CHAPTER 115 - WHY DID THE CHICKEN GO TO THE SEANCE? TO TALK TO THE OTHER SIDE.

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“Wait a moment. I’m tired. Let’s eat first, then discuss it later,” I said.

In the outer courtyard, the Demon Chef was waiting for us with a truly magnificent spread. Our mouths fell open when we saw a large round table full of colorful and delicate dim sum dishes, including steamed dumplings, pan-fried dumplings, spring rolls, pork buns, sweet custard buns, water chestnut cake, eggs tarts, sesame balls, and a few other items I couldn’t identify. The only thing missing was the more hearty fare like meatballs and spareribs.

I chose a light chrysanthemum tea and started eating. “Oh my gosh, I bet emperors don’t eat this well.”

Lari, Kharli, and Mo didn’t say anything because they were busy stuffing their faces.

There were three tricolor dumplings I couldn’t identify. The green, white, and red ones turned out to be stuffed with some sort of sweet bean, while the yellow, blue, and white ones were savory chicken dim sums. The orange, violet, and white ones were my least favorite since they were filled with minced carp and vegetables.

Though the spring rolls were the best I had ever eaten, with a crunchy skin and scrumptious meat filling, I stopped myself from eating too much because I knew for a fact that dinner tonight was going to be steak. Prince Baiyu’s men had delivered a whole demon cow to the house last month. The meat was now fully aged and it would undoubtedly be a meal to remember.

Half an hour later, the four of us leaned back on our chairs, happily full and feeling happy with the world at large.

“Teacher, what was that about us not raising animals on the farm?” asked Lari.

“You might think that it’s weird, but I honestly can’t bring myself to raise animals for their meat,” I said.

It’s true that I'm a meat lover, but I was used to buying meat at the supermarket, not slaughtering animals myself.

“But we’re farmers.” Lari folded his arms across his chest.

“It’s okay. I spoke to our chef, and he told me that he knew a farmer who raises the best pigs in the Westerlands,” I said. As expected of a Demon Chef, he always knew where to get the best ingredients. “He suggested that I sell a few piglets to that farmer, and it got me thinking about the [Lizardwings].”

Mo wrinkled her nose at the mention of the smelly animals. “What do the [Lizardwings] have to do with pigs? The pigs won’t be as smelly as the [Lizardwings]... Will they?”

Kharli laughed at that. “Nothing could possibly be as smelly as the [Lizardwings]!”

“No, no, no. You’ve got the wrong idea. It’s not about being smelly at all. My point is that I was able to sell the young [Lizardwings] to the clan members and most of them survived." The items from my inventory were all bound to me, which meant that I couldn’t give them away or sell them to other people. However, items that I grew or crafted could be sold. For example, I couldn’t sell [Lizardwing Eggs], but if I hatched them on the farm, I could sell the [Lizardwings] babies or adults.

“But why would we sell animals instead of raising them ourselves?” asked Lari.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“You know that we have a limit on how many animals we can have on the farm, right?” I waited until the three of them nodded before continuing. “It’s all about mathematics. At my current farming level, we can have a maximum of six animals on the farm. The smaller animals like the chickens take around two months to grow before they can be slaughtered for their meat. How many chickens would we be able to raise in a year?”

Lari, Kharli, and Mo exchanged looks full of alarm. They hated it when I asked them to do calculations like this. The orphanage had given them a proper basic education, but like most peasants in this era, they had difficulty counting stuff after they ran out of fingers.

They furrowed their brows, scratched their heads, and argued about it for some time before coming up with the wrong answer.

I burst out laughing. “One hundred? How did you even come up with that number?”

“It’s a lot, that’s what matters!” said Kharli with a cheeky grin.

“And how much tax would you owe?” When they just shuffled their feet and refused to look at me, I said, “Alright, that’s enough of that. I know you guys said you didn’t want a tutor, but you need one. I asked Fengying to get one for you. The tutor will arrive in the summer.”

All of us glanced at Mo, who sighed but didn’t object to it. She had some sort of reading disability, either dyslexia or some related learning disorder. Thankfully, she could use the System to read things out loud for her, but she'd had a bad experience with formal education in the orphanage.

“Don’t worry about it,” I said. “We’ll make sure to hire a good tutor who can deal fairly with everyone.”

“I’m not worried. I’d pity the person who tried to bully me nowadays,” said Mo, raising a fist.

The rest of us chuckled at her reply.

“Good! Anyway, on the topic of raising animals, if we raised chickens ourselves, we would be able to raise around thirty-six in a year, but if we sold the chicks right after they hatched, around every five to six days, we could have three hundred sixty-five to four hundred thirty-eight a year,” I said.

“That’s a lot,” said Lari.

I had the distinct impression that they couldn’t really grasp the numbers I was talking about.

“The point is that we will be able to produce a lot more if we outsource the task of raising the animals,” I said. “I’m thinking of signing a contract with the White Tiger clan and the chef’s friends. I’ll supply the animals while they do the work of taking care of them. Deming already agreed that I should ask for half of all profits and produce in return.”

“But, Teacher, no one else has spirit grass and forage like we do,” said Lari.

I nodded. “That’s a good point. We’ll just have to accept that the quality of the meat and produce won’t be as good as it would have been if we had raised them here on the farm ourselves. It’s worth it considering how much more meat and animal produce we’ll get.”

Lari seemed to accept this while Kharli and Mo frowned a bit.

“We were going to wait until the spirit grass grew more before hatching the eggs. Does this mean we won’t wait anymore?” asked Lari.

“I think we should still wait a few more days. The original plan was to have at least half of the area covered in spirit grass, but now that we’re only going to have piglets and chicks, we won’t need that much grass,” I said.

“I’m sure you’re right, Teacher,” said Lari. “Can I see the eggs, please?”

“Oh, I forgot I haven’t shown them to you. Here you go,” I said.

Taking out a few [Chicken Eggs] from my inventory, I handed them one each.

“Teacher, why is the System’s item information a bit weird?” Lari rubbed his thumb over the pale blue spots on an egg.

[Chicken Egg:

A wonderful item full of hopes and dreams! What kind of chicken will hatch from this egg?]

“Why are they all different? This one is black!” Kharli gave her egg a distrustful look.

“Mine is just pure white!” said Mo.

“...Is there a gold egg?” asked Lari.

I laughed and poured dozens of [Chicken Eggs] into three baskets for them to marvel at. Each one was a different size and color, and many of the shells had markings like stripes, spots, and stars. We talked about the eggs a little bit more before going to our bedrooms for a nap before dinner.

Of course, in Adventure Incarnate, the chickens were shown with the same old in-game sprite, just with their colors swapped. How was I to know that things would be different in this world?

The rise of the Feathered Fiends three years later shouldn’t be blamed on me!