Chapter 41

Even after understanding the concept and usefulness of division of labor, the assembly-line workflow itself still apparently looked bizarre, and when Iiria saw the magic stone processing worktables lined all around the courtyard corridor, she burst out laughing.

The chairs and worktables had been brought in from the various workshops, so their sizes and shapes all differed and looked unsightly, but trying to make things like that from scratch would cost quite a lot.

By the time I was thinking that I wanted to give things a more unified appearance once we got on track, the carrying-in of the equipment was finished, and the former masters and apprentices gathered together, all wearing uneasy expressions.

I, as a first-time master who had barely processed even a single magic stone myself, was to give the opening greeting.

“I am Yorinobu Takahashi.”

The artisans and artisan eggs gathered in the courtyard gave vague sounds that were neither quite “ah” nor quite “mm,” and several of them removed their hats and returned the greeting.

“From here on, I will be running this workshop together with all of you, but—”

As I went on and on with that sort of formulaic greeting, Kururu, listening from the corner, was obviously bored and yawning, Marks was whispering with his companions, and Kengo, who had gone out of his way to return from town despite being busy at the mine, was moving his mouth as though scolding me.

And even Iiria, the only one who had seriously been listening as the lord, was beginning to wear that smiling face that was not really smiling. There are more important things you should be saying, it seemed to say.

That night, when she came to the mansion and laid out her theory, Iiria had told me this.

Your role is to show them a dream.

I understood that, but when I had explained my thinking to Iiria, it had also been because of the late-night mood. Thinking about it again, I was anxious whether the artisans would really follow me with this, and I had needed that run-up.

But that had reached its limit too.

“Now then, I’ve said various things, but at present, my goal is only one thing.”

I took a breath, and let it out.

“To obtain a stable life together with all of you.”

Just as the word citizen carried a very different meaning here than it had in my old world, the meaning of a stable life was also entirely different.

This was a merciless world where if you got injured or sick, that was the end of it.

“Since I do not possess the techniques of magic stone processing, your cooperation is indispensable. You may think this workshop is a strange thing, but please lend me your strength for just a little while. And if it fails, I will carry the worktables myself and take them back to your original workshops. At the very least, I will make that much atonement.”

At that, hesitant laughter spilled from the former masters.

In any case, they had been unable to endure their lives as they were, and had come under Iiria in a manner that amounted to rebelling against the guild.

They knew that even if they stood still, much less turned back, nothing good would come of it.

Division of labor was something done by a group, and if I said that losers were suited to gathering in packs, would there be cries of protest?

“I have only one request. No shouting and no whips.”

Iiria had said that only the workshops that could drive their apprentices like slaves were profitable ones.

And precisely because most people could not become that ruthless, they ended up with workshops that never really got anywhere.

The former masters looked at one another, sparse applause broke out, then subsided.

Even I did not take that as a lack of enthusiasm.

They might not amount to much, apparently, but they were still artisans.

“Well then, shall we get to work at once?”

The courtyard immediately grew noisy.

The former masters had already been told beforehand about the concept of this workshop.

Break down the magic stone processing steps as much as possible, to the point that someone could manage them after only a day of practice if need be.

Then have each person focus as much as possible on the tasks they were best at.

Because they were people who were not particularly confident in their skills, they understood their own weak points better than anyone, and because they were also people who had been reluctantly running workshops they had not even wanted in the first place, they had no odd pride about it.

Before coming here, they had already exposed their own weak areas in order to decide how the work should be assigned.

Apparently even they had been surprised by just how different those weak tasks were from one person to the next.

Still, the ones most surprised here were probably the apprentices.

“Are we allowed to touch the tools?”

They had been handed hammers and chisels and simply stared blankly.

Even after coming under a master, for years they would be worked to the bone doing household chores, and even once they were finally allowed to stand in the workshop, they would spend endless days merely polishing magic stones. During that time they would gradually learn the workings of magic circles by watching and imitating, and only once they had become thoroughly old hands in the workshop would they be given a cast-off hammer and chisel from the master and practice at night, after work, on stones by the roadside.

Hearing stories like that, I could not help but admire how the masters had somehow managed to rise from apprentice to master after enduring such a grueling process.

No—if they had failed to become masters, they would either have died in a ditch or been kept their whole lives as workshop livestock, so they had had no other choice.

“We cannot afford to waste your valuable abilities on polishing magic stones. Please practice and be able to process magic stones properly as soon as possible.”

At my words, the boys, ranging in age from around five to around high school age, looked at one another.

Or rather, just from hearing about it, the existing workshops were inefficient.

The raw stones dug out from the mine naturally did not become standardized products for the magic stone trade just as they were. The unrelated rock had to be chipped away, and the surfaces had to be polished.

This was the very height of simple labor, yet in the workshops it had been the apprentices’ job.

The reason was that unshaped magic stones were cheaper.

Instead of purchasing already shaped magic stones, it was cheaper to purchase unshaped raw stones at low cost and have apprentices, who were little different from slaves, polish them.

As a result, even if an apprentice became highly skilled at polishing magic stones, once his value as an apprentice rose, he would move on to the next process where that skill could not be used, and then a new apprentice would once again begin learning polishing from scratch.

