After finishing the configuration of the Town, Theo was more than a little disappointed that very little seemed to happen. Sure, the slight sparks that glimmered about a kilometre around them slowly faded into nothing, but that was all, at least that he could see. The hum in the air slowly faded away as well, the slight disturbance it caused his very blood and bones easing as it did. The area fell into an almost eerie silence despite the good weather and beautiful surroundings. Theo wasn’t the only one who looked around for anything changing.

  “What now?” Willam asked confusedly.

  Congratulations! You have successfully founded a Town: Sigil Lake.

  You are listed as a part of a governmental body of this Town. There are more members of this governmental body. Would you like to share the System with your fellow Founding Council?

  ‘Yes!’ Theo screamed inside his own head.

  Wen’s eyes suddenly grew wide and Willam nearly fell on his back from his seated position. Their eyes gazed emptily into the space just in front of their eyes for several seconds, seconds that Theo spent grinning in further victory.

  “I just got a thing pop up! A ‘Town Management System’?” Wen quickly said.

  Theo frowned at the name, though quickly realised they were probably given only the functions of the system related to governing their town. Were there more opportunities to share more of his System with them?

  Willam agreed with her words, saying, “Me too!”

  Theo explained how he’d been asked if he wanted to share it, and his theory that it was only a piece of the whole, but they didn’t seem to care. The next few minutes went by in silence as the two of them seemed to be interacting with it. Not wanting to be left behind, Theo dived into the following messages as well!

  Town Management System.

  Resources | Inhabitants | Trade | Upgrades | Buildings | Management

  Theo was rather unsurprised to find every single menu empty of any specific listings except the odd secondary menu button under ‘Inhabitants’. The exception was ‘Management’ where Theo found his two friends had already done some work. Naming themselves ministers of hospitality and agriculture. There were several other normal-sounding titles to choose from, like ‘Chief Smith’ and ‘Minister of Trade’. There were also some that seemed a bit odd, yet still had no proper-sounding alternatives that seemed related, like ‘Lumberlord’ and ‘Lakemaster’.

  While ‘Lakemaster Theo’ did have a nice ring to it, he decided against writing himself up as something he wasn’t sure what would do in the future. He left the menu to face his friends.

  “Ministers,” he greeted with an exaggerated bow.

  “Peasant,” Wen pretend-spat in kind. The act was obvious due to her wide smile.

  “So what now?” Theo asked once more.

  “People, I guess?” asked Willam.

  “Where do we find them? We’re going to have to walk pretty far, aren’t we?”

  “Nope! We just order them! Look at the secondary menu under ‘Inhabitants’,” Wen explained. As if by magic, the secondary screen opened up directly, saving Theo a moment.

  Add more inhabitants?

  Note: You have no boarding available. This will likely reduce the number of applicants severely. Build more housing to increase the potential number of inhabitants.

  Filters active: Fresh start, No housing, No main religion, No social structure, Volunteer watch, Founding Council governance, Council judgment

  Range: Standard

  Applicants within Range: 302 (207m, 95f)

  Applicant filters active: None

  #1 Roger M. Ore

  #2 Vanessa Bludgeons

  #3 Perry Knotsmith

  The list went on and on. Theo barely parsed through it, but it was pretty long.

  “The ‘m’ and ‘f’ mean male and female, right?” Willam asked. Theo had been thinking the same thing. He nodded his own confirmation to the minister of agriculture.

  “Three hundred and two is far more than I expected considering we don’t have anywhere for them to live,” said Wen.

  “Wasn’t that the case for you both when Brook Town was founded?” Theo asked. He wasn’t entirely sure when the pair had started living and working in Brook Town, but they both seemed to have been there a while.

  “Not I,” Wen responded. “I moved there when my Da died an’ took over ‘is business. Sure, it was pretty recently built back then. The town, I mean.”

  “My family was there from the start. My parents and I were among the first batch that was ordered, so we took our tools and headed off.”

  “You both seem to be saying ‘ordered’ as if this is a transaction order,” Theo then commented.

  “Well, it is! Let’s set up a few filters, shall we? What kind of people do we need first and foremost? We might have to settle for some bad fits to get us up an’ running first so that we can get more and better suited applicants.” Wen seemed to be face deep in the System already, her eyes flickering randomly this way and that without anything noticeable going on in front of her.

  “To build houses we need lumber. To get lumber we need woodcutters, axes and saws, right?” Theo offered.

  “Aye. We don’t have any metal sources or furnace-building capabilities, so we should get extra tools while we’re at it. Though… Wait, Theo, you’ve got some coin, don’t you?”

  “Some,” he nodded. “Why?”

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  “It seems we can add prerequisite items on orders and even pay on their behalf. So that’s how that works,” she mused.

  Willam eyed her. “Oh, that happened with the seeds we brought! It was my father that got the order, so I wasn’t quite sure how it happened.”

  “Wait, what?” asked the off-worlder. “How can we pay for something so far away? I mean, in this world?” It was very possible where he came from, but here? They didn’t have datapads and a globalnet.

  “Is that what surprises you about this?” Willam then asked incredulously.

  Theo frowned. “What, so it’s like magic?”

  They laughed at him. “No? That’s how the world works,” the farmer stated.

  “Huh?”

  “When you order something from far away in your ledger, you pay the cost, they receive it, and then send you the order. Easy as that,” Wen explained. At least she thought she did.

  “But they’re not there to receive the money until they get there with the order,” Theo countered. What were these to either not getting about logistics or knew that he didn’t?

  “They don’t have to be, silly! You send the money first!”

  Theo stared at Wen. He then stared at Willam. He stared at both of them. What?

  “I don’t think he understands. His world must really be different,” Willam whispered out loud to Wen.

