Chapter 131: Milo’s New Project

And just like that, Empathetic Host leveled again. Arthur shuddered as the wave of information he could read from everyone in the direct vicinity got that much stronger. He sat down, ignored it as best he could, and got down to business.

“Lily, I need you to get some food for Mizu,” Arthur said. “Stuff you think might be comfort food for her.”

“She likes cheese,” Lily said.

“She really does. Lots of meat, bread, and cheese seems like a good bet. And Onna, could you take it to her? And keep Mizu company. I don’t want her spinning her wheels,” Arthur asked.

“I can, but Mizu should probably take a break from the well,” Onna replied, unaware of the plans already in place.

“She’s not there.” Arthur blinked away the beginnings of a headache. “She’s at her house. I told her she’s confined there to rest for the day.”

“And she agreed?”

“Yes. I… I’m working on some stuff for her. Or trying to. And for the town. I asked her to trust me.”

“Ah. Got it.” Onna nodded. “That would do it. Yes, I’ll bring her some food. And distract her. Now, what’s going on with the town? You look like you’re trying to keep an eye on ten kids at once.”

Arthur told both of Onna and Lily about the town's newly emerging Slapstone and fishery industries, both of which immediately interested Lily to no end. And then, before he could actually get down to the nuts and bolts of his plans for Lily, he found himself tugged in yet another direction.

“Arthur, can I borrow Lily?” Milo popped out of nowhere, breathless. “This Slapstone thing is changing everything for me. Every single thing.”

“Slow down,” Arthur breathed. “Go from the beginning. Today’s not a good day for me to try to figure out complex things. Trust me.”

“Okay.” Milo took a deep breath. “So, first. I know you’ve already talked to Talca about how he needs a depot. Did he explain much of why to you?”

“Not much. I figured just to hold goods,” Arthur said.

“Yeah, that. But it’s also because of a transporter feature that I’m not even going to ask if you know about because there’s no way you do. Basically, transporters get a small amount of experience for anything related to transporting,” Milo said as his face flushed red with excitement. “The depot organizes the town’s shipping and he gets a bit of experience for any transportation from the town. That means he can dedicate more time to organizing a central system for all the shipping that needs to happen instead of just shipping things himself.”

“Okay, I think I’m following,” Arthur said. “But I don’t see how that relates to you.”

“It relates to me because I’ve been trying to figure out this in-town delivery system,” Milo said. “And I’m hung up on how to do the dialing bits of it, to the point where I’m not even sure if I can really accomplish the whole system with my class. I had just about given up on the whole thing, until a watchmaker gets here or something. But if I can get a bunch of free experience and advance my mechanic skill with a smaller project, that changes everything.”

“Sorry, I’m still not following the Slapstone connection.” Arthur reminded himself that the world didn’t stop spinning just because he wanted to help Mizu with something. His own problems weren’t an excuse to be curt with Milo. Otherwise, he’d probably end up having to brew some hurt-feelings emotional-support tea. “But tell me. I care, I’m just slow today.”

“Slapstone is really, really easy to mine, to the point where even I can do it. As soon as we get a miner in town, or even before, we should be able to move literal tons of the stuff. Except that Karra can only carry so much of it so far, even with how strong she is. And only a few really good transporters can get this far, because of how rough the terrain is outside of town.” Milo paused for dramatic effect. “But what if I cut straight through that?”

“Wait, are you talking about a train tunnel?” Arthur said. “Straight through the mountain?”

“Not all the way through because that’s almost impossible. We are pretty much downhill from the entire world. But if…”

Milo began to related the bulk of his plan. It was a lot like the delivery carts in town, except instead of running entirely off majicka and delivering light loads, he was thinking about an industrial version between different towns. The system would be powered by a chain and crank system that drew power either from the river or just Karra putting her back into it. With just a few long tracks, a lot of metalworking, and involvement from a bunch of other people, he’d be able to solve a lot of the town’s shipping.

What Milo proposed to build was almost impossible by Arthur’s Earth standards, especially since he was only one person. But he was both a majicka-fueled blacksmith and could count on plenty of help. If Milo thought it was doable, it probably was.

“Absolutely. Do that,” Arthur said. “Talca will work with you on the details?”

“Yup. And I was hoping Lily would, too.” Milo threw an optimistic look to the tiny owl. “Could I count on you for a few hours a day? Just to keep me from doing something stupid, and to make the work go faster.”

“Me? Of course,” Lily said. “One condition, though.”

“What’s that?” Milo asked.

“I get to ride it.”

Before Arthur could determine a single thing about how safe that would or wouldn’t be, the pact was set between the blacksmith and the little owl. Before the spit on their handshake was even dry, Lily had already told Milo about the fishery, adding a lot of projected underground length to the shipping track and doubling the size of the job. Milo, to his eternal credit as a smith, was ecstatic.

