Maintenance (1)
When I came to and opened my eyes, I saw the familiar ceiling and some system notifications I hadn't checked yet.
["Homefront Proclamation" has reached Level 30.]
[You have acquired 3 skill points.]
A notification for acquiring skill points, and—
[The number of citizens has reached 100,000.]
[As the population reaches a certain threshold, "Power of the Star" has been unlocked.]
It was a newly unlocked feature due to the population increase.
Upon checking the citizen information, I found it to be a kind of enhancement system that allowed me to spend money to upgrade citizens.
When enhanced, a star icon appeared next to the citizen, and their overall stats would increase this seemed quite useful.
Naturally, the retainers were included within the scope of "citizens," which meant they could be enhanced too.
'Thanks to the crown, the enhancement effects should apply twice as strongly.'
I could worry about enhancing the other citizens after I finished enhancing my retainers.
"How much time has passed?"
It had been a period of repeatedly passing out and waking up from the pain.
Because I had lost and regained consciousness so many times, it was hard to keep track of time accurately.
'Maybe about a day?'
I got out of bed and pulled back the curtain-the sun was high in the sky.
Since I had leveled up after killing Jinjo (the progenitor vampire) in the middle of the night, it meant at least a few hours had passed.
'That could've been really bad.'
With the sudden expansion of my territory, a large influx of new people had arrived.
But I had been in so much pain that I hadn't been able to grant them citizenship.
'Thank goodness I had it set to auto-grant citizenship.'
I had temporarily activated an automated system to handle the wave of survivors pouring in from Ulsan's Homeplus, and thanks to that, even those in Busan were taken care of.
If I hadn't turned on the auto system, all the new arrivals wouldn't have been able to do anything until I regained consciousness.
And the longer I had remained unconscious, the more they would have suffered.
'I'm glad... but now I've got even more work.'
I now had to carefully inspect the new arrivals for potential threats-like vampires hiding among them.
'Seriously though, I thought I was going to die.'
Maybe because I leveled up five times at once, the pain was on a whole new level.
The pain had already been getting worse with each level, but going from level 27 to 32 changed the first digit-it was significant.
'Eye of the Absolute.'
As soon as I calmed down and fully regained consciousness, I used the Eye of the Absolute to check on the retainers' locations.
The operation was still ongoing.
The fortunate thing was that vampire sightings were almost nonexistent-there weren't even any battles.
The retainers were fully focused on rescuing survivors.
However, I could no longer sense the connection with a few of them.
'... Three of them died?'
Kim Ji-tae, Shin Ah-young, and Hong Gyeok-taek were dead.
I hadn't expected to complete the operation without any casualties.
But confirming the losses firsthand left a bitter taste in my mouth.
""
After a brief moment of silence in honor of their souls, I used the Ring of Communication to get a situational update.
I called out to Seo Ye-jin, who was cross-legged at the Homeplus operations command center, diligently controlling the rats.
[Ye-jin.]
"Oh, oppa?"
She opened her eyes wide and looked around.
[Can you brief me on the current situation?]
Seo Ye-jin nodded and began to speak.
"Yeah. Just like you instructed, we've been prioritizing the rescue of survivors over the past two days. Thankfully, ever since you killed the leader vampire, the berserk state disappeared-except for the lowest-class ones..."
[Wait a sec. Two days? You mean I've been unconscious for two full days?]
"Yeah."
She replied with worry in her eyes.
"Is that why? How's your body? Are you okay?"
[...I'm fine now.]
"Thank goodness."
She let out a sigh and then asked,
"Where are you now?"
[At home. I'll head over soon.]
"Okay."
Using the Gate of the Absolute, I teleported to the Homeplus operations center to assess the situation. But there didn't seem to be anything urgent that needed my direct intervention.
Even though the lowest-class vampires were still berserk, they were weak enough for any of the retainers to deal with them easily—and in practice, they were being handled effortlessly.
The real issue was among the survivors.
"Keeek!"
Low and mid-tier vampires who looked no different from regular people had slipped in among the survivors.
The foolish vampires had applied for citizenship and were immediately exposed-captured by Jang Sung-joon's telekinesis and thrown into the
basement.
We didn't execute them since they had already been granted citizenship.
If you killed someone who had obtained citizenship, you had to bear a massive 'murderer' penalty, so they had no choice but to imprison them like this.
[Execute them.]
They hunted them down one by one, stripping each of their citizenship qualifications, and were able to eliminate all the vampires.
After finishing the purge of all the vampires who had been trapped underground, I asked Seo Yejin:
"The survivors don't seem very friendly. Since when has it been like this?"
"Hmm. I think it started after the vampire rampage ended."
When the vampires were going berserk and trying to kill, people flocked to Homeplus in a desperate attempt to survive. But now that the progenitor had died and the rampage was over, they no longer felt the need to follow our instructions.
There were even many survivors who now regarded us with more suspicion.
'Time to wrap things up.'
"What about the survivors?"
"They don't want to come, so what can we do? We'll just have to leave them."
"But..."
"Why? Is there a problem?"
Seo Yejin let out a small sigh and said,
"Monsters in the surrounding areas are slowly gathering toward Ulsan."
"Monsters?"
"Yeah. I think they sensed the progenitor's death."
With the ruler of the territory gone, creatures were coming to claim the empty seat.
"Hmm."
People in Ulsan probably didn't fully understand the fear of monsters.
They had been living safely within the fence the vampires had created, not even realizing they had become livestock.
"Still, let's pull out for now."
"Will that be okay?"
"Forcing them to come with us will just cause more backlash. It's better to wait until they come to us willingly."
Of course, many would likely die or be injured by monsters during that time, but it was better than planting the seeds of unnecessary conflict.
