I set to work right away, for while the tent city was nice and all, people wanted more semi-permanent housing. The mustering camp was situated about ten miles away from the T-intersection in the direction the road would be built, and a short ways from that a clearing had already been established by dutiful workers. All the shrubbery, trees, rocks, and so forth had been removed, the ground flattened and leveled, latrine pits dug, and building markers placed. They even had the time and presence of mind to complete appropriate drainage systems for rainwater. Overall, it was a very well thought out and professionally designed camp; it just had no buildings or actual infrastructure.

A few hand-picked individuals awaited my arrival. I had not been idle the past week and had spent my nights harvesting resources and putting my [Basic Thermal Bottle] to good use crafting large modular bricks that could easily be stacked without the need of mortar to hold them together. Such construction of bricks would be a bitch and a half to make through conventional means, but when I can reform stone into any mold of obsidicrete or obsidisteel I want, complex had become the new simple.

And so, building the walls of the camp and the foundation of the buildings became a simple matter of placing blocks where they belonged. Some highly Skilled and speedy [Couriers] had delivered blueprints to me, so I just had to measure out the spaces and count out how many bricks of various sizes and patterns I would need to fill it. This far into the wilderness, the walls were the most important part, but I opted to build the foundations first just so I had room to move. I am not incredibly large compared to the impromptu town we were building, but backing up into a wall when I am trying to work would get old fast. Dragons may have small trunks to their bodies, but the necks, wings, and tails just stretch on and on and make fitting into places without squeezing a hassle.

With foundations completed after an hour, I started on the walls. I would pop the bricks out of dimensional storage roughly over where they needed to be placed, and to save my mana and time, the workers gathered would use some kind of levitation or telekinesis to move them into position for me. I made it about halfway up the wall before I ran out of bricks, but everyone knew that would happen. Instead of continuing the wall, which was good enough for a few hours, I started on the buildings.

I had crafted panels for walls and ceilings out of wood, each one keyed to fit together with wooden pegs and dowels. Ergo, the four walls of a building were assembled by me and some helpers ahead of time, and now they just needed to be put together in place. Likewise, roofs were done in a similar manner. This made all the buildings rather boxy and boring, but they were quick and easy to put together. Considering we would be tearing down camp and moving it every couple of days as we built the road, modularity and ease of construction trumped aesthetics. If we got it down to a science, by the time the bulk of the town moved to where the next town would be, we would have it torn down and reassembled before they could arrive.

I had a cache of bricks nearby, and while they were too big and heavy for my helpers to move on their own without a great deal of backbreaking effort, it was simple enough to place them into my storage, move over into position on the outside of the wall, and pop them back out. In this manner, the wall was completed, and by sundown, the basis of the town was finished. All I had to do was scoop up water from nearby and dump it into the water towers for storage and dispersal.

Sadly, plumbing was not a thing, not just here, but throughout the world in general. Nightsmen, or gong farmers, depending on who you asked, would collect the contents of chamber pots. We didn’t yet have the fancy ones like in the big city that could teleport the night soil to regional collection points, so some people would have the fun task of going to each building to collect it regularly. The night soil would be dumped into latrine pits outside of camp, where savvy individuals with the right Skills would mature it into fertilizer. There was big money to be had in such business, and I heard that the bidding war on such contracts was fierce, and dare I say, bloody. Bathhouses were located near the water towers and they did have rudimentary pipes to said towers, but the town as a whole would have to send family members to fetch water every day.

While most people can summon water to drink, it isn’t safe to do so long-term, as summoned materials disappear over time. The rates vary based on Skills, but the constant factor is that summoned material doesn’t care if it is currently in use inside your body when it is time for it to return to whence it came. Summoned food and water is also bad for mana regeneration, and while you could technically survive on it for weeks if stranded in the wilderness, you would eventually not be able to keep pace as your body essentially faded away while your mana regeneration trickled to nil. Hence the need for actual water collected from the environment, although a one to ten ratio of summoned water is technically considered safe in most places. Summoned water is great for dishes, but not bathing, as it can leech your mana regeneration away if you stay for a good soak, which is what most people would be doing after a hard-day’s work.

