Orc Lord

“Like I said, it’s an honor to have Knights of the kingdom in this little town of ours,” the village representative repeated. He was a slightly short, friendly man with grey hair and a moustache.

“Thank you very much for putting up with us,” Silvia smiled the way proper noble women were trained to do.

Claudia and Marilyn kept staring at the overly polite old man.

Seriously, old guy, you’ve said that three times now. Please stop.

Hm. It’s better to leave troublesome people like this to Silvia.

Out of nowhere, it had started raining heavily. They had prepared water resistant tarps for the wagons, but it wasn’t good to risk the horses getting sick. Around that time, they had happened to come upon this village near the forest, so they decided to stop.

They might have scheduled this expedition at a bad time. Right now was the hottest time of the year and also the time that saw the most rain. Out of the many books Marilyn had read, one had been an advanced study of meteorological phenomena, which had been borrowed from the royal library in the capital. According to that book, only when it was this hot was the water from the desert ocean able to rise from underground and disperse into the air. When enough vapors gathered, they became rain.

It was a controversial theory. Unlike when one boiled water in a pot, the process of the desert sea rising wasn’t visible to the naked eye. Many Scholars found it hard to believe that as much water as later rained down rose up without anybody noticing. Water Mages who studied the subject were often trying to gather measurements around this time of year, hoping to finally prove or disprove the hypothesis.

I think, if I were a Mage or a Scholar, I would like to go with them.

Marilyn sipped on the weak tea she’d been given while Silvia received a fresh cup. Claudia was busy trying to avoid the swill without looking like it was on purpose.

“Will you stay the night here?” The village representative asked.

“If it stops raining before dark, we plan to continue on our way.”

“Are you sure?” his eyebrows shot up. “The ground will be soggy by then. What will you do if your supply carts get bogged down in mud?”

“Please don’t worry about that. Our group has plenty of Warriors and Mages who can help in those situations. And besides that, my sisters and I have matters to attend to nearly as soon as this expedition is over. Sadly, we don’t have much time to laze about.”

This mission involved fighting Demonic Beasts, so it wasn’t easy by any stretch of the imagination, but for the girls who had troublesome tasks waiting for them back home, this was practically a vacation.

Tax season was approaching, so Claudia would soon be shipped around to all the most dangerous places in Andorin Kingdom where weaker knights couldn’t go. She would be constantly on the move—for a month, at least.

Silvia was recently married into another noble house, so she would have her hands full settling into the estate. She would likely be handling the family’s assets in place of her timid husband, so she had to quickly familiarize herself with all of her new holdings.

Marilyn would return to being a tool employed directly under the crown. Sometimes she was tasked with guarding the king’s family, other times she was used as an ambassador to deliver messages to other kingdoms that were difficult to travel to. If she was unlucky, she would have to “guard” the worst criminals and war prisoners in the royal dungeons.

Instead of dealing with all of that, killing some beasts was much more enjoyable.

After a few hours, the rain cleared up, and the expedition continued on its way. They had to stop once or twice more, but never for so long that their schedule was put at risk. Steadily, their procession advanced into the forest, mostly by following routes that were known to see monster activity less frequently. Marilyn was impressed, internally, at the guides and maps they had, because whether it was Goblins, Orcs, or even Kobolds, they probably only met a dozen monsters before reaching the base of the Black Mountain.

By then, it was late, so they set up camp for their second night in the forest. From here on would be frequent battles, so it was important to get proper rest.

***

Babylon was still intact when we returned. There was a small part of me that was worried some enemy would teleport over and destroy it while most of the fighters were out. I even prepared the golems at the gates, just in case, but nobody came.

First things first, I’m still in my underwear, and that has to change. I found a bear pelt to wear as a temporary solution, then I turned my attention to developing textile-making technology. I made a spinning wheel out of clay, along with a bunch of spools to wind the thread onto. I only had the memory of the old sewing equipment my grandma owned to work with, so it took a while to make something that worked. By the time I’d made a loom as well, it was completely dark out, so I went to sleep in the castle.

Oh yeah, even though there are bed-like structures in the Goblin housing, there are only Japanese-style futons where the Fomors sleep, and round nest beds for the Orcs. I think the city copied what the residents were used to sleeping on. The reason the Goblins got full beds might be because I made something like that for them back in the old village.

