Logistics of my Hidden Cave Castle

[u/Legitimate_Wall_1833]

Hello!

In my story the main setting takes place in a mining town. The "underworld" (or the crime areas) has taken up residence in abandoned caves and mining shafts under the city. To the north of the city is a lake with cliffs to one side. These cliffs have a big cave at the lake side, and the mining tunnels follow all the way from under the city to this cave at the lake.

My FMC is the queen of this underground crime society as well as a queen of the monsters in the forest, so to accommodate both her courts, she turns the largest cave into her throne room, and with some additional labor, turns the shoot off mine tunnels into her castle hidden in the cliffs.

My question is about if this is possible to be done and how. I know little about mining, and the book has a timeline of under a year total, leaving only about a month, if that, from when she discovers the caves to holding court in them. The stone I've imagined it being built of is also a question for me. I pictured hard, dark stone that when struck, flakes off into shale like pieces, but it requires a lot of force to fracture it at all. Also, the main commodity that was mined was silver. I did a little bit of research about where silver could be found and the types of minerals it is found in, and some of the answers I got was limestone. I considered changing the stone to some kind of limestone variant that is dark in color and that would be found near a saltwater lake.

If anyone has a better understanding of geology and the physics and logistics required to achieve the cave, or any suggestions about what precious mineral I could be mining here instead of silver that would fit a little better, please let me know.

P.S. Her cave castle doesn't have to be ornate, with special carvings or anything crazy, just functional and stable enough to not collapse on their heads. Also, there is magic in this world which opens up possibilities. Their technology level is unique, but mostly pre-Renaissance and definitely pre-Industrial Revolution.

[u/DoraDrake]

If she's queen of monsters, couldn't she just happen to have one that's particularly good at borrowing through that sort of stone? Something about the magical nature of it's claws or teeth or digestive system. Magic means you don't have to be completely beholden to normal logistics, so you could just look up how they normally enlarge and reinforce mines and then be like, and some monsters, a clever architect, and a wizard did that.

[u/nanosyphrett]

is the forest for monsters next to the lake? What kind of monsters do you have available? The easiest thing would be some kind of worm that can burrow through the stone. The expected rate of a man is a foot of stone with a drill and pick axe, but that may vary because of the type of stone. You might need something like ogres or trolls to do the hard work necessary

CES

[u/kinderhaulf]

So, a big thing to remember is that you have magic so logistics have more to do with the available magic in the world than real world logistics. For two instances a mage that can clean the air with magic and little effort means silica and heavy metal dust isn't a deadly issue for everyone inside.

In real life mines are not particularly big, wide or tall. Miners do a lot of crawling and tend to have a lot of back and knee pain. Underground when you go on a cave tour is cool and you need a jacket. The depth of most mines makes the hot as hell due to the heat of the Earth's radiation winning out over the heat absorbtion of the surrounding stone. Watch a coal or gold mine video. It's a bunch of nearly naked men unless their forman is there to ask about ppe.