Once he was done with that, it was time for the actual build. He began marking out the areas for the foundations, digging holes over the allotted space.
The alchemist's cabin would cover an area big enough to fit two large boars, which for someone of his size was quite an ambitious task.
"Say after me leaflings. If my foundations are wrong, the beatings I get will be strong," Lucius chanted as if he were back in the army.
And the leaflings innocently repeated the chant, watching carefully as Lucius filled the foundations with planks.
"Isn't this song kind of odd?" one of the leaflings whispered to its colleague.
"I don't know what you mean," the other leafling replied, having fun with the army chant.
Next Lucius started with the walls. This time he changed the chant to "If I build a bad wall, off a cliff I will fall," and once again the leaflings repeated. This time with even more vigor.
"I'm telling you, the Lighted One is trying to tell us something, and it sounds scary," the same leafling from before tried telling its colleague once again.
"You're reading too deep into it. It's just a fun song, why do you always do this?" his friend asked, now annoyed by his conspiracist friend's theories. "Look, just enjoy the song and watch carefully, he might test us on this later," he added, more calmly this time.
As Lucius constructed the walls he realized that each binding would require two times as many vines in order to make it stable due to the increased size of the building.
He also had to account for support pillars within the build as it was simply too wide to support itself with only the outer frameworks like the smaller cottage required.
At times when he thought he was nearly done, he realized that he had placed certain planks a little skew, which made the entire build tilt to one side.
Of course, matters like this would not have been a problem for an everyday person, after all, Lucius had no constructing experience -apart from making makeshift camps-prior to this. So one would've thought he would be happy with a somewhat decent build.
But no, if it required him to remove a few planks, he would do just that, to ensure the stability of the structure. The energy was something he could easily replenish, a dead leafling due to his incompetence not so much.
"Okay leaflings, now is the most important part, the roof," Lucius said, setting up the rope he would use as a pulley to place the roof atop the build.
"Repeat after me. Build proper rooves, or get boar hooves," he said, starting with the roof build.
"Build proper rooves, or get boar hooves," the leaflings shouted over and over.
"Are you going to say that there's some hidden meaning to this too?" the leafling asked to its conspiracist friend.
"I'll remain quiet for now. But when the Lighted One says that he was trying to teach us something with this song, I'll be there to shout I told you so in your face," the conspiracist leafling replied with a huff.
After finishing off with the roof, and placing it on top of the build, Lucius brought the ladder he had made before and began securing it.
"Now leaflings, I'm going to test you guys to see if you remembered everything," Lucius announced, taking this time to rest.
As he asked the leaflings to list all the different processes they would have to go through to create a cottage, but it seemed that only a few of them remembered well. Of course, the others would learn over repeated practice, but he decided to put the ones that remembered the first time into a special group anyway.
"From now on, you guys will be called my builder's unit," he announced.
The leaflings stood proudly, visibly gloating over their comrades who had not been chosen. Among them were the conspiracist leafling and his not-so-conspiracist friend.
"Ha, builder's unit? I tell you, there's something deeper to it. Perhaps we're the next to be named?" the conspiracist, whispered to his friend.
"He told us not to worry too much about naming. We will be named eventually, now stop talking nonsense, he might hear you," his friend replied.
"I wonder what my name will be? Don't you? Maybe something like BuildAlhpa. Or BuildGhost,"
"Those are stupid names," his friend quickly shut down.
***
"Will this area suffice?" Lucius asked, introducing Asclepius to its new home.
"All this space is for me alone?" Asclepius asked, finding it hard to believe.
"Yes and... for storing all poisonous resources. Oh, and also for all the processes relating to the brewing of concoctions," Lucius explained.
"I guess this will suf-"
"And Pagan will be keeping guard here. So you will be staying together from now on," Lucius interrupted.
"Ahh, and this isn't free. I will have you do experiments on different herbs to find out their uses. There could be more concoctions that you don't know about, don't you want to find out?" Lucius asked.
Asclepius seemed hesitant, taking their time to think things over.
"I can increase the amount of meat you get from every hunt. Also, we will discuss the pay for every new discovery you make. However, your discoveries can be shared with me alone. And all new concoctions you make will be under my ownership." Lucius explained.
"All concoctions? So basically everything I make is yours?" Asclepius asked.
"I will supply all the reagents. And I know you are going to sneak some for yourself regardless of our deals, so it sounds fair to me," Lucius said with a certain finality that could only come from a tyrant.
"Sigh, agreed," Asclepius said reluctantly.
"Great. I'll make a small garden for you here, and I'll teach you how to grow flowers," Lucius said, already walking towards a patch of dirt right beside the alchemist's cabin.
"Grow flowers? With magic?"
"No, agriculture. It's close to magic, but not quite," Lucius said. Though he was a bit hesitant to divulge his other world techniques to the shroom, he decided that he would have to use the techniques to grow his commune anyway. And one way or another, it would find out eventually.
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