Home Is Where You Build It | Roskana/Elenrian Diaspora

[StaolDerg]

He felt terrible.

The seasickness wasn’t great too, but the shame of being in his late forties and hurling over the deck every couple minutes was not the sort of role model that he would really like to be.

As he felt his stomach turn over again and he leaned past the railings, the yellow-streaked inselni behind him patted his shoulder sympathetically.

”We’re almost there, Monsa.”

The elder man picked himself from the railing, making a face as he got his bearings. “How… how long now until port?”

The inselni cast a look towards the bow of the ship behind them. “At least one or two more hours. If you squint, you can see the outcroppings of the shoreline.” He turned back towards the human and pulled a water bottle from the belt of his dress.

“Drink up. I think you’re the only one of us elders who still has a gut, you can’t possibly go losing it now.”

Monsa chuckled hoarsely, as he accepted the bottle, drinking deeply. “I will be honest, Anse. I didn’t expect the others to simply say yes so readily. I thought Lao Chen would have to pick up after me to get them to agree.”

“What would they say otherwise?” Anse watched the waves of the sea dissipate in the ship’s wake.. “The alternative is to stay in Zedonia, and become Gaelic citizens. I for one don’t enjoy being a colonial. And have you heard what Pei Sei said about how the Kumo do things? Would anyone go to the old homeland now at this time?”

Monsa nodded slowly. “Fair enough, I suppose.”

“Why did you want to leave Zedonia, brother?”

The human paused at the question. “…What is there for us in Zedonia? I do not want to serve the Gaelians, who’d happily have taken the place of the Kumo had they not been beaten at Hawaii. Kumosenkan… well, nothing needs to be said about them that can’t be said without words. Where can out children have a better future to learn and grow? Where could we send Expeditions that isn’t immediately a war zone? ”

The inselni cocked his head in thought. “Hm.”

They stared at the waves, and looked up as a seabird glided over them, calling as it circled out in a curve back towards the ship. It seemed ready to make its perch on a ventilation tube just beside the inselni at first, but seemingly at the last possible moment it seemed to halt in the air, flapping wildly as landed smoothly on Anse’s left upper horn.

Monsa stared at the beady-eyed look of the bird in surprise and laughed.

Bemused, Anse waved at the bird. “Really, my head? Do I look like a wooden post to you? Off you get!”

The bird fluttered off onto the railing, squawking indignantly.

“Perhaps you ought to pat down your horns with straw.” Monsa suggested. “Give it a nice little nest, no?”

Anse grinned. “Do you think seabirds enjoy having padding in their nests? Silk, maybe?”

Monsa laughed for what he thought was the first time this week. “Ah, just build a palace for the bird at that point!”

---

Mira.

The unfamiliar port was beyond alien to the Zedonia Elenrians as they disembarked from the passenger liner that had delivered them here. Completely unfamiliar with the everything from the climate to the language, the foreigners huddled in a crowd apart from the rest of the ship’s disembarking parties, waiting for their leaders to come to a decision.

They looked around with a sense of apprehension, with their cloaks wrapped tightly around themselves as they tried to not draw attention.

[“Meni, Sen Ka Feng, Po En, Re Sen, Wen, Mo, Kei…”] The elder finished off her count of the households with a nod. [“Yes, that’s everyone in our group.”]

Another elder raised their hand. [“What about the other households we left? Are they still coming?”]

[“The plan remains unchanged,”] Monsa replied. “They will probably arrive a some time after we do. For now, we are better off trying to figure out how to conduct the immigration process.”

He looked around. [“Some of the signs are in Common, I think. Does anyone know modern Common?”]

There was some murmuring between the group before a few hands rose.

[“Excelllent. In the back, over there, come up! Can you read the signs?”]

There was a moment of pained squinting and muttering from the villager before they shook their head in defeat. [“No. Common must’ve been changed again since the last century, I can’t make head nor tail of any of it!”]

Anse sighed. [“This won’t work. Let us find a member of the authorities and ask for help.”]

