A Dragon's Curiosity

Ser Alester, a former crook and villain, now counted among the lowest rung of city nobility.

A baron with some nominal lands in the yet unconquered Wildness near Leandar, he enjoyed the title, but no additional income from territory under him.

The old man earnestly presented the plans scattered around his desk to a young lass many times younger than himself.

“Miss Nisha, please take a look and decide which proposal is the most ideal version, the planners I hired prepared several different versions.

Once you make a decision, I will arrange for a master from the [Earthseer School] that I luckily managed to invite to make the final adjustments.”

Since the old crook found his drive again, he wanted to perfectly complete the project regarding the new district.

Such huge opportunities were rare, not to mention that he would not have the chance to participate if not for his acquaintance with the elf girl.

Hence, he busied himself often late into the night and carefully checked each step to guarantee that there were no problems with the building site or the workers he invited so far.

Even the Merchant House in charge of building materials was investigated through contacts at the [Thieves Guild] to make sure that they were the best choice and honest traders.

Nisha leaned over the table and studied the different proposals.

The first version followed her original idea, the new city wall ran along the north, east and south of the city and sectioned the new area into twelve districts, four in each cardinal direction.

A gate in the east and north allowed entrance to the city while the south had the palace region, where an additional entry point for enemies would be ill advised.

Pleased with the execution, the young elf turned towards the second plan and studied it.

Compared to her idea, this version did not add another area at the southern border of the city, letting the royal district remain untouched.

With a small district in the north, the main focus of the expansion meandered along the river Thurg.

It had twice the area compared to the areas in the first plan, but it also concentrated traffic around the river, with two broad main roads and a large public dock for river ships.

Reserving her judgement until Nisha examined all the proposals, she picked up the third and last paper.

Instead of occupying the entire east border of the city, the last plan proposed building a wall along the north side of the river, opposite of the road on the other side of the Thurg.

Shorter than the second proposal, but still fairly expansive along the river, the districts occupied half the east and north of the city.

The resulting city appearance no longer looked like a rectangle, but the derived space avoided building over the river and distributed the resulting space into equal districts.

Due to the lack of need for bridges to cross from one part of the area into another, the planner estimated that this version had the best flow of traffic.

Each proposal had their advantages and disadvantages, which were marked with annotations and estimations, yet Ser Alester did not hurry to give his own opinion.

He silently accompanied the young mistress of the Dharnas house while she perused the proposals.

Nisha earnestly considered the two proposals that differed from the suggestion she gave to the old crook.

When she had the expansion of the city in mind, adding areas all round naturally came as an idea.

Reconsidering the benefits of the other proposals, it dawned on the elf that the new area did not have to follow the existing city walls.

In truth, the existing districts of the city did not follow the preceding areas either.

Following the castle turning from a fortress into a palace, the first newly constructed city wall expanded the hill area not equally in all directions, rather it stretched all the way from the elevated spot with the castle all the way to the river.

The second expansion did not touch any of the pre existing walls, breaking the tradition.

Going over the river, the current second ring of city wall spread all the way to the top of the cliff and over the river, opening a large space for the common people to live in, and an exclusive district for the nobles.

Now that the elf and the old crook planned the third expansion, they did not have to rigidly adhere to the standard of the previous cityscape.

Limiting her imagination meant limiting the future of their project.

“You have done some impressive groundwork.”

The dragon meant what she said. Aside from the camp, the different proposal had detailed maps, measurements and annotations.

Everything revealed how much work Alester put into the preparations, how the elf’s gold was at work and not sitting in some dusty chest somewhere.

The old crook, who revealed no signs of joy or accomplishment at the praise, simply bowed with his fist in front of his chest, the perfect etiquette for an established noble.

It amused the young lady to see such a stark transformation that happened in less than two moons.

Perhaps it was only a thin line that separated an old criminal and a dignified noble elder.

She did not reveal her judgement right away, and put the three maps next to each other.

Next to her, Alester eagerly waited for her decision.

They had agreed to cooperate and the project was about to take off.

Nisha suddenly had a wave of heat run through her body, a mix of excitement and anticipation.

The dragon had experienced similar exhilaration when she plowed through masses of enemies and cut them down like wheat, but this was different.

A power derived from money and authority, a large amount of workers and manforce only waited for her decision to permanently change the face of the city she lived in.

Right at this moment, Nisha understood why nobles craved for more power and plotted against each other to raise their ranks, as well as their authority.

It was enough to be called an addiction.

Shaking off the intoxicating rush, the elf picked the plan modeled after her own proposition and handed it to the old crook.

