Chapter 57
That afternoon, Crimsonwood looked different from above.
Many of the city's buildings had already traded timber and rough stone for proper brick and masonry.
The Church of Light stood at the heart of it all, with the Mage Guild and the Mercenary Guild built facing it, as tradition required.
Around the Church, eight temples dedicated to the lesser deities were still being expanded. The land those temples claimed currently served as housing for the parish's Second-tier Awakened, but in truth, it had been set aside for the future Academy of Light.
After two months of reconstruction, Crimsonwood's Church finally looked like a proper parish center.
Beyond the city center, the northwest district belonged to the elves.
Gwenaeris had led her people in planting trees throughout the area. Their homes were built entirely of wood, and even the streams winding between them had been carved by hand. Elf archers and druids moved among the trees, each tending to their own duties.
The northeast had been claimed by the dwarves.
They lived on lower ground, which made it easier to receive ore shipments and forge alchemical equipment.
Their homes were crude by human standards.
The dwarves hauled in stone, stacked it into walls, then dug cellars beneath the floors. By their reckoning, that counted as a two- or three-story house.
The northern district belonged to the nobles.
With the elves on one flank, the dwarves on the other, and the Church, Mage Guild, and Mercenary Guild below them, they had little room to cause trouble.
The south was messier.
After two months, mercenaries and commoners had begun living there side by side, while exiles still serving criminal sentences were pushed to settle farther out.
Those convicts handled the hardest construction work.
Hauling stone, felling timber, clearing land—all of it fell to them.
In this two-month-old city, the most common sight was messenger falcons and courier birds constantly taking wing.
The merchant companies lining the main road had a fierce need to stay connected to the outside world.
They bought materials out of the Pyreflame Woods, hauled them to safer regions, and sold them at handsome profits.
Farther out, the broad stretches of land around Crimsonwood had only barely been made fit for farming.
Where the trees had been cut down, yellow-black soil lay exposed. Around several logging camps and quarries, rough settlements had already begun to take shape.
The seven towns the Church planned to build around Crimsonwood would be chosen from among them.
...
Bong.
A deep bell tolled across the city.
At the sound, the commoners set down their work, prayed, and took a short rest.
The nobles, merchants, and Awakened who supervised the commoners and convicts were less than pleased with the Church forcing everyone to pray several times a day.
But they understood what it meant.
This was how the Church extended mercy to ordinary people.
And no one in Aurelia's upper society had the leverage to push back. They could only bow to the Church's will.
This hour of the day was also when the senior clergy of each parish typically held their meetings.
On the Church's second floor, the meeting hall reserved for Second-tier and higher Awakened had been renovated yet again.
The statue of the God of Light had grown more refined, and the hall carried a deeper weight of solemnity.
Portraits of famous figures from the Church's history lined the walls, theological runes carved into every frame.
Alchemical lamps had been set into the ceiling so the hall would never want for light after dark.
By day, sunlight poured through the windows, and the architects had positioned everything so the falling light traced sacred patterns across the floor.
Twenty-four Awakened sat within.
Facing the doors were Archbishop Norias, Honorius, and Bishop Elydiana.
Before those three towering figures sat the twenty-one Second-tier Awakened of Crimsonwood Parish, Elise among them.
The three Prime Second-tiers held the center. The five Senior Second-tiers flanked them. The remaining thirteen ordinary Second-tiers sat farther out.
There were no tables for this meeting, but the atmosphere stayed formal and grave.
By the time the meeting was more than half over, Elise had mostly listened in silence, speaking only occasionally to answer questions about potion allocations from the elves.
The other Church Awakened kept stealing glances at her, smiling.
Then they would flick their eyes toward Archbishop Norias and trade knowing looks with one another.
Light above, my reputation is ruined.
Norias had a headache.
Back in Oakhaven Province, he served as dean of the Academy of Light. He had always been known as... well, in any case, he considered his reputation respectable.
Then he'd met Elise and been dragged into the mess Almus and Doran created.
He never should have agreed to play along.
He never should have believed that pressuring Elise would spur her advancement to High Cleric.
And now look where it had gotten him.
The entire Oakhaven Grand Parish knew Archbishop Norias as the old hardliner who kept suppressing Elise, the Church's greatest young talent.
He was innocent.
Elise wanted to clear the archbishop's name, but she understood exactly what was happening.
People loved gossip.
An archbishop quietly sheltering the Church's genius? Everyone had heard that story before.
But a stubborn old archbishop grinding a genius down, only for that genius to rise in defiance of the pressure?
That was the story people wanted.
Archbishop Norias had lost to humanity's universal hunger for drama.
Even if Elise tried to explain, everyone would only take it as further proof of the archbishop's "suppression."
"There are seven towns," Norias said at last. "You may all offer your recommendations. I will weigh them when assigning the defense posts."
The Church Awakened snapped to attention.
Noble factions, commoner factions, temporal factions, sanctified factions—every camp within the Church had candidates it wanted to champion.
"House Holim are devout believers in our God. They should receive a permit."
"I recommend Rosefire Mercenary Company. The Church must consider the dwarves' position, and Rosefire works closely with them."
"Doromy is a Grand Knight raised by the Church's own hand. His faith runs far deeper than House Holim's."
One by one they spoke, each openly backing a person or faction of their choosing.
What warmed Elise's heart was that everyone present had silently scrubbed the name Ember Shield Mercenary Company from existence.
The reason was simple.
Mona and Adair had tried to be clever.
While assisting Elise on a mission, their scheming had drawn Anarias's lich body straight to her.
The Church couldn't openly condemn Ember Shield, since hard evidence was difficult to come by.
But the Church of Light had no shortage of ways to deal with people like that.
Whatever faction they belonged to, everyone had silently agreed to strip Ember Shield of any claim to a town defense post.
That was the price of plotting against Elise.
It was also the Church of Light's way of protecting her.
Anyone who dared scheme against the Church's genius would learn what it meant to be rejected by Aurelia itself.
Once the recommendations wound down, Archbishop Norias looked at Elise with some puzzlement.
"Elise, I assume you also have someone in mind."
Elise hadn't attended a Church meeting in nearly a month. Everyone knew she had buried herself in training, pouring every ounce of energy into raising her transcendent rank.
Because of that, the Church Awakened had nearly forgotten the parish still counted Elise among its Second-tier members.
They had all been content to leave her in peace.
But now Elise had appeared at a meeting just as the new town project began.
Which meant she wanted in.
And if she wanted in, she would naturally have to contribute.
The moment Archbishop Norias asked his question, everyone in the hall remembered the special order he had given her.
She was forbidden to leave the city until she advanced to Senior Second-tier.
Smiles bloomed around the room.
They could all feel it—Elise was about to experience the archbishop's "deep concern" yet again.
What were you thinking, Elise?
Showing up to the meeting now?
Trying to get involved in the new town project?
Fine, then.
What strength do you have to offer?
Surely you haven't already become a Senior High Cleric.