Jaxon Therion LeonheartAge: 15Race: HumanClass: Tier-1 Magic KnightTitle: Hero of the Skyllian VergeNoble Rank: Baron of Vireaux
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Core Attributes• Aura Rank: Lesser• Mana Rank: Impure• Bloodline: Thunder Leo (Grand) – Inherited Traits: Heightened reflexes, electric resistance, rapid neuromuscular response – Mutation Present: Static Pulse Core (dormant)
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Talent Affinities• Electric Affinity: Grade B• Quick Casting: Grade C• Longsword Mastery: Grade D• Survival: Grade D• Building: Grade D
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Combat Skills
Spells:• Arc Spark [Novice] – Releases a targeted electric bolt. Low cost. Minor stun effect.• Static Pulse [Novice] – Emits a radial shockwave from the body. Brief knockback to unarmored foes.• Charge Thread [Adept] – Forms a magnetic line between caster and target. Power increases with movement and duration.
Martial Arts:• Thunder Step [Disciple] – Short-distance burst movement technique. Applies residual static along the path.• Cross Fang Slash [Basic] – Two-stage horizontal slash augmented by electric mana.
Passive Traits:• Residual Charge – After casting a lightning-element spell, melee attacks gain enhanced output briefly.• Battle Instinct (Incomplete) – Fragmented combat memory improves reaction timing under duress.
Beast Command:• Suppress – Level 1 – Commands bonded beasts to incapacitate a target. Success depends on beast loyalty and morale.
"How the hell did the other Jaxon survive this?" he muttered, bent over the glistening body of a freshly caught river creature. His skills are not good enough to improve the Honda tribe.
The thing sprawled out across the flat stone like a nightmare rendered in flesh. It looked like someone had crossbred a wolffish with an anglerfish and then left it marinating in the wrong sort of mana. A luminous lure still blinked faintly on its head—bioluminescent bacteria flickering inside a translucent fin ray. The creature's long, rubbery body shifted in color depending on how the light hit it—brownish-purple one second, a bruised olive the next.
Its mouth was the worst part. Even in death, canine fangs jutted past its lips like jail bars made of ivory. Jaxon had counted at least three rows of conical teeth, built for smashing hard-shelled nightmares. It looked like it could chomp through a tortoise without chewing.
And this was a baby.
He'd seen an adult—if "seen" was even the right word. A glimpse. A shadow slicing through deeper water, its bulk moving like a submerged god. It had to be at least five meters long and three tons heavy. It didn't chase him, thank the stars. But the idea that such monsters lurked in the lakes near Haven Outcrop made his skin crawl.
His hands worked in practiced rhythm—cutting down the belly, peeling back the skin. The meat underneath was lean and pale, almost translucent, with a firmness that reminded him of cod but denser. The smell was oddly clean. Briny, yes, but also faintly sweet.
He dumped the skin into a clay basin filled with water he'd infused with mashed berries, elfroot pulp, and honey to counteract the funk. The skin was edible, though it wouldn't win any awards for texture.
"Not kosher," he muttered dryly. "Not that I ever followed that stuff."
Religious dietary rules made no sense to him. If it was edible, not poisoned, and didn't bite back, he'd eat it.
He carved the meat into cubes and tossed the heads to Bront and Moro. His cats—well, monsters, really—tore into the skulls like they were soft fruit. Obligate carnivores. Needed raw meat, bones, and blood to survive. No scavenging. No foraging.
Which meant Jaxon couldn't rely on them for food. If anything, they ate more than he could hunt.
Humans here weren't like humans from Earth. They weren't soft. They weren't idle. Terrans were built for war. Mana-charged meat and vegetables, constant motion, constant danger—they were more comparable to Sayians or Serans than Homo sapiens.
Jaxon had learned that the hard way. A week of just fish had left him nauseous and weak. It wasn't until he mixed in wild greens and berries that the shakes stopped. Terrans demanded balance—even from its apex predators.
His pool of cooking oil simmered softly beside him. A pit in the ground lined with glassy black mud—superheated and hardened with magic and sweat. He had smeared the inside with rendered animal fat that turned sticky in the sun and clung like wax to the walls.
The oil itself came from a swamp plant he found near Mesa Hill Valley (after naming that the system flag it). The pods looked like oversized pea shoots, but the seeds inside, when mashed and sealed in nutrient-rich water for a week, transformed into a fragrant oil. Thick, amber, and clean-burning. It smelled like toasted sesame. Performed like olive oil. Better for fish and poultry. Useless for red meat unless flat-cooked.
He dropped a few pieces into the oil. They sizzled instantly.