There’s a nest bed in my room in the castle too. I’ve already gotten used to that way of sleeping. What I don’t get is that the beds aren’t only made of earth-type materials anymore. My nest bed has fluffy pillows around the rim and some kind of silky covering. When did the city learn to make things like that? Where did they come from?

At least, that’s the impression I had. Because I was so confused, I used all of my earth-type analysis spells. The stuffing is a very powdery stone that seems springy when squeezed—it’s extremely flammable, apparently; the silky covering is made by weaving super-fine crystals with a few metal strands for extra flexibility and strength. It’s very pretty and smooth, but it will apparently melt on contact with salt. Sweat is salty, so… they must be constantly repairing themselves. Thankfully, the outer layer is very flame retardant, or I would worry about Momma.

Wait, she wouldn’t get hurt even if her bed did catch fire, huh.

In the morning, I went to build more spinning wheels and looms. When I had enough, I gathered a few bored women and taught them roughly how they worked. After requesting that they make me some clothes as their first training exercise, I went to ask Balig about money.

“Money?”

“Yeah. Earth magic can make pretty much anything that’s valuable enough to be used as currency. Isn’t there anything people can’t make that has value?”

“Of course there is, but do Monsters really need a standard currency?”

“That’s racist. And we need it because I want one.” But, I guess in the worst case, I can just use an immaterial concept like a line of credit.

Balig sighed. “Alright then, but I don’t think you’ll like it. All the descendants used the same currency because it was the only thing that couldn’t be produced with magic. We used magic cores.”

Ah, you mean the thing that grows on the inside of my skull? (It turned into an eye now, though.) What am I, a clam? Is there a valuable pearl inside if you crack me open?

“What? Didn’t you use those to make magic tools?”

“They were used for both, though once a core was turned into a magic tool, it was considered a product, rather than a currency. They were valued based on how much magic power they could store, with smaller divisions based on how much was actually inside. The lowest denomination were the shattered fragments of magic cores. We had plenty, due to failures when making magic tools. Once the cores shatter, they’re useless, so they’re all valued the same regardless of size.”

I’m starting to hate the descendants of this world. But at the same time, I completely understand. Rather than try to keep people from illegally creating money, it’s much easier to set your money to be something that can’t be made by people. But, of course, people will still try to abuse the system. For example,

“What’s useless about fragments? Can’t you use earth magic to fuse them back together?”

“The magic power all leaks out when the cores break, and it will continue to leak out of a core that’s been repaired. It’s very easy to tell when one’s been tampered with. Well, after coming here, I noticed that there’s no problem if you put a monster’s magic power in first to stabilize it. I don’t think there’s anyone out there enslaving Monsters for pocket change, though.”

“Then, wasn’t there anyone who bred monsters in secret to harvest the cores?”

“No, that’s not the government’s problem. The church’s teachings forbid descendants to raise monsters. The punishment for being branded a heretic is way to extreme. Nobody who would dare try it.”

“The church, huh?” I still feel like I don’t understand those guys enough, but it’s pretty clear they hate monsters.

Still, I’m building a country of Monsters. Is it really possible that we won’t find a way to grow magic cores with Fiara here? I could always make it a government regulated technology, but I’m sure I can find something better.

I kept Balig around—since he already knows some government-related secrets anyway—for a descendant’s opinion. I also called momma, Fiara, Giji, and Bazarath to discuss the issue. Somehow, I had to spend time just convincing them that money was a good thing before the discussion could start.

“I see. So money can become many things, like magic power,” Bazarath mused.

“That’s right, but you can see how there would be problems if people made their own money with magic. They could buy things without really earning them. Also, the more money there is, the less each individual piece is worth, so if people can mass produce it, it will become worthless.”

“Isn’t it fine to just use magic cores like Balig was saying?” momma asked. “We have plenty of them.”

I stole a glance at Fiara. “There are other things that magic cores are much more useful for. Especially because monsters can absorb the magic power inside, we’d only be trading with empty ones, which would make trading with descendants hard because our money would be worth less than theirs.”

