Chapter 82

There was so much shit that needed to get done in order to build up a functional, sophisticated society from the ground up. The basics of keeping people alive were simple enough- apartment buildings to live in, food to eat, water to drink- but as you went above and beyond the basics, things got a lot more complicated.

In an important way, the market economy was me throwing up my hands and saying 'what the fuck ever, you figure it out' as regards the production of everything beyond the bare necessities. However, as has been discussed, the market economy is an imperfect thing, and you cannot trust it with anything truly important. And it turned out there were a lot of things that were important enough that I had to step in and guarantee them with the state.

Public schools were a big one. It wasn't enough that every kid grew up being literate, every kid had to grow up being educated, being someone who'd learned broadly and widely, and who was exceptionally difficult to hoodwink. So, y'know. Had to hire a few Guilders with teaching experience to come down here and not only teach the schoolkids, but also teach some local adults to become teachers.

Which brought in an interesting thing from the Purpleheart Collective's kids: for all that kids didn't have access to the System, stat boost effects did still work on them just fine, and Affinity stats impacted the rate at which people learned and grew. So, uh... well, naturally, I laid a few enchantments over the entire school to grant everyone inside it some huge boosts to their Affinity stats. Huge by the standards of low-level people, anyhow- it was a rounding error for even mid-level delvers, but for a ten year old, it was a huge improvement on their ability to learn new skills, and when they got that help young, it'd compound a lot over the course of their lives.

Buuuut... for kids to get the benefits of going to school, they needed to actually go to school, and that was something that they couldn't do if they were, say, peeling potatoes in the back of their family restaurant all day.

So... now that my personal affairs as the Duke of Shang were safely on the backburner, I had to put my foot down and pass some unpopular laws.

"Friends, countrymen, lend me your ears," I said, speaking into the microphone. I was not only being heard by the people who'd gathered in the plaza in front of City Hall, where I was standing to give my speech, but also by anyone listening to one of the many, many magical radios throughout town that I sold for ten copper a pop, guaranteeing that there'd be one in nearly every home, restaurant, and shop. "I am Duke Roxanne Updyke of Shang, and I am here to announce a new law, for the benefit of our children. From this point onward, going forward, children between six and eighteen years of age must attend public school, eight hours a day, five days a week. Absences in the event of illness and travel will be excused, but absence for the purposes of work shall not. Furthermore! From this point onward, children under sixteen years of age may not work for more than four hours in one day, or twelve hours in one week.

"I understand that, for many of you, your children are important parts of your family business, and that this work is how they learn to do it well enough to take over when you are old and unable to continue the business yourselves. But a child needs an education, and they also need time to play. A child needs a life outside of work, just as much, if not even more than adults do. And... To ensure that this law is not an undue hardship, I will be issuing an additional stipend of five silver pieces per month per child to parents of school-aged children, to pay for hired hands to replace the work their children were doing.

"Thank you for bearing with me in these trying times. We'll all get through this together."

A week after the new laws, and listening carefully to the informal community leaders and gossipy weathervanes (as in, people who weren't particularly influential, but who could still be spoken to in order to get a decent read on what the current consensus was), I was confident enough to assert that there wasn't that big of an outrage over compulsory public education and the concomitant child labor laws.

A small part of it was that I was 'compensating' the people who would now be down a few workers that they didn't have to pay, but the bigger part of it was that these people were Dornish, and in Dornish culture, education and learning were very, extremely valuable, and most poor parents considered it a far better trade to have their children receive a respectable education than to be working. An education, after all, could get you a much, much better job than someone who could barely read. The trick was getting their children an education to begin with- in most of Dorn, that was the sort of thing you had to pay for, and often had to pay quite a lot.

(The fact that nobody had to work to survive anymore was something that hadn't really sunken in yet, but hey, it hasn't been that long. They'll get there sooner or later.)

So I pulled the trigger on the next stage in my public education program.

"Friends, countrymen, lend me your ears," I said, once again standing before a microphone and a podium. "It has been a week since our public schools have properly opened, and in that time, I have spoken to many people, taking as much counsel as I could, from anyone who would grace me with their wisdom. I have even spoken to some of our children, at the school, and once I said I wasn't answering any more questions about being a Delver, they raised a very, very interesting issue.

"Most of us, in New Shanghelm, are grown adults who were, nonetheless, denied an education as a child, knowing only what our families could teach us, or what a master taught us during an apprenticeship, if we were lucky enough to even have one. This is not just a tragedy; this is an injustice. Every person who was deprived of an education was wronged, and as a faithful servant of the Crown, my duty is to see justice be done.

