Iron Harvest: When Farming Becomes Conquest
Chapter 160 - 32: Winter Hunt

Chapter 160: Chapter 32: Winter Hunt

Sanna once hoped to become a maid at a manor.

In her former little fishing village, this was a coveted job.

A simple life with enough food was already a luxury for a fisherwoman, not having to eat those low-calorie fish, shellfish, and crabs every day.

She had always wanted to eat bread and oatmeal.

But it was only after her family had been ruined and killed that such a vision was realized.

In comparison, her brother was really an oddity.

When pirates burned down their home, Kao took up a fish spear to fight desperately against them.

When he realized he was powerless against those cruel pirates, he immediately knelt down and begged for mercy, all the while protecting her from being slaughtered.

Yet the flame of hatred sinisterly smoldered in his ruthless heart, that smoldering pain driving his transformation and growth, daring him to dance on the blade’s edge.

Although she mourned the death of her family, she couldn’t reach the level of Kao’s paranoid madness.

Roman sent her to the classroom, to teach her arithmetic and writing, under Kao’s supervision she studied - that brutal youth never went easy on her, kicking and punching her at the slightest sign of relaxation, so her progress was always faster than Gwivelle’s.

But that only made her more confused; she wanted to blend in with the other maids, her greatest wish in the past had been just to eat bread and oatmeal.

And yet she was told that she was the sister of Lord Kao, the future sister of a Conquest Knight - how could a noblewoman’s sister become a maid?

The number of knights in this land only added up to four or five, and her brother was one of them, with a status higher than all the stewards and soldiers.

This identity, instead, felt surreal and unreal.

She was a bit lost, unable to find her place.

...

Sanna returned to her room feeling downhearted.

Lord had scolded her for not being by Kao’s side, and she was afraid, fearing that Kao would beat her if he found out, but he was all she had.

How could they be siblings? Sanna wondered.

They looked alike with wheat-colored skin, brown hair, and light blue eyes. But their personalities were completely different.

Kao was replaying that brief but life-or-death battle.

He had consulted Dick before, but after killing a knight with his own hands, he always felt that he could have done better; if he had been decisive enough, if his moves had been sharp enough, he should have seized that fleeting opportunity to kill without injury, instead of trading a wound for death.

There was no helping it; it was his first time on the battlefield, unaware of what to look out for in a life-and-death fight, unable to turn what he had learned into combat experience.

Sanna came to his bedside and whispered, "Brother, would you like some hot water?"

"Don’t disturb me!"

How could they be siblings? Kao thought.

He was sick of Sanna’s useless demeanor. His sister was cheery and healthy. But that wasn’t what he wanted to see; he wished to see an aggressive sister, like a pantheress or a lioness, capable of lashing out sharp claws, otherwise, how would she win the Lion King’s favor?

Without combat strength, how could she survive in this cruel world?

"Lord asked me to take care of you," Sanna said with a hint of grievance in her voice, as Kao’s attitude towards her had grown increasingly harsh since his return, making her consider asking Gwivelle for help, perhaps Gwivelle, being a fellow chamberlain, could put in a good word for her, to make Kao hit her less hard.

Kao suddenly fell silent.

There was only one Lord in the manor.

He stared at her for a moment and then suddenly said, "You go and serve our Master."

Kao suddenly felt this whimsical idea was brilliant, exclaiming with enthusiasm, "The Master is going hunting, did you know? He has a Large Bow, blood-red, very heavy, set with diamonds. You follow him, carry his bow and arrows, and go hunting with him!"

Sanna was startled, "Ah? I’m going hunting..."

"Yes! Beg the Master to take you with him! Sanna! You need to live under the Master’s eye, get him to notice you, you can’t keep hiding from him anymore!"

...

When Sanna approached Roman, he agreed to her request after learning about the situation.

Kao must have had his reasons for doing so.

He could tolerate the Angel Envoy having his own life and thoughts, for he had always been indulgent toward him.

Gwivelle, hearing about this matter, came eagerly.

Whether it was one sheep or two, the effort to herd them remained the same.

Thus, the winter hunting party gained two little ’sheep tails’.

For the nobles, hunting was first and foremost about economic issues and meat supply.

Because hunting could yield a large amount of fur and meat.

Roman could ignore economic issues, but he had to solve the food problem.

This time, he had to hunt at least a hundred thousand pounds of wild game to fill the food gap that had developed.

For this mission, he mobilized and dispatched troops, pulling together an army of three hundred, leaving two hundred back at the camp in case of emergency needs.

Even if Earl Kant wanted revenge, he would need time to prepare; he couldn’t possibly attack right away.

Having just finished a war and now joining a hunt, the soldiers didn’t object; they purely treated it as a form of entertainment.

Wasn’t hunting far more enjoyable than tough and tiresome physical training?

The Northern Land had a custom of winter hunting.

There, the land was vast, but the climate so harsh that crops could not grow; survival during the winter depended on fishing and hunting.

The Black Iron Land did not have this habit, as overhunting would disrupt the balance of the food chain. It could cause immense damage to the local ecology.

Despite the basin’s vast territory, the areas suitable for hunting were limited.

During the autumn hunt, the wildlife had almost been exterminated.

Now, the winter hunt could only proceed into even more distant regions.

The heavy snow from the previous days had not yet melted, creating muddy paths as it was trodden.

That day, the sun did not show in the sky.

The weather was bitterly cold, with piercing northwest winds.

This was the Black Barbarian Land, a mixed forest composed of oak, blackthorn, and dwarf chestnut trees which, upon entering, one could faintly hear the calls of deer and howls of wolves echoing.

The wild forest was intricately complex, and the footprint of civilization stopped here.

Yet, the winter hunting party had to pass through, looked down upon from high above, they seemed like ants searching for food.

Roman surveyed this Wilderness.

He realized that if he wanted to cultivate this land in the future, it would become fertile farmland.

This was a long-term project, without hundreds of thousands of people, it was unthinkable to transform this place into a habitable environment, and the transformation process might last twenty or thirty years.

But farming was never a losing trade—if it were, it wouldn’t be called farming.

Its income was bound to far exceed the investment.

Even in the early stages of land-reclamation, the output of the wasteland could surely sustain those who worked it, provided there was sufficient logistical support.

Once fully cultivated, the basin’s hundreds of thousands of acres of new land turned mature.

At that time, the yield of this land could sustain three million, five million people.

With improvements in wheat variety, sustaining ten million people was not an empty talk.

He kept these startling thoughts in his throat; the fools of today could not understand the glory and greatness of this mission.

They arrived at a suitable hunting ground.

Roman dispersed his soldiers, forming a surrounding encirclement.

Demon Beasts were ferocious, but when faced with armed soldiers, their claws and teeth seemed rather insignificant.

Unless they were the legendary different kinds, the Demon Beasts could not escape human encirclement.

Soon, the mountain forest echoed with the pitiful howls of wild boar, forest bears, and many other Demon Beasts.