Mountain of the Immortals

Twenty houses times five workers per house would take one hundred of them, which meant I’d better upgrade the farms with mana workers instead. And the seven remaining mortals would be able to work on upgrading the lumberyard and mining camp. After those were finished and I initiated the only countdown I could not skip—the guildhall upgrade—they’d be free to do all the resource gathering they wanted.

I heard the people starting to return from the houses so I purchased the lumber units all the farms needed to be upgraded to level three and saw the surprised looks on the mortals faces as the resources materialized out of thin air in front of them. They were even more surprised when they saw the spectral forms of four humanoids start picking up the lumber and expanding the farm with incredible agility and efficiency.

If ever there was a great display of power and magic for these mere mortals, it was taking command of what must have looked like ghosts and having them build farms. This was something I’d like to see less of, however, as I’d much rather have them build things and save the MP for things I could not otherwise get.

Once the men and women gathered around me again, I glanced at the guildhall overview and saw that all one hundred and seven of them had been registered and now counted toward the level-up requirement. I waited for their whispers to die down and cleared my throat before addressing them.

“Are you all happy with your new homes?” I asked, raising my voice as I neared the end of my sentence, prompting them all to cheer.

As expected, they were ecstatic to have such well-constructed buildings to live in. They were yelling and cheering as I’d hoped, but most importantly I could see the ecstasy in their eyes. They were truly proud and happy beyond measure.

“I have procured all of the resources needed to upgrade twenty houses,” I said. “We need to start upgrading them as soon as possible so that we can continue growing. Five people per house should be enough to do the job in eight hours. Once that’s done, you can bring all the furniture and livestock from Dion that you want. Do any of you have questions?”

“What do we do after we finish the houses?” asked a man with broad shoulders and a square jaw.

“That’s the spirit!” I said, and applauded him for his energy and willingness. “There are more things to build, but we should keep the farms, lumberyard, and mining camp working at full capacity at all times.”

“If we need one hundred people to build the houses, that leaves seven people free for now,” Artemis said. “Might I employ them, Zeus?”

“By all means,” I said, and smiled. “What do you plan to do?”

“You have all seen the marvels and opportunities of this place,” Artemis said, now addressing the crowd with a steady voice. “I want the seven most charismatic of you to come back with me to Dion and tell everyone what you have seen here. We need more people, and there are some very talented people still back there, because they have families and could not risk coming at a moment’s notice without knowing what awaits them here.”

“It would be a great service to our settlement if you went down there and came back with more people,” I said.

The crowd nodded.

“Alright, who’s up for this?” Artemis asked.

Immediately a few hands were raised while a couple of other individuals were pushed forward by their comrades. Those were most probably the ones who had influence in the city of Dion but were too humble to accept it. Humbleness was not going to get us anywhere quickly though, and so Artemis promptly snatched them and put them at the front of her group.

“I’ve got seven,” she announced. “Let’s hope we’ll have more by the end of the day.”

“Good luck,” I said and waved at her as she smiled and turned her back, prompting all of them to follow her.

She commanded the group of men and women just like a wolf would lead her pack into battle. Only she was heading into the portal in search of more wolves for our pack.

“You know what to do,” I told the rest of the crowd, showing them the semi-translucent frames of the upgraded versions of the houses that were starting to appear around the existing house, acting as guides for what should be built where. “Now go and start making this place the center of the Greek realms, just as it’s supposed to be.”

The cheers echoed through the shallow valley once again and then the men and women rolled up their sleeves and went to work—all in my name and for the glory of Mount Olympus, their new home.

* * *

Days went by and the construction projects were completed one after the other. The houses were indeed completed in eight hours and the only thing that was missing to upgrade the guildhall were the resources. I wasn’t going to wait for the people to collect ten thousand of each of the resources needed—that would be a tremendous loss of time—so instead, I spent a hefty 300,000 MP and bought ten thousand food rations, lumber units, and iron units. That way, as soon as the houses were upgraded after eight hours, I was able to initiate the sixty-four-hour upgrade timer to level up the clan hall. In the meantime, I made sure that the citizens always felt useful and contributed to the settlement.

That meant finding jobs for all two hundred and eighty-five of them, since Artemis’s second round of recruitment proved to be even more successful than the first. By sunset of the day she’d crossed through the portal for the second time, the seven followers she’d taken with her had multiplied more than twentyfold.

What’s more, all of the hundred and seventy-eight new citizens were active, productive members of the settlement that counted toward the total recognized by the Dark Energy. Not that they didn’t bring their children with them. But they were not counted in the total, and nor did they seem to occupy slots in the houses. The numbers I was seeing in the clan hall overview were only the active, ready-to-employee individuals.

Still this did not mean that the mortals could work nearly as quickly or efficiently as mana workers. My ratio of five mortals to one mana worker turned out to be pretty accurate, but there was another thing I hadn’t considered in my calculations. Mortals needed sleep, rest, and breaks for banter and meals.

I wasn’t against any of that, of course, but this brought with it a whole host of new problems. Eight hours was pretty much the maximum they could work without taking a break and that was only on the first couple of days. Pretty soon, having realized that this was going to be their lives from then on, their tempo slowed to one that was much better for them in the long run, but which meant they completed much less work.

This made calculating build times more complex and in the case of projects that couldn’t be completed in a single day, we would eventually have to account for delays for situations where one person might not turn up to work the next day, or had to account for covering the half-built parts at the end of their shift to protect them from the elements. Not that I had seen any rain so far, not this high in the mountain at least, but I couldn’t be certain that we wouldn’t face it at some point and didn’t want to have to spend my Divinity Points chasing away clouds.

On the matter of Divinity Points, the frequent contact with my followers and having them spreading the word about the guildhall when they visited their friends at the foot of the mountain increased their regeneration rate. As soon as I had amassed five DP, I initiated the construction of the latest divine realm project I’d unlocked, the god’s watchtower.

I wasn’t going to put any of the mortals through the process of building a divine construction so I paid the price of a 120,000 MP to have a mana worker construct it instead. It took a bit more than thirty-three hours but since the spectral forms did not tire or take breaks, the watchtower was soon ready and overlooking the vicinity of the settlement.

As soon as its construction was finished, I rushed to climb it, but discovered that the stone tower was nothing special in itself. Granted, I had a good view of both sides of the mountain and I could see through the clouds when I was at the top of it, but from this altitude the world seemed almost unreal. The land looked like patches that came together to form a colorful tapestry and the only indication of life was the lights from the fires the mortals burned at night.

However, I did see an additional system window when I checked the overview of the guildhall.

* * *

No hostile forces or powerful creatures are located within a 100-mile radius of the guildhall.

* * *

It looked like the first day of use was free of charge, but at dawn of the next day, I got a notification that a Divinity Point had been consumed in order to operate the watchtower. Having one DP permanently in use was a steep price to pay but this might just give us the necessary time to react to an incoming attack. After all, my father couldn’t be far from finding out about what was happening on the mountain.