  “Here,” Theo said, handing Wen his pouch of coins he received from Chaste. “Buy something.”

  Wen accepted the pouch and gawked at the pouch in surprise. “Wait, are you loaded? This is a lot!”

  “It is?” Theo had counted them. Without the coin worth twenty that he had paid Wen with and the five coins for his clothes, there were coins worth another 225. It was certainly enough to stay for quite a while if he had to pay for it, but that was working out differently now. He figured the inn was rather cheap considering the rather destitute villagers of Brook Town could eat and drink there and the rooms themselves weren’t all that much.

  “Well, it’s more than I’ve had in my hand, ever,” she added. “How’d you get this kind of money?”

  “A friend gave it to me, said it would help me with a few days’ worth of a roof and meals. I think you might’ve been charging a bit on the lower end, Wen,” he explained.

  “In what castle should this last only a few days?” the hostess countered.

  Theo shrugged. It didn’t seem that much for Chaste, but… He had been wearing pretty decent-looking clothes. Was Chaste wealthy?

  “I don’t know! Consider me less than a week old!” Theo exclaimed.

  “Anyway,” Willam interrupted. “It seems the System is shared among us, because I see the filters you’ve added, Wen.”

  “If, and only if, we can really get someone here with an order for additional stuff that we can pay for from right here…” Theo started. “Then I agree we should rather buy spare tools than raw materials to process here.”

  Applicant filters active: Preferred worksite: Lumberyard, Forest

  #31 Kenwood Christian Pine

  #44 Julie Woodrow

  #101 B.T. Wubs

  Theo expanded the top listing, getting a screen filled with more details about Kenwood Christian Pine. He was a man, 56 years old and had a few woodcutting and lumberworking skills at Level One or Level Two. It was nothing incredible, to be fair, but those that accepted to go to a newly founded town out in the wild nothing without so much as a tent to live in probably didn’t have much going for them anyway.

  That said, the next listing was far better. So much so, in fact, that Theo faced Wen and saw what must’ve been a similarly surprised expression on her face.

  Julie Woodrow was 27 years old and had not just one, but two Level Three skills in related skills, with plenty more at Level Two. She had a short description about herself, contrary to Mr. Pine, which explained she’d been taught by a Master Woodsmith Woodrow, though no relation was stated. Theo could only begin to guess what a woodsmith was and what counted as a ‘Master’ in a profession, but she seemed more than perfect. Theo was ready to give her the Lumberlord title right away!

  “Is she for real?” Willam asked, having checked out the same listing. “You think she’s escaping the law or something?”

  That made Theo flinch. Of course she was running from something! It was too good to be true! But what if it wasn’t? What if she just wanted to escape her strict tutor and father after considering her long years of learning under him to be over? Wen even offered the same alternative. It was a risk, though. The ‘Bio’ she’d written for herself could be a lie, after all.

  “Order her,” Theo said. The words tasted wrong in his mouth, and he grimaced. What was this, trafficking?

  “You do it,” Wen said with a grin. “Otherwise you probably won’t believe it.”

  That was fair enough. Wen laid the coins out on the ground between them, spreading them out so each and every one was visible. She then howled a girlish scream Theo never expected to hear from her. She dropped back down and picked up a coin with an adorned number ‘1’ on it. There were five of them. The others had an orange-tinted silvery colour to them, yet those five were of a different colour, resembling iron more than anything.

  “You don’t have two hundred and twenty-five coins! You have 720! These ones are worth a hundred!” she exploded.

  “This coin system of yours is embarrassingly stupid,” Theo countered. How was he supposed to know they weren’t simply worth one. That was what they showed!

  Wen growled, but like usual, he wasn’t sure if she was angry or happy. The two seemed very similar when Wen expressed them, he had found. Though he did rather like that slight furrow of her cheek when she looked that way.

  Order applicant #44 Julie Woodrow?

  Note: You may add additional goods required for #44 Julie Woodrow to join your Town. This will not complete an order, but send an offer to the applicant for them to accept or decline at their leisure. Once accepted, the order will be completed. All additional goods will need to be paid by the Town. The applicant is free to bring any additional goods of their own volition. Should the amount of additional goods required by the Town amount to more than 10kg of mass, an additional fee must be paid by the Town for carriage services. This fee will be provided to the applicant, but must not be spent by the applicant.

  Add additional goods to order?

  Complete order

  ‘Interesting’, Theo thought out loud, his finger tapping on his chin. So they could pay her to bring stuff, but if it weighed more than 10kg, they would also have to pay for transport. However, while Julie herself got the additional coin to pay for transport, she could haul it herself and have earned some extra coin for her labour. It was certainly an odd way to do things in a world where coins could be teleported all over, supposedly, but definitely an interesting idea.

  Theo expanded the option of adding more goods to the order.

  Additional goods available in applicant’s vicinity:

  A long list of stuff followed, though he was thankfully aided by filters once more. The mass of an iron axe was 2kg and a saw weighed 4kg somehow. Without needing to pay for a cart, Theo added one saw and three axes to the order.

  Order applicant #44 Julie Woodrow?

  Additional goods in order: 3x Iron Axe, 1x Saw

  Additional goods value: 3x 6 coins + 1x 10 coins.

  Complete order? (cost 28 coins)

  Theo accepted the order. The menu disappeared and he was simply left with a confirmation of the order. He eyed down and several coins were suddenly gone. A few other coins had somehow been added to the pile too! Whatever magic was happening also did small coin change!

  “What?” he burst as he saw the sudden change in coins below. Wen and Willam burst out laughing, but were pretty clear about it not being them that did it while he was placing the order.

  After Theo took it all in, they went back to work ordering people to come to Sigil Lake, the most recently founded village in the world! Most likely, at least.