Chapter 8: Chapter 8 Funding a Town

Chapter 8 “Funding A Town”

Galana took her job very seriously. She got all 14 militia together and had daily training sessions. She set up a makeshift archery range for practice as well. She also asked for a ‘budget’ to add 4 more militia, all women who wanted to learn bowman ship and defend the village. I conceded and gave her a monthly budget of 30 silver. With her skills she could use this to make bows and arrows for the militia these would be much better than what we were using. A very sound investment on my part.

Two days after Galana arrived the earth mage arrived riding a stone horse that dissolved into the ground when he reached the center of town. I went to see the commotion. A hairless man with ebony black skin stood looking around. When he spotted me he smiled with white teeth and approached. I invited him to my humble house and the villagers disbursed.

Sanso was the mage’s name. During our meal I learned he wanted one acre of land to build a residence and ply his skills. His requested wage was 2 gold per month! I choked a little on my food. I began to wonder if I was actually smart in hiring all these NPCs at master level. I told him for the first month his wage would be paid in terms of the acre of land. Then I could do one gold a month for his first year and then two gold a month after. Simba said to me an earth mage of his caliber was easily worth five gold a month. Shit, I hoped I had not insulted him. He said he would think on it and left having not finished his dinner. Crap I thought, he is going to leave the village. There was nothing I could do about it as I did not have the funds to meet his demands.

I pulled out my drafting tools and lost myself in my work. I finished the plans for the tannery and brewery by morning.

My notifications from the last few days showed that I had raised woodcraft by one and carpentry by two. My drafting skill was up two points as well.

Common Tannery Plans, Health 3000, Requires Masonry: Foundations 7, Woodcraft: Carpentry 7

Uncommon Brewery Plans, Health 5000, Requires Masonry: Foundations 23, Woodcraft: Carpentry 23

I walked out into the early morning light and saw the earth mage walking in the distance. He was already walking toward me. I waited for him nervously to hear his decision. Sanso had spent the evening talking to the townsfolk and seeing if this was a good place to live. He was impressed with everyone and the praise they put on their lord. It did take me a second to remember I was the lord! He was in! We talked and then we actually walked about two miles north, halfway to the mountains. During this time we talked about him teaching me the earth magic skills. He agreed but any spells I would have to purchase from him per guild law. He said he would build his home here and make a road straight to town to connect the main road. Great! He spent the next two hours unlocking my earth magic, and earth magic: stone skills.

Earth Magic 1 Tier 1 unlocked, +1 Magic, +2% effectiveness of earth spells

Earth: Stone 1 Tier 1 unlocked, +1 Constitution

I then paid 10 silver for two spell books.

Stone Bullet Earth: Stone Tier 1, Magic Cost: 25, Effect: Summon and send a rock at a target, Range 120 yards, Damage 20, Casting Time 1 second

Summon Earth Earth Tier 1, Magic Cost: 27+, Effect: Summon 1 cubic yard for per 27 magic in a single casting, Casting Time 5 minutes

I went home and while eating lunch learned the spells. Feeling good about myself I went Galana’s target range and practiced stone bullet. Each cast summoned a rock the size of a child’s fist and sent it forward with great speed. The spell could only direct the rock at a space. If the target was moving I would have to anticipate its movement to hit it. That meant I would need the ranged skill. Damn. Galana approached me and watched me fling rock after rock at the target before asking me if I wanted to learn the ranged skill from her. I said yes and under her guidance I leveled the skill to level four by sunset which gave me +3 agility. My stone magic also advanced to level 2.

Ranged 4 +2% range of ranged attacks

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Galana invited herself to dinner at my house. I prepared the food while we talked. She was impressed with the closeness and enthusiasm of the community. She said she could get the militia all to expert level in two months but she wanted them all to be full time town guards and not militia. We talked it over and eventually I decided she could choose four willing militia to promote. Then she asked what was the loadout of the city guards going to be. I was confused so she elaborated, the standard armor, melee weapon, ranged weapon and uniform. I was taken aback we really didn’t have a ‘city’ just a few families living in the town.

I finally caved and let her know my coin flow was not very high and I was stretched very thin. She just smiled and said she could solve that issue. She wanted to take a hunting party out into the plains to gather meat for the village, giant porcupine quills for arrows and lion hides to sell. Reducing predators was actually part of her duty and all harvested materials would go to me as lord but she would of course charge a slight fee for making arrows for the guards.

I asked Galana if she could handle the creatures in the forest across the river. She said probably one on one but if they outnumbered her she would probably fail. Fail. That meant death to a NPC. NPC's deaths were permanent from what Simba had said. We needed the lumber to expand and upgrade our town. I would have to wait until we increased our strength to venture across the river.

Galana left and I was finding administration was taking a lot of my time these days. There was of course an administration skill but I had not been prompted for it. I was not sure if I would accept it anyway, it was Charisma based and increased efficiency of your subjects.

That night I slept a little but found time to finish the plans for the brick factory. It was just a common building and I put the plans on the shelf, fugitively and literally. Our new earth mage assured me he could supply stones in any shape so it made the building moot. But I did take away a single skill point increasing my drafting skill.

During the new day I demolished all the remaining abandoned buildings in town for lumber. I had Jaesmin help and we brought it all to my mill. I planned to use half of it for the tannery which was going to be built near the wooden guard tower out near the plains. I assumed the building would have foul odors so keeping it away from the town center was probably smart. Jaesmin was eating dinner with me in the kitchen. We had spent all day hauling lumber nearby after all so it was rude not to invite her in. A knock at the door and it was Galana. She joined us as well. She produced a parchment while we were devouring a platter of mini venison sandwiches. I took the paper and read it.

Hunting Harvest, Septum 7^th, Year 1

18 Cleardusk Plains Lions

3 Giant Porcupines

29 Cleardusk Plains Deer

2 Cleardusk Pride Master Lions

1 Cleardusk Plains Buffalo

Wow! All in a single day. Quite impressive. Galana could one-shot most of these critters. The buffalo was found far to the west and there was a large herd of them but it was getting late in the day so they just took one beast to see if it would have value. The total value of this haul if sold in a big city was almost one gold Galana informed me! But I would probably keep the meat and quills so I would get closer to 60 silver for the pelts and hides. The pride master was a level 15 beast according to Galana and a boss monster. These two hides alone were worth about 15 silver each. Damn. Great work! We needed to get these hides to market. I told her to tell the soldiers great job and they could take as much meat as they wanted. I was now going to have to get that tannery built fast. Galana planned to hunt every other day and expected to bring in an average value of 50 silver worth of goods for sale. That was 14 gold a month! My money problems were solved as she had promised. Well as long as we could sell the goods anyway.

The next day the hunters harvest was processed and everyone loved the buffalo meat. When I sampled some buffalo jerky it had better recovery benefits than what I had been consuming. It tasted the same to me though. The buffalo steak tasted like lean beef to me. The villagers asked for more and Galana said she would take the hunting party to the far west plains tomorrow. She would shepherd them.

Today I started on the tannery. I hauled some foundation stones out to the site and began to dig. The building was not large and with Jaesmin I would be able to finish the building foundation in a single day. There was no basement so it went quick. We even had time to haul half the lumber out from the mill for the building construction. I figured it would only take me two days to build the two story building since we had the beams and planking available on site. The game mechanics allowed some flexibility in the usage of the salvaged wood.

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