The Tiger and the Dragon: Act 6, Chapter 9

Chapter 9

27th Day, Upper Wind Month, 1 CE

Another misty morning came and Nemel set off to conduct a more thorough investigation of Warden’s Vale. Fendros, Elise and Ida came with her, as did four woodcutters and three Goblins. The three Goblins had ‘failed’ the basic Ranger assessment and were assigned as general labourers in the camp. They loaded their vessel with goods procured over the past two days before sailing across the Katze river.

Wooden stakes tied with bright crimson ribbons marked off the area around where Nemel had left the Soul Eater with its wagon, so she figured it was alright to start using their transport. After transferring their cargo, she asked the Soul Eater to take them south.

“South?” Elise asked, “Why not north to Warden’s Vale?”

“There’s a new settlement in the south where they’re clearing land for development,” Nemel answered. “I figure they’re closer to our stage of things, so they’ll have more of what we need to see.”

Their wagon sped along, rolling smoothly over the nearly seamless paving stones of the road. A hundred metres to either side, the land had been cleared of trees and brush. The wooden palisade of a settlement came into view about thirty minutes later. An Elder Lich stopped them at the gate.

“Submit yourselves for inspection.”

The Undead mage didn’t wait for their response. Two Death Knights came forward and checked through their things while the Elder Lich recorded their findings. It raised a hand over the pile of goods.

“「Appraisal Magic Item」. 「Detect Enchant」.”

It repeated the process with each passenger, stopping for an extra long time to take note of Nemel’s equipment. A minute later, it waved them through.

“You are free to proceed. Thank you for your cooperation.”

Nemel still wasn’t sure how to feel about the arbitrary way in which the Undead performed their duties. On one hand, they gave off a feeling that they were simply doing their jobs. On the other, one could only wonder what would happen if something interfered with their work or if they discovered something that they didn’t like.

Their wagon made its way down a wide avenue with workshops lining either side. Nemel had the Soul Eater pull over in front of a building with a butcher sign. Several men and women passing by sent curious looks at her three Goblins, but they didn’t linger to watch.

“Let’s sell our meat first,” Nemel said. “I don’t want to flood our wagon.”

She went inside to see the shopkeeper while everyone else helped unload the wagon. Behind the front counter, a little blonde-haired girl with an apron over her kirtle was sitting on a tall stool, kicking her dangling legs. Nemel stared at her for a second before coming forward.

“Welcome!” The little girl smiled a cute little smile.

“Hi,” Nemel replied. “Are…are you the master?”

The little girl gave her a funny look before hopping off of her seat. She adjusted the scarf over her hair as she walked over to a door behind the counter.

“Pa! Someone’s here to see you.”

Nemel sighed. Of course the little girl wasn’t the master of the shop. She had just come to expect everything to be ridiculous in Lady Zahradnik’s territory.

A man a bit shorter than Nemel appeared from the back of the shop. He wiped his hands on a towel as he came over.

“Mornin’ miss,” he said. “What can I do for ya?”

“Good morning,” Nemel replied. “I’m Nemel Gran. I just moved in a few days ago, about twenty kilometres downriver.”

“Pleased to meet you, Miss Gran. Name’s Bochier.”

The door to the shop opened. Fendros held open the entrance while their goods were carried in. Mister Bochier leaned over to look past Nemel as crates packed with snow were lined up along the floor.

“Seems like you’re new new here,” the butcher said. “Come in from E-Rantel?”

“Arwintar,” Nemel said. “Er, not the Goblins.”

“Hrn. Guess that explains the funny way you talk.”

Mister Bochier gestured to the crates of meat being brought in.

“Looks like you’re clearin’ wildland. That right?”

“Yes, that’s right,” Nemel replied.

“The hunters ‘round here dress their kills,” Mister Bochier said, “but they don’t pack ‘em in ice like that.”

“But they’ll spoil if we don’t.”

The butcher knelt behind his counter, producing something that looked like a curtain. He laid it out between them.

“This thing here’s a lifesaver…well, a meatsaver. I think the official name is Shroud of Sleep or something close to that.”

Nemel frowned at the item’s name.

