[D'sP] Year 1aa - Chapter 418

Doyle and Ally settle down. Without a new floor to make and people they need to watch, there isn’t much that needs done. Well, obviously all the observational stuff still needs work, but this ends up being more like sitting back on a couch and watching Internet videos.

Because goodness knows, even post-apocalypse, people are still people. Even the inner circle isn’t free of nonsense. Though in there, things haven’t ever boiled over. It seems going through life and death together has given them a bit more common ground to understand each other on.

Which is the opposite of the case in the second ring. Despite everyone surviving the arrival of the system, it seems as if pre-existing cracks had been widened. Though it certainly didn’t help that there were legit demon worshipers running around.

Doyle got to watch a particularly fraught drinking competition centered on such a divide. On one side was a guy worshiping a god of revelry and wine. Not the most unique combo with a small following, hindered by the focus on wine instead of alcohol in general.

On the other side was another guy, skinny such that you think the first cup would send them under the table. They worshipped a devil of intoxication that had gained popularity for their willingness to take ritually sacrificed grains and water for a third or less as much beer as you could make from the sacrifice.

Which admittedly, made the devil unpopular with the people in charge of keeping the town fed. Not that the regular people in town cared about that. All that mattered was they now had a supply of beer until there was a better supply of homemade stuff.

Early on, Ace had actually been tempted to ban that ritual temporarily, if only from worry of something being off with the beer. Though after testing and cross checking with connections from other deities and such; it was found to be completely mundane booze with no demonic connections lingering. Which, in hindsight, Ace could understand.

After all, you need to get your foot in the door. Maybe the deeper rituals that brought about magical intoxicants might have demonic corruption hidden within, but just having people sacrifice to it was a win. Besides, Ace knew that even if they got an industrial brewery running, people would still get a bit of their beer from the devil or any similar entities.

After all, the produced beer isn’t limited to just the one “vintage”. While the basic ritual didn’t let you choose what showed up. There was a bunch of different types of beer that it pulled from.

Either way, it was easy to see why a follower of such a devil would disagree with a follower of a deity in the same alcohol based portfolio. Though since it took place inside of the town, things were a lot more peaceful. Such disagreements had already caused more than a few roadside deaths.

While Wolf’s Rest itself was peaceful, the wilderness around it was anything but. And so Doyle and Ally got to watch a bit of legal and/or courtly drama as Ace once again had this problem brought up to him in a more open council meeting.

Not that the inner circle didn’t care about such things. It is just a fact that most of them don’t leave the town and when they do; it tends to be for the forest and not the forming roads. So it is up to the regular populace to surface these concerns.

Ace shakes his head, “I don’t know if we have enough guards or the authority to handle this sort of thing. We already have patrols to the docks.”

An angry person in the crowd, “Which is in sight of the gate! We need protection on the road to Bennett town. I’d love to ride a boat here every time, but the traffic has gotten too much. And besides, as a merchant, I need to bring my wagon here to buy and sell goods.”

Susan, “We have taken care of a number of threats, however, we’re just one town. To patrol that road will require more work between us and them.”

Before others can talk, Ace continues where she left off. “Which is in the works! This issue was brought up just last week and there has not been enough time for the agreements to be finalized. Things, sadly, are moving at the speed of politics right now.”

From somewhere else in the town hall, “Yeah, politics. And it has nothing to do with you folk focusing on the dungeon too much? We see your teams going in early and leaving late.”

Jim takes this comment. “Of course, we are delving into the dungeon. You’re a fool if you don’t. If you think the roads are bad now, you must not have travelled far.

“The worst of humanity is really on display right now. Once you’re a couple settlements past Bennett town, the roads truly get dangerous. If there even are roads to begin with.”

Kelly, “And speaking of roads, we are working on that! Yes, I saw you about to shout. Magic might seem to make things easier, but for long-term changes, you need a lot more work.

“It is too simple for a spell to dust the house for you. Dust is small and it isn’t like you’re preventing more dust from settling. If instead you want to warp the terrain itself to form a proper road? Well, I know a few have already tried the ‘simple’ route as evidenced by numerous potholes magically growing in size.

“If you don’t pull material from the ground, then at best the summoned dirt you ‘fixed’ the road with simply vanishes. Though most of you try to get clever and blend the edges together so the pothole plug doesn’t just pop out. Which means that when the summoned material vanishes, there is now a bunch of loose dirt that gets blown away.”

Ace, “And so, if we catch you using that form of quick patch, we will charge you for the repair of the road. If you truly must, just summon in a simple plug. You trying to be clever only worsens the situation.”

Kelly nods, “And as I said, we are developing a solution. It isn’t like we got dropped into this world without knowledge. I have people researching various ancient road building techniques, looking for ones that can be easily implemented.

