Homesteading in a fantasy world

Bert was helped back into the inn and set down so he could recover. The food was ready and divided among everyone. Rich got out his meagre supply of smoked meat but at least everyone got one small piece as they started to enjoy the meal.

They didn't talk about anything important and stuck with simple stories to pass the time. Rich indicate that he would sleep in the village hall and leave the inn to them for the night. This pleasant calm dinner contrasted with what was happening on the other side of the message portal.

Tom was behind his table reading the food supply list. With every paper, he finished reading another sip of brandy went down his throat to comfort his worried mind.

The situation was not looking promising for anyone and if the nature oracles are to believe this winter will be a long one. They would need to do some favours and cash in some favours, but they would make it through the winter without losing anyone from starvation.

But that is if there are no conflicts and hoping for that is like hoping you won’t get burned fighting a fire mage. They had already consolidated as much as possible and beefed up their defences as much as possible, but they had lost too many people and given up too much to rescue the rest.

At that moment to Tom’s annoyance, his door swung open violently as one of the people responsible for the message tree ran in.

In his annoyance Tom hit his table making a sharp and loud noise. This froze the man that had run in. In the next moment, Tom took a deep breath and spoke in a barely controlled voice. “Why have you barged in like you own my office?”

There was a moment of pause and the messenger seemed to finally understand that he had been a little too excited getting here. Instead of apologizing he quickly put the message on the table and spoke. “This message was received 10 minutes ago from Michael and Bert.” He didn't say more, just turned around and escaped before Tom’s mind could start working again.

His mind started working when he heard the door close. Quickly he started to read the paper that was given to him. One of the big weights had been lifted from his shoulders and he was in a good mood knowing that they were alive.

Now he knew what they were actually up to, and it turned out to be them just going to bring more family here before everything went downhill even faster. And here I had hoped that Bert was going through a druid quest so he could finally advance his level.

The missing presence of Michael was actually worse than Bert’s. Many of their trade routes that are still alive are barely bringing any profit and he could help us quite a lot on that front, but the question is how to we get them back here.

But as he continued to read, he understood that some plans needed to be changed and quite a lot. An empty village ready for 1000 people to survive the entire winter was practically a gold mine where all the gold was already processed into bars and just waited for you to take them.

But if anyone caught their movement everyone would be rushing there. “Damn it.” Why couldn’t Bert open portals on his own? Then he could come here, and we could portal everyone needed there, and no one would be the wiser.

Even if we went to get him it would take too much time and then even with the portal people will notice that many of us have gone missing. Right now, there's still movement between towns and cities. We just simply don’t have the time.

Tomorrow at 9 o’clock they will be opening the portal again so we can send the message. We need to prepare our next actions before that. I will need to call in everyone and it's already quite late.

Then of course there is Rich Dirt, his name has come up again. He was even the one that helped Bert open the portal by giving his energy and he will do the same tomorrow morning. Looks like he is a competent fighter and better equipped and stronger than Meredith wrote in her diary.

But currently, he is nothing more than a curiosity. It’s more important to secure the company’s survival through the winter. Tom got up and at a hurried pace went out of his office and quickly down into the common room.

Everyone he needed was here drinking, gambling or just passing the time. “Bert and Michael have contacted me. There is much to discuss and plans need to be changed. So, follow me.” Quickly cards were thrown down and mugs were drained as multiple people quickly got up and started to follow Tom back to his office.

----

After the dinner Rich excused himself taking his helmet with him. He left to find a room for him to stay in that wasn't too gory and luckily, he did find a room that was not touched by the undead.

Giving energy to Bert was different to when he gave energy to Francis or Goose when he was still in his egg. He was able to give it to the body before but with Bert, his energy wouldn't go inside but stay outside and would be guided by Bert. Kind of similar to his camouflage that sat on top of his energy.

Helping open and keeping open the portal took about 1/3 of his energy. So quite a lot for only a few seconds. I wonder how much it would take to keep a portal open. Definitely more than he had or perhaps better quality of energy was needed. Just before rich went to bed, he checked his notifications.

Class levels gained:

homesteader level 15 --> 16

true archer level 13 --> 14

heroic soldier level 13 --> 14

Ability levels gained:

armor enhancement level 1 --> 4

active camouflage level 3 --> 5

heavy blow level 16 --> 20 upgraded to mighty blow

Skill levels gained:

armor level 2 --> 5

energy emissions level 9 --> 11

Stats:

strength +14

dexterity +12

vitality +11

endurance +2

empathy +2

intelligence +2

perception +4

constitution +4

presence +2

The next day came quickly and even before the sun was up Rich was already working. He found one of the wagons and pulled it close to the village hall. He then proceeded to start loading it up with salt and spices.

Anything else was not important in the village except the stuff in the glass smith workshop but since the owner was still here, he decided to wait until they all woke up to ask him.

The wagons couldn’t hold everything and just in case he also wanted to leave room for glass so most of his time was spent thinking about what to bring and how much salt could he fit and bring besides all the spices.

