Chapter 14

The protagonist seems to be dexterous with his hands.

In front of me are ten children.

Four of them are about four years old, and the remaining six are about eight.

In short, they are children who have been abandoned... but why now?

If it's so severe that they can't endure, shouldn't they have been abandoned when winter began?

"There are two times when children are abandoned. The first is during the wheat harvest season. If the harvest is poor, the village chief selects them. The second is after the New Year. If there's a miscalculation and more children need to be abandoned, it's usually realized in the latter half of winter, so it's late. Also, parents want to at least let their children enjoy the New Year's celebrations before sending them away."

"I see. Thanks for the explanation."

I ask the children their names and assign them living quarters.

I will save as many lives as I can.

The griffin's support will continue until the wheat harvest, so it's fine.

If next year is a good harvest, I can return them.

"Hey, Almus."

"What?"

"Do we have enough wheat? If next year is a poor harvest, we might need to be prepared for about fifty people."

According to Tera, if it continues for two years in a row, the reserves will definitely run out.

Do we have enough with the wheat we are growing now? That's Tera's question.

"It's fine. We're using fertilizer to grow wheat, so we can harvest more than usual. Plus, we've expanded the fields. And we're also growing barley."

This region mainly practices two-field agriculture.

In other words, after harvesting wheat, the field is left fallow for a year.

The food production efficiency is very poor.

On the other hand, we practice crop rotation. The production efficiency is completely different.

Tera's worry is unfounded.

"But, isn't it unlikely to continue for two years in a row?"

"I don't know. But the group casting this curse has a large number of high-quality sorcerers and the financial means to prepare sacrifices. So it might happen for two years. However..."

"However?"

"Rosais' kingdom might be different."

Rosais' kingdom... I think it's a mid-sized country south of the Romano Forest.

"Why is Rosais' kingdom safe when other major countries aren't?"

"Because Yuria is there."

Is Yuria from Rosais' kingdom? I've never heard of her.

Seeing my face, Tera answered.

"She's quite famous."

"But the other children seemed to be meeting her for the first time?"

"...Among the upper class. She's twelve years old this New Year and is supposed to start working as a sorcerer in Rosais."

Yuria is twelve years old...

"Can I change my age setting from eleven to twelve?"

"...Do as you please."

Alright. From today, I'm twelve.

It doesn't really matter anyway. Eleven and twelve aren't that different.

Besides, I'm actually over twenty.

"Think of it as an increase in labor. The harvest will be better. What I'm more worried about is the elderly. Making the elderly work..."

It's not very efficient.

They essentially just eat without contributing.

"The elderly are not often abandoned."

"Why?"

"...There are about eight children, but only one mother and one father."

I see.

"Most people die before they turn fifty. Long-lived elders are a sign of health, so it's hard to kill them."

It's considered bad luck.

And they seem to have strong emotional ties to the people around them.

There's more resistance to abandoning the elderly than children.

"Aren't you curious?"

"About what?"

"The reason I knew about Yuria."

Ah, that 'famous among the upper class' comment.

"I'm curious, but I won't ask. Tell me when you feel like it."

"Okay..."

Tera looked down, seeming relieved but a bit sad.

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"Amazing! How did you get so much wheat? What kind of sorcery did you use?"

"I didn't do anything special."

In front of me are golden wheat ears.

It's a bountiful harvest.

"What about yours?"

"Hehe! Thanks to me, it's fine. Not a great harvest, but there won't be any famine this year. My father was happy."

That's good to hear.

"By the way, what's that?"

"It's barley."

Yuria asks curiously.

"Don't you need to let the fields rest?"

"It's fine. I have a little secret."

When I answer, Yuria looks closely at the barley.

But she doesn't seem very interested and quickly shifts her gaze back to the wheat.

"Can we start the ritual now?"

"Sure. I'll leave it to you."

Yuria steps forward.

In front of her is a table with wine, deer meat, grapes, and olives.

The wine, olives, and grapes are things I obtained in exchange for Sueki.

"Here we go."

Yuria starts to dance gracefully.

She's beautiful.

My heart naturally races.

I could watch her forever, but the dance ends quickly.

"How was it?"

"It was beautiful."

When I praise her sincerely, Yuria smiles a little shyly.

"I'll be going now."

"Sure. I'll see you off."

I take Yuria to the lake.

"By the way, I'll give you some bread when it's ready. As a thank you."

"Hehe. I'm looking forward to it."

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Of course, wheat can't be eaten as it is.

It needs to be threshed.

The wheat must be removed from the ears and separated from the chaff.

If we did all this by hand, it would be a lot of hard work.

So, I'll borrow the wisdom of our ancestors.

"This is amazing!!"

Soyong talks to me while threshing the wheat with a thousand-toothed rake.

I'm happy to be praised for something I made.

Even if it's a copy.

By the way, the original thousand-toothed rake is made of bamboo or metal, but there's no bamboo here, and I don't have blacksmithing skills, so it's wooden.

So it's very fragile. Please handle it carefully.

"Hmm... The structure is simple. But to think it could be this efficient... What a great idea."

Tera mutters while looking at the thousand-toothed rake.

"If this spreads, it will be amazing, right?"

Rong says excitedly.

Well, the work efficiency will definitely improve.

But it also means taking away the job of threshing, which is usually done by widows, so it's not all good.

If we spread it, we need to consider the widows' jobs too...

But that's not something I need to worry about. I'm just a child leader. This group will disband when the time comes.

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Next, we need to remove the chaff.

Before machines were introduced on Earth, all regions used stone mills to thresh.

There are two types of mills: one where a round stone is rubbed against a stone plate, and another where two disc-shaped stone plates are stacked and one is rotated.

At least in this area, the former type of mill is used.

This method works, but you have to sit for a long time and do the same work, which can cause back pain.

I don't want to have back pain at this age.

So, I made a disc-type stone mill.

It was incredibly difficult to make.

After all, you have to rub stones together to make them round and flat.

I don't know how many times the devil in my heart whispered, "Why not just use the old method?"

But if this is completed, the work will be much easier. I believed that.

Thanks to the blessing? It wasn't too difficult to rub the stones together, which was a stroke of luck in an unfortunate situation.

But it's not very useful in such a subtle way.

By the way, I got back pain from sitting and working on it.

It's ridiculous.

"But this is so much easier!!"

"Me, me! Let me try!!"

Rozward and Gram are excited.

...If they're happy, that's good.

It was worth getting back pain.

"Next time, we should work together and take turns. Why did you make it alone?"

"Because I wanted to surprise everyone."

When I say that, Tera looks exasperated.

"The thousand-toothed rake was enough of a surprise."

"Hehe. I have one more surprise tool!"

"The weird one?"

"That's rude. It's a bamboo winnowing basket."

I touch the bamboo winnowing basket in the corner.

It's a masterpiece.

Of course, I'm not a farming tool enthusiast or anything, so I only know what it looks like from history textbooks.

But I know it uses wind to separate.

If you understand the principle, you can make something similar through trial and error.

It's not perfect, but it can be improved gradually.

After all, I have the skills to get an A in art class in elementary school.

This is something I should be able to do.

"Listen. First, you put the wheat mixed with chaff here, right? Then you turn this."

I try to demonstrate for everyone by moving the winnowing basket.

Crack

...

...

It seems more improvements are needed.

In the end, we all worked hard to separate it.