With the finishing touches completed just as the first grateful people from tent city started to arrive, I returned to my human form. Nanu, who had been flying circles overhead the whole time in overwatch, landed beside me in a smooth transition to human form as she touched down, such that she didn’t clip any of the buildings in the maneuver. Clearly, she had practiced at it, and equally clearly, I had not, for I would have certainly smashed into something or face-planted if I had tried. There are Skills to get things done, and then there is genuine skill, of which she had both in spades.

Everyone already had assigned houses. I deduced that this was not the first rodeo for whoever was in charge, for I had expected a snafu somewhere to cascade into a shit-show. I suppose when Blessing and Skills get involved, the ability to organize several thousand people can become trivial. We had no major hang-ups or snags in our construction process, no confused individuals wandering around without any housing assigned to them, no dangerous predators bursting into the camp to munch down on the innocent civilians. It was almost anti-climactic that nothing major went wrong, which in its own weird way was rather exciting. I vaguely remembered a few key names from the paperwork, but I had yet to actually meet the man in charge.

Fortuitously, a meeting had been planned for that very night for all the leaders of the new town. While all the worker bees would have their own small meet-and-greets, the brass would get together in the town hall. To be fair, those of the upper crust didn’t have all that much fancier accommodations than anyone else, for they would still be using the same communal wash bins and cooking stations like the rest. However, the town hall would host a wide range of services, and so it needed to be big enough to hold around two hundred people at a time.

Many were the jobs in camp, and so too for positions of leadership. Engineers, general workers, guards, Adventures, cooks, scouts, surveyors, diplomats, contractors, logistic personnel for food and other sundries, hunters, doctors, chaplains, nightsmen, prostitutes, brewers… it just went on and on. Chooka, being the guildmaster for the local and new guildhall for Adventurers, was mandated to attend. Alterez, as the head cook in town, also had to go. Skull slipped along in my shadow and Nanu escorted me as my advisor and bodyguard. I was not entirely certain what deal Nanu and Skull had going on for the protection of my person, but they got along swimmingly and didn’t seem to be jealously competitive about it. Naturally, as the guy in charge of everything, I had to attend, and so I did.

Chooka, Nanu, Alterez, and I arrived with appropriate punctuality. A few had arrived ahead of us, but we were by no means the last to show up. A youthful and eager-looking dwarf greeted us at the doors to the town hall; no doubt he volunteered or was ‘voluntold’ by an elder because he wanted to score points in the pecking order of his clan. Once inside, I found that the previously empty box I had assembled hours earlier was now furnished with tables and chairs. They were arraigned in long columns so that each person could turn their heads to view the elevated set of head tables.

Most assuredly, heads would have butted if someone had not had the foresight to have created an assigned seating chart ahead of time. Each seat had an illusory indicator that would glow only for the person it was meant for. I did not envy the task of arranging all of that, for someone had to make sure that people with large egos didn’t feel slighted by being placed too far away from the front or too near ‘lesser’ individuals. My party and I made our way to the front, for we were certainly important enough to be at the head table.

I had been placed in the center of the head table, with Chooka to my right and two spaces between her and Nanu. Alterez was placed on the end and closest to the kitchen, which was a good thing for him since he was responsible for the dinner that accompanied the meeting. Chooka, Nanu, Skull, and I already had a little wager of five silvers going for how many times he would need to scramble into the kitchen to yell at some poor sod to hurry up. He would have done all the cooking himself, but some of the younger cooks needed the experience of serving such large audiences, so he begrudgingly had to be more hands-off than he would have liked.