"To that end, I would like to announce the opening of the New Shanghelm Community College. Unlike our schools, attendance is not mandatory, but it is open to every adult in Shanghelm willing to enroll. And, to further sweeten the pot, I will be issuing an Adult Learner stipend of ten silver per month to all students, even those who only take courses on the weekends and work for the rest of the week. I heartily encourage you all to take advantage of this program... and not just because I'm hoping some of you end up smart enough to become teachers, and we don't have to keep getting teachers from the Delver's Guild."

There was some polite laughter at that.

"Thank you all, once more, for your patience. Course catalogs for the New Shanghelm Community College will be distributed to everyone's door over the course of today; if it doesn't show up by sunset, or you want a copy sooner, we'll keep a few big stacks of them in front of City Hall. This is Duke Roxanne of Shang, signing off."

With that, I turned off the mic, and stepped away from the podium, disappearing back inside City Hall, and then, once out of sight, teleported to a meeting room where I had an appointment in just a few minutes.

"Ah, good, you're early," I said, realizing a few people were already sitting around the meeting table. "Thank you for coming."

"Hey, with what you offered us just to come down here and talk, we would've been crazy to say no," the unintimidatingly short and waifish Captain Stacy "Ironside" Lewis chirped.

"Our numismatic engines will literally eat most of the coin we make from trade," the big, beefy, broad-shouldered and grizzled-looking Commander Asteria "Spots" Crete rumbled. "What you mailed us is enough condensed magicka in coinage to sail our ship all the way around the world."

The two of them were the senior-most officers, as well as owners, of one of the five entire metal-hulled ships in the entire world. Given that all five of those ships were built, owned, and operated by veterans of Dorn's own Delver's Guild, I didn't have much reason to be picky.

"I'm glad I got your attention," I said. "We've already discussed the matter a little through our correspondence, but, just to be clear... Commander, you did design your vessel yourself, correct?"

"Indeed, yes, and I still have my notes on the equations, formulas, and data points I used to arrive at my final design," Spots said, nodding. "I gather you want me to build one for you?"

"Oh, no, nothing so prosaic, Commander," I said, shaking my head. "See, I've just opened up the New Shanghelm Community College. It's free to the public, and anyone can go there and sign up for the public classes. What I want is for you to teach a more... private class, with handpicked students from my own civil service. I want you to teach them everything you know about shipbuilding, so that, by the time you're done, they can build ships for me. How about it?"

My civil service, originally, had just been the members of the Purpleheart Collective I'd brought with me to New Shanghelm, but as people moved in and started looking for things to do, the Collective started recruiting more people, giving me more and more loyal, well-paid, and happy government agents.

And then, a week ago, Nel and Lisa came back from a secret mission to the Red Forest to bring in a bunch of wood elves sworn to the Red King's service, and fully ready to transfer over to the Red Prince's service. These women were all Level 11 Heroes, and- after a lot of practice keeping up a Trickster disguise at all times because people would notice a bunch of wood elves showing up out of nowhere- were integrating themselves into the community as new immigrants, and gradually- not all at once- signing up for the civil service.

These civil servants, in particular, would be the foundation of my own ducal military, which I was not merely entitled but obligated by the terms of my oath to build. They'd handle matters of training and equipping soldiers for the army, and, if this deal went through, they'd also handle designing, building, and training crew for my navy- which, of course, would eschew the wooden sailboats whose only attack options are ramming speed, muzzle-loading cannons, boarding parties of marines, or a team of Wizards on deck, in favor of Titan's Steel battleships, with cannons big enough to destroy an enemy flagship that it missed, so long as the shell landed about a kilometer away or less.

"...Twenty thousand crowns won't cut it," Spots said, shaking her head. "Not for years of my time."

"I've got a number of powerful enchantments to enhance the rate at which my students learn new skills," I said. "You can leave after four months, guaranteed, and if they haven't learned everything yet, then they're the ones I'll be mad at."

"Still..."

"Hrm... Tell you what: I'll give you a contract, stating that the holder of that contract is always entitled to buy as many barrels of Level 10 magicka potion from the Duke of Shang as the holder can afford to pay for, at a rate of... Oh, let's see... A barrel of Level 10 magicka potion is worth about as much magicka as a thousand crowns, but usually sells for around two thousand crowns, right? Well, I'll sell it to you for only one thousand crowns a barrel."

Spots' breath hitched in her throat.

"You drive a hard bargain," Ironside said, eyes as wide as saucers. "We're in. We're in. How much magicka potion do you have on hand right now?"

I grinned. Gottem. "How many barrels can you afford?" I asked.