[N/A : Only description + this chapter is extremely (like really) long, I apologize but you know me now, the description is important and here we are talking about a whole Empire. So there is no status at the end. Courage and good reading]
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-- General --
During the month that Alayna had been traveling with the adventurers, Freya and her people had not stopped working hard once. Today, it was hard to believe that everything had been built in one month when one saw the extraordinary result.
In the place where the Empress had settled a little more than a month ago, there was no longer any plain. This immense expanse of grass was no more and in its place stood an entire kingdom...an Empire. In this Empire, you could see the different races that had settled there working, guided and protected by their Empress Freya. Most of the important buildings had been built and the number of houses was growing every day. With the strength of everyone, their abilities, their wills, and their particularities, the construction had made an exceptional leap. Everyone worked and even took turns working at night while others rested. Soldiers, citizens, commanders, the Empress, her wife and many others had all put aside their duties to help.
During that month, some of the creatures had spotted a dragon with crimson scales going back and forth to the mountain carrying tons of stones. Gaya had been in charge of transporting stones, ores, wood and special dirt that served as cement when wet. With her strength, she had also helped to make a huge and deep hole all around the Empire, leaving several meters untouched as an entrance big enough to pass through. With her Earth Fist skill, the dragoness had no trouble doing the job alone even though it had been quite hard. The crack however was not stuck to the houses, it was located one or two kilometers away to leave room for fields and breeding but also to be able to expand the Empire if necessary.
This idea came from Freya, so she was able to erect ice walls just before the hole, on the side of the city, in order to transform her entire Empire into a fortress with a moat. These ice walls were then covered with special dirt that hardened in the sun and served as a base by Gaya and the winged section from the sky. From there, with the help of everyone, the stone bricks were piled up and after long days became a huge wall protecting the people inside. It extended on both sides to the sea and was higher than any building. Once this was finished, Freya and Gaya had again dug a rift around this defense but this time inside and instead of remaining empty it was filled with water.
The river that passed by the ancient plain had been diverted by the Empress so that it could flow inside her Empire before joining the sea on the right and left sides. Thus the fields that had been built just after on a part of the remaining grass were perfectly irrigated.
The group of the farming section had been one of the few sections that had not helped much, too busy with their work. The 25 half-rabbits and elves had worked the land, planted various things and built pens for the animals captured in the forest. Thanks to their work, the Empire was now able to sustain itself without going back and forth to the forest to often. In time, Freya wanted her city to be self-sufficient in order to avoid the extinction of many creatures in the Dark Forest.
The dwarf group had not helped much physically either, as they were the only ones who could make what Freya needed. The forge was one of the first important buildings to be built so that the dwarves could work easily and quickly. It was built on two floors, on the second floor there was a kitchen, a shower room and a dormitory for the smiths who had asked to sleep together. On the ground floor, which was reserved for their work, there was the main room, the largest room where the dwarves forged and a second room that served as a warehouse for their creations. After the forge was built, the she-wolf had told them briefly about the facilities of her former world without telling them the details, and the passion of the blacksmiths had never waned. They began by building pipes that would be used to carry water to several large wells in the city to supply water to each building. The dwarves then made many objects that they found extraordinary and ingenious, and even reproduced glass with sand. Their help had been crucial during this month of hard work.
Thanks to this, the other important buildings were built quite quickly. In addition to the forge and the fields, there were now three bathhouses, a hospital, an orphanage, a barracks for the soldiers next to a training ground, a general kitchen and the Empress' mansion.
The public baths were easy to build because the river water now flowed throughout the city. The buildings were quite large, scattered throughout the Empire for the citizens and consisted of four large baths, two for women and two for men.
The hospital had a large room filled with beds for future patients, a room reserved for operations, a kitchen, a bathroom and a room filled with offices for the doctors who worked there that also served as a rest room.
The orphanage was quite large, as it had to accommodate the children and the many adults who cared for them and taught them. There was a large dormitory, a dining room, a kitchen next to a small storage room, an entertainment room, a shower room with a huge bath, a study room and several rooms upstairs reserved for the adults who slept there. There was no school yet because it had been decided that all the children for the moment would study at the orphanage, even those who were not orphans.
