Katze meant "cat" in German.
Thus, the Katze Plains could be called the Cat Plains, presumably using a cat's nine lives as a reference to the undead.
That made this place a holy land for the undead.
By the logic of transmigration, a player's racial preferences would affect where they appeared.
Roy was human. Even if his guild included countless races, he would still appear in the continent's northwestern corner.
Likewise, if the Bone King successfully transmigrated, he would most likely appear near the Katze Plains, unaffected by the butterfly effect.
Roy's interest in the Bone King was not a desire to get cozy with him. He needed to confirm the changes in this world and use the Bone King to scout ahead.
Useful fighters who worked for free were usually hard to come by.
Hearing this, Eve immediately answered:
"Laplace's Demon did detect an inexplicable power appearing near the Katze Plains, but it cannot observe any further."
"Hela used the All-Seeing Eye and discovered that someone had altered the nearby terrain, but she cannot investigate the interior."
Then he was here.
Roy breathed a sigh of relief. Although he had caused a considerable butterfly effect, the broad strokes had not changed.
"Tell Hela, the Governor of Eternal Night City, that I shall grant her the World Item [Veil of Divine Concealment]."
"I order her to monitor the forces on the Katze Plains. If she finds the Great Tomb of Nazarick, she must report immediately, but she must take no further action."
"I shall also grant her the World Item [Yata Mirror] to guard against the other side using World Items."
"Our enemies are not just the Great Tomb of Nazarick, but unknown dragons as well. Perhaps this tomb will become our pawn and help us discover the dragons' whereabouts."
Eternal Night City was Roy's undead headquarters. Its Governor, Hela, bore the epithet [Death of the Dark Night] and was also known as the [Overlord].
In fact, leaving World Items out of the equation, Eternal Night City alone could raze the Great Tomb of Nazarick.
But Roy's priority was intelligence, so he only ordered Hela to observe in secret.
While two parties fought, a third could reap the rewards.
Someone else might already be secretly watching the Great Tomb of Nazarick.
Roy could seize the opportunity to catch them.
With such a powerful dragon lying on the moon, Roy had to consider a possibility.
Perhaps the dragons really were watching the Bone King, waiting to finish gathering intelligence before delivering a devastating blow.
Then spying on the Bone King would give Roy a chance to catch them out.
Eve answered:
"As you command, Supreme One!"
Of course, this strategy seemed a little too conservative.
Roy added:
"Besides, we cannot let the Great Tomb of Nazarick do whatever it pleases. Next, investigate the Re-Estize Kingdom's Warrior Captain and the Slane Theocracy's operations involving the Sunlight Scripture."
"Eve will remain responsible for intelligence on the Re-Estize Kingdom. Be sure to watch out for dragons."
"As for the Slane Theocracy, leave that to Lucifer, the Governor of Sky City. She must not reveal herself either."
"I grant her the World Item [Heaven's Gate]."
After all, there were only a handful of World Items that concealed one's presence for covert observation.
The All-Seeing Eye, Laplace's Demon, and the Veil of Divine Concealment.
As for divine-class concealment items, there were plenty.
Lucifer, the Governor of Sky City, could simply take one along, but divine-class items could not block tracking by World Items.
That was why Roy specifically granted her Heaven's Gate as well.
If the Space Dragon came in person, Lucifer might not be able to win, but she could unleash Heaven's Gate, test the enemy's strength, and then make her escape.
"Yes, Supreme One."
Eve went off to continue her assignment, while Roy, having just finished his bath, planned to enjoy some good food.
The moment the thought crossed his mind, Veronica spoke:
"Master, dinner is ready."
"You once expressed a desire to taste the food from anime. Little Master has now finished preparing the dishes."
World City had tens of thousands of NPCs, some of whom had crafting and service classes.
An Immortal had to know how to enjoy life. Otherwise, how could they get through those endless years?
Ten years, a hundred, or a thousand-time could sometimes be terrifyingly long.
After acquiring the Immortal class, Roy no longer feared a short lifespan.
Even though he could pour energy into the Dimensional Gate to open a passage to the next world, he was in no hurry.
The Bone King's world was dangerous, but not that dangerous.
