Two hours later, after Isla and Grace returned hope through a portal, Rowan sat in a private cabin in Viscardi’s plane, considering his options and future actions while looking absently at the landscape below. Due to the dwindling economic resources, few cities had their lights on. There was a knock on the door, and he shouted: “Enter.”

  “You wanted to see me?” Victoria asked, stepping inside.

  “Yes,” Rowan nodded. “Since Vegas will become my vassal town, you’re working for me now, right?”

  “Yes, your Lordship,” she bowed.

  “Then, I want to ask you for a favor.”

  There was a short shiver over her body, and Victoria lowered her eyes. “Very well… But let's keep this between us. I’m seeing somebody now.”

  She started to unbutton her blouse and reached the second button before Rowan realized what she was doing and yelped: “Stop! Not that kind of favor! Why is everybody thinking I’m sex obsessed?”

  “Maybe because you have three wives. And I did notice you looking at me,” Victoria said coldly, rearranging her clothes. "Don't deny it."

  “Noticing a striking woman doesn’t mean I want to have sex with her.”

  “I’ll take it as a compliment.”

  “It was a compliment… never mind. You worked for… err… Novosibirsk? No… fuck… not that. These Russian names are confusing…”

  “Vladivostok?”

  “Yeah, that.”

  “I worked with them, not for.”

  “They are stubborn and want to activate a lot of cores. That puts Earth at risk. Who will activate the cores for them? I heard the Knyaz doesn’t have the perk.”

  “There’s an old lady, a former teacher. I met her only once. Stern, severe.”

  “Can you kidnap her?” Victoria stared at him with a blank expression. “I don’t want to kill people just for being in the wrong spot,” Rowan explained. “Or steal the cores, if possible?”

  “I was thinking about turning her into a thrall,” Victoria said. “Killing the woman is pointless, they have a Rezz perk.”

  “Do what you think it’s best at the moment.”

  The Vampire stood silent for a few seconds, then nodded and turned around to leave, only to stop at the last moment and look at him. “Is this all?” she insisted on the word.

  “Yes,” Rowan rushed to say. He blushed. Victoria was not ugly, far from it, but enough was enough.

  “I was just a little curious,” the blonde shrugged and left for good.

  Sighing, Rowan moved to the bed, trying to relax. Cora—who was in the cockpit, piloting— told him not to activate the Joint Trip: Warp out of fear of breaking the plane, and they still had a couple of hours to go. At least, once the core was claimed, they could teleport between towns.

  Outside, somebody was taking potshots at them, firing rockets or machine guns. Probably some faction of the former US. The airplane’s shield resisted as it was expected. Then, Rowan dozed off.

  “Pocket universes never cease to amaze me,” Cora said.

  “A pity,” Viscardi said, looking longingly at the core sitting on his desk, a black ball of swirling energies. “This is worth so much money…”

  “Let me guess: in the civilized part of the Galaxy, there are plenty of Awakened Towns, but not so many Dungeons, right?” Rowan asked.

  “Yes,” Cora sighed. “My parents were deeply in debt… Some of the cores were on lease, others borrowed.”

  “It doesn’t matter anymore,” Viscardi shrugged. “The first quadrant’s laws don’t apply here. Well, how will you do it? You want us to take over the state or only Clark County?”

  “How much area can a core cover?” Rowan asked.

  “The surface is proportional to its power and level, but it can be customized,” Cora explained. “This is a top-level one, so it can go as big as… maybe two hundred thousand square miles. The smaller it is, the more energy it has for perks and the larger the economy and population. Some levels will be lost in transition, but this Town Core will start around level twenty-five nevertheless.”

  “Can I have a map?”

  Cora offered ROwan her phone, but Viscardi was faster, producing a real paper map and a pencil from his inventory.

  “Thanks,” Rowan nodded. “What if we start around Las Vegas, then go northwest, climb up with the Sierra Nevada, then aim west to the sea, north, up here, and come back?”

  The Vampire Lord frowned and leaned to look better at the line drawn over the map. “I get why you’re bypassing the desert, but why the big cities?”

