The iron doors of Castle Nightfall shut behind Michael, sealing out the chill of the mountain air.

  He leaned heavily on his cane. The expedition to the Grey Moors had been an overwhelming success. He had neutralized a feral tyrant, secured a self-sustaining supply of Mana Crystals, and placed a loyal Thrall in charge of the most dangerous border zone in the kingdom.

  He had survived the immediate threats. He had a Sterling Rank insignia in his pocket, legal citizenship papers in his desk, and a reputation as a fearless, if not eccentric aristocrat. He was significantly more powerful than the vast majority of people in the city.

  But he was still subject to the law.

  If Charles Darlington, Admiral George, or—heaven forbid—Father Joseph ever found a legitimate reason to sign a warrant, all the power in the world wouldn't stop the combined weight of the Constabulary, the Navy, and the Church from collapsing on his front porch.

  Michael walked into the war room, where Morpheus was waiting by the hearth.

  "Phase One is complete, Morpheus," Michael announced, tossing his coat over a chair. "We are loud and visible. But we are still fragile."

  "A tree that grows too fast without deep roots is easily felled by the wind, Father," Morpheus agreed, his eyes reflecting the firelight.

  "Exactly," Michael said, pacing the length of the table. "Robert and the village of Gare are going to start funneling a stable supply of Mana Crystals to the Syndicate border camps. When those crystals hit the city, Londinium is going to enter an economic golden age. Industrialization will explode. And when it does... I need to be the biggest benefactor."

  Michael stopped pacing and looked at his Dhampir strategist. "We are going to buy the board. We need soft power. I want a seat at the table with the men who write the laws, so they can never write one against me."

  Over the next three weeks, Count Mikhail of House Sabwat launched a relentless financial campaign against the city of Londinium.

  It started with the Coal & Cog Syndicate.

  Michael and Morpheus walked into the grand, brass-and-marble headquarters of the Londinium Bank in the West End and sat down with the highest ranking bank managers.

  He began pulling out solid bars of gold. He had spent ten years in Romanov hoarding loot to get this. His wealth was limitless.

  When he casually pushed enough gold across the desk, the bank managers nearly fainted.

  Count Mikhail became the bank’s largest private client overnight.

  When a Syndicate-owned factory in the Rust Belt was failing, Michael swooped in as a benevolent "Angel Investor." He bailed out struggling subsidiaries, effectively becoming the primary lender to the very industrialists who ran the city’s economy.

  Next was the Church.

  Michael knew he couldn't buy the faith of men like Father Joseph, but he could absolutely buy their bureaucratic goodwill. He became the Church of Londinium’s greatest anonymous donor. He funded the massive expansion of their orphanages and paid for the restoration of the grand cathedral.

  Furthermore, he frequently requested audiences with Father Joseph. He played the role of a harmless, slightly eccentric "theological scholar." He engaged the terrifying Inquisitor in hours of incredibly dry, dense debates regarding the translation of archaic holy texts. It was agonizingly boring, but it worked perfectly. Father Joseph started viewing him as an annoying, wealthy academic with too much time on his hands.

  The Constabulary was easiest.

  Michael remembered the tired Redcoats in the Rust Belt. He "donated" a massive sum directly to the Constabulary's severely underfunded pension program and personally funded the upgrading of their Gatling gun armories. In a matter of days, the unquestioning loyalty of the city’s police force was bought and paid for.

  However, despite his sprawling financial empire, Michael knew a foreign noble throwing limitless gold around was still inherently suspicious. He needed a proxy. A native element to legitimize his presence in the streets.

  He needed Iron Maiden.

  Michael intentionally kept Christopher, Freya, Blanche, and Arthur incredibly close. He funded their Lodge expeditions and bought them top tier, enchanted gear.

  To the public eye, Count Mikhail was the incredibly wealthy, slightly-above-average noble patron of the famous Iron Maiden hero party.

  "The balance is exquisite, Count," Christopher boasted loudly one afternoon in the Lodge, swinging a newly purchased, masterwork rapier that Michael had bought him. The duelist’s snobbish vanity had only inflated with his new gear. "You truly have an eye for the mathematics of combat."

  "Only the best for Londinium's finest," Michael lied, sipping a glass of water.

  Beside him, Freya was hyperventilating over a Red Tier mana ring Michael had "found in his family vault," while Blanche creepily stared at Michael’s neck, constantly muttering about his need for iron supplements. Arthur stood silently in the corner, his brass exoskeleton now gleaming with expensive, custom gold trim.

  It was the perfect cover. If an Inquisitor or a Syndicate spy investigated Michael, they saw a rich guy hanging out with his famous, deeply annoying human friends.