“May I inspect it?” She asked.

“Sure, but it’s nothing fancy.”

She held a hand out towards the length of fabric.

“「All Appraisal Magic Item」. 「Detect Enchant」.”

It really is a Shroud of Sleep…

The item was one that would instantly arouse suspicion in the Empire. Shrouds of Sleep preserved corpses so that they would remain fresh for as long as they were covered by the item. There were three major uses for them.

Preserving the corpse of an important individual for resurrection at a later time was probably the highest-profile use. Keeping corpses from decaying for delayed funeral services was another. Finally, Necromancers used the item to save corpses for experimentation or vile acts of reanimation. A random person found to possess a Shroud of Sleep would immediately be taken in for interrogation by imperial authorities.

Nemel stole glances at the links of sausage hanging behind the counter. People in Lady Zahradnik’s territory were allowed to eat other people, so were they using Shrouds of Sleep as a makeshift preservation device? Were her Goblins nothing more than sausage to the Humans here?

“How are they used?” Nemel asked.

“It’s pretty simple,” Mister Bochier answered. “You kill something and wrap it in the shroud. The ones made here even have a hanger attached for convenient storage. Every household has at least one of them. Anyone who works with meat has a few.”

The butcher gestured for Nemel to come into the back of his shop. Along one wall, a long row of Shrouds of Sleep hung on a pole. He lifted one, revealing a dressed deer within.

“Wait a minute,” Nemel frowned. “How is it working on these? Is it actually a variation on a regular Shroud of Sleep?”

“Uh…I dunno about variations or anythin’ but a corpse is a corpse, right? Actually, no, there’s a trick to it.”

“What ‘trick’ might that be?”

“Well,” Mister Bochier said, “this magic item preserves ‘corpses’. As long as what you stick in it is a ‘corpse’, it’ll work. Anything that’s processed into something else – bacon, sausage, jerky, mince, cuts of meat, whatever might be considered a new ‘product’ – doesn’t count as a corpse anymore. The item only preserves one corpse, too, so when you take cuts out of your deer or whatever’s in there, you can’t throw the leftovers back in.”

Yup, these people are ridiculous.

The Empire’s eventual goal was to have a high degree of magical integration as a whole, but even this level of common knowledge was beyond the grasp of the average citizen. Everyday butchers did not casually explain how magic items worked and reenvision their theoretical effects to suit their purposes.

“Are there any other magical devices or techniques that I should know about as a newcomer?” Nemel asked.

“Hmm…you’re better off seeing Miss Pam about that,” Mister Bochier told her. “Her Alchemy shop doubles as an outlet for magic items. It’s a good time to be in the meat market, though: demand from E-Rantel and the Great Forest of Tob keeps prices nice and high compared to everything else.”

She settled her business with the butcher and they returned to the wagon with their empty crates. Once everyone boarded the wagon trundled forward. It didn’t get far, however, as they spotted the Alchemist’s sign a hundred metres away. Inside, a young woman about Nemel’s age looked up from where she was pouring something into a beaker.

“Welcome…oh, a new face…faces?”

“Good morning, I’m Nemel Gran. I moved to a place downriver a few days ago with some of my people.”

“In that case,” the woman said, “welcome to the Upper Reaches. My name is Pam. I’m a student at the Faculty of Alchemy in Warden’s Vale, but I’ve been running this shop for the last little while.”

Crates full of herbs and various other plants were brought in by the woodcutters and the Goblins. They were placed on the long counter that stretched across the front part of the store.

“You brought Goblins with you, too?” Pam asked.

“No, they’re some of the neighbours that joined us yesterday,” Nemel answered.

“Hmm…Lady Zahradnik wants the Demihumans around here to start mingling with us, but they’ve been pretty shy so far. Not a single one has come by here. What’s your secret?”

It’s simple, just beat them up! As if I could say that…

“I asked them to join and they eventually joined,” Nemel said. “Weirdly enough, they seem to fit right in once they figure out what’s going on.”

“Interesting,” Pam leaned forward and eyed the Goblins. “What do these ones do?”

“Um, we haven’t figured that out yet. The tribe that joined us had two Rangers and two mystics, so these guys must have done things around their camp. They’re just helping out with odds and ends for now.”

