Easygoing Territory Defense by the Optimistic Lord

After finishing the sewage treatment, we headed toward the castle walls under construction.

As expected of Espada. Looking toward the highway, a gigantic wall had already expanded its range far beyond last time.

"Oh, that's fast. Haven't we already built about thirty meters?"

When I said that, Espada nodded while holding a map.

"The straight wall at the front is fine, but the section after that gets a bit tricky. We need to create angles to draw a regular hexagon."

"So the plan is to make the corners later, right? Then first, let's draw lines on the ground. Espada, you handle building the front wall."

"Understood."

Espada immediately agreed to my vague instructions. So cool. A model butler.

If I, the person in charge of drawing the lines, turned out to be incompetent, that would be a disaster, but well, it should be manageable.

"I learned about triangulation, but I don't remember much... Well, since the village is the center, let's decide the corners so they form the diagonals."

While thinking about that and checking the angles, Panamera approached from behind with some soldiers.

"Are you checking the angles? How do you plan to draw the lines?"

"It's a hexagon, but is there a problem?"

When I asked, Panamera put his hand to his chin, looked around, and nodded.

"You're talking about the castle wall's positioning, right? In that case, we'll help. If you measure lengths with ropes and connect some lines, you'll get a pretty accurate diagram. Let's start by measuring one side."

With that, Panamera strode off with his soldiers toward Espada.

That left only Arte.

I was more surprised that there wasn't even a single escort soldier with her.

"Are you okay staying here alone?"

When I spoke, Arte blushed slightly and nodded repeatedly. Well, I guess that means she's trusted.

"Then, we'll watch the surveying and work on reinforcing the castle walls."

Saying that, we committed ourselves to building the walls today.

Climbing up to the newly built top of the castle wall, we installed the ballista.

"Lord Van, what exactly is this?"

"It's a ballista. Like a huge bow and arrow. We'll use it to protect the village."

After explaining, Arte glanced down at the device.

"It's really big and long. And very..."

"It's scary the first time you see it, right? But the bigger it is, the more powerful it becomes."

"Lord Van... somehow that sounds a bit suggestive... n-no, I mean, it's nothing..."

Arte's choice of words almost caused a misunderstanding, so I couldn't resist teasing her a little. Til, who tends to interpret kids' conversations in a lewd way, turned bright red and got embarrassed.

Well, Til has already turned eighteen. It's natural for him to have some naughty fantasies.

Hehehe.

"Kamushin. Show them how it's done."

When I gave him the order, Kamushin replied cheerfully, "Yes!" and operated the ballista, aiming at a distant tree.

We made the top of the castle wall spacious and upgraded the ballista to a larger two-tier model than last time. This allowed two consecutive shots from one ballista.

I wanted to make something like a repeating crossbow, but I thought it might fail on the first try, so I held back.

Van-kun is, after all, a boy. I don't want to show him failing in front of two cute girls.

Rather, I want to hear them say, "Wow, amazing!"

Just as I was seriously thinking that, Kamushin fired the ballista.

There was a tremendous sound as the whole ballista shook, and the arrow shot out powerfully. The larger size must have helped. The arrow, as thick as an adult's arm, pierced through the middle of a big tree and broke two or three more trees behind it.

Hmm. The power has increased dramatically. Since the arrow's sharpness remains, the power is improved, so large demonic beasts wouldn't stand a chance.

"Yeah. This is pretty good. If we line up these, the defense should be decent, right?"

When I said that and turned around, Arte blinked in surprise.

"D-did bows really have this kind of power...?"

"It's a ballista. Much stronger than ordinary bows."

After explaining that to a surprised Arte, Til and Kamushin exchanged looks that were hard to describe.