Iron Work with Sis Farine

"I talked to Granpa Chiyo, from now on I will help him with the cutting of firewood, but since he is too old, it was you who was doing it, wasn't it, sis Farine?" Thorin said looking at Farine who stood up and rubbed her shoulders.

"That's right, I use a lot of firewood in the forge so bringing my grandfather's fee is no problem, why do you bother with it? It's not like you're going to make a lot of money, you know Toms won't let you sell the firewood to the other villagers, right?" Farine shook her head as she rolled Maccy from her back onto her legs and rested on a log.

Maccy laughed happily as Farine wiped her face with a cloth that didn't look smooth at all.

"hehe, let's not talk about that guy, we already know he's the one who least tolerates us in the village, wouldn't you use my help Sis Farine? A year ago I was too young to help you and... after what happened with Big bro Flint... well, I understand that we couldn't cooperate more at that time" Thorin said with some problem.

Thorin had come to the village with the help of Gard and Gard had left him with only a couple of copper coins, the reason he has given him was that 'the wanderers had to help each other' and Gard had left him in charge with old Chuyi and his granddaughter Farine. who was newly married to Flint the blacksmith in the village.

Everything had gone well for the first few months for him and Thorin was also helped by the villagers, but after a few months, a war between the Count of Sicoal and another neighboring count caused there to be a forced call to arms, Flint, being tall and muscular, was one of the 10 recruited in the village, unfortunately, he did not return and left Farine pregnant, things got complicated whit the assignment of the job in the forge.

Thorin back then had wanted to help but he was just a 9-10-year-old boy and couldn't do much, Farine was separated from the villagers who had turned against her thanks to Toms, and old Chiyo had lost part of his prestige by protecting his pregnant granddaughter and her work at the forge.

At the end of the day, in order not to affect them, Thorin decided to make his hut because the villagers already had an opinion of old Chiyo helping his granddaughter and also an unknown boy, Thorin had tried to start working in exchange for food or money so that they would not look down on him, and that was how he had been swindled by Toms into helping him chop wood.

"eh?... EH??! Big Sis Farine! what are you doing!?" Thorin came out of his memories and screamed with 4 points of fear and 6 points of surprise.

"What are you screaming so much? Didn't you tell me to feed Maccy? What goes to my stomach ends up going to this little girl anyway" Farine said without flinching as she held Maccy which was sucking from a pinkish white hill.

Thorin blushed and turned 360º and looked at the pair of mountains in front of him, while Thorin was lost in memories, Farine had started to breastfeed Maccy who was happily nurturing her small body.

"um? how much do you want to look? you're supposed to be too young for that... if you're already a youngster, you'd better look the other way or I'll take out your eye... well maybe nothing so extreme, but believe me, I will leave you a black eye" Farine said grimly as Thorin kept staring at the white mountains in front of him.

"O-Of course, Big Sis... as for the firewood..."

"You can come tomorrow, or if you want, start helping me from now on, lest you get lazy tomorrow and regret wanting to help me, yes, it's not like I can give you much, there will be no chicken or wheat, but at least your belly won't stick to your vertebrae." Farine rocked Maccy as she watched Thorin blush, and he moved his gaze from her chest to her face, only to blush even more.

"What, what should I do sis Farine? How can I help you?"

"You can take the sacks with ore to the forge, there is no rush, Maccy won't finish eating for a while, take what you can"

"understood" Thorin looked down and didn't dare to look at Farine.

Thorin took one of the sacks, he lifted it with difficulty on his back and moved it towards the forge where it would be processed, after a few minutes he had already moved the 4 sacks and was sweating slightly while breathing through his mouth, his surprise was more knowing that Farine had carried all 4 of them in one go for who knows how many miles, and on top of that she had carried her daughter Macy on her back.

"Are you still watching? Is it a street show for you to watch with so much interest? It seems that you forget my words quite quickly, no?" Farine smiled slightly and said this, seeing Thorin who was looking at her again and seemed not to focus precisely on her face.

