The first series of tasks for building the new road involved scouting and surveying, each of which is distinct from the other. The scouts look for resources and threats along the way, because having your road go right past a den of monsters or a hidden army of rogue undead is a bad thing. The surveyors plan the route the road will take, map out elevations and floodplains, determine the best courses of action for cut and fill to smooth out the road, and determine good rest spots along the route. Small groups of scouts and surveyors, along with guards and Adventurers for protection, were assembled for an expedition into the wilderness.
Nanu, myself, and a few other individuals were to fly people out and drop them off along the way such that each group would be spread out roughly evenly along the 300 mile distance to the first mountain range we would need to tunnel through. The best of the bunch were tasked with surveying the mountains and finding a good place to tunnel through. It was deed prudent to start the tunnel construction early for two purposes. The first reason was that stone removed from the tunnel could be used to build the road, so that made efficient use of ti instead of just randomly chipping away at the mountain sowhere else. The second reason was that only so many people could work in the tunnel at a ti, so we needed it finished by the ti the bulk of the workforce could arrive at the mountain.
Most of the terrain to the mountain was a mix of gently rolling hills that were lightly forested or grasslands. Thankfully, no swamps, bogs, fens, or other such water hazards of note obstructed our roughly calculated path. Likewise, there were no known groups of indigenous people who would feel upset about a road being built through their land, but that did not an they did not exist this deep in the wilderness, hence the need for scouts. Strong emphasis was placed on building the road in such a way to have the least amount of negative impact on the environnt as possible. No one wanted to travel a road that cut right through migratory paths of dangerous animals or beasts, nor did we want our actions to anger so kind of ancient forest spirit and have our whole enterprise dood. The wilderness remained unclaid for a whole host of reasons and we did not want to add to the list.
Soil and rock samples would be collected all along the route for later analysis. Different soils behaved differently based on things like levels of sand and clay present for how they handled groundwater, and so rocks were more suitable for different kinds of construction. These principles applied not just to their physical characteristics, but also to how the materials and the regions as a whole would interact with magic.
Inherently magical materials, such as exterrium, the whole family of mithrilic ores such as adamanthril, certain species of inherently magical gems, and so forth needed to be harvested through manual labor because using actively magical ans would taint them for hundreds if not thousands of years until they would naturally purify. That ant using a magically enchanted pickaxe that was stronger and sharper than normal was fine, but using a Skill that manually shaped and moved the earth was to be avoided. Such materials would be naturally found along the way, and the demand for such materials always exceeded supply. Considering the cost of funding an expedition with thousands of experts that could demand high pay for their services, recouping costs with rare resources would help mitigate the blow to the coffers. The deal I had worked out outlined different levels of ownership to resources discovered, and I certainly had a powerful financial incentive to ensure that such rare and magical materials were harvested correctly.
Similarly, the local ecosystem needed to be properly managed. All manner of big nasty creatures live deep in the wilderness, and they in turn pressure less nasty things to live closer to civilization. The pattern repeats until typically the weakest beasts and monsters live near the border of civilization. Simply culling the local population of dangerous predators or territorial prey could destabilize conditions and lead to unusual and devastating developnts to towns and villages hundreds of miles away. For instance, many of the big bad monsters kept each other in check, each afraid to leave their territory lest the others seize it in their absence. Kill all but one, and suddenly it is free to go forth and conquer new lands to expand the holdings of the brood. To combat this issue, we would need either tunnels under the road or land bridges above the road so the local wildlife could cross the road without actually walking upon it and being exposed to people.
Water sources needed to remain uncorrupted by any changes we would make to the water table. Groundwater pollution and rerouting of waterways remained serious concerns that needed to be handled. I had only received a passing education on most of these matters, but fortunately, I had free access to the best and brightest minds in those fields and the others discussed. The last thing we wanted was a war breaking out because we rerouted a few key streams that provided the bulk of the water supply for one nation or another.
Then there were the more esoteric concerns, such as elentals that called the region their ho. We needed to make sure we didn't step on any toes and had their permission to move through their territory. Fortunately, elentals were known to be easy-going, but the paynts they would want varied wildly. An earth elental may want an offering of rocks from several nearby mountains to help complete its rock garden, or an air elental may want us to tell it a dozen good stories or rumors. Balancing the budget for essentially bribing beings that did not operate under the sa motives as humanoids must have been a nightmare.
