Homesteading in a fantasy world

The handles were easy to make. I decided to use the method I’m most familiar with where you hammer a wedge into the top to hold the handle in place.

For the cart, I was planning on copying the design of my current cart. Because I didn’t know how to build a proper cart, I was quite lucky they had left something to reference.

All I had to do was make everything stronger. Like my regular cart, it will have directional front wheels able to move in the direction the bull will be pulling. I will also need to make some better brakes otherwise the downhill part might become quite dangerous.

I am always amazed at how quickly I can make things now. I wonder why this world isn’t full of useful things if making stuff is so easy and I wonder what the upper limits are for crafting and how many can reach that level.

From what I understand from my time here and what I saw in the village don’t correlate. Why is everyone living in such poor conditions when making stuff is so easy? it just doesn't make any sense.

Perhaps when my visitors wake up, I can ask some more pointed questions and get a better understanding of how this world works or more precisely how human society works.

The turning mechanism was quite interesting I only hoped it will be able to handle the increased load even after I beef it up, this will be the weakest point for the cart.

After I finished cutting out all the wood pieces it was time to start making the metal ones and once again, I had to fire up my forge. It was quite a shitty one and I wanted to make a better one, perhaps even a building to house it in, but I just didn’t have time.

I am guessing that I will need to make a choice on what building to make after the harvest. Most likely it will be the smithy so I will have something to do in the winter besides making fabric.

Because of the sauna, there is more need for firewood. Currently, there is enough firewood drying in the cylinder stack that helps dry it fast to fill up the woodshed. But I would like to make a lot more and extend the current woodshed or make a new one. Luckily that didn’t have to be a proper building so it would be quicker to make. Then there will be more than enough for the sauna as well.

During the smithing, I was also thinking about the goblins. They seem to be having a problem with another tribe wanting to come to their lands and they are afraid that their low numbers will lead to a full war which would be quite devastating. I am certain that they could win thanks to the gaining of a lot of abilities, but they would still lose quite a lot.

I gave them some ideas about guerrilla warfare. Whenever they will meet the enemies scout teams they just need to have more members meet them. They needed to control whenever they meet so they can dictate the numbers they have. It will take a lot of hard work, but I believe they can frighten them off that way.

They also seemed to have a problem that they have few females. They didn’t think of infiltrating other goblin tribes to persuade the females there to join them.

I learned females do not want to become breeders so offering them a chance to get a better position in life, some if not most will join. I wonder how they will act upon that information and how did they not come up with that themselves.

I pondered upon that for a bit. It didn’t take long to put some pieces together from earth’s history. How simple things that could have helped millions were not invented or came into being too late simply because no one else had the idea.

I wonder what could be missing from this world that were simple everyday items that made life easier back on earth and perhaps there are some things here that were missing on earth. If we do not consider, the fantasy element which I’m pretty sure changes a lot.

I mean just look at me I’m currently forging metal I got from smelting down acorns and leaves. If you have enough of these trees, would you ever need an iron mine again? And it’s not shit metal, this is excellent steel.

As a resource, it seems incredible and renewable. I do not understand how people don’t live in luxury here, the conditions look so bad around the village.

Perhaps my father and grandfather were wrong about this Kingdom and about the ruling elite. This much wealth should make it back down if it were not controlled with an iron fist and prevented from getting out. Or was this such a rare occurrence, is my iron oak unique? That sounded wrong there must be more out there.

At least I now have some people to ask questions about this world but unfortunately, this will also reveal me being someone not from this world. Perhaps I should not ask until they decide to stay.

Then again, they might want to know that before they make their decision. I think I will go with the option that’s best for me and not tell them. At least not yet. They would probably figure it out even if I didn’t tell them if they stay with me long enough.

Oh, it was so much easier when I was alone, I could just do whatever I wanted, no one to question me. Of course, their help would be nice, just helping me with making hay would free up a lot of my time.

Then I will stay within my time frame properly and get everything needed for the winter done. This lesson helped me better understand my time management. I spent way too much time making the sauna.

The metal pieces done. I started to assemble the cart. It was like putting legos together and it was quite fun. When I was half done Francis came to see what I was doing.

I had the habit of leaving the barn doors open. The animals were smart enough not to run away and even if they did, I could sense it and catch them quite easily so why not give them a bit more freedom, especially Francis?

He seemed quite interested in what I was building because he recognized that it was something that can be pulled as it resembled the cart that was beside here that I used for reference.

Francis even helped to lift the cart so I could easily mount the wheels. I made them especially wide because I know that they were going to have to carry a lot of weight and I didn’t want my roads to be messed up. There was no time to start paving roads or no need at least not yet.

The brake system was probably the biggest upgrade I made. Instead of stopping the front wheels, I made them stop the back wheels. There was a big lever next to the seat that operated the brakes.

