CHAPTER 12 - FOUR ISSUES

Inside the town hall, In the main hall,

All the leaders of the legacy village were seated in their respective seats. The atmosphere in the room was heavy and looked like a conflict would break out soon. Aria, the leader of the archers was especially angry.

Firstly, some of the archers under her command had undertaken a secret mission to assassinate the village chief without informing her. It was already bad enough but she was then informed that all of them had died. Especially, one of the most talented archer under her had been killed by the village chief himself. She was caught in a dilemma. She wanted revenge for her people but she had no idea how to do that. Her people were in the wrong in the first. Trying to assassinate the chief? What were they thinking. She wanted to vent her anger on the barbarian who had killed five of her people. When she wanted to demand an explanation, his reply left her speechless.

"Your people tried to assassinate the chief and got themselves killed and yet, you have the gall to demand an explanation. Are you implying that I should have folded my arms and not protected the chief? Were you colluding with them?"

"I....I..". Aria sighed and remained silent.

Olivier then spoke. "Today i called all of you here not to point fingers and blame each other but to discuss the development plans of our village. Before that we should discuss about what happened. People in the village tried to assassinate me and they received the punishment they deserved. I can see where they were coming from. I was weak and we will leave it at that. I learned a lesson form that event. But, i must warn you I will not tolerate such action form now on". He spoke the last words with a hint of threat looking dead at Aria's blue eyes to make sure she understood.

"Now, we will talk about the important matters. As a member of the legacy village taskforce committee, you should be aware of the matters in the village. We have four important matters to discuss today. After i point out the matter, each of you gets an opportunity to give your opinions and suggestion on the topic. Is everything clear?" Olivier waited for the people to speak up. but nobody said anything.

"Ok, then I will begin. First topic of discussion today is resource management. Our village as of now has 6 resource collectors installed, 3 goldmines, and 3 elixir collectors. They can mine 800 resources per hour producing 57,600 gold and elixir every day. But we can only store 8500 gold or elixir as of this moment including the storing capacity of the storages and the treasury in the townhall. So, the first step we must take is to upgrade our storage units, so that we can stockpile more resources utilizing the full potential of the mine. Bryan, Erwin. I will leave this matter to you. Any objections?"

Nobody objected. Bryan and Erwin enthusiastically expressed their happiness to put their skill to use again.

"Chief, we will be happy to upgrade the structure".

Chief Olivier, you can count on us".

Olivier nodded. He thought for a while and called out, "Saya?"

"here". Saya called out form her seat.

"How much authority do you have over our village?" Olivier asked.

"Uh, I can move or teleport to any part of the village freely. I can even take one person with me. Other than that, I know the amount of resources we have, the level of the structures and all that information. As for other things, I can do almost any thing you can as long as you give the authority". Saya replied after thinking for a while.

Olivier nodded as he knew all that. He then asked "Then Can you help me upgrades all the storage units to their limits?"

"Mmm..". Saya nodded agreeing to Olivier's request.

"Good. Then it is settled. The second matter we are going to discuss today is the awakening of the giants".

Every one pricked their ears afraid of missing single detail. Olivier had mentioned the giants before but he had never talked about them in details.

After grabbing their attention, Olivier spoke,"Originally, I was planning to awaken the giants as soon as possible. But, after the event that happened a few days ago, I changed my mind. We are not ready to take that step yet. Giants are a unique race with huge bodies and immense vitality. They are slow in their movements but they possess immense strength. According to the information I know, Giants are usually calm but once angered their fury can unleash hell".

Olivier paused for a while letting them process the information they received. Then, he continued,"The giants are very strong. One of them could easily deal with two of your best warriors on the same level. Giants are especially hard to kill. One of them could deal great damage to our village as we are now. So. we should be prepared. We will awaken them when, we are strong enough to deal with them incase situation turns bad. For now, we will focus on raising the strength of our village and understanding each other. Any opinions?"

"That is a good idea". Kratos nodded. Aria also agreed.

"The third matter we are going to discuss today is exploration. As you guys know our village is build on a small clearing on a magical forest. Our village is surrounded by forest from the three sides and a river flows at the south boundary of our village. According to Saya and Bryan, There used to be goblin attacks once in a while but those goblins stopped attacking a thousand years ago. Those goblins used to arrive from the forest but there have been no sign of them since then. So, we need to explore the forest and understand the situation in the forest. We will need to form an exploration team to investigate situation in the forest. I will assign these task to the archers. Consider this as punishment for the action of your people. Uncle Kratos personally protected me from the danger and executed his own people for their mistakes. But, Aria you neglected your responsibility as a member of the taskforce committee. So, you will take this job. Do you have any objection?" Olivier asked Aria as he glanced at her.

"No, I don't. I will personally lead a group of archers to investigate the forest". Aria replied. She was not a person who did not know when to admit her mistakes. Similarly, Olivier had not judged her based on the mistakes of her people. So, she accepted the punishment which was technically not a punishment.

"No. You just need to assign a few of your people to conduct the investigation. You will have to stay behind to teach me archery".

