Chapter 157 - Battling the Cold

A bit over three days have passed, King Zar ill.u.s.tratio has received the letter he has been waiting for in anticipation these past few days. You would think why he would be so happy about spending so much Gold and possibly risking to pay a large fine if things don't go out as planned? It is indeed true that Pameres Kingdom is making many expenses to help these people, the main goal is of course to help these people. Let's call it the good deed of the year, he will be helping 250 Ignites who dared to oppose an entire Alliance, an entire Continent. But what about the secondary goal?

By helping these people now, he is also planting seeds for the future. Possibly not for the entire future of Pameres Kingdom though, this move wouldn't be able to unleash such an impact towards the Kingdom in particular. What he is planting, is seeds for a pure side profit in the future. Take it into consideration! In a Country where there aren't enough people to pull up their sleeves and put in work in various jobs, setting a stable base of skillful people who will stand in unity with Pameres Kingdom will inevitably lead to more profit even if those people are 100 kilometers away. When you take it into consideration, 100 Kilometers isn't too far if the journey isn't taken every week and the profit for the travel is worth the time.

If not more, Zar can strike deals with the Zamerians and offer Bale town the main(Bigger) profit share. No matter what Local(Ignis) domain is providing the product, be it Pameres Kingdom, Gaster Kingdom or Bale Town. The neighboring Continent(Zameria) will be of big help when it comes to finding well paying customers. Zar can use his reputation as a King, to help Bale Town sell more. Because it's quite hard to sell out of the Continent without some kind of superior social status. Being a King, works.

Bale Town won't have any other domains to work with after all, since it cut Relations(Or at this case, escaped Slavery.) from the ill.u.s.tratian Alliance. It can be considered an advantage for both of the Kingdoms even if Pameres Kingdom ends up with 20% of the profit or less, Gaster Kingdom with 10% of it(For the use of the port.) and Bale Town with 70%. For the Kingdoms getting the small profit it will be a profit without expense, and for bale town it would be a big profit but with of course more work and expenses. 

The Contract arrived, attached with a statistic parchment. This parchment was requested by King Zar. This way, they of course will know what Craftsmen or Craftswomen to bring on the first day. There isn't time worth losing. A year sounds a lot, but for such purposes it is very little.

Another Parchment attached to the Contract is of course the message of Which Guard Commander Delrus Aze felt the urge to send towards King Zar. Because one short statistic parchment isn't able to explain what the Guard Commander saw with his own eyes. This message will be of great help too. Delrus Aze explained each topic of the written statistics in great detail and even explained some excessively optional information as well. This will help Pameres Kingdom to approach with a more professional manner. Although this whole detailed message was technically not requested, it was a great move. When King Zar read through that message, he felt even more comfortable about the position he gave the Guard Commander.

The Messenger however seems exhausted. Its not easy to travel over 8 hours a day through this blistering snow. And although natural disasters such as Blizzards aren't exactly common on this edge of the Continent, low temperatures can be deadly. If not taken with caution, Hypothermia, Toe loss and even death is possible. King Zar requested to pay such bravery and risk with a small Gold Coin bonus and a warm bed in the Castle for the night. Now that this messenger has more experience in this specific travel, he will be leading the team of Governors and cargo towards Bale Town tomorrow.

You might ask why King Zar is giving bonuses this easily? Well it's a bit simple when you take it into consideration, he wants to inspire more people to work. It's a bit difficult to get people to work here in Pameres Kingdom even with good salary offers. A good portion of the unemployed are homeless but still have too much pride to work with certain crafts, some apparently don't see the salary good enough.

The town is overpopulated and there aren't enough job opportunities, these people need to take that fact into consideration. If they agreed to work, they would help raise salaries. He wants to make these people understand that hard work can pull most out of a craphole. And that work will eventually grant a bonus since any craft has value, it's worthy to be proud of and can grant a lot of independence the more experienced one individual has. The Craftsmen who have over 5 or 10 years of experience make a good living here.

But another man(The messenger.) sleeping in the Castle? Is that a good idea? Considering that King Zar ordered for elderlies and women with Children to sleep in the Castle, you would portray this as a problem. Specifically because there are a lot of women in the Castle now. Women with Children. It isn't comfortable to mix a young man in a room with anyone in particular, the same concept goes for a young woman with anyone in particular, if the two groups of people don't know each other well enough that is, this isn't boot camp. Well don't worry!

The Stonemasons and Construction workers did great progress. The year 201 of the Third era started in Pameres Kingdom with 320 houses, 20 of which were newly built. Well now it is the second month of the new year, February to be exact. Pameres Kingdom holds 360 houses now which caused a huge gap in the homeless rate.

The progress seems small, slow even. But remember, before the revolution in the year 200, there were only around 300 houses in total. 60 houses can fit around 300 people, of course there won't be less than one family in one house, but it is a fair temporary fix towards the homeless situation. That's still 300 homeless people saved from the punishing cold, but at this point it's way more than 300. Since King Zar has ordered for more people to squeeze in those houses. It can be a bit awkward to fit more than one family in a house, but it's either share or face the midnight cold.

A quarter of the people who used to temporarily live in the castle, now live in their own comfy houses. Which of course opened up more space for more homeless people, at this point it is less of a problem for the messenger to sleep in the Castle because now there are more homeless young a.d.u.l.ts in the Castle, because they weren't prioritized before compared to the elderly, Orphans, or women with children.