[“How?”] One of the elders frowned, looking about. [“Why would they understand us? They surely can’t speak our language.”]

[“We don’t know where to go regardless.”] Anse reasoned. [“Stay here while Monsa and I seek help. We won’t be an hour.”]

The two Elenrians ignored any stares they got for the clattering of metal plates in their jewelry as they strode down the harborfront, seeking a member of the port authority. Still, they failed to look any more confident than a bunch of lost ducks as they bounced from unreadable signs to unfamiliar uniforms with official-looking people behind them, only to be vastly disappointing when they eventually reached the conclusion they had in fact met a postman after several minutes of intense gesticulating.

They nearly gave up when they approached a final official-appearing person on the docks, speaking to a fisherman. With a shred of hope remaining, they approached the official, and in his best common he could muster, Anse spoke up.

“Allow I?”

[VoxApocrypha]

Looking up from his clipboard, they looked up from it and set their pencil into the fluff of their chest, the Festria looking them over and then a moment later, turned.
"..Allow I?" He'd turn his head slightly. "..Mmm.." He stepped to the side, and looked down the dock at the huddling mass of elenrians. "..Alright then.." He'd hold a hand up there in basically the unvierse hand sign for 'One moment', before he turned and made his way towards the port authority building.

A few moments later, coming out from the building would be a pair of men, with one of which that looked to be of Elenrian descent. They were on the older side, and were in part being supported by the green uniformed man on their right, guiding the human man to the dock and then down to the Elenrian that had approached the fisherman, who would return to his duties as the port authorities took over. Clearing their throat, they'd speak.

["Hello! Did you need help?"]

[StaolDerg]

Great relief washed over both Elenrians' faces. "[Thank heavens. Yes, we need directions to the immigration office of Roskana. We've come here with our households in search of a new life.]"

The crowd of Elenrians on the docks stared at the distant conversation with nervous mutters and looks.

"What if Roskana doesn't work out?"

"We cannot afford passage to another land. We can't go home, because we don't have one anymore. We must make the best of what we have here, or at least until we can work enough money to move our community again."

[VoxApocrypha]

The Elenrian man would after a moment ,reach up and take his hat off, a small smile breaking out across his face.
["Well then. You've come to the right place. Follow me, the Immigration office is just next to the port authority."] He would gesture for them to follow, while another would go back to the port authority and then later, cross to the immigrations building as the new Elenrian immigrants were gathered there to be, a few at a time, processed. Border guard personnel and Customs Enforcement, as well as some Auran police, would arrive with paramedics for extra hands not too long after, and they'd start to do medical screenings and first aid. The guards for the most part were just there as crowd control and to keep things organized.

One by one, they were sent through six stations manned by clerks who worked dilligently and quickly, all of them representative of the different races that Roskana harbored, including as well a Elenrian hybrid among the group. They would be given passports, National-IDENTS of which were basically paper cards with their names, ages, and so on on them, and then issued a Immigrations Tracking Number on their card. They'd be guided into what was basically a barracks, though much more well furnished and not geared towards the military, and then the overflow into another couple of barracks, overall housing them for the time being.

And then, after, a single man from the Immigrations Office would step inside, with a black suited Festria women with long hair following.
The Elenrian Officer from before would be with them, and they'd be the translator. The Festria speaks, and the officer would translate after.

["This is Commissioner Rosvardia Marina Alden. She is the acting Immigrations Official for the Roskanan Government and the one of whom operates this border control district. She's here, for you. She does not know your langauge but I will be your intermediary. And she has told me to tell you, that for tonight, you will rest here. And for as long as you need after you may too. But tomorrow, the work begins to find you a place to settle."]

Another brief exchagne is had.
["..But to warn you now, there are few homes in Auran available. It is a crowded city and it simply cannot grow that fast. But you have the option of government assistance in building for yourselves, inside of a few plots of land on the edges of Auran's metro, or in one of the sub-communities that branches off of it, your own community."]

