"It'll be the rainy season soon."

Caspian declared. Iris looked up from her plate of carbonara pasta and replied

"Oh?"

He nodded before clarifying

"I'm not really sure what sort of projects you want to work on this year. So, I was hoping you could let us know now so we could plan ahead by a few days."

Iris pursed her lips in thought. It was certainly true that they had all been working hard the last two years. However, it wasn't like she couldn't be satisfied without starting a bunch of big construction projects. Most of the things they had done thus far was either due to her receiving a quest from her system or needed to meet the needs of their people. However, they had already completed so many projects now that there hardly seemed like there was anything left to do.

The inner city had been completed being built before the harvest season had ended. There was plenty of housing, warehouse space for storage underground, and plenty of community areas to attend to their various needs. The outer city living areas didn't have to be expanded unless they needed more space for a growing population. However, most of the tribes near them had already joined them or been chased away, or worse killed, so they likely wouldn't have to worry about that for another decade, at least. Young cubs didn't mature until they were fifteen, so they would likely continue to live with their parents until then.

Their farming area likely needed all one hundred acres to be attended to in order to fill their large population. Meanwhile, the fifty acres of orchard were split between being used for trees that would be harvested for wood and bark flour and those that would produce fruit nine months a year. Even the livestock was starting to flourish now that they had been able to add a good number of auroch and jungle fowl to the stables. While it would always be nice to have more of them so they could continue to breed them and create a more reliable food source for their people, it wasn't like it was necessary. They'd need more than fifty acres for that, for one thing, and the appetites of beastmen was just too much to expect them to rely on mostly farm-sourced meat.

As for infrastructure, they were pretty set on that as well. They now had a large defensive wall that covered the entire housing and business districts. The agricultural areas might be nice to defend from invaders, but it wasn't realistic to waste so many resources to cover such a large area. It wasn't exactly common for farming areas to be covered by a wall in the history of Iris's old world either. There were even tall guard towers that overlooked the wall and deep trenches on the outside of the walls filled with sharp wooden stakes. That would allow them to see intruders and defend against them more successfully than most other cities.

The roads hadn't exactly been necessary, but their city now had beautiful stone roads as well. They stretched across all of the outer city living areas, business districts, and even over to the agriculture areas. Then they left the city, creating the trade routes to the Mermaid Tribe and Red Wood City with several well-built houses that even included wells for a steady water source. That last part had mostly been for the quest they had received as it would have been a waste of resources, otherwise, but Iris was still hopeful that it would last long enough for transportation to be developed that could make use of such roads. She was hardly an engineer or anything like that, so there was no way she was going to personally develop carriages and merchant wagons.

After some time of silence, Ember interrupted

"Perhaps we could focus more on the safety of the city? Having more guards and strengthening all of the males in the city only does so much. Most of them have seen a level up or more in the last year, some have even developed new elemental abilities. However, it would still be good if we could have more things like those trenches for passive traps."

Iris shook her head as she replied

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"I'm not entirely sure what else can be done. Maybe we could develop some plans that address specific potential threats our city might face in the future? That might be a good place to start."

Ember seemed a bit disappointed, but Basil nodded as he replied

"Alright, well, wild beastmen tribes tend to be wanderers, so it's possible that a new group could end up in the area in a couple of years. We also, recently, saw that natural disasters can affect tribes enough that they may have to flee, even if just temporarily, to escape the effects of it."

Ash interjected to add on

"I had to learn a lot about this sort of thing as a potential successor to my city. I was only third in line, but you never know when someone might become stronger than the others, so I still learned many of the same things as the others.

Even if you do your best to avoid it, war can sometimes be unavoidable. Plenty of people can covet the things you have and, if you don't have the strength to remove the threat by yourself, then your entire city has to choose between helping you fend off the threat or forcing you into a fight to the death. Some may even choose to flee your city so they don't get swept up into the conflict, preferring to take their chances elsewhere.

Then there is the rather rare, but still rather serious problem of plagues. There have been plenty of tribes and cities that have been wiped out seemingly overnight from a plague. People get really sick and it spreads really quickly. Some people try to flee the city to avoid getting sick while others might try to kill off those who already seem sick and things can just get really messy really quickly."

Iris nodded, taking both Basil's and Ash's words into consideration. There were definitely a variety of different things that could go wrong. After a moment, she said

"Alright, well, with plagues you do have to take action sooner rather than later. The first thing we would need to do is to quarantine anyone who seems sick. Basically, we just need to separate them from the others until they stop showing symptoms of sickness for a minimum of a week. Some sicknesses can still be contagious both before and after they stop being symptomatic for an extended period of time. It may also be good to make all non-essential workers remain home and discourage them from leaving any more than necessary until we are sure everything is under control.

We may also need to encourage everyone to be more hygienic. Cleaning with boiled, soapy water all surfaces in their home they can. We have brooms and mops now, so that means everything from floors to tables. They especially should be careful about properly cleaning their kitchens. That's important even without a plague, but it's common for people to share dishware and for multiple family members to be in the kitchen throughout the day, so it would be a pretty big danger zone. They should, of course, also be more careful to wash themselves, especially their hands frequently and cough or sneeze into their elbow to avoid spreading the sickness through the air to those around them.

The dead may still be contagious as well, so it may be ideal to have volunteers who are willing to take a chance on getting sick gather up the dead and bring them somewhere away from the city to burn the bodies. They should wear cloth over their mouths and nose to limit their exposure as well as gloves and clothes that cover as much of their body as possible. It may be necessary to make them outfits specially for such an occasion. They'll need to wash themselves and their clothes after every shift to prevent themselves from getting sick and quarantine for the entire time the plague is active in the city plus a week just to be safe. They would be some of the most at-risk individuals, after all.

Finally, we should consider preventative and curative options. In my world, we combated a lot of the older versions of plagues with antibiotics. This helped the body to fight off the infection so that even those who contracted the plague could recover and live for another day. However, I was hardly a scientist who developed medicine. So, I'd recommend looking over the new medicine book we received to see if we can find anything suitable and work on developing such a medicine sooner rather than later."

Caspian took notes on a stone tablet and everyone waited until he finished writing to ensure he got everything down before saying anything. Then, Basil replied

"There are a few medicinal herbs that are said to boost the immune system and others that say something about helping with recovery. There are also a few specific medicinal recipes in the book. However, I would want to go through trials before I try using it on anyone. Even if it is directly from the Beast Deity, I don't want to face the wrath of the males of our city if my lack of care leads to their females dying. While most of them may die from the backlash of the mating bond, those who survive would hardly be kind."

Iris could hardly argue with any of that. Instead, she just took a moment to organize her thoughts on the other matters that had been brought to her attention.