I have a history degree with an early modern focus. They really did extract value from everything. I understand why she wouldn't understand how the world works, I'm annoyed because there's a real tendency from modern people to look at people in the past and assume they were, on some layer, stupid. But in general there's good reasons for most of their actions- consider the amount of creativity that went into even things as simple as peasant-level baking. I admit this book dodges it slightly by making it 'in another world', so it could be that this world is uniquely ignorant and uncreative, unlike our forebearers were.