Chapter 168: Deep Affection and Heavy Responsibility

Nicole brought over a hundred cartloads of stone. To unload these heavy limestones from the ox-carts, Victor mobilized all the available manpower he could muster, which, combined with the several hundred able-bodied men under Nicole's command, took a whole day to complete.

These limestones, polished into regular blocks and strips, had all been dismantled from the castles abandoned by the Prince's faction. Neatly cut and uniformly shaped, they were stacked neatly in the open space in front of Estuary Village. The emptied ox-carts were set to return to Brick-Kiln Village to load up with cyan bricks before heading back to Black Castle—this was the agreed exchange of cyan bricks for castle stones.

"Darling, the newly ennobled lords of our York family don't have castles yet, and Madam said we should build yours first," Nicole said softly, linking her arm through Victor's.

Victor smiled faintly. "Afraid I'll be taken out by someone?"

Nicole pressed her lips together in a smile, silently conceding the point. Although Victor possessed Silver-tier combat strength and moved as swiftly as the wind, he lacked the heavy armor and endless stamina characteristic of true knights. Once his stamina was exhausted, he would lose the ability to break through a siege. Therefore, a castle provided an immense safeguard for an extraordinary archer like Victor.

"Nicole, thank you for coming to keep me company!" Victor looked into Nicole's clear, watery eyes and said sincerely.

Victor and Nicole had once made an agreement: once Nicole earned sufficient merit for the family, she would sever ties with the York family, join Victor's command, and become his knight.

However, after Sylvia returned from the royal capital, she summoned Nicole. She explicitly told Nicole that if she wished to leave the family, she would have to serve it for another decade. Just as Nicole was struck with disappointment, Sylvia proposed granting her the territory at the entrance of the Great Marsh, allowing her to become Victor's neighbor. Nicole's sorrow instantly turned to joy, and she nodded in immediate agreement. Sylvia then bestowed upon her a noble name, Phinices York, and invested her on the spot as a fiefdom baroness. Thus, Nicole became a vassal lord of the York family, with her hereditary domain comprising the three thousand square kilometers of land at the mouth of the Great Marsh.

Nicole had arrived in high spirits, joyfully sharing the entire story with Victor. Upon hearing it, Victor felt a complex mixture of depression and deep moving gratitude.

True to her consistent style, Sylvia had sold Nicole off and even had Nicole help her count the money, while neatly roping Victor into the deal as well. What depressed Victor the most was that, just like Nicole, he found it completely impossible to feel angry at Sylvia; instead, he felt compelled to thank her.

Nicole had every reason to be grateful to Sylvia: a baronial title, a hereditary territory of three thousand square kilometers, neighboring her beloved, mutual support, and constant companionship. It could be said that Sylvia had helped Nicole realize all her dreams. But viewed from a lord's perspective, the matter carried an entirely different flavor.

A three-thousand-square-kilometer domain and a hereditary barony held great appeal for most knights. Yet if a territory lacked rivers, lakes, and resources, no one would be interested even if its area were multiplied tenfold. Not only did this territory lack all of those, but it also had to fend off terrifying ant-men. This meant the appointed lord would shoulder only responsibilities and risks, without any of the resources or revenues needed to expand a family. Victor suspected that no knight in the York family was willing to play the fool and take on this thankless fief, which was why Sylvia had passed the burden onto Nicole. And who better than Nicole, Victor's woman? With a little pillow talk, a touch of spoiled pleading, and a dash of feminine whimsy, anything could be arranged.

Compared to the wise and resourceful Sylvia, Nicole was undoubtedly a pure, sweet fool. She cared nothing for families, lordships, or barren lands; she only wanted to be close to Victor, and nothing more. Victor doubted he could ever be as devoted as Nicole, and faced with her profound affection, besides being deeply moved, all he could offer was gratitude.

A smile playing at the corners of her mouth, Nicole rested her head against Victor's shoulder and said, "Madam attended the royal hunting banquet and reached a consensus with the royal family. Once the Water Season passes, the kingdom will organize the surrounding lords to transport supplies and stone to us. The family will dispatch twenty-five thousand able-bodied men to my territory, prioritizing the construction of the fortress at the mouth of the Great Marsh."

"Twenty-five thousand able-bodied men?" Victor asked with a solemn expression. "With so many people, how will food, clothing, housing, and transportation be managed? How will public order be maintained? Who is responsible for organizing these men? Who is the commander of this operation?"

"Their rations are the kingdom's responsibility, and as for the commander? Me!" Nicole pointed at her own nose.

"You? You're the commander?"

Victor was greatly astonished. Organizing twenty-five thousand people to build a fortress was no simple task; he certainly lacked the capability to handle such a feat himself. That Nicole possessed such ability was something he had never expected.

"Looking down on me, are you?" Nicole gave Victor's arm a pinch, with enough force to crush an ant.

