Let’s Build A Waterwheel

The next day, Maachan woke me up at a truly ridiculous hour by pounding on me.

“Good morniiing, Leopin-kun! Wake up, wake up, wake up, wake uuuup!”

“Ughn… what is it…? It’s still pitch dark…”

“But the sun’s going to rise soon! If we don’t hurry, the wheat’s gonna run away!”

I was dragged along to the field.

The sky was still a deep indigo, and beyond the horizon it had only just begun to turn faintly light blue.

It was still dark all around, and Mark and Tom were snoring away as if that were the most natural thing in the world.

The wheat and sesame in the field too had their heads drooping, as if they were fast asleep.

In the middle of all that, like a sun that had risen one step early, Maachan was swinging her arms and legs around and diligently doing warm-up exercises.

“Come on, come on, what are we starting with today!? Harvesting after all!?”

“Yeah. If that’s what you want, then I’ll have you handle the wheat harvest.”

Using the ‘Forest Stone Knife,’ I taught her how to harvest wheat.

After that I lent the knife to Maachan and decided to head into the forest.

“I’m going to gather materials in the forest, then prepare the other tools, so I’m leaving the harvesting to you alone.”

“Okay! Leave it to me! Have a good trip!”

Seen off by Maachan waving both hands wildly, I pulled a hand-drawn map out of my coat pocket.

This was something I had made when I wandered through the forest during the ‘Seven Days of Flame.’

“I wrote down the rough locations of any materials that caught my eye on the map while I was looking for water sources.

Lemme see, first I’ll go to the cliff where the ‘Daija Vine’ grows, then swing by the grove with the ‘Bamboo Wood,’ and after that…”

After putting together a route in my head, I loosened up my body by shaking out my arms and legs, just like Maachan had.

“All right then, let’s get this ‘Gathering Marathon’ started…!”

After that, I ran all through the forest until the sun had fully shown its face.

The gathering went perfectly, and with my coat pockets stuffed full of materials, I headed back home in high spirits.

As I was walking by the river near the house, I happened to run into Mark and Tom.

Mark’s nose was swollen up like an apple.

“What’s with you, Mark, your nose is bright red. Did a bee sting you or something?”

Mark nodded with teary eyes, saying, “Kuon.”

Tom was being carried in his arms and gave a weak little “Pyaa.”

“Tom, your leg’s injured too. What were the two of you doing out there? Hold on a second. I’m pretty sure I picked up something that could work as a medicinal herb.”

During this gathering marathon, I had not only collected the materials I needed, but whenever I found any promising-looking materials, I had thrown them into my coat pockets indiscriminately.

As a result, the inside of my pockets had become even more of a disaster, but…

“I really need to organize these pockets sometime when I’m unbearably bored. Ah, found it.”

While tossing the contents out one after another, I found the medicinal herb I had been looking for.

That was knowledge I had gained through the Ranger’s ‘Survival’ skill.

The fruits of Sentataki were smaller than beans, and on top of that, hard.

I transferred them into the mortar I had left in my coat pocket and tried grinding them down, but there was no sign of them crushing at all.

“If I put too much strength into it, the mortar might crack… I guess I just have to do it patiently.”

After that, I kept grinding away until my arm got tired, and it took a whole hour just to finally turn it into a coarse paste.

That was when I understood the meaning of this plant’s name.

“I see, because you have to pound it a thousand times, it’s called ‘Sentataki.’ This is one troublesome medicinal herb to make. If it doesn’t have some pretty strong medicinal effect, it’s not worth the effort.”

As if proof was better than argument, I tried it out right away.

I applied Sentataki to the affected areas on Mark and Tom.

Then Mark’s swollen nose shrank down to about two-thirds its size, and Tom recovered enough to stand and walk on his own.

“To heal injuries this much without magic or prayer, that’s an amazing effect. At this rate, they’ll probably be fully healed by tomorrow.”

And then I thought.

If I could keep this medicine on hand, it would probably be useful when the time came.

“But having to pound it a thousand times every single time is a pain…”

Most crafting work was enjoyable, but among it there were some things that required nothing but patience.

Whenever that happened, I always tried to think of an easier way.

“Isn’t there some way to make the thousand pounding strokes easier, down to a hundred, or no, maybe even ten?”

As I thought while gazing at the river flowing beside me, inspiration immediately came down to me.

“That’s it! A waterwheel! I can make a waterwheel do the thousand pounding for me!”

I immediately went back to the house.

Then I hauled back the cart parked beside the house that was loaded with Gisu lumber.

When I returned to the river, I used the ‘Dexterous Job Change’ skill of ‘Jack-of-All-Trades’ to change jobs to Carpenter.

“It’s been a while since I’ve done any carpentry.”

After picking out a flat stretch along the riverbank, I activated the ‘Construction’ skill with fierce momentum.

Following along the river’s flow, I built a long shed.

There were no partition walls inside, and it ran straight through like a corridor.

And since there was no floor either, it could be entered with shoes on.

There was no door at the entrance, and I made it large enough for a cart to pass through.

In short, it was a complete ‘workshop.’

“All right, now then, time to make the important part—the waterwheel! When I was little, I used to make tiny ones and play with them by spinning them in the river.”

I built waterwheels each more than a full size larger than my own body.

They were as tall as Monsoon, and to me they looked like giants.

“Waterwheels are fun to make when you imagine how they’ll look when they’re turning.

All right, let’s install them right away.”

I passed logs through the holes I had opened in advance in the rowhouse.

I fitted the waterwheels onto the logs jutting out toward the river.

The size was perfect.

They neither failed to reach the water’s surface nor scraped against the riverbed, and they began turning while firmly catching the water.

…go, go, go, gogogogo…

Five waterwheels in a row lined up along the river.

Just watching their powerful rotation was enough to get me fired up.

“Yes, yes, this is it! This is exactly the best part of waterwheels!

All right, next I’ll attach the mortar and pestles!”

As if I had been granted a share of the waterwheels’ power, I continued with the work.

At a speed I could scarcely believe myself, I made what I needed.

I wedged boards into the waterwheels to stop their movement for the moment, then set the mortars and pestles onto the waterwheels’ rotating shafts.

I poured the Sentataki fruit I had been storing into the mortars.

And then, when I removed the boards…!

The waterwheels began moving again with a deep rumbling sound, and their rotation drove the pestles up and down.

By their own weight, the pestles slammed into the mortars, crushing the fruit with heavy thuds.

“Hm, even though the pestles are just moving up and down mechanically, I can watch this without getting bored.”

When I was grinding it little by little by hand with the mortar, I had only managed to make a tiny bit of medicine in four hours.

But when I let the waterwheels do it, they made a huge amount of medicine in just one hour.

“Oh!? The quality level is even higher than the one I made by hand! Nicely done, that’s great! Ahahahahaha! Keep this up, I’m counting on you from now on too!”

For me, that was the moment five dependable giants joined my side.

And then, in my mind, inspiration struck again like bombs setting off a chain explosion.

“That’s it…! If it’s come to this, I’ve got no choice but to automate that too…!”