The Madness of Yilheim

The build began with silence. Not from a lack of noise, but from awe.

The foundation was already complete, but when Valerius arrived with the builders, it wasn't the foundation they stared at — it was the massive pile of logs he had stripped, shaped, and polished.

Broman walked up, ran a hand across one of the timber planks, and let out a slow whistle.

"This… this isn't normal wood."

Valerius, gripping a chisel in one hand and a notepad in the other, nodded. "It's treated."

"Treated?"

Val pointed to a fire pit in the corner. "I boiled tree bark with a mixture of ash, water, and sap. Then I soaked the wood in it overnight. Makes it resistant to rot, and smooths the grain."

The builders passed the planks between each other, murmuring.

"Feel that polish," one said.

"Looks like marble," said another.

"I call it varnishing," Valerius said, matter-of-fact. "You heat tree resin and brush it on thin. Seals it. Makes it water resistant. Then you sand it again. Reapply. Repeat."

The builders stared at him.

Grace crossed her arms, smirking. "Told you he's not normal."

---

Valerius stood in front of the skeletal beams rising from the foundation and pointed.

"We'll use reinforced beam layering. Not just one log per support, but a dual-cross brace inside each wall."

He grabbed two long wooden beams, joined them with a triangle of angled wood, and hammered pegs through the joints.

"See this shape? Triangle's stronger than a square. It holds weight better. I want the second floor to rest on these."

Broman scratched his head. "That'll hold?"

Val nodded. "Where I come from, entire towers use this method. It'll hold."

He made them drill holes using a bow drill he'd modified from a hunting tool, then carved pegs to connect beams with no metal.

"No nails?" one asked.

"Too few in the village. Pegs are better here. Stronger. Reusable."

---

When the roof began to take shape, Valerius surprised them again.

He laid out flat planks across the beams of the main hall, then began to carve them with swirling patterns — vines, feathers, stars, geometric shapes.

One builder stared, jaw loose. "This is art."

"It's called a coffered ceiling," Valerius said. "It's for beauty and structure. The grooves reduce warping in the wood, and the design makes the roof feel higher."

They stared upward as he carved.

Grace passed him a damp cloth and water. "Why go through all this?"

He looked down from the ladder. "Because you'll live here. And I want you to feel proud. Like your house isn't just shelter — it's something built to last. Also it me repaying you for saving my life."

"I didn't save you." Grace whispered.

---

Doors and the Doorknob

They built a massive front door from thick hardwood. But when the builders went to attach a simple latch, Valerius stopped them.

"No. I'm making this." He pulled out a strange piece of metal he'd forged from melted utensils and gears.

It was round. With a stem. And a pin.

"This… is a doorknob."

The builders gathered.

"You twist it," Val explained, turning it with a click. "It rotates an internal pin connected to a bolt. When you let go, it locks unless you turn it again."

"How does it lock?" Broman asked.

Valerius held up a small metal rod with teeth. "This is a key. Every knob has its own pattern. This key fits only this one."

They watched as he inserted it, twisted, and unlocked the bolt.

One builder whispered, "He's a mage."

Val grinned. "Nah. Just smart."

---

Inside the house, Valerius designed built-in shelves, pull-out compartments, and sliding doors using wooden tracks and greased stone rollers. The kitchen included counter space made from fired clay slabs and drawers beneath.

"Use every inch," he told the builders. "Space is a luxury."

---

Grace followed him room to room as he worked.

"You thought of all this… from memory?"

"Yeah," he replied, brushing dust from his sketchbook. "My mum made me learn all sorts of things. This is just one of them."

She looked around the structure — smooth wood walls, a tall ceiling, windows with symmetrical frames, and space enough for five large rooms.

"It's like… you brought another world here."

Val didn't answer right away. Then he said, "Maybe I did."

---

The morning mist clung to the fields of Kintol as the first hammer fell.

From the smoothed foundation of dirt and stone, the skeleton of a new house began to rise—planks lifted, beams set, ropes pulled taut. But what the villagers couldn't have known, what even the seasoned builders couldn't have imagined, was that this wasn't just any house.

It was the future.

Valerius stood barefoot in the dirt, shirtless and smeared with clay, his mind a storm of ideas. Every wall, every pipe, every bulb had already been built—inside his head.

