*

　If it was as usual, it would have been a long winter...if you sowed the winter barley seeds in November and made the preserves, you would have had free time until the following March, but this year's winter seemed a little short.
　This was because the repair of the fortifications in the city of Hashel and the construction of the new barracks had sent relatively young villagers out to work, so there was more work for the villagers who had stayed behind.
　Although there was some frustration, it wasn't a bad experience to be relied on for physical fitness after so long.
　The villagers who had gone to work had brought back a not inconsiderable amount of money, and some had brought back more souvenirs than they could hold in their hands.
　There was something very amusing about the sight of a young migrant proudly giving clothes and hair ornaments to his lover.
　When the bandits occupied the abandoned fort last year, I was chilled that they would be killed when the new lord's death squad arrived, but the bandits seem to have changed their minds and are working diligently.
　Well," the village chief said, getting up from his chair.
　We can't just sit back and relax.
　There is a lot of work to be done.
　The fields must be ploughed and the clover seeds must be sown in the fallow ground.
　In March of the year 431 on the imperial calendar, the countryside of the Marquis of Erakis was peaceful.



　It was near the Coma Forest that Silva had chosen as the site for the port.
　The coast was about two meters below the flatland and covered with rounded pebbles.
　It is said that the water depth rapidly deepens when you get away from the coast a bit.
　Incidentally, the procedure for building the harbor is the same as Silva described in his wagon: drive wooden stakes along the shoreline at right angles to drain the seawater, build a concrete foundation, and then reclaim the beach.
　A place to build the harbor has been chosen, and the labor force has been assembled... but first we have to build the houses rather than the harbor.
　So the rhythmic sound of thumping nails echoed off the coast.
　However, there is a big difference between a minotaur's house for a family to live in and a lizardman's house for a work team organized by Silva to live in.
　
　He is trying to make a prototype of a salt field while Crono is traveling back and forth between Baron Bowties and the Marquis of Erakis, and he is trying to make salt with his friends.

''Well?''
'I don't think I'm doing it wrong, but I don't feel like I'm being very efficient.

　Saying this, Silva looked at the prototype salt field.
　The prototype salt field is a 20-meter square concrete frame filled with fine sand.

It's winter time.
'It's not a good idea for mass production if that's what's causing the production rate to be so drastically affected, is it?　I want to be able to mass produce salt, regardless of the season. As it is now, we'll have to make up for the inefficiency with the number of salt fields we have.
I don't want to see the forest go away or anything.

　If we're going to clear the forest for harbor building and settlement, I feel that destroying the forest just to make salt is going to have a bad effect on future generations.

'Maybe we should think of a new way to do it.
Yes.

　I should have studied a little more, Crono said to the heavens.



　Perhaps because they had to cook for two hundred and fifty people at a time, lunch was a mish-mash of vegetables and fish, cut into appropriate pieces and stewed in a mish-mash-like soup.
　Crono sat down on a suitable rock and savored the rustic flavor.
　Is it because he is Japanese that he wished there was soy sauce or miso?

'Crono-sama, how do you like the taste?' (PUMO?)
It's good.

　When Crono replied with a smile, Aria, who had a magic item for translation in her ear, looked down in embarrassment.
　Aria, the deputy's sister, is surprisingly...well, that's a preconceived notion, but she likes to be domestic.
　Even after the house is completed, the lizardmen will have to continue to cook for the lizardmen, so they will have to ask the women of the Minotaur to cook for a while.

''........I heard from my brother that you're building a harbor, what is it for?'' (PUMO?)
'You want to enrich your territory. A harbor will bring people and goods together, and when that happens, we'll have a place for the powerful minotaurs and lizardmen to work.

　Crono sipped the salty soup.

'Of course, tax revenues will go up. When the tax revenue goes up, I'd like to do some bang-bang public works projects and increase the size of the poorhouse ... and build a school.
Is it human? (PUMO?)
No.

　Crono shook his head as a fearful Aria asked him.

