Chapter 112: Mystery Building

The town continued developing.

On an academic level, Arthur knew that he was looking at the most visible parts of progress. There was still plenty of work to do. Stone buildings gave a sense of safety, but that was nothing compared to a truly thick wall that would keep the outside dangers away. And a roofed building was comfortable, but they could be improved with heating elements, real furniture, and an honest-to-gods functional bathroom.

More important, they needed to start planting crops. A lot of the seeds the government had provided were quick-growing, meant to add some vegetable matter to their diets as quickly as possible. When they eventually got some farmer classes in place, they’d be able to push multiple harvests of even the slower-growing crops. But for now, they would be lucky to cover their own needs, even without adding some sudden weather event or pestilence to the mix.

Still, buildings were nice to have, as were newly tilled-fields bigger than what the whole town could have done in a day courtesy of Karra and a hastily-thrown together plow made of the last of Milo’s metal stores.

“So you’re completely out?” Arthur asked.

“Of metal? Yes. Unless I reclaim tools we aren’t using. I could melt down that plow now and use it for something else, and then remake it when we need it again or get more metal.” Milo grimaced. “It just feels gross to do that. I’d much rather find actual ore to make all the things we need with, permanently.”

“Yeah, I feel you.” Arthur kind of understood. Doing the same work over and over again instead of being able to establish a collection of all the tools the town needed did seem gross. “And you really haven’t found any yet? I know our intrepid scavenger said he was getting hits.”

“I think we might just not be digging deep enough,” Milo said. “Or something like that. When Karra has time, she’s promised to come out with me and help move dirt. I’m really hoping that will solve the problem.”

“I hope so, too. Although in the meantime, she’s doing an incredible job. She’s the Karbo of work.”

Milo nodded as they watched Karra absolutely going to town on Arthur’s terraces. Her buffs made her already-high physical stats shine, and after breaking the soil to the appropriate width with the hand-plow, she was cutting terrace after terrace at breakneck speed. They weren’t perfect, and Arthur could see points where he’d have to straighten out some walls or level out some ground later, but she was doing nine tenths of the work for him outright, enough that she’d finish the job before the morning was out.

“Are you going to line those terraces?” Milo asked. “With bricks or something.”

Arthur nodded. “I think so. I want it to be permanent, you know? I’m sure I’ll have to mix fertilizer into the soil and stuff in-between growing seasons, and I don’t want them to erode away.”

Milo stood from his tree stump, plopping a cup back on Arthur’s cart. “Good. Let me know when you’re doing that. I’ll help. And thanks for the drink.”

“Going back to work on the mystery building?” Arthur looked longingly at the increasingly finished looking structure he wasn’t allowed anywhere near. “I can help, you know. I feel bad not sharing the labor.”

“You are doing plenty.” Milo flicked his forehead. “Remember, you aren’t a labor class. You cook all our meals. That alone would be enough, but you’ve been chipping in on everything else. Nobody minds investing in a food class, and you’ve hardly even let us do that. Besides, I want to see the look on your face.”

That was the phrase of the day, it seemed. Lily, Mizu, Rhodia and even Spiky had said it at some point or another in the last several hours. Arthur was tempted to practice his poker face, just to spite them.

For now, though, it was time to roll the boba. Without a ready supply of iron and boba making machine, the making of the pearls was something that had to be done by hand, using a small scoop Arthur had commissioned for just that purpose. Since the task took forever, Arthur had given up on doing new research and development for the time being. Once the period of hard labor getting the town established was over, he’d jump right back in. He couldn’t wait. Kout had found several local ingredients that Food Scientist had gone crazy for, just waiting to be exploited.

“Well, that’s that,” Karra said, clapping dust and mud off her hands as she walked over. “Can I get one of those drinks? Just a cold, normal one. No pep. I still have plenty of effect left from the last one you gave me.”

“Sure thing.” Arthur took some very conventional boba pearls from a bowl, tossed them into a glass with a bit of ice, and poured some tea in. Without dairy to add or the need for much in terms of majicka, it was the work of a few seconds. “And thank you for the terraces. You saved me days of work.”

“It’s not my best. Sloppy, honestly. I’m sorry about all the fine work you will have to do.”

“Nope. Don’t apologize,” Arthur said. “We didn’t think we’d be this far along for weeks. You are the best addition we could have possibly added to our crew.”

“Hmm. Thank you. I like it here, too. Uncle Karbo said I would, but everyone’s been so nice, and there’s so much work to do.” Karra smiled around her straw. It was obvious to Arthur that “too much work” was pretty much her ideal life. He was pretty sure her class would have made him miserable, but it was clear she loved it to pieces. “Did you know I’ve gained four levels since I got here? Four, Arthur.”

“Whoa. That’s great.” Arthur topped off her tea and got to brewing another batch. “I guess it makes sense. You are pretty much building a whole town, single-handedly.”

“Nope. Never think that. I’m not just being polite about this, either. My class works best when I create the rough draft of someone else’s vision. If I had built all the same stuff for myself out in the woods somewhere, it wouldn’t have given me much experiences at all. But you all have dreams of what this place is going to be. That means I get paid a premium. Especially when Lily asks me for something,” Karra said as she downed most of the new tea.

