Emperor of Steel

On the hill overlooking the houses and complexes which were just constructed.

Was a large castle built of black rock.

In the third floor of the castle was a study room, with a young man in his twenties with platinum hair looking out the window.

Luke was his name, looking down at the new estates which was built.

‘Time passed by so fast.’ He thought to himself.

It seemed like it was just the day before when he was killing time with the Imperial Army, however, two years had passed by.

After the monster wave was done, Luke had to stay a lot of time in the Navarre Duchy region and look for any monsters.

Although he didn’t like Princess Margareta who was obsessed with Sebastian and the king who desperately wanted Luke to tie the knot with the princess, the duchy didn’t seem so bad.

However, the emperor had no thoughts of letting Luke stay there, and after a span of 6 months, Luke was asked to return.

After coming back, whenever there was a problem, either home nation or the foreign ones, the Emperor ordered Luke to go.

He was used to crushing down the rebellious barbarians in the eastern mountains and to clear the world from the warlocks.

The problem was that the Emperor and his clerk men had blocked the information about the enemies Luke could be facing. It was all sorts of despicable conspiracy, distorting the truth or withholding information about possible allies.

But Luke wasn’t going let them take him down with that, so he managed to see things through.

He took the trials and crisis as an opportunity to train himself and his subordinates.

As a result, the white magic, dark magic, and his sword skills had increased sharply. Philip along with Kaper, Alex, Hobart, and Anna, grew brilliantly.

Philip was on the top with his Expert training, while Kaper was upbeat, Alex, Hobart, and Anna were good.

The improved knights became the retainers of the Rakan estate after they had been discharged from the Imperial Army and developed strong relationships with their families.

Meanwhile, every time Luke had increased his merit, his fame had risen and many young knights wanted to come and see him as his subordinate.

Luke picked out the useful and reliable ones from them and assigned them to the Knights of Territory.

‘But, the biggest achievement is definitely this.’

Luke pulled out the sword which was dangling from his waist and fused mana into it.

Srrrrr!

Golden aura began to form around the sword.

The aura grew till two meters and then slowly receded again.

No, rather than receding, it condensed.

The condensed aura began to take a clear shape and light, Luke looking down on it couldn’t help but smile.

‘Woah, will the Emperor jump out if he knows that I am able to make Gold Aura?’

Every time that he went to the Imperial Palace for getting merits and rewards for his actions, he could see the face of the Emperor twisting more and more.

He was irritated, but he had to laugh and appreciate Luke who had performed the task he had asked.

If the Emperor knew that Luke could form a Gold Aura, he would have a very different look.

“That is good, if you can form the Gold aura, you have taken a step closer to being a Sword Master.”

Knight General Rogers said that once, Luke finally managed to make a Gold Aura a few days back.

Originally he thought that it would take around 5 years to build a Gold Aura.

However, there was no better training plan than practice, so as he went around to the battles, his sword skills had increased much faster than expected.

“But where the second part of the Gold Sword which needs to lead to the Sword Sage?”

The Rakan territory had lost the second part of the Gold Sword which had to be in the family after the long decline of their riches.

The first half was more than enough to be a Sword Master but to become a Sword Sage, the second part was required.

The problem was that no one knew how or when it had disappeared.

Smart.

Luke was deep in his thoughts about the Gold Sword.

Along with the sound of a knock on the door, the voice of Hans greeted him. As soon as Luke had returned back, he immediately went down his title of deputy lord to a deacon and remained faithful to his role.

“Lord. It is time for the meeting. Please come.”

“Sure.”

Luke nodding his head headed to the Lord’s manor.

The area of the lordship was much greater than the time when he opened his eyes for the first time.

Along the walls, houses and rounds were densely lined. The small shops were no three storey shopping complexes.

As a result, the size of the manor too had quadrupled, and the population had increased to 100,000.

‘This is still smaller than Lamer, but in a few years this will surely surpass it.’

The possibility of the development of his estate was infinite.

As you pass the main gate across the town, one could see the Knight’s building on the left.

In the knight’s division in the past year, more than a hundred knights were divided for the battle purpose.

The side wearing the golden armor were the Rakan Knights, and the side wearing the silver armor were Unicorn knights.

Shortly after his discharge, Luke created the new knight’s category with Kaper and the others in it.

The name was Unicorn knights, and the ones in it would learn Silver Sword.

And the most skillful of them was Kaper, the commander.

Kaper along with Philip, who was appointed as the Commander for the Rakan knights, watched the battle of the two knights and gave them proper orders.

“Nice, you’re doing good!”

When it came down to skills, the Rakan Knights learning the Gold Sword was better.

However, the Unicorn knights were filling in the lacking skills with rich experience and organizational skills acquired in the military.

So the battles between the two knights were almost close.

Of course, the case would be different if higher players like the captain join in, but with just the basic members they weren’t letting the other one win.

“From this moment start using aura!”

With Philip’s words about using aura, the knights who were purely displaying their individual swordsmanship changed into a storm.

Seeing the scene unfold as the swords began to display the aura, Hans with his face bright said, “I don’t think that we would get along well with the Knights of Guard.”

The Baroque Imperial had Knights of Guard and were very well known for their ability as individuals and groups.

They were closely paired with the Holy Arthenia Empire, the strongest Empire on the continent.

Luke smiled and shook his head.

“You might not see it, but in my opinion, Rakan knights or the Unicorn Knights are still less than the Knights of Guard.”

He had heard from Philip, a former member of the Knights of Guard, that they were categorized into groups: Gold Guards, Silver Guards, and Iron Guards.

Among them, the flagship Gold Guards were told to be composed of Experts of intermediate and above only.

The Rakan Knights who learned the Silver and Gold Sword since the young age were no less than the Gold Guards.

However, the number of knights caused a fall in comparison.

The Unicorn knights were just one step below the Gold Guards.

Each knight’s group in the Unicorn had an intermediate leader.

Of course, even with all of that, the two knights division of Rakan were at the top of the Empire.

‘But we might never know what would happen later.’

As the Knights of Guard had a higher status, there could be many stories and rumors.

Among the three units, there wasn’t any peaceful relationship, the nobles deceived and used trickery; they neglect training and don’t like being bothered. They kept the truth hidden about the skills of a noble’s son.

Luke, who often had to travel to the Imperial Palace for merits and had heard all kinds of rumors about the Knights of Guard.

It didn’t seem that obvious, but it was clear that there was a problem in it.

That could be known by seeing what had happened to Luke in the past.

‘Even then, we can’t wait for the enemy to die, we need to get stronger. We won’t be able to stand a chance unless we build our strength.’

Luke who stopped to watch the knights training, began to walk towards the manor once again.