During the winter months, Akira was focused on training the new warriors until they had reached the status of a soldier. The navy went through a similar but slightly different training so that they could fight both on ships as well as on land in rare cases.
When he was not training the warriors he was focused on helping the Dwarves create armor and weapons for the new warriors and navy and town guards. When those were completed they started to work on the large order to equip the Kamen tribe as they were paying a large sum for them and it had become one of the main incomes for the town other than import taxes at the city and trade post and the sales tax.
Delgar deemed it beneficial for everyone to have the assistant blacksmiths work on the minor orders such as tools and other items needed for the town. This way they could better their understanding of blacksmithing, or so he said.
With the new dungeon that spawned the [Cute ice slime], Akira was able to take warriors that were training, to the dungeon and have them gain experience while gathering the ice magic stones so that he could use them to embed the weapons and armor of his personal guards and the officers of the army, navy, and town guards. He would update the soldiers’ weapons and armor when they had enough to do it all in one go.
Doing all this gained him a large amount of XP raising his blacksmithing skill to intermediate lvl 9: 99% where it was now stuck.
During that time Yuki spent most of her time working in the greenhouse taking care of the special plants she had gifted to Akira. The other girls joined her in taking care of different plants that they had picked to plant inside.
While all that happened the tow was still growing and had reached the 1st tier town.
***
The warm months had arrived.
Over the last month, the snow continued to slowly melt during the day, and now it was completely gone in the large town of Kodria, but if You looked hard enough you could still find patches of snow in the woods.
The days were now longer, brighter, and warmer. While the nights were still a bit chilly.
“…and now that the snow and ice has melted from the town and the surrounding fields we must hurry with the planned building projects,” said Grand elder Carl.
Akira sat at a table inside the grand elders’ office finalizing the town’s plans one last time before they started.
“We also have to take care of clearing the land, tilling, planting, and replanting certain things to ensure that the town is able to have enough food stored up for the winter. If we can do this properly we will not be forced to continue buying what we lack from Jerora at such high prices,” said Grand elder Hegir.
“We have all the stone stocked up to build the first outer wall. We need to remove the remaining wood fencing around the city and start working on creating a solid foundation while the stone is brought over from the quarries. We also have to do the same for the three forts. Since the snow and ice has melted the fort’s walls have become rather weak wooden fences,” said Grand elder Àaron.
“Speaking of stone, now that we are such a large town we need to start replacing our wooden buildings with sturdier stone. Starting with our most important ones first. If there were to be a fire caused by accident or by a DGH attack we would be crippled,” said Grand elder Seoc.
Akira was writing everything down in his notes so that he could keep track of the main things that needed to be done.
“Haaa~ so much to do! We only have a short window to get everything finished,” said Akira as he looked at the list depressed at the large amount of work ahead of him.
“Ah! We can’t forget that the hot spring is still leaking now that ice and snow has melted. We have tried to keep it from affecting the area too much but it is only temporary we need to do something about it or we could be living in a swamp again,” said Grand elder Carl.
Akira let out another sigh as he added it to his list.
“Is that all?”
“For now it is,” said Grand elder Seoc.
Akira left their office with the intention to start walking to the wooden fencing around the town so that he could help with the dismantling as well as coordinate the smoothing of the ground for the stone foundations for the future stone walls. He was followed by his ever-present companion Fluffball who was sniffing the ground as he walked behind Akira smelling the dirt and grass.
But as soon as he exited the castle keep he found a large group of his companions were waiting for him.
“How did the meeting go?” asked Klyn.
“This is for you,” said Akira as he handed over a piece of paper full of notes. It was all about the town’s farming plans and information on replanting the winter berries and other important plants.
Akira watched as Klyn’s face crumpled as he looked at the piece of paper.
“There is just too much to do in the short time we have!”
“Don’t worry princess Gobalina and Prince Gobbers will be helping you with clearing the land, plowing, and planting you just have to make sure that everything on the list gets done properly,” said Akira as he turned to the Goblin Prince and princesses. He gave a piece of paper to the Princess who could read so that she would understand what tasks needed to be done.
“What about me and my Orcs?” asked Varbu.
