Discussing a New Plan

“I met someone who has a plan that could work to our favor,” said Selvina to all in the room, she had called an early meeting with them all, the receptionists hadn’t even started their shifts yet. So now; Yuri, Thelsia, Usagi, and Lithira were all in the office with her, each had positioned themselves at points they found most comfortable at that time. They all had their attention on Selvina, mostly because she practically dragged them in before the day was supposed to officially start.

“Care to elaborate,” inquired Yuri.

“Someone new recently arrived with a proposal for a project, one that will be more beneficial for us than she likely believes, for now.”

“That’s a given,” said Thelsia, “why else would be all here despite there being no impending threats? Do you want to bring her in the town’s little secret so soon?”

“She’ll learn about it sooner or later without anyone here in on anything,” said Selvina, “better to get the surprise out of the way now and be done with it. Besides, it might motivate some design changes to the project she proposed.”

“What sort of project are we talking about, exactly?” Inquired Yuri.

“An atelier,” said Selvina, “small communities out of the way like ours don’t usually have something so extravagant.”

“So, she wants to build a complex designed for artisans to practice their craft that also holds space for the materials they use and likely a space for them to sleep.”

“Yes,” said Selvina with amusement, “she’ll be arriving shortly.”

“What are you permitted to tell us about her,” inquired Usagi from her perch above the door.

“She’s a charming gnome with bright red hair, an advanced mind, and some rather flat physical features. The armor I saw her in actually looked a little loose, to be honest,” said Selvina.

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Four hours after sunrise, Althana walked into the guild building, there was a busty orc woman at the front counter. She walked up to the counter and told the orc behind the counter she had a meeting with the guild master, the orc took a look at some documents behind the desk before saying she found the note by the guild master and wished her luck with a sassy wink. Althana was confused by that as she checked her documents in her bag before heading up the stairs to the guild master’s office.

Althana ascended the stairs, a few minutes later she was at the guild master’s door and passed on through into the office, the door closing behind her. Inside she saw the guild master, Selvina, behind a desk on the far side of the room, a half-fey and demon-kin were on the couch near the door, a rabbit beastkin seemingly materialized from the shadows by the door, and someone that looked like they had a less feminine build than the rest of the room. Althana was confused why all these people were in the room, she guessed they were consultants that the guild master reached out to for the meeting, she was about to learn how accurate that was. Althana was feeling a bit more self-conscious than she had an hour ago.

“Little Althana,” said Selvina, “so good of you join us, these individuals are in the know about something we’ll be sharing with you shortly, after you present the basics of your plan out to us.”

“Oh, of course,” said Althana as she set her bag down and started sorting through it to find the most cohesive plan. We can actually cut down on a lot of the labor costs since I’m a bit more knowledgeable about construction,” she pulled out a schematic and took a quick glance at it before rolling it back up and putting it on the opposite side of the large pocket of her bag, “and if we source local resources it should cut down on material acquisition expenses, we just need to charge for labor and hazard expenses.” She pulled out another piece of rolled parchment and nodded to herself before sliding her bag over next to the door with her foot and placing it on the presentation board on the desk, passing by all the figures.

After a moment, the image was projected like an illusion at a little bigger than the redheaded gnome herself. What everyone saw was a mostly circular structure with two upper levels and two sublevels in addition to the main floor. Being honest with herself, Althana believed she would get one upper level and one sublevel but having two of each no the design plan allowed her space to make it look a bit more impressive and gave her room to haggle a bit. The structure only had one exterior door, and it was intended to be directed towards the town. Althana nodded to herself before diving into the presentation.

“This is one of the more complete designs I drew up,” said Althana with a bit of apprehension, “we don’t have to use this design exactly, I just wanted to show an idea of a completed work,” she stopped herself to pause and take in a deep breath she let out slowly a moment later, she was in danger of rambling again and she wanted to not do that in a room full of people she had just sort of met, “there will be different labs for different projects, not just a place for doing alchemy. I’m also skilled in clockwork, masonry, and carpentry, so we can have some rooms for mechanically oriented pursuits as well. As you can see,” she gestured to the lower levels, “storage will be below the main floor, this allows for better security, temperature regulation, reinforcement of containment of the rooms and what is stored within them. Then, of course,” she gestured to the upper levels, “rooms will be on the upper levels to allow separation from the workspaces and a means of being able to look out over the area for security and business reasons. And that’s the basics, we can hammer out the finer details but that’s the gist of the structure itself. As for why I want to build an atelier here…the location is close to plenty of raw resources, and most ateliers need to be kept apart from the communities they serve for reasons of public safety. This will also allow the town to be more self-sufficient and give some bargaining power for when merchants come for trade every few months.”

“Well,” said the strange figure, Yuri (?), Althana had subconsciously been looking at or to during her entire presentation, “have more ready access to potions and the like will be a more immediate boon to the adventurers in town, and help with emergency situations that could arise.

“Now that we have that formality out of the way,” said Selvina, “what I tell you is to not leave this office, most of it anyway.” Althana gave the wolf woman a curt, and serious nod, Selvina moved on forward as she positioned her hands in a serious slanting gesture, “Yuri is a male,” Althana felt her knees buckle almost as soon as she heard that and felt herself on her knees in what felt like an instant, “the rest of the town already knows about that, you can share that with the residents of this town; in particular, he’s a Realm Transitioner and an Alpharian.” It was at this moment Althana blacked out, that was a lot to take in at once.

“Wow,” said Thelsia in surprise, “I didn’t expect a blackout that fast! At least Lithira and Usagi gave the impression they hadn’t blacked out when they were told.”

“Yeah," said Yuri, "but Lithira blanked out so hard she looked like she was awake until we found out she was completely unresponsive. Usagi’s the outlier here with that state lasting barely 5 seconds.”

“Shock and surprise are nothing more than hindrances to the mission,” said Usagi in a flat monotone, “if it had been an enemy that did that to me I would likely be dead or in an unfavorable position upon awakening. That all said, this atelier is a good plan, it can act as place to better manage resources and act as place for all of us to occupy and defend when the time calls for it.”

“A high vantage point is usually advantageous for archers, like myself, and mages,” said Lithira. And we’re fortunate most of the work can be done by her and us, so costs will be pretty low for a structure of whatever size we’re building.”

“Maybe we should add in 3 or 4 additional sublevels,” said Yuri, “we can form and shore the walls and rooms with earth magic. And maybe add an extra level up top, with a doorway to the roof we can secure from the inside. The real issue is lasting defenses against magic so the same magics we used in making the structure aren’t made a liability and safeguard against destruction, without and within.”

“I may be a capable mage,” said Thelsia, “but I’m not that good just yet, I’m not as well-versed in warding magic as I would like to be.”