The sound of fists striking iron breastplates echoed through the dungeon.
It was a solemn and tragic sound.
‘I think they misunderstood something.’
Aiden thought they had clearly gotten something wrong, but the water had already been spilled, so it would be difficult to gather it back up.
“Ghk!”
Sure enough, even Jamie tried to kneel and strike his chest, so Aiden quickly stopped him with his eyes.
“...For now, everyone should get back to work.”
Then he ended the situation by vaguely brushing it off in order to escape from it.
Creeeak.
When he opened the rusty iron door and stepped outside, sunlight poured down over Aiden’s head.
At last, it was truly spring.
“I was truly moved, Administrator!”
The moment they came outside, Jamie grabbed Aiden’s hand with a choked-up expression.
“To think you would discard your pride so easily for our north!”
Ah, so that was it?
Aiden thought this.
Northerners, despite their appearance, were people rich in sensitivity, quick to jump to conclusions and quick to be moved.
“You won’t believe me even if I say that wasn’t my intention anyway, right?”
“Yes!”
“Good grief.”
“Heh heh.”
Aiden had told the truth, but Jamie still seemed to believe that his superior was merely embarrassed for no reason.
“By the way, where should I use this free labor so people will say I used it well?”
“Originally, we used to make them do fieldwork on the lord’s castle’s directly administered farmland, but this year is a bit....”
“Right?”
The lord’s castle’s directly administered farmland had already been leased to the people of the territory as pilot sites for cash crop cultivation.
“For the moment, we have mobilized them for forest clearing, but since the weather is warming, we do not need that much timber.”
“And there are no people who would buy it?”
“That is exactly it.”
Even if free labor appeared, it was still a problem if there was nowhere to use it.
‘It feels like a waste to use surplus labor just anywhere.’
The card called large-scale civil engineering works came to mind again, but that was still premature.
“When I think of forced labor, I think of mines.”
“Then shall we send them to the mine?”
“Hm?”
“Pardon?”
He had been talking to himself.
No, more importantly, wait.
“There is... a mine?”
“Of course.”
“Then why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because it is a place that was left undeveloped and abandoned since it has no commercial value.”
At Jamie’s answer, Aiden’s head tilted to the side.
‘There are mines with no commercial value?’
No, in a fantasy world, when a mine appeared, was it not supposed to be some cheat code that allowed everyone to live in luxury?
A short while later.
“This is the iron that comes from that mine?”
“Yes.”
Jamie brought a box containing iron ore, saying there was a sample in storage.
‘I can’t tell by looking.’
He had to check it first, so he looked, but he knew nothing about minerals. There was no way he could tell with his eyes whether this had economic value or not.
“It is recorded here that the blacksmith who inspected it before said the iron ore from this mine is of poor quality, so even if the ore is dug out, more than half must be discarded. Here.”
“Mm.”
Aiden, having read the paper containing the blacksmith’s opinion that had been stored with the iron ore, nodded.
“It says there is another problem.”
“You mean the mine’s location?”
“Yes.”
“That is correct. Unfortunately, that place is near the boundary between beast and monster habitats, so the danger is too high.”
“So both appear there?”
“Yes. According to the records, even during the few trips made to discover and inspect the mine, the party was attacked.”
“If it is still the same now, transportation costs would be enormous.”
“Because we would have to mobilize soldiers.”
“We cannot mobilize soldiers just to transport poor-quality iron ore.”
“It does not balance out.”
There had indeed been a reason they had discovered an iron mine and still failed to touch it.
“Still, forced labor means mines.”
By the standards of this age, those dragged all the way to the dungeon were people who would not have much room to complain even if they received the death penalty by twenty-first-century standards.
After all, one did not dare receive the Lord’s judgment for mere petty crimes.
Because of that, giving such lawless bastards labor that was not very difficult and only required them to pass time did not sit well with him.
‘Is there no method?’
It was a day when his worries deepened.
***
A new concern had appeared, but he could not keep clinging only to that matter.
That was what administrative work was like.
Even if one worked hard, it did not show easily, but the moment one slacked off, it became obvious.
‘It’s exactly like housework.’
They had much in common in the sense that maintaining the status quo seemed to be the best one could do even after working hard.
Of course, Aiden liked both administrative work and housework.
A home and society that were always kept straight, clean, and the same as usual.
Ahh, how beautiful that was.
It was a sad thing to possess an aesthetic sense others did not properly recognize.
At any rate.
“I have finally completed the Daily-Life Leisure Improvement Plan!”
Jamie set down a thick bundle of documents with a confident expression.
It seemed the results had come out from the order Aiden had given him to come up with ideas to change the northern culture of drinking and shouting whenever there was an opportunity into something a little healthier.
“You will not be disappointed!”
Jamie was so full of confidence that Aiden’s expectations quietly rose.
