Apparently, I'm the Infamous Earl's Legendary Bride

Book 1: A Girl in Another World - Chapter 29

Quinn

After dinner, Uncle Colt, Mr. Morton, Allan, Mark and his wife Frances, Eden and her husband Miles, some important members of the Norsewood community, and I had a meeting in the conference room. Apparently, I'd be taking the lead, and after creating myself a pen and a book to jot down notes, I began.

"As I've announced earlier, I'll be making us a temporary shelter, which I'll call Norsewood Lodge for easy reference. Now, I need to know how many families there are likely to stay at the lodge during this winter. I think it'll also make my life easier if I know the number of Norsewood population."

Mark said, "Before the dungeon break four years ago, our citizens numbered ten thousand. The monsters' attack halved that down to five thousand."

I swallowed hard at hearing that. I couldn't believe they had lost that many people.

Allan said, "Since then, roughly one thousand have left Norsewood, seeking homes elsewhere. Then we lost about two hundred after the surprise attack one month ago."

"Due to the loss of our food supplies, half the survivors left Norsewood to seek shelters from their relatives in other regions for the winter," Mark said. "I know it's cold of me to say this, but that helped reduce the number of mouths we needed to feed. Of course, that no longer matters now that you're here, Quinn, and the fact that we discovered rice."

Everyone around the table nodded their heads in agreement.

Allan summed up the number for me. "Right now, there should be around two thousand across Norsewood."

"Two thousand," I said as I jotted down the number. Then I asked, "On average, how many is per household?"

"I'd say eight to ten," Allan said.

I widened my eyes. "That many?" Then again, homes here were multigenerational, meaning family consisted of parents, children, and grandparents. Personally, I didn't think it was suitable to have that many people in an average-sized unit. I said, "On average, how many children do parents have?"

"Three to four, five at most," Frances said.

The number sounded like I'd have to create more than two to three bedrooms. There'd also need to be a common space for the family as well.

I said, "Then getting the data on each family's number is important so I can create a unit that's big enough for them."

"Unit?" Allan asked. "You've mentioned that before at the announcement. What is a unit?"

I chuckled, having forgotten that this was another world and that they were not familiar with certain terms. I said, "I'm referring to a family home in the lodge as a unit."

Everyone nodded in understanding.

"How big will this unit be, my lady?" It was Mr. Lamont who asked that question, the man who was so very intrigued with the double-glazing windows.

I said, "It depends on the size of the family. For example, an average-sized room will fit two to three individuals."

"That small?" Marked said.

"It is very small, isn't it?" a man sitting beside Mr. Lamont said.

I didn't think an average-sized room was that small, but I wondered if their metric was different.

I stood up and then walked around while everyone eyed me. I stopped in the middle of the room and said, "About here to the end there," I said. "That's an average-sized room."

Their eyes widened in surprise, and Mr. Lamont said, "That's the size of a small cottage, my lady."

I nodded. "That's an average-sized room. If there's a family of seven, say parents, grandparents, and three children, if the children are all under thirteen, we can put them all in one room with bunk beds, and the parents and grandparents in one room each, so there'd be three bedrooms in one unit."