The groups they meet up with once they reach the main branch of the road are just as happy to see Cain's Golems hard at work as the first group of villagers was. The main road might be wider, but it was still dirt, and still turned to thick mud during the rainy season. Now, for the fifty kilometers between the branch that leads to the farm Cain is renting and the city it has a solid base and a sturdy stone block top layer.
The larger villages are along the main road as well, so the connection is a cause for celebration, drawing them from their homes to enjoy the luxury and making the city guards briefly wonder if they are being invaded by a mass of farmers and golems.
Cain continues the road right up to the city gates, where the convoy stops to celebrate a job well done, bringing out sweets and drinks to have a picnic at the city gates.
More groups are following behind them, marveling at the new infrastructure, and it isn't long before someone notifies the Mayor, who comes over with his entourage to congratulate the crew who made this road.
That's precisely what Cain wanted. The Mayor has come to him, and that means he can get him to commit to looking after the people rescued from the vortex publicly, without a chance to back out of his words.
"Oh, Duke Cain, welcome. Did you come out to see the new highway?" The Mayor greets him when he sees the elegant form of Cain's demonic transformation.
"I didn't just come to see it, I built it. Now, I know I don't have the contract for this section, so this is all free of charge, but I do have a favor to ask of you. You see, I was doing an experiment with the vortexes that create the Crazed, and I managed to free a group of people who have been trapped since the Great War. Those few dozen beastkin over there in fact. They will need help getting settled, or meeting up with any remaining family they might have. I'm hoping that the City's generosity might be able to take them in for a while." Cain explains, and the Mayor nods.
"A few more refugees won't be an issue, they all look like they have a few skills to fall back on. Wait, did you say that they came from the vortex?" The Mayor's polite political answer makes a hard turn at the end of his thought.
"That's right. It caused a little damage and killed most of a square kilometer of plant and animal life, but I stabilized one of the smallest of the Vortexes and it ejected its occupants. That should cut down the number of Crazed that arrive in the area every night by at least a little bit." Cain agrees.
"Come with me, all of you. I simply must get this recorded for the official archives, and the Mages Association will want to hear all about the technique that managed to stabilize a vortex. Most of them believe that the vortexes are immune to modifications the way the dungeons are.
The Mayor leads the group back through the streets and away from the party that is slowly turning into an outdoor market by the city gates. Such a thing would have never happened a few months ago, but now that the transfers have gone so overboard on killing the Crazed, it is relatively safe to just hang around outside the city walls for a morning. It's a good feeling both for the farmers and the city residents, to not need to hide behind walls for safety.
It's still easy to tell who is who though since the city residents all smell like the incense that they believe keeps the Crazed away, while the farmers don't.
"Here we are, the Mage Association. I have warned them that you are coming, and what your experiments have managed to accomplish." The Mayor informs Cain as they pass by a large spire, in the uniformly black stone that makes up most of the city.
"Come in, come in. Real living soldiers of the Great War, fresh from the battlefield. We simply must bring the historians over. Too much of the documentation that we have was altered by the propaganda departments of the various nations, but you all should be able to tell us the truth of at least some of the more obviously altered parts of history." An elderly Youkai mage greets them. The old man looks almost human, but lopsided, with one arm and leg much larger than the other, and one side of his face almost flat, not even having room for an eye socket to the left of his nose.
"I can't guarantee that what we know isn't war propaganda, after all, most of us were just soldiers, but we are from a few different nations, and didn't all enter at the same time so we might have different versions of history for you to work with." The Turtle Kin, who has been silently chosen as the spokesperson for the group, thanks to his status as a transfer, informs the Mage Association leader.
A second mage comes out to greet Cain and escort him to another room while the history buff asks the new arrivals all about their experiences during the war. It's not that he is too young to know, but that the Youkai kept to themselves the entire time, so he never knew firsthand what was going on with world events until much later when the Youkai of the Sothern Continent decided that keeping up with the world was vital to their long term safety. They didn't choose to interact with it much more and keep most of the continent isolated, but they do at least keep up with the news now.
"So tell me all about what you did to the vortex that you managed to get it to hold together long enough to actually change the way it works." Cain's interrogator, a youthful tengu Man with long black wings and matching hair asks eagerly, a notebook in his hands.
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