Goddess Kaleidoscope

Especially the maid outfit that wasn't properly worn, with its exposed chest and back revealing large expanses of snow-white skin, made Lud not only feast his eyes but also feel a little nervous, fearing that someone might suddenly see them and he wouldn't be able to explain himself.

However, just as the saying goes, "what you fear most is what happens." Just as Lude reached out to help Snake Girl button up her clothes, Elijah, who had just woken up, crawled out of her urn and saw this scene.

In an instant, the three—a human, a snake, and a ghost—were utterly bewildered, and an awkward silence fell over the basement. Elijah, half-exposed, stood frozen for a full three seconds before slowly retreating back inside.

"Um, I'm going back to sleep for a while, you guys continue..."

"It's a misunderstanding! This is a misunderstanding! Let me explain!"

Seeing that Elijah was still confused about her condition, Lude had no choice but to use his "Erkang Hand" technique, relying on his ability to touch spirits, and forcefully pulled Elijah out again when she was about to shrink back.

Thanks to their daily interactions, Lude had left a good impression on the female ghost, so Elijah believed his explanation. She even helped the snake girl, who couldn't dress herself, tidy up her messy clothes, and then circled around her a few times with great interest, looking her up and down. She even reached out and poked her two very substantial and imposing breasts.

"Priest, what should we call her current state? She seems to be neither a living being nor a ghost, yet she can switch freely between the two forms. It's truly amazing!"

Having witnessed the entire transformation of the serpent spirit, Elizabeth felt a strong curiosity about her. Because living beings in this world are generally divided into two categories based on their form of existence: "living beings" and "spirits." The main difference between the two lies in whether or not they possess a physical body.

Therefore, in the world of magic, undead like Eliven are considered "incompletely dead living beings," belonging to the category of souls without flesh and blood. They are spiritual beings transformed from living bodies, and can only be considered truly dead when even the soul has completely dissipated.

Theoretically speaking, apart from special beings like gods, mortal beings cannot freely switch between these two forms. The transformation from a living body to a spiritual body is also considered an irreversible process. Even the most powerful resurrection spell among divine arts can only be effective within seven days after death, before the soul and body have completely separated.

It is worth mentioning that a small number of undead and elemental creatures possess rare skills such as "possession," which can temporarily seize control of a physical body. However, because it requires suppressing the original owner's soul, the duration is limited unless the original owner is very weak or simply gives up all resistance.

But the snake girl's current state is quite interesting. She is an unprecedented "summoned creature" in this world. She is not a god, but she can switch between a living body and a spirit body. However, whether or not she switches is not controlled by her own will, but by Lud, who is the controller. When she doesn't need it, she can put it into a book and carry it with her, which is very convenient.

However, this ability to manipulate things was indeed amazing, but it reminded Elizabeth of something that had a bad reputation in this world—the devil!

The so-called demons existed long before the war of the gods. They came from other worlds outside the realms and possessed unimaginable abilities. They tricked the mortal creatures of this world into making deals with them in order to harvest the souls of mortals.

Even though demons are infamous, and everyone knows they are extremely evil beings who covet human souls, people still continue to actively trade with them through summoning rituals deliberately spread by demons, ultimately becoming their servants and obediently offering their souls, because demons can indeed grant them powerful abilities that even gods do not possess.

When faced with temptation, most people have very weak willpower!

Out of consideration for Ludwig's feelings, Elijah didn't dare to voice her association with demons, as she didn't want the priest to feel offended.

But in reality, Lud was also criticizing himself in his heart at this moment, feeling that he had unknowingly done a lot of things that no human being could do!

Demons come from other worlds, lying and deceiving humans, possessing special abilities to imprison and enslave living beings. And Rud, aside from not harming people, is practically identical to a demon in every other way!

End of this chapter

After summoning the snake girl, Lude did not rush to put her back into the book. Instead, he had her stay in the basement for one night to calculate how much divine power was required to summon her.

If it weren't for the thousands of noble troops stationed outside the village, making it inconvenient to take her out, Lud would have wanted her to undergo a combat ability test, because she had clearly told him that she could indeed transform into her giant snake form when summoned. She hadn't tried it yet, but she knew she could.

