ericdontigney
patreon
Isekai Terry TOD: Chapter 56 – Home, Sweet Home
🕑 Added 2024-08-03 07:29:53 +0000 UTCTerry stood in the middle of an empty room and tried to wrap his head around the idea that he owned the place now. He’d come from a place where closing on a home routinely took a month or more. He’d gone from talking about the possibility of buying the place with Analina to home ownership in a couple of hours. He had asked her just how it was that the guild had come to own an abandoned farm.
“Oh,” said Analina. “Well, that’s a pretty long story.”
“Nevermind,” said Terry hurriedly.
The very idea that a story existed that Analina considered to be a long one was a little unnerving. She had talked at length about things he didn’t care about and seemed to consider that length of time normal. He’d had visions of himself sitting in a chair, drooling and barely sensate, while Analina yammered on for days at a time. He was also aware that she had charged him an absurdly trivial amount for the house and the land. Some of it was just his own sense of what money was worth in this world. In a place as medieval as this one was, good farmland would always come at a premium because yields would be so much smaller than back in his world. Food was simply worth more because of its relative scarcity.
People couldn’t even safely forage in the forests because of the monsters. If you weren’t an adventurer, it was probably suicide. He also knew he’d gotten beyond dirt cheap because Haresh had told him so. All of which led him to the conclusion that whatever “curse” was on the place, it was serious enough that the local adventurers couldn’t handle it. He also wasn’t stupid. Having a rank two adventurer who lived locally and was therefore always handy would be a net boon to the guild. Giving him a good excuse to stay was to Analina’s benefit. That’s an important thing to remember, self, thought Terry. Happy and pleasant doesn’t mean stupid. Someone can be smart without being evil. Of course, no one knew exactly what the problem was. Everyone who had tried to make a go of it on the farm or investigate had either died or fled. So, he was going to have face the problem blind, but at least he wouldn’t have to deal with it alone.
“There’s no furniture,” complained Jaban as he appeared from somewhere deeper inside the house.
Terry leveled a flat look at the young man and said, “You’re free to sleep outside or go pay for a room at the inn.”
Jaban seemed to realize that he’d made one complaint too many within Terry’s earshot. He lifted his hands in placating gesture and plastered on a bright smile.
“It was just an observation. Something to take care of at some point. That’s all. Promise,” said Jaban in a slightly squeaky voice.
“Very convincing,” said Ekori. “It’s bigger than it looks from the outside. I wonder how many people live here when it was first built?”
“I didn’t think to ask,” said Terry.
“It looks sound enough,” called Haresh from somewhere. “Although, I guess we won’t know if the roof is sound until the first time it rains.”
“We?” asked Terry in a cool voice. “I don’t recall anyone else volunteering their gold to pay for this place.”
Ekori gave him a surprised and mildly hurt look.
“Do you want us to leave?” she asked.
“Nah,” Terry snorted, unable to keep the mean face going. “You can stay. Just don’t get too enthusiastic about decorating. I should go pick a room, though.”
Terry wandered through the place. The floors looked to be made of some kind of hardwood. He was forced to agree with Haresh’s assessment that the construction was sound. The floors didn’t squeak at all as he wandered from room to room. There wasn’t much to see. Jaban hadn’t been exaggerating. There was literally no loose furniture in the entire place. Even the kitchen had been cleaned out, which he realized was probably a blessing in disguise. Sure, there was no pots, pans, or dishes. Of course, there also wasn’t any old rotten food to attract insects and other pests. At least there was still a little metal stove, which seemed a little too modern even if it did use wood. He shrugged it off. He couldn’t expect technological development wouldn’t be exactly parallel.
A worrying idea did invade his mind as he opened the stove and looked inside. I wonder if the chimney is clear? He’s seen news reports of houses burning down because of things lodged in chimneys or just from chimneys that weren’t properly cleaned. He sort of understood why blockages would be bad, but he was hazier on the threat posed by poor cleaning. Was it some kind of residue? He just didn’t know. That could be a serious problem, as he doubted there were chimney sweeps in Chinese Period Drama Hell. Even if there were, they probably didn’t speak in terrible Cockney accents while doing dance numbers. I guess we’ll just have to start a little fire and see what happens. It was something he’d need to look into, since wood was going to be the main source of heat and cooking for the place. The cold wasn’t a dire threat to him the way it had once been, but he didn’t like being cold any more than the next person.
Terry finally claimed the biggest of what he assumed were the bedrooms, which mostly amounted to dropping his pack in a corner. He pulled Dusk out of his robes and set her on the floor. She began an immediate inspection of the space, which prompted what was probably the cutest sneezing fit he’d ever seen. While she was doing that, he pulled out his few cooking implements, a bit of food, and some spices. He took those to the kitchen, intent on making some kind of food, only to realize that there wasn’t any wood to so much as start a fire. God, I miss electricity. And natural gas. And plumbing. While he doubted there was anything to be done about those first two things, it also seemed like there were magical stand-ins for them or the old standby of dry wood.
He was certain that there had to be a way to get some kind of primitive plumbing system in place, though. He just didn’t have the know how to do it himself. His understanding of plumbing and water systems in general boiled down to calling a plumber or putting in a maintenance request with the property management people who ran the various apartments he’d rented. In retrospect, it made him feel a bit like an idiot. Even if he’d just had a basic theoretical understanding of how plumbing worked, he could probably have worked something out a solution. It might have been a pretty kludge solution, but he’d have taken it if that meant showers and not needing to use an outhouse. Walking back out into what he considered the living room, he posed a question to the others.
“I don’t suppose any of you noticed a well or a stream nearby, did you? I assume there must be something like that for fresh water, but I didn’t see it.”
The other three shook their heads. Terry sighed. He supposed it wasn’t a crisis today. The town wasn’t that far away, and he did have mostly full waterskins. It would be fine for one or two days, but that was a problem that needed a solution sooner than later. With his improved constitution, he didn’t think he’d die if he didn’t get water for a few days. That didn’t make him eager to test the hypothesis. Since he didn’t feel like going back to town to get food, and he wanted a hot meal, Terry trudged out of the front door. He looked around the immediate exterior of the house in the vain hope that there might be some firewood that a previous owner had left. He didn’t find any. At least, I only need enough wood to cook dinner.
With evening settling in, he walked toward the nearest patch of forest. He found some fallen branches that looked mostly dry. By the time he’d collected a big armful of wood, true darkness was settling over the area. He found himself eyeing the surrounding forest with a jaundiced eye as he started making his way back to the house. It probably wasn’t late enough for any nocturnal predators, yet, but that didn’t mean some beast with a wonky internal clock wasn’t out there looking for an easy meal. For all his paranoia, nothing leapt out at him. He did get the sense that something was out there watching him. It wasn’t close enough to trigger his physical senses or even that internal sense that warned him of imminent danger, but it still made the hair on the back of his neck feel a bit off. As long as it waits until tomorrow, I don’t care. I just want to eat.