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“Hello there,” greeted a burly dwarf as he sat down beside me, presumably with his very pregnant wife in tow. “Name’s Torborg. I am your Junior Chief Engineer and the guy in charge of keeping this rabble in check so you can do your job without the additional headache of management.”

I half stood to shake his hand as he situated himself, greeting him in turn. “I am impressed with the blueprints and the level of organization that went into making this camp. There were no major hiccups or roadblocks to speak of, which vastly exceeded my expectations. With leadership skills like yours, I am surprised you are not a Senior Chief Engineer.”

“Bah,” he replied as he laughed heartily. “I am a Senior Engineer, but Junior when it comes to being a Chief. That means my leadership skills are not as strong as my construction skills. However, since there are only a few thousand people on this building project, a Junior Chief Engineer was deemed appropriate.”

“How tough is it to become a Senior Chief Engineer then? All of this,” I said as I gestured vaguely around the room, “seems to be no small undertaking.”

“After a few decades of jobs on this scale, I could get promoted. Senior Chief Engineers lead jobs that typically have ten to twenty thousand people working on them. We are only building a road, not a whole city underground, so the logistics and engineering concerns are vastly simpler.” His words finished with an accompanying shrug, he poured himself a drink and took a swig.

We continued to exchange pleasantries, and while I had not spent much time around dwarves by that time of my life, I did learn a good bit about their culture from observing him and asking him questions. He wasn’t being a dick by ignoring his wife, for her job was to converse with the person next to her, a divide and conquer strategy of socializing. Likewise, he never helped her or pampered her despite her clearly being close to giving birth any day now, the reason being as doing so in public would be seen as insulting her with the implication that she was incompetent or weak. The only expectation was when he poured her more ale and wine, reminding her that she was “drinking for two”.

That isn’t to say that dwarves detest helping the weak, but from their point of view, she clearly isn’t, and so she doesn’t need help. Self-reliance is a virtue to them, but so is knowing when to ask for help, and helping someone who doesn’t first ask is not exactly rude, but it rewards the wrong sort of behavior. In short, if she needed or wanted his help or doting, she would have made it clear to him, and then he would have provided. I made a mental note to be explicit in asking dwarves for help when I needed it, as looking lost and pitiful would not cut it.

Now, to paint the picture a little more clearly about dwarves for you readers, they are shorter than humans by about a head or two. Very stocky though, with arms usually at least as big around as their heads for their men. Women don’t have beards, at least not on their faces, but men do. If a dwarf is clean-shaven, then something very terrible has happened to him, the kind of thing that starts a grudge and a feud with the whole clan.

Loyalty to oneself and one’s values is core, then to family, then clan, and finally the community as a whole. While they don’t have a caste system, promotion of younger dwarves through the ranks is slow and at times prone to nepotism. Dwarves live to be around 300 to 500 years old, depending on how well they honed their Blessing and assuming they don’t come down with a terrible case of being murdered. They tend to live mostly underground, but they try to get a few hours of sunlight and a walk through nature every day. They do get along well with elves, with dwarves securing the land and resources below ground with the elves living directly above. That offers twice the number of people to wield pointy sticks at invaders when the time for violence comes.

I know, some of it deviates from the stereotypes, but I have seen dwarves and ‘dwarves’ from other universes, and let me tell you, some of them are unrecognizable when compared to your beard-braiding, ale-swigging, pickaxe-swinging, oath-making, grudge-bearing, ore-smelting, stone-shaping staple of dwarves. Also, don’t call them ‘dwarfs’ unless you want them to punch your lights out for an insult to their size, since they are not humans with dwarfism. Better yet, just never insult a dwarf, for they take such things very seriously.

For the sake of fairness, since I described dwarves in such detail, I will describe goblins, too. Goblins in the wild steal anything that isn’t nailed down, and if it is nailed down, well, that is just a good source of nails before they steal that, too. There, that’s like 80 percent of what you need to know, and now I have met my quota on being fair about describing various races.

