When I asked the others to stay on the hush about the guild, it wasn't that I wanted to keep the idea hidden from the world. I simply wanted to take the pressure off of my vassals- my friends. That included Roheisa and Lucia.
I wanted them to make their own friends. Form their own relationships. To follow their hearts.
It was when our time came to an end when they'd ask their friends if they wanted to join. If I hadn't already.
For all of us, it was our first time away from both our birthplace and home realm. But for them, it was the first time they've been truly free. Unburdened from the expectations and conditions placed on them by the society from which we were born, great as it may have been.
Here was the birthplace of their own ambitions. Here was a temporal pocket of happiness we'd been afforded before we hopped on the train to hell.
I didn't want to be the one to ruin that for them. So, I strapped the burden onto my back and laid it all out for the party to share.
And once I did, training seemed to cease entirely.
Instead, the entire party just stood around. Murmuring to each other about what they just heard.
Including Winston, who was shuffling forward to murmur to me.
"You really are serious about this." He gasped in disbelief. "But, why?"
"Living in Maru is like watching surface from the crowd," I explained while swearing under my breath. Never would I have thought I'd rue the inexistence of zoos. "The creatures living beyond the barrier are like the lion jumping through hoops. The tamer- the barrier, is the only thing preventing the lion from leaping into the crowd and ripping everyone to shreds."
"So." He droned on as the cogs in his mind turned. "The creatures from the other realms have their own empires behind the barrier. And you think it'll break soon?"
"Do you know of any fences or walls that don't need inspections or maintenance?"
As if my words were a punch, he reeled back and was seemingly forced to look away. "Well… no. I guess not."
"I think the challenge would be great!" Slate boomed alongside Kao. "So long as I meet your standards."
"I have no standards." I snorted. "The weak can become strong and the dumb can become geniuses given enough time and dedication. No matter how noble or how sleazy you are, I'll find a place for you."
With that, I dismissed training and elected to listen to the idle chatter on our way out of the gym.
Unsurprisingly to me, many of them revolved around the offer I just made them. While many of them outright claimed they'd join, I chalked it up to blind naivety and turned my focus towards those who were more skeptical to compartmentalize the information in my recently formed Guild App.
Regretfully though, tinkering with it had to come later. As the party wordlessly elected to have dinner as a group and continue their guild chatter in my presence. But also to complement my tomes and ask for some additional training sometime later.
One other conversation, however, wound up being far more practical than I anticipated.
"How will we be paid?" Rhody asked from the next table.
"Pay will be based on rank," I explained. "Those with a higher rank will be given additional benefits such as custom armor, weapons, and facilities. But I estimate those in the lowest rank being paid fifty gold a week."
"Fifty gold- Holy shit!" He slapped the table. "Who's funding it, you?"
"I have a fund set up," I admitted. "But most of our income will come from industry and trade. And the rest will come from ancient ruins or any entities we go to war with."
"You're gonna steal from the dead?" Samson dejectedly gasped.
"Trust me when I say the dead have no use for trinkets and gold." I snorted and didn't say much else.
I didn't want to disclose all my secrets after all. Hill Base was just the start of my military-industrial empire. The existing industry would be split in two just like we planned. One for the citizenry and the other for the guild. But there was still room for a third that I had yet to conceptualize.
Luckily, Rhody seemed to answer the final question burning in everyone's minds. Finally, giving me enough peace to wolf down my meal and return to the dorms with Zakira to smoke and tend to the widgets flowing around in my augmented vision.
As before, there were many things left to be organized and established. Namely, the guild's name. But I decided that'd be the last thing I decided upon, so I cleared out my digital work surface to start from the bottom.
I knew the guild would have at least three components. The first being the civilian population. Which would more or less be an extension of what currently existed. Albeit in a new location and with much grander facilities.
The second was the first side of the coin that was the military. Specifically, the Living Army, led by Toril. And naturally, its counterpart, the Shadow Army, would be led by me.
Despite the name, however, I decided to give a detachment of regular undead to each unit to act as the primary labor and logistics force.
And to be cannon fodder whenever necessary.
On top of that, I felt it necessary to attach a shadow undead to each unit to act as radios or relays with a direct line to me for emergencies. On top of that, I elected to have them serve as permanent ghost officers. Acting to ensure that each unit down to the lowest squad held the same standards in between leaders.
The rest of the shadow undead, however, would accompany me everywhere I went. And whoever I let join my squad would explore by my side. Acting as the guild's vanguard. Exploring ahead and most likely getting into trouble wherever we went.
Naturally, that'd give the military something to do whenever they weren't out securing our territories and outlands from the native creatures and ne'er do wells.
As for my squad, I didn't want anyone with any annoyances like morals or self-righteousness. I wanted chaotic, unruly individuals who weren't afraid to do dumb shit and break a few laws. On top of that, they needed to be resistant; or preferably, immune to necrotic energy and have natural darkvision. Zakira was a nice start to that, but I needed more. Around six more, to be exact.
