Chapter 863 — New Shoots

From the Fertile Woodlands to the Valley Corridor, from Stonehold City to Thoring Fort, from the Gorgon River to the mountain passes at the eastern frontier's entrance, the land that had been scorched by war and then frozen for a whole winter by bitter cold was now swiftly reviving.

Warm winds blowing up from the southern regions swept across the vast fields of the Thoring district, swaying the green shoots in the farmland and setting the banners atop Thoring Fort's walls rippling—banners bearing the Cecil emblem, gold tracery on a field of blue, rising and falling with the wind.

A young officer in a dark blue coat walked briskly along the half-open connecting corridor that spanned the wall and the fortress. He passed through the passage that had been repaired not long ago, through the archway of the brand-new keep, through the inner-bailey colonnade with its two hundred and thirty-four years of history, and at last lightly knocked on the wooden door of the Construction Corps command office.

After receiving a reply, the young officer pushed the door open and entered.

Margarita, dressed in a knight's everyday uniform, her neat ponytail and brisk, dashing air about her, sat behind the desk. She lifted her head and looked at the subordinate who had appeared before her: "Something to report?"

"Yes, ma'am," the young officer said, snapping off a crisp salute and speaking with scrupulous precision. "Word has come from Stonehold City, Red Maple City, and the Fertile Woodlands: the Magic Web hub devices required for the second-phase project have all been successfully activated. The network backbone for the eastern plains region is now in place."

Margarita nodded. "And how are things with the Thoring main hub?"

"The Thoring main hub is operating well; all data are within expectations. Lady Beiyila has also provided a very detailed observational report on the central crystal array, and the report has already been approved by the expert team. The relevant materials will be compiled and brought to you for review."

"Phew..." Margarita let out a soft breath. "All our efforts over this long stretch haven't been in vain after all... We're one step closer to His Majesty's plan for a nationwide network."

"Apart from the Southern Region, where construction is already complete, we seem to be the fastest-moving major district," the young subordinate said with a touch of pride. "We've been building amid ruins, and yet we've gone faster than anywhere else—the West Coast is next. Then the Western and Eastern Regions. Word is the Northern Region has only just begun preparing for the second-phase project..."

"That's because the Empire gave more than half its engineering strength and countless manpower and resources to us," Margarita said, glancing at her subordinate and shaking her head. "And it's precisely because the East Coast is a reconstruction zone that we've been able to move so fast—the Construction Corps used the reconstruction camps as its foundation, setting up camps while pushing the Magic Web hubs forward, and we had a convenient piece of 'infrastructure' like the Thoring Great Tree. None of those conditions exist in other regions."

"...You're quite right."

"Never mind all that," Margarita said with a wave of her hand. "The backbone network is only the first step, and the simplest one at that. Connecting the major cities into a network isn't difficult. The hard part is that around those cities there are countless towns and even villages, and all of them are in His Majesty's plan—they must be completed.

"While we wait on the progress of the other districts' projects, there's still a great deal for us to do. Go and make preparations—we'll hold a meeting tomorrow morning..."

The young subordinate departed. Margarita let out a soft breath, and after settling her thoughts a little, she rose from the desk and strolled over to the floor-to-ceiling window beside it.

Thoring Fort, steadily regaining its vitality, was bathed in brilliant noonday sunlight, and the residents who had migrated here hurried about their lives in the city blocks that were gradually being restored.

A group of merchants arrived from the Eastern Region were loading and unloading goods in the square below the castle. They had brought the sugar and spices most favored here, and were preparing to carry the local specialty—"Thoring tree-fruit"—off to distant parts.

From another corner of the square came the sound of cheerful music: entertainers from the north had come to town today, and brightly dressed dancing girls were whirling upon a crude stage hastily thrown together. Two young people bustled at the stage's edge, using arcane terminals to conjure thin mist and flying snowflakes, lending that crude stage and its dance a touch of the breathtaking.

Even in a world where Magic Web broadcasts and newspaper shadow-shows had appeared, certain traditional entertainments still had their place—especially in relatively remote, isolated, or otherwise exceptional regions, where the limited Magic Web facilities could not meet everyone's needs, and so wandering bards and traveling entertainers remained as popular as ever.

And these people, thriving in the new era, were also finding their own ways to encounter and explore this swiftly changing world—adapting, learning, and striving to survive.

This place grew livelier by the day.

The lady knight from the Kant region in the Southern Region sighed softly, yet could not keep a hint of a smile from showing on her face.

She had been born and raised in a small place; she was "a knight from the countryside." She had never imagined that one day she would stand here, that she would hold the position she held now. The post of commander of the Thoring Construction Corps was a rank her late father could never have imagined—that rigid old man had guarded an estate for the Kant family all his life, and though a knight, his horizons might not have matched those of an ordinary citizen of this age. Yet just now a certain remark her father had once made surfaced unbidden in Margarita's mind:

"Margarita, this world doesn't always bring good things—often, bad things may outnumber them. But so long as tomorrow's sun can still rise, we may as well expect a little more from the future, just as common folk expect the next year's harvest."

The lady knight's gaze passed over the city districts, over the walls; from her commanding height in the castle, the vision of a Transcendent let her see with perfect clarity the green waves rippling with the wind across the farmland beyond the city.

The seeds cultivated jointly by the Druid Research Institute and Lady Beiyila were growing strong in this soil—they had a higher survival rate, greater resistance to cold and wind, and, it was said, higher yields. Margarita knew nothing of farming, but she knew what those rippling waves meant: the hope of the whole plains for an entire year.

With grain raised through many channels, the Empire had bought the reconstruction zone the chance to hold out until the next harvest season, and the builders of the Construction Corps and the various reconstruction camps had not wasted that chance. With the aid of soil-purification agents, the reconstruction zone had exceeded the spring plowing plan set at the outset—and now summer had come, and hope surged in the wheat fields.

Soldiers patrolled among the towns and villages every day. Margarita had ordered sentries posted throughout every grain-producing area; fully armed soldiers and militia guarded those fields day and night like dragons hoarding treasure. Nothing—whether bandits, who were nearly wiped out by now, or beasts that spoiled the fields—could touch a single grain.

This was what her father had done when he guarded the estate for the Kant family—though some teased that he would end up a knight with a pitchfork, in all his life her father never let a single bandit or herd of beasts do damage to the estate under his protection.