Homesteading in a fantasy world

Waking up as the sun rises has been my way of life for a long time, so I didn't find it hard to wake up with the sun. Deciding to take my time, I went to the kitchen to see what I had to work with.

The house was a one-story, 80-square-meter building. The largest room in the centre of the house served as both the kitchen and the living room. Off to both sides were four bedrooms.

The main purpose of the living room seemed to be using the loom and crafting space. There was a furnace where two bedrooms met on one side, and another similar setup on the other side.

For cooking, there was a stove and oven combination. It probably took all three heating elements to heat the entire house.

Near the oven was a trapdoor that led to the basement. There were plenty of root vegetables and flour, but the basement was more than half empty. I grabbed some potatoes and lard and went back upstairs to cook.

It didn't take me long to get the fire going. In the meantime, I made a mental note of the cookware I had: a cast iron pan, a cast iron pot, a large and a small copper pot, and a few sheet trays.

There were only two knives, one small and one large, but they seemed to be of excellent quality. I remembered that I should have the identify skills restriction lifted.

Knowing how it should work from games and books, I stared at the knife and tried to understand it not just physically, but spiritually as well. That seemed to do the trick.

Large kitchen knife - good quality

I also opened up the new notification.

You have gained a new skill: Basic Identification Level 1

I started to identify as many things as possible while peeling the potatoes at the same time. I decided to dice them up so they would cook faster. When I finished with the potatoes, the stove was hot enough, so I started cooking.

When I finished cooking, I noticed the new notification.

You have gained new skill: Basic Cooking Level 1

"Hmm," I thought. I guess cooking falls under survival skills, which makes sense. I had barely started a new day and had already gained two skills. Next on my list was to do a quick survey of the surroundings.

Stepping outside, there was still a nip in the air, but the sun's rays were already warming everything up. There were three other large buildings: the barn, the workshop, and the woodshed. There were also two smaller sheds.

I knew that one of the sheds held tools, so I made my way to the last unknown building. The first thing I noticed was the wall thickness. Opening the door completely, I now understood why it was so thick—it was where the seeds for vegetables and some root plants were kept.

There wasn't much light that could get inside, but from what I could tell, there were tomato, cucumber, pumpkin, and some other seeds I didn't recognize at a glance.

I was really happy to see them; I could get a lot of food from these seeds. "Now let's see," I said as I walked to the centre of the buildings to familiarize myself with their layout.

If the sun rose from the east here, then the barn was to the north. East was the main house, and west was the workshop and woodshed. The seed house was situated between the workshop and the barn. All buildings looked like they could handle the cold.

To the south was the road to the village, which I remembered to be quite far away. To the west were the fields, and to the east was a small river with a forest beyond it. Behind the barn was at least two acres of fenced-off grazing area.

But the question was, how far did my land actually extend? From my memories, I knew that I owned a lot of land, and there should be a map in my grandfather's room. Returning to the house and searching his room, I noticed the lingering smell of death.

Before looking for the map, I decided to clean out all the bedding. There seemed to be the beginnings of a fire pit behind the main house. That task didn't take me long. Finding the property map was easy enough.

It looked like we owned two properties side by side, one from my grandfather's side and one from my mother's side. Both were around 160 acres in size, but my mother's side had no development—only untamed lands and forests.

Having gotten the lay of the land, I searched all the rooms for valuables and other necessary items. I found two more spears, a large iron shield, and a chainmail shirt too small for me to wear.

I found nothing else of importance. I also identified everything I discovered and gained a skill level increase.

Skill increase: Basic Identification now Level 2

Taking the shield and the spear with me, I headed towards the river and walked over the wooden walkway. The river crossing was a 4-meter-long narrow wooden walkway, where only a single person could cross at a time.

Luckily, there were supports already driven in for expansion. I continued onwards to explore the forest.

A forest is an extremely important resource, and I knew it would be a challenge to transport wood back home. The forest was on this side of the river and quite a long walk from the river crossing.

It took me another 15 minutes to reach the edge of the forest. During my walk, I searched for any useful plants, but mainly only grass was growing.

It was too early in the season for anything else to catch my eye. However, once inside the forest, it was a different story. I immediately found deer tracks and those of smaller forest creatures. After another 30 minutes of searching, without going too far into the forest, I also discovered rabbit footprints.

I found many different forest berry bushes and numerous plants that I had never seen before. I did find some familiar roots, which I dug up for snacking on the move. This activity earned me a new skill after I found a few.

You have gained a new skill: Basic Foraging Level 1

I decided to follow the rabbit prints I found, and after a few minutes, I received another notification.