“You’ll be joining me and my soldiers in the major wall project,” said Akira.
“And us?” asked Azura.
“Um… You have the important job of…taking care of the greenhouse and making sure that the rest of the important plants are planted and well taken care of,” said Akira.
“This heat is killing me. I’m going to die!” complained Nollan as he walked out of the castle with Yuki.
“Then stay inside the castle where it is still cool,” said Yuki coldly as she ignored the several handmaidens that trailed behind her.
“My daughter would kill me if I let you escape again,” said the elderly man as he was wiping his head that was full of sweat.
To Akira and the others, it was still quite chilly most of the day and was nowhere close to the humid swamps or the sandy deserts that he had traveled through.
“We all have our tasks so we need to get to work. Varbu, gather your men and meet me at the wall,” said Akira as he started walking towards the outer fencing around the town.
“Yap!” said Fluffball as he ran after Akira.
When Akira arrived at the fence the workers along with the army were already tearing it down and putting the logs into many different piles.
They had been working for a few hours already and were nearly halfway done since it was far easier to tear it down than to put it up. Plus the fact that there was no snow or ice hindering their movements made it all the more faster.
“Yes! I can see it now, this will be where we build the first of the three main great big beautiful walls better than all the walls before it! We also need it built before we can reach the 3rd tier city,” said Samuel as he looked at the blueprints that had been drawn up over the winter months.
“If you say so,” said Varbu who had just arrived with his own soldiers. “What do you want us to do?”
“Start helping tear down the fencing. When that is done I’ll have to start outlining the area for the walls and we’ll have to start working on leveling the land so we can lay down the stone foundations for the walls,” said Akira as he walked over to help those tearing the wall down.
With the large number of people working on the project the rest of the wooden fence was dismantled within an hour.
Akira activated the blueprint he had prepared before and started to outline the long outer wall around the entire town. He had to make sure to take several breaks in order to not faint from exhaustion.
The workers along with the Werewolf and Orc soldiers got to working with their pickaxes and shovels to prepare the area for the wall.
When Akira had finished the outline he left Samuel in charge for the time being so he could go check on Klyn and the others to see how they were doing with the clearing of the land and farming.
He arrived at the designated farmlands to see Klyn frantically running with several warriors and shamans beside him while he shouted at a goblin.
The goblin in question was bending over to smell a large green flower that was around the same size as the goblin and was only partially budded.
As Akira watched the large flower bud opened wide to reveal sharp teeth and bit down on the goblin severing him right in half. The lower half of his body fell to the ground spraying blood all over the ground.
Klyn and the warriors arrived too late to save the goblin, but when they did, they started hacking away at the monster plant that was still chewing on the upper half of the goblin in its mouth. [Fragrant Sunflower (Carnivore) Lvl: 30].
Akira jogged over to Klyn who was pulling the bloody upper half of the goblin out of the butchered plant.
“It looks like things are quite active over here,” said Akira.
Fluffball walked over to the dead plant monster and started to sniff it, curious of what it was.
“This is the 5th goblin that was lured in by one of these flower’s fragrance. It seems to have a large effect on them, we have been trying to clear all them but we keep finding more and more of them. It’s even worse in the woods,” said Klyn.
“Sorry I didn’t think there would be such odd monsters that would show up like this. I can send you a few units of soldiers to help clear the land of anything that might pop out,” said Akira.
Just as he finished talking a group of goblins came running out of the woods running with plants in their hands while screaming out something frantically in their own language.
Behind them, several large white and blue striped flying insects were chasing them. [Fluffy Ice Stinger Bees Lvl 40].
Before Akira could go over and use a skill to cut them down he heard the loud and long-winded command in goblineese. Followed by a loud thump as Prince Gobbers was hit on the head by his sister.
The goblin soldiers that had been training with the orcs and werewolves quickly took aim with their crossbows and filled the flying [Fluffy Ice Stinger Bees] with several metal bolts. Saving the running goblins.
Klyn continued talking as he had seen the same thing several times already, “While gathering the winter berries the goblins found a large bubbling tar pit inside the woods. According to the translated reports, there is something hiding inside of it and it has already dragged a few goblins inside of the pit when they got too close.”
