The Nerd Turned Conqueror: A Fantasy Harem Adventure

by Oscar Reeds

  Surprisingly, the Eighth Sector didn’t give a damn about my conquest. Fistote invited me over and offered me a quick surrender, but I refused. I liked this guy, and I told him that he will remain the only independent area on the planet, as long as he continued not giving a damn about the outside world. He agreed, and we actually became friends later. I have to mention that he has a wicked collection of old statues. Of course, as an emperor, I kept supplying him with more, and he devoted seven entire buildings for his collection.

  So now I had two massive areas to conquer. Eak and Egak, ruled by Eak and Egak. Sonia told me about their history. Their father actually held the area together during his reign, but he died of an unexpected illness. Some speculated that it was poison or some other kind of foul play, but no – he literally died from an illness. His two sons then bickered for supremacy of that one area, which I think was called Urkan or Erkhen or something. It didn’t matter – they split it, and to show how megalomaniacal they were, they named their areas after themselves. They would then wage war from time to time, normally around the borders of their sectors, and every time the border villages would either go to one or the other. So my first order of business was to conquer the border, so to speak. Now the only thing separating them was me, and none of them liked it. They couldn’t get help, as I held most of the planet under my thumb, and they damn sure couldn’t work together. So what was there left to do?

  And that was my most brilliant plan there. I decided to help both by attacking both. I offered open support to Egak, claiming that he was the rightful heir to the whole sector, and began to openly supply him with the army and the cash. However, I secretly supported Eak, giving him my criminals and diverting all of Egak’s new earnings to him. My shape-shifting Ehre continued to infiltrate both armies, and I even managed to sneak in several pockets of soldiers underground, led either by Penna or Arduck. Dahrmites were settling in each new area I would either win openly for Egak or win unknowingly to him for Eak. For some reason, they were both losing lots of men, while I kept gaining more local support. Soon enough, areas within these sectors began to openly declare their rebellion against either master. Engaged in a war on two fronts, neither Eak nor Egak had the capacity to quench these rebellions. They grew in number and size, and soon enough, both brothers were reduced to their capitals.

  I decided to throw down the last punch. I proposed to Egak to call for a truce, and if he did that, he would keep what little territory he had, but with a catch – my army would kill Eak during the negotiations, and he would take control. On the other hand, I offered Eak a similar deal, but secretly. Both accepted it hook, line, and sinker. However, I had to make the whole thing public, so we decided to have the peace treaty in the Eighth Sector, the only territory not ravaged by war. Fistote arranged for them to sit in a palace, and each of their personal guards was at the ready, just in case some foul play was afoot. I instructed some Ehre to broadcast live what was happening, and they did so with their particular speech which could reach the whole planet. As I held my own speech, I waved my hands and lifted both dukes in the air, where they were fidgeting and begging for help. Fistote merely giggled at this, while my Dahrmites and artificial Ehre slaughtered their personal guard. The ruler twins were literally left with no supporter of their own anywhere on the planet. The popular sentiment had already shifted, and they were all chanting my name. In fact, I made it a point to broadcast this as well – thousands of loyal Ehre across the planet were mentioning my name, and I could literally hear tens of thousands in the Eighth Sector alone screaming “Conrad! Conrad! Conrad!” Nobody on the planet could compete with that. The brothers knew defeat then and there and more or less accepted their fate. Considering I don’t like splitting twins, I fashioned a huge blade and dropped it on their necks, literally killing them at the same time. They were deposed, and their sectors became mine.

  In the glory of my conquest of the Ehre, I proclaimed the Eighth Sector the “peace place” and gave it the name Breastia. Not quite original, but I still liked it. I was crowned emperor shortly after, and right then and there I declared both planets the Empire of Conrad. By way of migration, I ordered for both the Dahrmites and the Ehre to move at least half of their populations to the other planet, making them more homogenous. At long last, they could have an empire which was run by someone other than a Dahrmite or an Ehre, an empire of peace that spanned two planets. And the ruler was, of course, Endolande, a human like me. I issued statues to be crafted in my name, as well as churches, shopping districts, and whorehouses. I looked at Norman, and could tell he was pleased.

