AK – The Alchemy Kingdom

Karl wore a complicated expression while he tried to estimate it. The reason why he didn’t want to reveal his plans and expectations for the cart project, was exactly this kind of behavior. He knew the others would drive him mad with questions that still didn’t have answers. Fortunately, they were at least sensible enough to not appear with unrealistic requests like building enough carts to transport back all the rescued. That would take years and more resources that he could count.

“Humm… It’s difficult to say, I didn’t even share my opinions with the cart builder. But from the Alchemy side, at least half a year, maybe a little less if we have enough hands.”

The estimative cool them down, and soon, they started to breathe normally again.

“I see. Let’s discuss it later when Karl knows more. I propose we make a list of requirements, so we could understand what would be needed.”.

Marlen's seemingly neutral suggestion was unanimously accepted by the other councilors, and Omero proceeded suggesting the key points.

“First, intelligence. We need eyes all over the regions to decide on the best targets, the escape path, and prepare countermeasures. It’s in line with the Ministry of Defense request, if we could establish an information net in every city we would only need one shadow in each of the four regions to supervise it. Either way, we have to get more shadow crystals… Any ideas? I don’t think Keller can get it.”

Unfortunately, nobody seemed to have a solution. At least not until Lew hesitantly added something.

“Maybe… We should send a team to the Death Valley…”

Surprisingly, most councilors had forgotten that Lew participated in a mission to the deadly place before joining them. However, they didn’t have any difficulty remembering the dreadful recounting of his unpleasant adventure. The fearful reactions revealed that none of the Council members was eager to send their people there. Yet, the communicator continued to send a message from the Tunnel.

“It would be a dangerous mission, but if our goal is limited to shadow crystals, it could be done. We faced the shadow beasts at the entrance of the valley before we even had contact with any death energy. Usually, for a highly dangerous collecting mission of just a few crystals, we would send a team of shadows. But I think the beasts would easily see through the concealment and even use it in their favor. So, it would take a strong small team equipped with everything we got.”

“Do you have the personnel and how long would it take?”

Although he knew that the military had 300 soldiers on standby, he had to be polite and ask.

“Yes. Sania’s team would be perfect for the job, but she would have to keep the team small, up to a dozen soldiers. Anything more would attract unwanted attention from the Tribes and reduce their mobility. Training and preparations would demand a couple of months, but if we don’t want to wait until next winter, they would need to leave in a month and come back before spring. It would suicidal to face the regular number of beasts in the forest and the valley. And we would need bubble shields for all of them, plus wind boosters.”

The message stopped for a few seconds but was resumed shortly.

“The team would leave the Tunnel and reach the Tribal Lands through the forest, so they wouldn’t be able to use wind horses in an unopened path. They could go through the wind region or walk, but we don’t want to risk being detected by the Wind Lord, and it would take too long to walk. With the wind booster, they would get there in a little over two weeks and also avoid beasts along the way…”

Lew’s slowly transmitted plan calmed them a lot, he had the experience so they trusted his judgment. Now, they were curious to see if Karl would be able to craft the tools in time for the mission.

“For the Origin! We’re already strained as it is, but you want us to make a dozen boosters in what, two weeks?... Anyway, I don’t know how but we’ll get it done, the plan will not fail because we lack magic tools! But we’re not crafting any new shields, you’ll have to get it from other soldiers. We still have dozens of undesigned magic carts to craft.”

“Fair enough.”

After discussing some last details, the first part of the plan was done. Samia would responsible for building the information net while her sister would lead a team to Death Valley to get the materials required for spreading more shadows through the Kingdom.

“Next, we need a plan to get enough resources. How about we start by estimating all we need? Food, carts, potions, crystals…”

As a resource specialist, Marlen easily coordinated them into forming a list of materials for each area. Everything would need to be checked again after Samia got the information, but it was good enough to get things going. They planned to free ten villages, which would amount to roughly 20000 people.

Statistically, they would be looking at about 3000 villagers who couldn’t walk back, and they would treat them as 4000 for safety. However, they would only move two-thirds of the rescued at the same time, so they had to craft 200 carts, 180 to transport people, and 20 for food. Karl felt a giant headache while hearing the numbers.

Food, on the other hand, would be their wildest guess. In the end, they hoped to find enough grains and vegetables to last until they enter the Eastern Forest. They hoped to get the furthest rescued batch to the forest in four months, and back to the Tunnel in less than six. Which meant, providing them with at least two months worth of food. Even with the improvement on their plantation, Kanin would need to double their fields. Fortunately, the heating circle would allow them to keep producing through winter, otherwise, they would never dream of taking in this task.

For crystals, they would need two protection barriers for each village, adding up to 12 bubble crystals for the first six villages. Last, they had to make four strong detoxifying potions and one healing potion for every person, resulting in a total of 100K potions. The terrifying amount made everybody speechless. They knew that life couldn’t be measured in terms of crystals, but as leaders, they couldn’t ignore the staggering cost of more than three million crystals. The sum, which was enough to run AK for a year, made them hesitate.

In truth, it was worth it rescuing the 20K, even in terms of practical gains. Aside from boosting their projects and freeing their overworked, the new citizens would bring at least one million crystals of seasonal taxes. So, they would repay their “cost” in less than a year. The only problem was how to pay for it. Right now, they could barely pay for the other costs of the plan.

An easy option would be sealing their potions or tools to the Kingdom, but they didn’t want to give benefits to their worse enemies. Though, it would be kind of amusing to have them finance the escape of their own prisoners. Fortunately, the price of the potions was paid to their government, so they would only have to front the cost of making them and forget the loss of not selling for profit. Every Ministry involved could also make a comprise to shorten the costs.

For this number of potions, the Alchemists would need to build twenty extra potion-making tools, but Reiner agreed to organize a volunteering schedule to draw them for free. Alfeur also promised to find a few crafters and convince them to help build the tools for free. Unfortunately, the workers who make the potions and clay vials, couldn’t be free-sourced. So, in the end, Lew had to lend them 50 soldiers, who would rotate with others after one month.

When they finished organizing the potion-making operation, the cost was reduced to 30K crystals used for buying the elixir, life, and plant crystals needed for production. They would ask Keller to get it as soon as possible, and hopefully, they would have enough potions to start the plan in the summer.

Once they dealt with the required materials, only the complementary tasks such as opening a path between the Tunnel and the Tribal Lands were left to plan. Unfortunately, the Ministry of Defense had to shoulder those too. It was an unproper use of their soldiers and a loss of training time, which was dearly needed for the missions to come, but they had no other options. Employing a third of AK’s workforce also had its downside.

A new era for the Alchemy Kingdom was on the horizon, and like everything else in their short history, it would be built on sweat and blood.