Chapter 23: City Wall Construction

News has recently begun to spread in Wilderness Village, and everyone has been talking about it in the tavern for nearly a week.

It is rumored that in the areas further south of the village, one or two massive black bears often roam nearby.

Those who unfortunately run into them are not harmed by them; some villagers who return late after being busy are even watched over by these black bears until they reach the village.

Some say these bears were sent by the gods to protect them, the kind-hearted villagers.

Others say these bears actually want to attack Wilderness Village and are looking for an opportunity.

In short, the rumors became increasingly absurd; at first, Allen did not want to inform the villagers that Beorn and his kin were helping to guard the place.

After all, bears are very ferocious wild beasts, and Allen was afraid of causing panic among some villagers; now, however, there was panic even without saying anything.

Allen had no choice but to gather the villagers and inform them that these bears were indeed protecting them and were very good friends of Wilderness Village, telling them not to worry.

After the villagers heard Allen's words, the rumors about the black bears preparing to attack Wilderness Village disappeared.

As a result, the stories about Allen and the black bears were discussed even more intensely in the tavern, and even the three recovered Dwarves joined in the discussion.

Yes, the three Dwarves had finally recovered their health, and after Artimenner learned that the village had a Dwarf blacksmith, he built a smithy near the location of the Anduin River.

However, it was just an empty shell; Allen could still provide the bellows, anvil, hammer, tongs, and even the pig iron, but Allen could not provide the fuel and furnace, so the first thing Fulei did after taking office was to build various furnaces for smelting iron and making charcoal.

Fortunately, Fulei was a versatile expert in blacksmithing, so these things did not stump him.

And that large net mixed with bright silver metal was also dismantled by Fudin and the others.

Fulei told Allen that the metal mixed inside was Mithril, which was the best metal Dwarves could find in Middle-earth; after melting it down, there was a full two-fist-sized amount.

If Allen were willing, he could use this Mithril to make a suit of chainmail for Allen; it contained the unique craftsmanship of the Dwarves, and the armor produced would not only be very lightweight but also exceptionally sturdy.

Allen, who had been thinking for a while, did not agree to Fulei's suggestion.

Allen had a vague feeling that this Mithril might come in handy for a greater purpose later.

He did not know why he had such a feeling; he always felt that he might have a little bit of inspiration, but he could never grasp it all.

Soon, Allen was occupied by other matters for the majority of his time.

Ever since the rumor that Wilderness Village was protected by massive black bears spread, many Woodland Residents came to Wilderness Village to confirm this fact and began to flock toward Allen's village.

A considerable portion of them pledged their loyalty to Allen, hoping to receive Allen's protection.

Another portion of people just moved to the vicinity of Wilderness Village and were watching from the sidelines.

Not counting these Woodland Residents who moved nearby, the population of Wilderness Village now exceeded two thousand people.

Allen learned from the new villagers that they all came from the south of Wilderness Village, or more precisely, from the southern part of Mirkwood.

The evil power there was becoming increasingly strong, and many villagers often saw unusually large spiders in the forest, which was not common in the past.

There were also villagers who said that a long time ago, under the moonlight, they saw pale-skinned Orcs riding white wolves, leading Wolf Riders to roam the Wilderness, not knowing what they were looking for, but they had never stepped into Beorn's patrol range.

Allen knew this was the evil power of Dol Guldur, and that Pale Orc should be Azog; this guy should be frequently traveling between Moria and Dol Guldur, managing his own territory, and incidentally fawning over his master, Sauron.

However, looking at it this way, in the short term, Azog should have no intention of attacking Wilderness Village; it was clear that Sauron must have given him a more important task.

Allen's current strength was not weak; if everyone were summoned, he could recruit more than six hundred warriors.

Although most of them were Woodland Residents and their weapons and equipment were not particularly good, if it were just for ambushes or defensive battles, their fighting would still be acceptable.

Fulei had also been using the spoils of war from the Orcs to forge some simple weapons, but in the short term, it was not enough to arm everyone, and armor was even more out of the question; this stuff was slow to make by nature, and high-quality ones were even slower.

Another biggest problem was that Allen's village had almost no city walls.

Although the wooden fences were constantly being reinforced and expanded, they were wood after all, and without the advantage of height, it was difficult to defend against a large-scale Orc attack.

And not every Orc commander was as stupid as the last one.

Setting aside the racial issue, Azog's command ability was very strong, enough to command an Orc army of tens of thousands.

Allen felt that he could not underestimate him; according to the development speed of Wilderness Village, he might have to have a showdown with Azog before the Battle of the Five Armies.

