After the meeting, as Roland requested, all the officials left except Barov.
The prince said to his City Hall Director Barov explicitly, "Now you see, both labs and Graycastle's factories need hands, and so do I. I plan to manufacture soaps and perfume on a large scale, but I have to wait until another batch of students, and at most 600 to 700 of them, will graduate in the following year to be recruited as the workers I need. It's obvious that even at that time, the graduates won't be able to meet the manpower demand. Given that, I need larger population."
"What about recruiting more workers from the stronghold..."
"No," Roland interrupted. "I'll establish a city next year and by then the stronghold will become part of it. Recruiting people from there is like moving the money in one of your pockets to another. It's pointless. I need to recruit more people from outside the Western Region."
