Building My SSS-Rank Universal Empire: From Trash to Cosmic Overlord-Chapter 184: Loots

Vale and the Flagbearers toured the fortress for resources. They went into the storage and found armor, weapons, and enchanted tools. They found herbs and potions, essence stones and gold coins, preserved food, and wines.

Most of the items had been separated and stored in spatial rings, so it was easy to share by just transferring and emptying them.

But before they shared the enchanted tools, they went to the CrimsonHood, where the same thing happened, talk to the soldiers, get the loot, and share the resources.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t any legendary artifact, not to mention Chained ones. And as per the agreement, Vale had the choice of the first two picks.

His first two picks were the Abyssal Chainblade, a segmented sword that can shift into a whip-like blade, made from darksteel and infused with void energy. It can extend and retract at will, allowing the user to attack from unpredictable angles. When fully extended, it drains essence from those it cuts.

And the Stormpiercer Javelin, a sleek, silver javelin crackling with bottled lightning, engraved with a tempest rune. When thrown, it summons a lightning bolt to strike the target alongside the impact. It can pierce through most basic magical barriers.

He planned to give them to Tiber and Slya the chainblade to Slya and the javelin to Tiber. Unfortunately, there weren’t any more powerful artifacts. Most that remained were basic, but none that could be used for battle.

Pomora grumbled that they must have a secret stash and that this couldn’t be all they had. Vale agreed with her, but there was nothing he could do about it. The only thing that bothered Vale was that he found no clue about who Sevrix was working for, no documents or anything left behind.

And even though he knew he wouldn’t find such with CrimsonHood, he still searched for it anyway. But at least CrimsonHood provided a lot of gold.

After that, the Flagbearers began the tedious work of sharing the Knights. Vale didn’t involve himself in this and let them deal with it as they wished.

But as promised, Vale made sure two towers were given to Takoda, as he was the one who suffered the greatest loss in battle. He was also given the most Knights.

It was closer to evening by the time they were done, and the already-packed Knights went to their various new fortresses. It remained Vale and his companions in the Scuffed Bones fortress, but Manefor was staying with them. Takoda wanted to put a guard for the safety of the Blessed.

Vale didn’t disagree. With the tower out of commission for a while, he would take all the help he could get. And Manefor was a powerful Knight.

"Did you hear any news about the Clan?" Vale asked. He was leaning against the roof of the fortress itself, looking at the sunset that so reminded him of his days back at the Clan. Each sunset almost always caught him in a soak after a long day of tedious work.

Tiber shook his head. "News has been slow since we reached here. Last I heard, everything was silent and normal. There wasn’t anything dramatic happening, except that the Chiefs had stopped complaining about the growing threat of the neighboring Clan." 𝗳𝚛𝚎𝚎𝘄𝕖𝕓𝕟𝕠𝚟𝚎𝕝.𝗰𝕠𝐦

Vale smiled wearily. "Isn’t that even worse?"

Tiber nodded. "I agree. It means they already found a solution to their problems." He hesitated. "Honestly, I don’t know why the Clan leader doesn’t just make some move. Having the military move closer to the border alone would be enough."

Vale shrugged. "I don’t know either. It’s as if he’s baiting the Chiefs and Elders? I don’t know how that’s supposed to work for him in the long run, though."

Slya grinned. She had forged a platform that extended outside the roof and was sitting on it. "Maybe he’s waiting for them to attack him so he can truly know his enemy, then take them all out in one go?"

"Maybe," Vale said doubtfully. From what he knew, his father had isolated himself for too long. If he had any friends among the Chiefs before, those relationships must now be strained and stale.

"Don’t worry, you’ll soon join them—shake things up as you did here!" Slya told him.

Vale managed a smile and then sighed. ’...Yes... that’ll be true if I still manage to keep the Master Knights with me, anyway. And there’s nothing like shaking things up... Taking over seems like the plan...’

They talked some more before retreating for the night. Tiber cooked them something from the ingredients that were left behind, and they ate before heading to their respective rooms. Vale’s plan for the next day was to find a place with a high concentration of essence so his tower might heal quicker.

And the next day began. The best place to find such an environment was in ruins, so the four of them found a ruin to clear, which wasn’t as easy as it sounded. The ruins here were at the level of the Errant Knights, and the monsters were powerful.

The only reason they were able to clear it was that they chose the weakest one they could find. Then Tiber, Slya, and Manefor acted as bait to distract the monsters and the boss while Vale set up his bigger Infernal Ball and then one-shot the boss.

Nearly. The boss was severely wounded but didn’t die. It turned its fury-filled eyes to Vale and decided it wanted them to die together. The other monsters stopped chasing the baits and rushed back, weakened by their boss’s wound.

Now it was Vale running because his core was nearly dried, while the others chased the weakened monsters to finish them off. After that, they set up camp and tried the meat of the monsters while Vale made his tower expand.

The essence in the ruin was thicker than outside, concentrated, too, so the tower was able to soak in it and use it to slowly heal itself. This gave Vale and the others time to rest. After all, no one knew when they would have a chance like this again.