Altura (the next morning)

“So, Norvithius was it? Are you willing to work for the duchy?” I asked the man sitting across from me. The feast was going well, but I had other work to do. Namely, to see if I could get a twenty-something man to join the duchy.

“And what can you offer me, your grace?” Notvithius asked. A fair question. Thankfully, I had an answer.

“I can offer you a set payment for every tool that you make, and if you instead prefer to gain a salary each month, that can be arranged. There will be a minimum amount of tools produced, however.” I replied. “While the duchy does not have any contacts with the Dark Empire, given enough time, I am sure we can find a way to escort you back-”

“Please, your grace, there is no reason to go to these lengths for me. I have no wish to return to the Dark Empire. It was no longer my home when my father died. It isn’t even my house now that the slavers burned it down.” Norvithius said.

“Very well. Is the previous offer acceptable to you, then?” I asked.

“That depends on how much you are willing to offer each tool. Will the materials be provided?” Norvithius asked.

“The materials can easily be provided, but I would suggest that you do not claim this. The cost will be deducted from your salary, whereas as an Earth Attuned cultivator you could simply shape the metals out of the ground.” I proposed.

The Duchy’s ground had plenty of metals, they were just too scattered as ores to be mined. Earth attuned cultivators, though, could simply ignore those restrictions.

“Then I will gladly agree to this proposal. That said, I fear that I do not know how to make the tools you ask of me.” Norvithius replied.

“From what I understand, you simply have to shape the metal with your Qi. The more Qi you use, the more powerful the tool. The tool should then be able to discern if anyone is lying. And burn anyone that does.” I answered.

I had asked Aswelth about it, and according to him, Earth attuned cultivators made things called truth rods that would become hot when the holder lied. The bigger the lie, the hotter the rod.

“Then we may have a problem, your grace, I have only one Qi.” Norvithius said.

“That is not a problem, Aswelth will have you join the next foray into the forest. A few beasts should be enough to level you up.” I said. “There should be one today.”

“Then we have an agreement, your grace.” Norvithius said.

“So we do, welcome to the duchy, Judge Advocate Norvithius. It is our pleasure to have you.” I answered as I got up. And that was my morning task complete. Now on to the next one. It was going to be a busy few days. I walked towards the guard headquarters while musing over yesterday’s events.

The feast yesterday had raised the morale by a good amount. People were very happy to see the duchy prospering, apparently the Clans had never actually held a feast like this one. But the registration had sadly not been completed.

I’d had to instruct all the citizens that hadn’t registered to return tomorrow. Thankfully, I had explicitly stated that tax would be based on the net income that one registered on the note. Of course, people could lie, and that was why I wanted the truth rods.

But I wouldn’t be getting any until the registration was over. I suppose it was best that this remains the temporary registration, a permanent, card issuing registration could be scheduled a month from now. By now, I had arrived at the guard headquarters gate.

I nodded to the guards at the door and stepped in, navigating the halls to Aswelth’s office.

“Ready to leave, Aswelth?” I asked as the old man picked up his sword. Of course, he wasn’t really taking anything else, just a little food and water for the day.

Stolen novel; please report.

“Yes, your grace, I shall report back to you with a suitable location to build a fortress. I am still unsure why you insist on building one, however. But I do recognize that the forest is a threat.” Aswelth replied.

“Very well, anything else I should take note of while you are away?” I asked, I didn’t really have anything else on my timetable.

“Yes, your grace. I do not know if you realized, but there were a large number of children in the group of freed slaves. Five hundred minors and at least 300 of those below five. The education system will be overwhelmed. It might be prudent to address the issue.” Aswelth said.

Uh oh. I apparently hadn’t looked at the list close enough. In my defense, I hadn’t looked at it at all. I’d just gone to sleep last night and then practiced a bit after waking up. That may have been a bad decision. I suppose it was time to make a child protection agency. The question of who would be in charge remained.

And of course I had to deal with the inflation too. And make more jobs. The Adventurers' guild should solve the latter. The former would be harder, though.

“Aswelth, I have decided. I will remain as nominal head of the guild. I think it is best that we establish it tomorrow. A way to deal with the excess of people is needed.” I said.

“That is certainly possible, your grace, though I would suggest that you let me take anyone that wishes to come to the farming villages. More lands will need to be cleared soon if we are to be self-sufficient, a few more farming villages would be in the duchy’s interest. If there was any mine in the duchy, I would even suggest a mining village, your grace”.

“After all, we do have an excess of miners with nothing to do. And getting them settled will take a few days. I suggest that the Guild be set up next week instead.” Aswelth said.

“That is agreeable. I presume you will get your volunteers by shouting in the residential area?” I asked.

“Well yes. Though now that you mention it, that may be a bad idea.” Aswelth replied.

“It is. I would recommend that you wait until most people are awake. Given that we had a feast yesterday, that would be about noon. Do you have any suggestions for someone that can handle running an organization that takes care of children?” I asked. Aswelth was likely the best bet to know someone. I still hadn’t finished reading all the files he had made.

“Yes. Do you remember that shopkeeper that insisted on selling everything and making a strange gold shape? Well, the wife joined the guard and has since divorced him. At the moment, she is in the Mid-Seedling stage and has shown remarkable skills handling children. I would have recommended her for the educational organization if she had any education. Sadly, she does not.” Aswelth said.

“I shall take that into consideration.” I answered, which basically meant, that I would interrogate her to see if she had any crimes in her closet. If she didn’t, she had the job. I needed an oversight committee for all of these organizations. But until I had people that could be trusted, I was the oversight committee. I could just see my schedule for the next few weeks.

“Very well then. I shall go have a talk with that wife, what is her name, by the way?” I asked.

“Karsita Roserte. After divorcing her husband, she switched back to her maiden name.” Aswelth replied as I left the guard house. Finding Karsita wasn’t hard, she was eating breakfast just a few rooms over.

After about half an hour, Karsita became the head of the new organization. Then came selecting the rest of the members. Thankfully, Karsita proposed that I simply co-opt from the mothers in the duchy. A large amount of them were stay-at-home parents and would be happy to assist. Especially since I would be paying.

Then came the subject of housing. The children had to be fed, clothed, taken care of when sick, educated and just parented. All of this would require constant manpower. And there was only one source that had enough manpower with experience. The slaves.

But that brought up the question of trust, how could I trust people that I did not know with children? It would be a disaster if even one of them turned out bad. Besides, most of them were traumatized themselves. I was about to give up on that, but Aswelth had another suggestion. Employment contracts.

The System enforced kind of contract. To me, they seemed like a simple form of slavery, but apparently they were more similar to the normal contracts back on Earth. While exploitive contracts were the norm here, it was quite possible for them to not be.

So it began. The rest of today went into choosing and weeding out candidates, not just for the children's organization, but also for all the organizations. Since I was doing this, I figured it was only right to do this everywhere.

The contracts were different for each organization, but they had three clauses that I had insisted on. That the contracts would have a termination clause wherein either party could terminate the contract with a week’s notice. If the termination was on my side, a severance package was also necessary.

Then there was the raise stipulation. The raises would be, at least, at par with the rate of inflation. And no salary could be below cost of life. Finally, each employee would have access to free housing. The clauses had apparently turned into a PR problem. By the end of the day, every organization had more applicants.

I had too good a rep. Guess that was the rest of my week right there, sacrificed to recruitment. Also, these organizations needed names. It was confusing that they did not have them. Hmm, what would be a good name for a duchy?