Dmitry, leader of an entire city.

  I let out a long sigh usually heard from people staring at tax forms. “We should… call him, right?” I asked, closing my eyes as if that would somehow erase reality and install a better one. “If we’re solving problems, might as well start with the one wearing sunglasses indoors. He died anyway, so he should be somewhere nearby.”

  Lola glanced down at her holo. “He is… uh…” Her expression froze mid-scan. “I didn’t know we had a Lola fanclub?”

  I opened one eye. “Gimme.”

  Before she could protest, I snatched the holo from her hands.

  Instant regret.

  The feed was a mess; blurry photos, rotating reports, clips from angles that had to be taken by people hiding in ridiculous places. But the activity log was the only readable part. Dmitry was currently located at…

  “…the Loli fanclub.” I squinted. “Not Lola. See? Different letter at the end.” Then, because I’m me, the words left my mouth before my brain approved: “If it were a Lola Fanclub, I’d sign up. Premium tier.”

  Lola made a noise like a kettle about to boil. Her face went scarlet, and she stared at the table as if it had suddenly become the most dignified object in existence. “He’s um… on his way,” she whispered. Voice tiny.

  I smirked and gave her a moment to breathe before turning back to Tyler.

  “Anyway. Our economist. Where do we create that coin?”

  “Yes!” Tyler jolted like someone plugged him into a socket, flipping through his papers with manic energy. “The minting should be centralized—uh—here somewhere—just one moment—”

  I raised an eyebrow. “Wouldn’t it be better to keep it all on holo? Digitally? Instead of… paper avalanche?”

  He deflated into a sheepish smile. “I know, Your Majesty, I know. But I prefer paper. And since Rimelion doesn’t have it, I practice with these.”

  I blinked at him and nodded slowly. “Huh. Actually, a good idea.”

  Tyler finally found what he was searching for and tapped the page like he’d discovered buried treasure. “There’s an Altandai family that specializes in creating coins. We believe they can produce and we’ll circulate enough Provisional Silver Tokens by dawn tomorrow.”

  “That fast?” I blinked. “Isn’t that, like… world-record speedrun territory?”

  Tyler checked his scribbly notes. “They… use magic.”

  “Of course they do.” I sighed. “Magic: the universal excuse for everything working instantly. Fine, I’ll ask Cloudy.” Tyler perked up, clearly expecting a dramatic reveal of who Cloudy was.

  He didn’t get one.

  Because the door opened instead and Dmitry walked in, straightening his tie, looking both confused and annoyed, probably his natural emotional state. “I truly hope this is important; I was in the middle—”

  I raised a hand. “Ogling young girls?”

  He paused mid-step, gave me a calm, dead-eyed glance, then sat in one smooth corporate slide motion. “I was visiting a focus group. For research purposes.” He adjusted his tie. “We need to produce a new version of Lunaris and they discuss the proper flatness.”

  “Yeah, sure,” I said, unconvinced. “Anyway. Tyler here… economy guy, Altandai stuff.” I gestured vaguely. Tyler nodded like a spooked owl. “I called you to ask: wanna be the Count of Altandai?”

  Dmitry blinked. “That would double my workload.” Completely calm.

  “Is that a no?” I cocked my head. “Because apparently you’re the best at it. But I’ll happily shove the title onto Llama or Lisa if you’re feeling shy.”

  “If that’s what’s required of me,” Dmitry said, “then yes.”

  “Lola, can you—” I turned to her, but she was still beet-red from the whole Lola Fanclub incident and refusing eye contact with reality, so I pivoted back. “Okay, Dmitry. What do you actually want to do? Count? CEO? I dunno, professional dungeon gremlin?”

  He looked thrown off, like no one had asked him what he wanted in years. “I… I’ll do what is needed.”

  “That’s not what I asked.” I reached over and put a hand on his shoulder. “I’m asking what you want.”

  Dmitry froze like a barman when hygiene inspector walks in.

  So I grinned.

  “Or I ask Kit to assign you.”

  His soul nearly left his body. “COUNT AND CEO! I can do both!” he almost shouted.

