How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom: Volume 1

“Huh? Uh… Yeah, sorta. But we were almost at the point where we could afford the budget for a large-scale project, so I ended up working my full consciousness for that last push.”

When I said that, Liscia sighed a little. “I know you’re working hard, but… don’t make me worry. Because you’re irreplaceable, all right?”

“Ha ha, if it comes to it… you can just summon another hero, can’t you?” I asked.

“You dummy! If you say another word about that, I’ll slap you!”

I turned my face to look at Liscia. There was real anger in her eyes.

“Even if we summoned another hero, that person wouldn’t be you,” she snapped. “You’re the one I want, Souma.”

“R-Right…” I faltered.

“Never forget. You’re the one I want to be king, Souma. I’ll accept no substitutes. If my father were to demand the crown back, I’d fight him at your side.”

When she made that incredible declaration with a straight face, all I could do was nod my head.

Somehow, it felt like I’d seen a portion of her motherly courage there. Liscia was going to make an amazing bride someday. That I was (planned to be) the groom, however, was something I still didn’t feel right about.

Liscia seemed satisfied with my response for now. “So? You were talking about a budget, but what do you need all that money for?”

“Oh, for a start, I was thinking I’d build a city.”

“A city?” she asked.

I had Liscia fetch a map of the country from my work desk. Looked at as a whole, the territory of the country looked like a < shape, and I pointed to the center of it.

“We’ll build a coastal city here. Also, we’ll be moving forward with road construction at the same time. If we have a transportation network from a coastal city to all of the other cities, we can control both marine and land transportation. That should allow us to make distribution much smoother. Honestly, it’s a wonder to me how such prime real estate has remained untouched up until now.”

Incidentally, northeast of that spot was Lagoon City, a coastal city ruled by one of the three dukes, Navy Admiral Excel Walter. Currently, Lagoon City was the largest trade port in this country, but at the same time it was also a naval base with docks for battleships. With a trading port where goods from around the world gathered and a naval base with its need for confidentiality linked to each other, there were mismatched priorities. In a crisis, that could lead to trade being stopped.

For that reason, too, it was urgent that we build a new city with a trading port.

“This coastal city will be the beating heart of this country, and the roads that stretch out from it will be its veins,” I explained. “If distribution is smooth, when there is a shortage of some goods in the south, they can be shipped in from where they’re plentiful in the north. Do you know what that means?”

“Um… You buy goods where the prices have been lowered by abundance, then resell them in places where the price has risen due to demand… or something like that?” she asked.

“No, no, I’m not a merchant. The king can’t be the one doing that.”

“You can’t?” She seemed surprised.

“What good would it do to take money from my people when I’m trying to make them prosperous?” I asked.

Well, if we’d been speaking purely about foreign trade, she’d have been right, but for domestic trade, we needed to think not as individuals, but as a country.

“Certainly, at first, there will be merchants who do that and make money hand over fist. However, eventually, the supply shortage will be resolved. Once supply and demand are in balance, the high prices should gradually come back down. We can plan for price homogenization across the country. Basically…”

“…people will be able to buy the things that were too expensive for them before?” she finished.

I gave Liscia’s answer a satisfied nod. “Currently, the largest rising demand in the majority of this country is foodstuffs. In order to stabilize prices on those, we urgently need to secure distribution routes. Besides, more than half of this country’s border is with the sea. We should be able to harvest a lot of maritime products. If those can be hauled overland, we can solve the food crisis in no time.”

“Even now, we’re able to bring dried and pickled goods inland, you know?” she said.

“Well, can you live on dried and pickled fish forever?” I asked. “Me, I’d get tired of it.”

“Well… Yes, I suppose I would, too.”

Dried horse mackerel is tasty, but I definitely wouldn’t have wanted to eat it every day. The salt in it is there to fight bacteria and decay, so you can’t change the flavor, even if you do get tired of it. Fish spoils fast to begin with, and even dried, it will turn in a matter of days. That was why the speed at which we could ship fish and shellfish inland was so important.

“That’s what the transportation network is for, huh?” she mused.