It Should Not Exist on This Land

Romain stepped closer and first inspected the food. It was fairly decent.

The dry rations consisted of beans and mixed grains.

The Black Bread was bran bread.

The oatmeal porridge was thick as well.

A clay pot behind them was also boiling water.

Deacon Seth had prepared food for him, just as Romain had instructed earlier.

This lunch was what he would be eating today as well.

Romain ate quickly. The Black Bread tasted awful, but he swallowed it without seeming to chew.

While the other farmers were still enjoying their meal, Romain brought Mol to the manure heap and began making compost.

Mol's face turned deathly pale. The stench hung heavily in the air, manure water flowed everywhere, and the fumes nearly made him cry.

Romain's brows were tightly furrowed as well. His stomach kept convulsing, and he nearly threw up the lunch he had just eaten.

Relying on his powerful self-control, he suppressed his instinctive disgust, picked up the tools, and walked toward the manure heap. After nearly two hours, he finally made a standard flat-ground compost pile, then sealed it with wet mud so it could ferment under high heat inside.

If all went well, it would fully decompose in half a month. By then, the stench would be gone, leaving only a faint smell of ammonia, and it would have truly become fertilizer.

But not yet. When Romain left the place, manure had splashed onto his clothes and trouser legs. His eyes were bloodshot, and his face had even turned somewhat purple.

He immediately went to bathe, scrubbed himself completely clean, and changed into fresh clothes.

When Romain sniffed his arms and palms, his brows knit slightly.

He felt like the smell had seeped into him.

It probably would not fade anytime soon.

Afterward, Romain summoned Mol and told him that all manure from now on had to be handled according to his standard procedure.

Any farmer who did this work would receive an extra two pounds of wheat as a reward.

The process itself was not complicated, but it was revolting, a blow to both body and mind.

Romain had thought his resolve was as tough as stone and his will as hard as steel, yet even he could not endure it in the end. It disgusted him beyond measure.

Mol believed the farmers would do this even without a reward.

He felt that Lord Romain had simply never come into contact with such things before. It was like getting motion sickness for the first time—the first experience was always the worst. Those lowly farmers, on the other hand, could accept this kind of work. They had long grown used to such foul odors. Whose home did not have a few piles of dung?

But when Mol saw Romain's complexion shifting from purple to green, he could not bring himself to say it.

Romain attached great importance to the matter and told Mol to carry it out as soon as possible.

What was there to say? The Lord had made such a sacrifice himself. If Mol failed to get it done properly, he could only imagine his future life in a pigsty.

So he quickly made the arrangements.

Romain, meanwhile, went to handle something else.

He first visited the Livestock Shed to inspect the Draft Cattle and farming tools, then summoned the blacksmith of Sigg Town.

The blacksmith was called Laxus. Upon receiving the summons, he quickly appeared before Romain.

He was a middle-aged man with thick curly hair, a full beard, and a hairy chest. He wore an open-front undershirt and had a sturdy build, especially his arms, which looked like iron hoops.

Craftsmen who possessed specialized skills held relatively high social status and lived quite well.

"You are Laxus?"

"Yes, my lord." Laxus placed his hands over one another before his stomach and answered respectfully.

Romain treated Laxus well. He valued what such professions represented.

Romain asked again, "Were the farming tools in Sigg Town made by you?"

"Some were brought by merchants, and some were made by me. But I am usually only responsible for repairs, my lord."

Romain frowned, his eyes narrowing.

He looked again at the iron plows, unconsciously bit a finger, then turned his head and spat with an ugly expression.

"How is business in Sigg Town?"

"Not very good, my lord," Laxus said.

A Blacksmith Shop's need for iron went without saying, but it lacked the capacity to smelt iron independently. It could only purchase basic materials such as Iron Ingots and iron blocks from outside, which Laxus then hammered and forged according to Sigg Town's needs.

But Sigg Town's economy was terrible. Put simply, it was too poor. The people could not afford iron goods, and only a few farmers owned iron farming tools.

This was perfectly normal.

In this era, iron and steel were scarce commodities.

