“By decree of his esteemed Earl Fracess Horin Kree, the newly appointed Noble Knight, Nil Null, has been appointed lord of this territory.” the official announced after two days ago changing the lives of this small nameless village.

Previously, with the help of Xero, it took only a few hours to arrive at the village in the north west.

Just as reports say, the area had a large amount of forests and several rocky mountains, the earth itself wasn’t ‘fertile’ thanks to the cold temperature but it was better than other regions that relied more on metal. It was clear this was a farmland area.

More than a fourth of the people that were sponsored to come here were farmers that would serve the Null family directly, specifically called serfs, they were people with more rights than slaves but less rights than common people.

As for miners, lumberjack, carpenter and masons, miners and Lumberjacks came while the former two would have to be attracted with the abundant resource and a structured foundation. In fact, half these people were reluctant because the area wasn’t exactly ‘safe’ there were lots of monster clans around, goblin and orc tribes inhabited the woods while monsters lived in the forest and caves.

It could be said that the recently risen nobles with only 30 common guards, did not really make the villagers that ‘safe’. Of course, the village did have small wooden walls but monsters did not really attack the poor people because there was really nothing to offer.

Hunters would avoid the big creatures and so a harmony was formed with the humans at the top of the food chain in regards to the animals but at the bottom when monsters are added. They actually feared that the coming of the nobles would bring more problems than benefits.

Of course they could not go against an imperial decree, so they could only regretfully accept it and try and aid the new lord.

As for Xero, he wasn’t seen by anyone besides as a young nobles son, no one regarded him as much more than a child.

In the two days that followed, it was with the help of the Lumberjacks that an area was cleared outside of the village and a large palisade was formed. A village lord’s castle was not built inside the village, instead when one appears, they built it outside and the village would grow around it.

It was only made of wood for now but the house was much larger than any of the villages house and was built a bit crude but everything was made well as there was no leak in the walls, and there was a room for each person while to floor was wood plank floor that held heat while a crude stone chimney was formed to heat the house.

When Mason’s arrive the lord's manor would be rebuilt out of stone and wood no longer looking crude but one needed to show results to attract the right people and so, with the help of a some studied scholars that were hired to help the Null family, they began their plan of action.

Xero would have only two weeks of break and one week was already gone by, he had four more days before he had to fly back to the academy for the second half of the year.

With Xero, Zip and Void as well as the scholars sitting in an office built into the manor, they look at a map of the area. The area covered was almost 30 km around the village with it being shown in the center. A small dirt path was drawn out leading towards the south east were the nearest village was.

The map had goblin and orc tribes marked out living in caves or having built forts in the forest, even level 45 trolls lived in some forests, larger mountain peaks had equally strong dragon type beasts and other areas where territory of feral beasts like wolves and bears.

“The Feral beasts are easier to kill off, this bear herd is from a Shadow bear group, there are between 10 to 15 bears in this territory and each have its own sub territory and their levels range from 25 to 35. They use darkness and shadow magic making them tricky to battle.” the scholar said and pointed to wolf and mountain lion territory, “There is a Pride of mountain lion in this area they are Rocky Hide Mountain Lions and the strongest is level 30, this mountain is thought to contain a mining node.” the scholar said. He then pointed to a river to the east about a kilometer away, “This river is the nearest source of water, the village has a well but it isn’t sufficient for us when you think of how the village would grow and the many things that will require a lot of water. Along the way…” The scholar pointed to goblin tribes, “These insufferable savages obstruct the passage as they pass in great number. The tribe itself number between 70 to 100 goblins 20 hobgoblins and 4 all of which are different and this even includes a magic type goblin.” He said.

Nil sighed as he heard all this and knew that it will be a long arduous problem to deal with the established monster tribes, conquering the region will take a while. “The least troublesome would be the beasts, the wolves I will personally attack while it is winter where my own familiar has the advantage. The bears should also be in hibernation so we should send someone to scout their caves.” Nil said. As an experienced hunter he could at least properly plan out how to get beasts, as for the tribal monsters he will need to see if he could hire someone that could make strategy and help him. He will also need strong defensive mage as well as strong magic users.