'It's a place where both humans and sub-humans can study together. There's only a limited number of people who can spend time studying in the middle of the day, so I'll be flexible with night school, or for rural people, winter when there's no farm work, or Sunday school, or having teachers patrol the grounds.'
"...it's like a dream." (Pumo)
For now.

　Crono drank the remaining soup and handed the empty wooden bowl to Aria.

*

　Muttering "efficiency, efficiency," Silva went around the prototype salt field.
　Occasionally, as he remembered, he would face the paper and do something that looked like a design, but no!　More efficiency!　He screamed and rolled around on the ground.
　You don't have to be so efficient as to scratch your hair, Crono thought, but the expression on Silva's face scared him to say it.

''Well you don't have to think about anything so much.''
'We think so too, but if I were actually in Silva's position, I think I'd be like that~'

　I looked down and saw a dwarven girl sitting on the ground.
　She was short, as all dwarven men are, but her width was incomparably thin.
　She may have been stoking wood in the hearth, but she had short red-copper hair like a boy, and her skin was almost entirely covered in soot.
　I think he was no more than twenty years old, but the dwarf's appearance was as unreliable as that of an elf.

''We'll never have a chance in our lives to have our own workshop. That said, there is a limit to how far you can rise through the ranks with spear work, and in that respect, the Goldie Centurion has done well.
If you have something you want to make, I can budget for it, but?

　The dwarven girl looked up at Crono and grinned.

'Hmmm, not quite, eh?　I want you to be a patron when I set up my workshop one day. So I hope you'll remember my face and name.
Oh, I see.

　Crono finally realized that the dwarven girl wasn't doing this out of the goodness of her heart, but rather to get a chance to talk to Crono and help Silva remember her face and name. Perhaps the others would be similar.

'My name is Paula, nice to meet you,'
Nice to meet you.

　When she looked up, Silva stopped moving and her eyes were wide open.

''This, this is it!''

　When Crono turned around, he saw a minotaur and a lizardman bundling straw.



　It was the next evening when Crono returned.
　I must take care of you, Tilia said as she waited in her room for Crono to finish his work.
　I've come a long way in many ways, but I've been reborn, Tilia said as she headed for Crono's room.
　Gently.
　It was better not to use force.
　Gently work on Crono he'll be tired, so he'll have to sleep with her.
　Well, well, I might comply if asked, but I'll have to restrain myself from that.
　Tilia knocked on the door and waited for Crono to come out.
　When Crono didn't come out at all, Tilia quietly opened the door.

''.........''

　When I opened the door, I found Crono asleep.
　That, too, was on Leila's lap pillow.
　When Tilia quietly entered the room, Leila seemed to notice immediately and looked up.

'Tilia-sama, what can I do for you?'
You'll know it when you see it.

　Leila and Tilia spoke in a whisper so as not to wake Crono up.

'I'm sorry, Master Crono is tired,'
Yeah, I understand that.

　Isn't it my job to give Crono a knee jerk reaction?　And Tilia looked at Leila, who smiled.
　No, you just decided to care and labor gently, Tilia decided to hand over the role to Layla.

''Tilia-sama.......I'm sorry, but I'd like to ask for your cooperation in coordinating your schedule when you serve as Crono-sama's night owl.
Scheduling?
'Master Crono doesn't know it, but we discuss who and when will serve as Master Crono's night owl in order to avoid unnecessary conflict between mistresses. Of course, Master Crono is often away, so we have been re-arranged.

　For a moment, Tilia was stunned, but she was strangely convinced.

''Well the day Tilia-sama was bound with fetters and blindfolded was originally the day I was supposed to serve as a night owl.
How did you know you were blindfolded?
Now, why is that?

　Leila smiled so small that you had to look into her eyes to see it.
　Gunnu, Tilia snorted.
　She wanted to say something, but she was confident that if she was told what was done to her face or mouthed to her, she would be in agony.

'All right. I'll be in on the talks next time, remember that.
"Yes, thank you.

　Tilia quietly slipped out of Crono's room and clenched her fists tightly.

''........Discussion?''

　I suppose it's better to adjust profits than to kill off Crono's favor, but how do you talk about it?　Tilia tilted her head.