Founding of the Knight Kingdom (Part 3)

Demonic beasts infested every corner of Kellierton.

Although they had successfully reclaimed the royal palace while the monsters' nest was empty, they now had to brace for the impending Wave.

“We are critically short on food and military supplies!”

“Scouts report that the demonic beasts will reach the royal castle within two days!”

The fundamental issue was that Kellierton was merely a splinter carved out from an Adrian Empire that had practically disintegrated in midair. While the fighting prowess of their knights was respectable, virtually everything else was severely depleted or nonexistent. They had less than a month’s worth of rations, and construction materials to rebuild the ruined city were nowhere to be found.

Feeling the weight of countless gazes upon her, Evelyn stared blankly up at the sky.

“Does the Head Moderator secretly hate me...?”

Every single day of Evelyn's life had become an unyielding survival game. Was it just her imagination, or had the stakes ballooned to an absurd scale right in the middle of this crisis? Unlike before, when death simply meant an end to her own misery, how many innocent lives now hung upon her shoulders?

“I just want to go home...”

It was right at that moment, as she was seized by a poignant ache of nostalgia for the days when her only concern was rationing canned tuna, that a chime rang out.

A fresh wind began to blow across the Gallery.

“Is that finally the last of it?”

Letting out a deep sigh, I straightened my aching back. For days on end, I had labored without rest at a single, grueling task: cleaning out the warehouse. I bought a replacement door from the system shop as a makeshift fix for the shattered entrance, tossed the pulverized debris into the rift, and swept out the cluttered interior. Finally, I propped the Masterpiece Sword gifted by the dwarves right beside the doorframe.

“That settles home security...”

Last time, I had blundered by relying far too much on the K2 and stowing my melee weapons out of arm's reach. Having a Masterpiece Sword standing guard by the threshold provided an immense sense of reassurance. That left just the Holy Sword.

“Now then, what should I do with you...?”

Vrrrrm.

As if pulsing with bright anticipation, the Holy Sword's radiance swelled and dimmed in rhythmic cycles. After some deliberation, I grabbed the sacred blade and laid it across the highest shelf, letting its holy aura illuminate the warehouse from above.

“You stay right there and serve as my ceiling light.”

...Vrrr.

Once I positioned the shotgun and hand grenades in easily accessible spots, the immediate preparations were finished. Yet a nagging sense of vulnerability lingered.

“It'd be nice if there were a way to make this whole space inherently indestructible.”

Tidying up was not enough. If the entire warehouse could be fortified like a survival bunker, capable of shrugging off external kinetic impacts and magical shockwaves, that would be ideal.

“Wait a second.”

A flash of inspiration struck. Could it be that the shop actually sold bunkers? Driven by curiosity, I scrolled through the system shop categories, and to my astonishment, a dedicated Bunker tab materialized before my eyes.

“Holy crap! Are you kidding me?!”

With one of these, wouldn't I be completely impervious to practically any assault? However, the moment my eyes landed on the price tags, my expression instantly froze.

“Whoa there.”

It had been several months since I was transmigrated into this other world. My current balance hovered around twenty thousand points. Considering that I had been generously handing out items and supplies all this time, twenty thousand points was actually a hefty sum. The problem was that the pricing structure for real estate was absurdly out of touch with reality.

“Is the system shop factoring in Earth's inflation rates or something?”

The numbers were downright ominous.

Especially that nuclear doomsday bunker. The note stating that its performance had been 'empirically verified' sent a chill down my spine.

“Did World War III break out on Earth after I got isekai'd?”

With no way of returning home, I had no ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠clue what Earth had become. Perhaps rifts had opened there as well, plunging my old world into the same desperate fight for survival. Shaking off the grim thought, I set a realistic goal.

“Let's aim for the Normal Bunker first.”

Luxury? Premium? Utterly out of the question for now.

Even this base model would be more than sufficient. To afford it, however, I needed to gather points and level up my Moderator rank, which inherently depended on keeping the Gallery users alive and active. My gaze drifted naturally toward the Golden Apple of the World Tree resting on my table.

Every single item gifted to me by the Gallums so far had possessed extraordinary properties: the Rabbit Warren Ticket, the Masterpiece Sword, the Holy Sword, the Golden Carrot, and so on. Yet this was the first time an item's description was so comically bare-bones.

“What if it literally does nothing?”

A momentary wave of anxiety washed over me just before taking a bite, but I quickly shrugged it off.

“Whatever, as long as it tastes good, that's a win in my book!”

If fruit is ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠delicious, what more could you ask for? I opened wide and sank my teeth into the crisp flesh.

Crunch!

“Otherworld Coin?”

It was like dumping a barrel of gasoline straight onto smoldering embers.

The instant the feature unlocked, a tidal wave of comments flooded the board as the Gallery erupted with intense curiosity. Without wasting a single second, Kellierton was the very first to dive headfirst into the newly opened investment tab.

“Smart move on their part.”

I clicked on the investment tab and opened the solitary listing posted by Kellierton. Under normal circumstances, one would expect investments denominated in Mana Dumplings, the standard dimensional currency. But Kellierton, cornered and desperate, was not in a position to be picky about what it took in.

Seeing the banter pick up, I decided to give the fire another heavy dose of fuel.

“Nice, nice. Smooth sailing.”

When Kellierton first posted its desperate plea, the Gallums were largely indifferent. But backed by an official system framework, and with me personally pouring in an enormous food supply to supercharge their odds of success, public enthusiasm skyrocketed. For me, it wasn't just throwing points away either; as an investment, I stood to reap massive returns once Kellierton stabilized. A win-win in every sense.

“It's getting there, but something's still missing...”

A faint sense of dissatisfaction remained. It felt as though pushing just a tiny bit further—just one precise nudge—would trigger an explosive breakthrough. I opened a direct chat window with our resident fallen lady.

Food was vital, and cloth was certainly useful, but those were not the most immediate survival necessities for Kellierton right now. Rumors had already begun spreading across the boards that packs of demonic beasts were converging on their borders.

“If that's all you need, it's trivial.”

The system shop was divine, and with it, I was invincible. I resolved to flood this fantasy realm with modern industrial steel—completely unaware of the cataclysmic cultural shock it would unleash.

A mere few hours after releasing the steel into the Otherworld, the entire Gallery was thrown into utter turmoil over the marketplace restock. Perhaps my mistake had been assuming that all steel was basically the same, carelessly dumping modern rolled plate without considering how its purity and tensile strength would be perceived by medieval smiths.

“Wait, what nonsense are they even spouting?”

I had literally just purchased the cheapest commodity grade steel from the modern catalog and listed it as-is. Yet somehow, against all logic, I had been canonized into a selfless holy saint devoid of worldly greed.

And the opportunity to test this miraculous steel supply arrived far sooner than expected.

The monstrous Wave was already right at their doorstep.