Ten Years

At some point, the villagers had grown accustomed to Lin Yu's protection. They gathered around his territory of their own accord, regarded themselves as subjects under the Forest Lord's rule, and took great pride in it.

Over those ten years, Lin Yu had acted a total of seven times, killing six Monsters and an entire Demon Race army.

Especially when dealing with that Demon Race army, the villagers suddenly realized that the once-arrogant Demon Race soldiers were as helpless as lambs beneath Rolycoly's horn and the Talons of Guangzhi and Guangmou.

The sight of hunters becoming prey dealt far too great a blow to the villagers' understanding of the world.

After the intense shock subsided, they developed an indescribable sense of reverence for Lin Yu, their mysterious Lord.

The nearby towns saw the aftermath of the Demon Race army's slaughter and hurriedly sent people to pay their respects and offer goodwill.

Trade routes reopened as a result, making the village even more prosperous.

Many refugees fleeing from farther north heard that there was a powerful and benevolent King of the Forest here. One after another, they gathered here and chose to join this burgeoning village.

As more and more subjects joined, the original villagers moved into Lin Yu's territory spanning ten li, while the newcomers spread outward from its borders.

Gradually, the village developed into a town, and the town began building walls.

Lin Yu did not interfere with any of these developments.

He merely upheld his original promise and acted against Demon Race members and Monsters that threatened the village.

Even so, the subjects remained deeply grateful to him and willingly upheld his rule.

It was rather amusing. He had never regarded these people as his subjects, so how could there be any talk of ruling them?

But some things could not be decided solely by what he wanted.

For instance, he had personally stated that he would not interfere in conflicts between human kingdoms. Yet his overwhelming strength forced the surrounding nations, and even the mighty Unified Empire, to take his stance seriously.

As a result, even if Lin Yu did not wish for it, his very existence had already become a deterrent.

Lin Yu understood this perfectly well, but he said nothing and allowed things to develop as they would.

After all, he had not yet lost his humanity. He still felt some attachment to the village that had grown beneath his watch, as well as to the villagers who revered him so deeply.

Moreover, this place lay along the border between the Unified Empire and the surrounding nations, serving as a buffer zone between them.

The small cities and towns nearby were caught between different countries, leaving their political positions inherently awkward. Coupled with the endless Monsters in the forest and the threat of the northern Demon Race, they were desperate for strong protection.

Thus, with Lin Yu's tacit approval, this emerging settlement developed at an astonishing pace.

Throughout this process, aside from Lin Yu, the hands-off Lord, there was another crucial figure: the old village chief.

It had to be said that the old man truly possessed some governing ability and was also an exceptionally clear-headed person.

He was the only person in the entire territory who knew Lin Yu's true attitude. If he wanted, he could easily deceive those below him while concealing the truth from those above, becoming the territory's actual ruler.

From God's Perspective, such behavior would have been incredibly foolish, but from the old village chief's perspective, it was highly feasible.

After all, the old village chief did not know that Lin Yu could sense every blade of grass and every tree within his ten-li territory while remaining inside Stone Castle.

All he knew was that this powerful Forest Lord studied magic every day. Even when Demon Race members appeared, he only sent out the magical beasts under his command. Over the nearly ten years, he had never once stepped outside Stone Castle.

Furthermore, Lin Yu appeared not to care much about the village. If it had been someone ambitious, they might truly have been unable to resist.

But the old village chief did not do that. On the contrary, he understood clearly that the Lord's power was the foundation upon which all of this stood.

Therefore, even though the not-yet-completed Ridge Peak City had been developed entirely by his own hand, he did not dare overstep in the slightest. When dealing with outsiders, he always presented himself as the Lord's most loyal servant.

Thanks to this cautious attitude, Lin Yu was extremely satisfied with him and had secretly looked after him quite a bit over the years.

The old man was nearly sixty, yet he and his wife, who was also in her fifties, had managed to give their eldest son, who was out adventuring, a younger brother and sister. This was the result of Lin Yu secretly using Magic Power to improve their bodies.

