The life of a farmer is full of hardships that Tanuki never encountered. From what little he could remember of his previous life, he lived his childhood in a suburban area. Occasionally he would find himself in the garden, removing weeds and all sorts of allergenic things that would steal the ground’s richness from helpful plants. Once he held a hoe in his hand when he was young and it left a water blister in his palm. Being young and afraid of pain, he thought he was going to die and cried until an adult carried him into his room. He was seven years old at the time, but the feeling of cringe followed him for ten years without a sign of fading.

Therefore, he greatly appreciated Edgar’s hard work on the newly placed fields. He had yet to remove the grass which, though sparser compared to the plains, would still take days of his life.

With a will that seemed almost mythical, he cast the hoe in the dry soil and pulled out the green by the root.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to help?” Tanuki asked, sitting in the hill’s domain.

Edgar wiped his sweaty forehead and continued his work.

“No one is standing foot on my land. I don’t need somebody trampling the dirt. Excuse me, my Liege, but I have to draw the line at the foot of that hill.”

Though Edgar was just an NPC, Tanuki feared he might be a bit too self-employed. After all, it was he who was the rightful owner of this realm and his word was law. No one could restrict him from the freedom to walk this realm. But he was aware that being too forceful might alienate him from his only source of company.

He cleared his throat. Never had anyone taught him how to appear strong, so he tried copying something he saw on TV, someone who could make people do as he pleased without being a tyrant.

He thought for a while.

A surprising revelation presented itself; almost all the characters he knew were eventually backstabbed by their friends or blood. Kings, commanders, revolutionists, and saviours. All of them.

Without a role model, he did not know what to do. He laughed. Despite the forced smile, deep down turmoil brewed in his stomach. Pathetic.

“Well, we might return to that later,” Tanuki scratched the back of his head and quickly changed topics before he could reply, “What are you planting?”

“Wheat.”

“Wonderful! That means we can make bread. Though it would require a furnace.”

“About that,” Edgar stopped his work to approach Tanuki, “I want to give a mission to you.”

When he said that a new kind of interface appeared between them. Tanuki had successfully expected this mechanic when thinking about settlement NPCs. He felt a little proud about that.

[ Quest: The Farmhouse ]

[ Difficulty: 1 ]

[ Objective: Gather materials for Edgar to help him build his homestead. ]

[ Requirements : ]

{ 20x Wood }

[ Rewards : ]

{ 3x Bread }

{ 1x Waterskin }

{ 1x Green Flora Token (Enchanted) }

Tanuki accepted the quest, though not without questions.

“Isn’t twenty wood a little too few to build a house? And what even is twenty wood? A whole tree or just a few logs?”

“You’ll see. God will tell you,” he said, then added before returning to his work, “With every quest you do for me, he will bestow me with more ways to reward you. It won’t be I who grows stronger, but my profession.”

Tanuki stared with confusion. Edgar noticed and raised his head.

“I call him God. How about you?”

“Well, it changes. Most of the time, I call it the game.”

“Hmmm,” Edgar shrugged and returned to work.

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It made sense he would assume it was God commanding them through this surreal world. Tanuki saw it as a game because the way things worked best resembled video game mechanics for him.

From a peasant’s perspective who had never even heard of electricity and less so tower-defence games, this was the only plausible explanation. It was easier to assume an external force was making them go through all these events for a reason. It would also paint a face that could be loved, hated, or feared, but ultimately it would provide an alternative to meaninglessness. And anything was better than that.

Tanuki humoured himself with the idea that an earthly god was the puppet master behind all this. Perhaps the next time he went to sleep, he would see Jesus or Zeus breakdancing in the sky. Maybe even Ra or Thor. What if it was a god that he had never even heard of? What if this was all the doing of a deity only worshipped in some random Siberian village that got buried by an avalanche thousands of years ago? What if he died and was judged by Anubis based on a four-thousand-year-old holy manuscript’s outdated laws?

He decided to keep calling the game. Edgar’s belief filled him with existential dread that he needed to walk off. When he got to the top of the hill, he turned around to wave and though he did not look up, Edgar waved back.

“I should see if I can repair one of the axes,” he thought and left.