  “I don’t want to manage big crowds. They’re grown-ups, let them take care of themselves. Smaller cities are friendly, and I guess that’s good agricultural land and scenery, and a few ports… What happens if the barrier meets the sea?”

  “It goes down into the sea, ground, and all the way around,” Cora said. “An Awakened Town is an enclosed space, like a sphere, only molded to an irregular shape. Some perks allow lifeforms to pass through unhindered, but they’re expensive.”

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  “So, in theory, we can also take some sea? For fishing at stuff?”

  “Yes.”

  “You can have the sea in California. Why go up?” the Vampire asked.

  “To put a wedge between California and Oregon. They’re at war, right?”

  “Are you into charity or something?”

  “I don’t want to change their pampers, but if I can help stop a war with minimal effort…”

  “Very well, but I want Reno,” Viscardi said and pressed a button on his desk. “We have invested a lot there. Vera, can you come for a moment? Bring Reno’s financial situation, please.”

  Moments later, a young woman in her mid-twenties, with brown hair, short and on the plump side, wearing glasses, entered the room, a thick folder in his arms.

  “My youngest daughter, Vera. She’s my secretary and an economist.”

  “Hi,” the woman waved discreetly, then forwarded the folder to Rowan. “Here you are.”

  Are all their names starting with V? Rowan asked himself but tried to be polite and refrained from voicing the question. “Give it to Cora, I don’t understand data as well as she does.” The Nekojin took the papers and moved to another couch, leafing through the folder as the secretary exited.

  “Indulge my curiosity… err… is there any difference in rank between your wives?” Viscardi leaned and whispered to Rowan.

  “No,” he whispered back. “But I call Cora baby, Isla, honey, and Grace sweetheart to avoid confusion.”

  “Good point,” Viscardi nodded. “So, Cora, what’s your take?”

  “Reno looks good. Should we give it a go, darling?”

  “Yes, let’s do it... How exactly are we going to do this? The last time, the core did all the job.”

  “Actually, I did all the job. Now, it’s more complicated. First step, I’ll scan the map you draw,” Cora paused and took a photo with her phone. “Second step, I’m overlapping it with the existing counties on the internet, simulating a takeover… OK, we might have quite a few enclaves or independent entities,” Cora touched the map with her finger. “Worst-case scenario, we can go around them.”

  “Why is that?” Rowan asked.

  “Native territories. We didn’t have them in Randolph. The System adores little city-states, and the voting process will be more lengthy and complicated based on their laws. They’ll have the option to become enclaves, with their own portals to the outside, or retain the same status within our new territory."

  "What if they claim their old territory? Ou know, like it was hundreds of years ago."

  "The System isn't here to patch back human history; it works on the status quo. It's take it or leave it. OK, I’m sending a notification to everyone. They’ll have to vote one way or another.”

  “Trust me, they’ll want in rather than stay out with some crazy people that throw nukes at each other,” Viscardi said.

  “Touch the core, baby. We’ll do it together.”

  Sitting on each side of the table, Cora and Rowan joined hands over the sphere, and a visual notification appeared above.

  Do you want to claim the Blackswarm Dungeon Core and transform it into a Town Core? Y/N

  “Yes. Consume the Dungeon Core to create a new Town Core, its capital on our current location, with the boundaries of the new polity based on the map I’m sending now,” Cora said, touching her phone for a second.

  A soft light started to shine from the sphere, enveloping the room and supposedly going all over the town. Ten seconds later, the core vanished, and there was a notification:

  The Town Core has finished installing its processing unit. The transformation will continue slower for the next forty-eight hours, creating new boundaries as soon as the voting process ends. Combatant forces have been detected in the area and Warped away. Suggested names for the new polity based on combinations of the first syllables: Vegorcal, Vegcalor, Calveor, Calorveg, Orcalveg, Orvecal. Please select an option or create a new name.

  “Viscardi?” Rowan asked.

  “Uh?” the Vampire jerked. He had dozed off while the two busied with the core.

  “Select or create a name for your domain; we’ll go with your choice. Right baby?”

