Arc II - Agrarian Revolution
Chapter 19 - Sanitation
2 months and 13 days since the summoning
In the village of Zoligasha, a crowd had gathered since early morning, comprising nearly the entire population.
Almost all the land surrounding the village had been plowed with the new device, and down the road walked an ox, five beastkin, and a peasant, intending to resume work on the remaining territory.
In the middle of one of the tilled fields lay a flimsy test foundation for the mill. Planks of wood, axes, and saws were strewn about, but there was no one there. Everyone had gathered elsewhere.
The beastkin stared at a strange wooden building on the outskirts of the village, which was divided into two distinct sections. Nearby stood a middle-aged human peasant, covered in wood shavings, who was also watching. He turned his gaze to Alan and Kamelia. "Lady Armenas, we have constructed it exactly as you commanded," he stated flatly.
Beside them, the village elder inspected the building, scratching his chin. "Hmm... Lord Gothwald, perhaps you will finally tell us what this is? Do you intend to store grain or provisions here?"
Alan almost laughed. "Yeah... close enough." He straightened up. "This is the new outhouse for the entire village."
The elder blinked, and the beastkin nearby exchanged glances. The old man cleared his throat. "Lord Gothwald... do not think I doubt you... but why? We have chamber pots for such needs."
Kamelia simply offered Alan a silent nod, as if to say, go on, explain your brilliant solution to them.
He took a step forward. "Listen, first of all, this is necessary to prevent diseases. Where does disease come from?"
"From miasmas," someone from the crowd replied.
Alan snapped his fingers. "Exactly! Miasmas. And where are miasmas most common?"
The replier, a dog-eared youth of about twenty, scratched the back of his neck. "Well... usually they come from the swamps of the snake-kin."
"Yes," Alan said. "And what are swamps like?"
"...Sticky?"
Gothwald shook his head. "Almost. Swamps are dirty!"
The beastkin slapped his forehead. "Right! Dirty." He lowered his hand. "But... what are you getting at, Lord Gothwald?"
Alan gestured with his hands. "My point is, miasmas don't actually come just from swamps. They come from dirt in general!"
The beastkin stood silent for a few seconds, then began whispering softly among themselves.
The elder looked at Alan. "Lord Gothwald, are you certain it is indeed from dirt? I would not dare doubt your words!" he added quickly. "But..."
"It is the truth," Kamelia interrupted. "Lord Gothwald has already proven this to me, and to the villages he saved from the plague. It is the absolute truth."
Alan nodded. "But this isn't magic. It depends entirely on you. You need to keep things clean CONSTANTLY... By the way, when was the last time you actually had an outbreak here?"
"Roughly... three years ago, perhaps?" the elder said.
Alan looked down.
'Hm... three years ago... while in the previous villages, it happened every year. That's probably because Zoligasha has been pretty isolated this whole time... but that doesn't make it any cleaner. Still, we have to enforce sanitation here. This village needs to become a showcase and a successful model for the other villages to follow.'
"In short, you only... relieve yourselves here. This is called a public toilet, by the way. Women to the left, men to the right. There are no cesspools, so you'll have to empty all this stuff into a pit a few times a week, which..."
"What?!" a bear-beastkin interrupted. "We are to carry feces?! Lord Gothwald, I understand much, but this is too much."
Kamelia frowned at the beastkin but said nothing.
Alan raised his hands. "Calm down. What's the big deal? It's necessary for..."
"No!" the bear beastkin interrupted again. "We will not perform such filthy labor. Are we hunters, or what?"
"Former hunters," Kamelia said coldly.
A large wolf-beastkin stepped up beside the bear. "Not former, but active hunters! It is the rest of them who chose to toil in the dirt instead of continuing our ancestors' legacy."
A dog-beastkin also stepped forward. "I agree! We tolerated them plowing the fields, but now we must carry feces as well?! Like hell we will!"
From another part of the crowd, a white-fox-eared beastkin youth emerged. "Hey! Are you saying we are toiling in the dirt?! You are the ones who want to hunt like savages! What if there is no game?! Are we to starve to death?! Our children deserve to know there will always be food!"
