The verdict of the clan arrived like a funeral bell. Every hidden stash of tea owned by the men of the Sonneberg family was confiscated under the smiling supervision of their wives, mothers, and grandmothers. No matter where the leaves had been hidden—inside cultivation chambers, buried beneath floorboards, tucked inside false ceilings, or sealed within lockboxes—the women found them all with terrifying efficiency. Some men resisted at first, swearing they had nothing left, but after several hours kneeling painfully on old iron keyboards while enduring relentless questioning from their spouses, every last gram was surrendered. By the end of the day, the women possessed enough tea to supply a royal court, while the men sat in silence like defeated generals after a lost war.
Naturally, the women claimed they were merely "safeguarding the tea for the family." No one believed that excuse for even a second. Every Wednesday afternoon, the women gathered inside the communal villa for their so-called "preservation meetings," and the rich fragrance of brewed tea drifted through the entire forest. The smell alone was enough to make grown men stare at the walls with hollow expressions. Some elders even wandered near the villa like ghosts searching for closure before eventually being chased away by their wives. The younger generation found the situation endlessly entertaining, especially because the older men had once guarded those same tea leaves more fiercely than national treasures.
Of course, retaliation came swiftly.
Arin returned to his family's private room late in the afternoon only to find his father seated calmly on the couch with several clan elders nearby. The atmosphere immediately felt dangerous. Teun rested his chin on his hand while staring at Arin with the expression of a man preparing a public execution.
"Well, well," Teun said calmly. "I reviewed your archery progress over the last year. Frankly speaking, your skills are lacking. Therefore, we, your respected elders, have decided to invite you to a special training camp."
Arin nearly laughed.
A training camp? Please. Everyone in the room knew this was simply a legal excuse to beat him up for his role in the Great Tea Disaster.
The instant Teun finished speaking, Arin spun around and sprinted toward the nearest window. The door was obviously trapped; he could already hear movement outside the hallway. Sure enough, when he glanced below after climbing out the window, five middle-aged men stood waiting in the courtyard like hunters surrounding prey. Even worse, three others waited on the roof above him. The trap had been prepared far too quickly.
'These old men planned this the moment the tea was confiscated,' Arin thought bitterly.
With no better option, he pressed himself against the wall of the five-story villa and began climbing sideways using narrow ledges and decorative stonework. Anyone watching from below would have thought they were witnessing a scene from an action movie. Meanwhile, Teun leaned halfway out the window directing the others like a military commander.
"He's moving left!"
"Block the corner!"
"Don't let him reach the balcony!"
Arin ignored them entirely.
"Mom!" he shouted at the top of his lungs after spotting Avela walking through the courtyard below. "Dad is trying to murder me because of the tea! Save me!"
The entire courtyard froze.
Avela slowly looked upward and immediately understood the situation. Her youngest son clung to the side of the villa like an oversized lizard while eight grown men coordinated a revenge operation against him. Her husband hung halfway out a window shouting tactical commands with complete seriousness.
The scene was so ridiculous that even nearby servants struggled not to laugh.
Teun suddenly looked much less confident.
To be fair, Avela understood why the men were furious. Arin's little speech had destroyed years of carefully hidden tea reserves. Under normal circumstances, she might even have allowed some retaliation. However, the timing was unacceptable. The women had only just secured the tea, and the men were already attempting revenge.
It was shameless.
"It seems," Avela said coldly, "that some people have forgotten who currently controls the tea supply."
Every man present stiffened.
Arin, meanwhile, looked incredibly smug.
"I already contacted the other women," Avela continued while smiling sweetly. "I'm sure they would love to hear that their husbands are bullying the younger generation out of spite."
The atmosphere instantly collapsed.
Several elders began quietly retreating.
One man actually abandoned his position on the roof and fled.
Teun closed his eyes in despair.
Within the hour, punishment descended upon the men of the clan with terrifying efficiency. The women showed absolutely no mercy. Afterward, Teun behaved considerably better, while the other elders suddenly became extremely respectful toward the younger generation. Only Karl suffered worse than the rest. Unfortunately for him, he had appeared far too happy when everyone else lost their tea, and his family had not forgotten that his stubbornness caused the entire disaster in the first place.
For the next three days Karl walked through the villa with bruises covering his arms while pretending nothing had happened. No one dared comment on it openly, though the younger members of the clan nearly died holding back laughter whenever he passed by.
Six months passed surprisingly quickly after that.
When the Earth's expansion finally ended, humanity received its first true understanding of how drastically the world had changed. Satellite images revealed a terrifying truth: the planet had nearly doubled in size. Entire mountain ranges had appeared where oceans once existed, forests stretched endlessly beyond former borders, and unknown regions now occupied vast sections of the world map.
The political consequences were immediate.
Some nations celebrated wildly. Countries like China and India suddenly possessed enormous amounts of undeveloped land, easing housing shortages and opening limitless economic possibilities. Other nations were far less enthusiastic. Russia, despite already possessing massive territory, struggled to manage the land it already controlled. Doubling that amount created logistical nightmares beyond imagination.
Meanwhile, ordinary civilians suffered through six months of isolation and boredom.
Modern society had not collapsed completely, but it had fractured badly. Internet infrastructure barely functioned outside individual cities because most long-distance cables and delicate systems failed during the expansion. Satellite communication still existed, but bandwidth limitations made streaming services, online gaming, and high-data communication nearly impossible.
For many people, losing entertainment proved more psychologically damaging than losing comfort.
Citizens trapped inside overcrowded cities quickly became restless. Work opportunities vanished as transportation systems broke down and supply chains collapsed. Governments around the world scrambled to keep populations occupied before frustration evolved into chaos.
Unfortunately, chaos arrived anyway.
Crime rates exploded across nearly every major city on Earth. People had returned from the Trials stronger, faster, and infinitely more dangerous than before. A single angry civilian could now seriously injure multiple people during a simple street fight. Mages proved especially terrifying. Even a low-level spellcaster could kill from a distance using Magic Missiles.
Police forces everywhere became overwhelmed.
Governments reacted by rapidly recruiting auxiliary officers from among awakened civilians and former Trial participants. Entire neighborhoods organized patrol groups simply to maintain order. In some places the situation stabilized quickly. In others, cities descended into violence severe enough that military intervention became necessary.