Looking at the snake girl who was obediently letting him manipulate her like a doll, Lude suddenly pinched his chin and asked.

"I've never asked before, do you have a name?"

Before the snake girl was fully tamed, Lude had never been able to have a proper conversation with her. So he only knew that the lizardmen called her the snake spirit, and the demi-humans called her the lord of the swamp, the black water demon, etc., but these were more like titles than names.

Faced with Lud's question, the snake girl tilted her head in confusion. As a monster lord who had evolved and leveled up from a low-level monster, she wasn't very intelligent in her early years. She gradually became smarter, but she wasn't very cultured, and her name was completely irrelevant to her.

So the snake girl shook her head, indicating that she did not have a formal name.

"Since that's the case, then I'll just give you a name! Since your original body has so many heads, let's call you Hydra."

And so, the snake girl got a name that was subtly questionable. She didn't know whether the name was good or bad, but since it was given to her by her master, she had no room to object no matter how awful it sounded.

Lud told Hydra to stay in the basement for a while to get used to his new human body. He had noticed earlier that Hydra's walking posture was strange, probably because he wasn't used to walking on two legs yet.

If Elijah has the time, she could try teaching her to read, write, and manners.

After all, Ludwig gave her a maid outfit, and Elijah had been a court lady-in-waiting before her death, so it would be a good opportunity to train her properly.

In the following days, everything in the village was normal. Lud had a lot to do, but everything was proceeding smoothly according to plan.

After the last Christmas of the goddess, the surrounding villages finally softened their stance and agreed to send their children to school here. Lude naturally accepted all of them and enrolled them all in his school.

Meanwhile, the Rainbow Circus's rehearsals were going smoothly, and Lude took the opportunity to establish an arts major at the school, giving Servis ten enrollment slots so that she could select children with talent in this area from the school.

Servis reciprocated by having an elderly couple from her circus, who were no longer fit to travel and tour with them, stay and teach at Ludd's school—a win-win arrangement.

During rehearsals, Lude would come over from time to time to check on things, offer suggestions to Servis and the others, and even show off his amazing makeup skills, which amazed everyone. This allowed Servis, who had been struggling to look "young" enough, to successfully rediscover the feeling of being young again.

At the same time, I became more and more convinced that Luther was Shakespeare!

A week passed in the blink of an eye, and before they knew it, it was the end of the month. The dwarf migration group was only two days away from Pine Village.

During this period, both Sharo and Rodriguez regularly sent cavalry to confirm the location of the dwarven migration group, and the lords of both families frequently corresponded with Gulig, the chieftain of the Steelwhip clan, to express their goodwill.

The Steelwhip Clan has been the official blacksmiths of the Duran royal family for generations. The clan leader, Gulig, holds the title of viscount, but previously had no fiefdom.

Upon discovering the ancient city of dwarves within the Void Forest, Gulig requested the king to allow his clan to reclaim this heritage that rightfully belonged to their dwarven race. The king readily agreed and issued a formal investiture decree, granting Gulig the ancient city and the land within a fifty-mile radius.

This investiture was a win-win situation for both the royal family and the dwarves, because Gulig remained loyal to the royal family and was a viscount of the kingdom, so their fiefdom was naturally considered part of the kingdom's territory, which was equivalent to expanding their territory.

While the migration of tens of thousands of dwarves weakened industrial productivity in the heart of the kingdom to some extent, the dwarves did not break free from the kingdom's control and may even become more dependent on the kingdom than before.

It should be noted that the fiefdom they were going to receive was located inside the Void Forest, outside the border, hundreds of miles away from Pine Tree Village in a straight line. The ancient city was surrounded by vast primeval forests, inhabited by countless demons and beasts, and in winter, heavy snow would block the mountains.

Even if the heavens were kind enough to grant tens of thousands of dwarves self-sufficiency in such a place, and there were no disasters or calamities, it would still require decades of careful management.

Therefore, the migrating dwarves would be heavily reliant on the kingdom's food supply. If they were to harbor rebellious intentions, the kingdom wouldn't even need to send troops to suppress them; simply cutting off their food supply would soon starve them into surrender.

