The Fiend's Creation System

Future Plans

After tending to his wife for a few days, Julius finally made his way to Redgrove City. He wasn’t that surprised to see that the once severely damaged city had now been restored to a more optimum state.

He walked through the streets of the city in his large, fiendish form but no one was repulsed or fearful of him. Instead, every human he passed bowed their heads at him respectfully.

There wasn’t a single actual human left within the city after his fiends massacred everyone a few days ago. These humans were just his transformed mimics and they were doing a good job keeping the city ‘alive’.

If anyone from outside the city were to come, they wouldn’t be any wiser that their fellow humans weren’t actually what they appeared to be. After devouring a human corpse and transforming into them, the mimics were able to retain half of the consumed corpses’ abilities along with all of their memories.

If they weren’t struck by the holy magic of the church and their mimicry dispelled, no one would be able to tell them apart from the previous humans they replaced. It was such a convenient thing having these mimics.

Julius had just gained a large number of spies that could be dispatched throughout the rest of the continent to scout out the rest of the human forces. At first, Julius only saw the other species of his world as any other creature, but the humans had made it into his list of enemies.

The church was his main enemy right now because of what they did to Eisha and the fact that they were out to exterminate him and his fiends. He wasn’t going to wait around for his enemy to catch him.

For now, Julius gained enough time to bolster his forces before the church caught on to his deception. Just yesterday he received a message from one of his priest-transformed mimics that the church had received a message asking how the progress of the expedition was going.

Naturally, the expedition was over since they were all wiped out, but Julius was going to drag things for as long as he could before giving the church a false report. He estimated that the church already predicted the expedition would take some time so his plans to drag the situation out were going to be feasible.

However, he needed some contingencies because the church might be able to figure things out prematurely due to receiving an oracle of some sorts.

The church had figured out his rough location and had already sent out a scouting team so they were naturally capable of figuring out the ruse he was concocting. Julius estimated that he had around a month or so before the church found him out.

It wasn’t too long but it wasn’t short either. Julius could do a lot of things within a month. His wife had reached level 50 within that short period of time and was now one of his strongest trump cards.

He just needed more information about the church’s movements but this was going to be hard since any information related to the church was strictly kept secret from the masses.

Only the best and long-standing information brokers would be able to provide him with any good intel but getting in touch with them was going to be hard since most information guilds were secretive.

Back when he was at the Empire, he remembered his father talking about the Empire’s intelligence network that was spread throughout the continent and the rest of the world. He thought that it would be a good idea if his fiends had a similar intelligence network.

Since his mimics could become literally anything, they were naturally the perfect agents. He was already spawning a few hundred more mimics and once this was done, he was going to send them across the continent.

It was a rather ambitious goal, but as the saying goes, know yourself and know thy enemy. From ages past, information was always the key to winning any kind of battle, whether it was a political battle or a war.

His enemy was in the open while he was still in the dark so for now, Julius had the advantage against the church. He wasn’t going to begin his attack on them any time soon because it would only attract attention to him if the church’s operations began experiencing hindrance all of a sudden.

Of course, it didn’t mean he wasn’t going to do anything. In the areas where the church’s influence was still budding or slowly waning, he would surely infiltrate these places and completely purge the church’s influence from there.

Once his forces were large enough, it was only then that Julius wouldn’t mind revealing himself to the world and openly show hostility with the humans and to be more specific, the church.

After letting his fiends know about his plans for their future, Julius had to make a quick trip to the elves. The elves were naturally surprised to see Julius, still in his Metamorphosis state, suddenly appear.

If it wasn’t because of his familiar aura and the bracelet he was wearing, the elves would have definitely thought of him as a demon.

“Welcome, Julius, our friend,” Grand Elder Hyacinth came out to greet him.

Judging from the way he acted, Julius concluded that he as well as the other elves, didn’t know about the m******e that had taken place a few days ago within Redgrove City.

“Grand Elder Hyacinth, it’s good to see you again.”

“Mhm, what wind has brought you over to our town?” Hyacinth asked before sizing up Julius and asking him, “What’s with this form?”

“It’s just my battle form.”

“Battle form? Did a fight take place somewhere in the Shifting Hallows?”

“Well, something like that. We cleared out a large arachnid nest just a few days ago.”

“Is that so? Are you here to ask for more supplies? I’m sure we would be willing to trade a few arachnid materials.”

“That’d be great, but I’d also like to ask if I can purchase some elven tonics as well?”

“For this missus?”

Julius nodded at his words.

“Here, take these notes. If you can find the ingredients on this list, our alchemists will be willing to craft you the tonics and potions. The quantity will be half the amount of materials you trade with us.”

“Thank you.”

Julius bowed and was about to leave, however, he was stopped by Hyacinth.

“Julius.”

“Yes?”

“About this form…” Hyacinth looked him up and down before continuing, “It’s rather frightening so if you don’t mind, please come using your normal form. You’ll give the children nightmares.”

“...” Julius’s face was a bit dark but he chuckled in the end after hearing the latter half of Elder Hyacinths’ words.

“It’s been a few days since I’ve remained in this form. I’m not sure why it still hasn’t faded away yet. Before, I wouldn’t normally be able to hold this form for too long since it consumes a lot of energy.”

Hyacinth had a thoughtful expression on his face as he observed Julius. 

“The energy within your body is rather chaotic. Maybe this is the cause of your permanent transformed state.”

“Chaotic? Is it bad if I leave it? Being in this state is rather convenient,” Julius said as he motioned to his wings.

“It does look convenient to be able to fly and all, but leaving your energy in a chaotic state could lead to some severe consequences, death being one of them…”

“!”

“I handed you a list of ingredients earlier. There’s a potion that my alchemists can concoct that will re-harmonize your energy after periodic use. Make sure you prioritize getting those first. I would rather not lose a precious ally.”

“...I’ll have to thank you again, Elder Hyacinth.”

“No worries. I just hope that our two races will have a long and prosperous relationship.”

“Mhm. I’ll see you again, Elder.”

“Likewise.”