An hour passed. None of the tools survived, but he found a triangle-shaped rock that was perfect for the head of a new one. He gathered the materials around the Gaia Core, then used the remains of his barricade as a stool.

While weaving blades of grass together to create rope, he whistled and sang a song he could not quite remember. After a while, he got too bored and leaned his head against the crystal, which promptly opened the menu.

“Almost noon,” he observed, “Gotta get some apples.”

His eyes wandered over to the new options in the menu screen. [Encyclopaedia] and [Cards]. In the sea of new things, he forgot to view these. The former seemed to be the less exciting of the two, so he began with that.

Immediately, he realised that could not have been further from the truth. There were two different sections, one listing creatures he encountered, like husks and bugs, giving further information about them. This also explained why he could research creatures more than once.

For example, he looked at the Soulless Husk. In front of him, a 3D visualization of the creature appeared with the information on the side and all around.

[ Soulless Husk ]

[ Level: 0 ]

[ Essence: Green ]

[ Traits: Summon, Magical Creature ]

[ Abilities: Claw ]

[ Description: A Soulless Husk is a vessel made of materials found in nature. They can be summoned through a ritual and commanded like minions. They are weak, though capable of mimicking human behaviour by wearing armour and carrying weapons. Soulless Husks are considered weak for combat and much more efficient as servants. ]

On the other side was a listing of its stats.

[ HP: 5/5 ]

[ MP: 1/1 ]

[ STR: 3 ]

[ AGI: 2 ]

[ INT: 0 ]

But most importantly, there were three milestones to be unlocked by continuously researching the husk. The first milestone required it to be researched once.

[ First Milestone – 1x Research ]

[ Ritual: ‘Conjure Soulless Husk’ ]

He had already used this, so he knew fully well what it did. He would have loved to see what more research would have unlocked, but only the requirements were displayed and not the actual rewards.

[ Second Milestone – 5x Research ]

[ Third Milestone – 10x Research ]

He was far from either of those.

Returning to the other creatures, he vaguely checked all of them. He did not pay much attention to stats as he would have just mixed up all the numbers, nor did he spend much time looking at the milestones, as they were all locked besides that of the giant centipede. That was the other unlocked milestone that gave him his trusty acid spell. Though the bug was sent to kill him, ironically it was the thing that saved him from death.

“Perhaps not all centipedes are bad,” he whispered, then returned to see the other available interface displaying bosses.

There was only one on that list, the Kiss of Death. When he selected her name, a wholly different stat screen appeared. Immediately, he knew this encyclopaedia thing would be much more than just a list containing the attributes of his enemies.

The bride appeared in a 3D form, floating just a bit above ground. He had never seen her like that, as before she could have stepped foot in his realm, her lower half got blown off.

It was eerie to see her like this. He hated looking at the visuals, especially the veiled face.

Instead of stats, she had a description.

[ Kiss of Death ]

[ The Kiss of Death was a plague that spread through the corpses of gods. Its origins are unknown and its goals are unexplained. Closer observation reveals it to be a focused swarm of Dark Essence. Whether it is the essence that bears consciousness or it is just a byproduct of the highly concentrated mass, the plague tears off a part of its victim’s memory and sews it into its collection. ]

Furthermore, there were milestones attached to the god. These were not research-based, but rather, refight-based.

[ Milestone 1 – Dark Essence ]

[ Milestone 2 – ??? ]

[ Milestone 3 – ??? ]

Below all of that, there was an option to initiate a wave with only the boss. Next to that loomed an ominous text.

[ Warning ! ]

[ Initiating a refight will immediately summon a Tier 2 version of this boss. ]

Tanuki got out of this tab as soon as he could.

“There is no way in hell I’m ever seeing that monster again!”

His palms were sweating. He exited the encyclopaedia and spent the next minute calming himself.

It was not that he had to see the bride again, but that he was smarter today than the last two days. He knew that if there was an option to fight her again, that meant he had to fight her again, lest he miss out on possible benefits. Hate would be too weak of a word to describe how he felt about that.

“I hope the cards menu won’t suck as much,” and as he tried to laugh it off, he failed to notice that the axe had long since fallen out of his hands.