I first had to make it livable.
So the next week I cleared the corpses and the debris. I let those before the entrance to mask my presence here. I didn't want some hunters and other people to find this place all clean when someone massacred everyone here. It was obvious that they wanted to keep this place buried.
But I soon found myself wanting some things.
First ? Food and waters. Waters could easily be taken care of, as I found a well inside a courtyard adjacent to the flank of the mountain. It seemed that a room was carved into the flank and a well was dug deeply inside, touching a stream beneath giving us plenty of fresh water.
For food, it was more complicated. I couldn't find anything, well I found some mountain goats but I loved the furry animals so I didn't really want to kill them and eat them. There were barely any trees and plants. Fortunately, I found some seeds. I also found space where I suppose, there was formerly a garden. Yeah, but right now, it didn't resemble anything. No the veggies and wildherbs had completely taken over.
So I went to work, and in two days, using a rusted sword I cleared the garden.
Two days later I tilled the soil and planted seeds. I had to be very smart about it and quick. My supplies where dwindling extremely fast and the seasons in the mountains where very shorts.
With that done I just had to wait and take care of my plants. The following days I made a fence to stop goats and foxes and other small animals from eating what would be my sustenance and tried to salvage any robes the monks still had around.
That strange fiber making up their clothes, was a mix between wools, that much I could recognise and plant fibers. There was something else too, but I couldn't be sure.
Anyway, I found several sets of clothes that could accomodate me, and lets just say that they were incredible to wear.
Warm and light, they didn't obstruct my mouvement and didn't stick to my skin as I worked and sweated. Making the clothes breath.
Really fine clothes.
As I waited for my veggies to grow, I started hunting rats from the temple. For several reasons.
First, they were numerous. And if I wanted to settle here, I wouldn't do it with rats and mouses next door.
Two, I was hungry and I needed all the food I could get. (Without killing goat)
So I started playing cat with them. Makes for good training for I grew faster and more agiles.
Anyway, for a month I lived of rats, mouses, seeds and roots I found in and around the temple. And I waited and waited for my veggies to grow. And when it finally was there, I had paltry results. Around 4 clean bountiful bush beans, some 3 brandywine tomatoo, 7 Red Cored Chantenay Carrots and that was it. I wouldn't survive with that alone.
So I grew smarter and more efficient.
Here the more important word was efficiency. I remembered some semi-science I had seen in my previous life, some image and explications I had searched on internet. For exemple how it would be better to have, in a mountain environment diagonal parterre of veggies. The soil would absorbs more nutrients I think. It made me think of the terace of the Inca I think ? Of the terrace of rice from japan ? Well it wasn't diagonal but it was an idee. I would probably mix the two. Make a diagonal terrace ? Or raised beds that I could reach easier with a passage inbetween for better accesibility?
We shall see.
Next, I would raise goats and chicken. I had found a pair of chicken and 2 goats and a doe as I explored further around the coumpound. I realized that the temple wasn't just the main building but sprowled all around the mountain.
Anyway, I would raise goats for their wools and milk, and the chicken for their eggs, plumes and meat. What I wouldn't eat would be used to fertilize the soil as I knew the mountain soil wasn't always the best for growing foods.
So that is what I did. The following year, I raised my goats and chicken that gave me around 100 eggs and four young bucks and 2 does. Honestly I'm blessed.
I really worked hard. I first made a small paddock where the chicken would stays and lay their eggs. Then I used the surplus of veggies and wild herbs I found to feed the chicken, leading to happy little hens and chicken. They quickly reproduced and I found myself with too much eggs. I couldn't let them be laid. I needed the eggs for myself and if I let them I would have too big a population of hens and chicken. I wouldn't be able to feed them correctly which would results in useless deaths.
So I limited the laying of eggs to 10 new and the others I ate.
I also used Bamboo found around 3 hours from the temple in a bamboo forest that I painstakingly took back. I used them to create a makeshift system of aqueducs to help my gardens prosper.
Yes I didn't forget my garden. I rearranged it, to be more structured. with less space between plants, there were less wildherbs that grew. Something that proliferated before.
I lifted up the beds to make them diagonal and receive and absorb the sunlight better. My system of aqueducs plus the death of two of my chickens, chickens that I used to fertilize my soils, resulted in a growth of my veggies profit.
Yes I had to uses some to feed the chicken, but honestly, that wasn't as much as I thought.
And the goats, I took regularly around the mountain as a good shepherd would. And for these regular walks, they rewarded me with milk and wools. How kind of them.
So yeah, Eleven years old and already selfsufficient, who's the best ? Yes I'm !