Industrial Cthulhu: Starting as an Island Lord

On Castel, inside the newly built conference room of the cathedral.

The main structure of this cathedral had already been completed during the Deep Sea War, but to say it was finished back then would have been too careless.

At that time, the entire cathedral was almost nothing more than a shell—bare concrete floors, with even the walls just coated with a thin layer of whitewash.

It was common for Banshees to complain about their scales being scratched.

Now that the situation was basically stable, the cathedral had undergone some renovation. At the very least, floor tiles had been laid, and some spaces had been partitioned off, such as this conference room.

Previously, Hughes had preferred to hold as few meetings as possible, handling matters directly in his office. But today, there were simply too many attendees, and his cramped office could not hold them all, so they came to the newly built conference room.

Today’s gathering was Castel’s full pre-war meeting.

Several clerks hurriedly carried in a few boxes of documents, distributing them in an organized manner to the people sitting around the long table.

Almost all the heads of Castel’s important departments had arrived: Gaia, who was in charge of military factory production; Richard, who was responsible for weapons development and the establishment of the medical system; Tata, who oversaw the shipyards; Nini, who managed agricultural production; and Feniel, who handled the Press (the official Press).

Why emphasize “official”? Mainly because those so-called unofficial newspapers—which theoretically should not even exist—wielded far greater influence than the official Press by several orders of magnitude.

These were the production departments. In terms of combat, the overall commander was Ash, with Erwin as her deputy. As for Alexei, he currently presided over Church affairs regarding Imperial Truth.

“Church affairs” sounded simple, but in fact encompassed nearly everything outside of religion: liaising with researchers, managing the Holy Guard’s logistics and administration, distributing both Mechanical Priests and combat priests, and drafting all sorts of plans.

The Political Commissar system also fell under his direct authority. One could say he was essentially in charge of Castel’s entire bureaucratic system.

These were the main personnel. Most of them had brought deputies along, some even brought clerks to take notes. The room was crowded indeed.

Hughes sat at the head of the long table. Looking at the people lined up on both sides, he suddenly felt déjà vu—why did this feel so much like the Golden Throne’s hall?

He subtly shifted his seat, making sure he could still move, and only then breathed a sigh of relief.

The meeting had not started yet. The room buzzed with chatter. Tata and Kenn were pointing at blueprints, Alexei and Gaia were quarreling furiously, their faces flushed, while Ash stared blankly at the flowers on the table.

Nini and Feniel were playing rock-paper-scissors—twelve hands playing at once was, admittedly, rather impressive.

Nora and Chloe whispered secrets across the table.

Looking at the noisy conference room, Hughes felt dazed for a moment. Mortals and supernaturals, the living and the dead, the Church and foreign races—all sitting together in one room. Sunlight streamed down from the stained glass dome, faintly reflecting the shadow of heavy machine guns mounted above.

He ducked his head to avoid a flying copy of the Holy Text. Gaia and Alexei had escalated from verbal sparring to physical brawling. Nini and Feniel had moved on to free fighting, fists raining down like raindrops.

Truly heartwarming.

“Guess who I am?”

“Monica.”

“??? How did you know!”

Hughes pulled away the six hands covering his face and sighed.

It was better to start the meeting quickly.

“Ahem, I said—”

The room was so noisy that Hughes’ voice was instantly drowned out.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

The room fell silent. Everyone turned to look at Hughes at the head of the table, where he was knocking a shoe against the surface.

“Quiet! The meeting begins!”

After that, he pointed to Alexei.

“You start the report. How goes the Expeditionary Army’s conscription?”

Alexei straightened his torn collar, calmly picking up a crumpled report:

“My Lord, the first phase of recruitment for the Expeditionary Army has been completed. A total of one thousand three hundred and fifty personnel were enlisted, including twenty War Correspondent Teams, four medical squads, and several logistical units.”

“So many?” Monica asked in surprise.

Castel’s total population numbered just over nine thousand. If all these one thousand plus were combatants, it would have been a terrifying conscription ratio.

But in fact, the composition of these personnel was far more complex. Not all of them were to fight on the battlefield—many were to participate in Blood Harbor’s construction.

Alexei set the papers aside:

“Castel is an island. Directly projecting force onto the mainland is quite difficult. My Lord and the Prince have held many discussions and decided to establish a full set of infrastructure at Blood Harbor.”

Zoe picked up the thread:

“We’ve started literacy classes in Blood Harbor, as well as the construction of new-style docks and several freight railways. All of this is preparation for the Grand Expedition and currently the work of the Expeditionary Army.”

Seeing no one else asking questions, Alexei continued:

“Most of these people were transferred from the Holy Guard, with a small portion drawn from the factories. All of them have completed advanced training courses, and at Miss Zoe’s request, many also have teaching experience.”

“Yes, we are very short of teachers in Blood Harbor.”

Hughes frowned, turning to the factory heads.

“Will this affect production on the island?”

After a brief low-voiced discussion, they replied:

“Not much. The Expeditionary Army mainly drew workers from non-critical roles, and our current production capacity… is somewhat excessive.”

Hughes rubbed his temples, already well aware of this longstanding issue of overcapacity.

Castel’s industrial distribution was extremely unbalanced, with nearly all productivity poured into heavy industry and military manufacturing.

It had been unavoidable at the time. During the Deep Sea War, Castel had nearly sunk; such resources had been desperately needed. Production capacity could not be left idle.

But now, these industries had become a burden.

Hughes had originally planned to directly shut down some of them, but the recent Blood Harbor Rebellion and the upcoming expedition to the Northlands had forced him to reconsider.

“This issue can be discussed later. Zoe, tell us about Blood Harbor.”

The Expeditionary Army was mainly under Alexei’s management, but everything was only just beginning—Blood Harbor was still at the stage of opening literacy classes and choosing factory sites.

Since Zoe had once run schools and knew the local conditions in Blood Harbor, Hughes had simply let her handle the literacy programs.

“The literacy classes in Blood Harbor have already begun. This is the first session. Since we’ve provided free meals, enrollment enthusiasm has been quite high.”

She flipped through the materials in her hand:

“This round had a total of three thousand four hundred and fifty-two people enrolled, and more than two thousand eight hundred are still attending after three days.”

Lifting her head, she added:

“Among them, able-bodied young men and women account for roughly forty percent. These people can all become industrial workers in the future!”