I spent some time looking around the workshop. It was pretty basic but had everything you would need to work with both wood and metal. There was even a small smithy inside of the workshop. There was no foundry but there was a furnace and a makeshift anvil. Basically a thick slab of iron or steel nailed down on a big block of wood. It makes sense that if you live way out in the middle of nowhere you will need to be able to do your own small repairs.

If I didn’t get back to my original purpose on coming here I was going to get way too distracted and not accomplish my original goal. On one of the walls hung a shovel. Next to it was a spade. I decided to take both. Unlike the axe, the tools on the workshop had been wrapped with oiled leather. Knowledge from The Pillars of Reality lets me know that doing so will prevent corrosion for long periods of time. Thank you Jack Campbell for doing all the research, I promise to use the knowledge well. I left the workshop and locked it back up on my way out.

When I got back to the piles of wood I decided to convert the pile furthest away from the house. There was 8 such piles left and I wanted to minimize the risk of burning the house down while using the least amount of effort. Something tickle in the back of my head about giving a task to the laziest person and they will find a way to make it easier to accomplish but I just couldn’t remember from where. With the shovel I loosened the soil around the pile all around about 2 feet deep and 5 feet around the wooden mountain. I then made my way back to the workshop and acquired 2 wooden buckets that look to hold around 5 gallons. Making the trip back and forth from the lake took 2 hours but it was worth it. I now had a muddy ring around the pile of wood and was ready to build my makeshift kiln. With the spade, I started to cover the wooden pile with mud until there was only a small opening at the top and 4 on each of the sides of the base.

Now for the real test. I picked up a wad of dried grass and concentrated, I know that it takes heat fuel and oxygen to create a fire and so focusing on my thoughts of fire and heat I stared at my fire bundle. The grass was the fuel and oxygen was all around us and so I had to supply the heat to make this work. After several minutes the bundle started to smoke and then it burst into flames. I was so excited that I dropped the bundle to the ground and had to stomp the fire out less I risk causing a grass fire. I didn’t even think about how I was still going around shoeless but I didn’t get burn from the event. Still, I was ecstatic. I had done Magic, MAGIC. Not magic with the little m such as card tricks but real Magic. Yeah sure I had done a few things already but this was the first time I willed something to happen and it did. My inner Chuunibyou wanted me to strike a pose and say something corny like “I feel the darkness flowing through me” but just the thought was too embarrassing that I held back.

Fate, Lady Luck, Mother Nature, Thank you. I love this world. Sorry for all of the bitching I was doing. I’ll built a temple for you or something as an apology. Just then the sound of rolling thunder could be heard in the distance, I looked up but there were no clouds. Aww shit, there really were goddesses in this world. Fuck, now I really do have to build a temple. The sound of rolling thunder came again, this time softer as to confirm that “yes, you better built that temple or shits going to hit the fan.” As I accepted my new situation, I grabbed another wad of grass and finally set the kiln ablaze. I let it burn for 2 hours before I covered up all of the openings. I’ve never made charcoal before but I had the basics from Google-sama and YouTube-sensei. My task completed I made my way back to the house and left the wood to its paralysis overnight.