"I am a baron of the family and a lord, so of course I'm the commander. But that's only in name," Nicole said with a giggle. "I'm only responsible for supervision; the specific matters will be handled by the family's magistrate, garrison commander, and internal affairs officer. The church will also dispatch priests and pastors to pacify the populace and monitor us, but the true person in charge is Master Edwin!"

"Master Edwin?" Victor cried out in pleasant surprise.

"Didn't expect that, did you? Master Edwin is well-versed in history, heraldry, monstruology, and biology, but his greatest expertise lies in architecture. Master Edwin is one of the finest master architects. The town of Black Castle was designed by his disciple, and the family specially invited him back to preside over the construction of the fortress. Ordinary families couldn't hope to hire Master Edwin; he is the most respected scholar and master architect of our York family!" Nicole said with pride.

Nicole had every reason to be proud; an architect's status was even higher than that of a knight. In this world, there were no orthographic projections or floor plans drawn by modern architects; at most, they sketched rough diagrams on wooden boards. Before beginning castle construction, architects would use marking rods and plumb lines to lay out the floor plan directly on the ground. Only for the most difficult structural parts, such as vaulted ceilings, would architects draw detailed blueprints, while the majority of the work relied entirely on personal experience.

Thus, architectural planning existed solely within the architect's mind. Once construction began, the architect could never be dismissed, and they held absolute command over the building operations. If an accident befell the architect during construction, it would spell utter catastrophe for the castle project. For this reason, lords were required to assign knights to guard architects at all times and implore church priests to provide divine safeguards.

There were fewer than sixty peak knights in this world, and master architects capable of constructing massive fortresses could be counted on the fingers of two hands. Master Edwin of the York family was one of them. One could easily imagine how lofty Master Edwin's status was. Yet this old man was far from settled; running about here and there, full of passionate curiosity for other fields of study, he had actually insisted on exploring the Great Marsh. Although Sylvia had dispatched Bruce—the man closest to a Silver knight among her subordinates—to protect him (Silver knights of the York family were all fiefdom lords; outside of wartime, Sylvia had no authority to mobilize them, as only the royal family could command the Silver knights of the court nobility), he had still nearly met with disaster, leaving Sylvia in a cold sweat.

"Does that mean Master Edwin can mobilize those twenty-five thousand able-bodied men?" Victor asked, his eyes gleaming.

"Of course," Nicole nodded.

Victor hurriedly pressed further: "Then, can Master Edwin mobilize these people to do something else first?"

"Do something else? If we change the construction plan, Master Edwin, myself, and the presiding priest must all three agree," Nicole furrowed her delicate brows and asked, "Darling, do you want us to help you build your castle first?"

"Is that a bit too difficult to arrange?" Victor asked purposely.

Nicole bit her lip and said, "Not really. But your castle doesn't require Master Edwin, nor does it need that many people. There are other architects in the family who can help you build your castle. I mean, if over twenty thousand people were to help you build your castle, the kingdom wouldn't cover their rations, and the presiding priest will be monitoring that."

*It seems I have to win over the church priest to pull off my plan,* Victor thought, rubbing his chin.

Nicole had almost zero resistance against Victor. She wouldn't have minded helping him build a castle, but she couldn't help worrying that over twenty thousand mouths would eat Victor into bankruptcy, so she felt obliged to warn him against using a sledgehammer to crack a nut. Yet Victor wasn't thinking about his own castle at all. With the alchemy auxiliary loading skill, his workers were far more capable than master architects, and coupled with hundreds of alchemical militia, building a thirty-meter-high castle would be as easy as turning over his hand. What Victor wanted to build was a six-kilometer-long artificial canal and a small reservoir. Once completed, his subsequent artificial river project would fall naturally into place, and mobilizing these twenty-five thousand able-bodied men was the absolute key to the reservoir project. To mobilize this workforce, Victor had to persuade three people. Nicole and Master Edwin posed no concern; only that priest remained the difficult puzzle.

"Victor, what kind of plan do you have?" Nicole asked with curious persistence.

Recovering his wits, Victor realized that the full-figured, dazzlingly lovely Nicole was practically pressed against his chest. A surge of heat rose within him, and he decided to handle the female knight first.

"Nicole, when are you heading back?" Victor murmured gently into Nicole's crystal-clear ear while his hand slid down to cup her astonishingly springy, curved hips.

A peach-blossom blush stained Nicole's cheeks, her gaze swimming with moisture and rife with sultry charm as she replied, "T-tomorrow, I suppose..."

"Then, Baroness Phinices, let us go tumble in the sheets."

"Ah?! O-okay, then..."

***

While Victor was dragging Nicole off to tumble in the sheets, old mercenary John caught sight of a familiar figure amidst the working crowd—a chubby man who was sweating profusely as he loaded cyan bricks onto an ox-cart.

"Isn't that Boss Wedge from Amber Street?" Old John's eyes gleamed as he struck his palm with his fist, chuckling softly under his breath. "Now this is wonderful! The mercenary band has an employer!"