"Certainly not Big Sis Farine, I'm surprised you can carry those 4 bags with ease, my look is one of respect and adoration!" Thorin said smiling while thinking 'a street show? it's a private show Big sis Farine!'

"snort, if your eyes are not honest I can't expect any honesty coming from your mouth, kiddo, you are at least 10 years too young to have impure thoughts about your Big Sis Farine" Farine got up leaving the pot on the floor and with Maccy in her arms, meanwhile returning her bosom inside her clothes.

"Okay now let's go to the forge to start refining the iron, I tell you that not much money comes out of this, I thank the gods for being born strong, otherwise I would not get anything from this work" Farine grumbled and turned to where was all the material

behind the cabin was the forge, this was the size of a bucket, about 25 inches in diameter, with a height of more than a 4 feet tall, made of stone and mud in the lower part and bricks in the upper part, as well as one side with a metal anvil supported by a wooden trunk, next to it, there was a wooden table.

"Well, the first thing is the firewood, generally I do that every 2 or 3 days but since I help the old man with the firewood, I usually collect a little every day, I already did that" Farine pointed to the side of the cabin with her chin as she leaned back on the table and held Maccy.

"After that, we have to make charcoal for the firewood, it is somewhat tedious since it takes at least 1 day to cool down and finish cooking, so in the backyard, I have several holes for it, let's take the current batch of firewood there, Maccy I don't want you to run all over the place, do you understand me? Forget it, I'd better leave you inside the cabin" Farine looked at her daughter but shook her head at the possibility of letting her roam free in the yard, she was barely a year old and she was already wanting to run and climb wherever she could.

"follow me thorin, this rascal won't let me work in peace if I don't lock her up"

"Uh, if you want I can help you take care of her" Thorin said cautiously.

"Hey, aren't you supposed to come to help me? I'll take care of squeezing every last drop of strength out of your soft body, boy, work dignifies man, what are you going to do taking care of this child? And even more so when I'm working away in the forge!" Farine told her smilingly as she pouted her nose playfully.

Thorin just scratched his head somewhat embarrassed, after having been in a work environment full of rules and production goals it was difficult for him to communicate with the active Farine who worked in her workshop with her own rules.

"You're right Big Sis Farine" Thorin didn't add more and they went to lock Maccy inside the cabin.

the place where Farine lived, was a small space and a clearing with visibility so they didn't care much about little Maccy being a risk situation, besides Farine's house was made entirely of thick logs and was far more resistant than his shack or that of the other villagers.

"Well, what were we doing? Yes! Let's take the wood to the pits to prepare the charcoal" Farine quickly took several bundles of wood and stacked them one on top of the other on her shoulder, Thorin could only swallow and with difficulty carry one on his back.

In 4 trips they had already carried enough firewood, although Thorin had barely carried a tenth of it, perhaps not even that.

"After this, we will let the firewood burn for an hour and a half and we will come to cover the ventilation of this, it is not difficult at all right?" Farine asked with a wide smile.

"No Big Sis, nothing difficult..." to which Thorin replied panting and with sore arms.

"Well, the following is not so tiring, although it is quite tedious, come on, bring the baskets to the second pit, I have a batch of charcoal already prepared to use, we must sort out the useful charcoal for the forge and clean the one that is not useful, that we can use it for cooking or to exchange with the villagers."

with the orders of Farine Thorin went for the baskets and they began to do the work of raffling the coal and cleaning the pit to use it later, Farine taught him slowly and in an affable way without getting desperate with him, she was direct and sometimes hurtful with her acid comments but she had no bad intentions so Thorin learned quickly.

"Now that we have the charcoal we can go grind the stones, this is a somewhat more difficult job, hehe it's not something you can do yet, watch and learn boy" Farine guided him to where the iron stones were, taking a handful of these, she put them in a metal bowl, then took a sledgehammer that at first glance must have weighed more than 20 lbs.