They had to do something. Living in the wilderness wasn’t so easy that one could just consume resources for nothing. Even children had to work. Since they had some equipment, one or more of her ‘general labourers’ probably had production skills in leatherworking or woodworking.

Nemel wandered around the shopfront while Pam looked through the goods they had brought in. As Mister Bochier had mentioned, there were magic items alongside the various potions, tinctures and other alchemical products on display. She stopped at a rack that held several Shrouds of Sleep, eyeing the price on the sign above them.

Expensive! No, each one should pay itself off eventually…

The problem was that they needed a lot of them. She could ask Dame Verilyn for capital, but Nemel also felt like it was something that her settlement could gradually achieve on its own. That being said, while pride and a sense of ownership were important, it wasn’t something they could bide their time with. According to her Rangers, outpacing the growth of wild animals with such a small community would be a hard battle. They needed to bring in twenty large animals per day to be able to even start chipping away at the population.

Let’s see…if our starting goal is twenty per day, we’ll need another set of Shrouds of Sleep while the first is used to transport goods…plus we could use some to preserve our meat supplies…

“I need fifty Shrouds of Sleep,” Nemel said. “But we can’t afford to buy that many right now. Would it be possible to come up with some sort of arrangement?”

Pam looked up from the crates of herbs.

“Sure.”

“Sure?” Nemel blinked in surprise.

“This shop doesn’t have fifty lying around,” Pam said, “but I can order them in. It’ll take a while to make them all, but you’ll get them eventually.”

“But what about the payment?”

“I can lease them to you.”

“Aren’t you worried that something might happen?” Fendros asked.

“Something…?” Pam tilted her head, “No, not really.”

Fendros exchanged glances with Elise and Ida. They were probably thinking about risks like theft. It was unthinkable to so casually hand out magic items in the Empire, but no person in their right mind would try stealing something if it meant Death Knights and Elder Liches chasing after them.

If contracts for leases and gradual payments for goods could be reliably enforced, then a lot of things would go more smoothly. As Nemel was a member of a family that produced magic items, a number of attractive prospects immediately came to mind.

Being able to lease magical tools and appliances provided not only convenience, but practical improvements to the citizens’ quality of life. Magical lighting, for instance, could extend the hours that an artisan could work beyond what daylight afforded. Since they didn’t burn fuel or require maintenance unless damaged, leasing out the magic item for a modest rate would eventually result in pure profit.

The extra productivity facilitated by the magical lighting could then be put towards permanent ownership, used as capital for other equipment, or treated as discretionary income. This process presumably applied to anything so long as profit was being made off of whatever the item was being used for.

“Let’s do that then,” Nemel said.

“Oh, that was quick,” Pam replied. “People usually take a while to decide.”

“My family’s in the magic item business, so I can see how it works.”

“That so? Our faculty is looking for master artisans – do you think they’d be interested in coming here?”

“They have a lot of things to take care of at home,” Nemel replied, “thank you for asking, though.”

“I see. Well, I’ll talk to Miss LeNez about arranging those Shrouds of Sleep for you. A few other magic items are being manufactured by the workshops in Warden’s Vale. We’ve got magical lighting, magical space heating and magical cooling. Interested in any of those?”

“I think I’ve seen the magical lighting and heating that you’re talking about. What’s the cooling one?”

“It’s basically the same temperature control appliance, but set at a different temperature. We ultimately want to develop an adjustable version, but, with summer coming up, our priority has been setting up cold storage for herbs, vegetables and processed foods.”

Nemel tried to recall the volume of air that Dame Verilyn’s heating strips could affect. They were sleeping in tents for the moment and permanent structures wouldn’t come up until autumn.

“Out of curiosity,” Nemel asked, “are the buildings in Warden’s Vale designed with these magic items in mind?”

“It’s the other way around,” Pam answered. “Lady Zahradnik started raising those nice big houses and workshops around Warden’s Vale first, then she chartered her magic item and alchemy companies. Since she made the buildings so uniform, the faculty was able to use that as a standard for its temperature control items. One item covers enough space for a single floor of a regular home in Warden’s Vale. The scheme now is that the first and second floors get heating items and the basement gets a cooling item so it becomes a super root cellar.”

