A Curse of Competence

24

^^ the Bacchus Capital map ^^

The dirt underneath my feet was a deep gray-brown that belonged more in a Bog than a field, sticking to my boots and gunking up the tread, making me slip every so often due to its naturally slick characteristics as I waddled through the fields and inspected them. Mother, of course, being the childish fool she was, along with her new best friend, -the queen of Bacchus, Seine's mother,- chose to giggle off to the side at my waddling and slipping, both for very different reasons that were apparently equally amusing to them at this juncture. Still, ignoring them, while tiring, yielded results, and I did find out why the dirt was so sorry with salt: underground rivers carrying seawater laced through the entire peninsula, likely why no one had ever bothered settling here, even once they got around the hellish mountain spine that separated the two parts of the continent. "Well that's... troublesome..." I muttered harshly under my breath, kicking some dirt off my boots and stomping my way back to the tent that was set up on the edge of the wetlands.

Mother smirked at me as she moved a small piece on the chess board I'd made for her and father, attempting to place Teresa, (Seine's Mother,) in check, but sacrificing a Rook. "Having fun playing in the mud, baby?"

"Having fun losing that game, mother?" I retorted sourly, and grinned viciously when Teresa placed her into check by ignoring the baited Rook and instead taking her Queen. "And no, I'm not having fun... there's saltwater rivers under this entire peninsula, and in this lower area, the only flat area for farming, it's so close to the saline that it's blighting the crops... if I had rice, I could manage to turn this field into a reliable source of food, but I haven't seen any rice in... god, ten years? The last time was aboard Father's ship, when we were going around the river and hunting water-beasts."

"Rice? Why would that work if there's salt in the dirt?" She moved her King impulsively, and managed to get herself into checkmate when Teresa's Queen moved one space closer, and so she conceded the game and looked at me, giving me her full attention now.

"Because I can get rid of the salt... It'll be difficult, but not impossible. Wild Rice also grows quickly, so if I could plant it here in great amounts, I could feed millions of people within a single season of planting them. Combining that with a steady diet of fish and fruit, the occasional vegetable, bean, and lean meat, and you'd have a healthy country. It can be fed to pigs, chickens, cows, and goats, because you also need grains in cows and goats if you want them to make milk for cheese, and rice is the best grain of them all, in terms of caloric intake... it can be used as a substitute for flour if they're dried and ground into a powder, and most dishes made of rice are delicious and simple to make. But, I don't have any, so that's pointless for now." I sat down in a chair heavily, sighing as I vaguely remembered the heavenly taste of sushi, which I hadn't had since coming to this world, and was slowly forgetting, like many other things. A travesty, that, truly.

Teresa reset the chess board carefully, taking her time with the gorgeously carved red-wood pieces. "If you get rid of the salt, we can plant wheat here, though, so that's enough, right? We don't have much, but we can manage wheat seeds."

"It'll still be a wetland, though, and Rice thrives in this environment... even the environment is good, this Biome is perfect... yes, I'll ask Father to buy a few bags of rice seeds for me, and I'll magically alter them to thrive off salt-water, that'll solve the issue enough to last several generations, at least. Maybe a Zeres-Style Gigantiflora? There's nothing to kill off in this wasteland, so it'll take the salt and turn it into necessary proteins magically... but then a barrier will be needed to keep it from spreading... A simpler variation of the Wall of Thorns would do the entire peninsula some good; monsters coming from the mountains are apparently rather common, so if I make a simple Wall surrounding the mountain range entirely, I could halt most of those invasions as they are; also, the Wall transfers the nutrients from what it kills to anywhere it's owner requires it, so it could increase the production of Rice, as well as increasing the security of the nation against an attack from the south..."