The peasants in that part of the crowd nodded vigorously, backing the white fox beastkin.
"Yes!"
"You only think of your pride!"
"We almost starved to death last year!"
Alan took a step forward. "Hey, guys! Calm..."
The bear took a step toward the white fox, ignoring Alan. "And since when did you start bowing down to humans?! They treat us like filth, testing their new things on us, and we are supposed to just beg for more?!"
The fox raised a fist. "Then get the hell back to your forest, live there, and hunt as much as you like! We will carry feces, and we will toil in the dirt! I am tired of constantly wondering if I will survive another year!"
The wolf gritted his teeth. "Have you forgotten why we starved?! The former Count stripped us of every single hide, leaving only miserable scraps! Now that the new Countess has abolished that tax, we can live properly and remain hunters! The forest is vast!"
The white fox, flanked by dozens of supporters, took another step forward, standing nearly chest-to-chest with the bear and looking up at him. "The forest is vast, but it is not eternal! Do you think I do not respect the traditions of our ancestors?! But traditions are just that! We cannot survive solely on hunting! How much game did you manage to find last month, tell me?!"
The bear froze for a second, then waved his hand. "That matters not! You do not see what you are doing, you are bowing down to the humans who squeezed everything out of us! Do you not see that he does not care about us?!" He pointed a furry hand at Alan. "He simply wishes to test his bizarre new contraptions on us because the others had the sense to drive him away! We are treated as lesser once more!"
The fox squinted. "Even if he does not care about us, what of it, Guktus take you?! We have a new plow, we will have seeds, and we will have fields! What difference does it make?!"
The bear opened his mouth to say something else, but they were cut off by a deafening, guttural roar. "QUUUUIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEET!"
Everyone fell silent and turned. It was the Chief who had roared; he exhaled his remaining breath and straightened up. "Silence, all of you! Lord Alan shall hear everyone out and find a solution!"
The bear-beastkin squinted. "I have no intention of speaking to him. He does not respect beastkin, he only pretends to."
Alan snorted. "Yeah, I don't respect beastkin."
Everyone froze. Kamelia stared at Alan with wide eyes.
"I don't respect beastkin," Alan repeated with a completely stone face. "Just like I don't respect humans, dwarves, snake-kin, or anyone else. In the world I come from, it's not customary to judge anyone by their race! I don't give a single shit that you have tails and ears!" He waved his hand. "Even if you were humans, I'd act exactly the same way! It's just a coincidence, that's just how the cards fell! I'm not building all this shit out of deep respect or fierce hatred for you. I'm doing it because you are the only ones capable of accepting novelty, and most importantly, you agree to it!"
A quiet silence fell, broken only by the soft wind.
The fox opened his mouth, then let out a brief snort. "Heh... I have never witnessed such honesty from nobility..." He quickly slapped his palm lightly against his face. "Forgive me."
The bear frowned. "So, he finally admits it."
Alan raised an eyebrow. "And did I ever say I was doing this out of respect for you? I never said anything of the sort, for the record."
The bear opened his mouth, closed it, and remained silent for a few seconds. "Regardless..." He waved his hand and straightened up. "Personally, I have no intention of carrying feces, nor do they." The other beastkin who had chosen to remain hunters nodded in unison.
Alan shrugged. "Okay, but then you don't get to use the public toilets either. And don't even think about dumping the contents of your chamber pots in or near the village. Deal?"
The wolf-beastkin nodded. "Very well."
The Chief let out a breath. "Very well, let us return to discussing these... toilets." He glanced sideways at the hunters. "As for you, we shall have a separate conversation regarding your manners before Her Ladyship and the Advisor."
Their defiance vanished instantly, and all the hunters turned slightly pale. "Yes, Chief!" they said in unison and quickly retreated back to the forest.
Alan whistled.
'Whoa... looks like I underestimated this old man. Dungel, I think his name is? I'll have to ask about his youth later.'
The white fox beastkin took a step forward. "So, Lord Gothwald, what is the plan for emptying the waste?"
Alan pressed his lips together.