  Two weeks later, the Londinium Gazette ran a massive, bold-print headline that covered the entire front page:

  THE MOORS TAMED! MANA CRYSTALS FLOW!

  Sitting in his drawing room at Castle Nightfall, Michael read the article while sipping a cup of tea.

  Unsurprisingly, Robert and the village of Gare were entirely left out of the narrative. The Coal & Cog Syndicate took all the credit for "securing the supply lines through superior firepower and industrial grit." The article detailed how the Harvester Golems were now operating at maximum efficiency, pulling thousands of tons of glowing peat from the bogs daily.

  Michael wasn't surprised. It was standard corporate theft.

  What mattered was the result.

  With the massive influx of cheap, incredibly powerful Mana Crystals, the city of Londinium exploded into an economic golden age.

  Unemployment dropped to an all-time low. Happiness and prosperity soared.

  And because Michael had invested so heavily, so aggressively, right before the boom hit, his influence skyrocketed. He had his hands in every industry, every institution, and every major organization in the city. He was a titan.

  But progress, Michael quickly learned, was rarely bloodless.

  A month after the boom began, Michael sat in his study, reading the morning paper. A new decree from the Crown caught his eye, chilling the blood in his veins.

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  To meet the sudden, explosive demands of the rapidly expanding mana refineries, the Parliament had enacted a new labor law.

  Corvée Labor.

  Forced, unpaid conscription.

  However, the decree made it explicitly clear: no human citizens would be drafted. The law applied strictly to undocumented. The "Mucks."

  A sudden commotion outside the castle broke Michael’s concentration.

  He stood up, walking out onto the highest balcony of the keep, and looked down past the cliffside, toward the Gallows.

  What he saw made his stomach twist.

  Thousands of Constabulary officers, armed with the very Gatling guns Michael had purchased for them, were marching in tight formations through the edge of the woods. They were dragging iron chains.

  Behind them, being forcefully herded out of the shadows of the Gallows, were tens of thousands of supernatural creatures.

  They were the monsters that had hidden in the woods. Weak Vampires shivering in the sunlight, hunched Ghouls, starving Elves, and broken Werewolves. They ranged from Level 1 to 10. They were being relocated, marched at gunpoint away from the forest and down into "The Dregs"—the deepest, darkest, most decrepit slums of the city, long abandoned by the human working class who had moved up in the new economy.

  Michael gripped the railing.

  A moral conflict warred within his chest.

  He was technically a Muck. Under any normal circumstance, if he didn't possess his max level stats and his human disguise, he would be down there in the mud, shackled in iron, being dragged into slavery.

  Yet, here he was. Standing on a balcony in a tailored silk suit. He was a citizen. He had a title. And he was the primary financial benefactor of an economy that was currently being built on the enslavement of his own kind.

  He looked down at his hands. He was playing Monopoly, and the currency was real lives.

  I should stop this, a human part of his brain whispered. I could fly down there and slaughter the Constabulary in a minute.

  And then what? his survivor instincts fired back. You blow your cover. The Church rings the bell. The Navy shells the mountain. You lose the citizenship, the bank accounts, the safety. You potentially alert another player who is hiding here in the city as well.

  Furthermore, he remembered the venom in Daizen’s voice when the Alpha had called him a "Corpse." In this world, supernatural alliance wasn't a given. It likely wasn't even possible. The werewolves hated the vampires. The elves likely hated the ghouls. If he tried to save them, they might just turn on him the moment they were free.

  Michael slowly pulled his hands away from the railing and turned his back on the horrific scene below and walked back into the keep.

  He decided not to intervene and look away.

  But the guilt, the deep, janitorial instinct that told him a massive mess was being swept under the rug, refused to let him rest.

  That evening, as the sun dipped below the horizon and the skies of Londinium darkened, Michael decided he needed to see the reality of the situation.

  He had never been to The Dregs. There was never a need. A wealthy noble frolicking in the deepest slums of the city was a terrible look. But now, he had a cover. Count Mikhail was a well known philanthropist and investor. It was perfectly reasonable for him to investigate the labor conditions of his investments.

  Accompanied by Lavius, Michael descended into the belly of the city.

  The Dregs was a nightmare of poverty and despair.

  It was located in a massive, subterranean sinkhole beneath the industrial sector. There were no gas lamps here. The streets were slick with old grease and raw sewage. The air was cold and damp, smelling of rot and sweat.

  Michael walked slowly through the narrow alleys, leaning on his cane.

  He saw the reality of the Mucks. They were crammed into collapsing tenement buildings by the hundreds. He saw a Level 4 Vampire, his fangs filed down, coughing up black sludge as he huddled near a trash fire. He saw an Elven woman with hollow eyes clutching a starving child, her pointed ears drooping with exhaustion.

