When Alfred returned to his castle, the butler had already set everything in order. The place gleamed; even the floor shone like a still lake, a mirror of stone.

It showed how seriously Butler Komir took this. The servants were undead, tireless as night tides; in no time, they scrubbed the place to bone-white.

But the food fell short. They needed a banquet for three thousand, a feast like a harvest moon, and the larders were bare as winter fields.

Alfred understood at once. He almost ordered a raid on the nearest town, wolves after lambs, then he checked himself and swallowed the heat.

“Hold it. Find anything valuable. Take it to the nearby town and trade for food. No looting, got it?” His voice cracked like a whip in cold air.

He’d planned to snatch supplies, quick as a knife. Then the thought stabbed back: this wasn’t any expedition. This was the Demon King’s own host.

If the three Demon Kings asked where the food came from, how would he answer? Pride prickled like thorns before a crowd of brothers.

Tell the truth? He’d look penniless, a lord begging alms, shame falling like rain.

Lie? The notion died in less than a heartbeat, thread cut clean. Those three could peer along the river of time; lying was a moth into flame.

Besides, the Expeditionary Corps Field Manual bound him. Worlds under their rule followed the High Civilization Code, a backbone like a mountain’s spine.

This world had once been Alfred’s domain. By that Code, as a god, he must not “rob” mortals, the way thunder spares the temple bell.

So a few bats lifted a bulging sack of gold and winged from the castle, black darts heading for town to fetch back food.

“You little rascals, don’t forget the wine!” Alfred called as they climbed like onyx leaves into the sky. With no food yet, he could only wait.

He held back from carving the rune array to bring the expedition across. If you start, you finish; if you host, you host like spring rain.

He’d set the tables first, so the army could wash off the dust the moment they arrived, guests stepping from snow into firelight.

Staring at the castle, Alfred felt something missing, a hollow like wind through a gate.

A banner—yes, a banner.

With a soft whoosh, a flagstaff bloomed in his hand. Black and white wings spread a little; a demonlike figure loomed over the star sea like a shadowed peak.

The figure stayed blurred, but the twin wings, one dark, one bright, were clear as frost.

“Butler, plant this Void Banner above the castle,” he said, voice steady as iron. “And when the expedition descends, drill the servants on the slogans and the welcome.”

“The Thirteenth Legion of the Demon King’s Expeditionary Corps wears black, with a burning flame on the chest. Greet them with the usual calls.”

“Shout things like, Welcome to the Expeditionary Army. Among them are three lords who dress unlike the rest; they’re the heads. Address them as Demon King.”

Alfred rattled off etiquette to Komir, words clattering like beads. When higher-ups inspect, you polish your armor till it sings.

His chatter with the butler left the bystanders baffled. Keliya, the dog-headed strategist, and the others from the Crystal-Radiance Temple wore matching blank faces.

Expeditionary army? Demon Kings? They didn’t get the words, but the weight felt like thunderheads.

Keliya, closest to him, tugged his sleeve like a worried sparrow. “This isn’t for us, is it? You’re hosting that expedition?”

Alfred nodded and sipped red wine; his wine-red pupils lifted to the sky like embers.

“Keke, and all of you who chose to follow me. You know I’m wanted by the God-King and the King of the Dead. Where do I find the nerve to ask you along?”

The worry pressed first, heavy as fog. Then he raised a hand toward the Void Banner spearing the roofline, and his voice steadied like a drum.

“See that? That Void Banner stands for a high civilization. In that civilization’s grades, the world of Koramor isn’t high, only middle-tier.”

“More than ten years ago, that high civilization sent out twelve… no, thirteen expeditionary armies. I, Alfred, was just a grunt in the Third.”

“Think about it. A nameless grunt like me stirred ‘high-civilization Koramor’ into storm and blood. Next, the Thirteenth will descend on this world.”

His friends stared, eyes wide as moons. If one nobody could do that to Koramor, what if an Alfred the Second, or a Third, popped up?

And if a whole legion fell like a mountain?

Some wondered if Alfred was conning them. But the thought faded like dew. By tomorrow, truth would stand like noon.

If no army appeared, the lie would tear like paper.