It was time for a test drive and the bull was quite excited as we were heading towards the quarry now. It was a bumpy ride but I’m guessing it will be a bit smoother when we go slower, and the cart is more weighted down, but it will never be a smooth ride.

We came back right away because I didn’t bring my stone cutting tools nor did I want to do it today because it was starting to get late. Tomorrow Francis still needed to do some road work to make it better especially in the hills part of the road.

What I needed to do now was start digging so I could figure out the size I wanted to make the root cellars. This was important for figuring out how much stone I will need and what the overall design will be.

I had in mind something that I thought would look awesome. Kind of like an ancient tomb. Something like that with great rock pillars supporting the roof. I wanted it to look nice and I also need to make some calculations on how much food I will get there from the field so I can plan at least what the minimum must be. Although I would like to make them bigger than that especially the root cellar for potatoes because that temperature will also be perfect for alcohol.

I was quite disappointed when scouting all the farms around here. I wanted to take some fruit tree saplings but there weren’t any, and it was another mystery that I could not understand. Why would you not plant some fruit trees for extra food? It just doesn’t make any sense.

My guests finally woke up, but I didn’t want to bother them. I wanted to leave them some time for themselves to talk things over.

I wonder if my owners land levelled up enough, could I hear what they would be saying if I focused. Will it be able to do it from the other side of my land? This ability worked very different from the other ones and seemed very powerful and hopefully, it will become even more powerful when levelled.

They finally came outside looking quite timid and it took them a bit to locate me digging the root cellar.

“Hi there sleepyheads, so you finally woke up. Is there anything I can do to help you?”

For some reason, I think that cross-circuited the brains but I couldn’t help but laugh out loud a bit.

“Sorry, sorry. Your face looked quite funny, and it’s been quite a while since I’ve seen humans that weren’t trying to kill me or undead.”

As always it seemed that the girl Emma was the one that spoke for them.

“I guess that is understandable we have a few more questions that we want to discuss with you but what do you mean about you haven’t seen other humans that weren’t hostile.”

Rich, “Well there were some people that wanted to take over this farm and take all that I have. I killed them. Then the rest of their group came, luckily I was able to ambush and kill them.”

No visible disgust or fear about me mentioning that I killed people. Truly a different society than I was used to.

“The village is full of undead and so were the rest of the farmhouses. Everyone that could have, left for better places or were killed by the undead or the group of humans that tried to kill me.”

“So, I might be a bit loopy, don't mind me that much. Ha ha ha yeah talking to people again is weird but in a good way I guess?”

Emma, “Well shit. I suspect you know nothing about what’s further beyond here.”

Rich, “Nope, absolutely no clue.”

Emma, “So you are all alone here and you have done all this. Why would you do all of this when there are no other humans around.”

Rich, “Well I didn’t know that before I started. I honestly hoped that I could provide food for the village but turns out the dead don’t eat the food I want to sell, unfortunately.”

Arthur, “Ha that’s kind of funny. If they did eat our food the dead would not be a problem just another pest.”

We all had a good laugh about that. It was good to laugh.

Emma, “So we were wondering if you were an adventurer and how you came to own this land and perhaps you could take my brothers as farming apprentices so they could level up their class. They are quite close to class up. We could of course help you around here for at least this season if not longer.”

Rich, “My father’s land and I’m no adventurer. I could use the help that’s for certain but about the farming apprentice could you explain a bit more about that.”

Arthur, “If you are not an adventurer why do you have that scar on the side of your face and why do you feel like an adventurer.”

There was a silence that I was not going to break. Honestly, I didn’t want to answer or actually know how to answer that question. Like that’s a weird question right? Why would I need to be an adventurer to have a scar? I didn't think it would be so noticeable, but I guess I don’t watch myself in the mirror every day.

Emma, “That was a rude question. I am sorry about my brother, what he meant was that you look quite capable of protecting yourself.”

George, “I’m sorry to be rude but one of your classes must be a farmer of some sort and those classes offer apprenticeship. That way we could get a better starting class than we might have available to us.”

“Currently me and my brother have grain farmer apprentice classes that are currently stalled because there's no one to teach us and we are hoping that you will have a class that is high enough to be able to help us.”

Rich, “Well that's a lot. Why would it be rude to talk about classes? I will be honest I don’t know if my class can do this but if I can give you that opportunity, I will require a lot longer than one year of service.”

“And that goes for all of you because I believe my class will take a lot longer to be able to teach you what you need so you can gain a class that you can level yourself.”

This is quite interesting I will need to think and meditate on the class to see if I can have an apprentice.

“Go and eat, there’s food in the cellar, and if you need more time to think you can have it. I will not kick you out and leave you to be nowhere without any food or a way to protect yourselves. So think about my offer carefully.”

“I will require five years of work here or until you get the class to level up, so you do not need me to level up. This is the minimum that I want because I have a bit of a special class but of course, that will also depend on if I can actually do this for you so off you go you need to think and so do I.