In a single movement, Farine dropped the sledgehammer on the stones and with a loud crash she made Thorin jump back for fear of flying stone shards, but surprisingly the stones did not fly and they turned into small pieces, such was her control over the sledgehammer.

a series of sledgehammer blows reduced the stones into small stones that ended in gravel, Farine smiled seeing Thorin's surprised face and giving him a look of satisfaction she put the sledgehammer on her shoulder.

"hehe, what do you think? maybe you think you can do it? that bastard Toms wanted to take my job away because I was pregnant and when I was still in quarantine, as if he could do this in a day, the work he could do in a week I do it in 2 days, and his stupid son may be strong, but his brain is not enough to take care of the tools or follow the steps to refine the iron" Farine wiped her nose and put more stones in the metallic bowl.

Thorin had nothing more to say when he saw Farine grind the stones as if they were chalk, and the sacks of stones quickly emptied into fine stone gravel.

Toms son Etred was a big guy at 6'2" for his 17 years, had a stupid face, but was a particularly cruel individual and had a record of having broken the arm of a smaller boy from another village, partly Toms wanted the job in the forge for his eldest son because this was strong and big, perfect for this job according to his idea.

"Is Etred still bugging you, Big Sis Farine? The guy is a brainless beast." Thorin shook his head as he helped her pour the fine gravel back into the sack.

"hump, I would like to see if he dares, he tried to come to bother me when Maccy was born, I was still in quarantine and I put him in his place, leaving his face more inflated than a pig's butt and raising his balls to his navel, if not that I was weakened by the birth, otherwise I would have left Tom's family without their main bloodline" Farine began to mix the pulverized carbon that she already had, with the iron gravel and to heat the forge.

Thorin felt a chill in his groin at the thought of how he had been watching Farine's arrogant pair bounce with each blow of the sledgehammer, he only hoped that his Big Sis Farine would not treat him as someone frivolous and give him the same treatment as Etred.

The 2 didn't talk about it anymore and Farine, remembering the charcoal that she had left processing, went to close the ventilation so that it would burn slowly and end up turning off and cooling the next morning.

Without further discussion, she began to work on processing the iron, regularly this type of profession is something that is not usually allowed to be seen or given an explanation to outsiders, so Farine did not give Thorin any further indication of what she was doing, Not that she didn't want to teach him but it was the rule of thumb in this profession, most blacksmiths would last as long as a decade as an apprentice before receiving a profound lesson in how to work with iron.

"It is hard work but here is the result" after a long time Farine showed him 10 ingots just over 2 pounds each, but they still required more refinement.

"And how much do you earn for these ingots, Big Sis?" Thorin asked as he looked at the porous pig iron.

even though she hadn't told him anything, he understood 90% of the iron refining process, after all, he had worked for a university newspaper and had seen all kinds of information in it, his memories as Thorin were vague but his memories of his previous life were clear as spring water, just trying to remember a little and he could have a vivid image of them.

"A large copper coin for 2 of these ingots, after all, they require refurbishment, if I could further refine them I would receive 4 times that value, not only that, but I could make the field tools and swords for the village myself, sigh, but then I would have to pay taxes and even be confined to live in the city in the artisans quarter" Farine dropped the ingot regretfully thinking that even if she moved forward in the art of iron working, things would only get more complicated.

"Well, enough to live on and even to help my grandfather and my daughter, and with you, then it would be a bit of a squeeze but not much of a problem." Farine sat up taking a deep breath and looking up at the sky as she rested her neck, losing herself in thoughts.

the atmosphere was a bit heavy and they both fell silent but were interrupted by the sound of falling pots and a giggle from inside the cabin.

"This little girl! Thorin I'll be waiting for you early tomorrow, don't let me down! Little girl, can't you let your mother rest?!" Farine entered the cabin with a quick step and shouted.

"..." Thorin said no more and took the pot which didn't even have a grain of rye or any chicken bone, he still felt strange interacting with previous Thorin's acquaintances, but he felt that they were people he could trust, at least he wasn't completely alone in this strange world.

his thin shadow was lost on the way back to his hut while the star king of this world was hidden.