Most of what was produced went into all kinds of military equipment. Next came the daily needs of nobles and royalty, followed by merchants and the landed gentry, who also had a pressing need for iron. Very little was left by the time it reached the farmers.

The Agricultural Officer held an extremely high position in Sigg Town. He controlled most of the Draft Cattle and most of the iron farming tools. His personal wealth surpassed that of everyone else in Sigg Town combined.

Romain asked Laxus, "How many Iron Ingots do you have?"

"Only two hundred pounds." Laxus looked troubled. He thought Romain might be planning to confiscate his property.

This was his entire fortune, the fortune of Sigg Town's only high-status professional, worth more than eight Draft Cattle.

Romain considered it for a moment.

Then he crouched down and drew a sketch of an iron plow on the ground.

"Can you forge a plow in this style?"

Laxus was greatly surprised. He studied it carefully, uncertain yet curious.

Romain described the specific dimensions of the iron plow to him.

Drawing on his experience, Laxus estimated the cost in his mind and was immediately shocked. "This big thing may use more than thirty pounds of iron. And it will need more than iron—it needs wheels too. You will need a carpenter."

There were many carpenters in Sigg Town, but only Witchi could make wheels.

Romain had reduced the materials needed for this Heavy Plow as much as possible, but upon hearing that, he immediately frowned.

"I understand. Forge this for me. I will pay you accordingly."

Laxus hurriedly declined, saying Romain only needed to cover the cost of materials.

He looked at Romain's face, hesitated, and said, "But, my lord, the men of the Church say that all things are gifts from the gods and must remain as they are. Change them, and hell lies ahead."

The Church's influence spread deeply across this land. Even in a remote place like Sigg Town, it remained enormously influential.

The meaning of those words was that every object and every technology had been bestowed by the gods. Humanity had to preserve the status quo, or else fall into hell.

Having farmers collect manure was one thing, since no one knew what Romain was doing.

But Laxus could see at a glance that Romain wanted him to forge a new kind of plow, which violated the Church's doctrine.

Upon hearing this, Romain stood and said calmly, "Then let their gods tell me that to my face."

Laxus was at a loss after hearing such arrogant blasphemy, along with that faintly contemptuous attitude toward the gods.

Romain paid it no heed. He intended to shatter every notion held by the people of Sigg Town and make them obey his every word.

What was the Church anyway? Two punches, and they would behave.

Romain continued, "This is important. Make it as quickly as possible. Take me to your Blacksmith Shop, and summon the carpenter as well."

Under Romain's urging, Laxus could only lead the way.

Romain followed, frowning as he turned back to take one last look at the iron plow beside the Draft Cattle.

It was strange. Truly strange.

What was strange was the plow's design.

Romain had seen the lands of the Armor-Splitting Family, and he had seen the land of Sigg Town.

The two places were in different locations, yet their soil structures were broadly similar. In other words, this land basically shared the same ecological environment.

The soil here held a great deal of water. It was excessively damp and full of clay.

After his Planting skill rose to level 2, Romain's understanding of soil had deepened.

Plowing, as the name implied, meant turning over the surface soil to make it loose.

Compared to a hard bed, most crop seeds preferred sleeping in a soft one.

The iron plows they currently used could turn the earth, but they were too light. They could only scratch through a shallow layer of soil and could not till deeply.

In other words, plowing with them was not very useful. At best, it could increase yields by fifty percent. This was also the main reason crop yields per acre were so disastrously low in this era.

The first requirement of intensive cultivation was deep tillage.

So the question arose.

Romain was very curious.

If the natural climate had not changed drastically, if the soil conditions had not become extreme in a short period, and if there had been no sudden cooling like a Little Ice Age—

Then why had such a light plow emerged on this land?

This thing was more like something foreign, something that did not conform to the objective laws of development.

It alone should not have existed on this land.

This place did not possess the natural conditions necessary for its birth.

Romain could have understood if there had been no iron plows at all.

But since they possessed the ability to create, why had the person who invented this light plow not simply invented a Heavy Plow instead?