The Game of Power (Part One)

Inside the flagship, the royals of the Sacred Worm Nation conversed among themselves. After discussing the Coordination Council's arbitration and punishment, another royal raised a more practical issue.

"I'm not worried about the Coordination Council. Compared to them, I'm more concerned about the Pence. They may indeed be incomparably loyal to the royal family right now, but don't forget—they are a race, a race not lacking in ambition. Having tasted the sweetness of ruling, I don't think they'll willingly give it back to us."

The Pence had originally been natives of the first class on a planet within the Gate World. Later, they came under the jurisdiction of fourth-class lords expanding outward. Because that nation's internal system was one of slaveholding over other races, the Pence who came under its rule naturally became slaves en masse and were sold as commodities in public markets throughout the Gate World.

Because the Pence were highly adaptable to different environments, they were widely favored by various nations, and the nation that practiced enslaving other races made a fortune from them.

The royals bought some of them to use as soldiers.

They placed the Pence on habitable yet harsh planets—worlds that were tasteless to the Sacred Worm Nation but too valuable to discard—and allowed them to breed and expand their population.

To speed up reproduction and reduce time costs, the royals would periodically drop drugs that stimulated mating upon all the Pence on those planets.

Once the Pence population reached a certain baseline, the royals would take away a batch and place them on other marginal planets. Thus, one planetary military camp after another was established.

The Pence were tools the royals used to rule the Sacred Worm Nation. Every soldier who died in the Sacred Worm Nation fleets fighting the Collectors was Pence.