  “There we go. Good job!” I clapped once, then threw both hands upward and pulled mana hard… way harder than in Rimelion. Earth resisted like a stubborn mule, but eventually… the air shimmered, cooled…

  And tiny frozen crystals drifted downward.

  Tyler nearly leaped out of his chair. “Is… is that a trick?” he asked, voice cracking.

  I turned slowly with a wicked grin and tapped the nearest paper, some farm layout sketch. A pulse of mana ran through it.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  The ink froze.

  The page was frost-laced and Tyler along with Dmitry gasped in stereo.

  “Hah!” I spread my arms. “Got ya!”

  Tyler kept staring at the frost-laced paper like it was a live grenade made of accounting errors. “But… you used magic?”

  “Yeah?” I spread my hands. “I told everyone Rimelion was real.”

  “…Yes, but—”

  I laughed. “Let me guess. People thought I was exaggerating? Role-playing? Pulling everyone’s leg? Yeah, story of my life.”

  Dmitry leaned forward, eyes gleaming with a disturbing level of curiosity. “You can use magic.” Not a question. An assessment.

  His stare got very… intense.

  “I’m not doing magic tricks at the zoo,” I snapped. “Anyway—back on track. Dmitry, congrats, you’re a Count. Tyler, tell him what’s wrong with his city.”

  Tyler was still in shock, but once he buried his face in the papers, professional instinct took over like a defense mechanism. He straightened the first sheet, took a deep breath, and shifted into Economist Mode?. On the verge of a panic attack.

  “Problem two,” he began, “is food production.” I nodded sagely, even though I had no idea where he was going. “The… ‘slave army’,” he said delicately, “ceased working the agricultural fields immediately. They are free now, so naturally they will not return to unpaid labor.”

  Dmitry raised an eyebrow. “Naturally.”

  Tyler continued, voice tightening. “This is catastrophic. Altandai is a farming haven. Losing ninety percent of daily food output overnight means—”

  “Starvation?” I offered.

  He swallowed. “Within days.”

  I winced. Lola shifted uncomfortably beside me. Tyler shuffled pages, finding the correct one with near-frenzied precision. “Suggested solution: All agricultural land is now seized by the Crown.”

  “That’s… dramatic,” I muttered.

  “It was owned by Grandmasters,” Tyler said quickly, anticipating my objection. “Which means it is legally yours now. We simply formalize that.”

  “Right. Loot but make it governance,” I said, nodding.

  Tyler blinked but continued. “All former agricultural laborers become Crown employees. Not slaves. They will receive guaranteed daily wages in Provisional Silver Tokens for one month, ensuring immediate food production resumes.”

  I sat up. “Actually… that’s good. Really good.”

  He nodded shyly. “Thank you. Additionally, I propose appointing someone knowledgeable as Provisional Minister of Agriculture.”

  “Who?” I asked.

  “Former Grandmaster Shad,” Tyler replied without missing a beat. “I was in the Altandai library the other day and found out he submitted several unsolicited proposals for sustainable crop rotation. And… irrigation rune layouts.”

  I barked a laugh. “Shad will love that. Grandpa already obsesses over plants. And soil. And weird magic vegetables.”

  “We spoke last night,” Dmitry added casually. “He said the plants ‘suffer’ and he wants to ‘free them’.”

  Tyler froze mid-breath. “What… does that mean?”

  Dmitry shrugged. “No idea.”

  Tyler blinked, made a helpless noise, and buried himself back in the papers like they might save him from the madness.

  I leaned sideways into Lola, whispering, “Hey, Lola. Boring meeting, huh?”

  She didn’t even look at me. “Lady, this is important.”

  “Mm-hmm,” I grinned. “But still boring.”

  Her cheeks turned faintly pink despite herself.

  Tyler cleared his throat, returning to the next point. “Next: non-combat essential personnel. Water purification workers, waste removal, energy channelers, Grand Hall clerks… all of them left their posts after the Grandmasters fell.”

  “So everything explodes within twenty-four hours,” I muttered.

  “Correct,” Tyler said. “We must compel all former infrastructure workers to return to service immediately. They are no longer serving the Grandmasters—”

  Lola straightened. “They will serve the Crown.”

