While the meal itself was mediocre, the mood was quite good as the goblins celebrated eating and cooking in a new place. Now they won't need to cook in the rain or under the harsh sun. The next few days are going to be filled with making storage containers in the basement, and getting trees ready to make palisades, but tonight, I can at least enjoy the food and relax.
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It took seven days to get the basement finished with basic shelves and containers for the goblins to store things in. I also have felled the rest of the trees I was working on, and have a total of six ready to make palisades. Which means there are still sixteen that need to be worked on. I've also built up such a surplus of straight sticks, that I've started to separate some to make spikes with. If we're building palisades anyway, may as well put some sharp spikes pointed outwards from them to really discourage any of the lizards from trying anything.
With my first major project completed, I have another project I want to work on now, since I fear winter might cause the goblins some trouble. If the winter down here is anywhere near as harsh as on the mountain, then I wouldn't be surprised if many goblins starve at that time. As such, I feel as though a smokehouse will be useful. It probably won't be as effective as I'd like, given they don't have salt right now, but it should be able to keep meats for a period of time at least.
Since the smokehouse won't have a basement, I'll be using stone from the pavilion basement to build with, which means I'll probably be digging a sub-basement at some point for it. I think to do work in a sub-basement, I'll actually need a torch of some kind as well, since it's already pretty dark in the main basement. Either way, the smokehouse shouldn't need to be that big, just big enough to hang a bunch of meat to smoke with the surplus of wood that we'll soon have.
Before I start on any of that though, I have one small project to complete before I show the goblins how to make palisades. That small project should be done pretty quickly though, after all it's only a ladder. I've been able to use the top part of some of the tree trunks to make two 10 foot poles, and I'll just hand drill some joints and use stone shaping to fasten the cross bars in. I should have it done later today, and then I can show the goblins how to make palisades.
Now palisades aren't meant to last forever. The wood will eventually rot and need replaced, but as a form of defense until these goblins become more skilled I think it'll do just fine. So hopefully in a few years, they'll be well on their way to surviving on their own. What I'll need to show the goblins are the steps to assembling a palisade.
We'll need to mark where the palisade is going, and dig a trench three feet down to the bedrock layer. If I was doing this for myself, I'd stone shape around the bedrock to implant the wood into the stone, but since the goblins will be doing this themselves, they won't be doing that. Once they have a trench, we'll tie a few of the sharpened logs together with rope, and hoist them upright in the trench, then fill the dirt in around them. We'll then hoist more sections up a few logs at a time, and tie the sections together, which is why they'll need the ladder. With the ladder they can properly tie together both the top and bottom for stability. I'll ultimately leave it up to the goblins where they want the palisades built when they know how. The final step will be driving pointed stakes on the outside, pointed outwards, into the ground, but honestly, it's not even worth really thinking about that step that much, since it should be fairly straightforward.
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Zaka and a handful of goblins picked up the palisade construction process pretty well, and got the first 20 pieces up in only 3 days. They've helped me process the trees I cut so far, and have driven stakes into the ground to mark where they want the palisades built. Honestly, I didn't expect them to want as much as they did, but they marked off a lot of the clearing, including both sides of the river. Maybe all my construction work has them dreaming big. I hope they don't expect me to build everything though.
Either way, with the measurements laid out, I got a rough estimate of the number of trees we needed to cut down, and it's quite high. I'll have to explain to the goblins the need for proper forest management at some point. I really don't want them just going wild cutting everything down. They'll literally need thousands of trees to make a palisade the size they want. A bit over 7,000. There are only about 10 or 15 trees per acre here of the size that will be useful, and only about half of them are actually straight enough to be useful.
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Conservatively, they'll need to harvest almost two square miles of trees of this size to make what they need. It's not enough to depopulate the forest, since they're only going to take some of the trees from the area, but I think they'll find the forest notably more empty than before in the nearby area. Well, at the very least it should be a good teaching moment for them.
I'm also already starting a pile of wood scraps for fuel as a consequence of the trees we've already cut. Honestly, for an operation this size, I'm glad that they want as much extra space as they do. They'll have their wood needs taken care of for a very long time if they properly store it.
I've already made a bunch more stone axes for the goblins, and I'll guide them tomorrow to show them how they need to cut trees down so they can start the process themselves.
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Only around a quarter of the goblins seemed interested in the tree cutting project when I gave them the initial pitch. With those goblins and Zeb acting as my translator, we went around to a few trees and I showed them what to look for in size and shape, then explained how you can only get one chop in a day. What I wasn't expecting was how much less they could chop into the trees than me. It'll take most of them almost twice as long to cut a tree down as I did. That is, except for a single goblin. The one that prestiged before and seemed much more physically strong. I ended up making it a much sturdier axe than my own axe.
That goblin goes by Kaga, and he can honestly get through those trees in less time than me. I'm reminded sometimes that I shouldn't expect everything here to be the same as each other. I'd hate to be on the receiving end of an angry goblin with strength like that. When the other goblins saw how much more Kaga was able to chop, most of them decided that Kaga should do all the chopping, and that they'd just help with the processing of the trees.
That in itself would be fine, but I'm a little worried about a power imbalance happening if Kaga were to suddenly prestige or evolve a bunch. They seem nice enough, but you know what they say about power. So I insist instead that at the very least, when the trees are close to falling, they split the cutting at that point. When I explain the reason, Kaga seems a little upset that they're not getting this apparent windfall, but acquiesces when the other goblins volunteer to trade him daily meals for this. It really is looking like I've started a barter economy among the goblins here. I guess I should just be glad that Kaga is either kind, or bad at long term planning to trade free levels for food.
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I was initially a little worried that the goblins that were working on the tree cutting might be the same goblins who were making rope and giving me meals, but I was glad to see that it wasn't the case. Save for some outliers, I can't tell many of the goblins from each other. Once they've prestiged they usually look a little different from each other, but unless they have a scar, they all look almost identical to me. So I'm glad that it seems like more of the goblins are working on projects of their own now than I initially thought.
In the past three days, the goblins have really been quite productive. There is now a decent amount of rope stored in the pavilion basement, and I've made decent progress on the smokehouse. Honestly, thanks to the goblin's more productive hunting with spears and tactics, they all don't even need to hunt each day, and I've noticed a handful of the goblins have been doing their own trades among each other for food. It seems some of the goblins enjoy hunting more than others, so they trade others for goods of their own. A whole tiny economy seems to have formed without me noticing.
As for myself at this point, after cutting the remaining trees, and the extra days, I've gained some levels of my own. I've decided that I'll be taking a few of the trees in a few days when Kaga's first batch is done, just to distribute the levels more. He's cutting a hundred at a time (give or take since he can't count all that well), which means of the goblins cutting trees, each one will get about 15 trees. I'll probably need the goblins to also distribute tree cutting to those with the least prestiges when the time comes, so that a power disparity doesn't occur.
Level: 65
HP: 1511/1511
MP: 567/567
Traits: Mana Affinity, Earth Manipulation
Magic: Stone Shaping, Tectonic Sense, Earth Spike