"First the toilet," he muttered.

Grace, who sat beside a bucket of drying clay, blinked. "Toilet? You're building the toilet first?"

Val didn't look up. "It's the most important part of civilisation."

He dug his hands into the wet clay mixture—sieved, pressed, and filtered from the nearby riverbed—and began shaping a wide bowl with a hollow base.

"This is what we used back home. It's called a flush toilet. But the water has to be up here." He pointed to a small ledge they'd carved into the back wall. "So when you pull the lever, gravity pushes water down and clears everything out."

Grace squinted. "And where does it go?"

Val grinned, setting the half-finished toilet aside. "Now you're asking the right questions."

Using hollowed-out bamboo and resin he'd boiled from tree sap, Val created a primitive piping system that sloped downhill, connecting to a stone-lined channel beneath the back of the house. This fed into a deep, gravel-lined septic pit dug far beyond the foundation.

"It filters out naturally," he explained, wiping sweat from his brow. "Layer of gravel, layer of sand, another layer of charcoal. No smell. No sickness. Just flow."

Grace watched him, awestruck. "It's like magic… but not."

"It's just science," he said, with a tired smile. "Where I'm from, everyone has one of these. It's normal."

---

Next came the paint.

"I need lime," he said.

"You mean the fruit?"

"No. Lime as in calcium oxide."

He took broken limestone from the village well's edge, piled it in a fire pit, and stoked it with dry branches and bellows until it glowed white-hot. The rocks crumbled into fine powder—quicklime. He mixed it with water, turning it into slaked lime paste.

"It's called whitewash," he told Grace. "Kills germs. Brightens walls. Cheap, easy, clean."

They brushed it onto the walls of the lower floor, and soon the house took on the look of a tiny palace.

---

The wiring came next.

Val tore strips of copper from broken village tools and cookware. From old horseshoes and rusted nails, he melted iron cores, hammering them into loops and pins. Everything had to be insulated—so he soaked cloth in hardened tree sap to make a crude rubber substitute, wrapping it around the wires with agonising patience.

Grace brought him water. "You haven't eaten."

"Can't stop yet," he said, balancing on a makeshift ladder as he stuffed wire into the hollowed wood beams.

"Will this really… glow?"

"If I get the generator working."

---

That was the hardest part.

The generator had to spin. So he carved a waterwheel and placed it at the mouth of a nearby stream, redirecting its flow with stones and sandbags. With axles of wood and iron, the wheel spun a rod inside a carved stone box lined with copper wire and iron magnets—primitive but functional.

He connected the wiring from the house to the wheel's coil.

The first time he tried, it sputtered and sparked. Nothing lit.

"Damn it!" he hissed, kicking the wooden frame.

Grace flinched. "Maybe it's broken?"

Val sat down, staring at his hands. "No… I just need more power."

They added another wheel. Larger. Angled better. He tightened every gear and tried again.

This time, one bulb flickered—dimly, like a star gasping for life.

And then… light.

The inside of the house lit up with a warm golden glow.

From the village path, people gasped. Children pointed. "It's glowing! The house is glowing!"

Even Broman, arms crossed beside the scaffolding, muttered, "By the old gods…"

---

Val didn't stop.

He made glass by melting fine sand mixed with ash in a deep stone furnace he and Grace built from scratch. The first few batches cracked, but he refined the process—cooling it slower, shaping it gently over wooden molds.

They cut the glass into windows. Into bulbs. Into a wide plate for a sunroof.

"Light," he said, breathless, as the second story went up. "Everywhere."

---

The house grew tall—two stories of sleek white walls and sharp angles. The living room had stone floors; the bedrooms had wooden ones. The kitchen had shelves built from bark-laminated planks. He even made a ventilation chimney from carved stone.

Grace watched every step.

"How do you know all this?" she asked one night.

He was kneeling by a wire junction box. "Where I'm from… it's taught. It's normal."

"But this… this isn't normal," she whispered.

They locked eyes. For a moment, the house was quiet.

"Maybe I'm not normal either," he said softly.

---

The pool was her idea.

"Let's build one," she said one morning.

"We don't have the tools."

She looked at him with that challenge in her eyes. "But we have you."