  “It’s only fair. He did most of the work.”

  “… let’s go for Calveor,” the vampire said after taking a moment to think.

  “Calveor is the name,” Cora said. “Count Rowan Allinder is the suzerain but appoints Viscardi Blackswarm as his permanent representative and Lord Mayor of Vegas City. Rowan and I will have Admin privileges for the Town’s Core settings. Lord Viscardi and a person he’ll appoint will have the same privileges.”

  “I appoint my oldest daughter, Victoria Blackswarm.”

  “Continue installation on default parameters. I’ll dabble with the perks tomorrow,” Cora said. “It’s late and—”

  “We have to go back home,” Rowan said.

  “I was thinking of staying the night and enjoying the town? It’s Vegas, after all.”

  “Good idea,” Rowan smiled. “I’ll call home to tell them we’ll arrive tomorrow.”

  “I’ll give you the best apartment in town,” Viscardi promised.

  Definitely, there was something strange with Cora. Her assertiveness was now at least an eight on a scale from one to ten. After playing in the Casino and having some snacks, she insisted on retiring to their room. That had been at nine o’clock. Then, she told him she had to do some shopping on her own and that it’d take some time. Which made sense because the next day was Christmas Eve.

  But why leave him alone? What gifts could she buy, he couldn’t see? OK, maybe the one for him, but for the rest? He knew Isla, Grace, and Lizzie better than her, so why not ask for his help?

  Now that he had an INT at seventy-five, it was up to him to use it. Rolling his little gray cells, like Hercule Poirot, and adding a ton of grimacing, Rowan reached an unbeatable conclusion: Cora was searching for a special gift for him. What did he like the most? Bourbon. There were a few decades-old bottles that could be found in Vegas for an exorbitant price or in auctions. That was why she was so late.

  Promising to pretend to be surprised, he took a second shower to kill time. When he exited, the room was in total darkness.

  “I disabled the lights,” a whisper came from the direction of the bed. “Tomorrow is Christmas Eve, so I wanted to give you a gift.”

  Now, his high INT has begun to ring alarm clocks over alarm clocks. What if Cora had taken on Grace’s example, and the surprise was a threesome with a certain blonde Vampire? Gifts are hard to refuse… but his two other wives could be upset. He needed to call home and ask for permission if that was the gift Cora had in mind.

  Oh my GOD! Rowan gasped.

  Cora had somehow shapeshifted into the most gorgeous woman he had ever seen. A Goddess. As sensual as Isla, as attractive as Grace, and as cute as herself simultaneously. Dressed in revealing silk underwear, she beckoned him.

  He dashed forward, covering her in caresses and kisses, inebriated by her scent, which had changed too. Their passionate intercourse held for well over an hour. Finally, it was done, and they rested in each other's arms.

  “It’s the most wonderful gift I ever received,” Rowan kissed her.

  She was panting, hiding her head in the pillow. “Thank goodness you like it… I thought I’d die…”

  “Did I hurt you?” he rushed to ask.

  “No, silly!” she laughed, showing her face and merry eyes. “I enjoyed every single moment. Preparing for it, that hurt. A lot.”

  Yeah, it’s understandable… if the body changes so much… What could do that? Could it be some magical surgery?

  “But it was worth it. I’ll gladly go through everything again if that’s the reaction I get from you.”

  “Err… what exactly happened to you?” Rowan asked, a terrible premonition nagging at his mind.

  “I don’t know where to start… Everything is so painful. They curl your hair and pull it, then you feel that sticky paint in it, then they throw burning air to dry it… And the eyebrows, how could Grace do that to herself? And the wax… oh my, that hurt so much. No, the claws, that was horrible. They have no idea Nekojin has nervous terminations in it,” she showed him her fingers, where the fingernails had a red color and a less pointy shape.

  A suspicion began to arise in Rowan’s mind. “So… Err… You’ve been to a Beauty Parlour?”

  “Yes… First time in my life… I had no idea doing my hair and stuff could have such an effect on you,” she walked two fingers on his chest.

  “Thank you for going through all the effort,” he kissed her.