Azalea looked up from her farm at the sound of a passing group of people, an expectant smile on her face. In the four or five days since the raid, the presence of players had expanded steadily out from the starting village. Some continued raiding, some began building a home like Azalea, and some were still engaged in PvP out in the wilderness. None of those could affect her as long as she remained on her property, of course, for which she was glad.
“Damn. You already have a farm and everything set up?” One of the passing players said, turning to study her property. “How’d you figure out how to do that?”
“It was a lot of hard work,” she admitted, standing to smile at the figure. Some person in a dark blue dress, she thought. She liked the garment. Much better than her grey tunic and skirt, that was for sure. “I already knew how to farm before I got in the game.”
“Oh, that’s cool. Can I come check it all out?”
Azalea nodded, confirming the player [Tankbabe] had permission to enter her plot. The woman approached, kneeling down beside the line of tomato seeds that Azalea was putting down. “What’s this?”
“Tomatoes. I also have carrots, potatoes, and a bunch of other stuff here. I’m thinking of adding some wheat to the right, and maybe diverting the river to grow some rice.”
“Damn,” Tankbabe whistled in amazement. “So you can pretty much grow whatever you want?”
Azalea shrugged. “I don’t see why not. You’d need seeds, of course. But I haven’t had any trouble as long as I keep up with the watering and maintenance.”
“Cool. How long does it take this all to grow?”
“I just harvested the plants early this evening, so I guess it takes a few days. Much faster than the real world.”
Tankbabe’s eyes flickered over Azalea’s shoulder to the two small houses, and then to the entrance of the mine. “You have a mine too. You must be the one I heard about. Did you get raided on the second day?”
Azalea nodded confirmation of that. “We did. Nearly lost too, but my friends are good fighters.”
Tankbabe made a small face, showing her frustration. “This combat system just doesn’t make sense to me. Nobody’s figured out how to activate their skills, best I can tell. We can take on monsters if there’s enough of us, but we can’t figure out how to actually fight.”
Azalea hid a small smile. Truth be told, she was surprised how little other players were figuring out the secret to the combat. But then again, not many of them were likely to be experienced fighters like Caius, she thought. Maybe a few had figured it out, but if they had, they were keeping it to themselves.
“You said you just harvested them this morning?” the woman asked, and Azalea nodded again. “You don’t think I could buy some tomatoes, do you? I really like cooking, and we just got some meat from a hunter in the village. If I can get some bread and lettuce, I could make burgers!”
“Sure,” Azalea agreed. “I have lettuce too, if you want.”
The woman’s eyes brightened at the prospect, and Azalea led her back to the house she shared with Caius. Opening the storage chest there, she pulled out a few tomatoes and a head of lettuce for her to see. She’d known that starting a farm would be a good move, but she couldn’t have predicted how much interest the other players would have in it. Tankbabe wasn’t the first person to ask about buying her produce.
“Damn,” the girl said, holding the tomato in her hand. “These are huge. Do you also know how to cook?”
“I do, but we don’t have a stove. Anything I make over the fire is okay, but it just doesn’t taste as good as what the restaurant in the village makes.”
She and Caius had discovered towards the end of the second day that food did in fact matter. The more work they did, the more they moved around, the more an invisible meter drained, and eventually, their characters would grow hungry. It seemed to happen about as often as it would in the real world, but if you got hungry enough, your character would slow down. And simple snacks wouldn’t cut it to stay satiated, either. They had to eat real meals.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
“They’re taking the realism of this game seriously, aren’t they?” Tankbabe asked. “I got a blueprint to make a small stone stove if you’re interested. I’ll gladly trade a copy for a blueprint of those houses you built.”
“Sure, I’m alright with that,” Azalea said. She and Caius had already agreed that, apart from the combat secret, they were okay with selling anything they came up with, including designs and recipes. Several players had already purchased a lot of the iron they mined up, though their stores still had plenty of surplus.
They traded blueprints through a Contract screen, then Azalea put up several of her fruits and vegetables. A pound of tomatoes for 20 Yemon, a head of lettuce for 15, and Tankbabe was on her way, a happy customer. She called over her shoulder as she left, “Have fun with the stove! I’ll be back for more vegetables, so you should probably expand your farm!”