“The other two plans have ideas that are worth reusing, so I would have to trouble you to modify this one based on their merits.

It’s not that I want to insist on my own design, but I think it’s best to surround the city as whole and evenly distribute it in twelve sections.

Otherwise there might be trouble later on when it comes to delegating responsibility and authority.”

According to the agreement between Nisha and the [Thieves Guild], several of the new districts would enter the influence of the guild in exchange for support and cooperation from their side.

It did not matter too much though, while the influence of the thieves and criminals over their area would be quite strong, it all still belonged to the Dharnas family and had the highest say if it came to a conflict.

Cleanly separating the spheres of influence ahead of time and adhering to the agreement reduced the potential clashes, hence the dragon chose her initial proposal, with adjustments from the heads of experienced experts.

“We can add another gate in the north, hence there will be a big main gate next to the continental road, a side gate in the north and the south.

Once the overall layout is decided, the housing areas and shop fronts need to get decided next, although each district should have a full set of essential facilities.

It’s for the best if we can reduce possible friction as much as possible.”

Nisha herself had no experience in territory management or city planning, the changes she proposed came from the annotations and layouts of the other proposals.

Four districts in the north, four districts in the south and four districts in the east along the road, slung around the current city like a belt.

In her mind, the elf already pictured the new area, bringing a smile to her face at the thought.

“I noted it down, Miss Nisha. The amended plan will be handed over to the experts first, who will make the changes, before the final version will be personally drafted by the master from the [Earthseer Clan], you will be notified once the final draft is ready for inspection.

Do you have any more questions regarding the planning and preparation?”

With practiced ease, Alester pulled a small notebook out of his breast pocket and retrieved a pencil stump from behind his ear, documenting the proposed changes.

Now he was neither an elder nor a crook, but only a worker in tune with his job, writing down the instructions he received.

“You mentioned a master from the [Earthseer Clan] twice now, can you explain more about that person? I am not sure about the details.”

The dragon returned the drafts and plans and seated herself next to the desk in the middle of the tent, giving permission to the baron to take one as well.

She heard about schools and family clans before, the [Royal Academy] had touched upon the subject during lessons, while the crash course on noble etiquette under Galan in the Dharnas house gave some clues on their standing in the social circles as well.

Nevertheless, the elf was unclear on the exact details.

“Oh, are you not familiar with the [Earthseer Clan]? They are quite famous when it comes to building and construction matters.”

With signs of genuine surprise, Alester finished his notes and bundled the papers together.

While he had not been in contact with the upper circles of society for a long time, information about clans and schools was quite common among regular citizens as well.

It was rather unusual to not know about them instead.

“I have heard that there are certain factions that do not enjoy the rule of the crown and decided to establish spaces of their own.

Of course, it’s impossible to separate completely, or that the crown would allow them to exist independently on Leandar’s ground, hence they set up branches in cities and towns sometimes to exchange goods and services.

I’m not too sure on the exact details, though.”

Recalling the little things she knew, Nisha explained her view on the clans and schools.

Alester smiled wryly and hesitated briefly, before he responded.

“That’s a very political view, pardon me that it’s impossible for me to comment on that perspective.

It’s true that clans and schools do not dwell in the areas ruled by nobles, they only station some people there, so perhaps branches is the correct description.

I don’t know where exactly they live or what made them leave the kingdom, but these clans and schools each have a speciality that they exchange for money.

The [Earthseer Clan] treasures people with strong aptitude in the earth element and sometimes accept disciples, though that’s only a rumour I heard.

For construction related matters, there are few people that know more than the experts they train.

Once a student of the clan has amassed enough experience, they go on a mandated mission to gain experience.

Since they go on a journey to exercise their knowledge, they are commonly called masters.

While expensive, very few architects and builders can surpass them when it comes to building things.”

The old crook did not need to praise them highly, just from the way he talked, it was clear to the young noble lady that he held these experts in high esteem.

It also kindled an ember of interest in Nisha regarding those family clans and schools that lived in unknown locations inside Leandar.

If the service of a great expert needed a similar great expense, it was entirely fine with the dragon, only the best results mattered.

“Oh right, I forgot. Now that we are on topic of the districts and planning, have you decided already how big the newly constructed areas should be?

The current drafts put the added space at roughly the same size as the commoners district, which is about half of the city size.

There’s still room for adjustment, of course.”

Like an afterthought, he retrieved the notebook and waited for Miss Nisha’s input, since the preliminary excavation for the foundation of the wall could only start after the plans were completed.

Alester was certainly not prepared for the answer he got.

“Half is not enough. Make it twice as big as the city area.”

The elf certainly had a big vision.