A Helping Hand

As the sun rose, the field glittered like gold. At first glance, one might think it was a place of great wealth, a land literally covered in gold. It was a place of great wealth, just not of precious metals but rather of agricultural product. It was a field of Golden Twos, a genetically modified crop designed for higher yields.

The farmer awoke, stirred from his sleep by the sun. His name was Robert and he was just an ordinary farmer. He had lived here for all his life, as did his father and his father's father. The land he lived in was once part of the Kingdom of Wolfheart. It had been that way for hundreds of years. However, just a few years ago that changed when the church invaded and took over the kingdom.

For a while, life was not all that different. He farmed his land, sold his crops and life went on. Taxes were somewhat higher, and life was a bit tougher, but overall he didn't really feel much of a difference in the change in management. Eventually, that began to change. He was given new seeds to plant by the authorities. These crops grew faster and larger than the originals. He was also given new machines to help him work his fields. Now, his field produced many times what it used to and he was much better off as a result. He no longer had any concerns about starvation and the money he earned from selling the surplus food allowed him to improve his life.

For this, he was thankful. He could see his situation improve before his very eyes and the progress was material. Robert didn't care much for the games of politics and diplomacy the kings played with each other, but he had nothing but gratitude toward his new overlords who had brought such wonderful change to his life.

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Ben was a normal citizen living in the City of Everwinter, the former capital of the Kingdom of Everwinter. Now, it was simply owned by the church. Ben was a resident of the city his entire life. When the church came and overthrew the queen of Everwinter, the city had been thrown into chaos. From then on, things only got worse. The church had continued their war against the other kingdoms and the city was being squeezed dry to provide the resources they needed. Food had become scarce and Ben had resorted to living on the streets trying to find scraps of food wherever he could.

Those had been the darkest days, Ben had been unsure of whether he would be able to survive. Every day was a struggle for him to try to feed himself and his family. Yet, the sun always emerges after the storm. He had managed to find himself a job at a newly opened factory. It had been a new experience, there had never been factories in the city before. He saw all kinds of strange devices whirling around and puffing smoke. He was completely confused about what to do. Fortunately, he was not alone. His coworkers were new to the work as well. There was a person sent over to teach them how to operate the machines. The tasks were not too difficult and he was soon able to get the hang of it. That was his life now, day after day in the factory. The pay was good and he was satisfied.

He was now able to afford a house. The house he lived in was new, built out of this strange material called concrete. Ben had never seen anything like it. Still, it did its job keeping the rain and the cold out. It provided a good roof over his head and that was all he needed for himself and his family.

Besides the house, there were also other improvements to his life. While he used to be on the verge of starvation, food had now become plentiful. The prices for food had been lower than they had ever been for his entire life. He heard that there was a new way to produce grain which allowed much more to be grown. He had noticed that the grain looked a bit different. They called it Golden Twos, probably named for the golden color of the grains.

Furthermore, his son was now able to attend school. The church had sent people to the city in order to set up educational facilities. Now that they were complete, the children were mandated to attend them so that they could obtain an education. Obtaining an education was supposed to allow the children to get jobs that were more important and paid more. Ben was happy that his son would have such an opportunity. In the past, schooling had been something only the nobles could have access to, now even commoners like him could send their children to school.

Besides the ordinary school, there was also a special school set up for witches. Ben found this rather strange. Only a few years prior witches had been persecuted with zeal in the city. The church had taught that witches used the power of the devil and that they were the enemy of humanity. However, they suddenly changed tack and now witches were valued members of society and an important ally against the demons. Though he found it strange, Ben had never been a diehard fanatic and thus didn't make much of a fuss about it. He simply followed the new policy.

The new witch academy had attracted a few students. However, there were still some witches that didn't trust the church and hid instead. However, as time passed some of them gained more confidence that it was not a trap and now more witches were attending. One time, a witch had ended up being revealed publically, and even though she was encouraged to join, she refused and the officials surprisingly did not force her to go. This event had ended up making many of the witches less nervous about the school. Ben expected that the number of witches enrolled in the school would soon grow.