“What would you have of the townspeople?” The scholar asked.

“The safe space around the village is limited to the south and southwest along the roads, have the lumberjacks start clearing the land in these safe spaces where there will be no danger of monster attacks. Although it is cold, it shouldn’t be a problem for them. What is the normal pay for the lumberjacks and miners?” he asked.

“The miners are currently ‘unemployed’ but they are people the earl sent so during the winter they will not be heavily affected by lack of food, along with the lumberjacks who are clearing space to the south of the village which is east of your manor, it will for a second district if one considers the village its own district. If left separate the district will develop into a workers village eventually.” The scholar said.

“What kind of work do the villagers have?” Nil asked.

“During the winter there is little to no work as for pay of the lumberjack, it is usually 10 copper coin a day while the query for trees felled is usually 5 trees done in groups of three a day. Then it must be trimmed removing leaves and branches and cut the logs for proper use.” He said.

Nil thought a while, “How many Lumberjacks do we have?” He asked.

“60 at the moment.” the scholar replied.

“That is 20 groups, or 100 trees a day, the first several days it will be mostly construction of the town itself.” Nil said and looked at he pay were the circles around each specific ‘district’ was drawn.

“Alright, instruct them to clear cut the south as well as the space between the village, manor and worker district. This will open land that can be developed. From there we will already have wood so wooden palisades can then be raised, if we hire some of the villagers we can increase the number of workers as well as help train their basic strength during the winter and give them some money. If they do not want to be lumberjacks then they can help construct homes and palisade. Offer 5 copper coin for young men who are new to the job and once they are experienced a bit raise the 10 copper, those building the palisades should have a wage of 10 copper a day as well. Have the miners help build so that they do not remain idle.” Nil said.

The Scholar looked at Nil in surprise by the accurate work distribution and use of limited manpower.

“When do traders start coming?” Nil asked.

“Usually during the winter they come once a month during days where snow is weakest and days of sun shining. Mostly it is those with good mounts that can transport goods through snow though and not many come this way because of the monsters and poor roads.” He replied.

“We need to develop the roads then.” Zip asked.

“When the forest clearing is done, it will naturally happen, chopping the wood along the road to open space for carriage and such and using earth magic to redefine and improve road conditions.” Nil replied.

“But to pay a mage for this…” The scholar started but Nil laughed “Don’t worry, there are numerous young commoner mage in magic academy who need to work to pay for their school tuition, I have already sent request for monster hunting and city development aid to several academy. Although the cost is between 1 to 5 gold coin, to get a 6th year student in his level 40 or so wouldn’t be hard especially when the biggest cost will only be giving the monster corpse to the student for him to sell the material.” Nil laughed.

“Oh so you lordship has thought of such a means already.” The Scholar said.

“No need for the formality, it is stifling. Now, we only have 1000 gold coin as fund, after all that we decided is said and done, what can we expect to have used?” He asked.

The scholar took out a parchment and an old calculating tool and worked for several minutes, “The winter season work is normally harder but the village has sufficient food and the chopped wood would supply sufficient firewood for the villagers and workers removing such costs. Wages for the 60 lumberjack for the three winter months will be 900 copper coins, or 9 silver coin and not counting the additional workers from the village. Wages for constructing the palisade walls and possibly other defensive measures will be estimated at 20 silver to 2 gold coin. Payment for talent hunters from the academy may range between 5 to 200 gold so it is estimated that at least 250 gold will be spent during the first three months without income until merchants arrive. If all goes well, the structure of the village will be enough to attract carpenters and the land will be ready enough for farming.” He said.

“There is also the mountain lions that we would probably have dead, the development of the mines on that mountain will also start to increase costs, the biggest need is to clear the goblins early to get the water and build a water mill and find a method to draw water to the village.” He said.

“Such things will be an additional 100 gold so and estimated 350 gold coin shall be used to set up the village with no income.” He said.

“How much do magic herbs sell for?” Xero asked.

“Depends the herb, common herbs go for a few copper to a few silver in large cities, magical herbs can go for several gold.” He said.