So they dug a pit. Lined it with smooth clay and stone. Laid copper pipes from the stream to flow water in—and out. Val even built a one-way pressure valve so the water wouldn't back up.

By dusk, the pool shimmered under the rising moon.

---

By noon, half the village had wandered by.

They whispered among themselves, staring at the smooth wood, the square windows, the carved archways.

One man said, "Is this for nobles?"

Another: "No noble ever built anything like this."

When the final roof tile was nailed, the villagers gathered around the house.

They stared at the glowing bulbs, the glass windows, the paint, the symmetry. The strange "toilet room" that used water instead of holes. The socket in the wall that hummed when Val touched it.

Broman said aloud, "This ain't a house. This is a miracle."

Grace stood at the front door, beaming.

Valerius emerged from inside, tired, covered in dust, and holding a glowing lightbulb in his hand.

He looked at her, and for once, she looked back… not like he was strange or dangerous.

But like he was brilliant.

The sun had set.

The house was finished.

Tall, modern, majestic—two stories of clean lines, smooth wood, polished stone, glass windows, carved ceilings, a door that clicked shut with a turning knob, and a working flush toilet. Pipes ran under the ground. Wires stretched through the walls. Light bulbs glowed faintly in the night.

Valerius stood outside, arms folded, staring at what he and the builders had just accomplished. Villagers still stood around the yard, mouths open.

He closed his eyes.

The blue chat panel opened.

Valerius:

> It's done.

A second later, the panel blinked into view in Heful. Eryndor was reading in the manor library. Ziraiah was lounging upside-down on a couch.

Ziraiah:

> What's done?

Valerius:

> The house. The new one. Two floors. Full wiring. I even made a generator.

Eryndor:

> A generator?

Ziraiah:

> What kind of medieval story are you in again?

Valerius:

> Mine, apparently. It's got electric lights. Running water. Flush toilets. Ceiling fans. A key-lock system. Oh—and a pool.

Ziraiah:

> You're joking.

Valerius:

> I made paint from crushed minerals. Designed the water pressure system from scratch. Built glass in a sand kiln just to make bulbs. They call me "The Sky Craftsman" now.

Eryndor:

> Most... impressive.

Ziraiah:

> Did you install an air fryer too?

Valerius:

> Not yet. Working on that next week.

Ziraiah:

> So let me get this straight—you landed in a medieval world, got shot in the head, survived, and then built a futuristic villa with indoor plumbing. Are you okay?

Valerius:

> I'm better than okay. Grace and her family live here now. They have beds. Real beds. Showers. Light at night.

Eryndor:

> You have irrevocably altered their way of life.

Ziraiah:

> ...I'm actually kinda proud of you, dummy.

Valerius:

> Thanks, squirt.

Ziraiah:

> You must be so thankful mum taught us all those stuff.

Eryndor:

> To think you once voiced the loudest grievances. Well done, brother—you've granted them what few sovereigns ever manage: dignity, and hope.

Valerius:

I didn't just do it for them. You think I lived living in this backward world with no flush toilet.

Ziraiah:

> You're just unlucky. We have a flush toilet where we are.

Valerius:

> No way. Damn, this world is so unfair.

Ziraiah:

> We'll be starting the Festitude Academy soon.

Valerius:

> Good for you. You're living good lives with magic everywhere and I'm...here.

Eryndor:

> We shall meet again soon. Stay safe, Valerius.

Ziraiah:

> Don't die, okay?

Valerius smiled as their messages faded from view. Behind him, the lights from the new house glowed warm and golden through the windows.

He turned and walked inside.

---

Fourteen days had passed since the builders first arrived. And now, at long last, the house stood complete—a towering two-story structure unlike anything the village had ever seen. Smooth varnished wood glistened under the setting sun, delicate glass panes shimmered in the windows, and elegant stonework ran around the pool like a crown. From its intricate ceilings to the flush toilet and secret key-lock doors, the house looked like something carved out of a dream.

That night, the villagers gathered to celebrate.

A great fire crackled in the open field beside the house. Lanterns—crafted by Valerius himself—glowed faintly with warm golden light, drawing the people of Kintol like moths to a miracle. Music played. Laughter soared. The scent of spiced stew, smoked meats, and oven-baked sweets wafted through the night air.

