Kuzunalis
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FLTL Ch 203. Shortages
🕑 Added 2025-04-03 14:35:00 +0000 UTC"Oh, that reminds me," Duvas suddenly exclaimed, "this is exactly what I was going to remind you about yesterday, but I forgot in all the hustle and bustle of your visit to the coal mines. Yes, we do rely on the temple of the Goddess for this. I visited it yesterday to see the calendar which is maintained by father Edric, and I saw that New Year's Eve is in just two days from today."
"From what I remember, the Kingdom of Reslinor uses a solar calendar, right?"
Gorsazo gave the answer this time. "Yeah, and it was quite controversial when Kreslinus Vorlarken, the mad king, had introduced it more than a century ago. The other countries in Cilaria still use the lunar calendar, and it is the same for most of the countries outside Cilaria as well from what I have heard from a friend who knew an ocean-going sailor."
Kivamus nodded. Along with the changes that the first king of the kingdom had made in the measurement and weighing systems, this change of the type of calendar used in Reslinor meant that it was a lot of changes to have been made by just a single person - kind of like him, in fact. He frowned at that thought. Although it was more than a century ago, the mad king couldn't be someone else who had transmigrated from earth just like him, could he? If he was, what if there were other people who had been reincarnated into a new life on this planet Eranityn? What if there were people from London as well? What if it was someone he knew?
No! He had to stop thinking about it! It just couldn't be! He shook his head to clear it of thoughts like that. There was no point in daydreaming about such things... Him being transmigrated to this place was something that was already done, and there wasn't anything he could do about it by thinking more about Earth, apart from making himself morose again. While he still didn't have any idea of why or how he had been transported to this world, it still couldn't be a common occurrence, or one of those people from Earth would have made a slip and the locals would have noticed that that person wasn't from their own world.
He nodded to himself. It had to be just a coincidence that Kreslinus Vorlarken had made those changes. He wasn't called the mad king without a good reason, after all. The haphazard measurement system he had implemented to enforce his new rule could be called nonsensical at best, which attested to the possibility that he really was mad. However, thinking of earth had made him feel reminiscent of his past life there once again, which threatened to derail his good mood from the morning. He tried to change his mood by asking, "Do you know why he changed the calendar system from lunar to solar?"
Gorsazo shrugged. "I can only guess as to what the real reasons were, but from what I think the reason was the same as that for changing the measurement system. He just wanted his new kingdom and dynasty to use something which was completely different from what was used everywhere else. This way, whenever the local priest of the goddess in any village or town would tell his people about the change of a season or a year, people would remember the mad king once again - along with his cruel punishments to anyone who thought of rebelling against his rule. Of course, it's just a guess on my part."
Kivamus nodded. It was more or less what he expected. He looked at the majordomo. "So what do you do on New Year's eve?" he asked curiously. "There were big celebrations and a feast in the Ulriga palace. From what I remember, there were even some travelling acrobats who gave a performance there on such occasions."
Duvas shrugged. "Tiranat can hardly be compared to the Ulriga Palace, so there isn't anything special done here to celebrate it. By this time in the previous years - that is after more than a month of the start of winter - most of the villagers would have started to get short on coin because the coal mines were always kept closed in the winter, since we couldn't sell any coal in these months with the northern road blocked for the season."
He continued, "Of course, it also resulted in a serious loss of income for the manor. That would usually mean that by this time everyone in Tiranat would be counting their pennies - including us at the manor - with everyone waiting for the snow to start melting so we could resume our normal lives again. So it wasn't like anybody really wanted to celebrate going through such a difficult time." He added, "Although this year, the savings which you brought from Ulriga has done a lot to tide us over in the last few months, which is why the conditions are much better in the manor this winter."
"I guess that's true enough," Kivamus muttered. "Without that it might have become really difficult for us."
Gorsazo shook his head. "That was a large sum at the beginning for sure, but after keeping aside the amount we need to pay the taxes after the winter, most likely we have already spent all of it which we could have safely spent."
Kivamus nodded. "That's probably right. We are still not sure exactly how much the tax demands will be, and we might still need to buy some wheat to use as seeds after the winter. It's true that these sawdust briquettes will help to save some coal which we can sell after the winter to gain some extra money, but that's not going to be much, especially since we need to keep the forest clearing in the South continued as longer as we can before we start to send workers to the coal mines. That means after the winter we are not going to have a big enough stock of coal to earn a lot of revenue to supplement our limited amount of gold in the treasury."
"Yeah, that's why it worries me if we will even have enough funds to buy more seeds to complete the targeted area for sowing," Duvas muttered. "While there is no news incoming in the winter from the north, it's not hard to guess that the grain prices must have kept increasing in the winter, and by the time we can send a caravan to buy wheat from Cinran, the cost might just remain prohibitive until we start selling coal again."