Even Fluder had managed to secure a lifespan of several hundred years. As long as Roy stayed in the northwestern corner, he was unlikely to encounter any particularly great danger.
Roy could live in perfect comfort while helping humanity grow stronger on the side.
Seeing how considerate Veronica was, he could not help smiling.
"Without you, I wouldn't even know what to do."
"You flatter me, Supreme One. This is simply my duty."
A happy smile spread across Veronica's face as she brought him an appetizer.
Roy took a bite, then changed into fresh clothes with her assistance and went to the dining room to enjoy his feast.
Little Master was a level-100 NPC he had created. There were more than a dozen chefs like him in the world.
He wanted to ensure that he would never eat the same food twice within a hundred years, giving each day a little novelty.
World City boasted an extravagant Paradise Lost, which held the richest collection of ingredients in the world.
When he visited other worlds in the future, he could collect more along the way to satisfy his appetite.
As Roy ate one dish after another, he could not help noticing that his body truly had undergone astonishing changes.
Golden fried rice, magical mapo tofu, rising dragon dumplings, peerless noodles...
The delicacies that had once made him drool while watching anime, without any way to satisfy his cravings, now lay before him.
Countless delicious dishes, along with all kinds of fruit, pastries, fine wines, beverages, and more.
Roy polished them all off in mere moments.
He was only thirty percent full.
What a wonderful feeling.
Even in his previous life, if Roy could eat so much food, he would never have been able to digest it all.
Although some wealthy people used nanobots to help digest food so they could keep enjoying delicacies, that was undoubtedly far too wasteful.
His body was now practically inhuman. Even if he could not compare to a dedicated melee fighter like Kagura Inori, he could still move at supersonic speeds, and his appetite had naturally become astonishing.
That meant he could indulge freely in far more delicacies than other people could enjoy.
The chefs bustled about while Veronica calmly directed them. Whenever Roy finished a plate, she brought him a new delicacy, timing everything perfectly.
After Roy finished enjoying his meal, he found that the dining table had already been restored to pristine condition.
The dining experience deserved full marks.
Creating Veronica really had been a fantastic decision.
Roy let out a satisfied burp just as Eve's message arrived.
"Supreme One, our preliminary investigation into the Re-Estize Kingdom is complete."
"Go ahead."
"So far, we have found no Imperial troops, or forces disguised as Imperial troops, harassing the Re-Estize Kingdom's border villages."
"Lucifer has tracked the Slane Theocracy's forces and located the Sunlight Scripture."
"This force has split into two detachments."
"One is heading to the Abelion Hills to hunt demi-humans and ease the pressure on the Holy Kingdom."
"The other is heading to the Draconic Kingdom to counter the Orc Kingdom's invasion."
"They have not dispatched any troops to the Re-Estize Kingdom's border disguised as Imperial soldiers."
"As for the Re-Estize Kingdom's Warrior Captain, such a person does indeed exist. He is a trusted and loyal retainer of King Rambasa III."
"But his orders are to subjugate magical beasts in the Great Tob Forest near the Azerlisia Mountains."
The plot had gone completely off the rails.
Roy's original plan had been to prevent the Slane Theocracy from massacring the border villagers, stopping a domino effect from disrupting his plans against the Great Tomb of Nazarick.
After all, the Slane Theocracy's actions in the original story were sometimes rather baffling.
For starters, the Sunlight Scripture's assigned task was to wipe out demi-human villages.
Such a force was essentially a squad of executioners, who generally needed extremely strong convictions, such as a belief in human supremacy.
Then suddenly, the orders changed: let's go slaughter humans.
Fine, even if they were not worried about undermining their troops' convictions, did the Empire know about this plan to assassinate the Warrior Captain?
The Empire did not.
The Slane Theocracy impersonated Imperial troops and committed massacres in the Re-Estize Kingdom's villages, supposedly for the Empire's benefit.
If Jircniv, the emperor of the Baharuth Empire, found out, surely he would ask:
"Are you helping me or trying to ruin me?"
All right, even if the assassination succeeded, did the emperor intend to send troops to occupy the Re-Estize Kingdom?
He did not.
