Two days. That's how long Kael spent on preparation. In his past life, a project plan for clearing a ditch would have taken an afternoon of conference calls and emails. Here, it meant backbreaking labor under a pale sun, fueled by thin porridge and Brenn's gruff encouragement.
They gathered materials. Brenn sourced a dozen old, leaky clay pots from the village midden pots the potter had deemed worthless. Kael saw them as vessels. He spent hours plugging the leaks with a mixture of mud and rendered fat, creating containers that would hold boiling water for at least a few minutes.
They needed salt. A lot of it. Brenn's wife, Elara, a wiry woman with shrewd eyes that missed nothing, traded a week's worth of needlework for two heavy sacks of rough, grey salt from the village merchant. She didn't ask why. She simply looked at Kael, at the new fire in her husband's eyes, and said, "You better not get him killed."
"That's not the plan," Kael had replied.
The final piece was the funnel. Kael, drawing on Kael's memories of working in the fields, wove a long, tapering barrier from willow branches and thick, thorny bramble. It was crude, but it was designed to be wedged into the narrowest part of the ditch, forcing anything flowing downstream into a single, enclosed channel.
On the morning of the quest, they stood on the bank of the collapsed ditch. The water was sluggish, brown, and fetid. The collapse was a jumble of earth, rock, and tree roots about fifty yards ahead. The air smelled of decay.
"You see the way the water ripples just there?" Brenn said, his voice a low whisper. He pointed to a patch of still, murky water a few feet from the collapse. The surface was unnaturally smooth, save for a slow, circular motion.
Kael saw it. Something large was just beneath the surface. Something patient.
"How many?" he asked.
"Hard to say. A nest could be three. Could be ten. They're not smart, but they're fast. You get a leg in the water, you'll be drained before you can scream."
Kael nodded. The fear was there, a cold knot in his stomach, but it was compartmentalized. He had a plan.
"We follow the sequence," Kael said, going over it one last time. "Phase one: set the funnel and the pots. Phase two: start the fires and get the water boiling. Phase three: I'll use the long pole to agitate the collapse. The leeches will come. Phase four: we funnel them, scald them, and salt them. Any deviation, we fall back to the bank. No heroics."
Brenn, holding a heavy, iron-tipped setting pole, just grunted. "You're the one agitating the collapse. You sure about that?"
"I'm the one with the lightest feet," Kael said. "And the most to prove. Let's move."
They descended into the ditch. The cold water rose to Kael's knees. The mud sucked at his feet with every step. They worked in tense silence, Brenn using his strength to hammer the woven bramble funnel into the ditch walls, creating a bottleneck. Kael positioned the clay pots along the bank above, each filled with water and set on a small pile of kindling.
Sweat beaded on Kael's forehead, mixing with the grime. His muscles screamed. This wasn't a conference room. This was real, and any mistake was permanent. He saw the system window flickering in his vision, a constant, silent observer.
[Quest Progress: 15%]
Finally, everything was in place. The funnel was secure. The fires were lit, the water beginning to steam. Brenn stood at the ready with the salt sacks. Kael picked up a long, sturdy branch.
He moved toward the collapse, his steps deliberate. He could see the leeches now. Three of them, each as long as his forearm, their mottled grey bodies pulsating gently in the murk. They were attached to the submerged roots and rocks, their circular mouths slowly working.
He took a deep breath, forcing his hands to be steady. He was a project manager. He managed resources. Right now, these leeches were a resource to be managed. They were an obstacle to be removed.
He thrust the pole into the collapse.
The effect was immediate. The earth and rock shifted with a groan. The three visible leeches detached from their anchor points, their bodies undulating as they were drawn by the vibration and the scent of disturbed blood from rotting fish trapped in the collapse.
They flowed downstream, directly toward the funnel.
"Now, Brenn!" Kael shouted, scrambling back.
The first leech entered the funnel. The second. The third. Kael's heart pounded as he saw more movement in the disturbed water two, three, four more. The nest was larger than he'd estimated.
He reached the bank just as Brenn upended the first pot of near-boiling water into the funnel's exit. A cloud of steam erupted. A horrible, wet hissing sound filled the air, like fat dropped in a pan. The leeches thrashed, their bodies convulsing as the scalding water hit them.
"Salt!" Kael yelled, grabbing a sack himself.
They poured the grey salt over the funnel, creating a corrosive paste that burned and shriveled the creatures. The water in the funnel churned for a few more seconds, then grew still.
Silence returned to the ditch, broken only by their ragged breathing and the hiss of steam.
Kael looked at the funnel. The leeches were dead, their bodies curled and smoking in the salt-and-mud mixture. He counted seven. Seven giant parasites that would have terrorized the farmers for weeks.
He leaned on his knees, gasping. His hands were shaking from the adrenaline. He looked at Brenn, who was staring at the carnage with a mixture of awe and relief.
"It worked," Brenn said, his voice hoarse. "Your fool plan actually worked."
Kael straightened up. The exhaustion was bone-deep, but so was a new sensation. Pride. Not in himself, but in the process. In the execution. In proving that a plan, no matter how simple, could overcome brute force.
[Quest Complete: Clear the Irrigation Ditch!]
[Rewards:]
50 Guild XP
10 Silver
+10 Reputation (Millbrook Farmers)
[System Alert: Guild Hall Upgrade Available!]
Current: Dilapidated Cellar (F-Rank)
Upgrade Cost: 100 Guild XP, 5 Silver
Upgraded: Makeshift Guild Hall
Features: Reinforced door, basic notice board, small sleeping quarters.
Effect: Allows for up to 5 registered members. Unlocks passive reputation gain.
Kael stared at the upgrade cost. They had 10 silver. They needed 5 more XP. It was tantalizingly close.
A voice called out from the field beyond the ditch. An old farmer, his face creased with worry, was hurrying toward them, a shovel in his hand. Two more followed.
"What's happened? We heard hissing!" the old man shouted. Then he saw the funnel, the dead leeches, the clear water now beginning to flow past the collapse.
He stopped dead. His eyes went from the leeches to Kael, then to Brenn.
"Brenn? Did… did you do this?"
Brenn, a new confidence in his posture, gestured to Kael with his thumb. "Ask him. He's the one with the plan."
The old farmer, whose name Kael's memory supplied as Old Man Hemlock, turned to him with a look of open astonishment. "You? The orphan? You cleared the leeches?"
"The Guild cleared the leeches," Kael said, the words feeling momentous. "The Millbrook Guild. We solve problems."
He looked at the old man, then at the other farmers gathering on the bank. He saw the relief in their faces. The dawning hope. He saw his next quest forming in their eyes.
He had a guild. He had a reputation. And he had 95 XP left to earn.
He turned to Brenn, a new plan already forming in his mind.
"We're not done," he said quietly. "We need that upgrade. And we need more people. But first…" He looked at the farmers, who were now excitedly discussing how to finish clearing the collapse. "…we need to turn this into a story. One that spreads. One that makes people talk."
"Talk about what?" Brenn asked.
Kael smiled. It was a thin, sharp smile, the smile of a man who had just proven that a mouse could bite a cat.
"About the new guild in town that solves problems nobles are too lazy to care about. And about how they pay fairly for work well done."
He looked at the system window again.
[Members: 1/5]
[Reputation: Minor (Millbrook)]
Step one was complete. The project had moved from conception to execution.
Now came the hard part: scaling up before the people in power decided to squash them like the leeches in the ditch.