"Chise okaa-san...... You are really quick to take action when you've decided on something."
"But, isn't that the best solution we can ask for? If your stepmother is going to help, there's nothing more reassuring than that. Furthermore, they're willing to take in the most troublesome bunch."
We entered the fort's meeting room and explained our idea to Selene and her husband, Margrave Reebel.
They both agreed to help so that all the refugees could regain their stable life.
"I would like to act promptly before the public order worsens. The debate over accepting the refugees is taking place in the royal palace as well. Iska kingdom plans to accept around 20,000 refugees slowly."
Reports about the situation of the western region continued to arrive every day, and according to them, two of the western region nations that surrounded the dungeon where the stampede occurred met their end, while the territories of the Mubad Empire in the north and the Parka theocracy shrank after being swallowed by the monsters.
While some surviving towns remained in the lands of the ruined nations, that alone wouldn't be able to make them function as a nation and, someday, they would be swallowed by the neighboring nations.
Now that their former home and motherland had been devastated, they would need new land to start their new lives. But even if they tried their best, there was a limit to the number of refugees each town and village could accept.
As much as I would like to rely on the other nations, this region was part of the border of one of the fallen nations, so they must be dealing with their own refugee problems too.
"In that case, there would be 30,000 refugees left to take care of. I'll take care of the emergency food with ."
"Teto will work with golems to clear the land and make farms!"
I'll create the necessary food with my magic while Teto will make the farms. We aim to hopefully reduce the trouble by making refugees work in them.
"We'll work together with the adventurers and the volunteer soldiers from Chise's place and hunt down monsters to secure meat."
As Selene and others listened to our suggestion, Alsace shared his own proposal.
"I have connections with the Adventurer Guild and former comrades who are clergymen. I'll try to ask if we can have their cooperation and divide the refugees into guilds or orphanages in other regions."
The church and orphanage that were once managed by Father Paulo had been succeeded by the clergyman who once used to be a member of Alsace's former party. He was able to extend the orphanage's scope under his management.
In the beginning, there were only the dispensing and paper-making techniques that I once taught in the beginning, but now, it has apparently been transformed into a full-fledged vocational institute as they further invited woodworkers, blacksmiths, and builders.
"That sounds good. I am also a church-recognized Saint so I'll try to contact the cardinal and see if there's something that can be done about the refugees."
Oh, if there was a joint request from Selene the Margravine, the Saint, and the administrator of the Apenemis church, from where the orphanage relief act originated, I think we could expect a favorable outcome.
Though, there was still a lot to tackle about our current situation.
"We have to first consider the situation of all those refugees before splitting and moving them to new places. There's a lot to take into account like their aptitude, their family relations, and their previous living circumstances."
The first step would be to divide the refugees into several groups following the said criteria and many more things other than them.
"In that case, we would need to dispatch civil officials to sort all this out. As for the other thing to take care of, I guess it would be to deal with the injured."
"The main threat from this stampede has been eliminated, so I am thinking of starting to heal the injured refugees."
The Margrave Reebel husband and wife, Weiss and Selene, spoke respectively.
After we decided on conducting interviews with the refugees soon and sorting them out into groups, we swiftly sprang up to take action.
********
"------ Wheat!"
The more complex the item was due to human craftsmanship, the more mana consumed to produce it depending on the amount.
So producing wheat consumed the same amount of mana as it would take to create wheat flour or bread but the quantity would also be larger in the former case. I continued to produce a large amount of wheat with my hands tucked inside a sack.
"A miracle...... She's a saint of benediction." "Ah, it's our fortune to have the saint of benediction's help......"
"Black-haired saint...... She's a black-haired saint."
There once existed an anecdote about a saint who miraculously produced wheat from nothing and shared it with the poor, and it seemed that my similar actions has made them associate me with that saint.
"But black-haired saint, huh?...... Another nostalgic title..."
I murmured with a wry smile seeing the reverent looks on the refugees' faces.
In the beginning, I was seen as the eerie girl with black eyes and black hair by them.
But as I continued to produce wheat in plain sight with without hiding anything, it didn't take long for me to become the center of attention of the refugees who began to revere me as a saint or a holy woman.
The wheat was then transported to the fort and ground into flour using a mana device there, then the refugee women kneaded the dough to bake bread for their fellow refugees.
"Well, I just hope this helps in reducing their prejudice and discrimination against black hair and black eyes."
I wasn't quite fond of standing in the spotlight, but nothing would change if I didn't take the lead in changing people's perceptions. After using my mana to the utmost limit, I joined the refugee women in kneading the freshly ground flour to make bread.
This was something on the side, but the refugees who witnessed the sight of the skeleton giant being defeated saw a pillar of light vanquishing the skeleton giant and took it as a miracle from the goddesses without knowing it was my doing.
Aside from me, Selene, too, has become a target of their respect as they called her the Saint of Recovery or Emerald Saintess since she was visiting their camp to provide healing to injured and sick people.
But with there being two saintesses now, it was getting easy to mix us up so they first imitated Teto's way of calling me 'Majou-sama' and nicknamed me or before finally settling on , capturing my true nature.
"Teto will also work hard to not lose to Majou-sama~"
" " "------Goo!" " "
Meanwhile, Teto took the clay golems from the to the land of the fallen nation, and using earth magic, she cleared the land and created farms.
Plunging her black magic sword into the earth, the ground trembled and the undergrowth withered away, swallowed by the ground, forming rows of plowed fields.
The clay golems, who had stored plant seeds within themselves, then buried seed-filled mud balls into the soil. After that, these fields were entrusted to the refugees for them to manage.
The fields infused with Teto's magic provided faster growth speed for crops, and in just a month or so, the vegetables with short growth periods could already be harvested, providing a low but steady supply of fresh vegetables.
As we all busied ourselves with helping out, communications from various countries began to arrive at the fort.
"Chise okaa-san! After a negotiation with Duke Gyunton, he agreed to take in 10,000 demi-human refugees! Also, the Great Forest of Elves is ready to accept 2000 elven refugees."
Through the connections of the Five Goddess' Church, which had their roots spread all over the continent, we managed to have orphanages accept the refugee children, while there were also talks of a dwarven mining nation taking in 5000 dwarves and a dragonkin nation taking in 2000 dragonkin refugees.
Aside from them, those people who managed to escape with their family fortune or had relatives in other nations used their resources and connections to leave the refugee camp and start a new life.
Those people who have some sort of skill like adventurers, knights, magicians, or artisans had been guided to the guilds in other nations where they sought out work and began their respective lives.
With such refugees leaving for new places one after another, beginning their new journey as they left riding on the carriages arranged by the Iska Kingdom, the scale of refugee camps gradually shrank.
Adventurers that were hired also gradually dwindled in number, and in their place, the knights from the kingdom and the Margrave Reebel house took the lead in managing the threat of the monsters.
Some refugees had also built their homes around the farms that Teto created, which were then bought by the House of Margrave Rebel from Teto, eventually becoming the territory of the Iska Kingdom.