Azalea finished planting her row of tomatoes, quietly thinking Tankbabe had a point. With how popular her veggies and fruit were becoming, she could definitely do with making more space for farmland. That didn’t take her long to accomplish, buying 2 more plots of land next to the road other players were using. I should make a fence for the property, she thought, using a hoe to till the soil, getting it ready for more seeds.
Several other players could be seen passing by as she worked. Most ignored her small little farm, though a few did stop to ask questions. One player, dressed in mage robes, offered to sell her a new spell they’d created. Called Contact, it allowed players to speak effortlessly with each other, regardless of the distance.
“Am I able to teach it to other players?” Aster asked.
“No, you have to buy individual copies. I can inscribe multiple sheets of paper if you want, but they’re 15 yemon apiece.”
It was a useful spell, so Azalea agreed without argument, paying the player 60 yemon through a Contract screen. The mage was soon on their way, and she returned to her work. The hours dragged on, with the occasional feature of Riley, Oscar, or Caius, who were all out hunting and exploring the nearby area. They’d been at it for nearly two days now, having grown bored of the quiet lifestyle of owning and operating a farm.
Curious, she tried to cast Contact on Caius. Could he reply if he didn’t have the spell? Could he even hear her? “Hey Caius, it’s Azalea. A player just sold me a copy of a spell that lets me talk to certain people no matter how far away they are. I don’t know if you can hear this or even reply to it, but if you can talk back to me, try saying something.”
She wasn’t entirely surprised to hear no reply back. She’d just have to wait until they returned to find out if she’d even reached him. Satisfied but a little impatient, she went back to her farm. A strange thing kept happening, she noticed. Distractions kept coming her way, whether they be other players or her own thoughts. It was almost as if she couldn’t stand to do nothing but tend to her farm for hours on end. That was ridiculous, of course, because that’s exactly what she loved doing in other games.
She was actually enjoying her work on the farm, that was true. But if anything, her constant silent questions and willingness to talk to random passersby proved that she wanted to do more, deep down. She let out a snort of laughter at that thought. What, was she turning into a combat nut like Caius? The answer to that was a resounding no. But something about Project Terra drew her in, and she found herself wanting to explore, to find a dungeon, or to take on another quest. Anything to get more invested in the game.
Her friends returned a little over an hour after the mage sold her copies of the Contact spell, laden down with items. In that time, with no work to do on the farm, she’d managed to build a simple stone stove based on the recipe Tankbabe had given her. She showed it off to Caius as he set his rucksack down, and he seemed impressed.
“Everywhere I look, there’s more things that surprise me,” Caius said. “But they really shouldn’t, I guess. I mean, it kind of makes sense that we’d be able to do things like this. What happened to all the vegetables you were picking while we were gone?”
“Other players keep buying them,” she explained. “I think I need to make more farms. I put down two new plots, but I don’t think that’ll be enough. Not in the long run.”
“You thinking of making a business selling food?” He asked, nodding in approval. “That would suit you really well.”
“It would,” she agreed. “But that’s not all I want to do. When are you guys going out next? I need to stretch my legs for a bit.”
She could see the surprise on his face at that question. Normally, whenever they played together, she was definitely the type to stay back at camp or in a city and enjoy her time playing the farming game. But his surprise didn’t last long. In fact, it was replaced with a grin that showed he almost expected it. “We’ve just been out hunting monsters for today. Tomorrow, we’re going to raid a dungeon we found. It’s E-Rank, so we should be able to handle it with just the four of us if you want to come along.”
“Of course,” she agreed at once. Then, she looked hesitantly down at the wand that sat almost forgotten on her belt. “I should probably get a better weapon than this if I’m going to be doing more fighting, huh?”
“Ah, about that,” he reached into his rucksack and pulled out a long staff. It almost looked handmade, as if it had been previously owned by some wise wizard in a fantasy novel. “One of the players who tried to ambush us had this. I thought you might like it. And you’re right, you need better gear if you’re going to take part in a dungeon raid.”