CH116 Building boats is better with buddies.
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Alex, who had been dunked before, swiftly swam out of the castle's water. She assisted the group of people falling from the pipe, who also ended up submerged. With a few skillful flourishes of the feather duster, the person pulled from the water was dried and ready to move out of the construction area.

 

Splash splash.  Cough cough.  Dust dust.

“Kyaaa,” A maid, dressed in a plumbers outfit screamed upon getting dunked.

 

Another person cleaned and joined the queue, and after 50 or so people everyone got sorted, though a little shaken from the whole affair. 

 

In a sneaky move, Alex took the maid outfit of each maid one at a time and replaced them with an identical maid outfit that lacked the curse.  She ‘took’ the maid outfits for safe keeping for transport in the carriage but really just hid them in a box when the maid was getting changed.

 

So now, the maids were getting changed in an unfinished room in the castle. 

 

Alex felt a little smug, using the same clothing swap trick that was used on her.

 

“Now that we’ve got everyone dried off,” Alex noticed all eyes on her and Fufi from the gathered crowd.  “Let me show you around.”

 

Everyone had to watch their step around the mass of concrete blocks and steel beams surrounding the castle construction.

 

“Wow, you really are set up to build a castle.”  Zeke stepped forward, looking a lot more male than when the maid outfit had half-transformed him.

 

“Merumeru and Magical girl Cosmos plucked away at it for a month or two now.” Alex led the group toward the cabin.  “It has been stalled a bit now that she had to go away on business or something.  We could use some help, though everything is way too heavy to lift.”

 

A middle aged man, after listening in, went to one of the concrete blocks and lifted the corner of it a foot off the ground with little signs of strain.  “It is heavy, but not too bad with the help of my laborer class.”

 

“Right.” Alex gaped, having temporarily forgotten that classes would make people functionally super-human.  “Maybe talk with Merumeru and Aqua and see how you can help out?”

 

“We can do that.”  The gruff laborer gave a single nod. “Having a more solid building would be a big help if the winter gets bad.   We have tents but if the winter dumps feet of snow they’ll collapse.”

 

Alex led them to the cabin where the Yvne family was waiting on the porch.

 

“Greetings.” The former baroness curtseyed.  “Welcome to Parker sky island.”

 

The maid group looked elated while the extended family group looked a bit nervous about seeing their former leader before them.  They didn’t know if they should bow, straighten up or run away.

 

One of the maids gushed. “Mistress, it has been too long!”

 

The maids swarmed the middle-aged woman.

 

“None of that.”  Yvne held up a hand. “Things are different.  I’m not in charge of anyone anymore.  The king dissolved the barony and I’m just another unlanded noble.  I don’t even have citizenship in any kingdom anymore.”

 

“This has to be fixed.”  The overly enthusiastic maid proclaimed.  “Perhaps this land can become your new county?”

 

Fufi didn’t approve of this kind of talk.  “Hey, this is Alex’s land.  If any nobles want to start up a county, they should do it elsewhere.”

 

The maids all looked at this flamingo with contempt, their movements almost in unison.

 

“Not far below us is the temple of purity.”  Alex decided to nip this in the bud.  “Ki said that it might be possible to have the demonic curse removed there.  But we need to make sure that they won’t just turn everyone into copies of priests and priestesses like they do with the harpies.”

 

“If that is what mistress wishes.” Another maid spoke. “But there is nothing wrong with any of us.”

 

Alex cleared her throat.  “What’s your name?”

 

“You may call me maid.”  The maid primly answered.

 

“Exactly.” Alex rolled her eyes.

 

Alex continued the tour, leaving the maids for Yvne and her children to try to get them to better understand the situation.  They visited the workshop, the container camp that professor copperpot set up.  And showed the remains of what used to be a road connected to the driveway.

 

“If you want to build more permanent housing, along this road and driveway might be a good starting place.”  Alex tapped a foot on the pavement.  “If we ask nicely, I bet Merumeru would help with the plumbing.  I guess a latrine or outhouse could be built temporarily.  I’m not sure that the septic tank in the cabin can handle all the people we brought.”

 

“Is it okay to farm here?” Zeke asked. “The majority of us have a farmer class.”

 

“Yeah, though, just be careful about killing any trees.”  Alex pointed to some of the trees growing.  “Obviously some trees, like willows, can be cut back a lot.  I’m a little worried that if we deforest the whole place it wouldn’t be good.  All of these plants are not native to Terre so it would be nice to try to preserve them.”

 

“We’ll til some land and get some things planted.  I think with all the farmers a couple acres would be enough.” Zeke guessed.

 

“With Yvne’s skills boosting us it could be even less.”  One older man added.

 

Fufi gave him a glare.  “That’s not up for negotiation.”

 

“Maybe something can be worked out later.” Alex added. “But for now, the family are prisoners.”

 

The group didn’t look too pleased by that.  Was Alex being unreasonable?  A quick look to the nearby standing Flamingo firmed the magical girl’s resolve.  The nobles were showing the maids around and Alex got the peasants.  Even after losing everything, they still felt like getting stuff handed to them was the natural order of things, Alex suspected.  And the people of the kingdom being brought up to believe that they deserved that didn’t help.

 

“Prisoners?” The man gaped.  “I know you had a bad conflict with lady Yvne, but still… She kept our farms from turning into a waste for years and letting everyone starve.”

 

Alex couldn’t believe these people.  Did they have blinders on?  Why were they downplaying the fact that demons terrorized them and took their sons and daughters to be maids.

 

“Anyway.” Alex changed the subject, thinking maybe something was mentally wrong with these people. “I’m currently working on building a model boat to show to the shipwrights in the capitol.  I’m sure you saw it by the workshop.  It is a little top heavy but anyone that has skills that might help with making it better or experience making boats would be a big help.”

