Bang! Bang! Clack!
“Honk-honk-honk-honk-honk!!”
Every time Dawi shot the wolves with his gun, the geese and ducks went into an uproar.
The geese and ducks were startled by the appearance of carnivores, and startled again by the sound of Dawi’s gunshots.
“Honk-honk-honk!!”
Among those that scattered in fright, a few were caught and eaten by wolves.
“No! I said stay gathered here!!”
But there was no way the geese and ducks could understand Dawi’s words.
Climbing the mountain while protecting them was no easy task.
Bang! Bang! Clack!
Bang! Bang! Clack!
The carnivores of the mountain range, seeing easy prey for the first time in ages, lost their heads and rushed in all at once.
Still, as Dawi continued killing them with his shotgun, they gradually realized the danger, and fewer beasts came charging in.
And the geese and ducks, too, realized it was safer to stay beside Dawi and began sticking close to him. Those that failed to realize it had long since become food for wolves or leopards.
“Hooonk!”
When one goose cried out and followed Dawi, the rest toddled after it.
From what Dawi could tell, that goose seemed to be the leader of the flock.
The goose’s cry was quite loud and deep.
It made sounds like guooook, gueeeek, and kooeeek.
“Ugh, I’m exhausted!”
After many twists and turns, Dawi finally brought them back to the ranch.
Only ten geese and ducks had survived.
In any case, Dawi let them into the ranch.
“Honk-honk-honk!”
“Guooook!”
They wandered all over the ranch, crying out.
Dawi set down the wooden feed bowl he had brought and filled it with corn.
Then they swarmed over and began pecking at the corn.
Creak—
After closing the bar on the ranch gate, Dawi hitched Malmari to the wagon.
The rye and barley were loaded into the wagon bed.
“Malmari, let’s go! Hyah!”
Thanks to the road, he could now reach the Snowhill Estate in half a day.
If Malmari ran fast, they could make it in under three hours.
“Oh my, you’ve come again?”
The guard at the lord’s castle recognized Dawi and immediately opened the gate.
It had not been long since Dawi had sold a little corn and some hides to buy spring clothes, and now he had returned again.
As Dawi was unloading the wagon, the baroness approached.
“Has something happened at the ranch? Why are you already…”
The baroness stopped mid-sentence when she saw what Dawi was unloading from the wagon.
Sacks of rye and barley.
“Those crops, could they be…”
“Ah, yes. You said you needed them before, didn’t you? I was lucky this time and managed to get some! I also got geese and ducks, so you should be able to have eggs now! Hahaha!”
“Why would you go this far…”
“Ah! From what I saw, there might be more crops than just these. I can guide the way, so if you send knights…”
“Wait. Just a moment.”
At the baroness’s words, Dawi stopped, looking puzzled.
“Um… First of all, rye and barley may grow even in barren places, but aren’t they crops planted in autumn? In Snowhill, they’ll all die in winter.”
“Ah… Can’t you just plant them in spring?”
“In spring?”
Dawi did not know this, but here there was no distinction between winter wheat and spring wheat, or winter barley and spring barley.
They were simply all crops planted in autumn.
Of course, Dawi had seen wheat and barley on Earth that were planted in spring and harvested later.
However, since the wheat and barley of this place might not adapt well, there was a possibility the yield would be lower than with autumn sowing.
“As long as they adapt well, they should grow fine even if planted in spring. Since spring to autumn is short here, you can start by planting them first in the areas where irrigation facilities have been made.”
As far as Dawi knew, wheat and barley planted in spring could be harvested after about four months.
‘I’m not sure about rye, but it’s probably similar.’
Just as Dawi thought, rye planted in spring also took about that much time.
However, what Dawi did not know was that rye grew better than barley in barren and dry places and was also more resistant to cold. In terms of farming difficulty, rye was the easiest, followed by barley, wheat, and rice. On top of that, rye was a crop that even restored the soil.
“That’s… hmm, that may be possible. Planting in spring… Very well. Let’s try it.”
The baroness decided to trust Dawi’s words that it could be planted in spring and harvested before winter came.
“Yes! I’m sure it will be effective. Before, there weren’t any irrigation facilities either, but now there will be, won’t there? I’m sure it’ll work.”
“All right. I’ll believe you and give it a try. By the way, you said earlier that this might not be all of it, didn’t you?”
“Yes! As long as you watch out for zombies, you should definitely be able to find more crops abandoned in the warehouses. There’s no need to go far south, either. Once you leave the Alos Mountains and go just a little farther, there are wheat fields.”
“Hmm… Very well. In any case, this is still a transaction… Is there anything you want?”
Of course, Dawi had something he wanted.
“When the harvest comes in, I’d like to receive the hay.”
Hay was usually made by drying the stalks of things like rye. Barley worked too, of course.
And hay could also serve as feed for horses, ducks, and geese.
What Dawi was aiming for was precisely this free fodder.
“Of course, I’m not asking for all the hay. Just enough to feed the animals…”
“If the harvest goes well, I’ll give you as much as you need. You may take all of it. Shall we write up the contract now?”
