Beneath the Dragoneye Moons

The Potentials had gotten varying [Surveying] skills, and many hands made light work. The grid for New Orthus sprang up with minimal problems, and the more important work of marking out farms and plots started, and quickly got to the stage where we could start the farming process.

The math on how large each plot should be was fascinating. Assuming wheat - the dominant crop of the region - one acre was about 4 million calories, and a person needed about 750,000 calories a year, children fewer.

Except things went wrong. Crops died, didn’t sprout, were eaten by insects and pests, floods washed them away, poor harvest… a thousand different hostile factors I was more than familiar with threatened the harvest. Then fields couldn’t be forced to grow wheat year after year - the crops had to be rotated. Roots, fruits, leaves, and legumes kept fields healthy and productive - except the one acre to 4 million calories was assuming peak efficiency in the first place.

Then people needed a place to live. We couldn’t live in the bunker for years, let alone the multi-generational plan Skye was developing, nor did people want to live in the temporary barracks that were next on the list. Then we had to consider growing families, raw size logistics - prime-numbered acres were absurd to work with - the lack of good skills, and suddenly plot sizes bloomed to forty acres each.

Cripes. I’d intellectually known the difference between gardening and farming, but seeing the huge swath of land laid out for us and being told ‘you need to work all of it’ was a different story. There was nothing to do but roll up my tunic and get my hands dirty. Thank the System for all the stats I had - it would make it far, far easier on me. I had renewed sympathy for all the farmers who did the whole thing by hand with no System assistance. Whoof.

I’d told Surveyor to find me before she dropped her skill. I fully intended to reclaim my home and rebuild from the very literal ashes, and I wanted our claim and the location of our now-destroyed home marked out. Petty and selfish of me, but like… that was our home, and I suspected Iona was chomping at the bit even harder than I was to get rebuilding. We couldn’t direct rebuild though. First, we needed a smaller ‘cottage’ in the middle of our fields, and would probably spend a few years growing whatever we could in the ‘easy’ field, versus the harder, rocky, mountainous terrain of our old home.

One day, civilization would be rebuilt, and we’d move back home. Until then, it was time to grab a straw hat and a hoe, and live the farmer life. Shame tons of wildlife had died or were dying, and we couldn’t simply hunt for our dinner.

Fenrir had flown off, looking for food, and I wished him luck. Part of me was speculating on a ‘second wave’ of fights and battles as various ancient creatures and lurking horrors ran out of food and started ranging out to find a bite to eat.

Many of us were chomping at the bit to get started, all this line stuff could happen later, and Skye bowed to the demand. Once the first farm grids were outlined, most of us began.

The only ones who didn’t were the farmers who just… went back home, found their land had been miraculously spared or were in tolerable shape, and just tried to pick up life where they’d left off. There was some future ugliness over who’d get farmer Joe’s house and land, but that was a problem for Skye.

“You know,” Iona said conversationally as we tried to figure out the best way for her to haul a plow. “While I had a bunch of reasons for becoming a Valkyrie, one of them was that I couldn’t see myself becoming some [Farmer’s] wife, toiling all day in the mud with the hot sun overhead. Now look at me.”

I looked up and down, resisting the urge to whistle like I wanted to every time I studied Iona’s body. 112, and she still looked fantastic.

“In the dirt, cool shade? I don’t know, it feels like you’ve gotten your wi-”

I ducked as Iona threw a dirt clod at me, giggling the whole way.

“Can’t touch this!” I taunted. Iona narrowed her eyes, then grinned viciously. She did a put-on turnaround, put her hands on her hips, and sighed.

“Alas, you’re right. I can’t touch that.”

“No, wait. Hang on, we can talk about this.” I protested.

Iona shot a wink over her shoulder at me, and threw the two straps of the plow over her shoulder.

“I think I’m just going to shamelessly cheat like this.” She said. “Ready?”

I grabbed the handles of the plow, having read a dozen books about it and knowing I had no idea what I was doing.

“Ready!” I confirmed.

Iona started what was basically a leisurely walk for her, effortlessly pulling the plow through the difficult soil. I held the handles, keeping it straight as it tried to do everything except make a straight furrow in the soil.

Her skills let her protect the plow from rocks and other hazards, but we weren’t leaving it up to chance. The Valkyrie stomped on some particularly large rocks she encountered, and used [Telekinesis] to move the shards out of the way.

