The Potential of Earth Magic

The break ended and we resumed work.

Alexia's mana had recovered sufficiently in the meantime, and she continued turning over the hard soil at an undiminished pace.

According to Alexia, the beauty of magic was that hard soil didn't tire you out.

The only cost was the mana spent on the spell.

Harder soil meant slightly more consumption, but only marginally so.

Manual labor was a different story entirely.

You'd swing a hoe down with everything you had, jolting your hands and arms with every impact, then swing again.

If it only took one pass, that'd be manageable, but doing it over and over was genuinely exhausting, and the toll accumulated.

That was what made developing new farmland so difficult.

No wonder Kwad was mentally worn out.

"I'm glad I learned earth magic for digging trenches. Between making roads for carts and this, though, being worked to the bone like this wasn't exactly what I had in mind."

"On the front lines, you dig in first, right?"

"Yes. Once you're within magic range, it becomes an exchange of fire, so cover is essential. Trenches stop arrows too."

The leading cause of death on a battlefield was magic. Second was being picked off by archers.

Yohane had always imagined cavalry charges as the centerpiece of battle, but that apparently wasn't how it worked.

"Ordinary cavalry get wiped out by magic before they can close the distance. The only ones who can charge into magical fire are cavalry equipped with something like the Anti-Magic Orb or other countermeasures. But as a merchant, I'm sure you can see the problem…"

"The cost."

"Exactly. Could you send cavalry that expensive charging into the front lines?"

"No chance. Losing them would be bad enough, but if they were captured and their equipment was seized wholesale, you'd be handing it straight to the enemy."

"Precisely."

A clear explanation.

It made sense for army commanders to invest in magical countermeasures for their own protection against assassination attempts, but equipping rank-and-file cavalry that way was pointless.

"That said, the fact that it's impractical is exactly why some eccentrics try it anyway. If armored cavalry actually reached the enemy mages' position, it would be a spectacular coup."

"At that point, your whole life strategy is a gamble."

"No argument there."

While we talked, Alexia finished tilling every last plot on the development plan.

What had been barren, neglected land was now entirely turned over.

I crouched and ran my hand through the soil. Soft.

The drainage would be good, and crops would grow here.

With the Earth Elemental Stone's influence, a bumper harvest was all but guaranteed.

Enviable.

"I've gotten quite comfortable with earth magic now. Still doesn't feel as natural as fire, though."

"This is more than enough. We could branch out into farming at this rate."

"I'll have you know, this is actually rather tiring…"

I let Alexia's protest go in one ear and out the other.

Elza, on the other hand, seemed fascinated by the agricultural potential.

"When the time comes, can I plant some of my favorite vegetables?"

"As long as they're edible, sure."

"Yay!"

"Running a tool shop is impressive enough. You're going into farming too?"

"Yeah. An acquaintance of mine has a field he can't keep up with. If there's money in it, I might buy it from him."

"Didn't you say you were opening an inn as well? Aren't you spreading yourself thin?"

"Heh. The tool shop will keep growing, but there's a ceiling. It's more efficient to funnel the shop's profits into new ventures."

I let the soil fall from my hand and dusted off my palms.

"I'm going to find Kwad. Wait here."

"Understood."

Leaving Azu and the others behind, I went to look for Kwad.

Heading toward the far end, the land was starting to look like proper farmland.

The development effort hadn't been as dramatic on their end, but sheer manpower wasn't to be underestimated either.

"Hey, what's up?"

"We've finished all the tilling."

"… Already?"

"She got the hang of the spell partway through. She doesn't usually use earth magic, so she probably just needed to warm up."

"That's how it works? Well, whatever. If you're done, go ahead and take it easy. If you did our side too, the rest of the crew wouldn't have anything left to do."

There were other participants besides Yohane's group, so doing everything ourselves would actually cause problems.

We'd handled the hardest part. The rest was better left to the others for everyone's sake.

"I know. We'll take a break, then. Call us if you need anything."

I said that to Kwad, and he raised his right arm in acknowledgment.

I headed back to Azu and the others.

When I arrived, I found chairs and a table that hadn't been there before, with all three sitting comfortably.

"Where did these come from? These weren't here."

"I packed and hardened the dirt from around here. Better than nothing, right?"

"Huh."

I gave one of the chairs an experimental knock.

A solid thunk.

Properly compacted.

"They'll turn back to regular dirt once I release the spell."

"Handy."

"I hadn't really thought about it before, but earth magic is more versatile than I expected. If I made walls out of dirt, I could probably block just about anything."

As if to demonstrate, Alexia raised walls of earth from the ground around us.

They were a bit taller than Yohane.

The thickness was about the width of an arm.

I tried giving one a kick. It didn't budge. And my foot hurt.

Elza healed me with a healing miracle while saying "Honestly," but that wall was seriously hard.

"Shaping it does burn through quite a lot of mana, though. Still, it'd be more than enough in an emergency."

When Alexia released the spell, the wall that had been so solid crumbled away.

I sat down in the chair she'd made.

It wasn't very comfortable. Could've used a cushion or something.

"Here, use this."

Azu pulled a towel from her bag and handed it to me.

Not quite a cushion, but it'd do.

I took it and laid it down.

"Much better."

"Ehehe, I'm glad."

Azu scratched her cheek with her right index finger.

Every little reaction of hers was adorable.

Still, having nothing to do was boring.

No sense in being restless about it, but time was finite.

"Downtime like this is important, you know."

"She's right. You work too much as it is."

Elza and Alexia had fully shifted into relaxation mode.

Azu glanced between the two of them and me, reading the room.