Xero nodded, “Father, if I have Ashley gather some herbs, I think mother will be able to form a herbal garden within the manors walls that can be sold when merchants come. I am sure there are some good stuff around and she will be able to spot them easily.” He said.

“We won’t sell them, not yet, gather them and we will start to cultivate it and use them to train the guards as well as turn hunters into guards to increase the defense of the village. Selling will only be if there are emergency needs.” he said.

Xero nodded understand, “Now that should do it, I shall be going out to hunt the wolves, Zip, you're a blacksmith but for now we lack material for it so at this time just train yourself and your familiar, you too Void. Xero help your mother and sister adapt to the magic creatures and learn their spells, give them your old magic books so that they won’t be clueless about how to use magical formula and magic itself.” Nil said.

“Alright father!” The three said and everyone leaves to accomplish the tasks at hand.

Ashley was summoned to gather herbs from the surroundings while Xero went to his mother and sister and began to teach them magic and to slowly understand the magic formula.

During the same time that they were learning, each spirit were given a mana stone to absorb mana in its easiest form, the fairy developed three innate skills, Till, Water Shower and Harvest. All three were farm related spells that would allow it to control earth mana to prepare farm lands, and call forth a rain to water the plants. The pot had no advancement besides shattering several dozen times and its appearance beginning to improve while its mana pushed into Nadir’s body.

In a blink of an eye, the day to return to the academy arrived, behind the manor, a small greenhouse was built and inside were magical herbs. There were four tables that formed the fields for the herbs and each herb was spaced out. These were still easy to cultivate and would sell for a good price. Be it for medicine or for tea leaves they provided, they were quite good.

Xero left after everything was set and showed his mother, as well as the rest of his family, his year 1 notebooks and said they should look through it and ask his sister in law since she also knew about it all.

On his sword, he flew off towards the academy.

***

Looking at the students while huffing, Professor Servine was in class as all the students had returned, “Starting today, children, you children are responsible for your own tuition fees. Previously it had been 50 silver that your parents paid but starting today you children of year 2 will have to pay 1 gold coin monthly to pay for school material, equipment, food and of course classes.” He said.

All the children began to complain upon hearing that.

“Now now, quiet! Silence!” the teacher shouted, “Every year this happens and it is meant to teach you responsibility and let you get real world experience, unlike before where you would have class in the mornings and free time in the afternoon, you children will be given all the study material of the month, homework, and guidebooks, for you to study. It is up to you to complete the request upon the mission board to obtain the required funds as well as complete all the monthly work. You will have to come only once a month to class to perform a test to make sure you’re truly learning. Of course, when out on missions, you are using the name of the school so lodging and such are easy to acquire as it is a benefit given by the requester.” The teacher said.

Then he pulled out a Magic back and from it, several dozen packets appeared on his desk, “With that, come pick up my months worth of work and wait for your other teachers to come in and provide you with their part.” He said.

Everyone sulked over and took the work material and stored it in their magic bags and like that Math, Biology, monsterology, Herbology, magic class, PE and all the other teachers came one by one dropping off work material until they had all been passed out and the class was released.

“Xero, are you going to do all your work first?” Meldie asked as they leave and walk down the castle like school.

"I think I will go secure money first, monster hunting is probably the easier mission but should also pay the least unless I harvest the bodies. Knowing myself, I think I can battle level 18 or 19 creatures without Ashley’s interference.” He said

Meldie sighed, “I’m still stuck at level 12 with Pou and my own strength.” She said.

“Maybe it is how you are training that doesn’t fit, have you tried looking for Mrs. Gilbody or Grunt about this?” Xero asked.

She nodded, “It seems Pou needs a different kind of food besides Magic bamboo.” She sighed.

Xero laughed because Magic bamboo was already a costly resource and yet it needed more. He remembered the gem spirit his sister in law had and thought about the Panda a bit. “What about fish? It’s a common bear food, maybe it evolved to eat like a regular bear, nuts and berries as well as fish. I’m sure there are plenty of monster fish that it could eat to grow.” He said.

“Oh~! I hadn’t thought of that! Thank you!” She beamed him a bright smile and hugged him before running off happily, he blushed watching her run off.