I helped with a liberal application of [Teleportation], moving rocks that couldn’t be as easily seen, and knowing that it was more efficient for me to do it. My mana regeneration was so high compared to Iona’s that the difference in cost didn’t matter.

As a bonus, in the tradition of millions upon billions of farmers before us, the broken-up stones were arranged on the side of the field, making a wall on the boundary line. It wouldn’t stop anything that wanted to go over it - a child would be able to haul herself up if she wanted - but it marked the edge of our field in a way that was difficult to argue with.

“I feel like a cow.” Iona complained.

I kept my mouth shut, but my wife glanced over her shoulder and saw the look on my face.

“Hey!” She protested.

“What!” I complained. “It’s not my fault that your description was spot on.”

I huffed and puffed.

“I also ran away from home to avoid becoming, effective, a farmer’s wife.” I said. Keberos’s family hadn’t exactly fit the image of a poor farmer - they’d been relatively fabulously wealthy - but fundamentally, they’d been farmers. It was no lie to say I’d wanted to dodge being a farmer’s wife… it just wasn’t close to the whole picture.

We made it to the end of our first furrow with a minimum of huffing and puffing - thank the System for physical stats making this trivial - and turned back to examine our work.

Our very crooked work, ashes already falling.

“How.” Iona demanded.

“It’s hard!” I defended myself. “You try keeping the plow straight, I swear it bucks more than a horse. We don’t have the skills for this.”

Auri chose that moment to fly over, hovering near my shoulder.

“Brrrpt.” She said.

I threw my hands up in the air.

“Everyone’s a critic! If it’s so easy, why don’t you do it!”

Iona and Auri traded a look I did not like at all, and gave each other a brisk nod.

“Brrpt!”

A minute later I found myself hooked up to the plow, while Auri was using her [Mage Hands] skill and a half-dozen hoes to make her own row.

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I wrapped my hands in the harness of the plow, needing to reach awkwardly out to grab both parts. Then I sunk my sandals into the mud as I started to pull, feeling Iona push on the other side. I ignored the distracting fire show on the other side, freely [Teleporting] rocks to our growing wall.

Honestly, how were there so many rocks in the ground!? It was absurd! It was like there were rock-rabbits down there. I kept expecting to level any moment in [Tender Gardening], but as I continued on I reached the conclusion that it was unlikely.

Novel, yes. Important, yes. But if it were so easy to level a skill over 600, everyone would’ve achieved divinity. Simply prepping a field would get dozens of levels, multiplied by several fields every year, multiplied by a lifetime… I was getting distracted.

No levels for me!

Step after step I pulled the plow, despairing as [The World Around Me] cheerfully informed me that Iona’s line was perfectly straight. My face looked like I’d eaten a lemon as we hit the end and turned around. Insult added to injury - Auri’s three lines were perfectly straight.

“Fine, you win!” I conceded. Iona waggled her eyebrows at me.

“I’m going to ride my horse hard and put her away wet.” She threaten-teased-promised.

I gave her a one-fingered answer, grabbed the plow, and started another furrow.

“Excuse me!” One of the Potentials waved to us from the side of the field. He then started to rub his arms vigorously. I should look into getting some sweaters made… then again, livestock was one of those things we didn’t have a whole lot of. Exactly none of, as it happened to be. Not even a stray chicken. The whole thing ran quiet alarm bells in the back of my mind for the long-term viability of our little town.

There were some stories and legends on the subject, myths that I hoped and prayed were more than fables.

“Here, you’re good at plowing.” I told Iona, and promptly [Teleported] over, leaving a blustering Iona alone with the plow.

Petty revenge! We were making good time, and would soon be able to help our neighbors - if we thought that was the best thing to do. If they were trying to grab their own skills and classes then level them, us stomping around doing most of the work for them might be detrimental long term.

I waited what felt like an eternity for the young man to finish flinching at my sudden appearance, mentally scaling back on my speed and perception to more mundane levels.

“Whoa!” He half-stumbled back at my sudden appearance. I decided to do him a solid and caught him with [The Mantle of Dawn and Dusk].

“Hi! What can I do for you?” I asked the young man.

I let him stutter and stumble over his words, then have a whole coughing fit as he breathed in some of the ashes, for a whole eight seconds until he managed to center himself.

“Well, miss, er, misses, the girl over there was bragging about what a good [Surveying] skill she got, and I figured, these two lasses are the highest level people around, I’d get myself a good skill if I could maybe plant the seeds for you…?”

