Upon stepping through the portal, I took a deep breath. The very air of the nation itself helped rejuvenate me. It was good to be back. However, my happiness didn't last long as I needed to go for a debriefing and then there would be a general meeting on what we should do next.

It was as annoying as I expected it to be but it was necessary, especially all the political stuff that the council needed to know. We might have gotten a potential ally, and I will leave everything to more qualified people on that front.

Apparently, Francis was doing incredibly well and the road project was well ahead of schedule. I guess if you throw hundreds of superpowered people at a problem, you get incredible results. Still, the road construction will take weeks but over time it should get even faster as the kinks are worked out.

It was late in the night when I made it back to my home but when I arrived, I was touched to my very soul. While I had made myself a bigger bed to sleep in, I hadn’t had time to do anything else but now the table and chair were made for my size.

It was incredibly thoughtful of them and I should think of a good reward for them but now I wanted to sleep. It was something different to sleep in your own bed and thanks to that, sleep came almost immediately.

The next morning I did my customary stretches but I couldn’t wait until I could use my right hand again but that would take a few more days. Everything I got from the dragon should arrive here in a few days so I would need to start making plans.

I wouldn’t want people around as I don’t want the knowledge of what I’m about to do to spread. But how will I get all my apprentices out of here? Nothing I could think of didn’t scream 'I am keeping a secret that I don’t want anyone to know', but while eating breakfast some of my apprentices talks made me finally realize what to do.

"I wanted to thank you all for making this table and chairs as they are quite comfortable to sit in unlike the previous one. I liked the initiative and I think you are all ready to learn to be even more independent. I will arrange for you all to join a survival training of the legionaries that will last 4 weeks."

At first, everyone was quite pleased but my words but then everyone froze. I could already see all the questions. 'Why are you punishing us, we did something nice and this is our reward.' But no one argued against my decision. I believed that they were now knowledgeable enough to know that this would be for their own benefit and something they will need in the future. "Before you go however, I once again ended up destroying my armour. So I want as much charcoal made as possible."

After that, I left and headed towards the mountain as I wanted to inspect the road. When I made it to the inn, I could already see that Francis had made one pass with his new device, scraping away a layer of dirt for the future road.

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About halfway towards Arthur's house, I found some legionaries and workers clearing dirt behind Francis. I spent a few hours with them, watching how they worked and just hanging out with Francis. I wanted to join in as I still needed to get my digging skill past the basic rank but doing work with one arm was annoying.

Eventually, we made it to the bridge that was currently dismantled and a new stone bridge was being built. The construction looked incredibly solid and I spent a few hours with the workers here to learn how they were building this bridge so I could know how to do it myself if I needed to. I wasn’t that familiar with stone construction but I knew the basics and this was an excellent example of using the basics to make something incredibly solid that will last for generations.

One thing that I have noticed is that everyone seemed to be quite happy with their work. If a nation’s workforce is happy then you are doing something right and I was incredibly glad that I was partly responsible for this. I was glad that I could see others enjoying life the way I currently am.

The stone road was made up to the river and it was a sight to behold. It was incredibly smooth but the center was higher up so water would move to the sides where there were drainage ditches. This should help with the longevity of the road but from the construction alone, I would guess 1000 years would be a good estimate. However, if the traffic was heavy it might become necessary to replace some stones if they're too worn out.

I decided to also visit the mining outpost. But before I made it there, I reached the quarry which was incredibly busy. I could see abilities being used constantly. Workers were cutting out pieces of stone, some were shaping that stone for the top layer of the road, while others were destroying the smaller fragments of rock to use for lower layers of the road. Once again, I wanted to join in but that would need to wait. When I made it to the mining outpost, I just stood there for a few moments, amazed at what I was seeing.

It looked like smoke was rising in two large columns from the very mountain itself, but they were just the chimneys for the two large smelters inside the mining outpost. From my current vantage point, you could see the large gate that was currently open.

Inside, it looked like an underground town. If the gate was closed, anyone trying to force their way in would find themselves having a bad day as I could see many murder holes meant to kill anyone or anything trying to get in.

Inside, the temperature rose a few degrees from the large smelters. There were many buildings and even an inn, and a few more were being built. Straight down the middle of the road from the front gate, you could see another gate that was also open and led further into the mine.

It was basically a mirror to the front gate with the murder holes to kill anything that was trying to escape the mine. If the outpost needed to expand, they would dig towards the sides so they wouldn't have to rebuild the gates.

There were also many warehouses where metals were being stored and salt from the nearby salt collection fields. The river that was so salty came from inside the mountain and unfortunately, no one could follow it to find out what was causing the huge amounts of salt, but right now no one was complaining that we didn't exactly know how this was possible. Not having to worry about importing salt from far away was something everyone was grateful for.

I was led by the outpost leader to their most secure vault where I collected a lot of unique metals that had been waiting for inspection. I loaded up my adventuring backpack and headed back towards my home.

I stopped by at Val’s inn to have some dinner and a good conversation. The next day, I headed to the town so I could arrange my apprentices' training. When I made it there, everyone was busy and it didn’t take me long to figure out that Roger was planning another trip.

After I organised my apprentices' training, I went to Roger to ask him to purchase some second-rank metals, fabric, and leather for my new armour. Roger was happy enough to give some of the dragon leather for my brigantine and for the leather straps other pieces of my armour required.

I explained some more about the construction of the armour I was making and the different requirements for it but after I was done, I went and got something to eat and then collected one of the most important pieces of loot we got - the dragon core.

I wanted to head straight back home so I could properly inspect the dragon core, but I was interrupted by Goose who was approaching the town. I hadn’t seen him in quite a while as he and the wolves were busy fighting off some of the monsters that have appeared in our land.