With the basic structure established, the next step was to establish a unit and rank structure. Which was relatively quickly formed into an amalgamation of the Roman Legion and the modern military I spent so much time with back on Old Earth.
Over the course of another blunt, I copied the long-existing rank and unit structures before toiling to tailor their titles, pay, benefits, load-outs, and all the other things from top to bottom. And much to my astonishment and dismay, what I wound up with ended up being overkill by leaps and bounds.
The smallest available unit in the guild was, naturally, a Team. Unlike the teams at the Bodhi Tree, however, each team had only two members. And each squad- or party, was composed of six such teams, plus a Sergeant, a Corporal, and a Medic. Making for a total of fifteen highly skilled individuals per party, equipped with an enchanted variation of the standard loadout Giorno made for us months back.
Plus their Doppelgangers. And a mindless undead partner for everyone.
In other words, a single squad was composed of forty-five living, non-living, and umbral troops.
Naturally, that led to astronomically large units standing at the top of the ladder. On top of that, however, each unit also had an additional specialist akin to the medics found in the squads.
Each platoon had a Supply Sergeant in addition to their Staff sergeant and Lieutenant. For companies, that duty was tasked onto the XO. And in exchange, each company was given a Junior Engineer. And battalions had a Senior Engineer in addition to a Civil Officer, tasked with addressing relations between the battalion and any locals within their jurisdiction.
Naturally, each subsequent unit had a similar position with a higher degree of responsibility until it capped out at the largest unit within the guild.
A Legion.
Composed of the Primarch- the commander, the XO, the Field Marshal, a Master Chief Engineer, a Senior Civil Chief, and 1,000,780 living members.
Making for a ground-breaking total of 3,002,340 living, non-living, and umbral legionaries.
And that wasn't including the auxiliary forces needed to produce and maintain their equipment or the abundance of other things that needed doing after a battle or war.
Even then, my plans called for no less than twenty legions to be formed before all was said and done. Twenty legions that'd be created in the wake of the living army's advances. Twenty legions, three million members strong each. One for each theater of war I could distinguish along the path I'd carved out for myself.
With that, and a general idea of their headquarters theorized, I moved on to the arduous task of conceptualizing a recruiting method, training regimen, and standard operating procedure for daily operations.
As I told the party, I was uncaring as to what type of person joined my guild. Even those I was most disgusted with were capable of being cursed or given a deal, after all. Making recruiting the easiest task of all, but devising an efficient reception and boot camp wound up taking a bit more time than I bargained for.
Eventually, though, I settled on a system that worked and turned my sights on the most important thing of all. As I again told the party, I wanted the legions to have an exploration-based focus. My main goal in exploring the Plane was to learn its ancient history. But I had other reasons to travel the realms. Naturally, I wanted to capture a dragon and see the other Trees of Life, starting with Betrarth. But I also wanted to see the Hells and, if I could, try Death's Key on the gate to the Under.
After that, I wanted to explore the Inner Reaches and make the journey to Egedil before making my way to Youtera to train with the elves. Not because it was the time Telin deemed. But because I decided it was time.
Once all that was done, I assumed I'd explore Nonus, the Shadowfell, or the Darkworld with Zakira. Or perhaps live in peace until I grew bored enough to explore those places.
Either way, that was only one side of the coin that was our duty.
Obviously, I wanted the legions to defend our citizens and allies. As I surmised long ago, that required each member to be as strong as possible. That said, I didn't want to run around the realms playing hero. Nor did I want to be a murder hobo villain. At the same time, I didn't want to run around doing whatever people asked of me for coin. I had coin. Millions upon millions of coins. And the people who needed help shouldn't have to scrounge up what little they had left to save themselves.
That, however, left only a few things as a form of payment. Namely, information, corpses, and prisoners. All of which were fine by me. But could prove to be problematic come time for negotiations.
Either way, three hours was what I wound up needing to formulate a good foundation for my legions. All that remained was to think about anything else the legions or civilians may wind up needing in the years to come.
Like an artificer. Not for the living army. That was Ed, and the civilians would have another. I wanted- needed an artificer for the undead. Some to brew potions and craft weapons and armor for the finest undead in my employ. Aside from that, I also wanted a Bard in my service so I could do as Henry did and have requiems play during our battles.
The civilians, however, needed many things as well. Churches and other religious organizations. Maybe some dedicated for me, assuming I was truly a god. But aside from that, the capital needed travel gates to connect them to the other allied cities. I needed a home for myself and the Menagerie. I had thoughts to move the Cole Crypt after I found and explored its contents.
And, of course, the guild still needed a name.
But those would come in due time. So I closed out the guild app and fired up another blunt to begin conceptualizing a new app in my Eternal Eye- a feature I was becoming quite obsessed with.
This one, however, was to facilitate the storage of the many enchantments I conceived and to facilitate the designs of the ones to come.
And there would be many to come.
Magical versions of cars, planes, televisions, radios, and everything else that existed back on Earth and beyond of course. But also a laundry list of weapons, clothes, and tools that could only be made possible with my magical affinities.
Or that of my friends'