Lord of Reclamation: I Can Unlock Abilities By Building Civilizations
Chapter 35: Sealed Agreements

Chapter 35: Sealed Agreements

The border city was miles away. Rather than buying salt, it’d be faster to mine the stuff directly.

Shallow rock salt was pretty easy to extract—you could even break it off by hand without any tools.

The method for cleaning up rock salt ore was fairly straightforward too: crush it up, then use coarse linen with big holes to strain out the chunks of dirt and stone. The second step was boiling and straining, then finally boiling it down to crystals.

After these three simple steps, while it wasn’t the fine salt Thane had enjoyed in his previous life, it was top-shelf quality for this day and age and would more than meet their daily needs.

What Thane needed Eliric to handle was mainly keeping watch and hauling the stuff back.

"Your boys need to make a choice—keep being mercenaries or stay put and become citizens of Fontdmer Town."

Thane told Eliric. "There’s no getting around it. This kind of work has to go to people I can trust, and I only trust you."

Only folks willing to settle down in Fontdmer Town could handle this job.

If none were willing, Thane would have to pick trustworthy people from somewhere else.

"Mm, understood." Eliric’s face showed rare thoughtfulness.

"You can take your time with it."

Thane added. "No rush. Tomorrow you find Ryan and take your boys northeast to clear out the dangerous critters near the roads."

Sometimes wild beasts were more trouble than bandits. Thane needed to wipe out these problems before they got worse.

He didn’t want headaches down the road.

"Alright, I’ll go track him down first."

Eliric nodded and turned to leave.

Thane pulled out an agreement and walked into the next wooden house.

Inside, Avril was embroidering something at the table. Hearing footsteps, she turned around.

She gently tucked the hair from her forehead behind her ear, showing a sweet smile.

"Good day, Baron Thane."

"Good day, Miss Avril."

This was Thane and Avril’s understanding—until Razor Plains was reclaimed, she’d be called Miss.

"Are you getting along well here?"

"Mm, it’s fine. Much better than Razor Plains."

Avril’s smile was a bit shy. "It’d be even better if I could have a little more honey each day!"

Avril had a sweet tooth. When she got back to Fontdmer Town, Thane had given her a jar of honey right away, which she’d polished off in a week.

"The town doesn’t have much honey on hand. I’ll have someone pick some up."

Thane actually wanted to keep bees, but beekeeping up north was a real bear in winter.

"You should also have a maid. How about that little girl Susan?"

Susan was the little girl they’d brought back from the hunter’s cabin.

"That sounds fine. I’ll go along with whatever Baron Thane decides." Avril smiled sweetly.

"If you need anything, you can tell me, or talk to Kralfard directly when I’m not around."

Thane had never actually dealt with noble ladies and didn’t know beans about what they needed.

Chronicles Medieval didn’t have a guide for this either.

After some light chatter, Thane didn’t beat around the bush and placed the hide on the wooden table.

"Take a look, Miss Avril. This has what we talked about that day. If everything looks good, you can put your seal on it."

"No need to look. I trust you."

Avril pulled out her seal, pressed it on the red wax pad, and stamped it without missing a beat.

Thane smiled and nodded. Without wasting time, he stamped his own name seal on it.

Then he tucked away the agreement, stood up, and closed the door.

"Since we’re partners now, I’d like to ask a favor."

"Please, go ahead."

"My man Eliric—that fellow built like a mountain—is going hunting in the wilderness. I’d like your double to go with him."

Thane settled back in his chair and lowered his voice. "You and your double share thoughts, so you can get word to me anytime."

Thane wasn’t trying to spy on Eliric, but he was worried they might run into trouble. He also wanted to test whether Avril’s ability was actually worth a damn.

"Perfect! Vivian doesn’t like sitting around anyway. This is great—she can get out and have some fun!" Avril agreed eagerly.

"Please tell her to wear a mask too."

Thane instructed.

"Mm-hmm."

Avril looked at Thane and asked, "Are you planning to work that salt mine?"

"Hm?"

Thane was a bit puzzled.

Though he hadn’t gone out of his way to hide it, Thane hadn’t told Avril about the salt mine.

