Chapter 223: Chapter 223: Grand Ambition

 

 

Nisha was firmly convinced of her decision to aim for a great expansion around the capital.

Perhaps the beast inside her hungered for a greater domain to rule over or the etiquette and conduct lessons for nobles paid off, since the young dragon began to aim her intent towards a great goal.

The old crook Alester attempted to dissuade her, since their likelihood of success dwindled in case they moved contrary to the interests of parties with greater power and influence, but he had no concrete examples why they should limit their plans.

He even pulled out the permits granted by the kingdom itself to convince her, advising her against overstepping the limits laid out in the documents.

To his astonishment, the old man discovered an aspect he had overlooked previously.

Instead of underlining his point, Alester discovered that the permits issued for the expansion of the capital Thurgau had no limit on them at all.

Despite not being part of the Thieves Guild that dealt with construction, materials and related issues, he had some friends in the business.

Whenever the city issued a permit, the minimum and maximum dimensions for a new building were clearly investigated beforehand and then enforced with ironclad precision.

The old crook had not paid much attention to these limits previously because they were still in the planning stage of the new districts, and only intended to have the final measurements adjusted to the plan commissioned to the [Earth Seers], yet now he discovered that they were given free reign to build whatever the hell they wanted.

This went contrary to any and all knowledge the old man acquired in his life so far.

Confusion and doubt clouded his judgement and the elf won the argument, setting the future projected size at twice the current city.

Alester was not in the wrong, though.

The officials in charge of the permits were to be blamed, as well as people above them.

When Nisha first pushed her attempt at obtaining the permit to construct a new city wall and the districts protected by the aforementioned walls, an investigation was launched to look into the party that made the request.

 

It was not uncommon for towns and cities to outgrow their available space throughout the kingdom.

Especially the central cities serving as the main trade hubs or political centres housing the families of noble factions needed to expand as their influence grew.

When the space inside the wall ran out, it was impossible to simply raise new shacks and houses outside of the safe perimeter of the walls.

Despite the rare occurrence, monsters and beasts living nearby were particularly quick to spot the weakness of easy prey gathering in dense numbers, leading to a tragedy when a horde of hungry predators launched an attack in the middle of the night.

Even if the city reacted quickly and sent their garrisoned soldiers to defend the people outside, the damage was already done by that time, causing regret and blame to swelter within the populace.

A rather established solution to the growing demand for more space came in the form of a second city wall.

The ruling family of a city often did not need to arrange for the costs and manpower associated with such a grand undertaking either.

Driven by the wish to further their influence or open new avenues when development halted, wealthy nobles from smaller spheres of influence or merchant houses in the city used the opportunity to establish themselves firmly in a greater range of influence.

Once the permit was given, the applicant bore the cost and construction work, solving a future issue for the ruler of the city.

In return, the new area was split between the applicants, in case more than one entity worked together to split the expenses, and the ruling party.

The profit from selling and renting the new plots of land easily returned all of the investments and propelled the participants into a higher strata of the social ladder.

Sometimes, barons from the countryside had the chance to turn the opportunity into a higher title for themselves, becoming Viscounts with their accumulated achievements.

While it did not guarantee that they could take the final step and truly elevate their fiefdom and standing to that of a Count one day, several success stories drove the noble houses to invest their wealth into such endeavors.

Similarly, merchant houses needed exactly such openings to expand their business in more prosperous places, otherwise they would never establish a foothold in the local market and make contact with major noble personages.

 

In Nisha’s case, the capital was in a somewhat awkward situation as there have been no previous records of nobles or merchant houses applying for a permit to expand Thurgau.

The royal family resided in the city and all officials working in different posts answered directly to them.

Campaigning for the opportunity to expand the area around the political centre of the kingdom would not allow the various Dukes to overtake their competitors or appeal to the king through such a method, and neither would they allow the lower ranks of nobility such as Counts to take a step into their territory.

It held no merit for them to spend money on a thankless task, rendering the project into one that failed to attract their interest.

Similarly, merchant houses that operated in the capital of the kingdom had no desire to spend money on a thankless task.

To expand their business, these major players looked beyond the borders of the country and established connections within other nations.

The payoff from expanding the city was not worthwhile compared to the money needed to do so.

So while the investigation revealed that a major noble house was connected to the application, the office in charge of the matter categorized the elf and the old crook as an extension of the influence around Duke Dharnas.

The report compiled on the project was passed to a butler of the royal palace, who in turn took it to an office inside the palace itself.

After a second round of investigation, the report was presented to the king during a meeting regarding the development of the kingdom, who shortly dismissed any mention of the matter altogether and approved of the request.

As the commander of the City Guard and a loyal subject without much ambition, Duke Dharnas counted as a neutral figure in the court with few dealings and connections to the competing factions of the other Dukes.