“Pardon? No, there’s no need to go that far…”
“Let’s say the ownership of all hay made from barley and rye produced in the Snowhill Estate belongs to Mr. Dawi Baroque’s ranch. The ranch may use as much as it wants, and only the leftover hay will be used by us as compost or for other purposes.”
“Uh… You really don’t have to go that far…”
“Butler? Write down what I just said in a document and bring it to me.”
In the end, Dawi signed a new contract.
“And as for going over the Alos Mountains, if you simply draw us a rough map, I will send my knights. I cannot place any further burden on you.”
“Pardon? But there are zombies wandering around…”
“Mr. Dawi. The baron’s household and your ranch are in a symbiotic relationship, are they not? Your ranch is not ‘under’ the baron’s household. I heard you finally brought in new livestock as well. You must tend to the ranch. And the knights of our territory are plenty strong. Now that winter has passed, the threat from wild animals will be reduced too. So the knights can certainly make the trip.”
At her subtly forceful tone, Dawi eventually nodded.
“…Understood. But you really must be careful around towns and castles. No matter how skilled the knights are, they must avoid places like that.”
Having once entered a castle that had become a zombie den, Dawi gave the warning seriously.
“Understood. I will make sure to convey that thoroughly to our knights.”
.
.
.
Dawi headed back again with an empty wagon after delivering the rye and barley.
‘Perhaps saying he was looking for livestock was just an excuse.
Perhaps his purpose from the very beginning was to find crops that could be grown here.’
Dawi was a former military mage.
He had likely traveled all over the continent, and must have seen rye and barley being sown in spring.
That was why he could speak with such certainty, saying they should sow now, while the snow was melting.
And perhaps, after hearing what she had said, he had deliberately gone down from the Alos Mountains and brought back crops that could be cultivated.
Even what he wanted in return right now was merely hay he would receive in the future, was it not?
‘He should have just honestly said he didn’t want anything and that he brought them out of goodwill… Hay, of all things. What kind of excuse is that…’
…was what the baroness was thinking.
***
“Kooeeek!!”
The ranch greeted the morning not with the crowing of a rooster, but with the grotesque cry of a goose.
Dawi woke up rubbing his eyes at the goose’s horrible cry.
“Uhaaam~ I’m coming, I’m coming!”
After roughly washing his face in the valley stream, Dawi put on his bear coat and came outside.
The morning was still chilly.
Dawi went to the ranch building, unfastened the bar, and opened the door.
Malmari was so strong that most wild animals could not hunt him.
So there was no particular need to lock the stable door.
But the geese and ducks were easy prey, so Dawi closed the ranch door and barred it at night.
“Gueeek! Gueeek!”
“Honk! Honk!”
As soon as the door opened, the geese and ducks poured out as if they had been waiting.
They immediately ran to the lake, swam around, and drank water.
If they suddenly started crying noisily, it meant there was a predator nearby.
The geese and ducks caught flying insects by the lakeside and grazed on grass.
Sometimes, they even caught and ate small fish living in the lake that were not silver trout.
Dawi went into the ranch, found the goose eggs and duck eggs, and placed them in the egg box he had made inside the ice cellar. The egg box was filled with straw to protect the eggs from breaking.
After that, he harvested corn and put it into Malmari’s manger, while the rest went to the ice cellar.
He checked Malmari’s water bowl and replaced the water with water from the lake.
There were no separate water bowls in the ranch. The geese and ducks went to the lake and drank to their hearts’ content.
With the arrival of spring, carnivores were not the only ones that came to the lakeside.
“Mwooo!”
Sometimes, a bighorn came by, just like now.
Even though it could have drunk from the valley stream connected to the lake, it insisted on coming all the way near the ranch.
It even went out of its way to ram and break the fence surrounding the lake.
Bang!
So Dawi had no choice but to shoot and kill it first like this.
Dawi skinned the bighorn, butchered the meat, and put it into the ice cellar.
“Honk! Honk! Honk!”
“Gueeek! Gueeek!”
When the geese and ducks started crying again, Dawi hurried out of the ice cellar, only to see a deer loitering near the lake this time.
The deer glanced at Dawi again and again as it drank from the valley stream flowing down from the lake.
When Dawi moved just a little, the startled deer fled.
It was so wary that it did not seem possible to domesticate it.
Knowing that carnivores did not approach this area much, more and more herbivores had begun coming nearby to drink from the valley stream.
“Hey there~!”
A human voice came from afar.
When Dawi turned his head, he saw ten knights climbing up in a ragged state.
On their backs, they carried bundles filled with grains of crops.
“We’re here! Haha!”
The senior knight at the front waved his hand as he spoke.
“I’m glad you returned safely.”
“Whew, there were more than a few dangerous moments. From what we saw, it seems the zombies are gradually moving north.”
“North… Do you mean they’re crossing the Alos Mountains?”
“No, not to that extent… But you can assume the area below the mountains is crawling with them. We nearly died avoiding their eyes on the way here. It felt strange, so I intend to report it to the baroness.”