Chương 49: Mountain Road

For months, the sound of the Frost-Grip valley had been the violent, howling wind. It had battered the castle walls, rattled the windowpanes, and buried the village in deep, suffocating white. Then, one morning, the howling simply stopped. Jack stepped out onto his stone balcony. He didn't need to wrap his thick coat tightly around his neck. The biting, painful chill that usually instantly numbed his cheeks was gone. The air was still incredibly cold, but it felt entirely different. It felt heavy and damp.

Instead of the roaring wind, a new sound filled the valley. Drip. Drip. Drip. Massive icicles, some as thick as a man's leg, hung from the stone eaves of the castle roof. Slowly, steadily, water was running down their jagged points and splashing onto the stone balcony. Down in the valley, a loud, echoing crack snapped through the air. The thick sheet of solid ice covering the river was beginning to fracture under its own shifting weight. The deep winter freeze was finally breaking. Jack looked down at the village.

The pristine, white snowfields were turning into a messy, grayish slush. The path leading from the village to the coal mine was already turning into a thick soup of mud. The human miners, carrying their pickaxes, were walking carefully, laying down scrap pieces of wood like stepping stones just to avoid sinking up to their ankles.

"Spring is coming," Jack murmured to himself. He leaned on his cane and watched the palisade wall. Just the night before, a small pack of six starving mountain hounds had tried to rush the gates. They hadn't even made it past the trench. The village militia, standing safely behind the wooden walls, had casually dispatched them in a matter of minutes. There was no panic, no screaming. It was just a regular chore, no different from chopping firewood.

But while the threat of the beasts was fading, a new, massive problem was rising from the melting snow. Jack left the balcony and walked down the mountain path to the village. He called for a gathering in the center of the settlement. They stood in the slushy street, wearing their new warm dire-wolf coats, looking at Jack expectantly. In his forge, Barnaby was pulling a glowing, red-hot piece of iron from his forge.

Since the beast attacks had become routine and the village defenses were solid, they no longer needed dozens of spears or extra ballista parts. Instead, Barnaby was melting them down. The blacksmith was reshaping the weapons of war into iron plows, sturdy hoes, and metal buckets. It was a beautiful, pragmatic transformation. Jack stood before the villagers, resting both hands on the head of his cane.

"The snow is melting," Jack announced loudly, making sure his voice carried over the dripping water and Barnaby's steady hammering.

"Which means the earth will soon be soft enough to work. We need to talk about the harvest." Old Miller stepped forward, pulling his wool cap off his head. As the oldest farmer in the village, he was the unofficial leader of anything involving the farming.

"We are ready, Lord Jack," Old Miller said eagerly.

"The greenhouse kept the seeds from freezing. Usually, when the first patches of dirt show through the snow near the cabins, we just scratch the earth with our tools and throw the seeds down wherever the ground is softest."

"I know," Jack said flatly.

"I remember how farming was done here in the past. It was chaotic. You planted a patch of turnips near the forge, and scattered wheat wherever the sun hit the snow first." The villagers nodded. It was the only way they knew how to farm in a frozen wasteland. You took whatever soft dirt you could find.

"We are not doing that anymore," Jack declared. A murmur of confusion rippled through the crowd.

"Scattered farming is a waste of time and a waste of water," Jack explained, speaking clearly and simply.

"If your crops are spread all over the village, you spend half your day just carrying heavy wooden buckets of water from the river to ten different locations. Furthermore, when the summer pests arrive, you cannot protect a hundred tiny gardens." Jack pointed his cane toward the southern gates of the palisade.

"From now on, all agriculture will be centralized," Jack instructed.

"We are going to establish a single, massive, designated farming zone right outside the front gates. We will dig proper irrigation trenches leading directly from the river to the fields. The soil will be properly managed, and the crops will be easy for the wall guards to keep an eye on." Old Miller looked out past the open wooden gates toward the southern fields. He rubbed his wrinkled chin, his expression turning highly doubtful.

"It is a smart plan, Lord Jack," Old Miller said slowly.

"But there is a very large problem with that specific piece of land."

"The stumps," Giles the carpenter chimed in, stepping up beside the old farmer.

"Exactly," Old Miller nodded.

