Following the devastating caloric audit, which revealed a mere fifty-two days of food remaining for the five hundred people now sheltered within the barony, Kael transitioned from crisis assessment to brutal, systematic triage. The two hundred newcomers were a mass of unknown variables, potential vectors for disease and internal instability. Kael's priority was not comfort, but turning them into measurable, productive labor input before the food ran out, regardless of the stress this placed on the original population.
The assimilation began with the Entry Protocol, a slow, deliberate process executed under the vigilant eye of Sergeant Rylen's defense teams. The refugees were allowed in only in groups of twenty. Each person was immediately processed at a temporary registration station managed by Steward Elms. Elms's team recorded the name, approximate age, and any claimed pre-crisis profession. The immediate goal was to find any latent skills—anyone claiming experience in mining, smithing, or engineering was tagged for immediate specialized evaluation. The vast majority, however, were categorized simply as unskilled, physical labor, destined for the high-volume tasks.
The most acute crisis was sanitation. Kael's refined water system was designed for 300; 500 bodies instantly pushed the system toward failure. Kael ordered the immediate, full deployment of the Contingent labor group to two tasks:
Emergency Latrine Construction: A massive trench network was excavated outside the main residential perimeter. The design incorporated deep, segregated pits and required the constant application of dry ash (from the briquette production waste) to manage odor and insect proliferation.
Boiling Water Mandate: Kael enforced a strict, non-negotiable protocol: all water for consumption, regardless of source, must be boiled. The entire capacity of the boiling furnaces and the residual heat from the Kiln were dedicated to this task. The newly arrived Dependent labor was immediately put to work managing the furnace fires and distributing the hot water, ensuring the rigorous hygiene that had kept the original 300 safe remained the absolute priority. Healer Mara was given full authority to enforce the sanitation rules, reporting any violation directly to Rylen.
The stress applied to the original 300 citizens was enormous. They suddenly saw their carefully managed resources being diluted by a desperate, foreign population. Resentment flared immediately, particularly among the Core labor group, who watched their industrial projects—the Iron Works expansion and the advanced mapping—ground to a halt as resources were diverted. Kael countered this resentment not with emotional appeal, but with quantifiable accountability.
Kael held an assembly, addressing the entire population, old and new. He posted the precise figures from Elms's audit: the original 22% buffer was gone. He explained that any collapse would affect everyone equally. The only solution was a massive, immediate increase in output.
"Your resentment is a measurable waste of energy," Kael stated to the original Core and Contingent workers. "The refugees are now integrated units of labor. If they starve, your projects starve. The only viable path is to treat them as an immediate, necessary input for exponential growth. Their output will replace the buffer they consumed."
Kael initiated the Mandatory Labor Assignment Protocol. Every refugee, regardless of age or previous status, was immediately assigned to a dedicated labor task aimed at maximizing short-term resource acquisition or long-term export viability. The largest assignment was Ash Reclamation and Sieving, where Kael utilized the mass of people to aggressively sift, compact, and process the maximum possible volume of ash waste. This achieved two logistical goals: immediate, supervised occupation for the masses, and a drastic increase in the raw material inventory for the crucial Refractory Block exports. Kael utilized the most numerate of the original Contingent workers as supervisors for the new labor pool, forcing immediate integration and control.
The limited food supply was managed with ruthless efficiency. Kael enacted a new, universal ration: a single, fortified tuber mash portion twice daily, strictly administered by Elms. No distinction was made between old and new citizens. The ration was insufficient for heavy labor but enough to prevent collapse. Kael made it clear that continued rationing beyond the 52-day deadline was impossible without a radical solution. He pushed the newly expanded Contingent labor pool to its physical limit, forcing round-the-clock excavation for emergency clay pockets and intense, systematic foraging, extracting every last potential calorie from the surrounding plains.
The ultimate measure of the system was its psychological impact. The original 300 citizens were forced to abandon their specialized, comfortable roles and embrace the new, desperate pace. The refugees, traumatized and desperate, were immediately taught that survival was conditional on disciplined output. Kael established a system where failure to adhere to the sanitation rules or refusal to work resulted in immediate, mandatory rationing cuts, which was often only half of an already insufficient meal. The barony was no longer a safe haven; it was a high-pressure engine, operating far past its designed capacity, entirely reliant on the perfect, systematic execution of emergency triage until a sustainable new food source could be established.