The Calm before...

The next few days were rather boring.

I got annoyed at the groups of people from other Kingdoms invading my space at one point.

So to send a clear message, I gathered them all up in my hands. I then carried them to some random coastal city that would be considered far away for their scale, and left them there with a warning that next time I'll start squashing any bugs I find near my bed space.

I haven't seen any more people swarming about, so I think it worked.

After I finally had some privacy, I ended up relieving some 'sexual frustration' and accidentally created a few new ponds in the wilderness nearby.

I had previously wondered why that particular function still worked, but now I'm starting to suspect that it's less about reproduction and more for Mental health purposes.

The other interesting thing that happened is that the Queen from before -who I now know was called Kiera- sent me a message asking me a question. She wanted to know "If it was possible for you to temporarily shrink and take a look around the city, would you want to?"

I told her that it was an interesting concept, but I highly doubt that it's possible. I mean Enlarge/Reduce is usually a low level spell, so I'm sure someone would have tried it on me by now?

Actually come to think of it, a mere Enlarge/Reduce spell wouldn't actually be enough. That spell only alters you by one size category, and I'm pretty sure that the difference between us would be closer to 6 or 7 size categories.

Apparently I was overthinking the issue because 3 days later I received another message warning me that the Archmage of the kingdom was going to come visit.

Curious about what he had to share, I moved towards the Castle, and with 2 minutes of walking, saved the Archmage a few days of travel.

After I found him, he explained to me that he had developed a spell to try and shrink me down to their size.

However the moment I saw that the spell was giving off purple sparkles, I knew that it wouldn't work.

However something else happened in the process. After watching him up close, I realized that I could kind of make out what he was doing to attempt to cast the spell.

Out of boredom, I tried imitating him. At first it didn't work, but after asking him some questions about how to move the mana around, I tried again and successfully cast the spell.

On my first successful casting, I only shrank to half my normal size. But after a few more attempts, I shrank myself to be merely twice the height of the Archmage.

I kind of felt like an Adult wandering around with a Toddler.

I promptly started walking towards the City, eager to check it out.

However the Archmage stopped me, warning that we should figure out how long the spell would last first. The mental imagery of accidentally crushing the entire city flat by suddenly growing was enough to convince me that the Archmage had a valid point.

After another 2 days of experiments, we learned something interesting.

The spell didn't have a set duration, and would only release when I willed it to do so.

Furthermore, I could control how much I released it, kind of like slowly letting air out of a balloon. Except that in this case I would get bigger rather than smaller like the balloon would.

A bonus of these extra experiments was that I gained increased control, and was able to shrink myself right down to the same scale as the Archmage.

Although I was still a few inches taller than him, it was still within a standard human variation range.

"Now can I go look around the city?"

"Ah, actually I was expecting you to ask that earlier, and so I have already made arrangements. We're just waiting for the carriage to arrive."

The carriage arrived momentarily, although the Archmage was given quite the shock when he discovered Queen Kiera was waiting inside of it.

I didn't really care, given that she didn't really have any power over me.

She seemed to be aware of this fact as well, as she was chatting with me like I was someone she had known for a while, rather than one of her subjects.

I had my suspicions about why she was being so friendly, and I wasn't sure how I felt about it.

"Alright, you obviously have some sort of motive for this. What exactly do you want from me?"

The Archmage looked scared by what I asked, but the Queen wasn't fazed at all.

"You're correct that I do have a motive. I'm hoping to make you more emotionally invested in this Kingdom so that if something were to happen, you would be more inclined to intervene on our behalf.

A defensive deterrent against our enemies if you will.

I also know that there are reasonable limits, and I do not expect that you would intervene if we were to start as the aggressors in a conflict, even if the conflict eventually pushed back to our territory."

It was my turn to be shocked. Everything she mentioned was actually reasonable.

Weren't people in power supposed to be power hungry, and greedy? Constantly demanding more of everything, especially when a tool as powerful as I could be ends up on their doorstep?

Not really, but that was a biased opinion that could often be found on the internet in my previous world.

"I see, and what exactly do you plan to offer me in exchange for this protection?"

"Pretty much anything that we could reasonably provide without violating the rights of my citizens"

"So I could for example ask for... you?"

I started laughing to myself imagining the stunned reaction she would undoubtedly have... but reality was disappointing.

"If the cost of your protection is as cheap as an arranged marriage that I would be expected to do with any number of other Kingdoms to secure a fraction of the level of protection... then my only question is when do you want to have it happen?"

I think the shock on my face must have been visible, because she then arched an eyebrow at me in a questioning gesture.

"I had been merely joking in an attempt to get you flustered. I was for some reason expecting you to be easily embarrassed."

"No true royalty could allow themselves to be so easily embarrassed."

Yeah, I figured that part out. I guess Webnovels and Mangas had lied to me.

"Wait, you said that you would view an arranged marriage as a cheap cost? Why exactly is that?"

"Well most alliances between Kingdoms are based off of arranged marriages between royalty.

The level of security you get from such alliances is moderate to low depending on how much larger the other Kingdom is, but larger Kingdoms tend to want additional benefits in exchange for the increased level of protection.

Meanwhile we have you, who at your full size are capable of singlehandedly ending any invasion.

To the point where I could reduce the Military forces at my command to just what is required to provide security for my people from Bandits and such.

Forces that would be too small for you to really engage with them.

This would save taxpayer money and allow me to reinvest it elsewhere.

So yes, if an arranged marriage was all it took, that would be a cheap price."

I sat there for a moment reflecting on what she was telling me.

Before I could come to a decision on what exactly I wanted from her and her people, a voice from outside the carriage informed us that we had arrived at the market, and we disembarked to take a walk around.