“Do larger buildings work like that, too?”

“Our early ones don’t fit exactly,” Pam said, “but everything built nowadays does. It’s all nice and convenient when it comes to household comforts. I’d advise that you follow the same building standards so nothing goes to waste.”

The materials that Nonna had dumped on her had a section for building standards, but she hadn’t paid it much mind. She didn’t think that it mattered when all she had was tents and shacks.

“What other magic items do you have for sale?”

“Er…nothing else,” Pam replied. “Our hands are full just making these. We’re nearly caught up with demand in Baroness Zahradnik’s territories, but the entire duchy wants our stuff. We’ve got orders to last us until the end of forever.”

“…does that mean my order will arrive at the end of forever?”

“Lady Zahradnik ensures that local demand is addressed first,” Pam said. “All of our work’s been focused on getting items to every household over the last year. Exports are only starting to trickle out now.”

Wait a minute. How many arcane artisans are in Warden’s Vale?

The time that it took to produce a magical utility item followed some simple rules – simple for those familiar with the matter, at least.

Barring the time it took to gather reagents and craft the physical object being enchanted, one multiplied the tier of the spell being employed by the power set to the spell for that item. In common vernacular, the power levels were referred to as minor, lesser, regular, major and greater. If the item had a persistent effect that could be activated and deactivated, the total was multiplied by two.

Dame Verilyn’s ‘heating’ items, which were used to maintain a pleasant temperature for Zu Chiru’s stand, were iron strips imbued with a lesser Temperature Change effect. Temperature Change was a Second-tier spell. The ‘lesser’ effect threw in a multiplier of three. As it could be activated and deactivated, that number was multiplied by two for a total of twelve days to create.

That meant that it took a single second-tier caster over a month to create the three items required to regulate the temperature of a single regular house in Warden’s Vale.

The Shrouds of Sleep on display used the Second-tier Gentle Repose spell as a minor effect, which meant each Shroud of Sleep took four days to create. Magical lighting was simpler, as the Continual Light spell was developed to instantly create permanent lighting on a target object. As long as one had the requisite amount of ruby powder, one could enchant a lamp post and leave it shining forever.

“…are you alright?” The Alchemist asked.

Nemel shook away her wandering thoughts.

“Sorry, I was trying to figure out how many arcane artisans Warden’s Vale has. Even if the population is small, you’ve filled demand for the entire territory rather quickly.”

“Ah, I guess that would be pretty confusing if you’re not used to this place. There are around seventy-five Human artisans around the territory right now.”

Seventy-five?!

It may have seemed a pittance with hundreds of Elder Liches all over the place, but it was a number of arcane artisans otherwise only seen in a good-sized city.

“Where in the world did you find so many?” Nemel asked.

“Most of them were here before Miss LeNez and us apprentices arrived,” Pam answered. “More come in every once in a while. They’re all Necromancers, so everyone jokes that Lady Zahradnik picked up an evil cult that was just lying around somewhere. Makes sense, though.”

“Sorry, my head stopped working when you said that.”

“The Sorcerer King is the most powerful Necromancer in known history,” the Alchemist told her. “He’s the god of death, as far as we’re concerned. Necromancy is suppressed in the region, so it makes sense that all the Necromancers hiding around the area come swarming to the Sorcerous Kingdom, right? Besides, with so many ordinary citizens using Undead labour, every third person in the territory looks like some kinda Necromancer.”

“I suppose that makes sense,” Nemel hesitantly voiced her agreement. “Do those Necromancers that you mentioned cause you any problems?”

“Aside from occasionally pestering the Undead, not really. They’re basically Wizards who’ve gone from clandestine studies to open studies. That means they mostly act like the rest of us in our respective fields of expertise. Lady Zahradnik’s trying to turn this place into a centre for magic, so all of the magic casters here are working toward that common goal. We’re here to build something up, not tear things down.”

Nemel pondered the approach that was being taken toward magic in Warden’s Vale. The Empire valued arcane casters highly and it was easy to find work so long as one wasn’t marked by the imperial administration somehow. Even then, one could strike off on their own and become an Adventurer or Worker.