  But I wasn’t. That was just one planet, and my appetites grew larger.

  CONQUEST #2: GIRODIA

  After becoming emperor of no less than two planets in mere days, I set my sights on a different planet. Discussing with the top scientists of both Dahrmite and Ehre race, I made a list of planets I was going to conquer and utilize to my advantage. One such planet, a nice little light speed jump away, was Girodia.

  Girodia was very Earth-like, with an added difference that every inch of it was used. Even the deepest parts of the ocean had stations built atop of them, with towers having foundations in the planet’s crust itself. Not to mention that there were airborne buildings as well, sometimes even entire airborne islands! The structures all over looked stunning. I couldn’t begin to describe you what a single building looked like, nor would I want to, as it would take away from their proper beauty. But regular housing was decent as well, if not a little too simplistic for my taste. The people inhabiting this rock were almost human, with beautiful sapphire-blue features to them and wide, inviting eyes. And unlike us earthlings, they actually had a third gender, one that was roughly the mix of both. From what I knew, men of this planet engaged in war, hard labor and hard sciences, women engaged in diplomacy, the arts, and child rearing, whereas the Thirds, as they called them, were in charge of agriculture and naturification in general. Everyone seemed to enjoy their lives to the fullest, and it was one of those rare planets in the cosmos, I learned, that had actually enjoyed proper peace.

  Naturally, there was a reason they enjoyed peace, and a reason why they didn’t wage war. The reason was that they were simply unbeatable. Unlike most planets in the region, their technology had advanced to a position where nearly everyone could envy them. But not all technology was that revered but one. One major aspect of the whole of Girodia – the tech regarding teleportation.

  That’s right. These good people could teleport whatever or whoever wherever, whenever and however they wanted to. From the smallest bacterium to the largest landmass, the Girodians could transport literally everything and everyone they wanted at a push of a button. This effectively explained away their architecture and efficient building time. Norman pointed out one particular building the size of the Empire State Building, and told me it was built in less than a month. Less than a damn month! How he knew the duration of its building I had no idea, but I had stopped asking a while ago – I figured Norman had had a turbulent life during his own fighting days, so he must have seen some weird shit. Knowing how long it took for a building to be done was just something that came to him on the fly, I suppose.

  But back to the Girodians. As I stated, their teleportation tech was astounding, and I dared not attack them head on. So I applied diplomacy here. I approached their Council of Five, and they took me in as a guest, but kept a wary eye. After all, I did just decimate two planets in less than a few days, so I wasn’t entirely trustworthy.

  The five assigned me a guide, a beautiful buxom girl called Flara. She immediately had the hots for Arduck, and I could tell he was intrigued. While she was getting her notes out, I took him aside and explained away our potential plan. He nodded, not entirely agreeing with it. I couldn’t blame him.

  Flara showed us everything a tourist was meant to know about Girodia. She gave us the tour of the great monuments of the planet’s capital city, including one related to the war of Waruinia, the las
t battle they engaged in and the one they came out of victorious. Several planets joined this war, but only Girodia came out practically undamaged. Oh how I was going to rectify that soon!

  Aside from the monuments, Flara also showed us the museums, the schools, the libraries, several graveyards, and then took us to enjoy the city scene. I saw equivalents of coffee houses, hotels, motels, bookstores, toy stores, and even what looked like a massive playground. The kids were surprisingly scarce on the planet, with maybe ten or so in total frolicking when I visited the planet. That was because the life span of an average Girodian is massive – they can live up to 400 years, which is why they don’t bother making kids until they’re at least 200. Flara was, indeed, herself roughly 80, though she looked like a high school girl.

