Chapter 128: First Arrival In The Valley
“We’re here, Miss Xilutiya.”
The horse carriage slowly entered the vast valley and finally stopped in front of a stone cottage.
This cottage’s first floor was like a rectangular prism, built of white stone, empty inside, suitable for parking horse carriages and miscellaneous items, or storing harvested grain crops. Stairs along the side of the cottage led up to the second floor, which was where Xilutiya lived, with a bedroom offering good visibility, a study room, and an exclusive small meditation room.
“The kitchen is on the side of the first floor, and there’s a cellar dug next to it. Later, Xilutiya can store things inside it.” The knight attendant leading the group guided her to inspect each place.
How to build city walls, castles, tall towers, and dwellings—the ‘Castle’ path contained professional planning examples. Often, these buildings would be part of a grand ‘Castle’ magic array, as well as symbols of civilization’s border.
Though small, it had all the essentials—this stone house was just right for Xilutiya alone, and it was on a higher mountain slope inside the valley, so there was no worry of flooding.
Behind the cottage, about 400 meters to the north, was the steep mountain wall surrounding the valley, covered in wind-eroded rocks, with no birds flying over.
The entire valley was vaguely C-shaped, with a 200-meter-wide entrance in the east, while the interior was a vast plain, roughly estimated at around 1200 mu, or about the size of 120 soccer fields.
The inner side of the valley still had large areas of primitive forest and stony weeds, with only the area near the entrance currently cleared simply.
Originally, Xilutiya had made some mental preparations, but upon arrival, she realized she had still underestimated the difficulty of developing this area. Leaving aside planting issues, just clearing this land was no easy task.
Fortunately, the Woodland Association personnel had considered the difficult start and had already cleared and plowed the initial 50 mu of fields for her, so it wasn’t completely starting from scratch.
“Miss Xilutiya should have a general understanding of the situation. Any doubts?” The second order knight attendant accompanied her standing in the open space in front of the cottage.
“Still very short on manpower.”
Xilutiya guessed this problem wouldn’t be easy to solve; if they weren’t short on people, they wouldn’t have sent her.
“No way around that, but at the beginning of next month, you can check the marketplace to see if you can find some alien race slaves or laborers. However, managing their lives will also take considerable effort.” The other suggested.
“Also, is it safe here? I see there’s still a large area of forest trees on the inner side of the valley.”
“We’ve cleared that area already; now there are basically no wild beasts inside, at most some rabbits, mice, and the like.”
“If you’re still not at ease, here are three signal rockets. Just light and launch one, and it will be detected by the tall tower of White Stone Fortress, then patrolling cavalry will arrive.”
“About 6-7 kilometers south of the valley, there’s a hunter’s cabin where forest patrollers are stationed long-term. They patrol the border and deal with monsters and wild beasts that intrude rashly. If you have troubles to resolve, you can try negotiating with them.”
“About 10 kilometers to the north, there’s a logging camp with people working there daily. If you want to add furniture, expand fences, or buy basic things, you can go there too.”
“Right, our captain said at departure that this horse carriage and horse delivering the luggage would be given directly to you as compensation. And in the first year, we’ll periodically deliver hay and beans to feed this draft horse and the two foals.”
Hearing this, Xilutiya then carefully examined the tall draft horse that had brought her. Its coat color was similar to roan, presenting as gray-white, though its thick hooves were black.
【Lakeside Horse】: A tall draft horse with a small amount of Blood Law Nature, robust and sturdy in build, suitable for pulling heavy goods and plowing fields, not fast, unsuitable as a war horse for cavalry.
The maiden gently stroked the tall draft horse with her hand. Its hooves were probably thicker than her thighs, with a weight of about one ton. Standing under this draft horse, Xilutiya’s head just reached the horse’s chin; if she wanted to ride it, she couldn’t straddle normally and could only sit sideways on the broad back.
Although this draft horse was too huge, the two petite foals beside it were just the right size to match Xilutiya; riding them would be very suitable.
【Lakeside Foal】: An immature Lakeside Horse, lively in temperament.
These two little ones were one brown and one black; on the way here, they had always stayed by their mare’s side, hiding under their mother’s body during rests, occasionally tilting their heads to eye these cavalrymen with their black eyes.
When no one was around, they would come out to play, hopping and frolicking about.
Afterward, some more matters were explained one after another, then these cavalrymen returned, leaving Xilutiya to live in this newly reclaimed valley.
……
That afternoon, the maiden’s footsteps crossed the wilderness of the valley, getting a preliminary feel for the environment here, then returning to her stone cottage.
Should she cook? She thought for a moment and went to the kitchen, where two bags of vegetables were placed under the cabinet, delivered with the horse carriage that morning.
Untying the rope seal on the bags, Xilutiya opened them and checked the contents.
Inside were about 20 jin of potatoes, an 8-jin pumpkin, five onions, six greenish tomatoes, four large cabbages, sixteen lovage roots, and eleven turnips.
After taking stock, Xilutiya opened the other bag, which contained three bundles totaling 26 sections of smoked sausage, five jin of smoked dried meat, and a bag of salt.
If eaten frugally, this food would last her a month.
Standing up, she checked the flour bag on the other side, which held 30 jin of good quality flour, also available for purchase in White Stone Fortress, a relatively good staple food.
As for excellent quality wheat flour, there wasn’t much sold in the marketplace; most was supplied to formal members of organizations in various stations.
She took out three potatoes to peel, one lovage root to peel, then put them in a pot to boil in water. Soon Xilutiya added a little smoked dried meat and a small spoonful of salt.
For the staple, she mixed flour with water to a thick consistency, then poured it into an oiled iron pot to make simple flatbread. Once fully cooked, she scooped it up, cut it into small pieces, and put them in a bowl.
Steaming buns or making bread were too troublesome; since she was eating alone, she naturally wanted to save some time.
After this operation, Xilutiya sat at the dining table by the stove, eating the vegetable and meat soup she had cooked, paired with crispy flatbread, and it felt pretty good.
Late at night, after washing up, Xilutiya sat at the bedside, covered with a brand-new cotton cloth quilt. A candle was lit at the bedside, allowing her to read the book in front of her.
Under the faint lamplight, the maiden’s soft cheeks glowed with a faint warm color. Her eyes were lively as she flipped through the pages with interest, only reluctantly lying down when the candle was nearly burned out.
The world outside the window was pitch black and quiet; the night passed quietly.
