The village elders called it a season of fortune.
Kael knew better. There was no such thing as luck. Only systems—of survival, of control, of cause and effect.
And right now, the effect was momentum.
By age seven, Kael had quietly engineered a network of loyalty inside the village. Not through kindness or charisma, but through results. He solved problems. He made them need him.
He created dependency, then reinforced it.
It began with the water crisis.
The village well had begun to dry. The elders blamed spirits. The farmers blamed the off-worlders who came through weeks earlier. But Kael had traced the problem to something simpler: a collapsed underground fissure.
He meditated at night, projected his senses into the stone, learned its shape and weakness through the Force. Then, over three days, he collapsed the obstructing wall using carefully measured microbursts of telekinetic pressure.
The water returned.
[Achievement Unlocked: "Local Savior"]
+15 XP
[Force Manipulation Lv.3 → Lv.4]
The praise came fast. Too fast.
They began to bring him offerings—tools, cloth, jewelry, dried meat. The elders offered him a seat at the council. He refused, but made sure they believed it was out of humility.
Truthfully, he needed no title to rule. Influence was quieter, harder to see, more insidious.
That same month, Kael initiated the first phase of his long-term plan: military control.
The village had no warriors, only hunters. No tactics, only instinct. Kael changed that.
He offered to teach a group of young men his "tracking techniques" and "fighting secrets." Most thought it a game, a child's fantasy. But he drilled them in formations, patrol patterns, target prioritization, and ambush logic learned from Earth and augmented by the Force.
He equipped them with bone weapons reinforced with salvaged ship parts and scavenged blasters he'd reassembled in secret.
At night, he ran private "war games" in the dunes—mock battles. Sparring. Silent takedowns.
And when a small group of spice smugglers attempted to raid the village's food stores, Kael's proto-militia struck first.
Not a single smuggler escaped alive.
[You have slain Smuggler x4]
+120 XP
Level 9 Reached
+5 Stat Points, +1 Skill Point Earned
[Skill Acquired: Tactical Command Lv.1] – Enhances leadership aura. Troops under your command gain increased coordination and morale.
The village celebrated, but Kael watched from the shadows.
Not to be thanked.
To observe.
Those who fought with him now looked at him differently. Not as a boy, not even as a protector—but as something higher.
A leader.
One of the warriors, a hardened youth named Dareth, knelt before him after the battle.
"Tell us what to build," he said. "We'll follow."
Kael said nothing at first. Then nodded once.
"Stone. Walls. Weapons. Dig into the mountain if you must."
"But... why?"
Kael's voice was cold.
"Because this galaxy isn't kind. And one day, something worse than smugglers will come. When they do, we won't beg for peace."
That night, Kael returned to his hidden cache beneath the sand—now reinforced with scavenged durasteel plates. His stolen star maps flickered under the glow of a broken navigation module he'd modified as a projector.
Red dots marked the closest habitable systems. Trade lines. Pirate zones. Jedi outposts.
He wasn't ready to act on them yet. But soon.
Very soon.
He opened his status screen.
STATUS MENU
Name: Kael
Level: 9
Experience: 43/180
Stat Points Available: 5
Skill Points Available: 1
Attributes:
Strength: 13
Agility: 16
Midichlorian: 8,030 (+3 from allocation)
Skills:
Force Manipulation Lv.4
Force Sense Lv.2
Combat Instinct Lv.4
Bone Craft Lv.1
Weapon Proficiency – Blaster Lv.1
Tactical Command Lv.1
Passive Skill:Veil of the Void (MAX)
He allocated 2 points into Strength, 2 into Agility, and the final 1 into Midichlorian.
Small steps. But critical ones.
He could feel the Force more fluidly now. Objects bent easier. Sounds traveled further. His reactions had outgrown any adult in the village—and most of them didn't realize it.
On the third moonrise after the raid, a shuttle arrived.
Kael watched it descend from a distant ridge, his eyes narrowed. It bore no Republic insignia—no Jedi crest. Its hull was weathered and unregistered. Pirates? Explorers?
No. The markings were unmistakable.
Zygerrian. Slavers.
He returned to the village before dawn. No panic. No drama.
Only precision.
He summoned his makeshift squad. All six came without question.
"We're being watched," he said. "Slavers. We strike before they can see weakness."
Dareth nodded. "Do we kill them all?"
Kael's eyes burned in the torchlight.
"No. We leave one."
The attack was clean. Surgical. Brutal.
The slavers had expected primitive prey. Instead, they found themselves outmaneuvered, surrounded, and executed one by one. Kael himself severed the captain's head with a stolen vibroblade, then held it up in silence for the survivor to see.
The last slaver—a thin, pale Nikto—shook where he stood.
Kael stepped forward, expression blank.
"You'll live," he said. "But only to deliver a message."
The Nikto stammered. "W-what message?"
Kael leaned in close. His voice was ice.
"Tell the outer rim that this world belongs to me."
[You have slain Slaver Captain x1, Crew x3]
+150 XP
Level 10 Reached
+5 Stat Points, +1 Skill Point Earned
[Skill Upgraded: Tactical Command Lv.1 → Lv.2]
[You have reached Level 10 – Milestone Achieved]
Unlocking New Feature: KINGDOM MENU (Prototype Version)
You may now begin constructing formal infrastructure, tracking territory, and assigning leadership roles to followers.
Kael stared at the new screen for a long moment.
There it was.
The first brick.
The beginning of a kingdom.
His kingdom.