  With a high school girl’s smile, she took us to a café, and we ordered meals that would not harm either me or my two species’ worth of soldiers and captains. We conversed about the technology her planet had, and I learned a LOT. For example, typical teleportation devices looked like phone booths. You could take one and go anywhere at any time. It was free, too, though there was some level of regulation – you couldn’t exactly teleport inside of a private residence, though that was to be expected. They also had small, portable teleporting remotes, which they would point somewhere and move to a different set of coordinates. Kind of like Rick’s gun in Rick and Morty, but a bit more sleek-looking. It had all of the advantages that anyone on earth dreaming of teleporting can imagine – you could travel with it to distant lands, go to the highest of mountains or lowest of caverns, and even dick around with it like a toy. Again, it came with regulations, but nothing major. Next, they had massive, building-sized teleporters which they used to transport vast amounts of rock, soil, and water. That way they more or less solved all of their climate and pollution issues, as well as irrigation or removing excess water. It was all very simple, but these teleporters required lots of maintenance. Finally, there were these odd teleporters that looked small but were used for bigger projects. It was in Bleach, I believe, when Ishida Uryuu uses his blades in his attack called Seele Schneider, where he sticks them in the ground around the opponent, and then activates it. This was similar to that. A person would stick a few rods deep into the soil, largely around the area they were planning on transporting. In a matter of minutes, that area would be moved, and a gaping crater would remain. These rods also had a marine version – they would float on water, and at the press of a button, said water would be transported, but the crater wouldn’t remain for long, as it would merely be filled with the remaining water in the ocean, or lake, or wherever.

  But it wasn’t just tech that Flara was talking about. She also touched upon their culture, their wonderful Dance of the Spring Cycle, the planet-wide Festival of the Unseen, the beautiful way the Ortegas (something that looks like a mix between a dolphin and a used car salesman) swam across the vast oceans and saluted the onlookers, the incredible way they came up with their technology and implemented it with nature, the list of problems they got rid of, diseases they cured, crimes they eradicated, treaties they hosted, planets they influenced. And, of course, she talked of love. She talked of love like any young woman would, love that would move the very heart of man to do the impossible.

  It was at this point when Arduck joined the conversation, and even though she was several genes away from my species, I could tell she had fire in her eyes. She was smitten; to her, this battle-hardened warrior had just opened a bit of his armored soul to her, deciding to share everything, to give her that privilege of knowing more about him than any other woman could even dream of. She took in everything Arduck spoke of, every battle he took part in, every second of his times in trenches, every time he had shore leave, every woman he ever dated (which made her frown ever so slightly), every brother he lost, every word his father told him upon leaving for another battle, every second of every minute of every hour of every day of every week of every month of every year of every damn waking moment where he contemplated just ending it all and just leaving, really leaving, everything behind in order to settle down at a remote place, alone with his thoughts.

  They exchanged a notion which bore the same weight as a kiss, and it was at this point when I signaled him. He hated that. But then again, it was time to move. Flara was about to show us to our rooms, for we had separate, large bungalows for guests. Flara, Arduck and I entered that one bungalow. Some hours later, Arduck, I, and a Flara exited. A Flara clearly not the one from earlier that day.

  While my troops were secretly transporting a bound, gagged, and fainted Girodian girl to my main ship, passing her off as cargo, I approached the Council of Five. From what I understood, no laws would pass until all of them agreed upon it, irrespective of what the audience out there would have voted upon. And once the decision was made, it was final UNTIL the five changed their minds. And so it was that we deliberated on things for a few hours. They told me flatly that they could not give their tech to outsiders, only advice on how to make it. Yet I needed more than advice – I needed the machines, and I needed the manpower. Not to mention that I also needed the teleporters to transfer things to earth, as well as other planets. To that end, they were firm; their tech was not to leave their planet, and even if they wanted to, they couldn’t really transfer that far away, for they needed bits of collapsed stars, and only the planet Cotahan had those. A planet whose name and location I filed away for later use. The people of this planet knew who I was, for news spread fast of my successes. They could barely believe that I didn’t attack them already. But I assured them that no blood will be shed, and no Girodian will die. Flara agreed.