Therefore, in the foreseeable future, the dwarves who take over the ancient city will make full use of their race's traditional skills to continuously supply the kingdom with various metals and high-quality metallurgical products in exchange for the food and wine they depend on for survival. Pine Village is located right on this trade route.

Over the past week, following closely behind the two lords' private armies, a large number of merchants, like sharks smelling blood, have flocked to Pine Village, far exceeding the previous numbers.

Some chambers of commerce hoped to establish a cargo station in the area to facilitate the future transshipment of goods. Therefore, they wanted to purchase a piece of land before local land prices were driven up. However, the merchants discovered upon inquiry that the local Medicine God Cult was the largest landowner in the area, and more than half of the land in the village belonged to the cult, with very formal land deeds.

At present, Pine Village is still in the development stage, and the five-year tax exemption benefits have not yet ended. There is no lord in the area, so the church, which owns so much land, only needs to collect rent from the tenants below, but does not need to pay taxes to the lord above. In addition, there were rumors about the Medicine God Cult selling medicine, so the merchants all thought that Lud was a very wealthy man.

These kinds of "country tyrants" are usually not easy to get along with! Even if you don't buy land from them, if you want to do business peacefully in the area, you still have to pay them a visit.

However, when the merchants arrived with gifts, they did not see a fat, nouveau riche adorned with gold and silver, but a kind-looking elder dressed in a simple, even cheap, coarse cloth robe.

Lud was fully aware of the merchants' purpose in seeking an audience, so he prepared in advance. He took out an exquisitely crafted planning map, pointed to the area outlined in red, and smiled as he spoke to the merchants.

"Gentlemen, would you be interested in learning about our investment attraction plan for Songshu Village?"

End of this chapter

There were more than a dozen merchants who were summoned to the temple by Lud for negotiations. At first, they simply hoped to buy a piece of land in the village to build a trading post, and also to give gifts to Lud, the local bigwig, hoping that he would take care of them in the future.

As it turned out, this seemingly upright old priest immediately proposed a business partnership with them. He even designated a large plot of land in the village to create something called an "economic development zone," hoping to attract these businessmen to invest locally and make money together.

Most of the businessmen present were cautiously skeptical of Lud's proposed plan, even mistakenly believing it was an excuse for Lud to extort money. They didn't want to participate but didn't want to directly refuse.

These merchants, who travel far from home year-round, have all experienced firsthand what it means for "poor and remote places to breed unruly people" and "the emperor is far away in the mountains!" And the church is generally no benevolent organization either. The priests control the local believers, and it wouldn't be too difficult for them to incite those unruly people to do something to these passing merchants!

Fortunately, Lud was not just empty talk; he prepared a detailed plan and even came up with a proper "butt kick"!

Pine Village's biggest advantage is its location at a new and important transportation hub. The two neighboring territories are currently building roads towards them, expected to be open before winter. After the dwarves conquer the ancient city, they will also build roads immediately to ensure connectivity with the outside world.

Therefore, for merchants who frequently do business in the northern region of the kingdom, Pine Village will definitely be a place they visit often in the future. Having a trading post there would make doing business much more convenient. However, Lude's expectations for Pine Village go beyond simply making it a logistics transit point.

How could the Industrial Party be content with merely being a middleman?

In the wonderful prospect that Lude described to the merchants, the future Pine Village would not only be a trade hub connecting the three places, but also an industrial town with complete supporting facilities, possessing a variety of unique "flagship products", and its industrial and commercial development prospects would be limitless.

As for what these "flagship products" look like, Ludger did not reveal them to the businessmen for the time being, citing commercial confidentiality. However, he repeatedly emphasized that these products are absolutely no worse than the various miracle drugs that are famous far and wide in their church!

With his flowery buttocks and eloquent speech, Lu De managed to tempt these businessmen with empty promises, making them all open their wallets to invest in his "future project."

The reason why the merchants were so willing to spend money was not simply because of Lud's persuasive skills, but because Lud promised to provide them, the investors, with various benefits, including free land leases, and all the terms would be put into formal contractual documents.