"I remember that we needed sixty-six sacks of wheat for sowing in the spring," Gorsazo remarked, "but we were already ten sacks short before the start of winter, since we only had fifty-six spare sacks of wheat which we could keep as seeds."
"You are forgetting that we have also taken in twenty-six stonecutters a month ago," Kivamus added with a grimace. "With a single sack of grain containing around a hundred and twenty five kilos of wheat, they are going to consume a full sack every ten days or so. In other words, that's nearly six sacks we need to keep aside to feed them over the two months of winter, which means we are going to be at least sixteen sacks short for sowing." He shook his head once again. "And it's not just that. Taking them in has also increased the required amount of land we need to sow, which will also increase the amount of seeds we need."
"At a rough estimate," he continued after doing a mental calculation, "that means we will need another four sacks of seeds to sow to feed them for the next year, which takes our total grain shortage to twenty sacks. That's nearly a hundred gold at the going rates before the winter, and it's only going to be higher in the spring. It might very well go as high as a hundred and fifty for all we know. I don't think we are capable of paying that much after paying for the taxes. It might still be doable, but it's certainly going to be close."
"However, there is also the fact that we are not consuming as much wheat as we were thinking before the winter," Gorsazo commented, "because the four hunting groups are bringing in a good amount of meat these days. That has meant a better diet for the villagers - especially those living in the manor - but more importantly, it means we are not using the wheat which we might have been using in the absence of that meat. The hunters have also brought nearly a dozen rabbits by now which we can use to reduce the wheat consumption further, although I believe it's a better idea to keep them alive for now so we can start breeding more of them in the future. A dozen rabbits wouldn't nearly be enough to feed the village even a single day anyway."
After a moment of thinking, Gorsazo continued, "I was talking about this with madam Helga earlier in the day, and she estimated that with the amount of meat we are feeding those in the manor and giving as weekly ration to the other villagers, we are going to save at least ten sacks of wheat over the winter. Although that will still leave us short of another ten sacks which we will have to buy."
Duvas stared at the teacher. "You do spend a lot of time talking with Madam Helga these days..." Then he looked back at Kivamus and added with a wince, "Anyway, that will still cost us too much gold, which we might not be able to spare before starting to sell coal regularly. We need to save as much as we can to pay the taxes, of course, but... also for some other stuff that I will explain another time, since it is a difficult topic."
Kivamus frowned at that, but didn't call him out on it for now, while thinking about their current problem. Was there anything else they could do to reduce the consumption of wheat even more? It didn't even need to be a long-term solution. As long as they could save enough wheat to complete the sowing in spring, they should be just fine from the next winter with the amount of grain they would be reaping."
Suddenly, he remembered the fish he had eaten from the eastern stream a few days ago. "What about eating more fish instead?"
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Next chapter> FLTL Ch 204. Problems
Comments
Jermel Purse
First love the chapter I pitched in $15 to subscribe because I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to know what was gonna happen next. It’s nice to see the small time jumps. It feels like the story is pacing a lot better now. About this chapter, it felt right, but not quite right. Let me explain. I get that they are discussing shortages. What we’re bringing in where we’re gonna fall short and it makes sense to have this conversation. It makes sense to discuss all the details they brought up how much we did we think we were gonna need how The new consumption of meat is helping reduce what we were thinking we were gonna need but how these new 26 people are gonna add to what we’re gonna need and figuring out new totals all of that made sense. It’s the way the conversation flowed that was not quite right. It didn’t feel like a natural conversation two or more people would have with one another about where we stand and what we need. I’m picturing them sitting at a table, babysitting near the fire having this conversation and it’s not the topic that felt wrong, but the words used during the conversation. It felt sometimes robotic the way they were speaking, not necessarily natural. Not like a conversation two people who knew each other would have it almost felt like a draft. That’s the perfect way of describing it how you would draft the conversation would flow as opposed to how the conversation is actually written for a script or something. I hope that makes sense not trying to be critical I just felt this was one of those chapters that has great importance in setting a tone for where we are now I need to go in the future, but it just needs to touchups for the conversation so that it feels more natural anyway onto the next chapter like I said I can’t wait to see what’s next
Kuzunalis
That is indeed the last option if nothing else can be done to improve this situation. But with all the work going on in the village, the labourers need as many calories as they can get, especially in the winter. So it's a better option for them to find a way to supplement their food sources while ensuring the workers are getting as much food as they require.
Gabriel Melnik
They could ration the food portions to one bowl per day.
