Dominic waved one of the new mages over, and she politely knelt at his feet, the way that Royal Maids would when being reprimanded.
"You’re not in trouble. I have a question. Do you know the magic to create quartz crystals for light and water creation magitech artifacts?" Dominic clarified.
She looked vaguely confused, but nodded. "Yes, My Lord. Those are basic spells for any acolyte of the Purity Tower."
"That is wonderful news. We will be building a factory to make magitech household goods, and those gems will be critical to our production. Do any of the boys have training in magitech engineering?"
The girl shook her head. "No, My Lord. The Purity Tower is a purely magical academy. Or, it was."
"That reminds me, what was it that got the entire tower purged?" He asked.
The girls looked at each other uneasily, unwilling to answer, but bound by their sect’s rules and the Prisoner Contract not to lie.
"The Sect Leader backed the second prince of Bothersia in the succession battle. The Second Prince lost, and was executed for treason, and his entire faction was purged. Including our tower, naturally. We were given a life sentence for providing magical weapons to the rebel forces." The girl explained.
Alexis sighed. "I should have known that it would be something like that. Dominic attracts rebel mages like a magnet."
The mage bowed her head. "We were acolytes at the tower, hardly involved at all, other than making spell gems and crystals for the seniors. That is why we were granted leniency instead of execution."
That explained why they were all so young. Everyone old enough to have joined the battle was killed, either in action or in court.
"Well, that’s not a great reputation to have, but I trust that you and your panions will be loyal and on their best behaviour now that you’re here and in service to the Ninth Princess of Cygnia. I will check in on the boys later to ensure that they’re not thinking of anything improper." Dominic replied.
The mages giggled at his phrasing, and Dominic shrugged. "There is a lot of trouble that young boys can get into without any inappropriate contact."
Alexis turned her attention back to the mages. "You say that you were providing magical weapons to the rebels. But you said that you are not skilled in magitech."
The mage kneeling beside Dominic nodded politely. "Indeed. But the Purity Sect is a versatile and traditional mage sect. We are quite skilled at imbuing items with bat magic, even though all our spell gems were confiscated when we were arrested.
However, we can only act in self-defence."
"That means you can create new spell gems for the spells you know, does it not?" Alexis asked.
"Naturally."
Alexis smirked at Dominic. "Then I believe we will have additional tasks for you, beyond the domestic duties and training as veiled maids. Our town guard will need to be properly equipped, and I am eager to find out what the Acolytes of the Purity Sect have retained."
The girls were clearly skeptical of her intentions, but they were surprisingly fast to accept Alexis’ proposition.
"Of course, Your Highness. Whether it is defending your person, or helping your people defend themselves, now that our life debt has been transferred to you, we live to serve." The mage girl replied quickly.
Then, she did a double take as Dominic patted her head, and motioned for her to rise.
That was unexpected. If he had any sort of bad intentions, it should have shocked him to the point his arm went numb, at the very least. But nothing had happened to him.
Did that mean he didn’t view them as females? Or perhaps he viewed them as still being children, and it was an indulgent pat, like a parent would give? He was rather young looking for that, though Dragonkin aged slowly.
The entire concept of a head pat was confusing to them, as they had been pledged to the Purity Sect at a young age, and there was no physical contact at all between the members, unless necessary to plete a task.
The truth was that Dominic had gotten used to Cutter silently following him around as he toured the territory, and he had briefly forgotten that it was not the aging hunting dog at his side.
Her hair was the same sandy brown colour as the dog’s fur.
Dominic rose to his feet and motioned toward the door. "I will go see what is holding up the others. If they have brought a large number of tools, I will see that someone helps them get unloaded."
Outside the Manor, the young mages were indeed helping the architectural team unload tools into a storage shed. They had brought not just the drafting and design tools that Dominic had expected, they had also brought construction and surveying tools.
The farmers had nearly finished their sales, and the last few were haggling with the merchant over the space that was being vacated by the tools the architect and his team had brought.
The Merchant was politely refusing, as he had no guarantee that he could sell more than he would be picking up at the next stop. But Dominic could see that he was being worn down.
The next stop on his route was Lympsbury, and the city was in rough shape since the war.
They hadn’t taken heavy casualties, but they had lost most of the city’s wealth when the Dagos Nobles and businessmen had fled during the early days of the occupation.
So, while the city wasn’t overrun with homeless refugees like Castle City and some others were, there were still plenty of impoverished residents, and even more ing from areas that simply couldn’t sustain residents anymore.
With the change in leadership, the people of Stansia Province were hoping that good things might start to happen to them for the first time in a decade.
They needed a lot, but they also needed money. Many apprentices should have taken over the shops by now, and even if the quality wasn’t as good as before, it should still be worth buying for the Merchant’s Guild.
Every little bit counted, and loading up with too much perishable food wasn’t the most profitable load at the best of times.
And especially not when you were hundreds of kilometres from the next city.
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