He watched the oil bubble, listening to the spit and crackle. One hour until dinner. One more hour in a world that wanted him dead. One more day where he hadn't starved, frozen, or been eaten alive.
Progress.
Still, this was just one piece of the puzzle.
Before the other Jaxon died, the imperial court had sent him on what amounted to a suicide mission. But maybe… just maybe, the Emperor hadn't screwed him over completely.
The other Jaxon had survived. Barely. But he'd been too weak, too slow, and far too trusting.
Now, it was Jaxon's job to live in that body—and train it into something worthy of survival.
He checked the perimeter of his camp. His hands were calloused. His boots were held together by vines and hide. His ribs showed when he stretched. But he was still standing.
His shelter was barely that—a glorified dugout with a roof of bark and woven grass. It leaked. It creaked. It would collapse with one bad storm.
He needed more.
As if in answer to his thoughts, the System flared to life again for the first time in weeks.
[Settlement Node Activated: Haven Outcrop – Status: Claimed][Territory Control: 0.6 km radius secured][Noble Rank Confirmed: Baron][Starter Asset Package Detected – New User Identified][Opening: Newbie Noble Deployment Pack][Host, you have items in your ring. Please open them.]
Jaxon froze.
"…Wait. That's a thing?"
A glowing square of light formed above his satchel and slowly folded in on itself before sinking into the leather. His pouch pulsed with warmth—soft amber light seeping through the seams.
Cautiously, he untied the flap and reached in.
His hand kept going. Past what should have been the bottom.
He raised an eyebrow. "Spatial compression. Thank God."
He poured a trickle of mana into the ring on his finger—just to see. Something pulsed back. A faint shimmer of blue. A scroll popped free into his hand.
It was sealed with crimson wax—the twin lion sigil of House Vallamir.
He groaned.
"This can't be good."
He unrolled it.
To Baron Jaxon Therion Leonheart, newly raised and wholly unprepared,As dictated by the Imperial Logistics Office, the following items are issued to you as part of your noble charter in accordance with Writ of Expansion IV: Frontier Claim Provision.May this aid you in your thankless endeavor to build something worth dying for.Do not embarrass us.– Royal Quartermaster Kaelis of the Fifth Ledger
Below it was a checklist.
He read the first few lines—and stopped breathing.
• 66,250,500,300 Imperial Gold Crowns• 36,170,000 Silver Dinars• 10,000 Imperial Platinum Marks• 100 Trade Bonds• 5 Vault Tokens
He stared at the numbers. Then stared harder.
The System chimed again.
[Your reputation with House Vallamir has improved!][Your reputation is now: Neutral (0)]
[You received a new quest!][Prove Yourself]Kealis Vallamir, patriarch of House Vallamir, has seen your potential and funneled all embezzled funds your way.Survive the angry nobles who believe you stole their wealth, and prove Kealis was right.
Quest Type: UniqueReward: Increased reputation with House Vallamir, formal alliance, and… Mirajane?
Jaxon's mouth opened in horror.
"That dumb motherfu—!"
Lightning sparked from his fingertips. Bront growled softly in his sleep.
Kealis Vallamir. The lunatic noble with a smile like a sword and a ledger thicker than a priest's prayer book. Kealis is from the royal, noble house that has multiple businesses and controls the largest gold mines, which is a rare mineral on Terra.
The nobleman had a knack for knowing precisely where he was going and showing up in advance whenever he was in the capital. To be honest, the old bastard was acting more like his stalker than a than a rich accountant who can kill an army with a sword strike. Heaven knows Jaxon encountered his fair share of them. Kealis had also bought the whole Hero of the Skyllian Blitz crap along with the Emperor, which only goes to show that the supposedly rigorous selection criteria used to choose nobles did not include a healthy judge of character.
Especially when that bastard thinks he can take the corrupt nobles.
Terra's currency followed the standard rules of the fantasy genre. The most common comparison is from the Hellenistic Age Mediterranean. Copper coins are produced for local exchange and vary wildly in value. The government mainly used silver coins for large transactions. They come in various sizes and can vary drastically in value as well. Gold is used to buy lands, slaves, weapons, and magical equipment and materials.
Compared to modern day, it would be something like this:
Bronze ~$20
Silver ~$1000
Gold ~$3500
Jaxon had a minor panic attack at the sheer number. That bastard had sent him all the stolen gold. Which meant the other nobles would think he was behind the scheme.
This amount must come from years of embezzlement and corruption, obviously, was going to stage a coup against the emperor because the humanity first nobles hated the old bastard.
He couldn't even run to the VIII Empire without getting hunted down. That much wealth marked him for death—or worse.
He kept reading the list.
