catalog and distribute over the barondons since she didn't actually have much idea how each space worked yet, she wasn't nearly as good as either her husband or cat wife when dealing with these informations, but she was good enough with people.
The results of the screening, however, ended turning into a challenge for her.
Different from other kingdoms where her species might have caused problems, all of the candidates were fairly polite, if still obviously restraining their gazes over her body. Their qualifications were equally as good and every knight would probably find themselves with a higher noble title somewhere in their lifetime anyway, but...
"I'm sorry for being too direct, but my wife would kill me if we got assigned somewhere with so many... liberal women."
"I'd never be able to look at a goblin like that!"
"So you mean i DON'T get special privileges for the termal baths?"
"... And with the new adjustment to the tax of multiple partners there'd be an increase in revenue of around..."
Each and every one of said knights had a problem of their own actually.
The first one had a very insecure wife, and she suggested some touristic guides for the more romantic sites with a full guide through the course plus some advice.
The third was straight up traumatized because of former experiences and saw monsters as complete beasts, to which she pointed out she was married to an orc and that she might very well be correct, but that the whole idea of the teachings of the 'saint of pride' was that all deserved a chance to be the best version of themselves. She could only assure her it was not something easy though, and that many tribes were simply exterminated for a reason or another, much like three other knights after her.
The seventh was actually the oddball of the bunch of twenty that she had tea with, seemingly 'misunderstanding what pride ment', in the words of her husband. Xera made sure to have someone dig things on his activities and of his management skills more thoroughly.
She was pretty sure the last guy was actually a spy though. Or very autistic. She'd began thinking on that after finding out it was actually a thing, looking for small behaviours she might have otherwise discarded as something that had integrated into the person in question through time or emotion instead of an unknown factor changing their response to stimuli.
The mage in question had not stopped talking even as she decided to keep such complex sounding sentence for later use and perrusal and how she'd try to show off the vocabulary she'd resently been learning. Just because she spoke little it didn't mean she had things of little value to say.
Aki had asked her 'how in the actual fuck', had she come up with such a notion, but she had a hard time actually explaining her past failures and he ended up just telling her several stories of silent characters. It made her feel like picking up smithing more than anything in the end, but the thought was appreciated anyway.
"I am sorry if i bore you madam, but i shall take my leave if that was all." Said the man with glasses in a monotome as he got up.
"Denied. I've been bored for a while now, don't think too much into it." She waved, her face just as icy as his. "I will tell you this now, but your ideas would be more appreciated in a diferent enviroment and to diferent people. Just be sure to pay more attention to the other side of the conversation and you should be perfect for the rank of baron. Maybe get someone not so iritating to remind you of such behavior before it becomes nescessaty others do it for you." The young man seemed shocked he'd actually been acepted and insulted at the same time, but she didn't give him space to speak. "Do not think that just because you have seen one side of things you can understand all of it, practice reveals failures, so practice and fix those until you can actually talk back. That is all, dissmised."
*****
As she retired from her official duties, Xera ended being invited for tea with the queen.
Yes, that directly and that subtly.
It took some guiding through the complex maze of beautiful and magical flowers interwoven through the walls of greenery for her to even reach the gazebo where the older lady seriously looked into the horizon with a fragant cup of tea in hand, steam floating up as the woman didn't seem to notice her precense in her mussing until she was already over the marble steps of the out of the way construction.
"Your majesty." She curtisied at an apropriate distance. While it was impossible to remenber all sircunstancial changes in mannerism like her husband had done to his body, she'd studied and practiced enough not to embarass anyone.
"Countess Xera. A pleasure to have your company. I wasn't sure an Augustus would answer my call." Slowly said the smiling sovereign, several inplications on her few words as she signaled her to sit. Most of which she likely expected answers to.
"I had no reason not to, after all, the honor is mine." She answered, hoping to have conveined their indepence and favorability to the crown at the same time. There was a reason Xera had not unlocked many politics related jobs though her titles would suggest otherwise.
"Always good to hear people haven't forgotten their elders." She chuckled. "Rona, pour her some tea as well, will you?" And a female butler went out of the shadow and did so. Then the high ophidian put a silver spoon on her cup before getting honey in it and nursing the scalding tea. She did not in fact remenber why that was so important, the story used at the time flying over her head, just that she was supposed to. "Now, why don't we discuss the news of your territory? Such expansion is already taxing on the governamental body, nevermind that the people in said territory do not have the same views as us. Yet you take so few personel, is the count certain about these decisions?" The other woman simply narrowed her eyes the slightest bit at her actions, but continued like nothing had happened.
"Finding the right person for the wrong post could be dissatrous, as i am sure your majesty is well used to keeping in mind, so we are being careful over said placements while giving more land to those that have proven themselves while the new nobles adapt to their new assignments. Of course, this period has been the worst for those able to deal with the work load as few have taken the lead, but their servises and loyalty are more than comendable enough for a reward of similar size, including, of course, more free time to spend with their loved ones after things start to calm down. Aki himself is taking plenty of his time to revise the regulations and measures to be aplied, but even his abilities find the task at hand chalenging. Though i imagine things would go faster if he'd not spend so much time thinking of a name for every law." She quipped, sipping her beverage, this time sure she'd done a good job on expressing herself.
"If you say so, then it does ease my mind. This expansion is very important to Moonlith after all, so as it's queen I cannot help but worry. I would, however, personally enjoy discussing simpler things with good company if you'd have me. What do you think of this land, how has it treated you? There are few Demi's that rise to become nobles, less yet that are their first generation, so your opinion is of great importance my dear." Softly said the experienced noblewoman, seemingly changing tracks after hearing what she wanted to and quickly becoming more friendly.