“PUSH!” I urgently yelled. “PUSH!” “I… I can’t!” Nairi replied with a strained voice. “You’re almost there!” “Ughhh!” Nairi grunted and groaned until she managed to push a heavy metallic box all the way up a hill. “You’re… so… mean… Forge-master…” Nairi complained as she gasped for air. I shrugged my shoulders as I looked towards Pridwen’s direction. “Sure, I could’ve helped you out with my >, but you needed the workout. Without decent strength, you can’t be a good forge-smith. And you sure as hell can’t be a good soldier with that wiry frame.” “Between the… drop-hammer… and the MG-42s… I don’t need… to be strong….” She argued back between pants. I sighed a bit. “Nairi, it’s fine to appreciate how technology has improved your life. But it’s not good to rely on it like a crutch. We live in a death jungle- it’s never a smart idea to rely on any one thing out here…” “This bloody weapon… better be… worth it…” She panted some more as she began to get her wind back

“Next slide please, Nairi.” Nairi dutifully replaced one poster of a figure with another. While I regretted importing Powerpoint into this world, nothing undersold my point about the impending iron crisis better than a giant poster of a figure that had a downtrending line and an uptrending line. “As you can see in this slide, the iron demand is expected to skyrocket with the addition of the M2 mortar in our arsenal. And the town production of iron is expected to gently decline due to the gradual depletion of the black sands on the banks of the Acheron.” “In other words, we’re heading for an iron shortage.” Tali grimly noted. The rest of the room, which consisted of clerks in training and militia team leaders, began to understand the problem at hand. “Correct, my Lady. We could lower the production targets for the Garand or the MG-42, but that seemed foolish considering we only have 3 dozen Garands and 10 MG-42s. And reducing the output for farming equipment is out of the question

“OK Nairi, that should be the list of ongoing projects I have. Is there any particular one you’d like to work on in my absence?” I gave her the illusion of free choice- this was actually a test. I’d be a crappy teacher if I didn’t occasionally torment gift my students with the opportunity to prove themselves, right?After tilting her cute head sideways as she read the list, she absent-mindedly replied. “Either finish the drop-hammer forge project or get started on the steel boat project…”“Why?” I asked with a smirk. It was then Nairi knew this was no casual conversation. She started to really think in earnest. Nairi stammered a bit. “Because we… we can immediately increase our food yield by hunting the mana-beasts in the river.” She then collected herself. “But at the end of the day, improving the quality of our steel output would be the most important.”“Correct. In fact, the quality of the steel we’re outputting would be insufficient against those aquatic mana-beasts. Sending peop

I grunted blissfully and gradually relaxed as Sapphy thoroughly cleaned me up. Her personal method of waking me up will never fail to wake me up with a smile on my face. Sadly, we couldn’t go further than morning BJs since that was all the time we had. A new day had dawned, and we were still quite far from Carwennan’s south gate. Since the gate closed at sundown, we were once again racing against the sun on the last leg of the journey. Fortunately for us, the wildlife had begun to learn that charging towards loud noises tended to result in death, so only the dumb ones would even bother charging at the caravan. Because of that, I was confident we’d make it in time.With pigeons cooing in the background, I casually drove my almost-empty wagon as Sapphy slept peacefully next to me with my seeds still in her mouth (whatever makes her happy, I guess). I gently stroked her brunette hair with black highlights as I schemed up a way to harvest iron and steel from the noble brats in this city.

Back when I was a naive little girl, I too dreamed of marrying an Imperial Prince, or some future Duke. In those innocent fantasies, the nobleman of my dreams would be my ideal partner in life- kind, thoughtful, and bold. Those fantasies didn’t last past my first bleed. I must've met hundreds of noblemen since then, and I had been disappointed by every single one of them. Every single one of them was lacking in some way- arrogant, abusive, indolent, dim-witted, weak, or some dreadful combination of vices. Perhaps the princelings and the dukelings would prove to be less disappointing, but I doubt any of them would travel to the edge of civilization just for an upstart daughter of a Count.  When the topic of arranged marriage came up right around my 14th moon, I was naturally distraught. Given the odds, I would be matched with yet another disappointment. And Father’s lack of wi