I swiveled my head around on my neck, enjoying the look on his face as I did so. Dude went green. I met Iona’s eyes and did a backwards shrug.

It was fine with me.

“Sure! You’re now Planter.” I told the teen.

I waited long enough to see the face of sputtering outrage before I teleported into my [Tower].

Thanks to [Astral Archives], my memory was perfect, and I didn’t need to pull out various books to consult as to the best foods to plant. The academic in me said carrots looked optimal. They were fine with both colder weather and low light conditions, as well as being filled with nutrients, unlike a number of other options which were closer to glorified grass.

I had the feeling that the Elaine living in the real world was going to strangle Academic Elaine after four months of non-stop carrot consumption. It wasn’t like I could barter with the neighbors either…we were all going to have an excess of carrots, and a deficit of everything else. No way in the frozen hells would they trade a limited amount of their rations for more carrots.

That, and for making us plow a bunch when carrots didn’t really need plowed soil. Or… wait, maybe they did? It wasn’t like this was a garden patch… and it wasn’t obviously written out in any of the books, the authors assuming we’d just know the answer.

Basic logic and long experience gardening suggested it was a good idea, getting rid of the rocks and turning over the soil. It wasn’t like it was going to hurt.

I zipped over to the seed storage level, thanking past-me for having the foresight to stash tons of different types of seeds, even when I thought wheat was the primary crop to grow. It’d be straight murder to try and plant wheat right now. Between the time of year, the chill, and the ashes blocking out the sun, it didn’t have a chance.

Carrots were a little hardier, and had a shorter growing cycle. Calories per acre they weren’t great, but we had food stores. They would stretch the stores, provide proof of concept, and level almost everyone. I grabbed four bags of twenty-five pounds each, resigning myself to planting the entire field. Well, the entire field, minus a small plot where our cottage was going to go. We couldn’t live in the bunker forever!

Wait. Waaaait. I wasn’t going to plant the entire field! Planter was going to plant the entire field!

MINIONS!

I left my [Tower] with a faint popping noise. I nearly tossed the bags at Planter, then refrained at the last moment. Getting smacked with a hundred pounds of high-speed carrot seeds was an ignoble way to die.

“Three seeds about 2 centimeters deep, 4 centimeters between carrots.” I explained. It wasn’t the best way to grow carrots - there were quite a few more efficient ways, like scattering them freely over the freshly tilled fields then thinning them later, or using a tray - but I had a minion. One willing to take skills explicitly for this job, and I’d be doing him a disfavor by going the easy way.

The hard, complex way here would maximize his levels, and maximize our return on seeds. The ugly specter of starvation was still looming over my shoulder, and I was determined to stretch every single last seed. It could be the literal difference between life and death.

Or normal food and cannibalism. The math on my rate of healing, death vs conjured food problems, and calories per pound gave a nasty solution.

I patiently waited as he went cross-eyed, obviously reading a System notification. I had a couple as well - I just didn’t obviously show it on my face when I read them.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the General Skill [Farming Foreman]. Would you like to replace a skill with it? Y/N]

[*ding!* Would you like to sidegrade [Tender Gardening] to [Farming]? Y/N]

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the General Skill [Minion Mastery]. Would you like to replace a skill with it? Y/N]

I briefly debated the [Farming] one before declining. I was already getting the occasional nudge from my skill, and there was no telling how far I’d downgrade or de-level. Also, selfishly, perhaps short-sightedly, I just didn’t want to. The skill had been perfect, practically tailored, to growing my mango trees, and by Ciriel, I was going to grow myself a new grove when I could.

A random note - I could not read System notifications through [The World Around Me]. It was like they didn’t exist to the skill, which made sense.

I [Teleported] over to Iona, carefully not stepping on the freshly plowed soil. Then again, I probably could. I could run on falling leaves, fresh soil without a footprint? Easy mode. It was the thought that counted.

“Hey love! I see you’re pulling along just fine without me, and-”

Iona flipped me off with relish.

“If the next thing out of your mouth is anything other than ‘I’m happy to help you continue plowing…’ I’ma be annoyed.” She said.

“I’d love to sleep on the sofa tonight.” I rapidly teased, my wits about me for once. “I’m dead curious how you’d manage to rustle one up.” I wasn’t a complete scourge though, the whole time I was picking up my part of the plow, and putting my back into it.