So the businessmen did the math and found that the money they would have to spend on the investment was not much different from buying the land directly. Moreover, once the factory in the village was set up, they would receive dividends as shareholders, so they would not lose money on this deal!

Similarly, Ludwig didn't actually lose out either.

Compared to directly selling land to raise funds, a major function of attracting investment is to establish common interests with these businessmen, which helps to expand networks and lay the foundation for further cooperation in the future.

However, as things stand, Lud's "development zone" remains only on paper; the plot of land marked out hasn't even been cleared of weeds yet. After all, before industrial transformation can begin, Lud must first unleash the local productive forces.

Currently, Songshu Village has a permanent population of over 3,500, but more than 90% of the villagers are farmers. Low grain yields tie most of the labor force to the fields. Lu De hopes to develop industry but does not want to give up self-sufficiency, so agricultural upgrading is imperative.

So over the past year, Lu De mobilized the villagers three times to build water conservancy projects, digging irrigation canals with a total length of 13,000 meters, and diverting water to low-lying areas to form ponds for future aquaculture.

In addition, Lude improved farming tools, tried every means to introduce and cultivate superior varieties, and used divine magic to develop Golden Fertilizer! The first batch of divine magic fertilizer was used in fifty acres of experimental fields two weeks ago, just waiting to make a name for itself at the autumn harvest, so that Lude could take the opportunity to add a "fertile" divine position to Aina.

If agricultural upgrading goes smoothly, Ludwig estimates that next year agricultural production could triple while freeing up the labor force of about 500 people.

Of course! It would be a pipe dream to develop industry with such a small population, so Lud also set his sights on the upcoming Steelwhip Clan, which consists of tens of thousands of dwarves. He plans to trick Gulig into joining them as well.

Three days later, around noon, two light cavalrymen came from the south and galloped into the two military camps outside the village to report an important message to their masters.

The dwarves, who had been eagerly awaiting their arrival for many days, have finally come!

Soon, Lude also received the news, so he put down what he was doing and took his whole family out to see the excitement.

As soon as the group stepped out of the temple gate, they saw a large, dark mass approaching from the south, like shadows cast by dark clouds on the ground.

Lude casually cast a far-seeing spell on himself, and his eyes immediately saw the dwarves who were still two or three miles away.

The migrating caravan, stretching for miles, was led by a group of about a hundred dwarven ram riders. Their fine armor shone with a unique glow in the sunlight, making the riders appear somewhat ethereal, as if it were a unique optical camouflage.

Following closely behind these cavalry were five columns of dwarven heavy infantry. Their armor was noticeably thicker and more robust than that of the cavalry, but it lacked the aura of cavalry armor. Each soldier carried a double-edged battle axe and a large shield on his back, resembling miniature fortresses on the move.

These well-equipped dwarven regulars numbered about seven or eight hundred, and behind them were ordinary civilians. The disorganized ranks were still discernible, with a jumble of heads and a long line of caravans.

"More than 30,000 people, that's quite a lot!"

Based on the information continuously relayed from before, the Steel Whip Clan's numbers had snowballed, more than tripling since they first left the capital. By the time they arrived at Pine Village, their total numbers had exceeded 32,000, far surpassing the initial estimate of 15,000.

The total number of dwarves in the entire Kingdom of Duran is less than 50,000, and now more than half of them have gathered under the command of the Steelwhip Clan.

This made Lude quite curious about how Gulig had managed to do it.

End of this chapter

Knowing beforehand that the dwarves were coming, Lud had made a point of brushing up on his knowledge of the race to avoid saying the wrong thing and causing unnecessary embarrassment upon meeting them.

As the demi-human race that lives in the most harmonious relationship with humans, dwarves are world-renowned for their superb forging skills and metallurgical technology. They are recognized as a nation of artisans in the world. "Dwarf-made" is almost synonymous with quality and high-end products. They do not rely on self-promotion or data fabrication, but on their genuine skills.

Interestingly, the dwarves are skilled at blacksmithing, which is not only influenced by their own cultural atmosphere but also related to their unique physical constitution.