He had already tested that he would be able to pull quite a heavy load although the journey back would take quite a lot longer than usual. He was quite certain that his movement skill wouldn't work when pulling something.

He just looked at the wagons with a pleased look and picked up the bag of potatoes he was going to bring so everyone could have breakfast. Inside the inn, only the children were still sleeping. All the adults were discussing their situation.

There were still a lot of questions to work out, some of them about Rich and who he really was. It was starting to cause problems as some people were starting to get worried about his identity and others were still hesitant to ask them.

This conversation was cut off when the back door opened and Rich walked in with a smile on his face. “Good morning. I brought some more potatoes for breakfast. Oh, and Albert I wondered if I could talk to you about the glass pieces you have. I’m in need of some and I was wondering if we could discuss if I can acquire some.”

Albert gave a crisp nod. He was not expecting a business deal from the only person here that wasn't a part of their group, but his salesman training didn't fail him. The women went to help with the potatoes, and they again shooed Rich away leaving them to do all the cooking.

Rich moved back and indicated to Albert that they should perhaps move into his workshop and Albert agreed. Michael and Bert decided to join, and they all walked towards the workshop.

During the walk, Bert spoke up. “Rich I wanted to ask you something. Are you a druid of some sort? I ask because I sort of feel something similar from you as I get from other druids?”

This question shocked everyone except and after a bit of walking when they were almost at the workshop Rich spoke up. “Are druids perhaps connected to nature with a trait?” He asked in a questioning tone.

“Yes, they are. So you have something similar. This makes complete sense and why it was a bit different from what I am used to, you are not a druid but still have that trait. You seem to be an interesting man Rich and I hope we can talk more later on.” He asked in a chipper tone.

“I would quite like that, but I will be leaving after you receive your message.” He continued before Michael could protest. “Depending on the message I can come back when needed but I need to go back and inform my people and the wagon is already loaded.” He ended his sentence by pointing towards the wagon that he had loaded up.

It took a bit longer for everyone to calm down and Rich encourage them all to wait until making any further plans until they received the message from their company. Next, he described his needs to Albert and showed what he needed.

The glass smith said that he already had all the pieces he needed only a little cutting was required. Albert was surprised that Rich wanted pieces that were so small usually he just broke them and remelted them.

Thanks to everything Rich had done he just wanted to give them to him and after a bit of back-and-forth, Rich accepted the gift.

When they finished loading them up, they went to eat breakfast and after that, it was time to open the portal so that they could receive the message.

They were already waiting at the tree and their current topic of discussion was on the portal. Rich couldn’t stop himself and needed to ask. “Hey Bert, you said that the problem is that the company doesn’t have anyone that knows this tree except you, and we don’t have the required energy here to keep it open or to open it.”

“My question is if we opened a small portal why couldn't someone with the same ability take control of it on the other side and make it into a portal so we can get everyone needed here or something like that?”

There was absolute silence as the words started to sink in. It was only a few minutes before they needed to open the portal. Bert and Michael looked at each other and quickly started to run towards the inn leaving Rich just standing there without any answer.

Quickly Bert told Michael what to write as he was quicker at penmanship. Rich wasn’t completely correct, but the idea was there. They couldn't make it happen now. Bert once again thanked his mother for making him study druidic magic so diligently. The changed portal spell needed some extra components for his plan to work.

Half a minute was left until the deadline so Bert and Michael quickly ran back. The spell for the portal was started but he knew that they would be a bit late, but it shouldn't be too big of a problem.

They should have been ready for a few minutes now and they will wait for a few more if it was a normal situation but with the current happenings, they would most likely wait for half a day hoping for the message. So, perhaps they didn't need to hurry so much but habits are hard to break.

On the other side, a tree stood with a lot of people around it who were waiting for the portal to open. After the required time had passed nervous energy started to permeate the surroundings.

They all had stayed up through the night trying to work out a plan, and in the end, they had to surrender. There wasn't a good solution. The best plan was to slowly start bringing small groups of people to the village over the following months. A bad plan among worst plans.

But what could they do? So as the portal opened a message was sent through and they all were quite saddened that they didn't find a miracle solution to solve their problems.

What no one expected was the portal to stay open longer than it was intended and then a change happened with the portal that only the observant ones noticed. “Bert has changed the portal so they can send a message to us.” A druid told everyone and not a moment later a rolled-up piece of parchment landed on the collection tray.

The portal disappeared and Tom quickly walked forward to read the message. Everyone saw his eyes widen and fear started to grip their heart. Tom quickly gave the parchment to the druid. Then everyone saw his eyes going wider, but he quickly nodded and finally said.

“Oh, that could work but we would need some expensive ingredients and a lot more energy must be given.” Tom nodded to this and cleared his throat and spoke. “We have ourselves the miracle solution that we were trying to find.” His face broke into a wide smile something he had not done in a long time.