The original definition of an acre was the amount of land one man could plow with an ox in a single day. A terrible imprecise unit, made all the more useless by stats and skills muddying it up. It took about half a day for Iona and I to plow the whole field, and we read each other’s mind - our goal was simple.

Always be ahead of Planter.

[Luminary Mind] let me think of a dozen different things at once, and plowing was boring. My respect for [Farmers] went up after every step I took, occasionally brushing the ashes out of my hair. My beautiful, wonderful, flame-bathed hair. Bless Auri, and her ability to keep me clean enough to feel happy. Our water supplies were far too limited to ‘waste’ on washing water, not when the aqueduct was in a thousand pieces. Sure, in a pinch we could start desalinating the Bloodmoon Bay, but that was a full-time job with huge mana requirements. Nobody wanted a single person’s skill to be the central linchpin of a community, that was how towns failed and villages died. Good, easy stone to work with, bad for having a ready supply of fresh water. Most of my mind was distracted by the field-spanning mandalas I wanted to lay down after, and how I could get them to work. Integrating runes with growing material and shifting dirt was tricky, especially long-lasting ones. Ink was extra hard to work with versus Radiance, then there was the question of ‘can I make these runes extend over everyone’s farms?’

600 souls translated to roughly 150 households, 40 acres each was a 6000 acre mandala. Add in the roads and gaps between everyone… I could try to have the enchantments along the stone walls, but those were going to shift as time went by. So fragile that one kid bumping a stone knocking the whole system down wasn’t viable. The trick wasn’t in power, or laying it down, the trick was in having it survive the rigors of life and the exposure to the elements. The problem had been far easier in my tame orchard, where I had the supplies to make a proper framework.

Auri continued to work her beak off next to us, but all of her [Mage Hands] suddenly guttered out of existence.

“Brrrpt…” an exhausted phoenix barely made it to my shoulder, where she promptly conked out.

“Ran out of mana.” Iona quickly diagnosed. I passed Auri off to Iona, who started the ‘hot coal’ routine. Planter was rapidly approaching, a glint in his eye hinting that he, too, knew about our little contest.

“Juice run, be right back.” I said. Inside the [Tower] I grabbed Auri’s favorite juice blend, a spoonful of honey, and I was feeling generous. I slapped together a quick bacon-lettuce-tomato sandwich - [Teleportation] was the best skill ever, how did I live without it? - then zipped back out, generously distributing everything. Mostly by teleporting it ontop of Iona’s head.

“Look at me! The amazing table!” Iona spun in place, everything staying on top of her head while Planter grabbed the sandwich, ravenously grabbing a bite and barely chewing before swallowing. I put a little [Dusk] over the lid of the juice, not wanting to contaminate her drink with ashes.

Furlong after furlong, we finished our plowing in a day, taking a moment to check on our neighbors.

Some were doing well, about a fifth of their way through their fields, while others were struggling, their first row jagged and crooked. It was best if they struggled themselves for the first, oh…

“Give it a week before we step in?” I suggested to Iona.

“I was thinking the same thing.” She agreed. “Enough time to learn and level, but not so long that it causes bitterness, resentment, or fouls the season.”

“They can get cabbage.” I decided. Iona and Planter laughed.

“You are a terrible woman.” She said. I bowed at my appreciative audience.

“That I am. Well, no rest for the wicked. Next stage?” I asked. Iona sighed.

“Yeah. Get me one of the good shovels, and the enchanted pickaxe with the double head? I don’t know why, that one worked far better for me.”

I grabbed the tools Iona wanted. She was off to start digging… well, digging a river basically. Sanguino had dammed up a river to create a reservoir for the city aqueduct, which was now not helpful to us. We wanted the water here, not a day trip away, and the only solution was absurd amounts of elbow grease.

“I think I can get the enchanting done before dawn.” I said, looking at the sinking sun.

“Bet.” Iona agreed, and we quickly haggled on the stakes.

“Deal!” I said in the end, Iona slapping her hand in mine.

Of course, that’s when the entire sky shifted, going from sundown to deep night, some god or another shifting the entire world to their whim. Iona looked just as surprised as I was, no impending knowledge of divine movement having been delivered by oracle to her.

Given where Lithos was, and how it’d just gone from night to noon there, I suspected a number of trolls were having a really bad day.

“Oh come on!” I complained. “Foul!”

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