 

An older man spoke. “Name’s Cid.  I have a carpenter class and spent some time working in the shipyards back when I was younger before the work dried up.”

 

“What kind of stuff did you do there?” Alex asked.

 

“Repairs mostly.” Cid didn’t sound confident. “Finding wood kept getting harder and harder.  The demons wanting flammable materials in tribute didn’t help with the scarcity either.  It might not even be running anymore.”

 

“How did they even keep people on staff if that was the case?” Ales thought that the shipyard would have closed down completely considering how unfriendly the seas were to demons.

 

“It got to the point that ships would have to provide their own resources in most cases.” Cid continued.  “Non-humans would stop and use the drydock if something really bad happened.  A master shipwright could throw something together with the stuff they had on hand so that they could have a good chance of making it back to their home port.”

 

“What kind of races?”  Alex wondered if there was some way to do this without blowing up the plan.

 

“Races that don’t enchant well.”  Cid didn’t sound sure.  “We got some ships with undead crews.  There was this one that was basically a giant golem that sailed itself and relied on longshoremen to load and unload it.”

 

Alex nodded. “That’s interesting.”  Perhaps the plan to have a boat sail into harbor crewed by one foot high dolls wouldn’t be something too suspicious.

 

After summoning the carriage, Alex distributed the dozens of tents that they picked up in town.  The bulk of the rest of the carriage was filled up with produce.  The two extended families agreed to set up tents for the maids as well.  Not having nymphs around to grow tree houses was a step down in terms of comfort but the people that used to be part of the kingdom were happy to get the extra security of being away from the slow pressure cooker that two very different cultures living together created.

 

They took the rest of the day and some of the next to get settled.  Luckily, someone had a mason class and set up his tent near the castle, saying that if he’s going to be spending his days doing stonework that he might as well set up nearby so there would be less of a walk.

 

Cid, the carpenter pitched a tent near the workshop.  Most of the farmers picked a spot near the stream.  Apparently, being next to a fresh source of water was paramount.  Hopefully, Merumeru would get some kind of plumbing system set up for them before they started making buckets and getting water that way.

 

Cid inspected the toy clipper ship.  “Did you seal the planks in the hull with anything?”

 

Alex shook her head.  “I didn’t really think about that.  When we made the little sail boats the nymphs helped a lot with the woodwork, and those didn’t leak.”

 

Cid hmmed.  “It is too bad we don’t have any nymphs around here to help make the boards watertight.  I think they would put strips of cotton dipped in resin in between the planks to give them a better seal.”

 

Alex thought that was a good idea.  “We have access to cotton.  Would tree resin work?”

 

The old man shrugged.  “It might?  Twas a long time ago last I was working with a shipwright.”

 

“What about making the boat less likely to flip over?” Alex went to the biggest problem.

 

“The cheapest way I remember was just throwing rocks in the bilge.”  The man pondered.  “Some of the fancier boats would put strips of lead on the keel and use brass rivets to attach them.  Towards the end, it was almost cheaper to get metal than wood.”

 

Alex pondered this.  Apparently at least some time in the past the kingdom had access to the metals to make brass.  “Well maybe one day we can find a good spot to start a mine or salvage an old one.”

 

Cid shrugged yet again.  He did that a lot. “Mining is something humans never were great at.  The old timers used to say that we should leave the mining to the dwarves or gnomes.  It is stupid to try to compete with them.”

 

Over the course of another week, with help from whoever was available, they got the lower floors of the clipper built for dolls finished up.  Some plant magic made getting resin from pine trees a lot easier and they got all the gaps filled.  A single [laborer] was able to pull the trailer to the lake and splash the boat.  Of course, Merumeru took some of the wooden dolls in sailor-school-girl outfits and stayed on the deck for the journey.  When the boat was launched this time, with some stones in the bilge, it stayed upright a whole lot better.

 

Everyone cheered at the successful launch. 

 

Alex possessed one of the wooden sailor dolls and practiced using the rigging to lower and raise the different sails.  She quickly discovered that with just one doll it would take forever to get all the sails up, or take all the sails down.

 

Ariel got tired of how slow it was going and dove into the water, swimming over to the 1/10th size ship to help out.  It was like a giant sea monster attacking the boat, only instead of destroying it, she just pulled on ropes to get the sails to move or the anchor to lower.

 

 They eventually pulled the boat out of the water and set it back on the trailer for inspection.  Alex’s little doll, hand-in-hand with Merumeru went down into the hold to inspect the bilge to see if they were taking on any water.  Luckily they were not.

 

Alex thanked everyone that involved themselves for the hard work.

 

The molds and fitting got used again.  While they finished up the first toy ship, Cid and anyone that would help, used the chainsaw to harvest a bit more branches to form another keel and start planking a hull.

 

Alex explained that the first toy was going to be given to the king’s shipyard.  And the second one could be a fancier, more clockwork driven ship that could make better use of Alex’s toymaking skills and the new magical girl feat.

 

“Okay, now that we have this thing working good enough to sail down to the capitol we just need to get it back to town.”  Alex looked at Merumeru

 

“Meru?”  She tilted her head.

 

“Merumeru, can you make a portal pipe that we could send a boat through?” Alex figured this would be the easiest way.

 

Merumeru made an ‘X’ with her hands, shaking her head.

 

“Ru ru ru ru ru.”  Merumeru protested.

 

“She can’t make them any size bigger than they already are.”  Aqua translated.  “Looks like you’ll have to find another way.”

 

Alex grumbled.  “There is a blizzard going below us last we went through the pipe by the temple.  There is no way we could drag it that far.  It takes weeks to travel by carriage.”

 

The success instantly souring, Alex facepalmed.  “I should have seen this coming.”

 

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