Spending My Retirement In A Game

The group made their way outside of the ego-castle at a quick pace. It seemed like Hephaestus was able to just control the ego-items however he wished, basically. It made sense, he made them after all. Or rather, he made the one that made them, as he was usually rather acting as the tool in the whole relationship, rather than the actual creator.

Eisen still wasn't sure why Hephaestus created this many ego-items in general, but maybe it was just some sort of experimentation. It seemed like a topic that the ego-item wanted to avoid, at least as far as Eisen could tell when he tried to mention it. Maybe he was just trying to learn more about ego-items so that he could 'fix' himself. At least that's a thought that stuck in Eisen's mind.

Either way, the group soon stood outside, and the others all came out of the ego-castle as well, meeting up right in front of it.

"Heh, so that's what you did with those ego-structures? Turned them into those forms?" The ego-item asked as he looked the giant structures up and down, although his eyes became fixed on Askr in the end, "That ain't one of mine that you took over, is it?"

"Ah, no, it's not." Eisen replied quickly, "It's an Ego-Golem that I myself specifically created." He explained. Hephaestus looked Askr up and down and nodded his head slightly impressed, "Seems pretty strong." He pointed out, and with a satisfied smile, Eisen nodded his head.

"He really is, yes." The old man said. Seeing the old man and the ego-item speak to each other like this, it seemed like Brody had something to say, "Could you guys stop jerkin' each other off and continuously saying how great each other's shit is? It's getting annoying at this point." The Demon-Orc pointed out. Eisen moved his fingers through his beard with a slight, quiet laugh, "Sorry about that."

"Yeah, I'm not sorry, I like hearing about how awesome my things are to other people." Hephaestus pointed out. With a slight glare, Brody turned away toward the group of people that just started making their way out of the ego-castle.

Evalia looked at the whole structure with a bit of curiosity, "Well, anyway, where are we putting the town core now? Inside of the ego-castle?" She asked, and Eisen, who was holding the town core, slowly turned toward Hephaestus, "You know the town best right now, what do you think?" Eisen asked, and the ego-item thought about it for a few moments. He crossed his arms and closed his eyes in thought.

"Hm..." He hummed, before just snapping his fingers in the ego-castle's direction. Before anyone knew it, with loud grumbling, the ego-castle's form started to shift. Stone scratched across stone, wood broke apart and rebuilt itself soon after, and glass simply shattered into pieces to be repaired somewhere else in another form.

The ego-castle laid down on the ground, with its back arched and its legs and arms stretched up into the air at different angles and heights. It didn't take long until the whole ego-castle changed its shape to be like that of a regular castle, and it wasn't recognizable as some kind of humanoid form anymore. Some of the arms and legs simply turned into towers, while some of the other arms, as the ego-castle had six of them, simply turned into more walls for the castle.

It seemed like there were some rock-like growths all around the ego-castle's body at some point to properly complete the structure, and sooner or later, everything stopped. The shifting and grumbling stopped, and all that was left was a proper castle standing in front of the group.

"We can head inside now, I guess." Hephaestus pointed out and took a few steps closer toward the castle. He was quickly followed by five originals and each of their companions, while everyone else simply stayed outside and took a break, camping there for now. They had properly conquered this island now, after all.

Amongst the people that went inside were the four grandmaster craftsmen. They maybe didn't know it yet, but one of them was set to become this town's Lord. The large group made their way through the castle to the throne room. The soul core was still floating in the center of the room. Hephaestus simply walked over to it and placed his hand on the large spherical rock that was just so slightly glowing.

After a deep breath, the giant sphere simply dropped down onto the ground. So that he wouldn't end up passing up this material, as the rock making up the soul cores of the ego-mansions before seemed to have pretty special properties, Eisen simply quickly compressed the large rock and placed it into his item storage to the others.

And then, only this central, empty room was left. Eisen looked at the throne, and saw some carvings on the wall right above it. There was a slot in the center of those carvings, and this just made it completely obvious that the town core was supposed to go in there.

In the first place, the town core's shape wasn't that 'natural growth' kind of thing, but rather, it had been just so slightly changed. Like a carved diamond, to make it more aesthetically pleasing, its form had been altered. And it obviously fit right into the slot in the center of the carvings.