'Damn, I'm starting to like this guy.'
"Well, we obviously aren't going to single out any one person; everyone will take turns. I suggest rotating by households. One house handles it this week, another the next, and we rotate in a cycle. That way, nobody gets left out."
The peasants nodded, and the Chief nodded as well. "Yes, that is the wisest solution. Well, now that we have settled these matters... will you inspect the mill?"
Alan nodded. "Oh, yeah, let's go." He looked around. "Where's that carpenter?"
Behind the outhouse building stood the man covered in wood shavings. He immediately stepped out from his hiding spot. "I am here, Lord Gothwald. Follow me."
The four of them set off toward the mill. Kamelia immediately walked up beside Alan. "Incredible. I truly believed a brawl was about to erupt."
Alan sighed. "Me too... but you weren't any better. Why'd you have to provoke them by calling them 'former hunters'?"
She shrugged. "I merely wished to remind them that the village has abandoned hunting as a whole, but... evidently, they did not appreciate it. By the way... you mentioned that in your world, it is not customary to judge by race... How does that work? You said your world contains only humans and no other species."
Gothwald rolled his eyes. "Just because there are only humans in my world doesn't mean they're different from here. Humans will always find someone to hate: skin color, the land they were born in... this shit has always been around and exists everywhere, even in other worlds."
The Countess nodded slowly. "Hmm... it seems we are not so different after all. Your world simply possesses more knowledge."
"Sigh... exactly." He clasped his hands behind his head. "Hey... Dungel."
"Yes?" the old man said.
"What's the fox's name? I'm starting to like that guy."
Dungel clasped his hands behind his back. "His name is Forkos. He holds you in no less regard, as it happens. Even before your arrival, he constantly argued that we should abandon hunting and transition to agriculture. You might say he was the first to speak of it."
Alan whistled. "Whoa, cool. What made him so different from the rest?"
Dungel sighed, bowing his head slightly. "Well... his younger brother died of starvation nine years ago. And a beast in the forest devoured his fiancée some four years back, while she was out hunting..." He shook his head, saying nothing further.
Alan's hands slowly dropped to his sides, and his pace slowed.
'So that's why... that's why the fox is pushing so hard for farming... Poor guy.'
They all continued toward the mill in silence. Alan looked up at the sun, which had already risen, illuminating the vast plowed fields. The beastkin with the plow and the oxen were already somewhere in the distance, out of sight.
A few minutes later, they finally reached the mill. Life was bustling around it: two beastkin emerged from the forest carrying a log toward a pile of others. Near the foundation, human carpenters worked with axes and saws, peering at the parchment with the crooked drawings Kamelia had sketched based on Alan's instructions. On the other side, four beastkin were hammering together the first mill blade from rough planks.
The foundation itself was simple: a floor, the lower section of the walls, and the frame for the steps.
Alan inspected it all closely, then turned to the carpenter who accompanied them. "How long will it take to build this?"
The man scratched his stubble, watching the frantic activity. "I expect we shall finish in about three weeks; there is no shortage of labor. Though whether it shall function, I cannot say... Still, observe how the men toil. They are eager to see this bizarre contraption." He smiled slightly. "A mill powered by the wind... heh... I never would have imagined such a thing."
Alan chuckled. "Yeah, I want to see this bizarre contraption myself... and honestly, who knows if it'll even work."
The carpenter shrugged. "Well, that is beyond my knowledge, Lord Gothwald."
Alan sighed. "Alright, you can go back to work."
The carpenter offered a brief bow and walked over to the others. "How goes the work, boys?"
Alan turned to Kamelia. "Any news from Tsinker?"
The Countess tore her gaze away from the early stages of the mill. "Yes. He sent a messenger two days ago, stating he would finish in two to three weeks."
Alan blinked. "Whoa, that's fast... He really is a psycho."
Kamelia crossed her arms. "I await it eagerly. To know the exact number of subjects under my rule, down to the very last digit... no other Count possesses such knowledge."
Alan nudged her shoulder slightly. "Ooh, political excitement?"
She rolled her eyes. "Something like that."