  After a wink and a nod to no one in particular, I suggested we all move to our quarters and wait for an hour for an official response. They all agreed, and everyone left. But nobody had to wait that long. In less than twenty minutes, five individuals did indeed come back to the stage, with me right there, and Flara not far behind. Each of them told the bewildered crowd that, from that point forward, all future decisions regarding Girodia would fall on Emperor Conrad. Effective immediately, the five were disbanded, and the people were serving their new lord. I admit, I felt rather epic then.

  And yes, the original five which got replaced by my shape shifters were transported to my ships and driven to the Ehre planet to be imprisoned, as was Flara, the original Flara. Arduck, I could tell, was not going to forgive me for that, but conquest is conquest, and, as they say, all is fair in love and war. He especially didn’t like that the people had dubbed me Conrad Fair-Tongued – the people were praising my oratorical skills and powers of persuasion. He saw it as the tongue that ordered him to go against his heart.

  I troubled Norman for a surge before any of this had happened. Now I was able to transfer any knowledge on any subject from a single person to me. That’s how I learned of the inner workings of Girodian politics, as well as how their tech works. Naturally, now I had everything at my disposal, but I still wanted to have that knowledge, just so I could use it when all else failed. And it was as I had promised – no Girodian died. And in fact, I didn’t even perform massive migrations this time. I merely left them to their own devices, but managed to install roughly half a million artificial Girodians who acted as ticking time bombs. If ever there were any rebellion anywhere, one would explode and cause a chain reaction. They all had the capacity of the Tsar Bomba, and worst of all – the moment they exploded, they multiplied, producing ten from a single dead body. Those ten would go on to explode, multiplying again and again, etc. I must admit, I got rather creative with the way I could create artificial beings now. It’s amazing what a determined mind can do with a simple ability and some time!

  All in all, Girodia was mine. Cotahan awaited.

  CONQUEST #3: COTAHAN

  Cotahan was quite the distance from Girodia, but it was easy to get to. They actually performed semi-regular trade with Girodia, so there were ports which would take Girodian ships. I entered one such port, only to b
e greeted by an entire army of angry Cotahi. Without a lot of effort, I surrendered and all of my men were sent to prisons.

  With Cotahan I had to be careful. It was a planet with a high percentage of silicates in the atmosphere, which made them unsuitable for my Dahrmite soldiers. I ordered Arduck to maintain his fleet of ships behind a local moon which barely moved. From what Norman explained to me, it was a “stationary celestial sphere,” meaning it never shifted position, no matter what happened. How this defiance of physics came to happen, I have no idea, but it was good for me, for I could hide my army behind the dark side of it, the side nobody on Cotahan could see.

  But Cotahan was not just dangerous for its air. The plant life here despised strangers. Any intelligent life form other than the Cotahi would get infected quickly and die a miserable death. That’s why even the Cotahi lived in isolated, dome-like areas. But they still kept plants in safe containers, only willing to unleash them if a would-be conqueror were to arrive.

  And now, one has. Within prison, the guards were tempted to release me just so that they could unleash one such plant on me. It was a dastardly looking thing, so much so that it didn’t really look like any plant I know of. And judging by its fidgeting, I knew it wanted blood. So naturally, I turned to Norman, and he was ready with three requests, delivering three surges. First I made myself immune to that particular plant. Next I wanted immunity from all plants on this planet. Finally, I wanted to transfer immunity to others. The last of these I actually did, and now it was time to perform our great escape.

  Before I get into it, though, I should mention what the Cotahi looked like. You should imagine a goblin or gremlin-like head with long, drooping ears, four eyes, gaping mouths, three arms (one came from the back above the head), a set of wings, and no real legs to speak of. They were mostly divided into two castes, one being the regular grunts, and the other being the patricians. The regular grunts almost wore no clothes to speak of, other than an occasional helmet for a soldier or a guard, or maybe a girdle for a peasant or a citizen. The patricians were obviously far better dressed, with some even being so elaborate I mistook them for humans. The strangest thing is, they had no animals on this planet. It was just plants and the Cotahi. Stranger still, they never had any animals ever. But then again, with the plants being alive and kicking, who needs animals anyway?