A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor

Though nervous at the sight of so many large men being brought into their village unannounced, with their dangerous appearance, and their roguish backgrounds, most had still met his decision with praise. There, again, he had not shied away from acknowledging the difficulties that he expected to have. In that, he spoke to both the villagers and to his new soldiers.

"I expect that there will be some friction between old and new, for a time," Oliver said. "I ask to have your patience in that. Any disputes that might happen, I will have dealt with quickly, through Nila Felder, or through Greeves, or through the assistance of one of you fine upstanding citizens, I do not matter.

One thing is clear – we must not have a repeat of the frictions that arose during Lombard's occupation. Solgrim is strong for its unity. With its wall, it will grow. Growing settlements will inevitably become fractured, but I would take measures to avoid the same happening to us."

In putting all their concerns out in the open, Oliver had managed to assuage many of them, even without directly solving them. He'd instructed the villagers to expect some sort of difficulty, and he'd done the same with the soldiers. That had won him more approval from the peasantry, and just as much from the slaves themselves.

Both parties seemed baffled by the familiarity with which a noble spoke to them. The villagers continued to be moved by it, because they knew Oliver so much better than the new arrivals, whilst the new soldiers seemed almost frozen in place by it. Only Firyr, so far, seemed to have been able to come to terms with the new circumstances that they found themselves in.

There were many among the villagers that began to see what Oliver was aiming for, in the same way that Nila and Greeves had begun to. They saw the value in having a garrison of men to protect them, even more so after what had happened. So too, did they see the value in the wall that Oliver was having built for them.

He'd managed to observe the progress of that too before he'd left. So far, there wasn't much to see, as was to be expected. They'd merely had time to dig the trenches needed before the walls were erected, leaving a ring around the village. Only now had they begun to process the wood that would be required for erecting the wall itself, but that hardly seemed to matter.

Merely the presence of the trench served as a symbol of progress and a fever was beginning to affect the village from it.

Greeves had informed him that three houses had been erected in the week since building had begun – the villagers seemed more willing to rebuild now that they could be sure what they built would be protected. Greeves anticipated that such desire to improve their village would only increase, once they saw the soldiers patrolling their village, instilling order and peace.

That still, though, was a rather distant dream. It would be another month at least before they could demand anything reliable from the wall, and it remained to be seen just how long it would take to integrate the likes of the slaves.

Though Greeves had gone out of his way to find some with previous experience soldiery, after meeting them again in person, Oliver was reminded of just how different a slave's mindset was from a normal man. They would require a significant adjustment period before they could be expected to operate as he needed them to, and that was time that he didn't really have.

Such thoughts had assailed his mind for the remainder of his stay. Even Nila, when he'd met with her, had fallen into the same rabbit hole of scheming that Oliver had fallen down. The expansion of the village concerned her business just as much as it concerned Oliver.

"…It's just not fast enough, is it?" Nila had said, hitting the nail on the head for both of them. As young as they were, no speed would ever be fast enough, but given Oliver's situation, that fact held even stronger still. "You know, new visitors have already been coming in – merchants ahead of the curve. Greeves said he didn't even recognize some of them."

It seemed that even before the wall was complete, and the garrison solidified, the mere prospect of it served to attract potential new investors. Oliver had hoped that would have been a positive thing, but when he'd questioned Greeves on the new merchants that he'd glimpsed, the man's response had been anything but enthusiastic.

"Pah," Greeves had spat. "I wouldn't trust them. They hardly stopped to stay. They just eyed up the village as though it were a prize pig, walking up and down as if they owned the place, and then they were gone again. From those accents, they'll be city dwellers. No good will come of them getting involved."

For Greeves to say that he didn't trust someone only added to Oliver's unease. Who could get shady enough that even the likes of Greeves thought they were a schemer?

Oliver sighed, as he thought back to it all. He'd arrived back from Solgrim late in the evening on the day after he'd departed, but it was only now, on the third day of the next week, when Skullic had seen fit to order him to a meeting, informing him of the next details of his mission.

Despite the lessons that Oliver had undergone in the meantime, he found it difficult to focus on anything but what was coming up. There seemed to be too many moving parts for him to focus on little else. There were still a good few preparations to sort, after all, and he still hadn't bought his armour…

"General," Oliver said, as he knocked at Skullic's door, taking a deep breath to compose his racing mind. Continue reading at My Virtual Library Empire

"Enter," Skullic said, with the same calm tone that he always used. It said something for Oliver's increasing apprehension that he took solace from that calm tone.