Speaking of goblins, Alterez scurried off to the kitchen. That’s one. My [Observer] nearby didn’t detect any uncontrolled fires, yelling of threats, bodily harm, or other such unsettling developments, so that boded well. Before long, servers appeared with trays of food, each one apparently having special Skills to carry twenty or more at a time without dropping any. We ate the same fare as the rest of the camp, which for tonight was a hearty stew of meat and vegetables with sides of cheese, bread, and fruit. Alterez could seemingly turn any ingredients into a feast fit for a king, for the food soon had the whole room buzzing with compliments, which certainly made him as proud as a peacockitrice. I made sure to stow away a full serving for Skull so she could eat later.

Again, Alterez darted for the kitchen when most people had finished their meals. That’s two. Dessert was brought out shortly after, some sort of personal-sized pie filled with cream and fruit and topped with fruit paste mixed with honey. It came paired with a cup of wine that matched well with it, complete with all the pretentious wine terms I don’t know other than ‘full-bodied’, although it was not super strong as we still needed everyone to be mostly sober for later. More heartfelt praise could be heard from those assembled for the expertise of the cooks, so no doubt they would each be getting a little bonus, or more likely, poached as personal chefs as a side-hustle.

With the food all finished and the dull roar of people chattering and rubbing elbows receding as many looked to the head table expectantly, I took the opportunity to kick off the meeting by rising from my seat and tapping my glass to get everyone’s attention.

“Ladies and gentlemen, thank you all for coming here tonight. While we will not always have the opportunity to experience the comfort of each other’s company and the excellent catering that we enjoy this night, I look forward to the future we will build together and the bonds we will forge.

We stand together at the forefront of one of the most ambitious construction projects ever undertaken on an international level. As most of you know, our mission is to build a grand highway that connects the north of Rubioco all the way south to the Ashlands. What most of you do not know are the stakes involved.”

A few chairs squeaked as people shifted to see me better, the interest of said individuals piqued as to the urgency of building this road.

“It is not for dramatic effect that I say that the fate of our world is on the line, for our very survival hinges upon this road being completed in a timely manner.” That earned a few nervous looks, but [Let Me Speak], a leadership Skill of mine, suppressed anyone who would openly contest my claim. “Within a few years, a great evil will emerge in the Ashlands, one that will require a continually deployed army to contain until it can be vanquished. This road will be vital to supplies and troops being delivered for the war effort. All we need to focus on is the road, for the burden of fighting the good fight will fall upon other shoulders. I have full confidence that we have the required expertise, attitude, and work ethic to complete this task, for you are among the finest in your fields that our world has to offer. With that in mind, I will now turn things over to Junior Chief Engineer Torborg, who will be handling the day-to-day affairs of leadership.”

Torborg rose, thanked me, and began getting into the meat-and-potatoes of the whole meeting. He called out each leadership position and had the related people stand to be recognized. That process would allow each person to remember the names and faces of people they would work with or report to. Thank the gods he did not make each person introduce themselves, say where they were from, and list a hobby of theirs. We had around two hundred names to go through, so he kept things moving along at a good clip. We had leaders for three shifts, as our work-force would be busy at all hours of the day to meet our deadline. With the chain of command established, he outlined rules, reporting procedures, and all the other wonderful matters relevant to command. Fortunately, handbooks were provided to go into more detail. However, no one here would have the grounds to say they were not told the rules, and so now the expectation to behave and do their jobs fell soundly upon them.

The meeting went well into the night, but eventually, we all made our way to our new homes. Mine was a wooden box just like what everyone else lived in; however, mine was kitted out with better creature comforts because I could afford to transport such things in my dimensional storage. Public baths were okay and a great way to scout out new paramours, provided one did not ogle, but a private bath in one’s own home was a luxury. We had to clear the furniture to fit the giant tub big enough for Chooka, Nanu, Skull and myself. Without much further ado, we all hopped in and enjoyed the pleasantly warm water.