Chapter 15: Expansion of Homes
Personal System Calendar: Year 00014, Day 1-28, Month IX: The Imperium
Imperial Calendar: Year 6858, 1st to 28th day of the 9th Month
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Approval and More
Winter was already creeping back onto the horizon. Summer had been short this year, and fall had arrived later than usual to make up the difference, which left everyone feeling like the seasons themselves were running behind schedule. The farming families said as much during their morning rounds, comparing notes about how this year's pattern didn't quite match anything they'd tracked before.
To ease the housing pressure in Zone Two, people had already begun moving into Zone Four. There had been a real housing crisis brewing well before the refugee surge made it worse. Zone Two's comfortable housing capacity sat at around six thousand five hundred and sixteen people, but somewhere along the way more than seven thousand two hundred had ended up packed into it. Nobody had planned for that gap deliberately. It had simply happened a little at a time, families growing, new arrivals settling in faster than new homes could rise to meet them, until the strain became impossible to ignore. With Zone Four finally opening, those people now had somewhere to go. The homes there came complete with furniture already in place. Families moving in only needed to handle the finishing touches, which made the transition far smoother than anyone moving house had any right to expect.
Sibus's apartment proposal had been approved. Existing buildings in Zone Two were being raised to six floors, which Sibus had been clear was the practical ceiling given the construction methods available to them right now. The original three-story design had been a conservative estimate from the start, nobody wanting to push past what they were confident the foundations could hold. Six floors was still safely within that margin, since the buildings had actually been engineered with that ceiling in mind from the beginning, even if the first round of construction had stopped well short of it. Three additional floors would bring each building's capacity up to roughly eighty people.
On the longhouse side, some homes in Zone Two were being expanded the same way August's own household had been, a second connected structure built onto the back. Zone One could handle this kind of expansion comfortably, plenty of space there, and that work was already underway. Zone Two, given how tight its land already ran, could only realistically manage this for around twelve percent of its existing homes. The real growth for this style of housing would happen in Zone Four, which still had enough open land to make it the easy default rather than a special accommodation.
The underground water tank system had also been revised, narrowed down specifically to buildings with constant, high-volume water needs. Taverns, the planned hospital, places like that. Twelve had been built so far, eleven of them in Zone Two and one in Zone One, August's own home serving as the original test case for the design. Zone One had room for two more to serve its other households, and Zone Two had twelve more planned on top of what already existed.
Grain storage in Zone Two had become a real problem. Only three silos had ever been built there, each rated for around two thousand bushels, roughly one hundred fifty tons combined across all three. Nowhere near enough for a population this size. Earth elementalists had already started digging beneath the existing silos to expand their underground capacity, with a target of fifteen hundred tons per silo once the work finished. The Imperial workforce of a thousand laborers, already in the village helping with construction, made a real difference here. Their presence sped the whole process up considerably.
More homes kept rising in Zone Four alongside all of this. Twenty more apartment buildings were planned, though none of them would get the six-floor treatment yet, not until the design had been properly tested in Zone Two first. Thirty more longhouses were going up as well, and these were already being built to the August model home from the start, since that design had proven itself enough to become the default for new construction. Some of the smaller families moving in had even started agreeing to split the doubled longhouse between two households, each taking one half of the structure rather than waiting for their families to grow into the whole thing themselves. These homes were rated to comfortably hold around twenty-four people.
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A Growing Household and Village
August's own home was due for some remodeling soon. Most of the founding members of Talon One were still away at the academy, but it was hard to ignore that the household itself kept growing regardless, especially with the children. Griz and Hela took up more space than they used to, in the literal sense as much as anything, and Adessa's presence meant the nursery arrangement they'd improvised would need rethinking before too long. There was also the quieter consideration that several of those still at the academy had paired off into relationships of their own, which meant more changes were likely coming whenever they returned for good. For now that particular conversation stayed on hold.
August had already asked Sibus to start drawing up plans for the next round of expansion. Zone One made an ideal testing ground, plenty of open space to work with, and August's own plot wasn't boxed in by neighboring structures the way some others were. They could build outward or build upward, whichever made more sense once Sibus worked through the actual numbers. Theressa had her own request to add to the list, complaining that the garden had gotten too small and she was asking for a proper miniature greenhouse to replace it, something that could keep producing through the colder months instead of going dormant every winter the way the open beds did. Between one thing and another, August's household had quietly become the testing ground for just how far these longhouse designs could actually be pushed.
There was also talk of an entirely different kind of housing, something a few residents had specifically requested. Outside the village, most people lived in smaller single-family homes, not the nuclear-family-plus-extended setup of a longhouse that the village has, but not packed into an apartment building either. Something in between. For now the village held off on the idea entirely. Resources were already stretched thin enough chasing growth and stability. Maybe once Sibus had the breathing room to actually draft something, that conversation could happen properly. But not yet.
Their industry was also running at eighty to ninety percent of current capacity, with output spiking even higher whenever a larger order came through. It was becoming clear that a dedicated industrial section, separate from the general zones, was probably coming sooner rather than later.
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The Two Towers and Other Projects
Mistress Mirabeth Flamespyre's tower was about ninety-five percent finished, even without it being treated as a priority project given everything else competing for labor and materials. It sat further off from Master Ben's own tower, both of them within the boundary shared by Zone One and Zone Two, but on opposite sides of the cliff face. Facing the mountain from Zone Two's side, Mirabeth's tower sat to the right, tucked in near the end of the mountain's V-shaped tip without crowding the walls or looking out of place. Master Ben's tower held the left and further inward towards the V.