And so the day was thrown off tracks.

On Earth, Arthur would have felt like someone was pointing down from the heavens and laughing at him. He needed to help Mizu, but somehow on the same day, the town was laying the foundations for a fishery, a mine, and the logistics backbone that would make it all work.

And he had to have a hand in all of it, in some way or another. He wasn’t exactly needed for decisions, but his tea shop had become an informal clearing-house for all of the town’s activities. He’d be slinging tea while also informally organizing jobs, information, and people in general.

Normally, this wasn’t much in the way of a problem. It made for better conversations and he’d also get a good grasp on what was going on in the town. The least story about a stamper hitting an eroded hollow in a hill and falling into that hole was both informative and also funny. But today, when the entire town was springing to life like a patch of flowers all deciding to bloom at the same time, it was a lot.

And so, Arthur found himself collapsed in a chair outside his own tea shop, drinking a glass of calming, un-pepped tea. He silently bemoaned the fact that he hadn’t found time to talk to any of the people he needed to talk to, at least about the things that mattered to him personally today.

“Told you he’d be moping,” Lily said. “He’s a moper. But he does it like picking his nose. Only when other people aren’t around, and if you catch him, he pretends he wasn’t.”

By the time Lily had stopped talking, Arthur had already adjusted his posture and facial expression to seem more cheerful. It was too late. Lily and the several people she had in tow had already seen her prophesy come true and laughed in a friendly way at Arthur as they pulled out chairs and sat.

“Why are you all here?” Arthur said. “I thought for sure you’d collapse after today. Between you all, you’re building an entire city.”

“Oh, I was trying, believe me,” Skal said, taking a swig off a flask and tucking it back into his pocket. “Then this little one came and rousted me out. Would’ve told her off, too, if she wasn’t right about why she was doing it.”

“Arthur, it was pretty obvious we were distracting you from something all day. Anybody talking to you would have seen it. Lily was there for most of it, long enough to see that you were distracted when talking with everyone.” Onna leaned back in her chair, yawned, and stretched her arms above her head. “So out with it. What’s this meeting about, Mr. Mayor?”

Arthur looked from face to face, from Rhodia to Milo to Talca to even Littal, who laid down on the stones and huffed with annoyance that he had been forced away from the other Hings before immediately falling asleep. Everyone looked exhausted, with the exception of Spiky and Leena, who seemed excited but definitely not worn out in the same way that the others were.

“Thanks, everyone.” Arthur forced himself not to tear up as he stood. ”It’s about Mizu.”

“Ah, yeah.” Milo perked up a bit. “How is she doing?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t really seen her much since this morning. She’s resting, hopefully. But what I want to talk about is less about how she’s feeling and more about what she’s going to be doing tomorrow, and how we feel about that.”

“She’ll be welling, right? She’s Mizu,” Lily said. “Even with everything, I was surprised you could even keep her away from the job today.”

“I’m sure she’ll be working, which is why I want to cover this now,” Arthur said. “Right now, we have a bunch of alchemy products that help people work faster, and that recharge majicka faster. Plus a couple other effects like what Lily has.”

“So you want to give me and her the pills, and then supercharge her?” Lily asked. “That’s easy.”

“Well, yes, that’s what I want to do. But I see two problems with that. First, she’s my girlfriend. I’d give her anything, but the pills are a communal resource. I can’t just…” Arthur paused as he felt the full weight of being elected mayor hit his shoulders at that moment. He took a deep breath and continued. “We’re getting bigger now. I can’t just hand out town-stuff like it’s mine. Even if nobody would care, it’s not good policy. And on top of that, even if I got over myself, Mizu wouldn’t accept it. She wouldn’t want preferential treatment.”

“So what are you trying to do here?” Milo asked. “We’re her friends too. It’s not like me and Rhodia don’t want to help her.”

“I’m asking for help making the decision,” Arthur said. “The way I see it, we’re the closest thing to a town counsel right now. And I’m asking you to be impartial.”

“Impartial in what way?” Milo asked.

Arthur turned towards Milo. “You have your project. Two, in fact. The mine, which is really important. And the tracks which helps with getting our industries set up, brings in more goods sooner, and generally helps the town become more self-sufficient. How much would doing things faster mean? If you had town’s resources to accelerate things?”

Surprisingly, Milo shrugged. “Less than you might think, Arthur. We don’t have anything to ship just yet and it’s going to take some time for word to get out to the other cities for trade. By the time those two things are done, I should have most of what we need built anyway.”

“Okay, that’s one thing down. Skal?” Arthur asked, sensing a bit of hope after everything.

One by one, they worked through everyone’s needs, which were very limited. And to Arthur’s relief, most of them were experiencing very good growth, and preferred working at a reasonable pace without any rush.