Homesteading in a fantasy world

We made it close enough to the fort that I could see it with my own eyes. At this point, Goose and I heard many bird calls coming from the forest below. The next moment, we saw many dog-sized birds taking flight and heading straight towards us.

Most were rank one, but there were definitely rank two birds as well. They looked kind of like ravens, but they seemed to have two pairs of wings instead of one.

They closed in fast, really fast. I had only gotten my sword out before they were almost at attacking distance. Then Goose acted. He used his wind manipulation to send wind slashes that quickly started to kill the flock chasing us.

I launched a few flying slashes as well, but the whole battle lasted for less than 20 seconds. The bird bodies, however, didn’t fall, and they were swept up by a wind current that Goose was controlling. He swept back towards the bodies and swallowed them whole.

A few did fall down to the forest, but Goose got most of them and seemed quite pleased about it. I patted him on his neck, "Good job." After that, we headed back towards the fort.

I hoped that there wasn’t a contract on those birds because I had a feeling that you couldn’t complete their quests retroactively. It seemed that I was also correct that fighting on Goose was quite awkward. At least I gained a level in my animal riding skill.

From far away, the fortress looked like a fortress; from close up, it seemed to transform into something else. It was truly intimidating, but it also didn't look pristine; there was quite a lot of battle damage.

Most prominent were three claw-like scars that must've been a few meters deep and about 10 meters in length about halfway up the wall. The wall itself seemed to be about 50 meters tall, and the towers it had didn’t extend much above that.

When we were even closer, I could see the thickness of the wall, and you could easily build houses on top of that wall; it was so thick.

There were a few people aiming large bows at us, but when I saw them, it seemed they were also able to see me, and they lowered their bows, most likely because they saw the ribbon attached to Goose's leg.

There was a large gatehouse, and only one. I could see people going in and out, but it was obvious the gates were only opened at certain times. Inside the fort, the area was not that large, but the buildings themselves seemed to be almost as tall as the walls themselves.

At this point, I did not know if 'fort' was a good description of this place because I could barely see any gaps between the buildings. It almost looked more like a bunker. The area inside the fort was even smaller than our current capital, but I could see why. Expanding the area inside would mean expanding the walls, and I didn’t even know if that was possible when you had already built this monstrosity.

A lot of people were on top of the wall and on top of the buildings inside. While I was contemplating whether I should land near the gate or on top of the fort, I saw flags being waved towards me. One of them was green, and the other was striped light blue and dark blue.

I wasn’t a master of flag communication, but in this world, green also meant good, and the striped flag had the same pattern as the ribbon tied to the goose. The area where the person was flagging the flags also seemed quite optimal for landing.

If this was some sort of trick to get me to pay a fine, I was going to be really mad. We dived at a relatively slow speed towards the indicated spot. No one shot at us, and no one looked mad. When I landed, several really strong-looking people approached us.

"State your business," one of them said. It seemed like a similar procedure to the city. "My name is Rich Dirt, leader of the United Freeholds Company. I have been assigned to this fort."

“Good enough, Near the gatehouse, there's a way down. Take that and then go to the command center. You should find what you are looking for in there," the same person who asked me the question spoke and then promptly went back to their post while continuing to search the sky for any danger. The way people acted actually started to make me nervous. Is everything truly this dangerous?

There was, however, one problem: what was I going to do with Goose? "Take him with you, there is plenty of space down below," the flag waiver told me, even without me having to ask. I thanked the man and walked along the wall toward the gatehouse.

People on the wall were constantly alert, looking out towards the land and sky beyond. Then I heard bowstring thumps. I looked towards the other side of the wall; there were many archers firing heavily ability-infused arrows.

It took my eyes a moment to see that they were shooting at large birds, but it seemed most of the arrows didn’t even penetrate the feathers, but it did seem to drive the birds off. Holy shit. While these defenders were ranked two, I was pretty sure that they were shooting arrows that were more dangerous than what I could produce right now.

I think I have been too lax in my thinking, even if I’ve been really careful. I think I need to consider this more like a war zone where we are surrounded by enemies.

When I reached the gatehouse, I was let in and needed to take wide stairs downwards towards the bottom of the gatehouse. When I reached there, I saw that the only way to enter was the two gates at the top of the wall and two gates at the bottom.

One led to the outside world while another led inside the fort. There were more people waiting, and when everyone got into fighting positions, I joined them, only to see the outside gate being opened. A voice that sounded throughout the gatehouse, "Opening the outside gate, 3 minutes before closing.

The incredibly thick and enchanted gate was opened. Everyone waited, but nothing happened. About seven people entered the gatehouse, while 11 left. When the gate was closing, I heard the voice once again, "Gate closed for three minutes before inside gate opening."

No one seemed to want to talk, and everyone was still quite anxious, but I could see when the gate that led inside the fort was opened how people sighed out in relief. Everyone walked out of the gatehouse, and when the gate closed, the voice announced once again, "Gate closed for 30 minutes."

It seemed that they were running a tight ship, but that also explained why I saw people entering and exiting in patches. There wasn't a time when all the gates to the gatehouse were opened.

Inside the fort, the buildings had many small windows that opened onto a small street. It was almost like walking in a maze, and behind many, I could see ranged weapons. The building walls closest to the gate also seemed to have claw marks and other kinds of damage. It seems that it wasn't that uncommon for creatures to get inside.

The street opened up a little bit and even more after the first bend. I still felt like we were walking between walls, and the current street we were on seemed to curve. I quickly figured out that we were walking the circumference of the fort.

On my map, I could see that when we finally reached almost back to the gatehouse, it finally opened up to a more normal-looking street layout, and here there were people, what looked to be different artisan stores, and even as we walked further in, a large market area.

There was one notable difference to the other markets in this world I had seen: there were no portal stations. I still believe that there must be some portal stations here, but perhaps they were only for emergencies.

In the information packet I got, it was quite clearly stated that portaling to the outer ring was extremely mana-costly, but it didn’t state it was impossible like in the middle and inner ring.