Dock Expansion

At the dock in Sea Song Town, Town Mayor Vincent stood on a high platform, looking worriedly at the workers bustling about on the beach and on the ice.

Workers are using various tools to break the frozen, hard ice surface, then insert prepared wooden stakes into the seabed, and several people work together to flatten the stakes with heavy hammers.

It's the end of February now, more than two months since Victor returned from the East.

According to the previous plan, Victor was to lead the newly formed troops of the Two Rivers Territory south by boat in early April.

However, the expansion of the Sea Song Town Wharf is not progressing as expected. Vincent has been coming to the wharf every day to check on the progress of the project and urge the construction team to hurry up.

At that moment, a man walked over. Vincent saw that the man was Bard, the head of the Sea Song Town Wharf Expansion Project Team.

"Bard, why are you guys so slow!"

You clearly promised me before that you would complete the dock expansion project half a month ahead of schedule.

There's only one month left until the project deadline, and you haven't even finished half of it. Are you kidding me?

Do you know I've already promised the lord that if I fail to meet my deadline, don't think you can get away with it!

After Vincent finished speaking in a stern tone, he turned to leave, Bard quickly stepped forward and grabbed him.

"Town Mayor Vincent, please calm down. I didn't mean to lie to you, but who knew the temperature would be so low this winter? It's already the end of February, and the ice on the coast is still so thick. The pile driving can't be done quickly. I really have no choice."

"If you can't do it, do you think I can?"

I don't want to hear your explanations right now. I only care about the project's progress; I don't care about anything else. If you can't do it, find someone else. I'll personally go to Levant and have him find someone else for me.

Bard was sweating profusely as he listened. Vincent was, after all, the Town Mayor of Sea Song Town. If they really found out about the Head of Transportation, Levant, he would be in deep trouble.

Bard was just a small merchant before, but his younger brother was a Squad Leader in the Golden Sunflower Territory. Later, he followed Victor north and his position rose with the expansion of the territory. Now he is a Detachment Commander and serves in James's regiment.

Bard also went north with his brother as a military dependent. The idea at the time was that the Two Rivers Territory had just been opened up and there would probably be a lot of demand, so he, as a small merchant, could do some business.

Upon arrival, it was discovered that most of the inhabitants of the Two Rivers Territory were indentured slaves and were extremely poor. Meanwhile, in Wood Fort Town, the largest settlement of Freemen in the territory, most businesses were monopolized by the Government Affairs Office's official chamber of commerce.

Bard couldn't find any decent business and could only sell groceries in the Two Rivers Territory.

He drifted along like this for a year, but the business didn't go well. He was planning to go south and run back to his hometown if he couldn't make any more money.

Fortunately, every cloud has a silver lining, and Bard's luck turned around.

After Levant became the Head of Transportation, Victor the number of Freemen people in the territory had increased considerably. During the off-season, many people had nothing to do and began to gamble.

Victor didn't want these workers to go to waste, so he had Levant contract out some small projects, such as road maintenance and canal construction, to private companies.

This practice serves two purposes: firstly, it keeps the labor force busy during the off-season, preventing these Freemen from gambling when they have nothing to do; secondly, it is because the territory has become too large. Originally, all kinds of infrastructure in the territory were built by the territory's official engineering teams, but these official engineering teams have become increasingly bloated and their efficiency has declined.

At this time, outsourcing some small projects to the private sector can reduce the size of official construction teams and boost the private economy.

Against this backdrop, Bard, through his brother's connections, secured numerous small projects from the Transport Department led by Levant. He recruited a group of Freemen to complete these projects and earn commissions.

Bard was quite business-minded, and with his brother's connections, he quickly became very successful, taking on more and more large-scale projects, and his construction team expanded from a dozen people to more than two hundred.

Just then, Victor planned to participate in the Civil War. As the starting point for the southward march, the docks of Sea Song Town were to dock a large number of ships to carry the army and supplies of the Two Rivers Territory.

However, the existing scale of Sea Song Town Wharf could not meet such demand, so Sea Song Town Wharf had to be expanded.

However, since the existing official engineering teams all have assignments, Levant plans to outsource this project directly.

Bard's engineering team, being one of the top private engineering teams in the territory, was one of the most suitable choices. Bard also wanted to make a breakthrough in his career with this project, and ultimately won the project from the Transport Department with the lowest bid and the shortest construction period.

Bard was also very interested in this project, not only because it could make him money, but also because it would allow him to come into contact with higher-ranking civil officials in the territory, such as Vincent in front of him.

At first, the two got along very well. Bard was very optimistic about the progress of the project and made boastful promises to Vincent.

As it turned out, the temperature this year was much lower than in previous years, and the engineering plan prepared by the engineers who were recruited from the official engineering team was simply impractical, greatly underestimating the difficulty and efficiency of the entire project.

Now Bard is in a dilemma. He has borrowed a lot of money from the Chamber of Commerce to make ends meet. If Vincent approaches Levant to ask for a replacement, he will inevitably lose the project. If he can't get the money, he will definitely go bankrupt.

Thinking of this, Bard gritted his teeth and said, "Vincent, the reason I'm making such slow progress is because I'm short-handed. Could you help me find some people, no more than 100?"

In this way, while we can't guarantee early completion, we can at least finish on schedule.