Adam was in the Royal Palace of Azure Sky, sitting with the Royal Family. He had been invited for dinner.
As they were waiting for the main piece to arrive, Adam finally asked what he had been holding back since the beginning of the meal "As you all know, I stationed my guild some distance away from the city."
Henry, Skade and Victoria all nodded at the same time, of course they had been told about this. Although Henry already knew what Adam was going to ask, he let him talk.
And just as he expected, Adam asked "I want to build a temporary town to house my guild mates and train them. In exchange of the rights on those lands, I can buy the services of the builders in Ember to build the city, instead of building it on my own."
If he wanted to, Adam could absolutely have his guild mates build the town on their own, although the quality may be lacking, it was more of a training camp than a real town, so it didn't really matter.
However, employing the builders in the city would give a lot of people a job as well and help the local economy.
Faced with Adam's deal, Henry smiled and said "You don't have to, I'd be happy to give you those lands. And at the same time, I can make you a noble."
Adam shook his head and said "I will pay for them, I can afford this… Just consider it as a gift from a friend."
Henry nodded and said "Then you have to accept becoming a Duke in my kingdom." Many would kill, or rather had killed, to get such a rank. One had to understand that in term of influence, a Duke was only below the King and Queen, and even princes and princesses were below them in term of authority, unless they inherited the throne.
But Adam didn't have this kind of relationship with the royal family, so he didn't care about status. Still, he nodded his head and said "I guess I should be thanking you then… Now, tell me, how does it feel becoming a Legend?"
Skade rolled her eyes and said "He definitely is happy… enough to talk about it fifty times every day."
Henry smiled awkwardly as he replied "Some call the passage from Hero to Legend Transcendence. I never understood why before, but now that I experienced it myself, I have to say, it really does feel like shedding from my mortal self. To understand this feeling, one has to reach that realm."
Adam tilted his head and asked "Transcendence? Shouldn't we be leaving that for becoming a deity?"
Henry laughed and said "Many once dreamed of becoming a God, but most of them are no more. Nowadays, becoming a Legend is the best most can hope for… Although, with the merge, this might change."
Adam said "What do you think of the Merge?" As he said this, he turned his head toward Skade. Of the two, she was the one who knew best politics.
Understanding he was asking her, Skade replied "The different racial powers will most certainly send emissaries in the different sub dimensions. For those where the strongest beings are Hero Rank or higher, the racial powers will try to befriend them. However, for those who don't…"
Adam said "Colonization?" Skade nodded with a grave face. Many realms would indeed suffer from this, the sole reason for the racial powers to enter those sub dimensions is for resources, and they will trade for those they can't snatch, and snatch those they can.
As the atmosphere was getting gloomier, Victoria asked Adam "Aren't you going to lead your guild in some of those realms? Gathering the necessary materials for your future city or whatever project you have will be simpler there."
Adam had already told them about his project of building up a city and slowly developing it into a Kingdom.
He replied to her "Not with them all. There still are the Dragons chasing after me, and the Demonic Factions too. I will only bring the best. But I won't go right away, I would rather wait for the first explorers to find the interesting dimensions. I don't really want to end up in a sub dimension ruled by a Great Devil."
They nodded, and after a moment Victoria asked "Can I and a friend come with you when you go?"
Adam raised an eyebrow, Victoria was a Level 140 Gold Rank SS Class, and she wasn't a pampered princess who never explored the world. As such, she was one of the strongest Gold Ranks in the entire world. She could even rival with some of the weakest Heroes.
In comparison, with all the recent upgrades he received, including his armor, Adam could defeat even the average Hero Rank, as long as they were lower leveled. Moreover, Victoria could only go up to Level 150 before she went past the limit of the sub dimensions, so she couldn't become much stronger.
However, Adam was only Level 50 and in the Silver Realm. Just becoming a Gold Rank would make him undefeated under the Legend Rank. Probably.
Still, he couldn't help but ask "Who is that friend?" Victoria only smiled mysteriously as she replied "You know each other, but you will have to wait until we go to see who I am talking about."
Adam shrugged, and heard the sound of trails rolling toward them. The main piece was coming.
The cooks in the Royal Palace were the best in the entire Kingdom, and the food they were making was great. It was the best food he had ever tasted. Well, except his mother's, but it was different.
When they finished eating, Adam left the palace and headed to one of the mason groups to order the construction of the town. After paying 10 000 Gold Coins, the workers agreed to start working the next morning, as the sun set.
Content with the arrangements, Adam left off to Serpentine Lake. The monsters there, who were at best Level 50, didn't dare to approach him.
Swimming toward the centre of the lake, Adam entered the Blood Tower and began cultivating.
Ever since he had broken through to the Silver Rank, he no longer relied on XP to level up, but real cultivation, like on Earth.
Thankfully, his new cultivation art was potent enough to allow him to meditate on the Water Concept and cultivate his Aura at the same time.
Since Adam wanted to wait for explorers to discover the interesting sub dimensions first, he had quite some time in front of him. He could spend it on Cultivation, he wouldn't even find that boring, but he wanted to discover the parts of the world he didn't discover yet, namely Alorge and the Citadel.
So the next day, as the sun set over the horizon, Adam returned to the city and used multiple teleportation arrays to first head to Alorge.
Alorge housed two races, Dwarves and Kartians, the first specializing in Forging and the later in Alchemy.
Their territory was actually an enormous mountain range which used to belong to monsters, but who had been driven out countless years ago.
Nowadays, the Kartian Cities would be on the surface, up in the mountains, while the Dwarven Cities would be inside those same mountains.
Well, actually, there weren't really Kartian or Dwarven Cities, they were all connected, but it was just that each race lived in their own place.
Dwarves preferred the inside of mountains because it was where the richest ores were, while the Kartians would prefer the surface because that was where the plants they used for their alchemy would grow.
The Capital of Alorge was called Fimdot, and Adam first appeared in the Kartian part of the city, on the surface.
As he appeared though, Adam made much more of an impact than he thought he would. Before his promotion, the strength his Aura released was only in the range of Gold Ranks, which, while it was good in the rest of the world, wasn't anything amazing in a Capital.
However, now that he had ranked up, the aura he released had clearly surpassed the Gold Rank and reached the Hero Rank, making a significant difference. The guards in the different capitals were only at the peak of Gold Rank, and even the majority of warriors were Gold Ranks.
As for Heroes, they were they leaders of the different organizations, and the Clan Leaders of the different clans, including the biggest ones, and were considered the true elite. As such, whenever people felt the presence of someone with the strength of a Hero, they would look in their direction.
And that was the main difference with the past. Before, people would have to be curious enough to look at him and see his identity. Now though, EVERYONE turned around to look at him, and saw the famous Aqua Sovereign had entered their city.