["The work will be hard. But we will help you with materials, construction workers and aid, and with transport so that you may all come back here to rest after a hard day of work. You will receive pay for your work, but it will not be as high as a citizens pay, but in time that'll change. You may as well, seek employment directly from within the city during the day, and we encourage you to do so, and to absorb yourself into your new host state. Still, you will make an hourly wage as you build your homes. They will, as well, be - your homes - and yours alone. You built it, you own it so long as it abides by the safety code."]

Another brief talk, and they would see the Festria turn to make her way to the door. The Elenrian translator remains.
["Now. You should all get some rest. The heating will be on shortly, blanekts are on each bunk, and extra blanekts can be procured in the chests at the foot of each bedframe. Food is served all day and night in the cafeteria -"] He reached into his pocket, and took from within, a box of vouchers of which he sets on a table. ["These are meal vouchers. The cost of your food will be covered by the government of Roskana. Hand it to the cafeteria staff, and you will be all set to get a tray of food. With this, I must head back to work. I hope you all rest well."] He turned, and made his way out.

[StaolDerg]

The matter of staying in the city stirred up a titter. "What about the others? There's at least another ship of our community coming- there are several hundred-some of us. We cannot all live here!"

The elders waved at their families to hush. One of them nudged Monsa and Anse, muttering. "Speak for us. You are more familiar with these people."

The two leaders of the community looked at one another. They certainly didn't feel incredible familiar with Roskana.

That was no excuse though. Monsa bowed, replying shortly.

"[We understand. Our community is familiar with hardship: we will work as we always have. Thank you.]" He turned back to the elders, most of whom were distracted organizing and calmin their charges.

"[Anse, can you inform and help the elders? I must write down what we've been told.]"

"[Of course.]"

The inselni turned back to the other elders and gathered them together before speaking to them. "[We are now people of Roskana, at least for this century. I know many of you were hesitant with my sworn brother's argument to come here, and I thank you for granting us your trust so that we could concentrate our efforts in protecting our people. But now the important matters- we must have everyone act orderly. Distribute everyone to their shelters, and hand out the vouchers for each household according to the numbers in the family. I know many of you still have more questions. Rest assured, they will be answered in due time. For now, eat and rest.]"

A wage. A promise of a new home.

It was almost like he was dreaming. He finished his notes on his journal before slipping it back into his satchel, turning back to the sight of the families of the community spreading out among the barracks, seeking someplace to sleep.

The concerns of the earlier doubters had been well-founded: there was indeed not enough space for every Elenrian to sleep. But that was of little matter to the new Roskanan citizens- if anything, they were delighted to have a far better place for their children and elderly to rest their exhausted bodies, themselves bedding upon the floor in their thick clothing and pulling the extra blankets upon themselves.

What little remaining preserved food- simple meals of congee with dried vegetables and meat they'd brought from Zedonia- was broken out and started to be distributed to the hungriest of the community while others grouped up in families to go eat in the cafeteria. The rest simply laid down, content to simply rest for the time being.

"[Anse, I must ask something.]"

The inselni turned at the voice of an elder, bowing respectfully. "[Grandmother. What can I do for you?]"

Anse pursed his lips.

The elder bowed, nodding. "[Very well. I will inform the others... But you are right, I think. Very well. Tomorrow, we will see what can be done to find work, or at the least, to learn the Roskanan language.]"

[VoxApocrypha]

The Roskanans would eventually start to drop off fold-out bedrolls with a stretcher-type design to them, and small fabric mattresses made of layered cloth. It wasn't great, but it was better than nothing, and pillows and more blankets were eventually delivered as well. But by and large they were pretty much left alone, though outside of the building there were a small number of police, and then a fair number of other staff bringing more boxes of supplies out of the back of a truck, as well as what looked like large numbers of books.

