Chapter 41

I got busy. Once a month I made my appearance in the 'Hall Of Justice', and that seemed to work. In the meantime, I wanted to better the life of my people. For a year straight, I ate, lived, and worked, Landkur.

Vostich told me that he had reached an agreement with Salvadi to salve and cement relations between the two kingdoms. I would marry Salvadi's daughter, Mariel. I was stunned. I told him I didn't love the girl. Sure, she was nice enough; but first, she was a kid, second, I sort of liked Darla.

Vostich told me that it was unfortunate I felt that way, but it was my duty to the kingdom; and that I would do this, to help the people we ruled. I was angry about that. I found Darla, and told her what I had been ordered to do. She was sympathetic, but said she thought something like this would happen.

"Paul. Surely you have read your history. Royalty, and the noble houses, have historically married for the purposes of the state. It was very rare for someone in a high ranking position such as prince or princess, being able to marry who they wanted to," Darla had told me firmly.

That was when I knew she did not love me. Oh, we could be friends, and I hoped to keep her as such. But she had sort of known the whole time, that there could be nothing permanent between us. Wish I had known.

Something else I did, was start an iron foundry. There was a place that was in a perfect location. Had a plentiful source of fresh water, was close to the sea, and was also close to the roads. I made sure no pollutants were sent into the air or surrounding water supply. Magic is a very useful thing.

I got a couple engineers and architects from the earth I had lived on for so long, and set them to making it happen. I gave them a few magic workers, who were good with 'building' magic. They also had hundreds of builders from the Builder's Guild, to get it done quickly and safely.

My people were going to get a little boost in their level of comfort. I wanted useful items rolling out of that foundry. I wanted them to be cheap, so that my people could buy them. We were going to be introducing good paying 'factory work', here, also.

As a result of everything I was doing, there was a huge boom going on. Money was being spent and made. The tax coffers were filling almost faster than I could spend it, which was good, as I was spending a lot.

I called a meeting with the 'slumlords'. I gave them a choice. I would buy them out at their property's current market value, and they could go their way. Or, they could tear down and rebuild the homes of their tenants. They would have to be built in a better and safer way, and with better materials. Of course this would be done at their expense, not Landkur's.

As you might guess, there was posturing, hemming, and hawing. Only one man actually looked thoughtful, and agreed right away. I was surprised with that man, right off the bat. I asked him later why he had agreed, while his compatriots were pissing and moaning.

"I inherited that mess, my lord. I have long wanted to do away with it, but if I pulled down my portion, that would have caused the collapse of at least two other buildings. I have long been embarrassed about the houses I own there. I tried to fix them once, but the Builder's Guild was asking for an astonishing rate, to even do the minimum," Goff Elfor said to me.

I found out he was very wealthy by the standards of this world. I made a proposition to him. He puts up a majority of the money to start the foundry, and perhaps to invest in other projects, and we would split the profits. I would put up twenty five percent, and supply all the building and magical help that would be required.

Here was a man who knew that something had to be done for the poor people in that housing slum, and admitted it right off. His willingness to help, made him my first 'private sector' investor. He was very good at procurement, I found. We got along quite well.

Shortly before the foundry was up and running, we started to receive wagonloads of ore. I had decided early on, to stoke the furnace magically. It hadn't been very hard to do. I found some most cooperative fire elementals who said they would love the job.

From everything I had learned about fire elementals, I knew they enjoyed burning things. So I made a deal with several of them. I would supply them with plenty of power, magically. In return, I asked that the elementals burned in specific areas, and at requested temperatures. The elementals agreed, happy to be so well supplied with power. I also set several 'safety spells'. For example; if the elementals deliberately burned at the wrong temperature, or if they started going astray with fires made in the wrong places, they were told that the 'safety spell' would cut off their power, and huge water elementals would be summoned. They shuddered at that, and promised that they would use and enjoy the power, very carefully.

All the furnaces were to be fired by elementals. All we had to do was pay for the workers and materials. Not having to pay for supplies to smelt the ore saved us a fortune. Then there were the forms that the product was poured into. We needed artisans to make them.

It was amazing how much we needed and how little we knew. I hired a couple people from my old earth to manage the foundry. They were tickled to be here, and a couple of the earth hires asked to immigrate.

I had long since pulled down the slums, and had them rebuilt on more modern lines. I also made sure they were as safe as could be. I now found myself to be the major landlord in the previous slum area. The Builder's guild wad been happy to accommodate me. I was brining a boom of building to a Guild that had been suffering from not much work.

After I was through, other people tried to buy their way into the new buildings I had put up. This I did not allow.

I'd had the area cleaned, and also ordered that a small park be made. While it lacked the modern refinements of a park from the earth I had lived in for so long, it was still nice. The Watch now had guards very 'visibly in the area'.

Simple seesaws, and some swings were installed for the children. This was something the society here had not thought of. It was an instant hit. Kids came from all over to play at the park. The whole tone of the area was changed, for the better.

I had set up a temporary tent city to house the displaced families and tenants of the slum. When they moved back in, I didn't charge them any more than they had been paying before, but now they had much better housing. I encouraged them to look for jobs now, as the economy had started to take off.

In that year, my credibility as Duke De Landkur rose a great deal. I angered a lot of people, mostly merchants, and lords. However, the majority of the people were happy with the results of my ruling.

Jorslan sent a delegation to start normalizing relations with Landkur. His brief meeting with the Goddess had definitely had an effect on his current world expansionism. One of the things he did was send fifteen thousand golds as a form of reparations, for the war.

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