The soldiers' barracks was one of the largest buildings in the Empire. All the soldiers without families had to be housed there, so its size and height was quite significant. On the ground floor there was a huge canteen, a large rest room, an armory and the offices of the different commanders. On the first and second floor there were many rooms for the soldiers, up to 6 per room. Finally, on the top floor there was the commanders' quarters, with 10 individual rooms, a kitchen, a dining room and a common lounge. And finally, right next to the soldiers' barracks was a training ground surrounded by trees.
For the time being, the general kitchen was also built, but Freya's idea was to turn it into a giant warehouse for the Empire's food later on. It was only there to feed everyone during the construction, but once everyone had their own place it would be useless. The Empress wanted to assign all the cooks to a particular building so that the people living there would not be bothered by the food. So for the moment there were 10 cooks for the manor, the barracks, the orphanage and the hospital. Once the work was finished, 3 would go to the manor, 1 to the orphanage, 1 to the hospital and 5 to the barracks. At the moment there weren't many cooks, but Freya figured that as more people showed up at the gates of the Empire, it would be easier to manage the work. Everyone was well aware of this and everyone helped each other out. The female commanders had also done an exceptional job of helping everyone despite their constant fatigue, they were the most effective in terms of strength and direction.
The sun was shining in the sky and the first city of the Empress had risen. The paved streets were not all finished, but the houses already populated the former plain by the dozen. The streets were wide enough and snaked through the city which made it pleasant, full of space and not at all stuffy. At the moment there was only one main street that was wider than the others, going from the entrance of the Empire to the last building at the back, slightly far away and recognizable among all : the Empress' mansion. Before reaching it, the main street passed in front of the numerous buildings and led to a huge square with a fountain in its center, hidden by the shadow of a gigantic tree.
It was located in the middle of the city where many future businesses would be built. This fountain was imposing, majestic, magnificent and a stone statue was enthroned in its center. It was a woman dressed in a simple dress, barefoot with her hair blowing in the wind, who seemed to be the guardian of the place under this majestic tree. She had been perfectly sculpted by the dwarves and it was easy to see that this woman had generous curves. Contrary to what many had thought at first, the statue of the woman did not represent Freya but the goddess of endless Chaos and eternal frozen Hell. Exactly in the middle of this new city, this new Empire, the statue of the beautiful Goddess Titania stood in the middle facing the sea.
Freya had not explained who this woman was, except that she was a person who had helped her realize her dreams. So the citizens naturally began to thank her in addition to the Empress and see her as a sort of celestial guardian entity.
Thanks to her strength and chaos skills, Freya had also taken care of moving an astronomical number of trees from the forest that had been replanted all over the city, including the huge one in the main square in the center. In addition to having supervised with her wife absolutely all the installations, the she-wolf had taken care to choose the location of each thing meticulously. In this great imperial city, the Empress had decided a month before where the numerous parks and the two small ponds that would be held inside would be located. There were three parks, one in the west, one in the south and one in the east. They were devoid of buildings, filled with trees, flowers and greenery. There were also benches along small dirt paths and a few kiosks. As for the ponds, thanks to the joint work of the dwarves and the workers supervised by Freya because of her knowledge, the irrigation system was perfectly realized and operational. As a result, water flowed through the entire empire, providing water to almost every building, feeding the vegetation and feeding the two ponds. They were quite large and rather long, which led to the construction of several stone bridges to cross them.
But in this town of more than 300 inhabitants, there was one building that was bigger than the others, the most northern, more beautiful and slightly higher than the rest, it was Freya's mansion. It was beautiful, made of stones that had been smoothed and cut with meticulousness. This mansion was shaped like a 3-sided square and had a beautiful garden in its center. It was the last major building to be constructed and was much larger than the Empress had imagined. In front of it was the large main driveway that continued on to its doors. To enter, there was no stone wall as Freya did not want to isolate herself but rather there was a rather imposing gate decorated with a wolf's head on the outside. Once past this gate, the paved path surrounded by grass, continued for several meters before reaching the entrance to the mansion to walk around it. The front of the building was simple with a small fountain and a staircase of several steps that led to the large door. On either side of the staircase at the first step on the left was a pillar with a two-horned she-wolf on its four legs and a dragon with outstretched wings on the right.