These would be moved into a room adjacent to the barracks itself, but not in it, so that the people within would be able to sleep in the insulated space without too much interruption. It'd soon progress to the night, and then to the day with little of note occurring, and come the morning the Roskanans would start to bring the new things in, with as well a number of these were books. Very, very old books clearly, but written with translations from Roskanan to Common, and Common to Elenrian, and as well Roskana/Rosark to Elenrian. Or at least, the most common dialect of it that they knew of. The age of the books showed and they were as well, quite worn.
But, it was a start.

Soon as well, representatives of the government's immigration works program arrived with buses, and they began to gather people who'd wanted to work on building new homes.

[StaolDerg]

As morning slowly rose through the windows of the barracks, Monsa and Anse rolled out of their respective sleeping spots to help direct the other working-age people as they awoke.

The books were the first focus. Gathering into study groups up to a dozen, the immigrants opened up the books and began their study of the language. While the old books used a dated form of Elenrian Tanhua, it was hardly an issue in trying to understand the books' contents. If anything, it was Common that they had more issue with, and many simply took to trying to speak Rosark from the Tanhua language manuals.

Rosark was strange. There was no phonetical system like Tanhua- instead, it had an alphabet that used a standardized set of letters to spell words, and no strict tone system for pronunciation like in Tanhua. Given the unfamiliar form of the language, the manual instructed to use a "short" form of Rosark: imperfect, in his eyes, but functional nonetheless as they worked to build a new home.

"[No swear words,]" Anse complained. "[Literally useless. Unusable!]"

Monsa chuckled. "[I'm sure we'll pick up plenty of curses enough soon. Do you want to practice some words with me? Can't hurt to get some practice.]"

---

The work buses were met with queues of those working-age. Notably, only three quarters of the working age had gathered- the rest were studying, spending time with and helping their families.

But those who had gathered were well prepared. Well, to the best of their ability.

With Monsa and Anse at the front of the queue were a handful of craftsmen- predominantly inselni, but with a number of austari and crown humans as well. They were volunteers: Anse had recruited them the night before to help with the construction with their expertise. They were in high spirits, eager to start building a new home for the community.

"[We should start with a community forge, like they have in Paishan back in Elenria. Good for tooling equipment.]" One of them mused aloud.

"[We need a source of fuel though,]" another pointed out. ["Not to mention we need a mine for iron and whatnot. No, no, wait. We also need stone. A masonry would do us good. And a quarry.]"

"[The Roskanan government mentioned they'd provide the tools and materials.]" Anse reminded them. "[Let us be content with the generosity of our hosts: they could've turned us away at the docks. Instead, they've given us food, land, and citizenship. No, we can fix and improve our new homes physically. For now, when we arrive our greatest goal will be to gauge the land we have been given and figure out how best to make use of it.]"

[VoxApocrypha]

The Roskanans would start to write names onto clipboards as a sort of tracking system, though they were mostly doing it to keep tabs on the immigrants who were leaving, not paying much mind to those who stay behind to learn. They'd let them all get onto the buses, and then they would put the overflow onto the trucks, before one by one the convoy of buses would travel along the roads of Auran towards the outskirts of the city. They chose an area with decent land to establish homes and farmland, and as well, vehicles and trucks were on their way to start dropping off materials and as well, to have more staff arrive to help them out.

When they arrive, the buses are emptied and lined up in a dirt lot to remain for the day, the drivers doing checks on their vehicles and then leaving to go and get food or otherwise handle other business while the work-day would continue, leaving only a couple of truck drivers. As well, a ambulance was parked nearby, in order to ensure that anyone who got injured could be tended too. A construction company was as well, arriving on-site with equipment and personnel to assist the group. They were near enough to the city proper to walk or run to a nearby commercial center for food and extra equipment.

Everyone who got off the buses would be given a hundred and ten Rosarks to use for food and buying extra safety equipment.

They'd be guided to the lots of land that were empty and claimable, and groups were instructed to start figuring out where they wished to build their homes and how.

[StaolDerg]

The land they’d been furnished with was incredibly generous for their expectations. As the Elenrians disembarked from the trucks, Anse and Monsa began organizing them- those with surveying experience were sent to examine the terrain and resources available to them, while those who had been farmers set about finding fertile soil.

