Chapter 17
Weight of a Crown of Grass
The dust motes danced in the slanted afternoon light of the Bluestone manor's main hall, now serving as Ser Renly's command post, study, and home. A crude map of the village and its surroundings was spread across the heavy oak table, weighted down with a smooth river stone. Renly's body ached with a familiar, satisfying fatigue, but the mind inside, Kaelen's mind, was already partitioning itself.
For six days in the main world, his routine was a study in focused preparation. His mornings began with intense physical conditioning in his empty Aethelgard apartment, pushing his Enhanced body to its limits, feeling the ghost of Renly's training in every perfected movement. His afternoons were for research. As he pored over publicly available data-slates on Elysian, his mind, sharpened by years of archival work, pieced together the galactic puzzle.
He knew of the Aethelgard Hegemony and the Euro-African Concord's cold war, and the Veridian Syndicate's lobbying. Now, he dug deeper. He read about the Slovanian Collective, masters of large-scale engineering, who were reportedly struggling to adapt their terraforming techniques to Elysian's Aether-rich, reactive geology. The Amerigan Confederacy, ever the pioneers, was already sponsoring private "claim-jumper" expeditions into the unmapped continents, operating in a legal gray area that infuriated the core nations. The Crescent Caliphate, with their deep traditions of Vitalist philosophy, had sent delegations of their own cultivators to study the new world's unique energy flows, seeking harmony where others sought domination. It was a tapestry of ambition, each of the eleven nations trying to stitch their flag into Elysian's soil first.
Then, as evening fell on Aethelgard, he would lie down, and his consciousness would cross the Veil, arriving in a body that had lived weeks in his absence.
In Valeria, the seasons had turned. The vibrant greens of late spring had deepened into the heavy, golden hues of full summer, and were now giving way to the first crisp hints of autumn. Seven months had passed in Bluestone.
His life there was a mosaic of mundane and monumental tasks. His days began at dawn with the Breath of the Wild, feeling the well of vital force in his core, now a deep, steady pool, responding more readily each time. After, he would join the rebuilding efforts. He didn't command from afar; he worked alongside the villagers, his Enhanced strength making him worth three men when lifting a new log for the palisade or hauling stone for a repaired foundation.
It was during these labors that the walls between Knight and villager began to crumble.
"Easy there, Ser Renly," chuckled Bor, a grizzled former militiaman with a limp from the beast tide, as they maneuvered a heavy timber. "Save some of that strength for the young ones. You're making the rest of us look bad."
Renly grinned, wiping sweat from his brow. "A Knight's duty is to protect, Bor. A weak wall protects no one."
"Aye, that it doesn't," Bor agreed, his eyes, once wary, now holding a glint of respect. "My boy, Finn, he's in the militia you're training. Says you're a hard taskmaster."
"The forest is a harder one," Renly replied, his tone sobering. "I'd rather he sweat in training than bleed on the wall."
The militia was his pet project. Ten volunteers, mostly farmers' sons and daughters, their hands better suited to scythes than swords. He drilled them for an hour each morning before the day's heat. He didn't teach them complex knightly forms, but simple, brutal efficiency: how to hold a spear, how to stand in a shield wall, how to listen for the breaking of a twig in the deep woods.
One afternoon, a young woman named Lyra, her red hair plastered to her forehead with sweat, failed to block a practice strike for the tenth time. Frustrated, she threw her wooden sword down. "It's useless! I'm not a warrior. I'm a brewer's daughter."
The other recruits watched nervously. Renly walked over, picked up the sword, and placed it back in her hands.
"Lyra," he said, his voice calm. "When you stir your father's mash, you don't just stir. You feel the consistency. You know the exact moment to add the hops. That is focus. That is timing. This," he tapped the practice sword, "is no different. It's a tool. Feel its weight. Know its reach. The skill is already in you. You just need to apply it here."
He saw a flicker of understanding in her eyes. She didn't become a master that day, but her blocks grew more deliberate, her stance more sure. He was not just building a militia; he was rebuilding their confidence.
His reputation was cemented not in the village, but in the woods surrounding it. Over the months, he led small, systematic hunts to clear the area of the scattered, lesser beasts that remained after the tide—fang-hares that could strip a field in a night, and a particularly nasty breed of venom-tipped vine that had taken root near the river. He used his Electric Surge only once, in a controlled flicker to stun a giant, aggressive boar that had charged young Finn, saving the boy's life. The story spread through the village, transforming their perception of him from a boy-lord to their genuine protector.
One evening, as he shared a simple meal of rabbit stew with Elder Elron, the old man looked at him, his eyes reflecting the firelight.
"You are not what we expected, Ser Renly," Elron said quietly. "We thought Lord Corvan was palming us off with a green boy to get us off his ledger. But you… you have the strength of a Knight, but you work like a farmer and speak to my people like they are your own. The Oak-Horn clan is in your debt."
Renly felt a warmth that had nothing to do with the fire. "There is no debt, Elder. This is my home now. Your people are my people."
As the autumn moon rose high over Bluestone, Ser Renly stood on the newly reinforced palisade, looking out at the quiet, sleeping village. The air was cool, the scent of woodsmoke and turned earth a comforting blanket. He could feel the slow, steady strengthening of his body, the deepening of his connection to the vital force of this world. He had built something here. Not just barricades and a militia, but trust. A purpose.
Back in his Aethelgard apartment, Kaelen opened his eyes. The six days were up. His transport to Elysian was tomorrow. He rose, his movements sure and powerful, a permanent echo of the Knight he was in another world. His body has crossed the borderline and reached the level of true 1st order Physical Enhancer. He was no longer just a fugitive from the draft or a cheater of the system. He was a leader, a protector, and a man with two homes to fight for. The journey to Elysian was no longer an exile. It was a deployment.