When one entered through the large door, there was a large hall with a corridor on both sides and stairs that went up to the right and left of the room to the first floor. Other than that, there was only a large door in front of the entrance that led directly to the throne room. This room was able to accommodate all of Freya's current citizens. It was long, very spacious with huge windows in the back overlooking the garden of the mansion. At the back, following the red carpet laid out on the floor, in front of those same windows in front of a 5-step staircase, the Empress' throne was there. It was huge, black and made of sculpted materials like stone and ice. The armrests were made of black stone as was the backrest which rose upwards with a wolf's head with two horns in its center. All around this backrest there were also ice spikes that made this imperial seat rather scary. Next to this throne, there were two smaller ones. The one on the right was gray and red, adorned with a dragon's head and belonged to Gaya while the one on the left was completely white with a symbol of a full moon and belonged to Princess Shiro. This large room had a perfect light that gave a perfect imperial atmosphere, solemn and incredible.
The first floor of the mansion consisted of the throne room, an equally large reception room next door, a large kitchen, a dining room and several unoccupied rooms. This area was for anyone who came to the Imperial Mansion, so they were not allowed to go up to the upper floors without good reason.
The second floor was reserved for those who worked with Freya, so there was a meeting room, the offices of the many section leaders who did not work at their place of work (like the farmers or the blacksmiths), a kitchen, the imperial library that did not contain any books yet, Freya's imperial office, Gaya's office and some rooms that would be used for those who in the future would be in charge of many tasks like cooks, servants or secretaries.
Finally, the third and last floor was reserved only for Freya and her family, it was strictly forbidden to go there without an urgent reason. It was smaller than the ones below because it was only built for three people, but it was still very large. After the stairs there was a large hallway that continued to the right and to the left passing through the two wings of the mansion. There were five bedrooms, only one of which had a double bed, Freya and Gaya's, a playroom that the she-wolf had requested to spend time with her family, a kitchen, a dining room that was also a large living room, a large bathroom with a large bath and a room with two offices. There were still other rooms but they were not useful yet so they were left for the moment. This floor also had a special place built on Freya's order, it was a small staircase that led to the top of a small tower. The roof and the whole tower were made of glass and there was a table and chairs, greenery but what made this place special was the breathtaking view of the sea that stretched out in the distance. The Empress had thought of this little extra that she had imagined thinking of those who made up her family, being sure to make them smile.
In the middle of this mansion, which was finally almost as big as a castle, there was a large garden with grass, trees and dirt paths. In the middle there was also a fountain surrounded by a garden of sumptuous flowers. This garden extended to the end of the small cliff because the building had been built at its edge. Therefore, Freya had planted trees at the edge of this famous cliff just after a limit made with a stone wall. In the middle of this small forest, there was a white kiosk that was bathed in sunlight. The garden was beautiful and there was a soothing, serene, warm and soft atmosphere. This place had been made entirely by the Empress who had worked for the pleasure of seeing her wife and daughter happy.
Finally, outside the mansion on the left, there was Freya's personal training ground that was destined to evolve over time and on the right the stable where Pearl and Inferno would live.
This great house was to the north, imposing, magnificent and represented the new Empire that had just been built by the Empress and her citizens. The very first Empire in this world that was not of the human race, the first Empire in the world to be different and modern. The first Empire to symbolize the end of an era of terror, despair and death for the half-humans and the first Empire that would be the refuge, the place of peace, the paradise for all those who would come exhausted, wounded in search of a place where they could be happy. This Empire had made everyone's dream come true.
The Empress had built her Kingdom and it was time for her to be crowned and marry the very first person to have made her frozen and ruthless heart beat.
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[N/A: It's possible I've forgotten some things, if so I'll talk about them in the next chapters. I could have continued to describe but it would have been too long (so I did the "main thing"). Also, I'm sorry, for the illustration images I found matching the Empire description you'll have to see on Discord (there are way too many)].