Moreover, Allen now had a lot of extra labor, and they could not all be sent out to reclaim wasteland; the difficulty of guarding the villagers would be too great that way.

Allen felt it was time to build higher, thicker, and more defensive city walls.

This order was agreed upon by everyone at the meeting in the Lord's Longhouse, but the problem was also placed in front of everyone.

That was that there were no stones around Wilderness Village; there were plenty near the Misty Mountains, but transporting stones from tens or even hundreds of kilometers away to build city walls—not to mention whether it was dangerous—was a cost Allen simply could not afford.

After everyone discussed it for some time, Artimenner proposed another idea, which was to use wood.

At this time, Artimenner spoke eloquently at the meeting, and there was always a sense of pride and confidence in his speech.

"When I was traveling in the Nord Kingdom before, I discovered that many towns and castles in the Nord Kingdom used wood to complete the construction of city walls. They buried five or six-meter-long logs side by side into the ground, then used iron nails, wooden boards, iron wire, and other things inside to fix them together, arranged in two rows, and then piled earth between the two rows of wood. Building this way is far faster and less laborious than using stones."

When he said this, Artimenner looked at Allen.

He held his head high and said: "Lord Allen, I have studied the relevant knowledge in detail in the Nord Kingdom. Although I have not joined for long, please believe in my loyalty and my ability; I will definitely complete this matter in the shortest possible time."

Allen had never doubted Artimenner's loyalty and ability; he was just considering one question: did the wood really have to be obtained from Mirkwood? Would the Woodland Elves come to cause him trouble? Allen then thought again, there was so much wood in Mirkwood, it shouldn't be a big problem for him to use a little, and he hadn't heard of any Ents in Mirkwood.

Allen also remembered that there was a place called Donglin Bay in the east of the southern end of Mirkwood; that place was cut out of the forest by Humans. If they were fine, then would he be fine too?

Allen sat in his seat and fell into a dilemma.

At this time, Fudin, whom Allen had invited as an exception, suddenly spoke: "Actually, you can use bricks. The defensive power of city walls built with wood is not high after all. If you use bricks, the strength will not be worse than ordinary stones. It just so happens that I know this craft, and there is no lack of suitable clay near Wilderness Village. To repay your life-saving grace, I am very happy to be of service."

Alright, now Allen was even more conflicted; both of these plans had their own advantages and disadvantages.

Using wood was fast; although the wood needed to be treated to a certain extent, its surface area was large, and the construction speed would definitely be very fast. The disadvantage was that the defensive power was indeed not as good as stone or brick city walls.

If bricks were used, the defensive strength would indeed be greatly improved, but the speed would definitely be slower than wood.

Allen considered for a short while and decided not to struggle anymore; he wanted both.

Allen looked at Artimenner and said: "Artimenner, you first design the corresponding blueprints. My requirement is that it is enough for three thousand to five thousand people to hide in the city walls for refuge, and there is enough space to store a large amount of supplies and water. As for the construction method, I think the two can be carried out at the same time."

Allen looked at Fudin again and said politely: "I will trouble you with the firing of the city bricks. I represent all the members of Wilderness Village in thanking you for your help."

Fudin waved his hands repeatedly, saying: "It should be done, it should be done; happy to be of service to you."

Allen said to Artimenner again: "How to use these materials is up to you. I can currently give you a labor force of seven hundred people, and you can build the city walls according to your own ideas. You can list the tools you need for me, and I will get them for you as soon as possible. I only have two requirements: first, be fast, and the other is not to treat the villagers too harshly."

Artimenner nodded excitedly after hearing this. He believed that if he could build this city wall well, he could not only gain a firm foothold in Allen's team, but he might even leave his name in history. For an engineer like Artimenner, this was quite tempting.

Yamila, who was on the side, stood up and said with a troubled expression: "My Lord, if you want to conscript so many people, the food will not be particularly sufficient. If it were just the initial few hundred people, our current food would indeed be enough, because the villagers who came later are currently taking care of themselves, but if you want to conscript another seven hundred people, and they have to perform high-intensity labor, then our food will soon be exhausted."

The initial villagers and soldiers in Wilderness Village numbered only a little over five hundred; these people either arrived here with nothing, or had their villages destroyed by Orcish, and Allen had always been responsible for their food and clothing, a situation that would continue until autumn.

The Woodland Residents who came to join Allen later consumed the food they had stored themselves, which was enough to last them until the arrival of the harvest festival (late September to early October).