“Lily in particular?”

“Yeah. She’s a little warlord. You should see her directing things on that building. ‘No, no, not there. It should be over there. People will trip over it.’” Karra chuckled. “And she’s right, pretty much every time. She has the whole picture of what it needs to be in her head, and she’s using other people to draw it.”

“Draw what?” Arthur asked, innocently.

Karra opened her mouth to answer, then slapped it shut. “Oh, no. I’m the new girl, Arthur. Stop trying to make me tell the secret. I want to be popular.”

“You already are! Just tell me,” Arthur said.

“Nope.” She put down her empty on the counter and stood up, cracked her back in several places with a stretch, and waved. “In fact, I think the only solution here is for me to go help them finish. Toughen up. It shouldn’t be more than a few more hours.”

Arthur half frowned, then smiled. He almost had the secret in hand, which would have been fun, but so was not having it. He decided to live with the ignorance before shouldering a very important sack and heading towards his terraces. It was, near as he could tell, time to plant his roots.

The flour that made up his boba pearls came from a kind of short, fast-growing bush. Arthur had several of the roots in his bag ready to be planted, and was almost sure of an eventual harvest from them if nothing terrible happened. He had made as sure of that as he could when he bought them from a friendly nursery owner just outside the city.

“How to make sure they grow?” The old eagle had actually cackled at Arthur when he asked. “Son, do you know what a weed is? The definition?”

“Not exactly. A plant you don’t want?”

“That’s one-way people reckon it. The other way is a plant that grows where it shouldn’t. Either it can beat up other plants to take what they need, or it can grow where near nothing else can grow. This plant is food, which keeps it from being a weed in the first way. But in the second way, it’s a weed. Through and through.”

“So how do I plant it?” Arthur had asked.

“Toss them on the ground somewhere. Bury them a bit if you want to be sure. Then start working to keep them contained. These suckers spread.”

Now Arthur was out on the frontier and ready to plant them, and the old eagle’s reassurances were making him feel a lot better. Almost good. But he still dug out holes to just the right depth, packing in the soil over the roots at what the old farmer had told him was the best possible density. And then, feeling a bit silly, he pushed a single pearl of boba into the dirt with each of them.

“It’s good luck,” the old eagle had said. “If you have a plant you care about, you give it something. Probably doesn’t do much besides add a bit of fertilizer, but giving a bit of food to your food just feels right. Young folks don’t do it much anymore, but time was we all did.”

Arthur looked at the little row of tiny mounds where his roots now lived. Tomorrow, he’d try and line this entire terrace with rocks to keep the growth of the plants in the area he wanted them. But if his gift was good enough and the old man was right, the root-bushes would fill up this entire section soon enough, growing throughout all but the very coldest parts of the year. It was still cold right now in the super-stable way that demon seasons tended to be, but in the valley it was just a bit warmer, insulated from the worst of the wind by the high cliffs on the sides. According to the old man, they’d grow.

“Arthur!” Lily jumped on Arthur’s back from behind, hugged him, then rolled off to where he could see her. “You got your roots planted.”

“I did. I’m hoping they do well.”

“They will. They have to. It’s all you brought, right?”

“I have a few more hidden away just in case. But if these fail, I’m waiting for the warm season. I can’t miss twice on this.”

“Do you have enough flour to get you through if they don’t make it?”

Arthur did some quick mental math.

“Maybe. It would be close. And it feels wrong to ration tea, so I’d probably just use it up and make do without if it came down to that.”

“Well, fingers crossed.” Lily suddenly puffed up to an enormous degree, proud and happy. “And guess what?”

She puffed up even more, looking like a ball of feathers crammed into a winter coat. There was only one thing Arthur could think of that would make her that excited, so he was fairly sure he knew what was going on. But he’d have a bit of fun in the process.

“What? You know I’m bad at guessing, Lily,” Arthur said.

“Just guess,” Lily exclaimed.

“Milo found iron,” Arthur guessed.

“No!”

“Mizu finished your toilet,” Arthur said with a smile.

Lily unpuffed just a bit at that. “Not yet! But soon. It’s very exciting. But it’s not the thing.”

“Just tell me. The suspense is killing me.”

The owl demon’s torso swelled so big Arthur thought she might split, then she let fly with the secret at last.

“The building is done! They sent me to get you.” She held up a small length of cloth towards his face. “But you have to wear this. So you get it all at once.”

Arthur protested but Lily won easily, and for the next few minutes she guided the now-blindfolded Arthur by the hand through the growing town towards the church and mystery-building outskirts. He stumbled along after her, almost tripping a couple of times and only putting his foot in the ice-cold river once.

“Okay, we are here. Ready, everyone?”

A cheer went up.

“Mayor Arthur, behold.” Lily’s voice brimmed with pomp as she ripped off the blindfold. Arthur opened his eyes to see a completely featureless wall of Slapstone, devoid of any windows, decorations, or interest at all.

“It’s… wow.” Arthur tried very, very hard to keep any expression off his face. “That’s a hell of a wall. An incredible wall.”

From somewhere above the most boring wall in the demon world, Milo started cackling. “Oh, gods, I’m going to fall off this thing. His face. Lily, you were right.”