As for the mountain range itself, the mountains in it were relatively 'young'. That is to say that they ford perhaps in the past million years instead of ten million years ago or sothing like that. Shifting of tectonic plates could cause mountains to form, but after that process ran its course and any volcanic activity ceased, mountains only shrunk over ti due to erosion and landslides. Well, that is a general rule if you exclude magic, but the point stood that the mountains were very tall with no promising prospects of weaving a road through their peaks and valleys. Ergo, we would need to build a series of tunnels through the worst of the mountains to make the road continue south.
While mountains are certainly made of rocks, they also tend to have a lot of dirt leading up to them. Tunneling through dirt is pretty terrible since, especially while soaked with water, it behaves more like a liquid than a solid when compared to the scale of a tunnel. Digging through it is simple enough, but the pressure of the surrounding earth can easily cause cave-ins or simply send it oozing into the front of the tunnel. The dwarves had a few techniques and Skills to help deal with that, so I would have to trust in their ability to help out.
My primary concerns would be digging the tunnel, creating obsidicrete and other materials for the road, and placing the proper materials into the prepared path for the road. The bulk of the workers would take care of shaping the path for the road and preparing it so I just needed to place the levels of sand, gravel, stone, and brick on top to make a good quality road. Culverts, retaining walls, drainage ditches, and the like were not my responsibility.
Fortunately, once I got into the part of the tunnel that was solid stone and not soil, things would get easier. Instead of digging out the tunnel as a whole, I could just dig a continuous spiral around the very edge of the tunnel. The stone would then snap off from its own weight, and that stone could be scooped into dinsional storage for transport. As such, larger tunnels were more efficient, since the width of the circle I would cut away on the edge remained the sa regardless of how big the tunnel would be. However, I remained limited mostly by how much mana I had available to pack away the stone. The workers would cart away as much as they could for to deal with later, but I would still have to tackle the lion's share.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
Fortunately, there are a few ways to cheat. While each person has a unique mana signature and typically cannot use the mana of others, so people have highly coveted Skills to transfer mana to others, typically at a slight loss. Likewise, certain magical constructs could be made to assist in the work. For instance, so variation of S.M.A.R.T. crystals could levitate the stone out of the tunnel or heighten my mana-efficiency while within their range, assuming the crystals were each calibrated and enchanted for their exact tasks. Presumably, anyone with the correct Skill or Ability could charge up a crystal with mana, so that would take so of the strain off . There are limits to these things, either in scale or scope. I can only accept so much mana from other people in a day, for the efficiency of transfer drops each ti I do it within a ti period.
Mana regeneration, not just for , but for all the workers, was the primary resource to be managed. Generally speaking, the total supply of one's mana and its regeneration worked in a similar fashion to muscles. The more you work out, the stronger you get. Ergo, draining a mana pool in a short amount of ti can make it bigger, and constantly draining mana throughout the day can make it regenerate faster. That was why people like [Warriors], [Rogues], [Miners] and the like tended to have small mana pools with high regeneration. They could do simple tricks all day with their Skills, but they couldn't get enough mana for big flashy things like dropping a teor swarm on their enemies. Conversely, people like [Artisans], [Mages], and [Clerics] tended to have large mana pools with low regeneration because they were boom and bust in the use of their Skills.
I personally had a large mana pool with high regeneration and a high level of mana efficiency. That last part ans that not only do my Skills not cost as much as the sa Skill used by soone with low efficiency, but my Skills don't ramp up in cost nearly as quickly when I use them in a manner that does not align with their intent. I could dig a tunnel with [Basic Earth Manipulation] better than soone else could because of Skills like [Advanced Earth Magic Efficiency]. However, [Advanced Stone Manipulation] perford much better when working directly with stone compared to [Basic Earth Manipulation]. When efficiency combined with the proper Skills, the difference in what I could do compared to normal people was exponentially different in magnitude.
However, despite my advantages in magic, even I could not both dig a tunnel and remove the stone from it during all hours of the day. Naturally, I would grow in Skill, power, and general wisdom over ti, but so would everyone else. Staying on task and not being distracted by my desire to do everything would prove challenging since I was used to being self-reliant and independent. With thousands of workers dependent on my efficiency and tily delivery of supplies, I would have a few 'handlers' to make sure I didn't deviate from my assigned work. As vexing as such constraints were, I understood the need, and indeed everyone else also followed such rules, so I would comply.