Grace spun in a loose white dress, twirling in her father Frederick's arms as they danced near the fire. Her laughter was light and free. Even the builders—worn and dusty from two weeks of labour—drank and celebrated like children on festival day.

Valerius sat quietly on the steps of the new house, a contented smile softening his features. He watched it all, arms draped over his knees.

One villager, chewing blissfully, shouted, "By the heavens! I've never eaten something so exquisite!" Another raised his wooden cup and cheered, "To the boy architect!"

The food had been Grace's doing, but the recipes were Valerius's—spaghetti, buttered garlic bread, crispy fried chicken, and something very close to cheesecake.

Anna came to sit beside him. Her hands were folded neatly in front of her, and her eyes sparkled in the firelight.

"Lerius," she said gently, "who are you really? You seem to know everything."

Valerius didn't answer immediately. He simply smiled, eyes on the fire, then said, "I'm just a kid who's lost."

Anna watched him a moment longer, then followed his gaze to the builders, now dancing with mugs in hand.

"They really like the food, don't they," Valerius said.

Anna chuckled and rubbed his head like a proud aunt. "Wherever it is you came from... I'm glad you came."

In the distance, Grace twirled mid-spin and locked eyes with him. Her movements slowed. The world seemed to pause. Valerius smiled softly, and across the fire, Anna noticed. She arched a knowing eyebrow and walked away grinning to herself.

Suddenly, a heavy arm slung around Valerius's shoulders.

"Lerius, my boy!" Broman bellowed, swaying with a tankard in hand. "A truly wonderful mind you have. You, my friend, are a genius!"

Valerius smirked. "You're drunk, Broman."

"And yet I still know brilliance when I see it!"

Laughter rose all around them. Valerius leaned back, listening to the simple joy of the music. He tapped his foot. Then a thought flickered.

Should I also give them good music? Hm...

He leaned back farther, eyes drifting toward the stars. A memory stirred.

His mother. Seated with her legs crossed. That same intense look in her eyes as always.

"Valerius, your greatest weapon will forever be your mind. That's why I'm empowering you. Enemies can take your arm, your eye, your wealth. But this—"

She tapped her temple.

"—with this, you can take it all back. The moment you lose it, you've lost everything… even yourself."

Before he could sink any deeper into the memory, Grace dashed toward him.

"Lerius!" she laughed, grabbing his arm. "Come dance with me!"

He blinked. "Huh? Nah, I'm good here."

She tugged harder. "Oh, come on, shake that body of yours! Or is the genius afraid of rhythm?"

He raised an eyebrow. A crooked grin pulled at his lips. Then, without warning, Valerius leapt from the stairs and joined her.

And then—he danced.

First a smooth body roll, followed by a perfect glide across the dirt. The villagers blinked. He moonwalked back, spun on one heel, then popped and locked his arms like flowing water. The way he moved was impossibly smooth—precise, confident, hypnotic.

Grace stopped dancing just to watch, mouth wide open.

"W-what are you—how are you—?"

The villagers erupted.

"Lerius! Lerius! Lerius!"

Some tried to mimic him. Others just clapped. Children jumped with glee. Even Broman, halfway through another cup, spilled his drink trying to copy the moonwalk.

Freya leaned against a tree, arms folded. She rolled her eyes and muttered, "Is there anything he can't do?"

Brian, standing beside her, just shook his head. "Honestly… I don't think so."

Valerius danced on, laughing with everyone, and for the first time in weeks since arriving on yilheim —he felt light. He felt safe.

Not just celebrated.

But accepted.

Theosis. Even Elder Miron danced.

The man of stillness and silence—the one who hadn't moved to music in seventy years—rose from his stool like wind stirring an old tree. His robe fluttered as he stepped forward, slow at first… then steady. His arms lifted, his feet began to move—not with skill, but with spirit.

The crowd gasped.

Grace stopped mid-spin.

Even Broman dropped his cup.

The old man smiled, his eyes glinting in the firelight. "It's been a long time," he said, voice gravelled with age but glowing with joy. "But this… this is worth it."

Valerius froze in place, watching the elder sway, stunned.

Theosis. A moment of unity between spirit and body. Between old and new.

Even here, in a village forgotten by the world… joy had become sacred.

And the boy from another world had made it happen.

To be Continued...