A short conversation was had between Monsa and the master craftsmen who had joined the construction force. It was decided that they would minimize the importance of building on the first day. Instead, they’d focus on city planning: marking where homes would be built, farming lots drawn up, locations of utilities and infrastructure such as water pumps and and presumably stables as well. Once the general idea of the day’s goals were laid out, the small dispersed themselves to survey the land.

The farmers did not waste any time planning. Fertile land was divided into communal plots, with two family homes at the edges of the plot. Granaries, and other facilities were to be built at the corners of each plot as they intersected another for easy communal access. Along the imaginary lines that divided the planned plots of land, a problem arose- where would water be sourced for irrigation? Traditionally, communities would have had to pay for another community with water access to build an irrigation canal to their region, or otherwise pump groundwater out to irrigate the fields. They ended up setting the matter aside for Monsa and Anse later- they still had more business.

Each farmstead area had an area drawn out for some animals- they didn’t have any at the moment, but looking at the Rosarks in their hand they wondered if they could sell what they grew and buy livestock that way. Perhaps the authorities would allow them to even dig a quarry of their own? And there was the matter of metal. Both tradition and honor determined that a community borrowing tools was fine, but it was a must that they should make their own tools at some point. They looked at the their feet and certainly didn’t see any iron deposits, or coal, for that matter. If they wanted metal, they would have to ask the authorities again. To a couple of the elder Elenrians, they could not feel that were not simply begging, if not downright draining the Roskanan charity and coffers.

It did not feel right to be the ones asking for things so often.

---

Planning the houses for the new community’s city had been a strange affair. Given the land, they’d decided to attempt to replicate traditional homes- Two-story, interconnected community buildings that could each house a five to -eight person family. In Elenria they would’ve had at the least a small basement to as storage, but they hardly wished to waste the time of the Roskanans helping them, and instead opted to plan out the building itself first. As they laid out cord with small wooden pegs marking the extent of the buildings on a solid plot of land on a hill’s small rise.

The planning group reconvened at midday, around lunchtime. As much of the workforce departed to buy food, the planners passed some of the money they’d been given to others who were headed for Auran, asking them to buy them a meal as well while they conversed with Monsa and Anse.

“Welcome back, everyone. I know that the main city building plans for a residential area have been planned out, but what about the farming areas?”

“We’ve made good progress. In fact, I’d say we’re done for maybe a good bit, but we’ve got some questions for the authorities. Mainly as to whether or not we can establish quarries for stone, and also where we’ll get water. There’s also been some other problems- this time about the community’s… differences.”

Anse frowned. “Is it the other communities that joined us from Zedonia? Aun, Meng, Tai...?”

His kinsman nodded.

The inselni rubbed his brow. They’d departed from Touli with a rather diverse group of households than just one community- numerous other community’s households, and therefore their customs, laws, and worst of all, grievances had also come with them. In Elenria the problem was less severe than it had been in old times thanks to the very much larger problem of the Takpoe governance, but that could not have been said for Zedonia- the communities there, impoverished and struggling as they had been had still somehow managed to find time to bicker and fight. He worried that too had disembarked from the ship with them.

“We will talk with their elders later,” Monsa interjected, seeing his friend’s grim expression. “Inform us at the end of this meeting. For now, it sounds like main planning is done. We’d do well to not waste the workday and get back to it as fast as we can. Get your work groups to begin working on foundations in the ground. We will consult the construction company for help, but remember that we must do the majority of the building.”

[VoxApocrypha]

Asking the Roskanans for resources would be a rather simple process. Go to the foreman, tell them what you need, they get it if they think they can.
Simple as, usually. But coal itself was hard to grab because it wasn't considered to be super-high in supply, and as well atop of that there were other issues such as wanting to establish quarries. The Roskanans had decided to take that under consideration, as they would have to actually discuss if that might be feasible or even safe, but ultimately come the next day they were given a tentative 'yes', but they had to do jump through a number of hoops to do it.

