The more Roland thought about it, the more excited he became. He suppressed his urge to immediately skim over the appendix and chose the witches and instead turned his attention to the present urgent matters that needed to be solved — after all, which kind of witches Sleeping Island sent was an issue for next month, but Border Town’s currently most significant problem was the housing construction.
Since the First Army had sailed to King’s City, an endless stream of refugees had arrived in Border Town. In order to prevent the disease from spreading, Roland had arranged an area west of the city wall all for them — there he had organised for long rows of wooden sheds to be built, providing a temporary place for the refugees to live in. Together with the serfs living on the other side of the Redwater River, their number already surpassed 8’000 people. In case the number of refugees will stay at the level of the last days, this number of people will most likely break through 10’000 in total.
Guaranteeing a supply of food for these people was not a problem. After all, since the end of the Months of Demons, Border Town had continuously imported food without interruption, but the accommodation issue was clearly a big problem. During the summer, it was no problem to live in a wooden shed, and besides shielding them from the sun and rain, it also offered an excellent ventilation, even though their number of mosquito bites might be higher. But once winter arrived, there would nearly be no difference between living in the sheds and under open air, the temperature outside would be the temperature inside of the wooden shed. If he was unable to let them stay in brick houses, Roland was afraid that most of the people wouldn’t survive past the long winter. In other words, Border Town had to build houses and dormitories for 10’000 people within the next six months.
Roland spread out a new piece of paper and picked up the pen.
He intended to take a part of the workers currently construction the Kingdom Avenue and put them to work building the houses. After all, it wasn’t a big problem if the road construction got delayed by ten days or half a month, but if the people froze to death within his territory, it would leave a stain on his achievements. Even when he had only recently crossed over and had no money, and none of the nobles wanted to help him, he was still able to insure that not one person died during the Months of Demons because from hunger or cold. So, now with the Witch Union and the steam engine, as well as substantial income and workforce, he naturally couldn’t allow such a situation to occur.
But at this moment, Carter suddenly walked into the office.
“Your Royal Highness, I have bad news,” Carter said with a serious face, “The chemical laboratory just exploded.”
Roland immediately rushed towards the laboratory next to the Redwater River. Arriving at the scene, Roland discovered that the damage wasn’t as severe as he had imagined. At least the main building for refining acid completely lacked any damage, while the windows at the side building had shattered into pieces.
“My Lord, please save our teacher! He is so badly hurt, almost on the point of death.”
Seeing that Roland had appeared, the group of disciples immediately gathered around him but were soon stopped by his personal guards. Roland waved his hand, indicating that they don’t need to be so anxious, “Where are the others? Let me have a look at them first.” Then he turned Carter and whispered, “Where’s Nana?”
“I’ve already sent someone, so I estimate that she will be here soon.”
“Alright.”
Roland nodded and then entered the laboratory, under protection of his guards.
Kyle Sichi was lying on the ground, leaving a bloodstain on the ground, which extended from him to the side room, giving the general idea that the accident must have happened in the side room and that he had been dragged to the main room after. His face was only an indistinct mass, with blood and other liquids mixed together, which should have been caused by the strong acid which had splashed on him during the explosion. He was also missing several fingers on his hands, and within the flesh he could see the white finger phalanges.
The apprentices had already provided him with emergency treatment, letting Roland see that they had also met similar situations in Redwater City. Dragging the people away from the danger, binding the wound to stop the bleeding, then seek help… these measures were all done quite well. However, receiving this kind of injury, and only having herbal medicine and the body’s own healing ability as treatment, would lead to ten out of ten people dying.
