The goblins had been swarming over the defenses for nearly 15 minutes now, and their numbers had been cut down by 60%. Kyle’s railgun was incredibly powerful, after all. It could punch through destroyer armor and interdiction fields.

  This was going to be a curbstomp unless something changed. Kyle could see how these things could be a danger to a frontier town without real access to magic. They would sweep over shield and spear walls, and their shamans could smite any potentially deadly opposition.

  Kyle’s targeting software tracked over a chariot at the far back of the army. On it, a hugely fat goblin surrounded by professional-looking hobgoblin guards and more shamans sat chewing on a chicken leg.

  Bingo. Right on the money. Kyle pulled the trigger, and prepared for the army to lose cohesion. Right before the round impacted the goblin lord, a huge shield of white smoke rose up around the chariot.

  When the round impacted the bubble of smoke, it spread over it like water over a rock. When the smoke dissipated, a scene of death was revealed. Every shaman lay dead, green blood pouring from their eyes and mouths.

  Kyle watched it all through his digital aiming reticle. With a pull of the trigger, a new rod was fed into the gun and accelerated and energized down the rails. Right before it impacted the shocked goblin lord, the blob of fat looked directly at him. A look of horror dawned on his face.

  A moment later, the chariot and the lord were consumed in the trademark huge explosion and conflagration of semi-kinetic plasma weapons.

  A wave seemed to pass through the masses of goblins. Their eyes seemed to dull, and they looked confused. After a second of this waiting, another volley cracked out from the riflemen in their trench.

  The noise seemed to spook the now animalistic goblins, and they fled en masse. Where they had once avoided obvious pits or traps, they flooded right into them instead.

  The horde was broken, and cut down by about 96%- 29 thousand out of 30.

  ———

  Kyle wasn’t one for speeches, but he still congratulated the men and women who’d volunteered and trained with the new guns.

  “Good job, everyone. You saved many lives with your efforts, stopping the goblins from hurting civilians. You’ll all get a medal, and some money. Any input on the medal’s design is welcome.”

  The guards, either mercenaries in armor or people in simple mass-produced clothes, congratulated each other and passed around back pats.

  What now? Uh. Attracting migrants and starting my own construction industry, that’s right. I hope that concrete factory is done.

  To be honest, Kyle was winging it in every way. The end goal was to build another Reality Sheathe and get back to the League, but that was decades away at least.

  In the meantime, conquering the planet sounded fine. First would be the Veskayan Empire. He would burn down the churches and bring the Orion League to this strange planet. Once the Empire had fallen, he could use it’s resources to build real industry, an Air Force, tanks, advanced chemical processing, everything.

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  The league had a well established first contact principle. If the civilization was at a similar or greater technological level, they would be treated as a diplomatic entity.

  Anything less, and the league would have to… civilize them. Given that the most advanced piece of technology he had seen was a mechanical bottle opener, he could do a lot for the world.

  Dealing with the goblin bodies was a struggle. Thousands had died before Kyle had killed the lord and broken whatever supernatural effect was holding the horde together. Their bodies clogged the plains to the north of the city.

  Apparently, goblins had some limited alchemical uses, but Kyle had no interest in minor potions of Detect Tracks or primitive contraceptives. The bodies would simply be burned.

  A few hundred large funerary pyres had been set up. It dug into his still limited wood reserves, but burying the bodies could cause issues. Monsters would be attracted, and the “death energy” or whatever could lead to zombie hordes. Kyle still didn’t really understand magic beyond the basics.

  It took nearly a week with huge volunteer support, but eventually most of the goblin bodies were dealt with.

  ———

  Kyle walked through his town, which he called New Brasilia in his head. House Jessek was lucky to hold some land on ! earth, as that was a sign of great success. Their land happened to overlay the region that the City of Brasilia once stood on.

  Although the city had been leveled in the War of the New Global Order, the land still held the name.

  Many of the evacuated cultural artifacts were preserved in the many museums and monuments owned by the house. Preserving ancient earth culture was a noble and vital element of League social policy.

  Unemployment had almost been eliminated in his holdings. Basically every former slave had immense agricultural experience, so any that weren’t employed in the main few factories or in more niche cottage industries just farmed.

  The first harvest had come in. Due to the advanced farming techniques and simple nitrous fertilizers he had implemented, food imports had finally ceased. Every now and then someone wanted some fish, but that was about it.

  A few major problems now plagued him. Most of his need for ores and minerals including the crucial sulfur could be found in the mountains, but coal was an issue. The coal veins nearby were still pretty rich, and were producing well. He’s equipped the mines with a steam powered ventilation system, keeping the mines mostly safe from deadly gasses and whatnot.

  A whole factory was dedicated to producing modular, multipurpose steam engines. Lathes, boring machines, and a large portion of the growing steel production all went into it.

  Someday, with magic enhancements, he envisioned lines of steam-powered combat tanks equipped with gas-operated machine guns and shell firing cannons rolling over lines of orcs or skeletons or whatever crap the fantasy planet would throw at him.

  Steam tanks had two main problems-storing enough water for long-term operation, and also catastrophic boiler explosions when even the smallest thing went wrong. Hopefully, basic magic could help solve both of these.

  In the meantime, more and more merchants were visiting his marketplace weekly. Steel, textiles, paper, and glass were the main exports at the moment. He was considering going into paper, but it wasn’t looking necessary. New Brasilia came closer and closer to breaking even daily.

  He had also easily expanded into his first luxury good-brandy. It was a simple series of steel convection condensers and stills, and wine made from a green grape-equivalent was easily refined into brandy. Brandy production was still a vestigial industry, and he had only dedicated a small warehouse near the farms to it.

  By this point, only the actual gold remained in the hoard. Paintings, jewels, works of art, and other valuable artifacts had been auctioned off by the Elnomagans in return for a cut of the profits.

  As Kyle approached the door of his manor, helmet off to get some sunlight, Carkh called out to him from nearby. “Sir, there’s some visitors down at the market place. Adventurers, the lot of them.” Kyle nodded appreciatively and headed there down the main road. “By the way, Carkh, this street is now officially named Main Street.”

  “Sure. Whatever you say, sir.”