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With no discernible threat or evident issues in regard to a thankless and expensive task, the kingdom was more than happy to approve it.

It was impossible to gain major merit or compensation out of building a city wall for Thurgau, making it a non issue for the king and his retinue.

Adorned with the royal seal and approval from the king himself, the report was returned post haste to the office via a butler serving under the king personally, removing all hindrances for the application and future documents.

Overwhelmed with such a strong response, the official in charge of construction and related issues in Thurgau signed his name on the draft and opted not to include any restrictions or stipulations and marked Ser Alester as a very very important personage under their care.

As such, it was not quite as unbelievable to see the enthusiastic support for a new city wall project, although it astounded the old crook.

 

Nisha herself had no idea that her plan was unintentionally stamped as part of the neutral faction at court and enjoyed the old man’s flustered attempt to argue against her goal of expanding the capital to twice its size.

She patiently waited for him to double check all documents and permits, although the elf already decided in her heart to push for her plan.

In the end, Alester had to give way and promised to commission the final plan from the [Earthseer Clan] master with her instruction in mind.

Satisfied with the outcome, the dragon praised Alester and transferred some more of the more valuable materials and weapons that appeared in her room at the Dharnas estate and asked him to turn the goods into coins necessary for the construction, she lacked the time to do it herself.

Alester gawked at the pile of valuable resources and almost had smoke rising from his head trying to figure out wherever the funding for the project came from, seeing as the second round of investment came in the form of rarely seen high tier materials and high rank gear suitable for the sixth and seventh aura rank.

Even the Thieves Guild would have trouble to procure such items, how was it possible for the daughter of a major noble to possess such a grand fortune?

Sighing deeply at the sight of the departing young girl, who did not bother to mind the fortune she just piled in front of him or their origin, Alester decided to not mind it for the sake of his health and mental sanity.

The dragon was already used to the randomly appearing goods inside her resting place, it had been the same in the [Dragon’s Den] and the phenomenon had now happened again in her bedroom, making it more of a habit rather than an unexplainable mystery.

Since the items ranged from third tier materials to seldomly appearing seventh ranked items, the elf was just glad that humans were eager to pay a lot of gold coins for them, allowing her to undertake the expansion project.

She enjoyed some of the more shiny items and stashed them away, but even the ugly ones sold for high amounts, hence she did not feel the heartache to part with them.

 

Finished with her business in the temporary tent city meant for starting the construction work, Nisha headed over to the remodeled [Navis Terram] that housed the Terus Empire legion.

Recently, her training progress with the [Imperial Swordplay] stalled more and more.

Although the dragon was entirely capable of executing the twelve moves by themselves, she found it hard to connect the various moves with each other to form a flow that allowed her to use them smoothly in battle.

Rather than a combat technique, she executed independent stances according to the situation.

Nisha had tested the moves recently in a warrior class, but even the other students like Lisa and those around her level easily took her stances apart with less coordinated but more intuitive attacks.

Since the Terus empire distributed the sword manual to their soldiers, the technique clearly had its merits, it was just herself that failed to properly execute them.

After greeting the soldier on guard duty, the elf looked for Lance Corporal Hale, who had the highest mastery of the [Imperial Swordplay] in the entire camp.

Even the other soldiers praised her for the high accomplishments she achieved and whispered quietly among themselves that it would most likely not take long until their Lance Corporal obtained another promotion once she accumulated enough achievements.

Unlike other armies, the Terus empire placed a heavy focus on personal strength among their higher ups.

Without sufficient proficiency in a weapon scripture, it was impossible to assume a higher office.

Unfortunately, she did not meet the rumored woman.

Knife Leader Tanya greeted her instead.

 

“Good day, little Miss Nisha. To what do I owe you the pleasure of a visit?”

As usual, the woman looked stunning, even in her uniform.

Compared to the other soldiers - who appeared valiant and rugged - the Knife Leader bloomed like a flower in a rocky environment, brightening everything around her.

With her increased knowledge from visiting the [Red Night Palace], the elf discovered that the woman in front of her only applied a very minor amount of makeup, her beauty stemmed from her good skin tone and features instead of dolling herself up.

For some reason, the dragon was reminded of Velvet, who took good care of her when she visited the establishment in the past.

Their temperament and demeanor was quite similar, although they worked in two entirely different occupations.

As Nisha tried to figure out their parallels, though she was still too young and inexperienced to figure out exactly why, she still answered calmly.

“I was hoping to improve my fighting style when using the [Imperial Swordplay].

My combat experience is still too little and I’d like to train more.”

Knife Leader Tanya knew that Lance Corporal Hale held the elf in quite high esteem and invited her inside the legion base.

“Of course. Only frequent practice can allow you to display your maximum potential. Follow me.”

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