Chapter 23
Chapter 23
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 23
Chapter Title: Horses Captured, Walls Complete
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I received the urgent report(?) and went out to greet the scouting party.
Familiar beasts I'd seen somewhere before were moving around.
With incredibly dynamic movements.
They were horses.
Eagle's Eye and the scouts were covered in scratches all over their bodies.
The horses tied up behind them were quiet, likely due to their bindings, but they clearly weren't thrilled about being captured by humans.
They weren't large in build. They were the steppe horses from the BC era I'd seen in the game—small-framed ones from beyond Turkey or Kazakhstan.
Horses like these were known for their large hearts and highly developed muscles. Being lightweight with excellent endurance, they were perfect for long-distance travel.
Of course, they only seemed small to my eyes, accustomed to the massive breeds born from repeated selective breeding. If you armored one of those and charged, who could possibly stop it?
Another key trait of these horses was their extreme skittishness.
If they were any other type, a few warriors might have been kicked to death by their hind legs.
Eagle's Eye wiped the blood trickling from a cut near his eye and grinned.
"You remember the beast the chieftain drew on the stone tablet once? We found traces of it at the pass leading to the steppes and chased it for three days. It was a real ordeal to catch."
"How'd you do it?"
He gestured, calling over two slender rangers who stepped forward with nets and wooden stakes slung over their shoulders.
"We started by tracking its scent."
"Huh."
"We gauged its path from the short grass stumps where it had grazed—they only nibble the upper leaves. The hoofprints were deep and egg-shaped, and its droppings were scattered pellets. We followed the mingled scent on the wind until we found a shallow ravine near a water hole. We drove stakes into the ground and hung the nets between willow trees on both sides. Then we herded them in. The tactics you taught us worked perfectly."
After capture, they looped ropes through their noses and blindfolded them, he explained.
Skittish animals like these often collapsed just from being blindfolded, and that's exactly what happened.
On the way back, they put up some resistance, but nothing too bad.
"Outstanding!"
I was genuinely impressed.
Deep down, I'd figured we'd start by catching wolf pups to domesticate dogs first, but horses? Not bad at all.
No—thinking about what we could do with domesticated horses, this was basically an invincible cheat code for explosive expansion across eras.
I clapped them on the shoulders.
"You did incredibly well! Eat your fill tonight and get some solid rest!"
The horses were still tense, snorting through flared nostrils.
I approached slowly and extended the back of my hand.
A moment later, I stroked the fur on its forehead at an angle.
Now it seemed a bit more at ease.
Black Stone stared at the horse in astonishment.
"Can you tame it?"
"I think so."
My heart was really starting to race now.
Horses in this era? Riding across the steppes on horseback would rival a modern supercar.
Or, by modern standards, it would be like cruising around in an autonomous flying car.
What changes would horse domestication bring to our lives?
Agriculture and transport revolutionized by beast power.
Militarily, we'd develop cavalry with breakthrough power, and faster travel to distant lands would lay the foundation for an early kingdom.
Of course, we'd need bronze alloys to get there.
With my knowledge, it didn't feel impossible at all.
This was the era of grasping and solidifying the seeds of civilization.
We were already applying all sorts of overtechnology to the primitive age, so in another 500 years, who knew what it'd become?
Horses were originally domesticated after the early Bronze Age, so I had no idea how many years ahead we'd jumped.
I immediately summoned my advisors.
The ones who'd been working were stunned when they saw the horses.
"Is this the beast the chieftain mentioned!?"
"That's right."
"Riding it lets you cover several times the distance a man could walk, and just as fast?"
Red Rock was practically buzzing with excitement.
This hot-blooded warrior had always talked about how quickly the tribe could advance with fast transport.
Many tribesfolk had agreed.
Ever since I'd described this fast-moving animal called a horse, the mood had been building.
Now that we'd actually captured some, it was nothing short of inspiring.
I shared what knowledge I had.
"Horses live mainly in areas rich with forage. Usually, a mare leads the herd. They're fundamentally skittish. With nose ropes and some basic training, I think we can tame them fully."