The Slane Theocracy specifically dispatched elite troops just to create an opportunity for the Empire that even its emperor knew nothing about, while framing the Empire in the process.
The two countries had not coordinated at all.
Besides, the Re-Estize Kingdom's truly powerful Hero Realm fighters all came from its two Orichalcum-class adventurer teams.
One was Blue Rose, and the other was Red Drop.
In particular, Red Drop's Azuth Aindra possessed powered armor estimated to be level 55, and he was a legitimate noble to boot.
Although adventurers did their utmost to avoid participating in wars between nations under their unwritten rules, those rules had no real binding force.
If Lakyus of Blue Rose tried to protect her country, the combat strength she could unleash would be far more frightening than the Warrior Captain's.
Would eliminating the Warrior Captain really matter that much?
However inept the Re-Estize Kingdom's nobles might be, they had genuinely assembled troops in the face of the Empire's invasion, mobilizing 260,000 men.
With a population of only nine million, the king had still managed to mobilize that many troops.
The Re-Estize Kingdom's nobles were not all that disloyal.
They had no intention of surrendering to the Empire and did not want to live under the Blood Emperor's rule.
Even with the Warrior Captain eliminated, the Empire would still have to destroy the Re-Estize Kingdom's army of two hundred thousand before it had a chance of conquering the country.
Had the Slane Theocracy really thought this through?
Whenever Roy thought about that plan, he questioned the Slane Theocracy's strategic competence.
Now that the plan did not exist, Roy pondered for a moment, then tapped the table and asked:
"Why is the Warrior Captain being sent to subjugate magical beasts?"
Eve had been waiting for Roy to digest the information. She continued:
"The Slane Theocracy has been selling fertilizer to increase grain yields, making an enormous fortune in the process."
"The increase in food production has fueled population growth in the Re-Estize Kingdom, intensifying conflicts over farmland. This has increased the number of displaced people, severely undermined public order, and allowed gangs to run rampant."
"King Rambasa III attempted to reclaim some of the nobles' unused land and distribute it to the displaced people to ease domestic tensions."
"The nobles unanimously opposed this, arguing that fiefs must not be altered, as that was the Re-Estize Kingdom's tradition."
"If His Majesty believes there is insufficient land, they are willing to support the Re-Estize Kingdom in clearing the vast Great Tob Forest."
The Re-Estize Kingdom's nobles seemed to have become somewhat more intelligent as well.
Just as Roy thought this, Eve added:
"Thus, the situation is clear. Subjugating magical beasts and clearing land will address the domestic refugee crisis. For the king, this is better than moving against the nobles and causing civil unrest."
"At the same time, if the Warrior Captain succeeds in subjugating the magical beasts, the nobles can claim a share of the benefits. If he fails, the king's power will be weakened, leaving him even less able to act against them."
"Two gains from one move."
Roy agreed with Eve's analysis. Compared with their behavior in the original story, the Re-Estize Kingdom's decisions were clearly more coherent now.
There was still one problem, though.
"Wait. If the population is growing and there are too many displaced people, why don't the nobles clear more unused land?"
"That would let them take in the displaced people, expand their influence, and increase their own strength."
Eve answered:
"Supreme One, there is something you are unaware of. Thanks to the fertilizer magic invented by the Slane Theocracy, grain yields in human territories have continued to rise, driving grain prices steadily downward."
"The Slane Theocracy is also exporting grain to the Draconic Kingdom and the Holy Kingdom."
"The Re-Estize Kingdom's nobles are extremely dissatisfied with this, because their income as major landowners has declined."
"They are now shifting to growing cash crops while leaving unused land and forests intact."
"Population growth has driven fuel prices steadily upward, so the timber produced by forests now brings in more revenue than grain."
That cleared things up.
Roy had never expected increased grain yields to have such a profound butterfly effect on the overall plot.
In that case, how much could he still trust the future plot?
Roy continued:
"I understand now. I wonder whether the Warrior Captain can defeat the Wise King of the Forest. That might be rather difficult."
The Warrior Captain had one foot in the Hero Realm, putting him at level 28.
Yet Eve answered with certainty:
"Barring any unforeseen circumstances, he definitely can."
