"I have a plan."
Eric raised one finger and looked straight at Bard.
"You don't think the roads around here are a little too difficult to travel, do you?"
Bard frowned. "I think... they're fine?"
He thought about it carefully. The roads weren't exactly smooth, but the journey from Lake-town to Dale never took more than a day. With no enemies daring to come close, transporting goods or simply traveling was manageable enough.
"In fact," Bard continued, "word's already spreading that Dale is being rebuilt. Plenty of merchants have shown up recently. They pass through Lake-town, then take the smoother paths toward Dale. No real obstacles, everything goes smoothly."
Eric shook his head.
"I'm not talking about these roads, though of course they'll need improvement too. I mean the road from Dale all the way to Roadside Keep."
"Roadside Keep?" Bard's brow furrowed. The name sounded utterly unfamiliar.
"And where exactly is that?"
"West of the Misty Mountains," Eric replied calmly.
Bard leaned back as if Eric had just suggested building a road to the moon.
"That's... a very long way. Forgive me for saying so, but to build a road that far, it would be nearly impossi—"
He stopped mid-sentence.
Not impossible. Not anymore. Not with Eric's construction magic, which every inhabitant could now use in some small measure. The thought struck him like a spark catching dry tinder.
"Well," Bard said slowly, "not impossible, but certainly not easy to finish quickly."
"Of course not," Eric said, twirling the small box of enchanted blocks in his hand. "This is a long-term project. Once Dale and Lake-town are thriving again, the people will need new work. Better to give them something meaningful."
The truth was that even now, with the basics restored, the townsfolk were already free from the grind of mere survival. They just needed time to adapt.
"All right then," Bard said, shrugging with a half-smile. "If you say so."
His unspoken thought was simple: If the lord of Dale says we're building roads, we're building roads. Whatever difficulties appear, he'll find a way to solve them.
"Let's start with the early stages," Eric said.
He had Bard fetch a map, then spread it out across the table. His finger landed on Dale.
"First, a proper road from Dale to Lake-town. The land here is safe enough, so we can build it on the ground, which makes things easier."
"That won't be hard," Bard said confidently after recalling the terrain between the two settlements.
Eric nodded. "Good. After that, we extend southwest a little, to here." He tapped near the dense forests at the edge of the Mirkwood. "This will serve as a buffer zone. The path remains safe, guarded by Elven watchtowers along the border. I'll add some iron golems too, so nothing troublesome should get through."
"And then from there..." Eric drew a line across the map.
"Upwards."
"Upwards? You mean north?" Bard asked, puzzled. "There's already a road that way. Why build another?"
Eric gave him a sly look. "Not north. Up."
He picked up a pen and sketched a straight line, beginning west of Lake-town, cutting clean across the sky. The line leapt over the Anduin valley, crossed the Misty Mountains, swept past the Trollshaws, and finally stopped at Roadside Keep.
"We build in the sky."
Bard stared at the map, completely silent. For a long moment his brain refused to process what he was seeing. Then the realization struck like a thunderclap. He sat bolt upright, eyes wide.
"You... you're serious? Is that even possible?"
"Of course it is," Eric said with a grin. "After all this time rebuilding Dale, you still haven't grasped what these blocks can do?"
Bard thought back. Yes, those blocks were astonishing. They fused together seamlessly, never collapsing even when logic insisted they should. They could be placed, moved, or shaped with ease. If they had enough time, then... maybe, just maybe...
Eric leaned back. "We'll still begin with the ground road. In the meantime, I'll visit the Mirkwood. This sky-road idea needs the Elvenking's approval."
It wasn't something to be rushed. Dale's facilities, Lake-town's trade, Roadside Keep's growth—all of it would take time. And time was something Eric had in abundance.
After a brief discussion, he took a handful of blocks and casually laid down a sample road between Dale and Lake-town. Then, just for good measure, he ran up to Lake-town and built another stretch heading north along the river, setting the starting and ending points.
"I see," Bard murmured. He could already envision it: Dale and Lake-town connected not just by river but by land, the two settlements expanding outward along the road. In time, they might even grow together into a single great city. What a sight that would be.
At dawn, Bard stood at the gates of Dale and gazed upon the smooth new stretch of road that had appeared overnight. His heart stirred with fierce determination. If the ground road already looked this good, then what kind of marvel would the sky-road be?
Still, Eric was right. They needed the Elvenking's consent first. The northern half of the Mirkwood was, after all, firmly within Thranduil's domain. Without his permission, there could be no claim, and the magic would not work.
Bard cast a silent wish toward the forest. "May your way be clear."
A clear road? Hardly.
Deep within the Mirkwood, hordes of monstrous spiders swarmed toward a single point. Fire flared again and again at their center, dying out only to blaze anew. Chunks of charred spider flesh flew through the air, thudding onto the ground or splattering against tree trunks.
Strangely, the flames burned only the spiders, never catching on the surrounding forest.
Eric wiped sweat from his brow and swung his blade, [Nemesis], through another thick web. "Honestly, do none of you understand what a natural enemy looks like?"
One by one, spiders fell to fire and steel, yet more kept rushing at him with furious screeches.
And if he had understood their hisses, he might have heard the frantic chorus:
"Cursed human! You destroy our webs, you free our food, we will kill you!"
Eric hacked down another wave, his enchanted sword glowing with steady light. Spider corpses piled high, and yet he showed no sign of slowing. At last the spiders hesitated, realizing too late that perhaps blocking this human was not the wisest decision.
Meanwhile, from the western edge of the forest, another figure slipped quietly through the trees, heading straight for the halls of the Elvenking.