The dog-headed strategist gazed at Alfred, eyes bright as lamps. “Boss, when the expedition comes, will life change for us orcs?”

A beastman with an eagle’s head and a man’s body chimed in, voice rough as gravel. Orcs ranked third in numbers, yet lived poorer than humans, thin as winter reeds.

They remembered bitterness like old tea. Under Alfred, it hadn’t been great, but after he fell, Ymir and the humans turned colder than iron.

“This…I can’t promise,” Alfred said, honesty bare as steel. “Once the expedition arrives, we won’t know who’ll run this world.”

“But if I still govern it, I’ll make your orc lives better, greener than spring fields. That much, I can swear.”

“Relax. A world without a single god doesn’t catch my brothers’ eyes. If not for my ties to you, I wouldn’t bother with a low-civ world.”

“Once I become an Astral Envoy, I might hand it off, like passing a lantern in a long night.”

“Astral Envoy?” Keliya seized on the new word, curiosity fluttering like a moth. She stared at Alfred, asking for a key.

Alfred realized he’d let it slip, a pebble skittering down a cliff. In the expedition, it wasn’t a secret, but to them, it was an outside wind.

“An Astral Envoy means what it says, a messenger of the star-realms. Think of the ‘astral’ as the unit of worlds; one world is one realm.”

He paused, then smiled like dawn breaking. “And honestly, I think each of you has a shot.”

In Miracle City, a plan had long circulated like a whispered hymn: the Astral Administration Plan. They said the First Demon King, the Void Messenger, proposed it.

In that plan, a hundred realms make a district. A hundred districts make a system. A hundred systems make a domain, laddered like constellations.

Normally, an ordinary god manages a single world. Gods who travel to manage worlds are called Astral Envoys, realm-level, a lantern for one house.

Manage a hundred worlds, and you’re district-level, a beacon over a city. A hundred districts, system-level, a lighthouse for a sea.

Manage a hundred systems, and you rise to domain-level, a sun for a sky. District means a hundred worlds, system ten thousand, domain a hundred million.

Domain-level means shepherding a hundred million worlds. Only a Primordial Deity, who crosses starfields in a single thought, can wear that crown.

For now, it’s just a concept, a map drawn in cloud. If I become an Astral Envoy and hold several worlds, one man can’t handle it all.

Then I’ll have my friends help manage them, like captains steering sister ships. You stuck with me while I’m hunted; I’ll win you real spoils.

His words made heads spin, thoughts tumbling like leaves in a gale. The leaps were big; the ground kept shifting.

After a while, they grasped one thing, bright as a torch. Follow Alfred, and one day they might govern a world.

Heaven and earth, that’s the gap. What’s “high-civilization Koramor” worth, a cracked coin in the dark?

Follow Koramor’s way, and what do you get? A nameless god, walking on eggshells before high gods, fearing a frown like a guillotine.

Follow Alfred, and you might hold a world, or several, in your palm like marbles. Just imagining it tasted sharp and sweet.

Dawn thinned the night. The feast stood almost ready, steam rising like mist over fields.

“It’s time.” Alfred’s voice was low, a bell under snow.

On a bare patch in the courtyard, he traced a vast sigil array with a fingertip. Ancient runes bit into stone, then rose and hung like stars.

Seven-colored light spilled, and space warped like heat over sand.

Thunderheads rolled over the sky, drums in a black sea. The world’s will resisted, bristling like a beast in its den.

Gods were within its tolerance, pebbles in a river. But what was coming stepped beyond that line; the world recoiled from the knife.

Then, as three figures walked from the rippling space, the sky cleared in an instant, blue as a polished blade.

Grass bowed and swayed; the stars seemed to hum; the wind poured out its heart, soft as silk.

A bright rainbow arched across the vault. Phantom cherry petals drifted down, and ancient notes rang in every mind like temple bells.

It felt like an old sacrifice; it sounded like a secret creature whispering at your ear; it glowed like angels at prayer.

In that moment, Alfred finally pinned the one he’d never read among the three Demon Kings. The veiled face had a name.

“Hail and welcome, Your Majesty the Void Messenger!”