Otoko Nara Ikkokuichijou no Aruji o Mezasa Nakya, ne?

Isekai: Hah. Owned.

Year 7447, Month 4, Day 1

After having breakfast, Miduchi and I started on our way towards the headquarters of the company in the capital. After going over the paperwork and giving out any necessary instructions we'll check out the sausage factory as well. Since Basutoral came last night obviously it won't be in operation today. By that time it was already close to lunch but John or Terry one of the watch guards should be there.

""Ah, master, madam. Welcome.""

When we arrived at the factory John was disassembling and cleaning the meat mincer while Terry was cleaning up inside of the factory.

Umu.

The hygienic "feeling" is important since we deal in food products.

It's completely impossible to reach modern day Japanese standards of hygiene, a level that will never be reached, but just because other places are dirty doesn't mean we should follow suit.

It means that my efforts in harshly directing them paid off.

Since we had the occasion I had them make some tea and have a short break.

"Is everyone getting along well without fighting?"

Miduchi asked the two of them while handing them a bag of candy she bought along the way. We've already read the report from Cathy but there might be some places she doesn't notice. It's possible for fights and bullying to occur anywhere in the world of children. It even occurs between adults at times.

"There were two fights since the year started. Myusshi and Bagu, Maru and Rinbi. But, in both cases it wasn't over anything important."

Terry put a piece of candy in his mouth and smiled while saying.

If you can resolve it all on your own then fight as much as you please.

Incidentally, Myusshi and Bagu are both boys at the same age as John and Terry. This is fine.

However, Maru and Rinbi are the eldest boy and girl who reach adulthood this year.

Get along well with each other...

"Also, there wasn't any cases of bullying anyone. Cathy-san has always harshly spoken out against it since then and..umm, everyone is afraid of being scolded by master."

John said while sucking on some candy as well.

Come to think of it, I guess it was around the end of last year? Something like this happened.

I heard from Cathy that Byogu the smallest child was almost neglected for not moving fast enough. In anger after hearing that without even taking my armor off when it was close to night when we came out of the dungeon I hopped on my horse and rushed into the factory. Rushing my horse from Boil Manor in Baldukk to the factory I arrived in 30 minutes.

After arriving at the factory I told John and Terry who came out to greet me to gather all of the slaves. That day it was already in the a.m. after everyone returned to their inn but I had them all gather within 1 hour.

And then I hit John and Terry. It's only obvious for a small child to have slow movements. Take your time and patiently teach them. Furthermore, using that as a reason to neglect them is absurd. In the first place if you can't resolve it then why didn't you tell me about it? Ah, it doesn't matter either way whether or not you all were involved in neglecting them. After all for the time being future candidates for management positions.

For that sort of reason I yelled and hit them each once in front of everyone. Of course, I properly took off my gauntlet with brass knuckles embedded into it. Also, I held back quite a bit so healing spells weren't necessary. Obviously I paid no mind whether or not John and Terry had any complaints about it. Though I think they probably didn't have any.

I heard from Cathy that there's a number of children older than John and Terry and with the passage of time there was an age based hierarchy being formed. Well it's only natural so I have nothing to say about that. If the oldest one in the group is superior then that person would do just as expected from their age after all. If it was Japan then I think that would have been plenty.

However, the seniors John and Terry learned to read and write from the Basutoral couple and along with that were a bit more intelligent. They're both 13 years old this year. The level of their studies should be around the middle to late years of elementary. After all it seems they can do the addition and subtraction of fractions now. In comparison there's other child among the slaves who reach 15 years old and adulthood this year but supposedly they're at best around the lower to middle grades of elementary school.

It's because it's gotten difficult for Basutoral to take the time to directly teach them and the incomplete teaching that Cathy can do through hearsay. Even in regards to Cathy her calculation abilities and various knowledge are at best around the first year of middle school. In fact this level is already more than enough to consider it high level. Particularly if you think about how she was born at the slave ranking and you could even call it a miracle.

Even on Earth until just a few dozen years ago there were a lot of people that couldn't read or do calculations. Those sorts of people weren't educated with the foundations to make logical thoughts or come up with abstract ideas. Because of that they were said to not have enough imaginations in regards to things outside of their sphere of life. It's just my personal opinion but I even think that a low literacy rate may be an necessary requirement to maintain a system based on social status. I think this is just because the past Japan is abnormal and that isn't the case for the trends of the entire world.

Whatever the case, even if it's not all of them a reasonable number of the slaves who are working in my sausage factory right now have a chance of taking on decent jobs in my country in the future. That's why a certain level of education is necessary. For ruling class purposes.

That's the reason why I told John and Terry who were one stage higher from the start for obediently learning things to keep an eye on everyone. I gave them individual rooms for the night watch in the factory and even told all of the others to listen to what they say as seniors, showing the difference between them and the others. And then I've heard from Cathy's reports that no other child has appeared yet that can exceed John and Terry. That's why the only ones I can scold in front of everyone is just those two. Well, the only time I've scolded them was just that once.

Thanks to that John and Terry had the dishonor of being directly scolded by me but at the same time it had the result of putting more emphasis on the fact that they're "left in charge of things" by me after being by the number one adventurer in Baldukk. Just as planned.

Putting that aside, I ended up receiving complaints from the third knight group that act as guards of the capital for running my horse through the town in the middle of the night and had to stupidly pay a fine of 30 silver coins.