You have gained a new skill: Basic Tracking Level 1

"Interesting," I thought. I needed to do a lot less to unlock the tracking skill. Why was this so much faster than the foraging skill? Maybe it had to do with the complexity and difficulty of the task, as tracking a rabbit was more challenging than digging up roots to eat.

Looking at the wood all around me, I regretted not bringing an axe. Finding a big tree, I decided to practice my spear thrusting. I had never actually needed to use a spear before, but I had made one in the past and had a bit of fun with it.

So, I practised for some time, but all I got was a stinging hand and no new skill. After that, I went back home. I had no water skin for a longer stay or any other useful items to find at the moment.

I put away the spear and shield and headed to the tool shed. There, I found the axe and other useful tools. There was also a wooden harrow with iron-reinforced spikes. Mounted on the wall was a wooden plough with iron reinforcements.

However, the problem was that the plough looked ancient and was meant to be pulled by hand. None of the tools were designed to be used with animals; they were old and meant for manual labour. This didn't look promising for working the land effectively.

I did see some harnesses in the workshop where the wagon was. Going there and investigating the harnesses, I found them to be meant for horses. Of course, there were no horses anywhere around here.

From my memories, I got the impression that before everyone got sick here, someone came and took the horses and a lot of food for the village.

Considering the harness, I thought I could make a few alterations so I could use the bull for some farm work.

But it was too early to think about that. First, I needed planter boxes for tomatoes and cucumbers. It seemed they didn't use planter boxes here.

They only put seeds in the ground, which, while perfectly fine for most plants, wasn't the best strategy for all of them. I started looking for the wood I needed to make the planter boxes.

Finding some good-sized pieces of wood for the bottom and sides, I was about to start cutting them when I remembered I needed to select the rest of my classes.

I decided to read them over just once more.

Animal Husbandry: This class lifts restrictions on animal interaction skills. This class unlocks the Empathy stat.

Handyman: This class lifts restrictions on all basic crafting and building skills. This class unlocks the Intelligence stat.

I decided to just get on with it and selected them both.

Level up: Animal Husbandry

Animal Husbandry now Level 1

Strength +1

Dexterity +1

Vitality +1

Empathy +1

Level up: Handyman

Handyman now Level 1

Strength +1

Dexterity +1

Vitality +1

Intelligence +1

New trait gained: Strength reaches 10; new trait gained: Better Bone Density

Now, onto it. My hands were already itching to start working, but then I began to look around for something to measure with, only to come up short. I started to think up a solution.

It took me quite a while to remember that the property map had distance reference markers. Quickly, I found a good piece of wood to turn into a ruler.

It took only a few minutes to smooth it out with the sanding stone. Once finished, I moved into the house.

I could make an accurate mark every half a centimetre, which was fortunate since the map had that length. I also calculated how far away from the village I was.

It turned out I was about 10 kilometres away by road, but there was also a closer mark. It was depicted similarly to a watchtower symbol and was only four kilometres away, at the edge of my territory.

Not finding anything better to mark with, I used charcoal for the moment. Knowing that charcoal would come off easily, I went to the living room's crafting space to carve out everything I needed for a 1-meter ruler.

While doing that, I also noticed the two large windows. I hadn't considered them odd before, as I was used to them in my previous home, but in this medieval world, they didn't fit the time.

Ruler finished, I inspected the windows, which looked like modern ones. It was impossible to make them using medieval techniques. I bet they were made using either high-level skills or magic.

The windows were perfectly placed on both sides of the living room to let in the morning light and then the evening light, perfect for illuminating the room for activities.

I also decided to make a string measurement tool, heading over to the loom. I searched for a suitable roll of string to use.

I needed some dye to mark it as well. There were yellow, blue, green, and red options, but I picked the red so I could see the markings more clearly.

I also used the dye to make the carvings more visible on my ruler. It was easy to mark the string every 1 meter using the ruler.

When I finished, I had a 34-meter measuring string. Now, it was time to get back to making planter boxes. There was also a notification that I had received and now decided to open.

You have gained a new skill: Basic Wood Carving Level 1

Now I was able to make perfect 1-meter-long and half-a-meter-wide boxes. When I finished the box, I received a new notification.

You have gained a new skill: Basic Wood Crafting Level 1

For the dividers, I wanted to use extremely thin wood pieces. I ended up using four 1-meter-long thin wood boards, attaching them simply by carving grooves into the inner sides of the box.

I also made more small pieces of wood to use as horizontal dividers to insert later when the box was already filled with soil. This arrangement would accommodate 40 plants per planter box.

I would need to make quite a few of these boxes, and honestly, I didn't want to use the good wood boards I had. I checked if I could use firewood to make the boards I needed.