As for the environment of Wilderness Village, there is a great river to the west and a forest to the east; in a season like summer, it is also easy for the villagers to obtain extra food.

If the villagers were to be conscripted, it would be different; Allen would have to shoulder the burden of feeding at least 1,200 to 1,500 people.

Allen calculated carefully: if he used the Simulator to purchase enough grain to last until the harvest festival,

... it would actually cost tens of thousands of Dinar (fifty people cost ten Dinar a day, 1,500 people require 9,000 Dinar a month, and there are at least four months from summer to the end of autumn, so tens of thousands should be correct).

Allen had a bit of a headache; he still had a lot of Dinar in his balance, over 90,000. It looked like a lot, but he hadn't expected it to be used up so quickly.

"The city wall must be built; if the money is spent, so be it. I am not one of those miserly Dwarfs."

Allen thought to himself while quietly glancing at Fudin, not expecting to be discovered by Fudin.

Fudin was a bit puzzled as to why this young leader was looking at him; he couldn't come up with food.

Having made up his mind, Allen said to Yamila: "No problem, I will solve the food issue. You all go down and prepare; I hope everyone can get moving tomorrow."

After finishing, he scanned the crowd and said: "Everyone, are there any other questions?"

"Then the meeting is adjourned."

The crowd left the Lord's Longhouse one after another.

Lying in his bedroom, Allen felt that he might face a financial crisis, and he began to struggle with whether or not to perform a simulation.

After resting for more than half a month, Allen felt that his mental state had recovered quite well, but he was afraid that if he didn't recover thoroughly, some other problems might arise.

After struggling for a long time, Allen gave up, feeling that he still needed a good rest and should wait until he had fully recovered.

Allen said melancholically in bed: "Choices are the greatest difficulty in life."

"My Lord, do you have any instructions??"

Alayen, who was sleeping next to Allen, asked loudly.

"It's nothing, go to sleep."

After responding to Alayen, Allen closed his eyes.

Since the last meeting, Wilderness Village had entered an unprecedentedly busy phase.

Artimenner led the villagers to start building roads; transporting timber could not rely entirely on human labor, it required the cooperation of wagons.

Fudin was also preparing the site for brick firing and the brick kilns.

The guard duties of Fatis and Bandak became even busier, and Yamila was also doing her best with the logistics work.

Even James went onto the field with his apprentices; during work, villagers would often bump into things and suffer some minor injuries.

Cress... Cress was often playing and could not be found.

Allen became idle again.

Everyone knew that after Allen had been unconscious for nearly a day last time, his mental state had not been very good.

Although everyone was unsure of the reason, they were all very considerate of Allen; after all, there was no existence in this village more important than Allen.

If Allen collapsed and there was no designated successor, no one knew what would happen to the village.

Faced with this situation, Allen did not want to look like an outsider; he often appeared in front of the busy villagers with Alayen.

He would ask them what their needs were and if they had encountered any problems during work; if there really was a problem, Allen would solve it immediately.

For example, if a villager said they ate vegetarian food every day and hoped to eat some meat, Allen would arrange a meal with meat for them every few days.

Or, for instance, if some villagers suggested that they hoped to drink some alcohol after work to relieve fatigue, Allen would purchase some ale and give them some in his spare time, but he strictly forbade drinking during work and absolutely forbade any trouble caused by drunkenness.

Of course, during this time, Allen would also often take Alayen to visit Bëor to improve their living standards.

The place where Bëor lived had already been built into something decent; it already had the prototype of a manor, and one could tell at a glance that it was very comfortable to live in, which made Allen somewhat envious.

However, not everything was good; because of Bëor's help with guarding, no Orcish had appeared around Wilderness Village, but Orcish figures often appeared on the opposite side of the great river.

They would even appear during the day, shooting arrows across the river in an attempt to kill the busy villagers, thereby provoking Allen.

In Allen's view, they were simply courting death.

Allen stood on this side of the great river and used the War Bow in his hand to pick off quite a few Orcish who were provoking him.

This situation lasted for quite a long time; finally, after hundreds of them died and they received a bloody lesson, these Orcish learned their lesson and no longer appeared on the riverbank, but instead secretly observed Wilderness Village from the dense forest.

Regarding this phenomenon, Allen was also helpless and could only let them watch.

Time passed bit by bit; the construction of the city wall moved forward little by little, and Allen, who wandered around the village every day, saw his mental state recover bit by bit.

This life continued until one morning, when some unusual guests arrived at the entrance of Wilderness Village; it was a team of Elf who claimed to be from the Woodland Realm.