SS - Chapter 20 - Urban Planning

No TBoB today, but not for the reason you might suspect. As much as I'd love to dive back into Monster Train, I'm feeling quite ill. I tried to power through, but I really need to go lay down. I may try and get a chapter done over the weekend, depending on how I feel. Sorry.


“Well, that was unexpected,” Camille chirped from behind me. “Not that I’m complaining, it’ll be good to see the lady, and some of the manor staff again.”

I didn’t acknowledge her, I was too deep in my own head, muling over the conversation I’d just had with my mother. 

It had taken us months of hard work, and toil, to get this village setup. It was just large enough to shelter and feed our small community. Inviting the elf bloods to stay would have stretched out resources a little, but I was confident that we’d be able to grow the village fast enough to support them. 

An exodus from the duchy was an entirely different matter. We’d go from a population of just under a hundred to several hundred. 

Actually, knowing my mother and how much she cared about her people, I wouldn’t be surprised if that number reached over a thousand. She wouldn’t want to leave anyone loyal behind.

Camille popped up, on my right side, just inches from my face. “Care to share your thoughts with the rest of us?”

“I think we’ve got a lot of work to do, and not a lot of time to do it,” I replied, pushing away from the table. Grabbing the mirror, and the spent magic stone, I immediately strode back towards the front room.

When I pushed through the door Selena and Seigward looked up from their books. Apparently they were willing to give me a little privacy while I had a chat with my mother, unlike some people.

Seigward looked me over, thoughtfully. “Did something happen?”

“Something massive,” I replied solemnly. I took a minute to tuck the mirror back into storage before standing up and addressing everyone. “When I claimed sovereignty over Hoarfrost the system informed my mother and brother that, as part of my bloodline, they could sever their ties to Iskel and join Hoarfrost.”

Selena looked at me blankly, she didn’t have the context to understand why that was a big deal. Seigward, on the other hand, his eyes went wide. 

“Your mother has spent years trying to figure out how to sever your family’s relationship with the Rothchild royal family. She must be ecstatic to have this opportunity,” he exclaimed.

“It actually looked like she’d spent the last few days planning, so they can slip out before anyone notices the change,” I explained, slowly pacing back and forth at the head of the table. “There are a couple issues too. They only have a month to accept before the offer expires, and she wants to bring as many of the remaining loyal retainers as she can.”

“The same ones I had to evaluate for this trip?” Siegward asked thoughtfully.

“And probably more. I’m sure there were a ton of people that didn’t volunteer due to their loyalty to my mother. When she leaves, they’ll have no reason to stay.”

“We can’t possibly support that many people,” Siegward said quietly. “We barely had the space to shelter Selena and her people.”

“I know, that’s why we need to take advantage of the time we have. She’ll probably put off the decision as long as possible, to give herself as much time to gather supplies and prepare her people. Plus, she’s asked me to create a warp gate, so they don’t have to try and sneak out of the country on foot, and I can’t even start that project until the Citadel finishes, so we have a little time,” I said.

“Not nearly enough,” the old man muttered.

“That’s why we need to prioritize, and do as much as we can not,” I said, walking over to the nearby bookshelf, looking for the map. Once I found it I brought it back over and unrolled it in the middle of the table. “You all know as much about the area as I do, so if you have any suggestions feel free to speak up.”

Surprisingly it was Selena who spoke up first. “You should start expanding the farms now. Even if your mother does bring a ton of supplies, it’s probably better to be self sufficient as soon as possible. Not only do we need to feed everyone, but we need to start creating a surplus for winter. The more of those supplies we can conserve, the better.”

“A sensible suggestion,” Siegward nodded. “We’ve already felled a lot of trees around the village, in order to obtain the wood required for building, so we could start converting that area into farmland. The problem is we didn’t foresee needing the land this soon, so we left the stumps intact, and it would take a significant effort to dig those out. I’m not sure we have enough spare hands to remove them efficiently.”