Including, starting a company that would be able to hire standard roskanans, per workforce regulations and as well, they'd be given safety equipment as a small government subsidized upstart. It was a okay deal, but also not really an amazing one. Other questions would similarly be answered with a sort of 'green tape', offerring ways to do it, but putting it squarely in place that it had to be done to Roskanan standards or at the least, close to them.

The Roskanans had as well though, noted the sort of problems beginning to show among the immigrant communities, and they employed their translator a lot for that, having them mediate or listen to disputes so that they could maintain order and keep track of affairs between them all. They were being rather attentive to it, keeping an eye on them all when they were at the worksite, though they were not actively spying on them within their temporary housing.

[StaolDerg]

If anything, the conditions and assistance rendered by the Roskanans only cemented the gratitude of the Elenrians as they accepted whatever they were offered. Though there were grumbles about how the Roskanans expected them to build roads and other structures to their standards, the delegations of translators managed to settle their concerns at least temporarily, aided by assurances by Monsa and Anse that they would be able to improve upon their homes after they finished the important issue of actually building the settlement first.

Planning had concluded after spending far more time than they would've liked into the evening, but with satisfaction Anse noted that none of the planners had had major issues with the final plan. If anything, they seemed relieved with the prospect that their families could finally live in a solid home.

The plan for the settlement itself would of course be submitted to the foreman in supervising them for approval: they wanted to build a city styled after the ones they'd left in Elenria, with a large primary settlement surrounded by farmland, with the city itself guarded by a city wall of around 26 feet tall, or at the very least a number of 30 foot city gates at the entrances of the settlement. Many other such alternative measures were included in the final plan of the city, such as requesting to buy land outside the city limits in a mineral-rich area at a later date if they could not dig a quarry in the farmland itself.

The second day was greeted with eager enthusiasm by the immigrants as they arrived at the worksite once more. The evening before had given them time to start on the paving of simple dirt roads, but the paving stones that most of the planners wanted to use were simply unavailable, and on more than a few occasions the immigrants noticed that the dirt collected into large, dusty clouds upon the removal of plants whose roots anchored the dirt. Regardless of how the city plan was approved of by the authorities, the main roads and building foundations would likely remain unchanged, and that was what was focused on.

Nevertheless, they persisted. Though they started digging building foundations with shovels, they were pleasantly surprised by the mechanical rumble of a steam shovel when the army engineers assigned to help them set to work bulldozing earth out of the way.

Elenrian homes had seemed quite straightforward on paper, but as confused exchanges broke out between construction workers, Elenrian immigrants, and army engineers, it was realized that many of the plans not directly written by those familiar with Common numerical systems had been using traditional Elenrian metrics- significantly larger than those that they had been using.

[VoxApocrypha]

The discrepencies with Elenrian and Common numerics would put a bit of a damper on construction as they would have to verify if plans were being followed correctly, and translators would once again be brought in to handle the task of making sure that measurements were being done accurately. The stone wall would be a point of debate, and ultimately it would be decided that plainly there would be no walls, though gates could be more or less acceptable - so long as they could not actually close. It was clear that given that the Roskanans more or less still owned the land for the time being, and that they had the cultural dominion overall, they were not going to allow for the Elenrians to effectively segregate themselves from the rest of the world around them by building walls - being basically the exact opposite of what the Roskanans ultimately wanted them to do, integrate.

They told them this in polite terms, making an active effort to avoid it, and they said plainly that fences around individual family's properties would be reasonable and fine, but a city-sized wall was simply off the table.
Still work continued on other things and the Roskanans gave approval to the idea itself aside from the wall.

Work kept up with the Roskanans and Army Engineers in particular making the roads via following the plans, and then breaking them off or altering them if needed to connect it back to the proper infrastructure of the city itself, and as well plans were made to start paving it as well to make it suitable for automobiles to use. As well, the Roskanans would make a suggestion - choosing an area that would be a good market spot for if they wanted to open and maintain any sort of stalls or barter spots that locals could trade with them at.