"Lord Jack, when Giles and his men cut down all those pine trees to build our palisade wall, they left the massive tree stumps in the ground. That southern field is covered in dozens of deep, thick roots. And beneath the top layer of slush, the earth is still frozen as hard as iron." Old Miller did the calculations, looking around at the small crowd.

"We only have roughly forty people in this entire valley, My Lord," the old man explained gently.

"And most of the strong men are busy swinging pickaxes in the coal mine or standing guard on the wall. If I take the remaining women and the older men out there with shovels, it will take us a full month just to dig up those frozen stumps and break the hard earth. By the time the field is clear, the planting season will be half over." Jack looked at the southern field. Old Miller was completely right. Human labor was their absolute biggest bottleneck.

They didn't have draft horses to pull heavy plows, and they didn't have the sheer manpower to dig up a forest of frozen stumps by hand. A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

"You will not be digging up the stumps," Jack said. Jack turned his head and looked up toward the gatehouse watchtower. Standing perfectly still on the wooden walkway, wrapped in his dark traveler's cloak, was Elias. Jack pushed a small, concentrated pulse of mana down the thin mental thread connected to his Iron Core.

"Come down," Jack commanded mentally. Elias turned smoothly and walked down the wooden stairs. The villagers immediately parted, making a wide path for the "Wanderer." They respected the mercenary deeply for saving their lives during the beast attack, but they were also terrified of his lethal fire magic. Elias stopped next to Jack. His pale face was entirely expressionless, his dead eyes staring straight ahead. Jack gathered his mana, preparing to puppet the dead vocal cords.

It still drained him, but his Iron Core was much stronger now, making the process slightly less painful.

"Elias," Jack said out loud, playing his part.

"The village requires your skills." Jack forced the dead lungs to draw a breath.

"I am a mercenary, Lord Jack," Elias rasped, his voice rough and cold.

"My blade is for killing beasts and men. I do not pull weeds." The villagers shifted nervously. Speaking to a noble with such blatant disrespect was dangerous, but the Wanderer clearly didn't care.

"I am not asking you to pull weeds," Jack countered smoothly.

"I am asking you to clear a battleground. If you burn the stumps, you will save these people weeks of backbreaking labor." Elias stood silent for a long moment, playing the role of a grumpy, reluctant veteran perfectly. Jack simply waited, letting the performance settle over the crowd.

"Fine," Elias finally rasped.

"Show me the field." Jack led the way, walking out through the iron-reinforced gates, followed by Elias, Old Miller, and a crowd of curious villagers. They stopped at the edge of the designated agricultural zone. The field was a mess of gray sharp rocks, and dozens of thick pine stumps sticking out of the mud.

"Burn them," Jack commanded mentally. Elias stepped forward, his boots sinking slightly into the slush. He didn't draw his sword. He simply raised his bare right hand and pointed it at the nearest massive pine stump. During the beast attack, Elias had used his magic like a bomb, unleashing violent, explosive bursts of fire to instantly kill the bears. But this was a completely different task. Through the mental link, Jack commanded Elias to suppress the violent nature of the spell. He didn't want an explosion.

A deep, glowing orange light ignited in the palm of Elias's hand. A steady, intense stream of pure heat shot forward. It didn't explode when it hit the frozen pine stump. Instead, the fire washed over the wood like a heavy blanket. The freezing slush surrounding the stump instantly vaporized into a thick cloud of white steam. The intense, sustained heat rapidly dried the wet wood and then ignited it.

The thick pine stump, which would have taken three men a full day to dig out with iron axes, began to turn black, crack, and crumble. Jack maintained his focus, feeding a steady stream of mana from his Iron Core down the tether to sustain Elias's spell. It was a heavy drain, but it was smooth and manageable. Elias slowly swept his hand back and forth. He reduced the massive stump into a pile of glowing red embers in less than a minute.

Then, following Jack's precise mental commands, Elias aimed the stream of fire directly at the ground surrounding the ashes. The heat slammed into the rock-hard, frozen earth. The ice trapped deep in the soil flash-boiled. The hard dirt softened instantly, turning into rich, dark mud, and the extreme heat naturally mixed the fresh wood ash directly into the topsoil. The villagers watched in absolute silence as they were stunned.

