Chapter 453: The Great Canals of Goldenveil

Ethan and Hilda had fallen asleep right there on the couch, without even bothering to go to bed.

Hilda slept straddling him, her knees bent and her ass slightly raised, its entire plump weight resting on Ethan’s thighs.

Her shorts, pulled tight by the position, had ridden up until they were almost like panties.

The fabric sank deep into the cleft between the plump, caramel-colored buttocks of that perfect ass, leaving most of the soft flesh exposed to the warm air of the living room.

Her breasts were bare. The strip of fabric that used to cover them was now nothing more than a crumpled rag, forgotten in some corner near the couch.

Large, heavy, and the same sweet brown as the rest of her body, they were pressed flat against Ethan’s bare abdomen, spilling out to the sides under their own weight in two wide, soft mounds.

Her arms wrapped around him, and her head rested on his chest like a pillow.

It had been a cold, rainy night, and Ethan woke early under the weight of that beauty sprawled across his chest.

Almost without thinking, one of his hands drifted up to Hilda’s wine-red hair—short and spiky—and gently stroked the strands, which were softer than they looked.

The other rested on a back that seemed far too delicate for a body of such obscene proportions.

"How do you manage to get comfortable in that position?" Ethan asked, his voice still hoarse with sleep.

Hilda’s eyes cracked open for a moment, then closed again.

"Nghnn~~ silence, pillow," she grumbled, rubbing her face against his chest as a sleepy grunt escaped her lips.

She gave his chest a lazy pat, as if to punish him for waking her, and then relaxed again, her entire body going limp on top of him and her heavy breasts spreading even heavier against his stomach.

Ethan sighed. Then he slid both hands down her back, following the dip of her spine and the curve of her waist until he reached Hilda’s ass, and gripped it tightly.

It was like sinking his fingers into a pillow made of some kind of divine silk, too soft to be real.

Her caramel-colored flesh swallowed his fingers right down to the knuckles, bulging out between them.

Her shorts, which had already been barely covering anything, rode up even higher and disappeared completely between her buttocks, until both plump cheeks were fully bare in his hands.

Hilda moaned softly, a muffled sound against his chest, finally opening her eyes.

"Ah... fuck... you’re a really shitty pillow, you know that?" she grunted with a sulky expression, bracing both hands flat against Ethan’s chest and forcing her body upward.

Her plump breasts slowly peeled away from his skin, the warm flesh clinging for a moment before letting go, and hung heavily beneath her, swinging with every small movement as she straightened her torso.

Once she was sitting upright on top of him, those enormous, perfect breasts gave one last bounce, lifting and dropping back into place with a heavy jiggle that took a moment to die down.

Hilda smiled at Ethan when she noticed where his eyes had wandered.

"By the Eternal North Sea, you really do seem spellbound. Are my tits really that perfect?" Hilda asked, pressing her forearms against the sides of her breasts and squeezing them together.

The soft flesh piled up between her arms, bulging upward and inward until the line of her cleavage almost disappeared, her nipples pointing straight at him.

Then she swayed her torso from side to side in an obscene motion.

Her breasts followed the sway with a slight delay, swinging heavily and bumping against each other with a muffled plap of flesh on flesh.

A soft ripple ran through them with each impact, her nipples tracing small arcs in the air.

"Well... I am a man, after all." Ethan laughed, his hands rising to Hilda’s delicate waist, his fingers almost meeting around her.

"Good." Hilda smiled, satisfied, before climbing off him.

Her plump ass swayed heavily as she swung one leg over his body and stood, the two bare cheeks shifting against each other and giving a slow, heavy bounce as she straightened up.

She pulled her shorts back into place with a quick tug, the fabric slipping free from the cleft between her buttocks, and her caramel-colored flesh quivered slightly as the elastic snapped back against her skin.

"Now it’s time to get to work. You said I’d be getting the first shipment of steel today, right? I’m going to finish up the final designs and start preparing the first Goldenveil ships," she said, already scooping the strip of fabric up from the floor.

She tied it back over her breasts with the practiced ease of someone who did this every day, the soft flesh bulging out above and below the tight fabric.

Ethan nodded.

The order to Windmere had been placed the day before, and soon hundreds of metric tons of steel would begin arriving at the Goldenveil shipyards, along with plenty of lumber and magical cores coming in from Fallenwinter and the palace throughout the day.