There are 35 experienced Construction workers who proved heavily productive and useful, there also are 45 other Construction workers who can be considered a bit experienced now, and 35 Stonemasons, 5 of which have a longer experience with their Craft, well known as the supervisors of the less experienced 35. This ensured 60 new and much better houses compared to the older ones in a considerably short period of time.

The older 300 houses can't be destroyed and rebuilt into a better shape at the moment, but they sure can be temporarily improved for the civilians, free of course. This work is put in by the Construction workers who don't have their hands busy. A lot of them have free time since there are only 35 Stonemasons under the Castle's employment. The house foundation building rate doesn't meet with how fast 80 Construction Workers can build a house or houses. Laying stone foundations requires time and caution.

The lack of Stonemasons sure proved to be a problem. Especially since the year started with only 20 of them hired. Here is the issue, if the Stone foundation isn't layed, the Construction Workers can't start building a house, so it became a big issue. Not being able to build the houses fast enough, resulted to losing 14 homeless people. They died due to the blistering night cold.  So King Zar urged his personal assistant "Seer" to file a doc.u.ment, urgently requesting 30 experienceless Stonemasons. A rather strong risk considering they will be setting foundations for houses people will live under, but with people freezing to death, what Choice did he have?

But god damn it, these people do not want to work. They think the salary is too low for such mind scrambling work. They don't take it into consideration that when they acquire this job, they will be given priority to obtain a house if they are homeless. They would be able to obtain a middle class status because of this job. Due to this nonsense, Seer was only able to recruit 20 Experienceless Stonemasons. Even after he spend a stupid amount of gold to spread the word about the offered position. The gossipers however, sure became rich.

Now, by the start of March the 100 house project which started outside the protection of the walls, will be finished and there won't be a single homeless person on the streets. Rather late considering that Winter ends by that time. But hey, these people will at least be safe from cold next winter. If King Zar didn't take action and just decided to live with 300 houses, the death rate for these homeless people would be way above 14.

King Zar plans to build around 100 more houses after this little project. This different patch of houses will be for sale, but not right away. Because after those houses are built, Zar also plans to rebuild the older 300 houses from scratch. And although he won't destroy all 300 at the same time, he will still need houses for the Citizens to stay while their houses are being rebuilt. This my good reader, is called a good plan getting together. While the Construction Workers will be occupied with those old houses, the Stonemasons will be building the second wall. Employees here will always be busy, there is no gold without sweat. But to built a second wider and bigger wall? It requires a lot more than 35 Stonemasons. Perhaps King Zar will be able to hire more of them in time.

There is one more problem that has been bothering King Zar. Guards don't get paid. They work a full schedule too, so it would be unfair to not pay them. Solution? Well, he opened two new businesses. One very profitable locally, the other with half of the impact but still profitable if the products delivered to Zameria. Tailoring and furniture Construction are the two new businesses.

See Tailoring can prove profitable since there are 2,500 people here, each house has at least one person working for a salary. People will eventually need new clothes. And since 300 Guards will receive a salary soon, what are the odds of a bit of the salary going back to the castle due to cloth purchase? The Salary will be a hundred Gold Coins, but they will still receive free food, but now half of the amount. It's the most fair. Zar could of taken away their free food entirely now that they will receive a salary, but these Guards contributed a lot to the Kingdom. To squeeze in even more profit out of this idea, he also included shoemaking in the tailoring business. Since shoes aren't a thing that 2,500 people will buy every month, it's best to not seperate it as another business for now.

While with furniture construction, there aren't enough customers locally, since people don't buy furniture over and over each month. The houses aren't too big after all. But if taken to Zameria sold with the local(Ignis) prices, it's a good business for both Domains. Especially for the Zamerians who likely resell it for half or double the price. With a Continent holding 3 million people, the economy there is sure to be different.

He opened these couple of businesses quite close to each other. Near the main gate, destroying four very old houses and sending the families up the castle to rest there as the new houses are being constructed in the outer lands.

There even are assigned Guards to these businesses, keeping the place safe 24/7. This is where King Zar found the opportunity to encourage salaries for Guards. These specific Guards assigned to these businesses, also signed a year long Contract. Gold Theft, corruption, material Theft or basically any illegal move towards these businesses will lead to a year in the dungeon and the best job the violator can get afterwards, is working as a shop assistant or practically anything that pays little, for a couple of years. It's all in the contract and local business owners are forced to cooperate to such government rules.

Now that we are all caught up, it's time to reveal the Governing party. Now this is a rather sensitive subject where there is a lot of gold thrown at, and could quite possibly make the difference between helping a little village progress, or starving everyone there.

To find good governors, is of course a duty trusted upon King Zar's personal assistant. Seer. King Zar trusts Seer's skill a lot even though considering the huge miscalculation he had with the Gr.a.p.e Ale Project. That was just a mistake, and now Seer is taught(ordered) to calculate everything three times.

Picking Governors now can be a tricky task. Because he would need to find people of different skills instead of bashing the responsibilities all in one person. While nothing big is done without Guard Commander Delrus Aze's acknowledgement and of course further acknowledgment here in the Kingdom, the governing party still needs skilled academics.

For example, one has to deal with the budget, one has to deal with the employees, another has to deal with the employee salaries once an income is established and of course there are business managers in need, managers that the Business Governor has to find.

So which people would even qualify for such important jobs?