All the Dust that Falls

Chapter 166: Spot the Builder

I watched as Bee led the train of people out of the city gates and crested over the horizon. It wasn't the first time that we had been separated. But it was the first time I had really been on my own. Who knew how large of a commitment I had just made? But I still stood by my decision.

The undead needed to be stopped. And judging from what I had seen here, the humans were going to struggle at it if they were left to themselves.

I turned as Beatrice moved out of sight to look down at the people below. They were surprisingly fast at stacking blocks. I never watched anyone stack blocks at home except for the small clumsy human, but I couldn't imagine him ever moving anywhere near as fast as these men. Which was strange because they were obviously so inferior to my humans in every other way.

It probably was related to the skills that seemed so popular around here, but at the rate they were stacking the blocks, they would likely be done with building suitable gatehouses by the end of the day. Apparently, the longer time that they had estimated came mostly from gathering new blocks and getting a new door. It was good that they hadn't received nearly as much damage as expected. Looking back on it, my domain probably had something to do with making sure they stayed in nicely-shaped rectangles instead of shattering everywhere.

I spotted Arthur walking among the people working. He wasn't shouting like he had been during the battle now. Instead, he mostly just watched. However, wherever he went, the men worked about 23 percent faster. It was like a bubble of efficiency followed him around. For a human, he sure resonated with my kind.

Still, this work as a whole was going to take at least a day or two at the rate they were lifting everything into place. I could feel my domain assisting them; each time they placed a block, it was nudged to be in a slightly more perfect spot. This wouldn't really help them move faster, though. Unless I started intervening more directly, of course. The only issue was that I didn't know anything about building large stone structures.

Hovering down from the wall, I went over to Arthur's side. He saw me approaching and waited for me before giving me a slight bow. "Lord Void."

I returned his formal greeting with one of my own before launching into why I had come over. Unfortunately, he still didn't seem able to understand me. "I'm sorry my lord, you may need to slow down. I don't think I caught that."

Arthur was too polite. Changing the pace at which I beeped at him wasn't going to help anything. I still wasn't sure what made people understand me, but it had taken everyone a bit of practice. Some of the children were better at it, but the adults always took a decent amount of conversation to glean even approximate meanings.

I wasn't expecting him to be any better, but if I didn't give him a chance to practice, he definitely wouldn't learn. Well, when I thought of it that way, maybe trying to speak slower might help. So to humor him, I repeated myself, drawing out each beep until the distortion was just to the edge of understanding.

"Terribly sorry-" Arthur started to apologize again, but I cut him off and backed up a little, leaving a lot of room between the two of us. With my claw, I slowly and painstakingly scratched in the dirt. It took me a minute to make sure the letters were perfect, but when I was done, the letters read, "I HELP."

Arthur tilted his head to the side, and I realized that I had written them upside down from his perspective. Whoops. Still, he was able to read them and nodded. "What would you like help with?"

No, that wasn't what I was asking. I wanted to help. I tried saying this to him. It was a bit complicated, so I tried again, just telling him "no." This made him cock his head, and it seemed he understood somewhat. To speed the process up, I added a word. Now the dirt read, "I HELP BUILD."

I wasn't really happy with my messy scrawl in blocky letters, but the dirt wasn't the best medium for this. Scratching out the letters took a while, too, so I minimized the number of characters. It kind of resembled the writings of one of the smaller children. To assist my communication effort, I pointed to the large wall and construction effort with emphasis.

"You want to… help us build?" Arthur asked in a truly baffled voice. "Really?"

Of course, I didn't understand what was so confusing about my request. Were the humans so touchy that they would be offended if someone helped them? Or did they have some secret building techniques that they didn't want to share? They were working out in the open, so I doubted that was it. Maybe they just doubted that I would be any help. I suppose a demonstration was in order.

With a careful bit of Air Manipulation, I lifted one of the medium-sized blocks up and shifted it over to the wall, slotting it into place a few dozen feet above the ground. All around us, people froze in place and watched the floating block.