“But isn’t that still better than using a different kind of currency altogether?” Balig asked. “You might not be able to trade at all if what you use is too different.”

“Ah, that’s true, isn’t it? For foreign matters we should still use magic cores. Actually, Balig, does the church allow descendants to trade with Monsters?”

He smiled bitterly, “There’s no way they would.”

“Of course not,” I sighed. Then I won’t accommodate them.

“Well then, we’ll have to start by trading with other Monsters. If that’s the case, what we need is a currency that all Monsters will see as valuable.”

“We only see value in things that can help us survive or make us stronger. Money’s too indirect for that,” Giji said doubtfully.

“Hoh, that gives me an idea.” I looked at Fiara again. “What if we made the currency functional? What if they were all tiny magic tools?”

“That would be a bit much for me alone, chief.”

“Yeah. I think I have an idea to ease the labor intensity. If it works, I’ll just need you to design the magic circuits.”

“That would be fine,” she nodded. “But what do you want them to do?”

“About that, there aren’t typically any Holy attribute creatures in this forest, right? So spells unique to that would be useful to have in a tool, wouldn’t they? Maybe the higher value coins will have more useful spells and the lower value coins have more common spells. The cheapest coins should be able to cast a little light spell, while higher value coins could cast something like .”

“You have other rare spells that aren’t Holy attribute. Why not include some of those?” Momma offered.

“Hmm, then, is it possible to add to the middle value coins? It’s rare and one of my most convenient skills, but it’s an evolved resistance skill, not a spell.”

“Enchanting skills into objects?” Fiara lowered her head in thought. “Well, that’s, I don’t know. Spells have a consistent formation that can be simplified and replicated.” Her eyes searched around randomly for a minute until they lit up. “Okay! I have a way to test it! Hold on a minute.”

She ran out then, arriving a minute later with three Fomor magic cores. “Chief, here,” she held out one of the cores for me to take.

“Alright,” I held it, “what do I do?”

“Please cast on it.”

I shrugged and tried to turn the core into a tiny air conditioner. A strange shape spread out inside the crystal structure. Unlike a spell formation, there were almost no curved lines, and most of the short segments were disconnected. There were lots of dots, dashes, funnel-like shapes, and tree-like shapes. When I saw that structure, my breath almost stopped. Fiara, and momma were the same, but Bazarath and Giji didn’t seem to know what was going on.

Is this what I fucking think it is?!

I swallowed a mouthful of saliva. “I’m naming this a skill formation.”

“Is that what you were making such a fuss over?” Balig exhaled. “Had me all excited for nothing.”

“So the descendants know about this already?” I asked.

“How could we not? Core-based magic tools have been around for hundreds of years. What would be impressive is if you could find a way to simplify that into a skill pattern. Nobody’s figured that out yet.”

“But the skill pattern is exactly what we need,” Fiara murmured. She shook her head. “It will take some time, but I’ll try to figure it out.”

Fiara also had me experiment by engraving a non-resistance active skill and a passive skill, though I couldn’t really do the last one.

“One more thing, Fiara. Make it so that the coins break if you use them at maximum output.”

She blinked. “That’s in the future still, but why would you want them to break?”

“So that people aren’t satisfied with just one of each coin, and they’ll keep trading to earn more.”

For the rest of the meeting, we discussed what the coins would look like and what they would be made of. They need to be convenient whether Goblins or Giants are using them. Also, I’ve been calling them coins, but even that isn’t certain yet. What turned out to be a surprisingly heated discussion continued until the sun was high above our heads.

***

A badger had invaded the old man’s home. Using a stick he kept inside for emergencies, he drove the creature out. It fled in a hurry, and the old man stood under the sun, reveling in the glory. Almost immediately, his triumphant sun was blocked out, and the dirty old man was drenched with rain. The beast must have sensed it; no wonder it was looking for shelter.

The ragged old man quickly ducked back inside, wringing the moisture out of his beard. He noticed the badger from earlier, shivering under a sparse bush. Immediately, the old man forgot how he was wet and miserable and laughed at the stupid animal, making obscene gestures with his hands.

The old man ended up sleeping in a muddy puddle of a hole that night because he was mocking the badger and forgot to block the entrance of the hole before it flooded.