This is not to say that we were all tyrants and mindless workers. Everyone still had leisure ti, and, for so individuals like , we were still permitted so amount of personal mana expenditure. It would take ti to discover the proper work/rest cycle so everyone could exist in harmony. As ti went on, everyone would grow in Skill and as a team, each learning the tricks of the trade and how to work together efficiently. Everyone expected these first few months to have growing pains, and by the end, we were projected to produce two to four tis the amount of road in a day compared to when we started. That assessnt did factor in how the terrain near the end of the road would be relatively easier to build in than even grasslands and sparse forest.
To be fair, the first few days passed without incident. None of the scouts died by biting off more than they could chew. No surveyors found that their area of concern contained impossible terrain. By the end of the week, we had finished planning the route to the mountains and out the other side, analyzing samples of soil, stone, flora, and fauna, and drafting up maps and blueprints. The biggest blow ca from the birth of Torborg's son.
At that point in my life, so of the finer details of dwarven society escaped my knowledge. Grim dwarven faces all around offered sympathy to their Junior Chief Engineer. There are many complications that can occur during birth, and not even the rare line of Teleportation Skills could overco them. For instance, a nuchal cord, which is when the umbilical cord wraps around the neck of the baby when it is to be delivered, cannot be solved by just teleporting the baby out of the mother's womb since they are too intertwined and would both teleport together. That just glosses over how a baby is too fragile to withstand any turbulence that may accompany teleportation.
Torborg's son had a similar problem, but it also involved the baby's beard being entangled in the umbilical cord and around his neck. Strangulation being a chief concern, the midwife and the healer both concluded that extre asures had to be implented to save the boy's life. With heavy hearts all around, the decision was made and the efforts implented to perform the grim and live-saving work. A healthy baby dwarf was born that day, but his beard had been mostly shaved off while still within the womb. Such a boy, growing up without his baby beard, would suffer ridicule and would be ostracized by his peers.
The best that could be done was muttonchops. It would be well into his adolescence when the fine hairs of a dwarf's baby beard would fall out and be replaced by thicker and more masculine adult beard hair. But even then, the stigma and sha of not having a baby beard, not to ntion the trauma from not fitting in, would likely linger with him for much of his life. Not even the best of Costic Skills could fix it, for the beard was too ingrained in dwarven culture and society to be affected by such Skills.
Torborg took a few days off to be with his family. His firstborn, a child that was essentially viewed as a cripple, would live a hard life, and his parents knew it. I did not know how to comfort or console my new friend, especially with the nuances of dwarven emotions and civility being a mystery to , so I remained available if he wanted assistance or to talk but otherwise passive. Chooka, being a [Courtesan], possessed a fair number of Costic, Social, and Therapy Skills that could help, so she offered to help in any way she could. While Torborg's son would not be prince charming, he would not be a complete pariah either if Chooka had her way, so I trusted that the boy would be in the best hands this camp had to offer.
Despite the tragedy, ti passed as days yielded to weeks. When it cos to trauma like that, it never gets any easier, but the person experiencing it grows stronger. Being from a resolute and hardy people, Torborg soon returned to work, and within a few weeks, his smile almost returned to its normal level of width and mirth and his laughter almost carried the sa degree of rrint, and so everyone continued with their lives as normal.
His tragedy and Chooka's support helped us to grow together as friends, for at tis he would ask what it was like growing up as a dragon among humanoids. I told him tales of my childhood and how I was often excluded from group activities and how I adjusted and grew because of that. However, I was a well-adjusted adult with only a few quirks that were not detrintal to my social standing or health, such as my inclination to prowl the town at night surreptitiously and just people-watch. Not exactly a harmful quirk, but more than a little invasive of privacy. In ti, Torborg learned to deal with and accept the reality his family would face, but my family, for that is what Skull, Chooka, Nanu, my pets, and myself were, helped him cope as we could.
As months passed, we made our way through the mountain range, and at one point, we needed to ferry everyone across since the construction of the road outpaced that of the tunnels. Between the constant digging, use of dinsional pockets, leadership responsibilities, and other challenges I faced, my Skills grew quickly as Experience Points racked up hand over fist. Occasionally, we got to fight beasts or monsters, which Skull absolutely lived for since not much else happened when she guarded . Upon occasion I would spar with different people to keep my Skills sharp, which often beca spectacles of entertainnt for workers on their break. For the most part, ti was spent building as we made our way down south.
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