Homesteading in a fantasy world

Francis was doing a magnificent job, and so was Luke. At the end of every day, they were completely tired. Coming back with the wagon hauling so much more weight was putting a lot of strain on both of them. Still, they were getting it done. They were, however, both completely relieved when finally, the city walls of Connection came into sight.

The city guards did hold us up for a little while. They still wanted to do a proper check so nothing illegal or dangerous would be brought inside the city. They seemed quite impressed by the amount of resources we brought back but they were professional as always.

Our first stop, however, wasn’t our company compound or even the market; it was the city's warehouse where we needed to pay tax in materials.

Fortunately, this tax also counted towards the material responsibility of the company. If we brought in enough, we wouldn't actually have to give anything extra to satisfy the company’s material responsibilities towards the fort they are located in and its connecting city. When all of that was done, we finally made it to the company compound.

I gathered everyone around me so I could make an announcement. “I’m certain all of you are wondering who will be able to go back to United Freeholds and who will need to stay behind to guard the wagon and what's inside of it.”

“I am happy to announce that all of you can go back. I will be the one who will stay. Also, Luke, you can go as well, and perhaps you would even want to become a citizen of United Freeholds?” Luke looked a bit nervous, but he also seemed a bit more relaxed. He gave a small nod.

“Why are you all still standing here? Do you not want to go back? I mean, I guess if you wanted to, you could stay here and I would go back. Also, this break will be for two weeks.”

I didn’t even have to count to 10 before all of them had gone. This brought a smile to my face. While it was a bit sad that I wouldn’t get to spend the winter solstice with Tim and Val, I would at least dodge my involvement in whatever event the government was doing during the winter solstice.

I turned around and started to look at the building in front of me. Not all of this was rubbish. There were still some good pieces of wood that could be used to make the new building I was planning to build.

First, however, I looked towards the boundaries of the land. It has become standard that the first thing built in United Freeholds compounds was the outer wall. I did not see a reason not to do the same.

Now, it won’t actually function as a wall but it would certainly look like one, but it would simply be a fancy fence. It did have one positive aspect: it limited visibility. It would make this a proper compound, cut off from the rest of the city, so it would function as its own little world.

Unfortunately, I didn’t have enough stone to make the entire wall out of stone and to also build a foundation. We just simply couldn't bring so much weight back.

Still, I had some wiggle room. I think I will do it with the posts being made out of stone, and I will just connect it with wooden logs. Fortunately, on that front, I had plenty to use.

First, it was time to dig. Time went by fast, but I did spend some time with Goose as well. He was missing the wilderness, but I assured him that when he made it to rank three, he would have more freedom to go and fly around.

Building the wall/fence was quite fun. The winter solstice went by fast. When I finished, a full four days had passed. Now, however, the fun part. It was time to demolish the current building.

With a sledgehammer in my hand and a big smile on my face, the first thing I did was destroy the non-weight-bearing outer walls. Next were the non-weight-bearing inner walls.

What I also did was bring out all the removed materials and put them in neat piles. Every piece of metal was saved in a special pile as all of it was needed.

When all of that was done, it was time to start with the roof. This was a tedious job as I wanted to preserve as many of the roof tiles as possible because they still looked good, and I wanted to use them.

The house looked like a skeleton, and you could easily see through it. I kinda wanted to just start hitting the corners and watch the whole thing crumble down, but once again, I was more measured in my approach. I started from the top and worked downwards, leaving nothing left but the floor and the foundation.

When the floor was removed, all that was left was the foundation. This also needed to be destroyed as it wasn't up to the quality I wanted it to be.

Here, I could be as wild as I wanted to, as I would just use the destroyed foundation as a base. It was incredibly fun to destroy all of it. I could have done it faster if I used more of my abilities and more energy, but it was also a good workout.

When everything was done, only 2 and a half days had gone by. Being a superhuman was amazing. This would have been a week’s job for a team of experienced workers. This is just wonderful.

Now, it was time to do some more digging. Not only did I need to make the foundation area for the main building larger, but there would also be four other buildings that needed their own foundations.

I do not know why, but I enjoyed every bit, even just the digging. Why was it so wonderful to work with your hands? I was busy making the foundation. Melding the stones together was so satisfying. It was at this moment, however, that Goose let out a cry, meaning that someone was actually approaching.

I looked up towards the tower I built for him. It was a modified watchtower design. It was high up and was perfect for Goose so he could watch around us, and so he would have a good place to sleep that he actually enjoyed.

Goose, however, wasn't worried, and when the gates swung open, I saw my company members and Francis coming in. Had it already been two weeks? That didn’t seem right, but after thinking about it for a moment, I think that amount of time had actually passed.

I kind of felt proud of that—sinking into work so much that you forget time passes. Now that's the dream.

"How was your vacation?" I asked them as they approached while they looked at the disappeared building. None of them answered me, continuing to look with dumbfounded faces. Was it really that surprising? I mean, I hadn’t even started to properly build any of the buildings.

"It's good that you're here now; I won’t have to bring the stones here, you can do that for me. Also, you can start cutting out the logs needed for the buildings. They should be prepared enough for that.”

“What are you all standing there for? Let’s move; I’ll show you what you need to do. You, Arabella, however, need to start finding new members. This time, when we go out with the wagon, we would actually need people to protect this place."

"Now, while we’re all doing this, tell me everything about what happened back home. Luke, did you become a citizen?" I had noticed that he had a constant smile on his face, so I wasn’t surprised when he answered in the affirmative. But what surprised me, however, was that apparently, he had found himself a woman.

Apparently, others were constantly teasing him about it, but he seemed to be too in love to worry about anything. The better question, however, was. When we were building this building, what could Luke and Francis do? As I looked around, I saw that we had an empty place near one of the walls that didn’t even have a garden planned. It seems that I had made a slight oversight.

Not only people needed to train; animals needed to train as well. Immediately, I put my abilities to work to figure out a training plan for Francis and so I could figure out something that I could build that would help Francis train.

Also, from the looks of it, all of them slacked off during their vacation. I think some proper training is in order. "Why are you looking at us like that, Rich please don’t?" All I did was smile at that, and for some reason, all of them took a step back.