“I’ll have the Soldiers look into it while they clean up the rest of the woods. It looks like there are a lot of new problems we have to take care of now that the weather is warming up,” said Akira.
“Until we can get rid of these problems we will be behind on schedule,” said Klyn.
“I’ll send someone to get the units right now,” said Akira as he motioned one of his guards to gather the soldiers.
“Now, we have to take care of the leaking hot spring problem,” said Akira as he left Klyn and the goblins.
Akira had given orders already for clearing the land around it so that it could be worked on for the new building he had gained blueprints for.
He opened the blueprint prepared for just this and went to work on outlining everything.
When finished he started to draw and write down the important information for the foreman of the work crew that would be working on it.
“The main building will be built from stone as well as the large and small pools. You’ll need to dig about this deep for this and this deep for that. We will be using the reclaimed logs from the city fence that are still in good shape to create a tall vertical wall around the pools to block the view of anyone from outside. Also, we’ll need some walls blocking this pool from that pool,” said Akira as he explained the scribbles to the work crew foreman.
“Ah… yes… I see, and what are we building?” asked the foreman.
“Kodria’s very own Hot springs spa! I’m sure that it will be a popular place to go especially in the winter!” said Akira as he nodded to himself thinking of a certain someone in a certain bathing suit.
When he finished answering all the man’s questions he visited all of the important city buildings and helped explain what needed to be changed and updated.
Several of the buildings such as the warehouse, granary, hospital, schools, and the like needed to be upgraded to the stone city version in order to reach one of the requirements of 3rd tier City.
Along with those buildings the Tavern, general store, and blacksmith shop were all getting updated to be fully stone as well as receiving a larger add on to accommodate the growth of the town.
***
Akira sat slumped in his chair exhausted from running around and using the blueprint skill to make sure that everything was built according to plan.
He was half awake while he listened to the Grand elders discuss the day’s progress and other issues that had come to their attention during the day.
“According to Samuel the wall will start to go up in a day or two as they are working as quickly as they can to get the foundation in place,” said Carl as he looked at the paper. “We have just enough stone for the full length of the 10ft outer wall as we planned before. Right now the miners are hard at work getting the needed stone for the rest of the buildings.”
“Are we really sure we only want the outer wall to be 10ft tall?” asked Àaron, still having doubts.
“We are sticking to the plan. Although it may not be as tall as the outer walls of other countries’ outer walls, we will not be having just one wall like them. With the other two walls both being taller and thicker than the first they will be able to support the outer wall,” said Akira sleepily.
“That is true, even if we planned it out months ago this is still the first time I have seen something like it,” said Àaron.
“Right now we don’t have enough stone to be creating a huge and long wall outside like the other kingdoms. For now, this size will have to do. If we need too we can always upgrade it later,” said Seoc.
“What I’m more worried about is the rate of our growth. It is alarmingly fast compared to any settlement I have seen or heard of. With this there are several large glaring problems,” said Hegir.
“Right, there are many people coming to live in the town every day, and now there are several babies being born due to the long winter nights. With such a population growth our army is quite lacking compared to the large human cities and places like Beorin,” said Àaron.
“I agree that it is small right now but we are in the process of training 500 new recruits to add to the army. Most of the new recruits are those who have recently come of age and decided to join so we have a long way to get them fully trained to what I can call a true soldier. Right now I don’t think we will be facing large armies like Beorin so we don’t need to panic… yet,” said Akira.
“Àaron, I understand your concern about our lacking army but with the Orcs, Goblins, and Werewolf armies growing together we will be nearing 3000 active soldiers when the new batch is fully trained, not including the expanded town guards and navy and militia,” said Seoc.
“Hmm…I know we cannot have every militia member joining the army as they all have important jobs to do in order to keep the town running, but there are still a lot of them as well as the retired warriors who are in the reserves. I suggest after the wall is built that the militia and the reserves join the army for some extreme summer training,” said Àaron.
“Agreed. Even if they are not at the level of the soldiers in the army we need to get them marching to the same tune so that there are no mess-ups when they need to co-operate on the battlefield,” said Hegir.