I sketched simple diagrams on a stone tablet.
Reins, clove hitch, noseband, saddle.
The gear needed to domesticate and utilize horses had developed slowly due to lack of conceptual breakthroughs, but with prior knowledge, this era's tech could produce it easily enough.
Of course, bronze would enable true armed cavalry and accelerate vehicles like chariots.
I also explained the horse's anatomy.
"The spine runs like this. You mount right here. Riding bareback for long periods damages their vertebrae."
I drew a saddle too.
Saddles and stirrups were what turned early riders into munchkin cavalry.
Bronze again, as always.
"Just making saddles and learning reins will transform patrolling and pursuit on flat ground. Don't think about combat right away. But hunting? That should work. We'd be free from wolf chases and could easily haul game from afar."
"What an amazing beast!"
Anyone with a bit of brains could see the horse's advantages—even the advisors, of course.
From that day, the scouts desperately ventured into the steppes to capture more horses, and I explained training methods to the best of my knowledge.
Of course.
I figured it'd take quite some time before we could truly domesticate them and use them freely.
Winter was approaching.
Breath hung longer in the air, and the ground grew harder by the day.
Around then, the walls were completed.
Five meters high.
Encircling the entire village with gates installed to boot—what kind of absurd structure was this for an age of pit huts?
The tribesfolk who'd slaved away daily on the grind were moved to tears.
"Great Whirlwind!"
"No! Spirit Whirlwind!"
"......"
These red-haired zealots were making major contributions to our religious development.
They'd deified me and erected a stone pillar by the communal fire to make something shrine-like.
On rest days, they'd smear white ash on their foreheads, paint leopard patterns, and hold rituals.
Red Mane was fully playing the priest.
Already, many tribesfolk were swayed(?), and some joined the ceremonies on rest days just to kill boredom.
Ancient times were like that, and in the primitive era especially, with no concept of leisure, rituals were quite the spectacle.
Unfortunately, refining the laws was ongoing.
Establishing a tax system via surplus production wasn't easy.
Same with the various statutes.
I'd put real thought into them, but many didn't quite fit this era.
Caught scamming?
It'd be seen as deception and end in a mob beating.
In a world like this, it might take years for laws to be proclaimed and enforced.
This was homework to tackle step by step.
I climbed the walls and looked down at the village.
It had grown to a size where "village" felt inadequate.
In other words, it had real urban vibes.
Brick walls curved gently into an oval, with rectangular bastions protruding at the corners.
Atop the bastions, narrow loophole windows (for arrows and sling stones) were evenly spaced.
Before the gates, layered woven-wood frames and movable barricades, with stones embedded in the inner moat slope to make footing slippery.
From walls to the city's interior.
All fruits of our mad labor investment.
This would tempt any greedy soul.
Satisfied with urban planning at this point?
With horses steadily incoming and cavalry on the horizon?
We needed an outer wall.
Designate the current one as the inner citadel and build an outer.
The inner could comfortably hold 1-2 thousand people; the outer needed space for at least 10 thousand.
I called Black Stone, Quick Hand, and Wise Flower to explain the plan.
"You want to expand the tribe tenfold?"
"Exactly."
"Got it."
The advisors didn't question it.
When I first arrived in this world, the tribe numbered 30.
Now over a thousand—a 30x-plus growth.
Another mere(?) tenfold seemed doable.
With our tech and gear levels, nothing seemed impossible.
We wandered the area, driving stakes into the outer fields at the four cardinal points.
"Outer walls in a larger oval, two-and-a-half times the inner's distance. Connect south to the riverbank, use the gentle ridge north as a natural barrier. Outer moat shallower and wider than inner. Mound the earth inward for ramparts."
The master plan was set.
Of course, such a grand project couldn't start immediately.
This was winter prep season.
Stockpile food, fell and dry wood for firewood, maximize fields for spring sowing.
Outer expansion would begin next year.
But.
In this era, population boom events had a way of arriving unannounced.