Having said goodbye to Old Sal hours ago, twilight had been kissing the sky for quite a while now. Light scarce and the winds bringing about sounds of rustling grass and the smell of our fresh harvest. This was the perfect scene. Just staring over the stretching fields, I was reminded of just how recently I had arrived here.
Coming up to stand beside me, caked in dried mud head to toe, Mia joined me in staring out at the setting sun. “Do you still want to go fight underground in a dungeon? I could not even imagine giving this up. If I could, I would pause time with this scene every day just so that I could enjoy it a little longer.”
Looking over with a smile, I was struck by something else. Mia with her cheeks muddy and flushed from a hard day's work with her eyes glinting in the setting sun gave me pause. “Ya, I could too. It's a pretty beautiful day” I said, turning back towards the horizon.
“Well we should finish up what we are doing. We still need to pick the last of the strawberries before going in to eat dinner and sort the loot from Rumble. We are doing great on what we harvested in terms of quality, but we are way behind in total revenue due to the potato replant cycle we want to start.”
Turning back towards the field I couldn’t help but feel both excited and exhausted from today's work. Replying to her, with my feelings showing through I said, “Agreed, but tomorrow we don’t have to water the crops. As such I plan on clearing some more of the fields and hopefully find some foraged goods!”
“I never thought of that. I remember reading about them some, but it usually takes a specialized class to really buff the goods enough. With your druid domain it might make a decent source of supplemental income until our farming becomes a full time operation. We should ask Rumble if he has stumbled upon anything.” Mia suggested.
“Agreed, he might not be able to tell us anything specific, but he should be able to at least answer that he has or hasn’t. Hopefully he could lead us to a potential patch of stuff.”
“He might be able to. I think that at this point in time he roams quite a ways from the shack. There are times throughout the day that I stop hearing him and his fighting.” Mia reflected.
“Well judging by his health going up and down, he definitely takes quite a few breaks throughout the day, but you are right in that he is almost always fighting.” I replied.
“Do you have any way of calling out to him through menus or is it only by verbal communication?” Mia asked.
“As of now, my side is purely verbal. He has some cute emojis that he sends me for his end though.” I said, replying to her question.
“You had mentioned that before, I wish I could see them. He is cute enough already, but those would just make it perfect.”
“You still think he is cute with all of those thorns poking out?” I asked with a hint of humor.
“Well no, but when he retracts them he goes back to being as cute as ever.”
“Ha, well be sure to tell him tonight. I honestly think that he likes you as much as he does me!”
Laughing at my comment Mia said, “Of course! I am a pretty girl and I always compliment him on his loot.”
Looking up from the strawberry plant I was at, mid-picking, I looked straight at Mia. “What do you mean? I compliment him all the time.”
“I guess that I am just better at it.” Mia said looking up with a mischievous grin.
Still stuck in disbelief, I got hit when Mia tossed a piece of dirt my way teasingly. “Get back to work, I really want to go eat soon!” she said.
“Speaking of which, what do you want to eat tonight?”
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“I was hoping that you would make an omelet with some of the cheap seasonings that we have.” Mia said.
“Okay, no problem. Do you think that we can afford anymore seasonings? Don’t get me wrong, I am glad we have what we have… But a few more would help round out our culinary experience.” I said with more than a bit of hope.
“Without the potato revenue we cannot afford them and still make our summer planting goals. Honestly, I should head into town tomorrow to get more seeds with today’s income.” She said while mentally calculating the new planting schedule.
“What if I stay out a little later today, while you make dinner? I might be able to forage up something. Who knows, I might find something worth a new cooking spice.” The words spilled out of my mouth with more than a bit of hope coloring them.
“Haha, fine. If you can get something that I can sell tomorrow, then we will use it on something food related.” She conceded.
With the last strawberry in hand, I jumped in joy at her concession. “Rumble! Where are you!?” I yelled.
“Don’t bring him in early, he can still get more loot!” Mia chided me.
“It's fine, he can kill what attacks me. I am going to start foraging now.”
Rolling her eyes, Mia let out a short snort. “Fine, but you should be extra careful. Monsters are more active at night. I heard that they also get a small buff at night.”
“I should be fine with Rumble guarding me. Worst case I will make a run towards the shack.” I reassured her. “God knows that I don’t want to end up back at the healers again.”
“Are you sure? That healer assistant, Melissa, seemed to really like your company.” Mia asked.
Without knowing exactly what was going on with the question, I couldn’t help but feel as if a monster was stalking us at that moment. “Ya, waking up from a coma really isn’t pleasant. I mean, it is better than not waking up, but your head hurts for days!” I replied succinctly, feeling as if that was my best course of action without knowing exactly why that was.
With a rustle nearby and happy emojis blasting the corner of my vision, Rumble ran out of the nearby grass while carrying a large segmented log creature.
“What is that!?” Mia asked in surprise while examining the creature.
“I am not sure, let me check my bestiary entries.” I said.
Flipping through my menus and finding one of the newest entries to be the monster in question I gave Mia the answer she was looking for. “It says that it is a ‘Stamp python’, apparently it lifts its body high up into the air and tries to crush its prey. It is also weak towards fire due to it actually being a plant creature.”
“I hope that was the only one, I really hate snakes!” Mia responded.
“Same here, but it looks like they live in colonies called ‘Piles’.”
With a look of appalled disbelief, Mia asked: “Is that supposed to be a joke name implying them to be ‘A pile of sticks’? Hopefully for Rumble’s sake, the local ones are not very numerous or in a single large alliance.”
“Nah, Rumble can obviously handle them. As you have said before, he is the apex predator around here.” I said confidently as Rumble made an imitation arm flex with branch arms that didn’t quite bulge up as he obviously had hoped.
“Speaking of which, did he make much progress today in terms of leveling? I am sure our farming skills went up quite a bit today and chances are my merchant class will by the end of the night.”
“Let me check” I told her. And upon checking I was more than pleasantly surprised by today's progress. “Plant-familiar is level 8 and Farming is level 7! That seems really high for such a short amount of time in the World…” I said with my surprise evident.
Matching my tone exactly, Mia had obviously checked her skills and had the exact same reaction. “My farming is level 6 and my Merchant class is 7 as well! From what Sal said in town, we shouldn’t be hitting these levels until near the middle of summer.”
“Well, my farming has always leveled along with Rumble… Usually it sticks to about half his total level… So our farming skills have probably been constantly boosted by him shooting up in levels and us getting farming experience from his growth. And combined with our awesome harvest, I think I can see why we leveled so much.”
“That sounds possible, but that would be quite the feedback loop of experience. Thank god I found a druid to partner with!” Mia said in wonder.
“Thank god you found a druid? Am I not the important part of that thought?” I asked with mock hurt.
“Haha, just kidding!” she responded before her face started to grow serious in the dim light. “Brad, it is already pretty dark,if you want to go out to forage any then you should hurry. I will go get dinner started, but you should be sure to hurry home as soon as you can!”
Nodding my head and her wishing me luck, we went our separate ways. Mia off to cook dinner while organizing the day’s collected loot and I off with Rumble to forage up something to sell.