“I wish we could use the classic methods, but that involves many layers of varied size gravel and blocks. Which if we build the roads by hand, isn’t hard to set up, but when using magic introduces complexity.”

From the crowd, “But that doesn’t solve the bandit problem!”

Jim scoffs, “It doesn’t hurt either. In fact, a proper road would only help. While it does give the bandits a place to ambush, properly designed roads don’t just cut straight through the terrain. You sculpt the area around it to make such things harder as well. Besides, patrols are much easier if they’re on proper roads and you can know the best locations to set up an ambush.”

And on and on the town hall went. Doyle found it particularly amusing how Jim in particular kept getting more and more angry as things circled back to the same talking points. Though he can’t blame him.

While the arguments are legitimate, the ones pushing things are the big merchants. Those with wagons and so incapable of taking a boat from Bennett town. And while any wagon leaving Wolf’s Rest is a prime target, they actually fare pretty well.

What this is actually about is the merchants don’t like having to hire so many guards. Guards which tend to be hired at Jim’s guild through his quest board. What with the fact that he has a near monopoly on being able to vet such people.

Though besides such highlights, Doyle is able to calmly watch winter progress. Which causes even more consternation for those merchants who are really missing pre-system snowplows. Either way, the town is a hive of constrained activity.

So many things are being prepared for when spring rolls around. Farms to make, walls to build, and an uncountable number of small outside tasks. Throughout this, Doyle actually gets some relief from the floor six problem from a strange vector.

Once winter really got into gear, more regular people than ever before started to delve into the dungeon. It was for any number of minor reasons. To find some extra herbs to spice up their meal, to get a little exercise, or simply to get out of the cold.

Few of these new people ended up even getting to floor five, let alone six. However, their presence split up things enough to let the world energy in floor six to settle and flow to other floors. It wasn’t a big change, but to Doyle it felt like coming down after a weekend on a mountain. The “air” hadn’t been thin enough to cause problems, but now that he was back to normal, the difference was obvious.

Still, Doyle waited. He was watching for the right chance. Some movement from the professional “bus to six” people that is so big, a change from the dungeon would seem to be a simple reaction.

Before that, though, a significant day comes to pass.

“Happy New Year!”, drunken revelers shout in the streets. The system kindly marking the passing of the first year since the system arrived. Year 1aa, with double ‘a’s standing for after apocalypse. Though the double ‘a’ notation was purely for scholars and partly a joke. More appropriate would have been pa or ps for post apocalypse or system.

However, neither Ace nor the people in charge of tracking such things figured any notation they used would last for long and so they wanted something that would at least come first alphabetically. After all, every community well off enough will probably mark it in their own way. Though it was important to note that they had at least gotten the entire community to agree to it. So it wasn’t like each town had their own way of recording it.

Of course, even during a celebration, Ace isn’t free. Instead, he is meeting with one of the candidates for the inner circle. Marigold Sole goes by Mary and is not only in a leadership position among the deerkin, but more relevant to this meeting, one of the more experienced farmers.

Mary nods, “Not only is my knowledge telling me so, but I’ve got a system skill that’s acting like an almanac right now. The first day of the new calendar is also the first day of spring. Don’t know how long that will last once the system stops stabilizing the weather so heavily, but here we are.”

Ace sighs, “How soon can we start working on breaking ground for the fields?”

Mary, “You already had some work done before winter, so that’s working in our favor. However, we won’t get half the fields we need in time for the spring planting.”

Ace turns to Kelly, “Can magic help with this?”

Kelly shakes her head, “No, or rather, that is counting magic already. We’re going to make heavy use of magic to kill off any unwanted plants currently in the fields, including the seeds. Then even more magic to speed up the decay.”

Marry, “Which will make our later tasks much easier. I would hate to try and dig up the fields as they are right now. The local grass’ root system is something else. Though even with magic decaying the mess, it will still not be easy to till.”

Kelly, “And before you ask, yes, the time frame still includes magic. If you wanted to break a big rock into smaller rocks or move said rock, that would be easy enough. In fact, once again, magic will be used heavily to pick out the bigger rocks in the field. However, we are having trouble making a spell that will till the soil properly.

“Turn it into mud? Pack it tight? All possible. However, we don’t want to actually kill everything. Our previous steps aren’t even aimed at fungus for the most part. Plants grow better with a bit of mycelium kicking about as long as it isn’t the wrong kind of too much. But more important are things like ants and worms.”

Mary nods, “If you didn’t mind the magic users doing the fields one pace at a time they could do it all with magic. Or in a fraction of the time, a proper plow being pulled by our cattle can do it. The bottlenecks being how many cattle we have that can pull a plow and how many of said plows we can make.”

Not CEO Material - Chapter 417

Shutting Them Down - Chapter 419