The thing was that the Empire treated magic as its own ‘thing’. Much of it couldn’t be helped. Just as those of other vocations tended to relate well to their peers in the field, arcane casters were in a little sphere of their own. Not only were their fields of study so far removed from the mundane matters of the vast majority of imperial citizens, but it was costly to train a mage and very few became professionals.

Further exacerbating the problem was the way that the Empire’s greatest magic casters tended to purposely segregate themselves from ‘the masses’. While it involved itself in national efforts, the Imperial Ministry of Magic was essentially an institution where members just shut themselves away to pursue their studies in seclusion or amongst an exclusive group of colleagues.

Warden’s Vale, on the other hand, was taking an entirely different approach. The Baroness was trying to populate her demesne with so many magic casters that every third person was one. Things once considered esoteric and unapproachable to the uninitiated would become common knowledge gained from everyday experiences.

The people had a practical ‘gateway’ in the form of alchemy, which was the arcane vocation most integrated with society at large. Nearly every industry used alchemical products in their processes or at least could. Education afforded to everyone made for the second angle of attack, and many families might see their sons and daughters become mages.

Divine magic was the only avenue that appeared to be missing, though Corelyn Harbour’s temple university meant that it was only a matter of time before the Temples had the staff to send to Warden’s Vale. There were the Lizardman Druids as well. Nemel doubted that they were left unconsidered with how involved Baroness Zahradnik’s plans were.

“All done here,” Pam slid a piece of paper between them. “Please make sure everything is accounted for, Miss Gran.”

Nemel raised the receipt to scan its content.

“As expected,” she murmured, “herbs and such are cheap here.”

“Yes and no,” Pam said. “The reagents that you gathered are all things that foragers commonly look out for, which is probably what they’ve been trained to do back where they came from. Let your people know to keep an eye out for other things. Eventually, you’ll start seeing stuff that’s worth more. Who’s been collecting these?”

“Some Rangers who moved in with me.”

“Ah, that’s good, then. Rangers and Druids won’t over-forage like other people might. Just let them do their thing – if there’s something that Lady Zahradnik absolutely won’t budge on, it’s preserving the natural balance of her territory. Overburdening the land will get her on your ass real quick.”

“Has that happened to anyone?”

“Not really. Just some minor things here and there. We don’t have desperate people trying to scrape up a living here and there hasn’t been a real greedy guy that ignores the rules yet. Not that I’ve heard of, at any rate.”

The last part was a bit unsettling. It either meant that people were satisfied with what they had or the ‘greedy guys’ vanished without a trace or memory.

“Oh, by the way,” Pam said. “I didn’t ask about consumables…”

Nemel scanned the vials, jars and miscellaneous containers lining the shelves behind the counter. She had packed some healing potions and other curatives since they knew that they wouldn’t have access to a temple, but now they had what was probably a Goblin Druid. There were other things even more frequently employed, however.

“Is there anything the camp needs from this shop?” She asked the row of settlers standing along the wall.

“Glue, Varnish, Lime, Lye…”

The men rattled off two dozen materials used in woodworking, construction and daily life. Pam had a couple of Skeletons bring out barrels of the requested goods from the workshop’s warehouse. The cost of everything wiped out the proceeds from the foraged goods that they had brought in and put a solid dent into Nemel’s remaining funds.

“Do you have a Merchant Guild account?” Pam asked as Nemel counted out her payment.

“I don’t. I always just used my family’s before.”

“You should get one set up as quickly as possible,” the Alchemist said. “People don’t usually use physical coinage when performing large transactions. I know it sounds strange for a frontier territory, but we’re pretty well-connected with the rest of the country.”

“I didn’t see a Merchant Guild branch in Warden’s Vale,” Nemel said.

“Corelyn Harbour’s the closest one. It’d be a day trip with those new barges.”

The next time she had planned on going there was when she would need to meet the next batch of settlers. As Pam mentioned, however, it wouldn’t take more than a day to go back and forth. She would have to think of some other things to look around for to make the most out of the trip.

