Greed God chapter 127

February 27th 2016 Gemworld 1:00 PM EDT

I  hadn't been expecting things to go like this. I wasn't against it,  marriage wasn't a huge deal, much less permanent than my Brand was as  far as I could tell. It would even help with my plan, making getting  close to her much easier, and give me an identity here I hadn't  literally made up on the spot. There were about a thousand advantages to  agreeing to a betrothal with Amy, and I was probably going to do it.  There was just one thing about it I didn't like. MY FUCKING PLANS WERE  ALL WRECKED!

I'd been slowly bringing her around, wrapping  her around my finger. I could still do that, no doubt, but it was going  to be much harder to get her enamored enough to feel like I would be a  good husband as soon as I'd been hoping to leave. Now I'd have to slow  court this bitch, and it was going to take me weeks longer than  expected. I'd been counting on sex to seal the deal, but while I could  have arranged to get her away long enough to fuck her when we were just  two people, the royals would doubtless have countermeasures against the  impending prince consort getting some before the wedding.

Still,  it was an answer to the current problem. At the very least it would but  me time to gather the points I needed for my plan, even if that time  would be spent trying to placate Barbie, who was almost definitely going  to lose every ounce of her shit over this. For the moment though, we  had to play this smart. I needed to give Amy a reason to be here that  didn't cause house Emerald to look too hard, otherwise they could get  wind of the quarries before they agreed to turn over the land. Amethyst  needed these quarries, and I didn't think Graciel would have another  option than to declare war to get them, especially given the magically  contractual need to protect me when I was supplying them.

As  such my only option was to say yes and hope we could steer this  situation away from devolving into a literal warring states situation  that would seriously fuck with my ability to get out of here. If I had  to force Amy to take us home in the middle of a war it would basically  ruin any chance of a cordial relationship. I'd end up micromanaging the  shit out of her until she found some loophole to fuck me over with, and  it would possibly prevent me from exploiting the resources here for the  money and power I was hoping to use them to accrue.

I  reached out and took the rings, kneeling down in front of her. I took  one ring and slipped it on her finger. If I had to roll with this shit I  might as well keep all my hard work going. I'd have to keep stacking  brownie points anyway, stupid to burn my good will with a tantrum  because things took a turn. I knew she was probably planning this to be  temporary, just a for show engagement she could cancel after they left,  but the only thing worse for me than not doing this would be doing it  and letting her walk it back. If she cut the engagement she would feel  all awkward and try to distance herself which I had even less time for.

So  I put on my most earnest expression, not too eager but serious and  hearfelt, and slipped the ring onto her finger. I wanted to take control  back of the situation, and making a production of accepting would help.  "It would be my honor, princess Amaya of house Amethyst, to betroth you  to my house." I changed the wording slightly, which I bet she would  have caught if she hadn't been all weak kneed at the romance of the  moment. She'd been expecting a business transaction and was getting  flustered.

The word choice there was actually extremely  important. Marrying her into MY house made her a Lord. Marrying into  hers made ME an Amethyst, and I absolutely wasn't putting up with that  shit. I liked my name, and having to introduce myself as Nicholas  Amethyst would be embarrassing, not to mention they would probably try  to restrict me to gemworld or something. Doing it this way would be  easier for my long term plans, I just had to hope she was too distracted  by this whole mess to rebuke me.

She was, and I heaved  and internal sight of relief as she let me slip the ring on her finger  with a blush. I almost groaned at her for getting all twitterpated while  we had shit to deal with, but I'd been banking on that exact  flightiness so I couldn't really complain. I stood up and turned to the  guard. "Lead us to the envoy." The former bandit had been standing  around silently, and now that he had a job again he rushed off, trusting  us to follow, which we both did. I wanted to try to intercept the envoy  before they entered the town. It was a show of strength to grant them  entry as opposed to letting them take it.

With Amaya here  and the new connection between us I wasn't too worried, but Emerald WAS  technically the owner of this land so I was hardly willing to let the  bastards get an inch they might try to leverage into a mile. Amy looked  torn between flustered and giddy, which seemed poorly timed to me, but  would at least help sell the lie when they got here. I already had a  headache from imagining the fallout of this whole clusterfuck of a day. I  had so many fucking plans to revise, and that was in a vacuum. I had no  clue how Graciel would take this.

If I wanted to keep the  engagement I doubted she would break it outright. Probably just give me  some impossible task to do to prove myself or some shit. It was the  last thing I had time for but Amy was my ride home and future meal  ticket. I'd have to make the trip back to Amaranthine after this to talk  through the politics of this mess. At least it would get me away from  Barbie for a bit. Plus having shown Amy the quarries and proved my  capability there at the very least they would have to treat me like a  trade partner as the contracts specified.

