Steampunk Era: Mad Abield

As autumn gave way to winter, construction of the new city halted, as the ground became too hard to dig through with mortal efforts, and it was far too extravagant to have the Transcendents do such labor. So, Malin directed the construction workers to focus their energies on the districts where foundations had already been dug, initiating the construction of usable new streets.

The mayor also found his purpose within the town hall, as the construction of the city walls required his signature and supervision—mainly because Malin didn’t want the mayor to be lonely and daydream all day, and he also slipped him a wad of cash.

Initially, the mayor’s expression wasn’t too pleasant to look at, but he couldn’t resist when Malin opened a suitcase filled with a stack of hundred Mowish notes. In the end, he shook hands with Malin warmly—the idea being that I wanted to scold Mr. Malin, but the money he offered was simply too much.

A group of High Elves also joined Carterburg, and Faye, as their representative, had met with them. Malin, too, went to see the excitement. The High Elves indeed represented elegance and beauty, but the fact that half of these handsome men and beautiful women were color blind made Malin think that the sacrifices made for genetic stability were too great.

He left them in Faye’s care and allocated them land in the Oak District—according to the elves, a tree already felt like home. Malin thought it acceptable to give them some privileges, but if they wanted to establish their little kingdom, it would depend on whether the guardians of the World Tree agreed.

By the way, the tree guardians listened to Malin. With their wands and nearly maxed-out magic resistance, dealing with some daydreaming High Elves wasn’t a problem.

The High Elf ambassador also stated that as long as no lives were taken, Malin could beat them up if he wanted to. If this group of High Elves really did something outrageous, like revolt passionately, then just killing them was also an option—provided there was legitimate evidence, and with Nameless backing up the story, no one from the High Elves’ side could cause a commotion.

This pleased Malin immensely—after all, on their first day, this group of High Elves was thoroughly trounced by the Elite Sharpshooters of Malin’s workers and army.

Both sides were equal up until four hundred and seventy-five yards, but at five hundred yards, Malin’s hunters and poacher-born sharpshooters, with their long-barreled bolt-action rifles, brutally outmatched the elves with their longbows.

They continued up to six hundred yards before the first miss occurred.

Then came the wooden sword duel. Though Malin’s soldiers, hailing from the Eastern Kingdom, couldn’t win, they mostly managed to achieve a draw, one for one. After ten rounds, they had wiped the elves’ disdain for short-lived beings clean away. Then these scoundrels brought up sword dancers for the challenge—after much consideration, Malin decided not to issue his lead soldiers with large-caliber revolvers loaded with rubber bullets. The caliber was too big; a close-range shot to vulnerable areas like the eye socket, the exterior of the heart, or the liver could be lethal. It would be a huge hassle if someone were actually killed, and Malin, who loathes trouble, would not hesitate to eliminate whoever caused it.