Standing Out

It didn’t take long for Jinga-san and his people to fully blend into Tree Village.

At first, there were some quarrels and disputes caused by small differences in customs, but lately those had settled down quite a bit.

Since none of them had a strong sense of territorial attachment to where they had lived before, they came to see themselves as fellow companions, determined to live together in this place.

To balance between the two villages, Jinga-san was made deputy village chief.

Now, the active tasks were handled by Jinga-san, while the smaller details beyond his reach were managed by Shekuri-san, and things ran smoothly.

They said the first time was always the hardest, and it was true.

Thanks to taking in Jinga-san’s group, we now knew how to handle these kinds of problems in the future.

Now that there were two other responsible leaders besides me, Shekuri-san and Jinga-san could probably manage the village on their own from here on.

So, we decided to set out again to gather people from other villages.

There were still many small settlements in the area.

If they were struggling, I wanted to bring them all into Tree Village.

Though, convincing them sounded like it would be difficult.

I thought it might take several trips back and forth.

But then…

“““Please, take us to Tree Village!”””

“Eh, uh…”

When we visited a nearby village guided by Ran-san and her companions, the representatives of surrounding villages had already gathered and were desperately begging us to take them in at Tree Village.

At first, their eagerness was overwhelming, but then I realized—our goal had been to bring them in anyway, so there was no problem at all.

Thus, on just my second expedition, I succeeded in absorbing the surrounding villages.

However, while creating Sanctuary Roads to guide the people to the village, a new problem arose.

The trees rose with thunderous sound as they pierced the ground.

And suddenly, a shining path leading to the village appeared.

Yes, the Sanctuary Road… was far too conspicuous.

Rumors spread quickly: there was some mysterious village creating mysterious glowing roads.

Those rumors brought desperate people, hoping for salvation, flocking to us.

That part was fine—in fact, more villagers were welcome.

But the problem was that the rumors also spread to unsavory ears, and now sand bandits had begun to appear, eyeing the lush Sanctuary.

As the lord, I couldn’t ignore this.

So far, it hadn’t become a problem only because Ran-san and her group had hired White Silver Wings, who were strong enough not to lose against mere bandits.

But if we wanted to attract more merchants in the future, we had to prevent banditry and worsening security at all costs.

So, we entrusted the village integration to Shekuri-san and Jinga-san, while we set out once more to subjugate the sand bandits.

This time, Nadja was officially appointed as captain of the subjugation force, with Dan and Meg as her subordinates, and former sand bandits now serving as soldiers under them.

I could only hope everything would end safely again this time…