"Oh.. Ok!". Aria agreed. She had nearly forgotten that she had promised to teach him archery.

"I will leave the matter of investigation to you as you know your people and their ability the best. Now, we will move on to the fourth matter. I believe this matter has been put off for a long time. Today, we will discuss and formulate the rules and regulation of our legacy village. What we will decide today will be the constitution of our village according to which the villagers will be awarded for their merits and punished for their crimes".

After a heated discussion for a whole day and night, the consitution of the leagacy village was passed. The consitution of the leagacy village contained a set of handwritten laws which are regarded as the highest level of public regulation. Each and every people in the village are entitle to follow the constitution without any contradiction. The laws were to be followed strictly under any condition but on special cases, the decision would be made by the task force committee. The constitution can be amended according to the need and changes in the legacy village. Each member of the task force committee had the right to cast a single vote on the occasion of contradictory opinions while Olivier's vote counted for two.

The constitution of Legacy village provided different fundamental rights to the villagers such as right to live with dignity, the right to freedom, the right to equality, the right to communication, the right relating to justice, etc. The fundamental rights of the villagers were designed according to the right of any citizens back on earth. But the punishment were designed according to the rules of this world.

Olivier wanted the villagers to enjoy all the rights the people back on earth could enjoy. He wanted to build a world where people of all level of strength had similar rights and respect for each other . he knew world outside had a single rule 'might is right'. But he wanted the legacy village to be different. That was one of the reason why it took long to formulate the laws. Kratos and Aria had differing opinions from Olivier. They could not understand the rules Olivier proposed. Thus, after the heated discussion, Olivier managed to add the fundamental right part in the constitution. He was helpless about the punishment part as Kratos and Aria were adamant about 'No leniency Policy'. Olivier also did not argue much as he had experienced the consequence of leniency himself. Only, he felt that the rules were too cruel.

The constitution of the legacy village was soon published before the training camp on a notice board creating quite a commotion among the archers and the barbarians. They were surprised by the laws of this village. It might take quite a while for them to adapt to this new law. But all of the troops had a similar thoughts on their mind, 'The chief sure has an eccentric personality'.

Meanwhile, Olivier unbothered by the commotion in the village was busy training with Kratos. On the same hill where he refined his body, Olivier was swinging a broadsword, repeating the same action again and again. Kratos was watching Olivier movement and pointing out his mistakes.

"Control the strength of your body and try to make as minimum movement as possible. That will decrease the flaws in your swordsmanship".

"Maintain your body balance. Try to spread your body weight evenly through your feet and always be aware of the distance between you and your opponent and be ready to strike at the right timing".

Kratos instructed Olivier from the side as he gave pointer based on his years of experience. Kratos wanted Olivier to have a impeccable form, balance, and timing. While speed, agility and strength were necessary for any swordsman, it would be useless when facing an experience opponent who is good at grasping your flaws.

After training for a long while Olivier stopped. He sat down on the ground gazing at the broken trees in the distance. This place had a special significance to him. Here he had completed his body refining and killed for the first time.

After drawing his first blood, Olivier had thought deeply and accepted the fact that he had to kill to survive. While he had some reluctance to kill in his heart before, that was now replaced by determination. Only facing a life-or-death situation did he understood how much he wanted to live and the things that he had yet to accomplish in this life.

Thus after a long deliberation in silence, he accepted the fact. He did not like killing but it was neccessary to survive and he accepted the fact that killing was as important to survive in this world as food, water, and shelter were to survive on Earth.

After long deliberation, Olivier had set some goals to achieve for himself. He would add more goals as he accomplishes them, one step at a time,

Olivier's Short term goal:

1. Take full control of legacy village.

Status: In progress

2. Control his body and learn swordsmanship and archery.

Status: In progress

3. Figure out the mystery behind his birthmark.

Status: ....

4. Figure out the effects of gold, elixir and gems on his body.

Status: ....

5. Investigate the forest.

Status: In progress

6. Find a way to return to the outside world.

Status: ....

With this goals, Olivier now had a direction to move move towards. He could figure everything slowly as all he had was time.

Kratos sat beside Olivier on the ground. "What you did back in the hall was amazing. I had to say, I am amazed'.

"I just did what I was supposed to do from the start".

"Well, you are right. Those rules that you come up with are really unique. Does the outside world follow those rules? Have the world changed so much?" Kratos asked sighing with emotion.

Olivier replied, "The world outside has not changed. It is still the same cruel place where the strong eat the weak. I just wanted a change is all". He randomly made some excuses.

"Indeed, the rules of the world would not change so easily. Only the strongest person who could defeat the world by himself could change the rule of the world. But who could defeat the whole world alone? Even if some one could do that, why would they bother changing the rules of world when they could rule over it". Kratos muttered as he were speaking to himself.

Olivier thought it was plausible. Only the strongest person might have the qualification to change the rule of the whole world, ending the old era and starting a new one. He sighed to himself as he stood up. wiping the sweat from his face he said to Kratos,"Uncle Kratos, I will return to the village first. I have an appointment with Aria".

Receiving Kratos approval, he ran towards the village.

Time to master Archery!