After finishing up her business and loading her wagon with the supplies, they continued shopping along the main street of the settlement. She found that the shops were not just local workshops servicing the community, but outlets for industries in Warden’s Vale. The local blacksmiths, for instance, filled custom orders for the nearby construction, but the tools and supplies being sold were delivered from the foundry in Warden’s Vale. This gave a sense of uniformity as everything was constructed out of the same, standardised components.

Eventually, they came to Nemel’s main objective for visiting the settlement, which was the mill and the nearby workshops processing lumber.

Though the river was nearby, the mill didn’t use a water wheel. Instead, a Soul Eater was used to power the machinery. A horse shaft was connected to a giant steel gear, which in turn powered a drive shaft extending to the workshop. There, two Death Warriors were feeding logs through a circular steel saw under the direction of a woodcutter.

Nemel’s people watched as the log was quickly divided into uniform planks. The planks were loaded into one of the ubiquitous metal containers that were seemingly used for all cargo.

“There something I can help you with?” A man called out to them as he walked out of a nearby office.

“We’re new to the territory,” Nemel smiled in greeting, “I just brought some of my woodcutters to see how things are done here.”

“I see. Well, this part don’t work too different from a decent water mill. The difference here’s that the Undead handle the logs like twigs, so moving wood around goes faster. How we handle transport is a godsend, too.”

“Can the Undead do this part on their own?”

“The machinery is pre-set so they can,” the man said. “All they have to do is repeat a few simple steps. The woodcutter on duty calibrates the machinery according to our queue of orders.”

A mill usually employed dozens of people, hundreds, if one included all of the associated industries and services. The mill here looked like it had eight Humans between the various operations at most.

The sound of metal doors banging shut filled the air when the Death Knights closed the filled cargo container. As if on cue, a Soul Eater drawing a wagon came into the yard. A gurney crane offloaded the empty container from the wagon, and then loaded the filled container. Once it was secured, the Soul Eater trotted off with its shipment.

“Those go to the lumber yards in Warden’s Vale for seasoning,” the man said.

“How many trees do you go through per day?” One of Nemel’s woodcutters asked.

“This here’s the quick part,” the man replied. “We go through trees faster than they can bring ‘em in. Right now, they’re clearing the way to the western pass. You can go take a look at how they do things if you want. A freight wagon brings in a fresh set of trees every half an hour or so.”

They thanked the man and left the lumber mill before heading over to take a look at the workshops nearby. This part, at least, seemed normal enough. The shops were almost entirely operated by Humans fashioning parts and pieces for local construction.

When a Soul Eater pulling a wagon full of logs entered the southwestern gate of the settlement, they rushed over to their wagon to follow it back out. It led them upriver, passing another wagon bringing timber in the other direction. Twenty-five kilometres from the settlement, they stopped at the end of the pavement where piles of timber awaited loading. Her people backed away nervously as an Elder Lich came forward to question them with two Death Knights.

“You are not staff assigned to this site. State your name and purpose.”

“Nemel Gran. I work for Dame Verilyn. These are some of the people from my settlement. We’ve come to see how land is cleared around here.”

The Elder Lich raised a hand to the side of its skull. After several moments, it set it back down again.

“You may proceed. Do not block the passage of cargo. Straying beyond the bounds of the worksite will place you in the territories of the local tribes. Enter at your own risk.”

Do they just say ominous things on purpose? Wait, doesn’t that mean I invaded the neighbouring territory yesterday?

She had crossed the river, spied on the neighbours and her ‘raid’ netted her a small tribe’s worth of Goblins. Nemel the Demihuman subjugator. The road to potatoes was fraught with all sorts of questionable acts. At least she wasn’t enslaving them…or was she? She intended to pay them eventually, but they were currently working for nothing but room and board.

They walked west up the slope, occasionally passing a Soul Eater dragging a tree chained to its harness in the other direction. A few hundred metres further along, they came across a group of Vampire Brides in yellow helmets and blue coveralls with reflective stripes directing an assortment of Undead labourers.

“Good morning,” Nemel said.

One of the Vampire Brides turned to reply to her greeting.

“Good morning.”

