Growth

Regardless of what changes had occurred to the Lord of Storms' divine position, Gawain clearly had no way of getting answers from the Deep Sea Harmonious God in front of him, who was currently fiddling with her tail tip.

It even seemed that the entire race of sea sirens was still in a state of confusion.

He could not help rubbing his chin and leaning back in his high-backed chair, allowing his turbulent thoughts to wander.

The news Tir had brought made it difficult for him to suppress an impulse—the urge to go to the depths of the sea, to the far side of the Endless Sea, to see the sea sirens' homeland for himself, or personally inspect the Lord of Storms' corpse and verify some of his own judgments.

Yet he could not do so, not only because he could not casually abandon the newly established empire, but also because the Cecil Empire currently lacked the seafaring technology needed to cross the endless ocean.

And when he thought of the words "seafaring technology," Gawain could not help recalling another matter that troubled him: the Cecil Empire did not currently have a suitable outlet to the sea.

Most of the Cecil Empire lay inland. Its southern, eastern, and Western Region territories had no coastline at all. Its only coastline lay in the Far North Realm, beyond the northern mountains, and that was undeveloped land. The harsh climate, the barrier of the mountains, and the dangers of the ocean itself had kept the Ansu Kingdom from considering its development for centuries.

But that land could not remain desolate forever.

Gawain raised his head, his line of sight passing over Tir's swaying tail tip as he looked at the continent map nearby.

Beyond the mountains in Ansu's far north, there was not