AK - The Alchemy Kingdom

Chapter 125: Their own path II

Many opposed the decision to call it the Path, as to avoid bringing bad memories of their old life, but once they understood the defiance and mockery of calling it such, they also agreed with the name. Their Path wouldnt be a farce, it would a proud statement of their power and freedom. The Kingdom could build an illusion connecting the cities and villages, but they would build something that really worked inside the Forest. It would cost them a lot, but they were used to working tirelessly.

While Karl continued building the powering structure around their home, his disciples focused on drawing the power distribution for the Path. The plan was simple, gather energy in the powering gap and transfer it through lines that would follow the Path in the ground. Anya and Wein would be responsible for one powerline each, and the powerlines would be at opposite sides sharing the energy burden of maintaining the Path.

In truth, only one powerline was needed to power supply the energy, however, two lines would be able to carry more energy and thus keep a longer Path. Oliver, who was the weakest of the disciples in terms of spiritual energy, became responsible for drawing the borderlines of the Path which would work to mark the limits for the protection. To keep up with his senior disciples he would have to draw double of what they did in size. Fortunately, the borders only need one-tenth of the spiritual energy concentration of the powerlines, which meant his work was still five times easier than of his peers.

Others questioned Karl, why dont bring more disciples to help, but he explained that this task had high standards that could only be met by the direct disciples. While they worked on the Path, the others didnt stay idle. The shadows started to bring groups of three every odd day, who also started to help cleaning and prepare the huge land inside the earth wall. In the third week of work, Karl had already expanded the barriers to cover a two kilometers radius bordered by the energy vein at the east and the river at the south.

The path continued to expand, piece by piece. Of course, the disciples werent drawing it directly into the ground. They were safe inside the earth walls, drawing on stone plates prepared by their camp, which was carried using bags with imprinted lightness effect. The job of preparing the path and placing the stone plates was done by helpers who were brought by the shadows. In two weeks, the three kilometers were finally covered by the Path and the basic powering structure was also finished.

Since the most dangerous part was now safe, the shadows increased the number of people being brought into the groups. The disciples could only cry because their job was far from being finished. Fortunately, the stressful and repetitive tasks ended up being good to increase their abilities. Without noticing, they were drawing almost double their previous limit.

A month passed and the Path hit the 15 kilometers mark. Karl had used this time to improve the powering structure and he was finally comfortable with leaving it like this for the near future. The number of people already living in the settlement was a little over 400 and was growing by 50 every day, if they kept this pace, everybody would be settled just in time for winter.

Their speed was far from exciting but it gave time for the workers to build homes for everyone who arrived. At this time, Karl finally allowed the disciples to rest and take a pause from the Path drawing work, they still hadnt learned the Runes and were eager to study it. As they slowly settled down, the pursuit and other Kingdom-related problems became a distant memory.

Two months ago, the Council already started discussing their settlements structure, but a lot of things were still uncertain about the vein. They wanted to build a city, an Alchemy Capital, so city planning was essential. It would be better to start organizing everything from the beginning than to create disturbances in the future. According to Karl, the best option was to build the city around the vein, keeping it at the citys core, so they could better use its energy and protect it.

Unfortunately, the energy pouring from the vein couldnt be controlled just yet, so they decided to build the barriers in a semi-circular form, covering only a section of the circle, and slowly expand sideways until surrounding it completely. From the energy vein to the outer barrier, the earth wall covered three kilometers, which was already enough to house all their citizens and develop their activities.

In regards to the city structure, Omero and Marlen raised a few ideas copying what they remembered from the Democracys organization, Lew also had many things to add based on what he knew of the Kingdoms cities. After discussing the plan for a few hours, they decided to divide the city into four sections to separate the production, housing, business, and governmental districts.

One kilometer of the outer part of the circle would be reserved for production, which would involve farming, crafting and any other large-scale production. The next section would be used for housing and would cover another kilometer, leaving only one kilometer to the energy vein. The next 300 meters would form the business district, which for now would only have the Council trading pavilion and a special health care center.

The government district would occupy the next 200 meters, where the pavilions of the Council and each department would be built. The last half kilometer in the inner part of the city would be left for the energy vein, the earth walls and the powering system. Until they could invest time in construction, the city would look empty, but planning was done looking to the future.

To house the constant influx coming from the camp, the Council decided to only build the crude earth houses. Once everyone was settled and they had time for improving their live conditions, every family could slowly acquire a better house in an area of the housing district. For now, the priority was to move everyone and arrange their basic needs.