When I arrive, about an hour later, the guards direct me into the city without firing at me. They must have been told to expect me because they only look a little nervous when they see me. I am directed to a square near the center of the city and Emperor Amn meets me there shortly after I arrive.

  Emperor Amn says “Welcome, Ash. I am sorry it took us so long to get things prepared on our side.”

  “No worries. I have had plenty of other things to keep me busy. I take it you want the gate set up in this square?”

  Emperor Amn says “Yes, please. My experts tell me that this square will allow for maximum access to the gate.”

  “Alright.”

  I take the gate out of my ring, position it where the emperor points, and use my mana to activate it. Because it is paired, all it takes is some mana and it links to the other gate automatically. Once it is active, I go through both to make sure it works and that my people are ready for traffic.

  Everything on our side has been ready for days, so I head back through to let the emperor know. He of course has to send some people through to verify that the gate is safe, but there are no problems. It isn’t that he doesn’t trust me, just that it will make it easier to convince the merchants.

  Although, they don’t really need convincing, just the potential profits are enough to get them to go through. Once a couple of the braver ones go through, the others have to to avoid falling behind. Before long, there is a line of merchants just waiting for their turn to pass through the gate.

  Emperor Amn and I stand off to the side, chatting and watching to make sure nothing goes wrong. This will benefit both of our empires, so it is fairly important that nothing happens. Luckily, everything goes smoothly and we end up just having a pleasant chat for an hour or so.

  Emperor Amn says “Everything seems to be going well. How about we go have some dinner?”

  “Sure, sounds good.”

  The emperor has taken over the lord’s castle and I am glad to find out that he brought his chef with him. We continue chatting as we enjoy a delicious meal, mostly about governing. As an acting emperor, Amn has a lot of advice for me in regards to building a government.

  If nothing else, he can at least help me avoid making the same mistakes he did when he took the throne. He was raised to be emperor and yet he still made mistakes when he was younger. They were mainly due to him gaining power and wanting to use that power for the first time.

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  I am not going to have those kinds of problems, if anything my mistakes will be due to me trying to avoid responsibilities. Still, hearing about his first years as emperor does provide me with a lot of useful information. Our situations are nothing alike, but I can still learn from his experiences.

  Unfortunately, he can’t offer me what I really want, a way out of my current situation. In fact, when I tell him what is going on, he has a good laugh at my expense. The worst part is that when I am done explaining, he agrees with Lin’s reasoning.

  It seems that no matter who I talk to, they all seem to agree that Lin is right and I am trapped. It would be a different story if I had someone I trusted that was strong enough to take my place. Without that, my only choices are to take charge or to let everything fall apart.

  A small part of me wants to just sit back and watch everything come tumbling down. That is the part of me that loves monster movies, but I have too many people I care about to do that. So that just leaves me with one option, not much of a choice and definitely something I don’t want to do. I keep trying to fight against it, but I keep ending up right back at the same place.

  Talking it through with Amn does help me to realize that it is not marrying the girls that bothers me. It is the responsibilities that it represents that is really what I am fighting against. Unfortunately, there is nothing that I am going to be able to do to avoid them at this point.

  However, I can’t really stop fighting against them because I am not doing it consciously. I don’t even know I am doing it until I stop and think about things when I find a quiet moment. Honestly, it probably means I need to stop and think about what I am doing more.

  I just get so caught up in doing things, moving from one to another as fast as possible, that I don’t think. The problem is that I like living that way I am right now and I don’t really want to change it. There isn’t really anyone who can make me change, it is all up to me to decide.

  Well, that’s not entirely true anymore, there are four opinions that I need to pay attention to. It is a new feeling for me to get used to, but I need to start considering their opinions. This is probably something that I can just put off until later, I can talk to them about it after the wedding.

  It isn’t an urgent problem and it is also one that is not going to be fixed quickly. With that being the case, I don’t see a need to worry about it right now, there is enough going on. By the time we are done talking, dinner is long over, so we return to the gate to check on things.

  While the emperor is getting reports from his people, I head through the gate to check with mine. For now, everything is going fine on both sides of the gate, so I say my farewells to Amn. After saying goodbye, I gate back to the island, but it is too late to do any more hunting.

  Instead I sit on the beach and enjoy the sunset while crafting some more obelisks. The sun setting over the ocean is amazing and I can’t wait to sit and watch it with the girls. When it gets fully dark I go back to working on the hunting lodge with the occasional break to make more obelisks.

  I find that switching between what I am crafting helps to keep it from getting too boring. About halfway through the night I take a break to eat a snack and take a short nap. When I wake up I start the process of enchanting the lodge since the construction is done.

  By this point I have gotten to be an expert at enchanting a living space to have all the conveniences. Thanks to that, it only takes me a couple of hours to completely enchant the lodge. After that I move on to the last step, crafting and enchanting all of the furniture.