The Rise of the Black Plain

After Minos sent his orders to the Black Plain, it took his group a day to reach the last point on the border of that state with the Flaming Empire, where the capital of Rosser was.

This part between Rosser and the Flaming Empire had a mountain range marked by the extremes, where there were places that were very difficult to access unless one used a unique route.

Since there was no other point like this in Rosser, the royal family of this state had decided in ancient times to build their headquarters there, even considering the border with its number one enemy.

But having chosen this location to be its home, this organization had taken steps to secure its location, having developed a complex security barrier.

Such a thing was made up of special spiritual arrays placed on floating islands nearby, creating a region of restricted flight!

That was like a thermos, which had the outer limit, the inner limit, and the empty space between the two. So this flight restriction layer was between the outer and inner limits of the capital's security space, separated by a few kilometers.

Because of this, no being, winged or wingless, could fly in this space, and if they tried to force their way into this security space, they would plummet and be at the mercy of the royal guards on the ground.

Thus, even though this capital city was in such an extreme location, near the conflict area of the border, it existed as normal, with millions of people living without much concern regarding its location.

Only a Spiritual Sage could enter there, considering all its defenses. But someone like that could enter any other capital of their allied states, so this location was not a problem.

Minos and his wives were able to experience this as they entered this area, quickly passing through this security space where they really could not fly.

"That's very interesting!" Abby commented to Minos, eager to do something similar on the Black Plain.

Minos smiled at her and said. "This is only effective for those below the 9th stage.... Above that, cultivators can manipulate space and open wormholes to places they've been before or are within a certain distance of them."

"So it wouldn't work to do something like that?" Abby asked, feeling frustrated that her idea was refuted so quickly.

"Not in that way they use here," Gloria commented.

Minos then said. "To stop people from higher levels, only a dome with space stabilization arrays could bring the expected result..."

"Oh? Then we just need arrays of proper level to increase the security of our headquarters." Ruth commented as she thought of the Dry City Defensive Dome, which today protected only the core of the Minos government and army.

"That's right." Minos agreed with his wife, thinking it would be useless to copy Rosser since they would have people even stronger than Spiritual Sages on the Black Plain in the future.

As they talked, they passed through the checkpoint of that place, quickly gaining access to the capital by having identities related to the Spiritual Church.

With this, they soon arrived at a city with a very different construction style, extremely steep given the mountain it was located on.

There were many stairs in this place, and in some parts, the streets where carriages passed, the pedestrian sidewalks, were the roofs of buildings or houses.

Noticing this, how this place seemed to be a grandiose construction, Abby and Ruth, who had never seen anything of the kind, were open-mouthed, watching everything with interest.

As they did so while walking through the narrow streets of this city, each of which had magnificent views, Gloria was telling them some of the local histories.

"... Anyway, this place maintained its matriarchal tradition after this happened, with women ruling this state." She said, after talking for minutes without stopping.

Abby then commented. "I didn't expect that Albano and Rosser were parts of the same state in the past..."

"Hmmm." Ruth nodded to Abby. "The traditions here are all the same as in that place? Do they have reverse harem too, like the West family?"

Ruth was from the Flaming Empire, like Gloria, but she did not have the same information or experiences as this Archbishop of the Spiritual Church.

Aside from the nearly half-century difference in their ages, Ruth had never toured the enemy states of the Flaming Empire or had time to learn more detailed information.

She had just over ten years as a cultivator in the Gray Clouds Sect, leaving that place when she was not yet relevant. Hence, she naturally had not taken on significant enough responsibilities in that sect to learn some information about its enemies.

Ruth knew that Rosser was like Albano, a matriarchy. But other than that, she knew as much as Minos and Abby.

So the three of them looked at Gloria, and she answered their doubt, strangely smiling. "Not exactly."

"What do you mean?" The beautiful blue-haired woman questioned her harem sister.

That favorite redhead of Minos then said. "Here, the queen has a common harem. That is, she has several women..."

"What?" Abby exclaimed in surprise as Minos' eyes opened a little wider.

Ruth opened her mouth and asked. "And what is the royal succession like? How could she possibly have an heir? She'd only have bastards if she slept with men who aren't her spouses!"

Gloria smiled, considering that the local traditions indeed were strange. "Well, the local succession is done, as you said. Through bastards of the queen."

"In the royal family of this place, there is usually a period of the year, something that happens every year until at least two princesses are born, where the queen has sex with men chosen by her principal wives."

"Generally, they are people from large families, individuals who can support potential successors to the local throne if they can get the queen pregnant," Gloria said as her group viewed the local royal palace on top of the mountain.

"In some cases, such a person might be the brother or father of one of the queen's wives, since some of them are from pretty powerful families... Anyway, the local traditions are way out of the curve. Some people say that things here are almost as impressive as those in the Flower Kingdom."

Minos and his two wives were stunned by this. A woman with a harem of women was already something extremely unusual. But a woman with such a thing and still slept with men other than a husband was even more surprising.

In the Spiritual World, women who had preferences like that did not have children and did not want them either. So those three found such a situation strange.

"Unbelievable!" Minos muttered as he watched the sunset above that palace on the peak of the mountain they were on.

Gloria nodded at him. "Hmm. The current queen supposedly has 12 wives and 3 children, two of them being men and the other a girl. Of those three, their parents are two men, one is her first father-in-law, and the other is a patriarch of a large local family."

"My goodness..."

"There are all kinds of strange things in that world!"

Gloria laughed at those two. "You wouldn't believe it... But anyway, let's go to the local temple. Maybe we can get more agreements here as we did in Vogel."

...