Once I was satisfied with the placement, I stopped and looked around. It seemed that most people hadn't realized it was me that moved the block and were glancing about with nervous looks on their faces. Arthur definitely understood, as he was looking at me with interest. "So, you want to help place the stones? That could be helpful. How many can you do at once?"

That wasn't something that I had really considered. Running some quick simulations, I was pretty sure I couldn't do more than a dozen at a time. Looking around, though, I realized that it would be a great help. With 58 people working, they were only able to move about four blocks at the same time. Two were being slotted in at a time, one in each tower, and teams were working on that. Another two were being moved into position to be set next.

I beeped at Arthur, but instead of using the dirt to say how many I could theoretically hold, I just started moving blocks. The humans holding and maneuvering the blocks jumped back, even though I was very careful not to squish them. Once they got out of the way, I was able to be less cautious, and they started sliding into place, a couple each minute for each tower.

The humans had been putting some sticky paste in between the blocks, but after some analysis, I realized that it wasn't really necessary. It seemed that it would dry eventually, bonding the rocks in place, but it was ultimately still weaker than the rocks themselves.

When the first blocks that didn't have the paste prepared for it floated up in front of me, I used my sanitation lamp to carve a pattern of ridges into the bottom and top. There. Those would help the stones snugly interlock on their own. I considered taking the rest of the tower down to do it right but decided that wasn't the best use of time. Besides, I was still not an expert at construction, so I didn't want to mess with their foundations.

These would nest with the other blocks, and they would form a wall with 87 percent of strength as if it was solid stone. Much more than my estimated strength of 53 percent with the rock paste.

I supposed that the humans had good reasons for building the way that they did. If they were to carve out these grooves by hand, it would take a very long time. Even only took 30 seconds per block on average, it was going to take me most of the morning to get the gatehouses ready for reseating the gates. They would have been here for days without me.

—-

The foreman came up to Arthur, cursing up a storm. The man wasn't particularly angry; it was just the way he talked. Arthur listened to the man give his estimates. The news sent a smile to his face despite his best efforts to maintain his composure.

It seemed they wouldn't be waiting here for days after all.

Turning to his aide, he gave him orders. "Ready the men; it seems the few days in the city are canceled. If there are any grumblings, let them know the sooner we catch the enemy, the sooner we all get some proper leave.

The aide scurried away, and Arthur continued his discussion with the foreman. With the method that Void was stacking blocks, the man was worried that they would need to alter the gates themselves, but Arthur had his doubts. Perhaps he was too trusting too soon, but that sounded like something Void would be able to handle.

He promised the man that he would confirm the matter about the gates. Then he reassigned him and his team to work on repairing other parts of the city with the rest of the engineering corps.

Now that their timetable had moved up several days, he had a lot more work to do. Calling all his officers through messengers, Arthur made his way to the command post. They had plans to make and not much time to get them moving.

Once he was in front of the map table, he didn't wait for everyone to show up. Instead, he just started working with what was available. The first was an armory report. They needed to know how much equipment they had and how much to take with them.

The number of spares was calculated by a complicated formula based on how many men, how long the campaign was, and how frequently there were engagements. The Quartermaster class greatly helped with all of this as often most of the variables couldn't be known. Arthur was lucky to have the best Quartermaster in the country. While he was a respected commander and good at tactics, his head wasn't the same for numbers. It had taken a significant effort for his tutors to drill them into his head as a child.

Basil was the first to arrive; the Quartermaster was ever punctual. "Sir." He saluted. "'We should be ready to go. The stores have been packed and counts are being done. But for a two month campaign we should be fine. Sir."

"Very well, Basil. How are we on winter supplies?" Arthur asked.

"You think we will be wintering in the field sir?" The Quartermaster asked with a grimace.

"I think this hunt could take longer than any of us would like."