Chapter 91
A few days passed after I started noticing that it was getting cold.
Suddenly, the cold became much harsher.
This world's temperatures seem to swing more wildly between hot and cold.
Since it's cold, I'll find something to do indoors... Huh?
Three one-eyed creatures are working hard at hulling the wheat.
...Thank you.
As for grinding it into flour...
So the one-eyed ones can use magic, too? Amazing.
Making yeast... I can't see them, but the amount of yeast isn't decreasing.
There are more jars of fish sauce fermenting, too.
The sugar isn't decreasing, either.
The oil was in the process of being made, I think... Thank you.
The salt, too?
...I have nothing to do.
There are members of the farming team mixed in with the one-eyed ones, too... Ah, thank you.
Maybe I'll make a stone mill.
I'll do that.
I know what it should look like, and I have a vague idea of how it works.
For now, I'll make a rough cylinder of rock about 30 cm across.
It should be about 20 cm high.
I cut the cylinder in half.
The trick is to cut it slightly off-center rather than right through the middle.
The shorter half will be the lower millstone, which serves as the base.
The longer one will be the upper millstone, which I turn around and around.
...I remember needing to work on the surfaces where the upper and lower stones meet.
The upper one should be concave and the lower one convex, if I remember right. I saw it on TV, too.
I carve them, making adjustments with magic.
...The height ended up a little lower, but I don't mind.
The lower part became a little too thin.
It should be fine. Probably.
I make a handle on the upper millstone to hold while turning it around and around.
I make the handle from rock, too, then smooth it with gold ore so it won't hurt my hand.
I make holes in the centers of the upper and lower millstones for inserting a rod.
I drill a hole all the way through the upper millstone for pouring in wheat, and it's complete.
I insert a rod made from silver ore into the hole in the lower millstone, cover it with the upper millstone, and it's complete.
Oh no, I forgot to carve grooves into the surfaces where the upper and lower millstones meet.
I neatly carve grooves with magic, and now it's finally complete.
I put in some wheat and turn it around as a test.
It's being ground into fine flour... and before I know it, one of the one-eyed ones is beside me.
Um, I'll leave the rest to you.
I renovate the room next to the kitchen on the first floor into a workroom for the one-eyed creatures.
A workbench and a stove.
The rock figures are a little short, so I make a stepstool.
What else? A place for bread to ferment?
...A shelf for checking its fermentation?
...A small storage room?
I made everything according to their requests, but isn't this a little too elaborate?
Besides, what about my work...?
It's easy, but... too easy... I'll find something to do.
...
It seems to be a full-fledged winter now, and it's cold.
Snow is starting to fall.
I haven't seen Shuri, and now I haven't seen Boss-san, either.
When I looked, I found Boss-san... a little smaller than usual, asleep on the second basement floor with the baby spiders and tiny spiders.
...Is this hibernation?
Does that mean Shuri is hibernating underground with the whole family, too?
I haven't seen Shuri in the morning or at noon, so maybe Shuri really is hibernating?
I haven't seen Shuri for the past few days, either.
At dinnertime, they were there.
So it wasn't hibernation, then.
Fried chicken today... Could this be why?
...Anyway, I ended up having to make far more than planned, so I did my best.
The kitchen inside the house has reached its limit.
I decide to remodel it halfway through frying.
The farming team is helping, but there's far too little space for frying.
I'll work hard on the remodeling.
...Eating while I cook gets me burned. It's delicious, though.
Fried chicken, teriyaki, pepper-grilled, steamed, braised-pork style, kakuni-style, and char siu.
Eggplant-like vegetables, fried and simmered, crispy-grilled, stuffed and grilled, and stuffed and fried.
Daikon-like vegetables, fried, sweet and savory, chewy-grilled, and stuffed and grilled.
Depending on the menu, Shuri's family and Boss-san's family stop hibernating and wake up.
The eggplant-like vegetables go to Boss-san's family, the daikon-like vegetables to Shuri's family, and the meat to both families.
They're not hibernating!
But since they don't wake up for anything else... is this some kind of pseudo-hibernation?
Either way, watching the tiny ants and tiny spiders battle over the food, I think the families have an incredible sense of smell.