“I know a couple of the younger people in my group have been itching for a chance to prove themselves,” Selena said. “They should be able to help.”

“Hup!” 

The little cry surprised me, I’d forgotten that I’d left the little maids in the hall before heading out to check out the citadel this morning. As I looked over the head maid pulled out one of the chairs then climbed up and stood on it, joining in on our conversation.

“What?” I asked blankly.

She pantomimed digging, then pointed at the village on the map.

“You want to help with the digging? You can do that?” Camille blurted out.

In response the head maid stuck out her hands, shaking them, while the rest of the squad held their hands up so they could just be seen over the edge of the table. 

“Hup!” They declared in unison.

“Hands? What about hands?” I asked.

“Interesting…” Siegward muttered. “I think they may be referring to the signature skill you chose, ‘Many Hands Make Light Work.’ Perhaps it allows them to assist with labour, or large projects. Is that right?” 

The head nodded, then puffed out her chest proudly. “Hup! Hup! Hup!”

“That’s extremely helpful, if true,” I said, looking the head maid over. “It also gives me an excuse to start Construct Replication. We’ll probably want the extra security setup before my mother arrives.” 

I immediately opened up my system and swapped over to the constructs tab and tapped ‘Enable Replication’. I saw the available magic drop at the top of the screen, and the option changed to ‘Disable Replication’, but I really didn’t see any other change.

“I have no idea how long it takes to generate a single construct,” I muttered. “The system doesn’t seem to have any indication.”

“I’m sure they’ll start showing up soon,” Camille declared. “We can pop by the citadel later, if you really want to know.”

“It’s not that important,” I said. “As long as they start showing up.”

“With the help of both the refugees, and the maids, we should be able to clear enough land to triple the size of the current farms,” Siegard exclaimed, bringing everyone’s attention back to the map. “We’ll probably have to start clearing more forest if we want to expand further.”

“We should probably start clearing more of the forest anyways,” I said. “Even if we don’t need all the extra farmland, we’ll need the logs for all the construction we’ll be doing. Sieg can you organize the lumber crew, get them to clear areas we might want to reclaim in the future.”

“It would be my pleasure,” the old man replied.

“You should also get someone to survey for more underground water reservoirs, so we can dig a couple more wells before everyone shows us,” Selena suggested.

“Yeah, I doubt we’d want several hundred people huddled around a single well,” I agreed.

“Should we look at creating new wells, and housing closer to the citadel?” Camille asked. “If we’re expanding all fields this would make an excellent farm town, which means we can start developing the capital city.”

“Capital city? Aren’t you getting a little ahead of yourself? Even with the extra people we’d only have enough for a large town or two. Cities are a long way off,” I grumbled.

Camille shrugged. “All the current cities started small, you have to start somewhere.”

I stared at the map, thinking it over. “Sieg, plot a path between the village and the citadel, and have the lumberjacks clear that before they start on expanding the fields. Whether we decide to stay here, or move closer to the citadel, we’ll need a road so people can retreat there in the case of an emergency.”

“I’ll see it done,” he replied.

“Great. That takes care of food and water, now we just need to handle shelter, medicine, sanitation, recreation…” I said, slowly going down the list of concerns.

“You don’t need to settle everything today,” Selena reminded me calmly. “You can bring in experts over the next few days, and make more detailed plans, let's just get through the basics for now.”

“Right,” I muttered. “One step at a time.”

I slowly took in the entire map, mind working. “In that case, I’d like recommendations on where we can develop a temporary refugee camp. We’ll do what we can before everyone arrives but, at the very least, we should have a place where everyone can set up tents, and have access to water and toilets. We’ll do our best to provide better accommodations, but that should be the absolute minimum.”

Siegward stroked his chin, then wandered over to the bookcase to retrieve something. “In that case I have a list of alternative townsites that we reviewed early on, and some of them are fairly close. It’ll take a little time to go over them, would you like to do that now?”

I nodded. “Let’s get it done.”