You Really Are Something, Shar

There was no doubt that the Magic Plague in Neverwinter and the awakening of the Creator Race posed no threat at all to Raymond as he was now. At most, they could barely be called minor troubles.

After the local residents, adventurers, and mercenaries of the Northland's towns and villages completed their nearly brutal land-grabbing expansion, they had nominally been incorporated into the Sword Coast Empire's territory. In reality, however, most regions still retained a semi-autonomous status.

This was especially true for towns that had originally possessed legitimate lords, as they had basically all reached private political deals.

The Imperium publicly granted these people noble titles, recognized their landholdings and property, and allowed them to retain their lordly titles and part of their authority.

In exchange, they acknowledged that the lands under their rule were part of the Imperium, accepted administrative, judicial, and tax officials dispatched by the cabinet, and voluntarily surrendered a series of powers, including military and diplomatic authority.

Clearly, the terms of these deals revealed that the Sword Coast Empire's upper ranks had adopted a cautious approach to annexing the Northland. They were in no hurry to accomplish everything at once, instead intending to assimilate it bit by bit through economic and cultural power.

After all, the people here had always been fierce. The Ten-Towns of Icewind Dale, for instance, often erupted into bloody fights over fishing resources, with anywhere from a dozen to dozens of people dying every year. And all the Barbarian tribes combined numbered several hundred thousand people.

They were not monsters like Goblins, Gnolls, Lizardfolk, Trolls, Orcs, and the like, which could be slaughtered at will without worrying about public pressure. They were primitive human tribes that lived by fishing, hunting, and nomadic herding.

Though these people were not fundamentally different from monsters,