That evening, he and his friends sat around at the Hammer and Feather. Birbella had returned. The restaurant owner's daughter, called Birb for short, had been away lately to train with the Baron's people. Now the dark-feathered girl with orange markings was back, sounding glad to be away from the loud and raucous bunch of strangers over there.

When they'd run out of gossip, Kotta got Vonn to finally tell a story about Dragons. Vonn had to warn him that the Dragon was the bad guy. "Once, there was a town of peaceful people called Hobbits..."

He tried to translate and sing the Dwarven song, what little of it he could recall. "Far over the Misty Mountains cold, to dungeons deep and caverns old..." and so on.

Kotta seemed entranced, and groaned when Vonn yawned and left off at the part with the magic ring. "So the Dwarves were being punished for their greed and wickedness."

"I guess that's one interpretation."

"I need to think about this. And to wring the rest of the story from you."

"Another night!"

Vonn went back to the little apartment he'd helped build for himself in the Rising World building. He checked on Polestar, who'd been reading a history book borrowed from the local Monks. Polestar was still living in the hangar, where he had a crude sleeping mat of wood and cloth. The hangar itself had canvas for a door. "You doing all right?" asked Vonn.

The Centaur had a dangling gem he was using for a reading light. "Decent. Been trying to learn a little of everything. This life I jumped into... the old me was interested in dungeon plants, right? They don't usually have plants at all. But the one where I first showed up was a kind of fake ruin with sunbeams coming through and ferns growing in it. Still not sure if the dungeons are making the plants or if they just show up naturally. I've been hearing about life energy this, necromancy that."

"We're still figuring out how it all works. Our perspective is different, so maybe we can find answers nobody here has thought of."

"I guess. I'm not much interested in the magic theory though, when there's basic stuff we can do to help people out. Can I use your workshop tomorrow?"

"Sure! What do you have in mind?"

"I want to try some woodworking. Not sure it'll pay off yet."

"We got chosen for this. Whatever you want to do, you'll probably accomplish something good."

Polestar didn't look convinced, but shrugged. "I signed up for that challenge where I help somebody with something every day. So I may as well try."

#

Smith Urika grumbled at having another Centaur taking up space in the workshop, but there really was enough room for everyone. Those two, Vonn, Tazo, Birb, and Ashfall were hard at work.

The main project was the milling machine. Easier said than done, but they'd made a crude prototype and had the right kind of cutting bit. Part of the work had been done over the last few days. Vonn used his abilities to make the rotation of the main whirling tool nearly frictionless. Urika made some crucial, tricky rods and gearing. Ashfall hammered out the main iron brackets that would hold the thing steady, and Polestar took a break from some kind of box he was working on to help make a bench.

Their machine came together that afternoon. The cutter spun and held steady, all right, but power was going to be a problem.

"Another windvane?" Tazo suggested. At the previous forge building, Vonn and Urika had rigged up a simple device that could lift and drop a smithing hammer when the breeze was blowing.

Vonn said, "I think it'd need to be big, to be useful for this. The town mill is using a waterwheel. Maybe it's time to install our own."

They looked to the drive shaft they'd built into the wall for that purpose. Tazo explained to Polestar, "We've been meaning to build one but a big wooden wheel is a lot of work."

Polestar said, "Ideally you'd use metal. Did you work out a design already?"

"Yeah, but Vonn's trying to do the, um, 'overshot' type and that means making a kind of ramp so that water can reach us from a greater height." The mill used an undershot design where the river just went beneath it, which was less efficient.

"Guess that's something I could help with. If you don't mind someone who hasn't had the System declaring 'This is a good woodworker!'"

The table he'd just built showed up as [Fair quality], and he obviously knew what he was doing. Vonn nodded and said, "It'd be very useful. For the moment, we should try the pedal-powered system."

They'd built bicycles and belt-driven machinery, so the assembly of that section wasn't that hard. They ended up with something like an old sewing machine, and similar to the lathe they already had. Pumping a foot treadle would keep the cutter spinning with enough speed and force to be useful, or so he'd calculated. But an external power source would help.

He worked the pedal a bit, then stepped back and frowned. [Milling machine, fair quality], said the System's judgment. "Now that I see it, the range of motion is limited. Can't cut just anything from any axis."

Polestar said, "It's probably the most advanced tech of its kind."

"But I can imagine better."

Tazo patted the machine. "There, there. Don't listen to the mean fox."

They clamped its table to the floor and began using it right away. Metal shavings flew from an iron block, slowly carving part of an air valve. "Yeah, okay," Vonn admitted, looking at the [Fair quality] result. "Not as good as I can make directly, but faster."

"And it's not fully calibrated yet."

They gave Birb a turn making exactly the same part. Hers was a bit better. They kept adjusting things to stop a slight wobble and finally got a [Good quality] result from Tazo.

Urika said, "We'll reforge the first two. We must not waste iron while the mines are down."

It would be nice to ignore the wounded land next door, to focus on machines and magic. There was even good reason to do that, since it'd help get more useful production and income. But reluctantly, he admitted it wasn't safe to stay home and work. They needed to go fight.