"Laplace's Demon has assessed the Warrior Captain, Gazef, as level 35."
"Meanwhile, the Wise King of the Forest is level 31."
Good grief.
How had even the level of the combat-power yardstick changed?
Roy pondered aloud:
"Does the Warrior Captain's level here refer to his level after equipping the Re-Estize Kingdom Treasures?"
Eve immediately denied it:
"No."
"Gazef hasn't brought the Re-Estize Kingdom Treasures, but his chances of winning are still very high."
"Even if something goes wrong on his end, the Re-Estize Kingdom has sent other Hero Realm experts as well."
What butterfly effect had caused this?
Roy frowned.
The treasures he had given the Cat Re-Estize Kingdom shouldn't have affected Gazef's level.
The level cap for humans in the New World was pitifully low, with an absolute maximum of level 42.
By the standards used to classify adventurer teams, the breakdown was roughly as follows-
Copper (levels 1-3), Iron (levels 4-6), Silver (levels 7-10), Gold (levels 11-14), Platinum (levels 15-17), Mithril (levels 18-20), Orichalcum (levels 21-23), Adamantite (levels 24-28).
Above level 28, the classifications no longer applied to adventurer teams, but instead measured individuals.
Hero Realm (levels 29-35), outlier (levels 36-42).
These levels provided a rough gauge of the strength of the New World's natives.
In the original story, the Warrior Captain served as a yardstick at a solid level 28, just one step short of the Hero Realm.
How had he become level 35 now?
Roy asked again:
"Do you have solid evidence?"
"Laplace's Demon only eavesdrops for intelligence. Are its appraisal capabilities sufficient?"
Eve answered with certainty:
"Rest assured, Supreme One. Laplace's Demon has already measured him in this respect. Unless he has a World Item to falsify the results, they are accurate."
"Adventurers throughout the Re-Estize Kingdom also say that the Warrior Captain entered the Hero Realm long ago and is no weaker than the legendary Thirteen Heroes."
Determined to get to the bottom of it, Roy continued:
"How many Orichalcum-class adventurer teams does the Re-Estize Kingdom have now?"
"Four."
"And the Empire?"
"Four as well."
That explained it.
There had only been two in the original story. Now that number had doubled.
The Re-Estize Kingdom's population had doubled, so naturally, it had more talented people.
Realization dawned on Roy.
Apart from the level 42 ceiling, the reason most native humans in this world failed to reach their limits was that they couldn't level up by killing monsters.
Many experts progressed slowly not because they had exhausted their potential, but because they lacked opponents of equal strength to fight battles appropriate to their level.
Brain had been an extraordinary genius in the original story. After Shalltear taught him a lesson, he soon entered the Hero Realm. That showed just how many geniuses had failed to realize the full extent of their talents.
As for those who died before reaching their potential, there were even more, like Neia in the original story.
The populations of both the Slane Theocracy and the Empire were more than twice what they had been in the original story, so naturally, there would be more geniuses.
Under normal circumstances, one person in a million reached the Hero Realm.
One in ten million became an outlier.
Now the total human population had more than doubled, and food production had risen to the point that grain was cheap.
With a large population and abundant food, they naturally had the means to nurture more experts.
Although humans still couldn't break through the level 42 cap, their overall circumstances were undoubtedly much better.
Who would have thought that a few things I casually handed out would change the world so dramatically?
Filled with emotion, Roy added:
"I need the numbers and relevant information on everyone who has reached the Hero Realm in the human nations."
"Also, keep an eye on the Warrior Captain's progress in subjugating the Wise King of the Forest."
"If he clashes with the Great Tomb of Nazarick, things could get interesting."
"Yes, Supreme One."
Carne Village, Great Tob Forest.
As this was humanity's outpost in a forest of magical beasts, the Re-Estize Kingdom's troops naturally chose to station themselves here and set up camp to rest.
Yet a trace of hesitation crossed the Warrior Captain's face.
"Gazef, what are you thinking about?"
"Don't tell me you think a mere Wise King of the Forest can stop you?"
Among the Re-Estize Kingdom's troops, only his close comrade Brain dared address Gazef that way.
Before you continue