• 10,000x Ironsteel Longsword• 10,000x Recurve War Bow – Blackwood, with 60 Arrows• 10,000x Steel Hand Axes• 10,000x Bastard Sword• 10,000x Chainmail Shirts• 10,000x Battle Cloaks• 10,000x Longstaves
Construction Blueprints:– City Blueprint: Hamlet– Barracks– Treasury– Root Cellar with Ice Pit– Armory
Tools:– Advanced Builder's Kit– Mana Furnace Core– Territory Crest Pillar– Imperial Ledger– Banner of House Leonheart (Blank)
He dropped the scroll.
Then looked at the sky.
"Are you telling me I've been skinning radioactive fish, building shelter from twigs, and boiling soup over a pit… while carrying enough wealth to bankroll a coup? Also I could have sleep in a real fucking bed."
He laughed.
Hysterically.
The kind of laugh that came from somewhere deeper than humor. The kind that clawed its way out of a cracked soul and refused to stop. Bront flattened his ears and lifted his head. Moro, returning from the treeline with something limp in her jaws, paused mid-step.
Jaxon wiped tears from the corners of his eyes, still chuckling.
"Why must every chapter of my life end in misery?" he asked the sky, arms spread like he expected divine explanation. "Seriously. First I choke on bad chicken. Then I inherit a body built like a malnourished track star. And now I'm apparently sitting on enough money to fund a rebellion."
He flopped down onto a log, exhausted.
"This isn't a starter kit. This is bait."
He drew a deep breath, steadying his heart, then turned to the glowing System interface still hovering beside him.
[Newbie Noble Deployment Pack – System Provision]Purpose: Initial survival & territory stabilizationBinding: Personal / Territory
• 3x Reinforced Water Skins (Purification rune included)• 4x Weeks of Rations (Hardbread, salted meat, dried greens)• Class Equipment Set: Heavenly Liger Set• Construction Speed Buff: +10%• Mining Speed Buff: +10%• Production Buff: +10%• Terrain Scanner (Marks resource nodes within 5km)• 10x Cattle• Mana Infused Compass (Always points toward crest pillar)• Personal Banner Template• 3x Beast Feed Bags (High-energy feed for bonded creatures)• 1x Awakening Potion
• 1x All-Cure Potion.
"Awakening Potion?" he echoed, squinting. "Nope. Gonna pretend I didn't see that. Neither the All-Cure Potion." There was a good reason for this. Both potions will cause him to be killed faster than a black guy cuckolding a white woman at the KKK rally.
The class equipment was stored in its own bundle, wrapped in protective hide. He opened it and found light armor forged from pale hide and dark iron—marked with glowing white runes shaped like a predator's fangs. The Heavenly Liger Set. Flexible, insulated, surprisingly lightweight. Made for a fast-moving fighter who didn't want to die to his own spells.
He'd take it.
Jaxon leaned forward and set the compass beside the other gear. The mana readings around Haven Outcrop flickered to life across the floating terrain map—a clean 5km scan showed a river node, iron vein, and a faint mana leak to the northeast. All prime locations for expanding infrastructure.
He rubbed his hands together.
"Okay. First thing's first: move Haven to a better position. Second: convince the bloodthirsty woman running half the outlaw territories to either join me… or not kill me."
He grabbed the construction scroll for the small town layout and let it unroll. The paper itself shimmered as it responded to his mana. Lines of light traced walls, water catchments, towers, and roads.
At the bottom, in etched imperial script, were the words:
Pour mana to begin imprint.Speak the domain's name aloud.
He closed his eyes.
The wind picked up, rustling the trees around the outcrop. The smell of the fish fry drifted behind him—rich and crisp, mixing with the earth and smoke like a campfire feast from a world away.
Jaxon raised the scroll.
"Haven Outcrop," he said quietly. "Domain of House Leonheart."
The scroll ignited—not in flame, but in blue firelight. Runes spiraled into the air. Mana flooded the ground. His crest ring flared to life, and the stone crest pillar nearby rumbled as it activated.
Then the System rang again.
[Domain Crest Established: Haven Outcrop][Territorial Control Expanded – 3.4 km radius][Administrative Node Initialized – Rank: Hamlet][Construction access granted. Please select next structure.]
[Imperial Authority Acknowledged. You may now issue Noble Decrees.]
He felt it. Not just as power, but responsibility. Weight. Reach. His land.
His.
He took one last bite of the sizzling fish, then wiped his mouth with his sleeve.
Tomorrow, he'd build the town square.
Tonight… he'd sleep in a real shelter.
And maybe, just maybe, he'd survive long enough to make this miserable barony into something real.