'Summon retainers.'
After summoning all the retainers scattered across Ulsan, I said:
"Good work, everyone. This operation is now complete."
After wrapping things up in Ulsan and returning home, I assessed the current situation.
'The territory has expanded a lot.'
Even when I was level 27, the territory had reached the sea. Now that I was level 32, it even encompassed part of the ocean.
With the eyes of the Absolute, I could clearly see underwater-but oddly enough, I saw plastic waste more often than fish or marine life.
'I can't even gauge how big it's gotten.'
Checking only a small area at the edge of the territory made it hard to grasp the true extent.
'Maybe this will work.'
Using a high-altitude, top-down view like in construction mode, I could finally get a sense of how vast the territory had become.
'It's now partially merged with the annex territory.'
The two territories that had slightly overlapped near Busan Station now formed a Venn diagram, with over half their areas combined.
Because the overlapping regions covered most of Busan's major districts, it was effectively all my territory now.
'Thanks to that overlapping area, the pain was probably reduced a lot.'
Even so, unbearable pain had washed over me.
'If that overlap hadn't existed...'
I might have actually died from shock due to the pain.
'Seriously, I need to do something about this.'
Looking at the expanded territory left me feeling bitter.
'Only 100,000 survivors in this vast area?'
Out of a total of 230,000 survivors, 30,000 had been rescued from Ulsan, which meant only about 100,000 survived in Busan.
'Too many have died.'
With Busan's population being around 3 million, that meant only about 7% had survived roughly 200,000 people.
It had only been a few months since monsters appeared, and yet 93% of the population had already died.
'Most of the new survivors are gathered near water sources.'
The Nakdong River, Suyeong River, Oncheon Stream, etc.
Those who had managed to survive for the past few months had mostly gathered near rivers.
'Doesn't seem like things are great there either.'
Being near water solved the drinking water issue, but food was always a problem.
Looking into their internal situation, it seemed they'd been surviving by hunting monsters.
They had been eating monsters like the sky-blue swordfish that came from the
sea.
But with my territory expanding, all the nearby monsters had been wiped out.
'I've accidentally cut off their food supply.'
Some areas near the Nakdong River still bordered monster-inhabited zones, so hunting was possible-but for those with citizenship, monster corpses would just disappear after being killed.
'Good thing we at least have the marketplace system.'
Quite a few were using money earned from hunting monsters to buy food at the exchange.
'I should build some shops nearby, create a few facilities, maybe appoint some hunters too...'
There didn't seem to be a need to forcefully merge them into Seomyeon.
It was already a group where their hierarchy and rules were all established, so if they were forcibly brought in, there would inevitably be some friction.
It seemed like, with just a bit of basic support, they'd be able to live on their own just fine.
"If I just create a few instant dungeons for them, they'll figure things out themselves."
He had no intention of taking responsibility for everyone.
"Still, I should at least make them feel like getting citizenship is a much better deal."
The number of people to whom he could grant citizenship was starting to hit its limit.
"Now that I'm level 32, the maximum number of citizens I can accept is only 320,000."
Out of that, he had already accepted more than 230,000 people.
"Back at the lower levels, every 5-level increase came with a big jump in the number of citizens I could take in."
A hundred, a thousand, ten thousand per level.
The capacity that had been steadily increasing had suddenly plateaued at ten thousand citizens per level.
"Eventually, there will come a time when I won't be able to grant citizenship anymore."
When that time came, he would need to be much more careful about who received citizenship.
Anyone without it would be forced to live outside his territory.
"Hmm. But..."
There had been one strange thing he noticed earlier.
"There are quite a few Awakened here too."
The lower region of the Nakdong River, far from where he currently was.
Just like in Ulsan before, the ratio of Awakened here seemed fairly high.
"While there aren't many people who've awakened high-level powers, the number of those who've awakened low-level powers is higher than expected."
Could it have just been a coincidence that there were so few Awakened in Seomyeon?
"Or maybe... because I was in Seomyeon, the survival rate of non-Awakened people was higher. If not..."
A few hypotheses came to mind.
"Maybe the number of Awakened is low because I was there."
If there was only a limited amount of energy available for awakening in a given area, it was possible he had absorbed all of it.
"Well... my power is absurd, after all."
People who received citizenship through his ability had much higher average stats compared to ordinary people.
If you weren't Awakened, you gained nothing from hunting monsters.
But citizens gained experience from monster hunting and grew stronger.
If your level was below 15, even just working out at a gym could raise your level.
That's why the average level of his citizens was inevitably high.
"In a way, you could even say every citizen I've accepted is like a low-level Awakened being."
He suddenly felt the magnitude of his power.
"It's overwhelming."
He recalled something Jinjo had once said to him.
That guy had described him as someone who didn't belong in this world.
He stretched out his hand and released his power.
Fwoosh.
Dark energy rippled like flames.
"What even is this?"
One thing was clear-Jinjo knew more than he did.
"Jinjo wasn't a human who turned into a vampire."
He was certain of it.
That the system had judged Jinjo as an entity not eligible to receive citizenship.
That he wielded a ridiculous amount of power.
Even from their brief conversation.
Jinjo was fundamentally different from other vampires.
"He's a monster."
Just like goblins and orcs, that guy was clearly a creature from another world.
"Where the hell are these monsters even coming from?"
It was an old question.
Ever since goblins first appeared on the apartment walking trail, and he awakened his powers and became unable to leave the house-it had lingered in his mind.
"...Phew. Whatever. Let's try out the new function."
The power of the stars.
The very first citizen to receive a one-star designation would, of course, be-
"Moon Byungho, obviously."
[T/L: Read extra chapters on my ko-fi page "Pokemon1920" : https://ko-fi.com/pokemon1920 ]