Eisen quickly increased his size so that he could actually reach that slot, and then pressed the town core into it. The moment that this was done, the carvings lit up, but nothing happened. Everyone curiously turned toward Hephaestus, who just shrugged in response, "It doesn't really do anything, just kind of turns this room into a specially protected domain with the power of the town core. Like a boss room, but also not. Like a protective barrier for whichever sad sap becomes the Lord of this town."

"You know that 'sad sap' is standing right behind you, right?" Xenia asked with a slight frown from in front of Hephaestus, and the ego-item just shrugged, "Do I look like I give a shit?"

"Of course you don't..." The high-elf muttered annoyedly, and Eisen just slightly sighed as he approached the others, "It's fine, it doesn't matter. We will probably have to work on your personality a bit, Hephaestus." Eisen pointed out, and the ego-item crossed his arms with a slight smirk, "Sure, try your best, old man."

"Not letting you provoke me." Eisen laughed slightly, and then turned toward the four grandmaster craftsmen, "Alright. Now... We already told you who the lord of this town was supposed to be, and you agreed to these decisions, right?" The old man asked the four of them, and they all nodded their heads.

"Of course we did. Now come on, old man! Let's get this on with!" Denmir exclaimed with a slightly smug expression, while Jekyll side-eyed him with a slight grin, "Says the guy that's literally becoming a noble now. I think we three should have answered that question." The half-dwarf pointed out, and Denmir, the one chosen to become the town's Lord, simply laughed.

"Aye, as you'd expect from commoners, always tryin' to turn things to be 'bout them. Sad, sad..." The dwarf sighed loudly, and Jekyll, who had slight anger issues to deal with, just glared at him with a wry smile, "You gotta be fuckin' me, right?"

"Haha, aye, of course I be, lad! And it ain't like you three are gettin' off without anythin' either. Right, Eisen?" Denmir asked as he stepped to the front anyway, and the old man nodded his head, "Exactly. I was planning on making you guys 'honorary nobles'. You'd be a rank below Denmir, but that's just because I don't think I can properly justify giving you guys the same legal power without any land right now." Eisen pointed out, and the others simply shrugged, "That makes sense. Ruling land seems pretty bothersome in the first place." Jekyll replied, and Morrom quickly agreed.

"Yup. I'd prefer to just keep playing around with materials. New materials that we'll be able to find on this island, hopefully..." The elf-dwarf halfling said with a broad smile, and Eisen slightly laughed, "Of course. But just as he was thinking that, the old man turned over toward Hephaestus, "Actually, speaking of this island... Every animal, whether a critter or even a bug, was an ego-item in some way, shape or form. You didn't make all of those, did you?"

"Eh?" The ego-item asked, "You think I'd be wastin' my time with that. Nah, this island just works that way. There ain't many real animals here, the majority of them are just random ego-items created by the god of craftsmanship's aura in this place. I think. That sounds like the explanation I heard some time ago, at least." Hephaestus pointed out with a sligth shrug. It really seemed like he wasn't all too interested in finding out why all of this was, which kind of did make sense. Eisen didn't care too much either, after all, so him being an ego-item would probably strengthen those feelings. From Hepheastus' perspective, it was like those ego-item animals were just actual, proper animals, probably. Or maybe not, it was hard to empathise with these sorts of feelings all of a sudden. He never had to do that with an ego-item of this level yet.

Either way, for now, it didn't matter all too much. Denmir made his way toward the town core and was quickly lifted up by Eisen so that he could push his mana into the town core. The dwarf chose a name that had already been chosen by the group beforehand.

[Guild Member Denmir Dimhide has founded the town of <Nidavel>]

It was named after one of Yggdrasil's realms, Nidavellir, the realm of the dwarves. It seemed like a good fit, and even Hepheastus seemed to like it after hearing the explanation. Either way, after the town had been properly established, Eisen pulled out a box out of his item storage. He opened it up and made the core guardian appear in front of him.

"Denmir, activate it as well." The old man told the dwarf, who quickly nodded his head and pressed his palm onto the guardian's chest and pushed his mana into its heart. It quickly reacted by jolting its body awake. The core guardian simply stood there for a few moments, before being told which core to connect to.

The guardian quickly did as told, and soon changed its form. It was now wearing something like a tool belt and had knives, and hammers attached to it, wore thick leather gloves, and wore a simple apron above a cloth shirt. It seemed pretty energetic, as far as Eisen could tell.

And just like that, the group took over the Island of the God of Craftsmanship.