A Large Community

What I had done—or rather, the only instruction I had given Simurg-san beforehand—was just one thing.

Once the trees were moved, I asked him to sanctify the path.

With Simurg-san’s agreement, the rest was simple.

By using Tree Arrangement, I could shift trees even across distances.

After we departed, I made sure to keep track of the direction from Tree Village so I wouldn’t lose sight of its position.

Once Chief Jinga gave his approval, I carefully checked the pre-determined direction and began relocating the many trees of Tree Village toward this settlement.

Then, with Simurg-san expanding the Sanctuary along the line of trees… in no time, a holy road connecting the villages—the Sanctuary Road—was complete.

“O-ohhh…”

“Trees are sprouting in the desert…”

“And every one of them is bearing delicious-looking fruit… is this heaven?”

The people of Jinga’s village were dumbfounded at the sight of the Sanctuary Road.

Perhaps because they hadn’t eaten breakfast yet, some of them gazed at the fruit, drooling openly.

Of course, they were welcome to eat.

After all, I had already prepared large quantities of frozen fruit back home for situations like this.

When I gave permission, the villagers timidly began plucking fruit.

At first I wondered why they seemed so hesitant, but then realized the reason right away.

I had only ever given them fruit I’d harvested with Auto Harvest—they had never picked it themselves.

From now on they would have more opportunities to harvest, so I wanted them to get used to the trees and their fruit.

As I watched the new villagers nibbling their freshly picked fruit, Aira came up to me.

“By the way, Lord Woody.”

“What is it?”

“If you can extend the Sanctuary like this, wouldn’t it have been better to just make this village part of the Sanctuary?”

“If you ask whether it’s possible or not, it is possible. We could have left the Sanctuary Road and simply sanctified the entire village to make travel easier.”

“Then why didn’t you…?”

“Well, to put it simply, because of what might happen.”

This desert held many dangers threatening villagers’ lives—bandits and monsters among them.

And likely more I still didn’t know about.

Would turning a village into a Sanctuary solve everything? The answer was clearly no.

If sand bandits came again, and it was beyond our watch, the villagers would be helpless.

And if the village remained distant, we couldn’t respond quickly in emergencies.

If I harvested fruit here with Auto Harvest, then I’d have to bring them all the way to Tree Village to distribute it, which would waste the convenience of that skill entirely.

After weighing the risks, pros, and cons, I decided it was better to have them relocate to Tree Village.

Fortunately, the villagers here—including Chief Jinga—already had some ties with Tree Village. There would surely be problems, but desert folk, used to helping each other, could overcome them. I believed that.

And so, Jinga’s village was absorbed into Tree Village.

Their number was thirty-one people.

Combined with the forty-odd villagers already there and the former bandits, our community now numbered over eighty—a large household indeed.

All right! With more villagers, I’d collect even more Smile Points!