Life in Grenville

Life in this new world was pretty tough. The obvious hindrance was being in the body of a child, but Asterion had come to terms with it more quickly than he had expected.

Like everything, it had its benefits and drawbacks. The good part was that he did not have to do anything. The bad part was that he could not do anything.

While doing nothing have Asterion a lot of free time to learn and adapt to his surroundings, it limited his freedom of movement and speech. This was the main issue for the first six to ten months of his life. He could not walk, he could not talk. And that felt quite a shit situation to be in.

Then there was the matter of food. Well, since he couldn't speak, he couldn't ask for food when he was hungry and crying felt too much trouble. Adding to that, he was breastfed for about six months after his birth, which was a whole new level of awkward and embarrassing, at least for him. After that, his diet shifted to sheep milk and barley porridge.

Things definitely did get easier once his body was capable of bipedal locomotion. It didn't take him long to recall walking, given that he recalled doing a fair amount of it in his previous life.

But things got absolutely delightful after he had spoken his first word. It was 'chapel', referring to the chapel in the village center. That action had brought many to the conclusion that Asterion would grow up to be a godly man.

In actuality, he had said it because Tilde, the shrinekeeper there, conducted what passed as education in this world. Or at least in this village. Every afternoon, all the young children in the village would go to the chapel and Tilde would teach them reading, writing, and other stuff like that. Stuff that Asterion yearned to learn.

While the Gwyn family were not indentured serfs of the local Earl, they were still miserably poor. All they owned was forty sheep, a small stone cottage, and not much else of any significance. Asterion did not blame his parents for their lack of wealth. From what he had seen and what he understood, the society he was born in was akin to the middle ages of his previous world. People tended to remain in the social standing they were born in for life.

The level of technology, however, was not exactly at the stage he had expected it to be. Grenville was a coastal village, and thus it was filled with about half a dozen windmills to harness the strong gales accompanying the sea currents. The mills were mainly used for grinding grain and as a source of mechanical energy.

It seemed that gunpowder was also commonly used since Asterion had noticed that a couple of villagers owned matchlock rifles for hunting and staving off stray predators.

Printing presses also must have been invented at some point in this world. Asterion had come to this conclusion when he found the only two books present in his parents' cottage. One was a holy book, the Ardric gospel, which appeared to have been printed en masse commercially. The other was a brief record about the Royal lines of Estfal and later Ardwen.

Asterion wished to read both of those, and that was precisely why he was so eager to learn reading and writing. Well, that was easier said than done and in this case, it was literally so.

Rind, or Rindish for those who liked longer words, was the predominantly spoken language on the continents of Isthon and Medlun. Learning its spoken language had been a relatively simple task. The written form, however, was a whole different hill to climb. And a very unnecessarily tedious hill at that.

The alphabets appeared similar to those used in English and Latin, although stylized to the point of looking more like calligraphic cursive. There were nineteen alphabets used in Rind. These alphabets made hundreds of thousands of words, and a good amount of those were spelled and pronounced differently. Yes, the chief obstacle was that Rind was a non-phonetic language.

But it was an obstacle that could be overcome and Asterion did exactly that, though after a considerable amount of time.

By the age of two, he could walk, talk, read and even write as proficiently as his little body allowed. And in terms of education, he was making good progress as well. Tilde was the one with whom he spent most of his time when he was not with his parents, and she saw in him a scholar in making.

It was a pretty good existence, Asterion had come to realize. His parents loved him and were quite proud of his intellect. Most if not all of the village folk were fond of him, for he was a quiet little kid who was obedient and well-mannered. It was all one could desire.

Life was tough, but it was also good. And as is the way of the universe, all things come to pass, especially the good ones.