Eisen planned out his work. He already knew what he wanted the statue to look like generally, but he still had to wait for one of the other originals to finish their portion of the workload, so that they could collaborate on this. But that didn't mean that Eisen couldn't already start piling up the stones from bottom to top so that he could build the new statue to replace Silber.
He jotted down some numbers to try and calculate exactly how much stone he would need. It was such a massive amount that he couldn't even fathom something like this. He would basically be building a giant-scale skyscraper by hand. The old man rubbed the bridge of his nose, "Alright, we're basically going to need...
that much?" Eisen said, pointing at one of the smaller mountains that was sticking out in the distance. He wasn't totally sure, but it should be roughly that much. It mostly depended on how much hollow space, in the form of caves, there was within the mountain, and what the quality of the actual stone ended up being.
"That's gonna be a task and a half, huh?" Silber sighed, and Eisen nodded his head, "That it will be," the old man replied. Eisen didn't like that he was going to need to permanently change the scenery here, but that was going to happen either way.
Either through the removal of that small mountain to create the new pillar, or through the collapse of the Mountain Gobbler, which would also lead to immense losses in life. It would be an incomparable catastrophe.
"I'll have to come up with something to transport all that stone first. Carrying it all by hand is going to take way too long," Eisen ran his hands through his beard, trying to think about what the best method was going to be. One that would not only speed up the stone-piling process, while also not taking too long to prepare beforehand.
Just as Eisen was finding a thread of thought, he felt something heavy hit his back. He turned his head behind himself, finding a crying Caria that had thrown herself at him, now clutching onto him without any plans of letting go. Melissa and Sal were also both there, joining in, even if they didn't jump at him. They still held him and didn't seem to want to leave.
"Eisen... Eisen!" Caria cried out, big tears falling down the sides of her face, "We... we thought you were..."
Eisen smiled lightly, reaching back and pulling Caria in front of him, as he dropped to his knee to properly hug the three of them, "I'm sorry for worrying you. But you kids know I can't die, so even if it had been worse, I would have come back in just a couple of days."
He thought that this would help calm them down a bit. He understood how scared they were, considering that Eisen had never actually died here since he met these children, so maybe that reminder would help.
"No... no, it felt... it felt like you were gone..." Sal explained, slowly rubbing the tears from his face, "Usually we know where you are, how you're doing, at least to an extent... we can just feel it, you know? Even when you're... when you're in the other world, we still have a connection to you, but..." the boy said, but Eisen couldn't really follow what he was trying to say.
"It felt like you were... gone... just... disappeared..." Caria finished, "We were so worried... we felt really, really weird when that happened, we..."
"We felt really weak..." Sal said, "We don't know why, but... just don't do that again, okay..?"
Eisen was speechless. What was going on? The... connection between him and the kids disappeared for a while? Technically, these three were tamed monsters, so there was a permanent link between them. Eisen should talk to Jyuuk about this later to see if this could happen.
After a few moments of thought, Silber stared at Eisen once more, "Hold on, why would that sting more than my nickname? Eisen, why would that sting more?"
The old man smirked silently, as Silber caught on, "You're kidding me, that bratty little stone dragon became a god?"
"B-Bratty?" Kiron repeated surprised, and Eisen laughed loudly, "Mhm, he's become the king of all dragons and the protector of justice."
Silber squatted down and let out a loud sigh, "Good for him. Yeah, honestly, good for him. Glad he managed to get there. For sure, for sure," he rubbed the bridge of his nose and sighed deeply, unable to properly and fully hide his annoyance. Figuring that he should give Silber a few moments, Eisen looked at his grandson.
"Kiron, how are you? Are you okay?" he asked, looking at Kiron's shoulder. Some of his scales were cracked.
"I'm fine, grandfather. There's no need to worry about me," Kiron smiled lightly, but Eisen just locked eyes with him. He pushed his hand into the ground, having opened his item storage there, and quickly pulled out a container of high-grade healing salve and some bandages.
"Come here," the old man said, waving Kiron over. He quickly shook his head, "No, grandfather, I promise I'm fine. Lady Xenia already healed me, so..."
Eisen locked eyes with the half-dragon, who realized that there wasn't anything that he could do to change Eisen's mind. Kiron knelt down on the ground next to Eisen, who, still having the kids cling to him, covered Kiron's wounds in the healing salve, "I know that Xenia is great at healing magic. Well, she's good at any magic, so that's a given.
But a lot of healing magic mostly recovers one's 'HP', neglecting the actual body. You don't heal as fast as the five of us do, nor as fast as the artificials. You need to take care of your body more, alright? Your scales are your armor, and your body. I will neither let you walk around unprotected or covered in scars. And in this case, it would lead to both.
So stop whining and make sure to rest your shoulder, alright?"
Kiron slowly nodded his head, unable to stop himself from softly smiling as Eisen tightly wrapped some bandages around his shoulder. As he did so, Eisen asked about something else, "Did you see Parc and Rouge? Are they alright?"
"Yes, they are," Kiron said confidently, "They were out in the camp as the destruction occured. Once things settled, they came into the city and are now helping as they can."
"I see," Eisen smiled lightly, looking down at Melissa, "Could I ask you to call them for me?"
Melissa quickly nodded her head, stretching out one of her hands. A couple of small bees flew out of her sleeve. They were bees that Melissa had specially bred; instead of just buzzing normally, they could create a few simple words. It was a quick and easy way to send a message.
And then, once Parc and Rouge got here, Eisen would get started making some Golem Cores.