"By the gods," Old Miller whispered, his eyes wide as he stared at the steaming, dark earth. Elias moved to the next stump. He repeated the process perfectly. Burn the wood to ash. Sweep the fire over the ground. Thaw the earth. For over an hour, Elias walked methodically across the southern field, acting as a terrifying, magical plow. Thick clouds of white steam and the heavy smell of burning pine filled the air. When Elias finally lowered his hand, the entire field was completely transformed.

There was not a single stump left. The gray slush and frozen dirt were entirely gone. In their place was a massive, perfectly flat expanse of dark, steaming, incredibly soft topsoil, richly mixed with gray ash. It was ready for planting immediately. Elias turned around and walked back toward the crowd. Jack quickly pushed a pulse of mana into Elias's chest, forcing the dead lungs to heave heavily, simulating deep physical exhaustion.

"My contract is for defense," Elias rasped loudly, glaring at Jack.

"Do not ask me to farm again."

"Your efforts are appreciated, Wanderer," Jack replied calmly, hiding his immense satisfaction. Elias pushed past the stunned villagers and walked back up the wooden ramp to resume his silent post at the gatehouse. As soon as he was gone, Old Miller rushed forward and fell to his knees in the steaming dirt. He scooped up a handful of the soft, ash-rich soil and let it crumble perfectly through his fingers.

"It's a miracle," the old farmer laughed, looking up at Jack with tears of joy in his eyes.

"We would have broken our backs for a month to get earth this good. We can start digging the irrigation rows this afternoon!"

"Do it," Jack ordered.

"We need this field ready before the merchants arrive with our spring supplies." For the next few days, the village was consumed by the mud. With the designated farmland cleared by Elias's fire, Old Miller organized the women and the older men to dig neat, straight rows for planting. Meanwhile, the human miners continued to extract coal from the deep, newly sealed shafts, hauling it up to keep the bathhouse and Barnaby's forge running. The weather continued to warm steadily.

The dripping icicles disappeared completely. The massive snowdrifts that had buried the cabins began to shrink, revealing the muddy ground beneath. Jack sat in his study one afternoon, reviewing his ledgers. The math was incredibly clear, and highly frustrating. The village had survived the winter, and they were swimming in raw resources. The deep cellars his skeletons had dug beneath the castle were packed full of premium smoked meat.

The village square had neat stacks of perfectly tanned dire wolf and mountain bear furs. They had high-grade coal. But they still only had forty-four people. Jack tapped his charcoal pen against the wooden desk. A designated farm would increase their crop yield, but they still needed hands to weed, harvest, and process the food. Barnaby needed strong apprentices to help him mass-produce iron tools. The coal mine could produce ten times as much fuel if there were more human miners working the day shift.

And then there was Karen. The poor maid was running herself ragged trying to manage the castle's laundry, cook for Jack, and oversee the village women in the tannery. She looked exhausted every single day.

"I need labor," Jack muttered to himself.

"A lot of it." Suddenly, a loud, sharp sound echoed through the valley. Jack stopped tapping his pen. He listened closely. It wasn't the short, frantic bursts of the beast warning horn. It was a single, long, incredibly deep blast from the gatehouse watchtower. It was a sound Jack hadn't heard. Jack stood up, grabbed his cane, and hurried out of his study. He walked briskly onto his stone balcony and looked down toward the village.

Down below, Giles and the militia were rushing up the wooden stairs to the palisade firing platforms. They weren't raising their spears. They were pointing toward the distant southern horizon. Jack squinted, following their gaze. Miles away, at the very edge of the valley, there was a narrow gap between two towering mountain peaks. For the entire winter, that gap had been completely blocked by a massive, impenetrable wall of packed snow and solid ice.

It was the only road leading south and to the rest of the continent. The white wall was gone. The rising temperatures and the spring thaw had finally caused the massive snowpack blocking the pass to collapse and melt away, revealing the dark, muddy mountain road beneath. The watchtower horn blew one more long, steady blast. The total isolation of the Frost-Grip fief was officially over. The mountain pass was open. Jack gripped the stone railing of his balcony. A cold, pragmatic smile formed on his lips.

The winter had tested their ability to survive the brutal cruelty of nature. They had won that battle.