Scratching his head he walked down until he reached the first floor before walking to a very special room that was the entrance hall of the castle. It had seven large pillars, each with a number 2 through 8.

Previously he had not known what it was but after asking he discovered these pillars were where the requests appeared through magical means. These were called the Request pillars.

Walking to the pillar with a number 2 on it, he found a circular board around the base of the pillar and there were second year students around it. On each board was a crystal panel and from this area the children saw an image of the requests and when they accepted they would press a space and insert mana and from the crystal magic image, a true physical page containing the information would appear.

Xero saw that the board rose several meters up but there were few who could actually fly but pulling out a pocket knife sized sword, it suddenly grew as mana filled it and Xero stood on it before flying up over everyone and approaching the pillar where he stopped.

Nothing really happened until he put his hand against the crystal board.

“Welcome Xero Null, to the Everlight Academy Mission Board. What kind of request do you wish to complete?” Magic letters formed in front of him.

“Let me see hunting?” He said.

There was no reaction so he put his finger against the crystal board and wrote, “Hunting requests.”

“All hunting requests for your age and skill range have already been picked. Please choose another type.” The board replied.

“What type of requests are there?” He wrote.

“Hunting, Gathering, Schooling, Training, Escorting, City Development Aide, Scouting, Investigation, Criminal Raid…”

The list was quite impressive to a 12 year old like Xero. Some were quite open like City Development since it would be things like finding resource nodes and such while training would be helping to physically train people. Schooling was an interesting one because it involved teaching children that studied in National schools the more advanced magical knowledge of the Magic academy. This one he didn’t want to do but when he looked through it he actually stopped when he saw a specific request.

Location: Lurian Empire

Requester: Rank 1 Lower Knight, Nil Null

Request Type: Schooling

Request: Teach the Wife and eldest 3 children of the noble about magic formula and magical knowledge. (1st year material only)

Pay: 2 Gold Coin Monthly

Xero was very surprised to find his father's name on this but then suddenly remembered his father saying that he had sent out requests for the academy to attract students for work.

“How many requests can I take up?” He asked.

“As many as you can handle, though the first request will limit the search range of all the other requests.” the board replied.

“Show me all the requests sent out by the Rank 1 Lower Knight, Nil Null.” He said.

A large list appeared most of which were hunting quests. Mountain Troll hunting limited to 4th year and above and only those at least level 40, Goblin village raid, requires a party of at least twenty and at least a level 40 mage to counter a high class magic user goblin. All the stated monsters in a radius of 40 km were listed all under hunting quests and put into different age groups.

Then City development missions that were on hold until the hunting quest tied it was finished. There were Scouting missions to scout the numbers of specific creatures in a specific region around the city before the hunt quest will become active.

Besides that, there wasn’t much else.

Most if not all besides the schooling one, Xero could not help his family with, he was simply too weak at the moment.

“Show missions that are tied to the village run by Nil Null or from nearby villages.” he wrote.

At once he found several interesting ones, from several nearby cities, there were requests for escorts of merchants to the surrounding villages, this included the village of his family but due to the undeveloped roads it was the least chosen destination. Word of the develop did bring people wanting to move over so worker hands also wanted to go there and were paying 10 silver coin to be escorted. Then there were villages that were in need of processed wood for development and request had gone out to the nearby villages since it was a small village without any professionals. The price was 30 copper per processed tree to make palisade, a stack of 5 wooden planks was 50 copper each, brute stone they were buying 10 copper every 10 kilo and processed bricks were 50 copper a stack of 20 bricks, a stone brick was usually 30 cm long and 10 wide and 15 high.

All these material transports were quite interesting, when Xero thought about it, if his father or himself becomes a baron, the surrounding villages would also be under his family's control. As such their success and failure would eventually rest on their shoulders. With these thoughts, he hand half a mind to accept escort and transport missions to and from his family's village increasing merchant trade and so on. The problem he faced was that he was just one person, although he wanted to transport a lot of goods, he could only control one sword in flight and although these resist the wind, the wind still blew, who knew when something would fall.

It wasn’t like he could hire helpers either, he was broke as a beggar after all and needed money to not be expelled.