Soon, everything would be ready to begin building what would one day be Goldenveil’s mighty fleet.

Shortly after leaving Hilda immersed in her work, Ethan made his way to the Goldenveil Military Complex.

The place was much emptier than usual. Fifteen thousand of the thirty thousand men who trained there had already left the barracks.

Now, only the first three legions remained—those responsible for the city’s defense.

Ethan opened the description of the Custom Military Unit Creation Card, the system’s translucent screen appearing before his eyes.

Originally, he had planned to start with just five hundred cavalrymen—a small number for an army of thirty thousand men, but decent considering they would be the absolute elite.

This card, however, allowed him to recruit up to two thousand five hundred men into a custom military unit, where he could decide every detail.

Spotting Doran approaching in the distance, Ethan smiled and activated the card.

The average level of the units would be 61, with the commanders at level 119, one step away from the fourth stage.

Ethan defined each soldier’s traits, specialties, and experience, and adjusted the armor to meet the Goldenveil standard.

His fingers glided quickly across the screen, and each option he checked made the price in the corner climb a little higher.

Shortly after, he simply clicked to confirm.

Every modification to the unit came at a cost, so the total price for those two thousand five hundred men exceeded five million gold coins.

Even so, Ethan paid that amount with a smile on his face.

It would have been even better if the commanders were already at the fourth stage, but with their base talent and Goldenveil’s magical density, it wouldn’t be long before they got there.

Doran, less than a hundred paces from Ethan, stopped dead in his tracks.

Before him, a wall of steel rose out of nowhere.

Two thousand five hundred men in heavy armor appeared in perfect synchrony, the silver steel gleaming in the sunlight and their red cloaks billowing in the morning breeze.

And exactly as Ethan had envisioned, they were already mounted on their steeds: enormous divine stags with emerald eyes, their broad antlers rising above the ranks.

The ground shook under the weight of thousands of hooves striking the earth at once. The animals’ heavy snorting and the clang of metal filled the courtyard, along with the smell of oiled leather and warm fur.

Since they were soldiers generated by the system—with loyalty set to the maximum and personalities and backstories artificially created—Ethan didn’t have to do much.

After a brief conversation with Doran, who was still staring at the ranks as if he couldn’t believe his eyes, Ethan handed him command of the five specialized cavalry divisions.

He then headed to the Palace of Beasts, where he left the ten thousand emerald-eyed divine stags for training.

With all that settled, the time had come to build the great canals of Goldenveil.

Fortunately, these worked much like instant construction.

By paying an extra fee, he could integrate everything directly into the city’s infrastructure.

And since the Empire these canal designs came from was extremely advanced, most of the problems that would normally arise in a project of this size had already been solved.

The canals came equipped with filtration and treatment systems, and could even detect blockages and incinerate them with mana.

And so, with a single click, Ethan created the canals of Goldenveil.

A low tremor ran through the ground beneath his feet.

A massive main canal tore its way through the city, splitting the gates of the Noble District in two.

It ran from the very edge of Ethan’s palace all the way to the shore of Lake Azur, where the canal’s water flowed out into the lake and the lake’s water passed through filters before entering Goldenveil.

Hundreds of smaller canals branched out across the city, with entire houses and neighborhoods adapting to the new layout.

Citizens poured out of their homes and workplaces to watch, torn between shock and admiration, as crystal-clear waterways now flowed through Goldenveil.

The city even gained artificial beaches, with restaurant areas ending in long stretches of white sand and shallow water—perfect for cooling off on a calm day.

Normally, canals this large, with such advanced filtration systems, would require an enormous amount of magic crystals to operate, and could easily bankrupt a city like Goldenveil.

Fortunately, they had the Magic Vein, so that cost was negligible.

Many new residences, hotels, and restaurants sprang up along the canals, mainly because the waterways sat about three meters below the level of most of the city, surrounded by long, wide sidewalks that led straight to their doors.

Soon, the Goldenveil City Hall would register all these buildings.

Some would be given away for free to anyone who wanted to start a business there, while others would be sold.

In any case, it wasn’t something Ethan needed to worry about. He had plenty of people to take care of that for him.

With a broad smile on his face, he returned to the palace, eager to spoil Alice and Ophelia a little—both of whom were pregnant with their first children.