Alex after a long journey of raiding bandits and helping the citizens had finally returned to the capital. Except for him, everyone felt that the journey was quite short.

The schedule of going and returning from Godavari mines which should have taken from four to five days has been extended to nine days.

As Alex reached the city, he slowed down the pace of his horse and decided to inspect how things had changed while he was gone.

As he reached near the city walls, he saw many people working on reinforcing the wall.

All the cracks in the wall have been sealed and some parts were broken down entirely and then new walls were made in those places.

It was a pity that there was no mage in Nevan and it would still take a month to successfully integrate his mana heart so the wall can’t be reinforced with magic.

Still, something was better than nothing.

Alex looked at the masons and craftsmen who were working on the wall and roads which were being supervised by the servant of nobles whom Alex had given the task.

The worker and labour class, who were out of work for years had now got a pile of work on them.

At least, for now, they can get the money to live their lives and get the daily necessities.

Alex scanned and observed the city’s scenic beauty. The roads were quite clean now and the dreary roads were starting to fill with people coming and going out of their homes.

The shabby shops have all started to operate once again though they were still shabby.

The inns and taverns had also opened for the influx of people who may gather thereafter hard work.

The gloominess was slowly disappearing followed by the forthcoming of mirth and joy among the people.

Slowly and steadily, the capital was returning to normal.

Every time people saw Alex and a group of men, they would occasionally stop to give a bow out of politeness and respect.

Max and Ben can be said to be popular figures who are tasked with City Safety and maintaining law and order for now until they can gather more personnel.

…..

As soon as Alex entered the castle, a figure appeared and jumped on Alex.

Alex smiled and extended his hand and pulled Riya into his embrace.

“My Lord, what took you so long?” Riya spoke with a cute pout while resting her head on Alex’s chest.

Alex just caressed her long silky smooth hair and spoke”I had some miscellaneous matter to handle on my way. I helped some people and punished some evildoers on my way.”

“Ohh!” Riya exclaimed and flashed a gentle smile with a knowing expression.

“So, how are things here,” Alex asked Riya.

“We have already used the money we got to balance the efflux and influx money.”

“Building and Construction are also going quite well.”

“The only problem we are having now is with the merchants.”

Alex’s mood soured when Riya told him about them.

Previously, due to Nevan’s poor state, all the merchants packed their things and left Nevan.

Merchants are valuable assets of each Kingdom. After all, without merchants, one kingdom cannot import or export things as merchants are the most significant channel in exchanging things.

“Riya, please try to arrange a meeting with them. I will talk with them.”

“By the way Riya, I got some donations while coming back. Those good people were so good that they gave us everything they had earned through their hard work for the growth of the Kingdom.” Alex spoke with a solemn expression showing his respect for those poor souls who donated their money which they got after working their asses off.

While Riya made an awed expression and thanked god for the kind and charitable people.

“Ohh! May god bless these kind and noble people who donated their wealth for the cause of people.” Riya prayed sincerely.

Max and Ben’s lips twitched uncontrollably hearing Alex’s words.

Donations, kind and hard-working people.

What kind of bullshit is this?

This man raided and looted every bandit and thief on his way.

Some bandit even doubted their own existence and wondered if they were bandits or him.

The bandits cried tears of blood, seeing Alex thick-skinned calling himself a Saint who is stealing for the good of the country.

Hearing Alex’s words, they wanted to rush and shut his mouth from praising the bandits anymore.

“Riya, I have brought the iron ores.”

“Is everything else ready,” Alex asked.

Riya nodded and led Alex to a secluded place at the back of the castle.

Alex entered the ground and looked at the huge oval-shaped furnace drawn out with many beehive cones.

The production of blast furnaces according to Alex’s instructions had been finally been crafted.

Alloys are an unexplored field in this world.

The alloys people knew were generally of higher metals like adamantium.

While people neglected low-level metals, Alex knew that by combining and creating alloys of bronze, and brass and using steel to craft weapons, they would get an edge over their neighbouring Kingdom and have solid and robust weapons.

For low tier kingdoms, iron is primarily material to make ore as there aren’t any good blacksmiths in this kind of place who can make the artifacts and if by any chance a good blacksmith is born, they would be taken by Kinely and treated as nobles.

Steel is fairly easy to make if one knows the procedure right and after some experiments on a smaller scale, Alex was finally able to produce a fillet of still.

Generally, it was the blacksmith’s job to extract the metal and clear the impurities and make weapons.

But going by this process is quite cumbersome as he had to take a fillet of ore and refine it and purify it and then start hammering to make the weapon.

Most of the time was taken in extracting metal but what would happen if Alex could extract the metal in mass quantities and provide them with materials ready to craft weapons in one go.

With the furnace, he would extract iron in huge quantities and make the steel.

Steel is not as easy to make as it sounds and he would have to use all his previous life knowledge of metallurgy to do this.

Getting carbon steel is quite easy but getting higher quality stainless steel which is one of the dense and stronger metals is going to be difficult.

Still, he laughed seeing the things in front of him.

“Hehehee!”

“In a few days, I am going to change the whole Nevan.”