“What are you doing here?”

“Earthworks for the highway,” the Vampire Bride said. “Well, the new highway, at least.”

Beyond the Vampire Brides, the Undead were tearing up what looked like the remains of a much older road that had been exposed from their excavation.

“Wait, aren’t those ancient ruins?” Nemel said, “Should you really be destroying them?”

“Parts of this old highway were identified half a year ago and we’ve avoided construction here because of that,” the Vampire Bride replied. “Lady Zahradnik wanted to commission the Adventurer Guild to investigate, but they’re still working in the Azerlisia Mountains. The Prime Minister sent down the order for the new highway to be laid without further delay.”

Nemel eyed a wheelbarrow of ancient paving stones being carted away. Any fragment of history from before the Demon Gods was precious and rare, but most people only saw it as an opportunity to lay claim to wealth long lost by its original owners. The Sorcerous Kingdom seemed to care even less. Then again, the Sorcerer King’s claim to E-Rantel was supposedly ancient, so maybe they already knew the history of the region.

“What are you doing with all the stuff you’re tearing up?” Nemel asked.

“Baroness Zahradnik instructed us to store everything in Warden’s Vale,” the Vampire Bride answered. “Representatives from the Adventurer Guild will investigate everything when they’re available.”

“I see.”

At least someone was making sure that it wasn’t being thoughtlessly discarded.

They continued walking past the construction site, eventually reaching the end of the clearing. A dozen men and women were directing teams of Skeletons to clear the brush while others examined the huge trees left over in their path. One of the woodcutters took a piece of chalk and drew several lines on a trunk over a metre in diameter.

“We should walk around the side, Mistress Nemel,” one of her woodcutters said, “looks like the trees are set to fall toward the clearing.”

After they scurried out of the way, the woodcutter gave a nearby Death Warrior a thumbs-up. The Death Warrior hefted a one-handed battleaxe and started chopping out the marked area. Two minutes later, it moved to the other side. In less than four minutes, the sixty-metre-tall conifer fell into the clearing. Four Death Knights came up and started excavating the stump while a team of Skeletons trimmed the branches from the fallen tree.

“What do you think?” Nemel asked.

“It’s uh…fast?” One of her woodcutters answered with a helpless laugh, “A tree that big would take one of us a day to get down with an axe. Then it’d take days to trim and split up so we can move it with draft animals.”

After the woodcutters and their Skeleton labourers trimmed off the last of the branches, the tree trunk was divided into ten-metre-long sections. Iron stakes were driven into the sides of the closest one and chains were attached to them. They hitched the felled timber to a Soul Eater that arrived to drag it off.

“How much is one big tree like that worth?” Ida asked.

“A lot,” the woodcutter answered. “Could probably sell it for somewhere close to a hundred platinum in Arwintar. Assuming you can even find one that big and manage to move it. One tree like that could build a small village. Or a heck of a lot of furniture.”

“…do we have trees like that at our place?”

“Plenty. Bigger, even. Problem’s how much work would go into harvesting and transporting even one of them. We can drop trees near the river into the water and move them that way, but, after that, we’ll need animals…except I haven’t seen a single ox or draft horse the entire time here.”

Another huge tree crashed to the ground. Going by the man’s estimate, a week of work was going by in minutes right before their eyes. Smaller trees were felled by a single stroke of the Death Knights’ greatswords. It was no small wonder that Baroness Zahradnik’s subjects shrugged off the ninety per cent tax rate like it was nothing. The question was whether it was incentive enough for her people to set aside their fear of working with the Undead.

Nemel licked her lips nervously.

“If you’d like,” she said. “I can lease these types of Undead to help with your work.”

Her men exchanged looks.

“If that’s what you think is best, Mistress Nemel.”

“Nonono, I wanted you guys to be okay with it!”

“Doesn’t look like the people here have any problems with ‘em,” one of the woodcutters shrugged. “Besides, we won’t be able to get far without using the Undead like everyone else here.”

Relief flooded through her, and she concealed a sigh.

“Then let’s head back home and drop our things off,” Nemel smiled. “I’ll fill out the paperwork when I visit Warden’s Vale this afternoon.”