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Ch.73: City Planning
🕑 Added 2025-02-24 07:00:07 +0000 UTCBolton Lands
POV of Domeric Bolton
Today, the alchemists Domeric had hired in Kings Landing finally arrived by ship to Dreadfort after two whole moons' worth of time.
If he had not used portkey to travel back from King’s Landing after the end of the tournament, he would similarly have wasted two months on a ship. The thought made him shudder.
He was never a fan of conventional muggle vehicles. Especially the ones that travel on water. And the fact that these medieval ships rocked a lot even in a rather calm ocean made it so that the only time he traveled in these ships was when he had to put up a show so that people wouldn't suspect him of using his teleportation powers.
After meeting with the Wisdoms, he led them to their new workshop which was larger and cleaner than the one in King’s Landing, and gave them their first task.
Create cement. And concrete after that.
The thing was that despite being in the medieval world, these people already had some kind of mortar made up of volcanic ash that acts as a decent substitute for cement and is used in the construction of their castles, buildings, and walls.
The problem was that the concrete made from this mortar did not hold up to the elements. Which meant that making roads from it would be foolish and far more expensive than it had any right to be.
So, he found a quarry of limestone in Skagos and imported it here along with the few other core materials required to make cement and gave all this material to the Alchemists along with a decent explanation of how cement was made. Thanks to the book he got as a reward in the past, ‘Buildings and Construction’, he had all the necessary knowledge.
If they succeed in this then Domeric would have access to concrete and would finally be able to build roads in his domain.
Decent concrete roads and not the dirt path that everyone else seems to accept as proper roads in this world.
Merlin knows that a proper cement factory along with a brick factory would work wonders to improve the infrastructure of this world.
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Dreadfort Castle
POV of Domeric Bolton
Domeric realized that it was time to design a city planning for his city around Dreadfort.
By this point, every other lord in the North knew about the rapidly expanding businesses in the Bolton Lands.
Paper Mill, Brick Factory, Steel Factory, Shipyards, Glass Guild, Weapon Manufacturing Factory, Printing Press Workshop, Cleaning Supply Factory, Board Games Workshop, Clock&Watch Manufacturing Workshop, Clock Towers, School Building (still under construction), Library (still under construction) etc.
All these things and more have been built around Dreadfort over the past few years. And the more his businesses succeeded and flourished, the more people came to his lands to work for him.
All of this led to a rapid increase in the number of people living around the city’s construction area which resulted in them forming a sort of village around Dreadfort.
A collection of temporary houses and tents constructed haphazardly with no care for aesthetics or order.
This was the reason why he had called architects from his lands to design the plans for the city around Dreadfort and the Weeping Water River. Till now he only constructed some buildings that he needed and didn’t make a proper city design. After all, a city needs a dense population and without it, couldn’t be called a city.
But things have changed now. People were coming to Dreadfort to settle here not just for business or other reasons. So, he needed to plan things carefully.
It took his men three days to come up with a proper design and two more to revise it as the plans didn't hold the numerous Weirwood gardens that he wanted in his city.
The architects warned him that having luxuries like gardens would then force them to expand the size of the city, which would in turn cost much more to build. But he knew that planting Weirwood trees was not a luxury but a necessity for someone like him.
Plus, with his brick and cement factory, along with ships that would transport the raw material from Skagos and Sisterton, and stones from the mines in Lonely Hill, the costs had already become far less than normally they would be for any other lord who had to import these things from outside sources.
The difference was so large that if some other Lord of the North wanted to build a 2-story building for a tavern then it would cost him about 20-30 gold dragons but to him, it would only cost about 5-10 gold dragons thanks to everything required for the construction of a building already being present in his domain.
A week after planning and replanning the whole design, they finally came up with one that he was satisfied with.
The construction of the whole city around Dreadfort was going to cost him an estimated cost of 150,000 to 400,000 gold dragons. A number that his treasury can handle thanks to all the gold he stole from Petyr Baelish and the 1 million gold coins that he stole from Braavos.
But he cannot simply show the extent of his wealth like this as it would make the other lords wary of him.
Which meant that he would once again have to go to Braavos to get another 100,000 gold coins for loan as a show to other people.
Or maybe he would send his aunt for this job. After seeing him gallivanting around Westeros and Essos, she had shown some desire to travel the world as well.
Of course, she didn't say any such thing to him, but he picked it up from her longing expression that she did from time to time.
Going to Braavos, traveling to the city, and seeing its culture and people would be a good change for her. Especially because she spent a good deal of her time cooped up in Dreadfort.
It could be like a vacation for her after working all this time.
Hmm… yes. That would be good. However, he would have to plan for the bodyguard detail that would guard his aunt on her journey to Braavos. Along with an emergency portkey and a few other things that would protect her if something went wrong. Of course, Bethany, his aunt’s direwolf, would follow her anywhere she went.
She was, after all, the only family he had, and he would do everything for her safety.