  Tyler nodded. “Exactly. And with Dmitry now installed as Provisional Mayor, they will report directly to him.”

  Dmitry adjusted his tie again, the picture of corporate readiness. “Understood.”

  I exhaled, rubbing my temples. “Count Dmitry, CEO of Altandai, Mayor of Everyone’s Problems,” I muttered. “This city is about to get spreadsheets in places it didn’t even know had places.”

  Dmitry gave me a thin smile. “Good,” he said.

  Tyler continued talking, words flowing like a polite avalanche of economics. “…and so the regional supply lines will require at least three days of stabilization, with agricultural token incentives rolling in cycles of—”

  Somewhere around token incentives, my brain quietly slipped out the back door.

  I leaned over the table.

  The papers were right there.

  Within reach.

  Crisp and boring.

  Desperate for salvation.

  So naturally —

  I started doodling.

  A frost bunny.

  A dramatic stick-figure Gatei eating a sword.

  A smug little cloud with pink glasses.

  Lola with sparkles.

  Yuki as a fox-girl with nine tails.

  Tyler kept explaining crucial infrastructure collapse, Dmitry nodded like every sentence was a profit margin, Lola took notes like a queen of efficiency.

  And I…

  I added sunglasses to my fox-girl doodle.

  I was deep in artistic genius when a sharp elbow nudged my ribs.

  Lola.

  I jolted up, blinking.

  Four pairs of eyes stared at me, Tyler, horrified. Dmitry, judging. Lola, painfully disappointed. And my fox-girl doodle, very proud of itself. “Yes, totally,” I said out loud, as if I knew anything they’d said in the last twenty minutes.

  Lola leaned closer, whispering. “We asked if you wanted to add something.”

  “Uh…” I blinked at the room, at the doodles, at the stack of problems that made my soul itch. “Make my city prosper?” I offered brightly.

  Before anyone could object, I stood, grabbed Lola’s hand, and strode toward the door.

  “We still need—” Lola began, trying to keep up.

  “No.” I tugged her closer. “I’m going back. I almost forgot.”

  She blinked. “Forgot… what exactly?”

  “Yuki,” I said, like it was the most important universal constant. “I promised her she’d become a fox girl if she helped me rob the Grandmasters.”

  Lola opened her mouth. Closed it. “That is… certainly a reason.”

  I dragged her toward the elevator. “Meet you back in Rimelion,” I said. “I’ll go check on Dhriti.”

  “But I had plans—” Lola tried weakly.

  I grinned over my shoulder. “No plan survives meeting me.”

  And with that… I vanished on the spot.

  I exhaled like someone who had just escaped a boss fight. Not a hard boss fight, a boring one.The kind that drains your will to live instead of your HP bar.

  I shook off the mental cobwebs and stepped out and found Dhriti standing there like a proud golden retriever knight on duty.

  “Oh—hi,” I said, smiling. She lit up. Fully lit up. Like Christmas, sunrise, divine revelation.. all at once. “Queen! Is your matter done?”

  I laughed as we started walking back toward the temple. “I decided it is,” I said with a wink. “I appointed a new mayor, created a new currency, and… other stuff. Me. All me. Totally alone.”

  Dhriti’s grin somehow got bigger. I giggled. “Anyway—how’s the temple? Did you preserve the artifacts? Especially the sun-fox tail thingie?”

  “Yes, Queen!” she said proudly, armor clinking with enthusiasm.

  We stepped through the threshold into the chamber with all the ugly paintings, still smug, still staring, and continued on toward the newly claimed temple area.

  The moment we crossed into the next room…

  I blinked.

  It was huge… spacious enough to fit a banquet hall or a medium-sized cult. But now? It looked like a magical burglary gone horribly right.

  Tens of crates were stacked in neat, terrified rows. Each overflowing with artifacts, relics, gilded trinkets, enchanted books, ceremonial blades, ominous crystals.

  At the center, the custodian stood guard, posture rigid, face pinched in the expression of a man who had aged ten years in two hours. He watched every crate like someone expecting it to spontaneously explode into heresy.

  “Hey guys!” I announced, hands on hips. “Let’s borrow some artifacts!”

  The custodian visibly tried not to faint.