Early morning. Arthur walked through the settlement that had appeared around the Hub.
What should have been temporary tents were becoming permanent.
New wooden structures were already being built—walls going up, roofs being framed, smoke rising from chimneys that hadn't existed a week ago.
People were claiming land without permission, driving stakes into unmarked ground, arguing with neighbors about boundaries that existed only in their own minds.
Shopkeepers were extending stalls into pathways. Families were building fences around patches of dirt they had decided belonged to them.
Children played in pathways that didn't officially exist—because nothing was official yet. Nothing was planned. Nothing was organized.
The town was growing faster than construction crews could react.
Arthur stopped in the middle of what might have been a street. Or a market. Or someone's front yard. It was impossible to tell.