‘Did he create and bring something groundbreaking?’
Aiden turned the cover, which was written in neat and tidy handwriting unlike Jamie’s appearance, and began reading the report in earnest.
Rustle, rustle.
How long had the sound of turning pages continued?
Tap.
Aiden set down the documents and smiled.
“It is a good idea, isn’t it? Keuh! I knew you would think the same, Administrator. Actually, what I have been thinking lately is that perhaps you and I are soulmates—”
“Get out.”
“Eh?”
“Get out, you bastard!”
Aiden had told him to create a healthy leisure activity because more people might start drinking and causing trouble, and yet,
“You want to open a war tournament between villages? What the hell...!”
With the northerners’ personalities, it would surely end in laughter and smiles. Of course it would.
“No, you should not look at it only negatively, Administrator. Now, look. We open a tournament-style war tournament between villages! Like the jousting tournaments those noble lords hold!”
Pretending not to see Aiden’s expression, which looked one step away from bursting with frustration, Jamie desperately explained his plan.
“Now, if this happens, the village that comes in first will gain the pride of being the strongest village in the north! Yes, pride. Is pride not very important to people? That is what will form.”
“What about the villages that lose?”
“They will prepare for the next match, analyze the cause of defeat, and train together, developing that, what is it, yes, cooperation! They will cultivate things like that.”
“Bullshit.”
It sounded nice to call it a war tournament.
How was it different from a gang fight?
“But everyone liked it.”
When Aiden’s reaction was hardly favorable, Jamie’s mouth jutted out as he grumbled.
“They liked it? Who did?”
“I listened to the residents’ opinions before submitting the report. You said it yourself, Administrator. No matter how good a policy looks, it is useless if the residents dislike it.”
“...They liked this?”
No matter how extraordinary the spirit of northerners was, surely they would not support village-wide brawls....
“Administrator. If that is implemented, will our lord’s castle participate too? I think we could make one team with the workers!”
Brikal, the head cook, who for some reason had personally brought the sandwiches, asked with even a blush on his face.
“See? Everyone likes it. They are looking forward to it a lot!”
“Haa.”
Aiden could only sigh more and more.
“Even so, no. Permission denied.”
“But...!”
“If rival villages form for no reason, it will spread into emotional conflict between villages. If that happens, village unity? That will all go down the drain. Is that not so?”
“Still....”
“And what about the people who get hurt? In a situation where we do not even have a proper clinic, if young people who should be working get injured, who will farm and who will hunt?”
“......”
“Do you think that is all? Suppose there is a village that keeps losing. In the north, where strength is already considered a virtue, what will you do if people from that village are pointed at just because they come from that village?”
Tsk, tsk.
At the sound of Aiden clicking his tongue, Jamie’s shoulders drooped.
It was not that he had failed to consider that there would be various side effects. Still, he had pushed it because he thought it was leisure perfectly suited to northerners. Hearing it laid out like this, however, the disadvantages were indeed significant.
“Usually, you wouldn’t submit a plan with this many side effects. Did something happen?”
“Since the drawbacks were clear, but there were also advantages, I wanted to discuss it together.”
“Advantages?”
There were advantages to village-wide brawls?
“If things went well, I thought we might be able to attempt military training for all northern residents for free....”
“Military training?”
“The north is extremely vast, is it not? Because of that, when a distant village is in danger, it is difficult for the lord’s castle’s soldiers to deploy immediately. So I thought that if they developed their own skills, it would help their safety.”
“No, if you had that kind of purpose, you should have written that first.”
Then the matter changed.
‘Hmm.’
With a little adjustment, it might be usable.
“How about turning hunting into a competition, Administrator?”
Kalisa offered her opinion.
“Turning hunting into a competition.”
Tap, tap.
Aiden tapped the desk a few times with his fingers and sank into thought.
“First. In order to remove disadvantages caused by village size, we need to set the number of participants. Ten men and women aged fifteen or older, recommended by each village council. That should do.”
“That sounds good.”
“Second. To ensure fair progress, the competition will be held only in a designated place during a designated period. We cannot stop individual training entirely, but private competition between villages must be strictly forbidden.”
“Why is that?”
“Because they might end up neglecting their main occupations, including farming. We have to prevent that.”
“Ah.”
“The types and specifications of weapons used for hunting must all be reported as well. It is essential in order to recover all traps and capture frames after the competition ends. Weapons that could injure people if something goes wrong must be filtered out from the start.”
“Of course.”
“Finally, the competition format will be a points system.”
“A points system?”
“We will assign points based on the prey’s danger, size, and rarity, then add all the scores together. The side with the highest final score will be first place. Then, we will pay prize money to the villages from first to third place, and to the participating athletes of the first-place village, we will award the title of Honorary Ranger and championship rings.”
After all, even mere ball games awarded rings after a championship.
That was the rule.