"I saw the salt ore in Susan’s pack. I figured there was a salt mine at the cabin?" Avril explained without being asked.

"Mm."

Thane nodded, his opinion of Avril going up a notch.

Noble ladies were indeed sharper than ordinary folks.

"Down the road, I might need your double to help carry messages there too."

"No problem."

Avril said, "I’m happy to help you out."

"Then get some rest. I’ve still got things to take care of."

"Hold on a moment."

Avril stopped Thane as he got up to leave. She picked up the leather pouch in front of her and handed it to him.

"Here, a little gift for you."

Thane looked down at the pouch, which was embroidered with dragon claws and tulips—his own coat of arms.

But this pouch’s embroidery and design were much more refined and beautiful than what he’d made.

His own was a rough sketch at best, while this was the real deal!

This kind of coat of arms had real noble class to it.

"Last time the coat of arms on your pouch was pretty ugly, so I redid one for you."

Avril tilted her head, smiling somewhat sheepishly. "I might not have gotten it exactly right. If you think anything looks off, I can fix it for you."

"It’s already perfect—much prettier than what I drew myself."

Thane tucked away the pouch and said earnestly, "Thank you, Miss Avril."

"These little things are all I’m good for. I’m glad you like it."

"I like it very much."

Thane smiled and nodded.

Without more small talk, Thane said a quick goodbye to Avril and left her wooden house.

With the manor finished, the slaves didn’t have any new work lined up for the moment.

Thane couldn’t keep them fed for nothing, so he decided right away to get started on the irrigation channel project.

Fontdmer Town had thousands of acres of farmland, much of it on hillsides. The irrigation network naturally couldn’t reach everything.

For starters, Thane planned to take the shortest route to bring water from the river bend, then dig a reservoir fairly close to Fontdmer Town.

Of course, this so-called reservoir was also the fish pond Thane was itching to have.

Thane was dying for a fish pond.

It could provide irrigation water, raise fish for food, and even let folks take a dip in summer.

More importantly, it could unlock livestock breeding abilities.

After the reservoir was built, they could run more irrigation channels to other farmland through it.

For those high spots that channels couldn’t reach, they could haul water by hand or build waterwheels for irrigation.

Things would be simple after that.

But this was all down the road. The first order of business was digging the reservoir.

Thane’s starting plan was sixty-six feet wide, ninety-nine feet long, and ten to thirteen feet deep—shallow around the edges, deep in the middle. This first project would keep the slaves busy for two months.

The first reservoir would go in a hollow between two hillside farmlands, over two hundred feet in both directions. Even if the fish pond got bigger later, there’d be plenty of room.

This hollow was full of soggy mud. Thane figured that during summer’s heavy rains, it’d collect water anyway.

This kind of soil was easy to dig, and what they dug up could be hauled back to town for making compost.

The wet, sticky mud gave off a rotten stench. About ten slaves stood barefoot in the hollow forming a circle, rhythmically scooping up the muck shovel by shovel and heaving it to shore.

Pop—

A foot pulled out of the sticky mud with a wet sucking sound.

"Damn mud!"

Matt griped, shaking the muck off his foot with gusto.

Old Tom straightened his back and cracked, "Eat too much black bread this morning? Look at that gut bigger than a wild boar’s, tsk tsk tsk..."

"Shut it, old man! This here’s muscle!"

Matt raised his arm and proudly flexed his bicep, only to find it was squishy.

Old Tom shook his head. "Give it up, boy. You’re not as solid as this old codger."

"Hahaha!"

The slaves burst out laughing.

The slaves were all tickled to have new work.

When there was nothing to do, daily food got cut in half.

Only when they were busy would they get proper grub, and they could even get a small cup of ale in the evening.

The slaves had gradually figured out this noble lord Thane’s ways.

As long as they worked hard without goldbricking, they’d have decent food and drink and wouldn’t get knocked around for no reason.

They didn’t carry that bitter grudge they used to have.

After all, wasn’t work the same everywhere?

"Hmph."

Only Matt was pouting.

"Look down on me? Last time I got picked as a reserve soldier and earned some respect."

Matt muttered under his breath, keeping his head down and working.

The shovel scooped up a puddle of mud, and a fat loach was wriggling in the slop trying to get away.