“What are you doing?” Xero suddenly heard someone talk.

Turning around, he found Univa sitting on the back of her Drake, mid flight.

“Looking for requests. What about you?” He asked.

“I’m here to do the same, I will not be supported by my family anymore so I need to start making my own money.” She said.

She tilted her head and looked at the pillar. “Transport and escort missions? I would have expected you to go to the third your pillar to get hunting missions, the pillars react only to power, if your strength matches the year standards you perform those missions.” She said.

Xero was surprised but he kept firm, “My family recently became nobles is I want to help them settle down.” He said.

Univa seemed to understand. All nations followed the same system of nobility. It was a system set up internationally meaning every known nation uses it by standards of an international treaty on this subject.

She moved closer and caught the name of his father before having her dragon hover closer and with her wand she shot magic and formed her request to see all the missions released by Xero’s father.

“Your family were sent to an unexpectedly high level region!” She exclaimed and read using her sharp eyesight and using her wand to move the requests and bring out more.

“Oh, Mountain Trolls!” She exclaimed, "I have been looking for this kind of target, the Troll blood is perfect for improving Tryus’s regeneration ability if he can drink a bit of it and the troll meat may even help him advance some levels if he eats it early!” She said with sparkling eyes. “Still, they are level 40 and it seems there are groups of them…” She muttered.

Xero turned back to his own selection, the first mission he choose was to school his family, if it was 2 gold a month it meant 50 silver a week. Since it was his own family it would be easier to set up teaching hours and training hours and then allow him to do other missions during his free time.

As for the other missions, to begin with he simply choose the merchant escort via to and from his family’s village as it would be easier than following a complete route and it can be done within a few hours.

Accepting them both, the paper of these formed from the crystal wall showing the requester and where they were. The merchants would be reaching a village around 50 km from the Null family village in three days but it was also there that the road got bad. If he waited there he could bring them or else they would go a different route.

It was a good chance to get winter time trade.

Getting his hands on the two papers Xero turned and saw a tall young man standing in mid air next to Univa and she was showing him the requests.

When he noticed Xero’s look, he looked his way making the girl turn as well. “Brother, the village area is under control of his family, I found it when I searched using his father's name. We can get information from him and probably see all the creatures in detail that surround the village. I only skimmed but there is also orc and goblin settlements with magic based monsters as well.” She said.

“Oh, do you have some kind of interest in this boy?” The young man asked.

“NO NO NO! I checked because he said they were newly titled nobles and normally such people would be sent to backwater villages to help develop them normally in dangerous places. It was how I found the troll notices.” She replied blushing.

The young man laughed, "I understand, I’ll see with some of my friends if they have any juniors that would also want some troll blood and would like to join. I am curious about the goblin subjection more though, I am in need of a magic type goblin monster core for my familiar, I shall look into this and we shall go when we are ready.” He said.

“Thank you brother.” She said. She looked towards Xero a moment before patting her drake that turned and flew away.

Xero scratched his head when he saw the girl fly away and land in a clear area before calling back her drake and walk away.

He flew around a bit and landed before putting away his sword.

“Xero!” He heard Meldie said and found her holding a poster for a Gathering mission.

"I found an interesting mission, it has someone with your last name on it so I took it because there are no hunting missions and I am not strong enough for escort missions or any of the other more complex ones.” She said showing him the poster.

Xero smiled wryly when he saw the herb collecting mission that was indeed from his father and kinda wondered what she was thinking when she took the mission.

“The mission belongs to my father, he is a newly appointed noble so probably wants to gather the surrounding herbs to sell or cultivate before they are killed off by the clean cutting the lumberjacks will do during the winter.” Xero said and slowly she blushed as she realized she choose a mission simply because of the familiar last name but unexpectedly had actually chosen a mission from his family.

“Well I am heading the same way, I want to keep helping my family so I will be schooling them in 1st year magic knowledge and escorting some merchants. I can take you there as well.” He said.

She nodded blushing, then turned and ran away much quicker then she came leaving Xero even more perplexed. “Girls are strange.” He thought.

Turning he walked back to his dorm room to look over some of his school work before he leaves.