It would require a bit more work, but the firewood was plentiful and suitable since they were over a meter long. Next, I went to the seed house to see how many cucumber and tomato seeds I had.

There were fewer than I'd hoped for, only about 200 of each. To plant them all, I only needed to make 10 planter boxes. It took me until around 4:00 PM to finish the boxes.

I used up about half the supply of small nails I had. After eating another lunch of potatoes, I noted that I needed to make some food I could bring with me, so I wouldn't have to cook lunch or skip it. This could save a lot of time and ensure I was well-fed.

I also levelled up my Basic Wood Crafting to Level 4 and Wood Carving to Level 2. Taking out the shovel, I went to fill up the planter boxes. But first, I needed to find good soil.

Fortunately, that was the easiest part, as good fertile soil was all around. Deciding to see how deep the fertile soil went, I was surprised to find it was deeper than 1 meter. Not wanting to dig any further because it would just waste time, I noticed a new problem.

The issue was that there were too many rocks, ranging from small to medium in size. So, I'd need to sieve the soil I used for the planter boxes.

However, there was no soil sieve here, and to make one, I'd need green bark. It was the only material strong enough to create a sieve mesh that could withstand the rocks and the weight of the soil.

So, I needed to make a trip to the forest. But this time, let's make it a proper one. First, I needed an axe and a knife. I filled up a waterskin from the well and found some thicker clothes.

I had also been a bit too careless, so I should always carry around a weapon. The spear would be too cumbersome to always carry around. Therefore, I guessed the sword would have to do, and luckily there was a sheath and belt for it.

It took me an hour to get everything ready. I was now wearing a rainproof cape, a thicker shirt and pants, and better boots that looked like hiking ones.

My sword was on my left side, and I used my sword belt to also keep the axe on my right side. I also found a belt for my knife, which was on my right side as well.

So, I was wearing three belts: one to hold up my pants, a second to hold my sword and axe, and the final one to hold the knife.

I think I've never looked quite this ridiculous, but I guess I needed to get used to this for my own safety. I also put a waterskin with a sling over my shoulder and wore a backpack meant to bring back wood.

When I finished my last check, everything worked fine, and I could run and move without anything coming loose.

I had the brilliant idea to bring some rope and string to make traps to catch animals and get some meat.

With that taken care of, I started to head towards the forest. I almost slipped when I walked across the narrow walkway over the river. But luckily, after that, I made it safely to the forest.

My goal was to find some young trees that were about the thickness of my arm. I stripped them of their bark and cut them down to about 1-and-a-half-meter lengths. After the second one, I received a notification.

You have gained a new skill: Basic Logging Level 1

I reached Logging Level 2 when my backpack was full of wood and bark. I began to move towards the edge of the forest.

Upon reaching the edge of the forest, I decided to set up traps for the animals. I dropped my backpack and ventured back into the forest.

I started to follow the tracks to see where most of the animals would walk. It took me some time, and I had to move quite far into the forest to find a consistent deer trail.

Following it led me to a small stream. Retreating some distance from the stream, I started to set up a snare to catch a deer.

I made a simple one that I tied to a medium-sized tree. I spaced them out and set up a total of three snares on the deer trail. I continued to move and familiarize myself more with the forest, so I would know where I left everything.

Next, I set up smaller snares where I found rabbit tracks. I ended up with a total of six in different spots.

Not knowing how many animals there were or how often they came through here, I decided that these numbers were good to start with.

During that time, I gained two skill levels in tracking and a new skill: Basic Trap Making. Finally finished, I headed back home, picked up my backpack on my way, and noticed that it was quite late. I maybe had two hours of light left.

When I made it home, I offloaded all the wood into the woodshed. I brought the bark with me into the house.

I gathered some more potatoes and onions, deciding to make onion-potato pies in the oven so that I could take some food with me if I needed to spend all day in the forest.

Making pies was easy, as I had done it many times before. When I finished all the preparations and the dough was rising, I started processing the wood bark. However, the natural light was almost gone, so I had to rely on the furnace light to continue working.

I started by making the strips thinner, then began weaving them into rope. As I continued weaving, I quickly gained a new skill.

You have gained a new skill: Basic Weaving Level 1

My practised hands made quick work of the material. By the time I was halfway done, it was time to make the pies, and I had also gained two new skill levels in weaving.

Making the hand-sized pies was easy; the problem was that I was unfamiliar with the oven. I needed to constantly monitor the temperature. It took a bit of effort and adjustment, but they came out excellent.

You have gained a new skill: Basic Baking Level 1

With 20 hand-sized pies ready, I went to bed, exhausted from all the work I had done.