Looking at Zone One now, the two towers framed it from either side of the cliff, a kind of architectural symmetry nobody had specifically planned for but that worked out well regardless. The building itself was ready for occupancy in every meaningful sense. Only a handful of small details remained before it could be called properly finished. It carried its own distinct look compared to Ben's tower, sitting noticeably lower on the slope, which gave it a quieter presence even standing in the same general direction.
The barracks, the school, and the administrative building were all still in progress, though only at the foundation stage for now. Most of the current labor was going toward what the village needed immediately. Everything else would come in time.
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The Department Proposal
With the immediate housing and food security concerns finally stabilizing, a different kind of proposal landed in front of the council. A streamlined departmental structure, meant to take the village's increasingly scattered administrative functions and consolidate them under a smaller number of clearly defined departments, each with its own head answerable to the council rather than every small decision routing back to Red's office directly.
Maya Village — Departmental Structure
Office of the Chief & Elder Council
It remained the overarching seat of governance in Zone One, Red Peerce presiding as its officially recognized Village Chief or Head; he also has the final authority on village-wide matters.
Department of Security & Defense
Headed by Supreme Commander August Finn, it consolidated the Settlement Security Division, Patrol Division (with the Grimfang Cavalry as a sub-branch), Guard Escort Division, Beastfolk Specialized Force, Militia, and Auxiliary Combat Support. Talon One and Talon Two remained outside this structure entirely, answering to August directly the way special operations units typically did.
Department of Health & Civil Welfare
Headed by Theressa Peerce, brought together clinical care, field medicine, and what had until now been Donna Campbell's informal counseling practice, finally given proper standing given how much demand the refugee crisis had placed on it.
Department of Agriculture
It would be headed by Theon Harvest, at only twenty-seven years old, whose specialty in irrigation and water management made him the clear choice with Zone Four's farmland coming online and a refugee population still needing to be fed. He'd grown up in the village his entire adult life, giving him both the institutional trust and the practical knowledge the role demanded. Janei Plowman and Reyna Barley, both strong candidates in their own right for soil conservation and seed development respectively, were positioned as his deputies.
Department of Architecture & Infrastructure
Stayed under Sibus Dino, consolidating engineering, construction, and ongoing maintenance of the village's water, road, and wall systems.
Department of Commerce & Industry
Went to Andy Shoor, with Marcus Fernando as his deputy, covering trade, market regulation, and the village's production facilities.
Department of Immigration & Civil Affairs
Split into two closely linked roles given how directly tied infrastructure and refugee intake had become during the current crisis. Petyr Mason, thirty-one, took the civil infrastructure side, his background in urban planning a direct match. Esmerelda took immigration specifically, her own history as a refugee who'd come through the village's integration process years earlier giving her an understanding of the experience that nobody else who ran for office could match.
Department of Education
Went to Jeany Hermes, the natural choice given her gift for teaching and the speed at which she'd absorbed formal pedagogy since arriving. Young for the role, but with Theressa stepping back from her education commitments to focus fully on health, she remained close at hand as Jeany's senior advisor, a handover that felt more like a natural continuation than a risk.
Intelligence
remained unofficial for now. Juan Tamad's small unit continued operating without formal department status, no records, no name, by design rather than oversight.
Outside the structure entirely sat Master Ben's tower, independent of village administration, and the Imperial Garrison, which coordinated with the village without ever truly answering to it.
The departments would now handle the bulk of ongoing maintenance, planning, and administrative work directly, freeing the council from having to personally draft and approve every individual proposal that came through. Each department head would bring matters forward as needed, with the council acting more as an approval body for funding and major decisions than as the source of every plan itself. It was, by every account, a relief. The council had been stretched thin for longer than anyone wanted to admit.
More departments would likely follow as the village kept growing. For now, this was the structure they had.
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The Grimfang Pack and The Eagle Flock
Away from all the paperwork, the Grimfang wolves who'd settled permanently in the village were, more or less, living their best lives.
At certain hours you'd catch them wandering the streets specifically looking for belly rubs, more dog than wolf in those moments despite their size. Both children and adults had stopped being afraid of them after a while, and now it was common enough to see a wolf the size of a small horse lying flat on its side in the middle of a street while some kid scratched its stomach without a second thought. Their dens sat scattered throughout the village, dug deliberately into quiet corners, and if you looked closely enough at the right time of day you'd catch a pair of eyes watching from somewhere inside the dark and half-hidden, sizing up whoever walked past.
Some days they left the village entirely to hunt with their pack. Other days they joined humans on a hunt instead, or extended the invitation the other way around, depending on what kind of mood the pack was collectively in. Nobody had ever formally arranged this. It had simply become the norm, the way most things in Maya eventually did.
One particular pup had earned the name Scratch, on account of how much he liked exactly that. Still mostly wild at heart, he didn't take kindly to being touched without his permission given first, though he was warming up to it slowly, a little more each season. He'd grown especially close with the beastfolk in particular, gravitating toward them in a way he didn't quite extend to everyone else yet, though even that was starting to soften around the edges.
The eagles kept a different kind of distance. More reserved with humans than the wolves ever were, closer in temperament to nobility than to pets, the kind of creatures that interacted on their own terms when they felt like it and not a moment before. They knew exactly what they were worth, and they carried themselves accordingly to their standards.