Chapter 51 — The Ore Arrives

The second contingent, the one that had remained in Tanzan Town, had finally arrived.

For Gao Yang this was undeniably good news.

At the very least it meant more hands—it meant he could put up the docks and the sawmill, it meant he could consider formally opening the mines in the east, and it meant he could push this camp toward becoming a true "territory."

Even with the second contingent added, the Pioneer Territory could boast only a scant eight hundred-odd souls, but compared to the hundred-man vanguard, this was already a tremendous step forward.

Sir Philip had led the several soldiers and dozen-odd militiamen left behind in Tanzan Town to complete this escort mission. The promising young knight received a warm welcome from Hedy; the arrival of him and his soldiers filled what had been, apart from manpower, the camp's greatest shortfall—its defensive strength.

Though no monsters or the like had been sighted thus far, merely surviving out on a barren wilderness bred a sense of insecurity among the people. The fence walls and magic traps could only ease that unease; only soldiers truly armed and patrolling about could set their minds fully at rest.

As for Sir Philip, what stunned him far more was the scale and refinement of this camp.

They had actually leveled out such a vast area already? The carpenters' workshops were up? They were even building a smithy?!

The young knight walked into the camp nearly in a daze, staring blankly at the sturdy, handsome large tents and the handful of wooden plank houses already completed around him. He also saw the serfs and freemen bustling about the open ground; the latter were busy turning timber that had been roughly dried and smoke-cured into planks, and further working those planks into all manner of tools and building materials. He had never seen labor like this before: laborers who ordinarily needed the whip to work were cooperating in teams, dividing tasks among themselves, coordinated by one of their number into moving like the limbs of a single body. If in normal times putting these people to a single task merely produced a mutual cover-up of idleness, then the present situation was its exact opposite.

And where were the overseers who ought to be standing by with whips in hand?

Philip searched around and only then discovered that the overseers were in fact picked family soldiers who could write a few more characters than the rest, standing at the edge of the clearing—but they merely paced about checking on the completion of work in each area, and what they held in their hands were not whips but wooden boards for keeping records.

"Does it feel rather wondrous?" Hedy's voice startled the young knight out of his stupor. "I never imagined those simple measures could make them so diligent—even the serfs have begun actively learning how to do work they aren't good at."

"Measures?" Sir Philip repeated the word in surprise. "What measures?"

"The Ancestor devised a set of rules for work..."

Before Hedy could finish, Sir Philip's eyes lit up. "Ah, then it must be that the honor and virtue of the ancient knights have reformed these serfs and commoners who are usually so skilled at shirking..."

"No—it's giving them meat," Hedy said, her eyes curving into a smile. "A very simple principle: work more, eat meat."

Even as she said this, she was sighing inwardly: using rewards to spur work efficiency—she had of course tried such a plain, simple method before, but it usually only worked at the very beginning. The serfs would soon find all sorts of ways to both slack off and cheat their way to food, and go on being lazy. Yet once direct competition, precise accounting, strict enforcement, and the so-called "team concept" were folded into the method, everything turned out utterly different. It was truly an incredible thing.

She had also learned for the first time that serfs and commoners were not dull and lazy by nature.

Just then Gao Song's figure appeared not far off.

Hedy and Philip immediately went to meet him. Gao Yang waved a hand to cut short their bows; he nodded first to Hedy, then looked at the young knight. "Thank you for your hard work. Well done—not a single one lost. Let the soldiers and settlers rest a while; after lunch all labor forces are to assemble in the clearing at the center of the camp, and Hedy will tell them the work rules here. Soldiers, militia included, assemble west of the camp—Sir Byron will hand out some new equipment."

Then he looked at Hedy. "For the newcomers' first day, no need to split them into work teams yet. There are too many new rules; they won't remember them all at once."

Hedy nodded in assent, while Sir Philip looked somewhat puzzled. "New equipment? What new equipment?"

Gao Yang looked at him and revealed a faintly mysterious smile. "Definitely good stuff."

Only when he actually laid eyes on the new equipment did Sir Philip have to marvel that his earlier expectations for "good stuff" had been far too low.

He had assumed it would be at most a batch of brand-new blades and armor, with a hand crossbow for each man at the very most—but who could have imagined it would be a complete standardized set of "transcendent armament"?!

Enchanted blades, enchanted armor, and military crystals from the ancient empire!

The longswords bearing "Keen Edge" flickered with cold white light; the half-plate inscribed with "Elemental Ward Incantation" and "Featherfall" shimmered with a faint gray radiance in the sun. The rank-and-file soldiers, with little learning to their names, might never in their lives have seen what an enchanted weapon looked like, but they still realized at once what manner of thing they were now wearing, and every one of them was beside himself with excitement.

What left Sir Philip even more astonished was that even the militia got a set each... Did these things cost nothing?

"They're all old antiques, the older the worse they keep—no point hoarding them; better to bring them all out and turn them into combat strength," Gao Rong said with a chuckle. "Honestly, there could have been more, but plenty are damaged beyond use, or their magic has drained so badly they're empty shells. It does pain me a little."

"Transcendent armament... every piece is priceless," Sir Philip said, stammering slightly. "These things... in the old days you couldn't find even a few sets of enchanted gear in the whole of the Cecil Territory!"

Amber stood nearby with her arms crossed. "Look at you, acting like you've never seen anything—seven-hundred-year-old grandpa, is it so strange to have a bit of private savings stashed away? Whose grandfather doesn't tuck a few silver coins under the bed boards... Ow ow ow, that hurts, that hurts!"

Gao Yang grabbed Amber by the ear and dragged her aside, while she flailed and hollered at the top of her lungs. "Let go! Let go! Haven't you heard elf ears are super sensitive! Let go!"

So at a time like this the disgrace of elvenkind remembered that half-blood lineage of hers, did she?

And Sir Philip, watching Amber being hauled off by the ear, straightened his chest with a face full of earnest pride. "Our family has worshiped Kell, god of warriors and knights, for generations—we never keep our wealth beneath our bodies!"

Gao Yang glanced at the young man with some surprise, thinking to himself, no wonder the fellow clung so strictly to the knight's creed, to the point of seeming excessively rigid and hidebound compared to his peers—turns out he was a believer after all... Far better than a certain someone who claimed to follow the Goddess of the Night but improvised her prayers fresh every single time.

"With these things... even if we run into those 'Aberrants' from before, it'll be much easier," Sir Philip said, still marveling over the new equipment. Then he suddenly spoke up. "By the way, we can give the patterns to the craftsmen in Tanzan Town—even if it costs a bit more..."