When we arrived  at the gate, it was just in time to see an ostentatious green carriage  drawn by a bear bade of polished gray stone trundling down the road. I  blinked at the sight, but remembered Emerald were beast tamers, so this  was probably the beast of whoever was in the carriage. Knowing Amy  wasn't as familiar with the rest of Emerald as she was with her one  friend, I turned to Roderick. "Hey big man, you have any clue who we're  about to be dealing with? Be nice to know exactly what we're dealing  with."

Roderick, whose gaze hadn't gotten less unhappy,  but had gotten slightly more confused by having to actually trat me  respectfully since I was theoretically in his chain of command now, just  nodded with a frown. "Earl Cesare. He's...problematic. They use him to  make visits to the outer edges of the kingdom. He's known to be somewhat  unrestrained, and his reputation keeps the smaller Baronies in line. It  isn't exactly a good sign he came, though he isn't a threat to princess  Amaya with me here, obviously."

I grimaced. Provincial  governor who abused his charges to make himself feel powerful. Annoying  when you were one of his charges. I should be protected, but worst case I  might have to fight that bear, and given Thud was E rank while Malcolm  was just F, that might be a D rank animal. I was strong but I doubted I  had that much fight in me. I'd have to lean on Amy and Roderick here. I  was suddenly much happier I'd accepted the engagement. Annoying problems  or not, this was going to be much easier with a tangible reason to lean  on Amethyst.

They would have helped either way I'm sure,  but their aid would be much more thorough now that their reputation was  tied to mine directly. Assuming Cesare was stupid enough to try to start  shit anyway. Even odds on that though. Bullies tended to be overly  prideful, and it wouldn't be a shock for him to try to establish  dominance in some oblique way to preserve his 'honor' or some shit. I'd  have to meet him first and get a feel for him to know for sure. Maybe  power hungry dicks who love to smash people under their boots were  different in Gemworld...not. As the carriage came within range, I used  appraisal on the bear though, just to see what we were dealing with.

[Appraisal  function activated. Treasure detected. Mountainrock Sovereign- D rank  Earth Spirit Bear. An indomitable foe with an unbreachable hide, the  Mountainrock Sovereign boasts a near perfect defense for its rank.  Despite being a bit slow to move, the beast is akin to a walking  fortress, such that even C ranked enemies may have trouble injuring it.]

Huh.  Well first off, that Sovereign thing was apparently it's name, which  made me immediately label Cesare a giant fucking tool. Second of all it  was apparently a full on tank. I'd seen from Waylon that hyper  specialized abilities high enough up the spectrum of rank could  transcend it a bit. I was guessing this thing just barely edged into C  rank territory in defense, which was irrelevant because it meant that I  had literally nothing that could even scratch this fucking thing. I made  a mental note to fix and upgrade that hammer for Waylon. Shit would be  perfect for this thing, but for now I had an annoying meeting to get to.

Within  a few minutes the carriage showed up at the gate, and my guards stepped  up to halt it, clearly unaware of the horrifying monstrosity of a bear  they were getting in the way of. I made a mental note to have the 'don't  judge a book by its cover' talk with the bandits. That thing might be  around the size of a normal bear but it was infinitely scarier than  Waylon's massive terror croc form. Fucking bandits had no survival  instinct. Luckily, the bear stopped instead of stepping on my men and  making bandit wine. Once it did, the driver hopped down and scurried to  the door to open it up.

The  man who stepped out of the thing was...easy to dislike. He head a  prominent nose, hawkish green eyes, blonde hair with a goatee and  generally seemed to be sneering at everything all the time. He kind of  reminded me of pictures I'd seen of Oliver Queen, and my momentary  fleeting desire to impregnate his wife if he had one drowned out all the  annoyance before I refocused on him, appraising the noble real quick to  get an idea what I was dealing with.

[Appraisal function activated. Treasure detected. Cesare  of Emerald- E rank Emerald Noble. A vain, petty member of the Emerald  kingdom aristocracy, Cesare was banished from polite Emerald society  because of his excessive cruelty and deviant sexual tastes, which  resulted in the deaths of multiple maids and servants, and eventually  the daughter of one of the Emerald side branches. Having crossed a line  but not enough of one to warrant execution Cesare was sent to the border  to oversee the lesser territories.]

Ah,  so a total asshole then. No one that full of themselves was going to be  shy about being a dipshit in front of Amy. I was positive he would make  some kind of power grab or try to put me in my place. Whatever the case  may be I doubted he would be able to do much with Roderick around to  handle the bear. I could deal with him personally if he started shit, so  mostly I was just curious about the political ramifications of this  little visit. Time to see if Emerald was going to buy me as the newest  potential member of the Amethyst royal family.