[StaolDerg]

There was again some grumbling, but the overwhelming consensus was accepting of at least a gatehouse, even if there was no gate. Fences were however a point of debate: traditional housing was meant to have a set of stone walls surrounding the central home area, but after a good half hour of bickering, Monsa finally convinced the other elders that the traditional home design of a interlinked house by itself would do just as well.

For the market, the central square was designated as the trading hub, with spaces for stalls interlinked into blocks of five to eight stalls with the buildings that surrounded the square drawn to have business areas right below, with the operators living directly above, as well as acting as storage for other business operators in the plaza.

By now, the Roskanan translators would likely see a trend forming: "traditional" Elenrian building structure and design seemed almost feverishly focused on defending the community's populace, with numerous central reserves in homes and neighborhoods for food and water, as if they expected a siege at any given moment. The idea of a decorative garden was alien to them: the courtyards common in the traditonal Elenrian home were always a garden, and more than once it would be noted more than once someone wanted to start a garden on their roof.

And then there was the mention of individual property, which was utterly baffling even to Monsa, who considered himself the most open-minded of his community, (or the most utterly mad and rogue, depending on who was asked) and ended up having to confusedly explain the immigrants' idea shared property to a rather irate Roskanan construction worker after one of the immigrants asked for someone's lunchbox.

[VoxApocrypha]

The Roskanans were generally amicable even with the notable cultural differences, what made it more difficult to work with them was the problems presented by the langauge barrier.
This would be, or at least it'd attempt to be remedied, by the oversight committee that'd been more or less 'formed' by the administration of the overall endeavor calling for assistance from the government, primarily in the form of additional building materials - because these people wanted to build what amounted to a fortress city in the middle of a Auran development, but as well, they needed more translators.

The Roskanans would still bring food to the worksite however, and in large amounts. It'd be pretty easy to tell Roskanans ate a lot of corn, given how many of their dishes actually had it - even the 'fast food' was notably rich in a lot of Maiz or corn of some sort. They brought enough for people to get seconds too, having bought from multiple restaraunts in the city proper, as a proper field kitchen was still a fair bit from being setup - the army not having brought it in yet.

The architects meanwhile would use the slowly trickling in translators as a means to suggest changes to the building plan of the Elenrian structures, mostly aesthetic ones that somewhat lowered the 'defensive' nature of the buildings, and instead allowed for them to be able to garden and have more access to the sunlight, so that their plants would be happier, and as well they would be too - sunlight afterall was believed to be a blessing by a lot of Rosark peoples and Auranites were no different.

It was sort of an effort to make them able to integrate better, as while having fences and walls was fine, there was a point that the Roskanans figured it'd be effectively enabling self-isolation within their own country, and that level of antisocial was generally considered a thing to subdue and avoid. They had had to deal with it 28 years ago in the form of Kiralia and that had been a tragedy that most people still remembered. Similar issues cropped up with the Kumo minority in the past, and other immigrant populations. It was cultural assimilation in action.

The architects were fine with a gatehouse.

[StaolDerg]

Corn was, while not unknown to the Elenrians' extensive collection of inherited cookbooks, was still a surprise. They were used to rice as their staple crop, and the first time they got their hands on corn, many set to rummaging through the cookbooks for reference. Lack of a field kitchen proved not to be that great of a problem to the Elenrians: A small team of designated cooks set up a tent, a couple of big pots, and frames of stacked bricks to suspend the pots above fires. They got creative- what ingredients they lacked, they substituted, and noted what ingredients could and couldn't be grown in their new home in Roskana.

Despite being talked down from their initial fortress-like structure of housing, the Elenrians were satisfied with the expanded space for gardens. Though it was clear some of the immigrants wanted to separate themselves from the Rosark, the majority reconsidered the isolationist nature of their homes, with the residences closer to the city center chosen to completely abandon the traditional home design in favor of Rosark-inspired apartments. They would still ask if they could build deep basements, as well as start on the basic farmhouses outside of the settlement area.