  They were broken refugees.

  Lavius walked beside him in absolute silence.

  "Do you feel pity for them, Spymaster?" Michael asked quietly over the weeping and coughing of the slums.

  Lavius scoffed softly under her breath. "Pity? No, Master. I feel disgust. They are creatures of the night. They are genetically superior to the mortals in every way. Yet they allow themselves to be herded like cattle, broken by iron and steam. They are pathetic."

  Michael didn't respond and kept walking until he reached the darkest, most secluded alley in the district.

  Sitting on a barrel, casually flipping a rusted copper coin, was a Level 10 Wood Elf. He wore a patchwork coat, and his eyes darted nervously from side to side.

  "You look lost, silk suit," the Elf said.

  "I am looking for information," Michael said, stopping a few feet away.

  The Elf caught the coin and slipped it into his pocket. "You found it. I am Jalus. My secrets ain't cheap for upper crusters though. Especially not today."

  "I have gold," Michael said. "Tell me exactly what the Crown is using your people for."

  Jalus let out a laugh. "You want the grand tour of our misery? Fine. That'll be a thousand gold pieces."

  It was an absurd fee for a slum broker. Jalus was clearly trying to scare him off.

  Without blinking, Michael reached into his coat and pulled out a pouch.

  Jalus’s eyes nearly bulged out of his skull as he grabbed the pouch, his trembling fingers frantically checking the gold inside. He looked up at Michael, terrified by the casual display of wealth.

  "The... the official statement," Jalus stammered, "is that the Mucks are being conscripted solely to work the dangerous Mana Refineries. The ambient magic in the raw crystals is highly toxic to humans. It burns their lungs. So, they use us. We have a higher baseline resistance to magic and work the hot zones to cover the manpower deficit."

  "And the unofficial statement?" Michael pressed, leaning slightly on his cane.

  Jalus swallowed hard, his pointed ears twitching nervously. He leaned forward, lowering his voice to a whisper.

  "What the Crown has told only the Muck overseers," Jalus hissed, "is that the refineries are just the beginning. During the 'rest periods,' when the factories are cycling down... we are not allowed to rest. The Crown plans to integrate us into the city."

  Michael frowned. "Integrate?"

  "Serving," Jalus spat the word like poison. "As low tier laborers. Street sweepers. Carriage pullers. Maids in the estates of the West End. Unpaid, expendable, magical slave labor."

  Michael’s eyes widened slightly.

  Interesting, Michael thought, his mind instantly grasping the volatile genius of the plan.

  He saw exactly why the Crown hadn't revealed the second half of that plan to the human public yet. If the human working class—the very people who had just found prosperity in the boom—found out the nobles were planning to eventually replace human laborers and servants with free, enslaved monster labor... there would be a violent uprising. The human workers would burn the factories to the ground to protect their wages.

  The Crown was walking a terrifying tightrope, balancing on a powder keg of racial and economic tension.

  "Thank you, Jalus," Michael said softly, stepping back from the barrel. "Spend that gold wisely."

  Michael turned and walked out of the dark alley, Lavius trailing silently behind him as they made their way back toward the surface of the city.

  The geopolitical implications of the slum were staggering. The golden age of Londinium was built on a foundation of wood and gas.

  Hours later, Michael sat in the war room of Castle Nightfall, staring into the fire of the hearth. Morpheus stood nearby, pouring two glasses of wine.

  "The city has changed, Morpheus," Michael said, accepting the glass. "The kingdom is prospering. We have unparalleled influence over the Syndicate, the Church, and the Constabulary. We have human proxies in the Lodge, and we know the volatile secrets of the Crown."

  "We are deeply rooted, Father," Morpheus agreed, taking a sip of his wine.

  "But there is a blind spot," Michael said, swirling the dark liquid in his glass. "A massive one."

  He looked up at his strategist.

  "The Royal Navy," Michael stated. "Unlike the factories or the cathedrals, the naval shipyards are highly restricted military zones. I cannot just walk up to the docks and observe the fleets without raising massive suspicion. If we are to truly secure our board, we need to know the capabilities of the military that guards our borders."

  "And how do you propose we inspect a restricted military fleet, My Lord?" Morpheus asked, his brow furrowing slightly.

  Michael stood up, walking over to the arched window of the war room. He looked out past the cliffs, past the city, toward the vast expanse of the ocean.

  To truly secure his empire, he couldn't stay in Londinium forever. He needed a legitimate reason to interact with the Navy. He needed to be invited onto their ships.

  "It is time," Michael said, tapping his cane against the floor, "that I take a trip outside the Kingdom."