Time continued to advance amid those peaceful yet bustling days.

Until ten years and seven months after Flamme's departure, a change finally occurred in Lin Yu's Internal Universe!

The scene shifted to Lin Yu's Internal Universe. Ten years had not made much difference here. The entire Internal Universe remained as harsh as Hell, filled everywhere with scorching, high-density energy.

The only difference was that an extremely stable spindle-shaped cavity had appeared at the center of this newborn universe.

Compared to the entire universe, this cavity was minuscule.

Yet in reality, its external volume was comparable to Uranus in the solar system of his previous life.

A deep-blue Magic Barrier tens of thousands of kilometers thick enveloped the cavity's exterior, shielding it from the harsh environment outside.

Inside the cavity was an extremely stable space. A continent more than ten thousand kilometers across floated within it. Although endless mountain ranges dotted its surface, there was not the slightest trace of life.

On a plain at the center of the continent, all kinds of items had been arranged by category. There were plants, wood, soil, stones, metals, jewels, various manufactured goods, and mountains of magical tomes.

Without a doubt, this was the Storage Space Lin Yu had developed!

Above this plain used for storage, countless clouds and mists swirled, gathered, and dispersed as they emitted white light. They resembled a white sky that shone at all times, illuminating the entire dark land.

If Flamme could come here, she would surely be shocked to discover that the vast, boundless ocean of light stretching endlessly across the sky was composed entirely of incomparably pure Pure Magic Power!

That was right. In the Frieren World, The Essence of Magic Power was actually a kind of universal energy.

This energy not only existed throughout the world, but could also be converted from everyday food.

In other words, as long as one grasped the principles and methods, any matter or energy could be transformed into Magic Power.

As it happened, Lin Yu lacked everything except energy.

He controlled the matter and energy of an entire newborn universe, an inexhaustible supply that could never be depleted.

Not only that, in the worldview of Frieren World, Magic Power could even be converted back into all kinds of matter.

The matter in question was not merely things like shields and barriers, but actual physical matter.

For example, in the original work, Frieren had used Magic Power to conjure everyday items such as shaved ice and hot tea out of thin air.

The deep-blue barrier tens of thousands of kilometers thick outside the cavity, as well as the floating continent within it, had both been created by Lin Yu converting matter and energy from the universe into Magic Power, then using that Magic Power to create them.

Of course, using Magic Power as an intermediary to create matter was merely a temporary measure born from Lin Yu's insufficient control over his own authority.

If he could completely understand and control the powers that belonged to him, he could cut out the middleman and use his will alone to freely manipulate all matter and energy in the universe.

Back to the matter at hand: after Lin Yu immersed his consciousness into his Internal Universe, the previously calm ocean of Magic Power instantly began to boil.

The white sea of clouds was stirred by that innately magnificent and vast will, forming two incomparably enormous vortices.

From below, they looked like a pair of giant eyes suspended high in the sky, casting lofty and indifferent gazes upon the land.

At the same time, beneath the sea of clouds, a fist-sized Blue Cube was emitting a faint, crystalline glow.

Upon closer inspection, the Blue Cube was a Magic Barrier compressed and condensed countless times over. The space within had long been tightly sealed by Lin Yu's will, transformed into a stretch of utterly frozen spacetime.

At this moment, it was not the barrier itself that shone, but the strand of mysterious power within the space, invisible to the naked eye.

"Ten years!"

Lin Yu could not help but sigh.

After a full ten years, this thing was finally about to finish recognizing him as its master!

"It actually made me wait this long..."

"I'd like to see what exactly you are!"

Staring at the fluorescent glow blooming within the Blue Cube, Lin Yu's thoughts shifted. His vast consciousness immediately descended from the heavens like the Milky Way pouring down from the ninth firmament, flooding into the Blue Cube.

In an instant, that mysterious power merged into his consciousness, and a brand-new piece of information appeared before Lin Yu out of nowhere.

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