HMJ - Chapter 42 (Patreon)
Content
Nico Robin joined Harry’s household, kingdom, or organization; he hadn’t a fixed term yet or even a proper name. He only knew Skagos wasn’t what he wanted to call it in the long term.
It took a bit for her to acclimate herself to these unfamiliar lands, and she spent a lot of time in the presence of Lust’s pet, Maester Pylos, learning the languages of this world to read and write.
While Harry had a lot of Essence Potions with the ability to speak Westerosi Common or the Old Tongue, there were very few with the ability to read and write amongst them. And even then, it was only to a very terrible level.
The literacy rate of Skagos was or rather is almost nonexistent; that fact is mirrored by the language essences he receives through his contracts once one of the Skagosi that signed them died.
One limitation of his contact ability is that everything has a fixed amount, even knowledge. It can’t be replicated with the contract ability; he can only sell the original.
Which doesn’t allow him to sell a copy of his own knowledge, and things had to be taught and learned in the traditional way.
Robin came to the conclusion, after trying one of the language essences, that she had to learn to read and write in the traditional way.
After all, she desperately wanted to study the history of a completely different world. At her core, even while being hunted by the World Government, she remained an archologist.
This also gave Harry another question he needed to answer. What kind of role should Nico Robin fulfill on Skagos?
Lust was pretty much responsible for inner affairs, overseeing the development of Skagos and solving inner matters like disputes and different conflicts, while also taking on a ton of other roles, as long as they missed the qualified personnel.
Harry himself was also taking care of different matters here and there, while guiding the greater direction of how his land developed and also taking care of the dimensional trader.
He always had something to do; even while sitting in the store, he was grinding, studying, doing paperwork, or writing down some knowledge to share. He wanted to turn his land into one of the most advanced civilizations in the multiverse while also becoming powerful himself.
To create an advanced civilization, education was a necessity. A role that would be very fitting for someone like Nico Robin. But it wasn’t really an effective use of his resources.
In a primitive place like Skagos, education would take decades to show any visible effect.
They lacked teachers or other skilled people, and this would force Robin to do most of it herself, binding her to the task of teaching, something that could be easier solved by immigrating more educated people from the multiverse in the future.
The multiverse was vast; surely there would be people who wanted to immigrate to Skagos.
The Ishvalians from the Fullmetal Alchemist Universe that Scar was recruiting, for example, He was already in the process of convincing them to come to Skagos as part of their agreement.
While they weren’t the most educated people, they were centuries more advanced than the Skagos.
Education was the way to go for Nico Robin. Especially not if there was another far more fitting role that she showed natural skill for. And her Devil Fruit was perfect for it too. In all honesty, it is more suitable for that task than for combat.
Espionage.
Knowledge is power, after all.
Without a doubt, in a few years, his land would overpower most of the other territories on Planetos. After all, he had access to the Multiverse, with its vast resources like superior weapons, powers like Devil Fruits, other valuables, and information.
But to securely establish himself in the multiverse, information was a key resource that he desperately needed. His store was, after all, not the only way to travel between universes.
Look at the Veil of Death; his body used to arrive here.
The basic idea was that Robin starts an intelligence agency under their control here in Westeros, training their agents, which they later could use in other universes.
A functional multiversal information network was a valuable thing; for example, in Robin's own homeworld of One Piece, they could use it to locate demon fruits, graded weapons, and other valuable resources. The same principle would apply to any other universe.
Her Devil Fruit was perfect for spying and stealing. The ability to create ears, eyes, limbs, or whole clones to spy on others was OP for such an occupation.
While it had its weaknesses, like having to see the area where she could grow limbs or any damage she received on her created body parts would land on her original body, they could still be easily overcome or were not that dire.
Combine it with magic that she could learn through the ancient language, and she would be an unparralled spy. And Harry was giving her lessons in the ancient language like he did with Lust when they had some time.
If you were to believe some of the more convincing One Piece theories, her father had a similar occupation as a former agent of Cipher Pol. Nothing about it is confirmed, but it makes sense.
Nico Robin and the Skinchangers of the Free Folk are a solid base for a powerful intelligence agency under his control. While he was planning to employ many skinchangers in different fields, like scouts in his army or around Skagos, on ships for scouting and warning from storms, and similar, it was no problem to use some for spying.
Especially since skin changers seem to have a certain affinity for specific animals. While the more powerful ones could create bonds with 2 or 3 different animals, the weaker ones could barely warg into one that they had an affinity for.
Rats, mice, other rodents, or cats were simply not a good fit for scouting. But they could be well used for spying in cities.
Even in modern ones, many major cities on modern Earth, where he had been originally from, had rodent problems. A rat somewhere would be nothing strange.
His territory was coming out well.
And soon he would meet the other lords in the north.
After all, he had just received an official invitation for the nameday festivities of the Heir of the North, together with the other lords in the North.
The official reason was to celebrate the 13th Nameday of Robb, to create stronger bonds amongst the Northern Lords, and to introduce the North to the Stark Children.
But Harry could read between the lines. After all, he only recently returned from an expedition into the True North.
He knew for certain that his boats had been spotted by the night’s watch in Eastwatch-by-the-Sea.
Lord Stark surely wanted to know what he had been up to. After all, they would have been even more visible on their trip back with a small army of giants on their ships.
Harry would have acted in a similar manner.
———
“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Nico Robin asked as the girl was clinging onto him,“They certainly have people around to keep an eye on it.”
“It’s in the middle of the night, and we are disillusioned. They won’t be able to spot us. Let’s just take a look.” Harry said as he flew his firebolt over the ocean. The wind was ruffling through their hair, but overall it was calm. “I need to confirm how accurate my foreknowledge is.”
It has been a few weeks since Nico Robin stormed through the doors to his interdimensional store and joined him. She fit well into their small family. I even met with Lisbeth and the others from SAO.
But she didn’t just want to abandon her old world. There was too much she would leave behind, with the legacy and wishes of the Scholar of Ohara and her own parents.
And Harry himself wanted to learn more about the One Piece World’s true history. He also wanted to get his hands on the technologies and weapons, including the ancient weapons, Devil Fruits, Haki, and the secrets he didn’t know yet.
The One Piece World was far too valuable to abandon, even if he was far too weak to truly get his hands on the best things.
But he had many advantages that this world didn’t have. His magic gave him the tools to reap benefits even now with his meager strength.
And he could fly, a fact that was a massive advantage in this strange world that mainly relies on maritime transportation.
According to Robin, it was very hard to fly on the Grand Line. The climate was just too unpredictable and got wilder the further down the Grand Line you went. In the New World, it was easy to lose your life.
Which makes sense, or someone like the Golden Lion Shikki with his Float Float Fruit could have directly gone for the One Piece.
But this didn’t matter right now. He wasn’t planning to directly head for the Grand Line either way. The goals he knew for sure were all in the Four Blues.
Right now they were flying over the West Blue, a blacked and burned island on their horizon.
The only thing truly distinctive was the burned stump of a formerly gigantic tree.