The old-fashioned masters apparently said that this very thing was an important process for learning what it meant to be a magic stone artisan, but that was clearly a lie. It was nothing more than a bad custom where, because they had been made to do it, they made the newcomers do it too.

So I had asked Kengo to expand the magic stone polishing line that already existed at the mine.

At the mine, in addition to ore selection and washing, it seemed that beastfolk children were handling the shaping work. There was also the meaning of giving them jobs, but by establishing a permanent specialized work group even for shaping magic stones, efficiency and quality ought to improve.

“So everyone is doing different tasks, right?”

After the masters had finished discussing who would handle which task and which apprentices could take which tasks, they scattered in twos and threes to their respective worktables and began working.

Iiria, who had been watching the scene in the courtyard with great interest, asked me that.

“I believe so. Even I don’t know who is doing what.”

The masters had the shapes of magic circles beaten into their heads, so they knew better than I did what should come next. So rather than having me say all sorts of things, I chose to wait for them to settle into whatever felt easiest to them on their own.

“It still… somehow feels really strange.”

Iiria shrugged and watched the masters’ somewhat awkward working scene.

Of course there was no way it would go smoothly from the start, and many of them especially kept silently doing their work alone and ended up handling the next person’s process too, over and over again.

And when handing over a magic stone they had carved to another master, they looked terribly embarrassed, or made excuses, while the receiving side frowned, or on the contrary admired it and got absorbed in technical discussion, so work kept getting stalled here and there.

Each time, I stepped in and went around asking them to please save the stories that had built up until after the church’s evening bell rang.

Some of the masters, though used to giving orders, were clearly made irritable by being given them, but even those people seemed to forget all about it once they went back to work and became absorbed, so they would likely get used to it little by little.

Or rather, I thought it would probably be better to appoint one of the masters to oversee the whole operation. Or perhaps a retired master would be even better, someone who could point things out without it causing offense.

As I watched, there were some helpful masters who seemed more delighted to instruct the apprentices than to do their own work, so perhaps those people ought to be dedicated entirely to training roles.

Also, the boy apprentices around high school age who already possessed some carving skill were tense at first about processing magic stones, but perhaps because repeating the same process over and over worked in their favor, they soon got used to it and became engrossed in their work.

Overall things were still scattered and full of a feeling of groping in the dark, but it did not actually take that long for the first completed magic stone to be produced.

When I judged that a magic stone was about to be completed, I pulled out the handbell I had prepared.

At Kengo’s suggestion, I had borrowed it from a cowherd.

He had said that when the first magic stone was completed, everyone ought to be made aware of it.

“The first magic stone is complete!”

When I rang the bell loudly, those who had been absorbed in their work looked up, blinking in puzzlement.

Then they exchanged looks and came crowding over.

In my hand was a fourth-grade magic stone engraved with a flame magic circle.

“You’ve got to be kidding. They only started work a moment ago.”

“Did you bring in a magic stone that was already halfway done?”

“At my workshop, this wouldn’t be ready until three days from now.”

They all said such things in turn and groaned over the magic stone in front of them.

“Still, while the groundwork is so-so… the carving is magnificent.”

“Indeed. The curves are splendid. I simply cannot do this part.”

“Who carved the ‘fuse’? How do you adjust the depth this cleanly?”

“Look, the ‘fire mouth’ is quite something too. Even at Yanosh’s workshop it wouldn’t come out like this.”

The sight of the bearded masters jostling and shoving one another brought back a memory from childhood, when I had gone on a ranch visit and, trying to feed the cows, had started crying because so many of them gathered all at once.

“Um, the talk—the talk can come later!”

When I raised my voice, the masters lifted their heads just like those cows had back then.

“We’ve also prepared food and alcohol! Of course,”

I said, catching my breath,

“Every day. Once the evening bell rings, all of you will eat here together every day and make an effort to exchange information. If you do that, this workshop should be able to mass-produce magic stones like this one.”

If each person handled the work they were best at, then overall speed would increase tremendously.

Even when they had been told that, they had probably been only half convinced, but now the results were appearing right before their eyes, and their expressions had plainly changed.

“Ohhh! At this rate, debts will be gone in no time!”

“Gars, stop standing around talking and get back to work already!”

“What was that! You’re the one who does nothing but look for flaws in other people’s work!”

Arguing noisily like that, they each returned to their workstations.

With a wry smile, I also went around showing the magic stone to the little calves who had not been able to see it behind the masters.

Every last one of them forgot to blink as they peered at it, then started shouting that they had carved this part themselves.

Then they too were yelled back to their workstations by the masters, but the promise of no shouting and no whips probably did not count this time.

It looked like things might somehow work.

Just as I was feeling relieved, I was suddenly jabbed in the side.

When I looked, it was Kururu with suspicious eyes.

“Surely you’re not planning to dump all the meal preparation onto me alone?”

I was the one who had pompously spoken of the concept of division of labor.

“What should I help with first?”

Kururu gave a snort and declared loftily,

“An apprentice starts by washing the vegetables.”

“Yes, Master.”

When I answered like that, Kururu looked blank, as though she had not expected that response.

And then, as her feelings gradually returned, she looked pleased.

“Fufun. Master, huh. Fufu, not bad.”

Watching Kururu’s catlike tail as she headed back toward the kitchen in a restored mood, I found myself thinking that the magic of the word “master” might be quite useful after all.