CHAPTER 72 - GRAPE-FUL FOR A GOURD-GEOUS HARVEST
🙞❤︎🙜
I woke up the next day after dreaming of taking care of a dragon child. In my dream, I was struggling to find enough food for us. As I lay in bed, still half-asleep, I felt relieved knowing that harvest day was just around the corner since I wanted to feed him more vegetables. It was only after I had gotten up and splashed some water on my face that I realized I didn’t actually have a dragon child to feed.
Harvest time was always a joyous time, and the autumn harvest was particularly important because there were no edible winter crops. Therefore, whatever we harvested in the fall had to provide for our needs for a full six months, the three months of winter and the three months of spring.
Harvest day was tomorrow, and we were all inspecting the nearest paddy. The rice stalks were around three feet high, and the panicles were heavy with golden seeds. I breathed in deeply. The air was filled with the sweet fragrance of ripe rice, and the rustling of leaves as they brushed against each other. We had drained the paddies yesterday, and everything was ready for tomorrow.
Since the harvest season lasted for two weeks, farmers should pick and choose which crops were ready and should be gathered first, and which ones would benefit from a few more days in the field. Some of the vegetables were already at peak ripeness and would be harvested first. We planned to leave the red and black rice for last since that would give them more time to dry out, which was apparently good for them.
Deming had already inspected the vegetable plants and told me that there were not enough. We had plenty of rice and fish, so it’s not like we would starve, but the kids and I would have to do a lot of foraging to make up for the vegetable shortfall.
Meat technically wouldn’t be a problem because I could always buy more demon meat from the White Tiger clan, and Prince Baiyu gifted a lot to me. The Demon Chef and his assistants had also been busy making smoked, salted, dried, cured, and lard-sealed fish and meat for later use. Still, I liked a full larder, so my apprentices and I would step up our hunting when spring arrived.
The good news was that Deming had inspected the weird-looking rice plants now that the grains were ready and assured me that they would produce Miracle Pearl Rice. At least the clans wouldn’t be disappointed.
“Teacher, why do you keep sighing?” asked Kharli.
“Deming said we won’t have enough food,” I said.
“But there’s obviously an easy way to fix that,” said Lari.
“What? How?” I gave him a suspicious look. My [Lazy] apprentice was prone to finding “solutions” that involved nothing more than ignoring a problem.
“We’ll have enough vegetables if we reserve them for the four of us. I’ll even cut my own share in half if I have to,” he said.
“Haha. You’re not getting out of eating your vegetables,” I said.
If it was up to him, he would eat only rice, fish, and meat every day.
“But it’s true. We have more than enough for the four of us,” he said.
“Yes…” That was indeed true, but feeding my staff spiritual food was part of their perks. I’m pretty sure it was a big part of how I was able to attract a top talent like the Demon Chef.
“Teacher, there’s no need to worry, I can forage a lot!” said Mo.
“Normally you can, but not in winter. Hmmm. I guess we’ll have to stop growing the trees and fill the greenhouse with vegetables instead,” I said.
“We do have over three hundred trees, anyway,” said Kharli.
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“I’m sure it will all work out,” said Lari. “Why are you so worried, teacher? We have enough for five months, and when spring comes, we’ll be able to forage.”
“No, it’s nothing important. I’m just mad at myself for making a mistake about how much we planted last time.”
Kharli nodded. “We probably should have planted more vegetables instead of rice.”
“Kharli, you have the notes about the summer season, right? Make sure you also write down how much we harvest of each vegetable crop. I want to plant the most productive seeds in the greenhouse,” I said.
“Teacher, I didn’t take notes, but I memorized it,” said Mo.
She started reciting the harvest figures until Lari cut her off by saying, “Stop showing off and just get to the point.”
“Potatoes, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, corn, beans, and chili peppers gave the most exp,” she said, pouting.
“That’s good to know. Let’s decide what we’ll plant after the autumn harvest season is finished,” I said. “Pay attention to which crops give the most food.”
After we finished inspecting the crops, Kharli and Lari went back to the house to rest, while Mo and I went our separate ways to forage. Kharli and Lari had done all of the weeding and watering today in order to allow Mo to keep most of her energy. We did it that way because she was so good at foraging that she would probably be able to gather twice as much as the other two combined. I did caution her to only use half of her energy because she needed to be at peak condition tomorrow.
We walked a little way into the forest together, then parted company. Unfortunately, we had already foraged two days ago, so it was likely that all of the nearby foraging spots were depleted. I had to go deeper into the forest than I normally did. I put Mr. Bear on [Guard Mode] and walked for the rest of the morning, only stopping to eat the packed lunch that Fengying had handed to me before I left.
I sat on the root of a towering oak tree as I ate the lo mai gai, sticky rice with demon chicken, black mushrooms, and wild scallions cooked in lotus leaves. The Demon Chef had really outdone himself this time. It was so good that I licked the lotus leaves clean when I finished eating the rice.
The crisp autumn air stung my cheeks, and the damp leaves underneath my feet squished and crunched loudly as I walked. It had rained yesterday, which made the ground muddy, but it was good for the mushrooms, which I found growing in abundance. I found a scattering of chanterelles, porcini, and morels at different spots, and I was very pleased when I found a patch of ripe elderberries. The berries grew in bunches, so I simply used the scissors from the System toolbelt to cut the stems instead of trying to pick off each berry individually.
By that time, it was already midafternoon, so I walked back home using a different path and was lucky enough to find a small patch of blueberry bushes. I plucked the few that were ripe.
When I came across a stream, I took out a few of the berries and washed them in the crystal clear, icy water. The taste of the blueberries was tart, with only a slight sweetness. Wild berries tended to be less sweet than the cultivated varieties. I was about to eat an elderberry when a System pop-up appeared.
[Elderberries should be cooked before eating.]
What? Does this mean that they’re toxic if eaten raw? I hadn’t known that. It’s a good thing that the System warned me before I ate them.
Putting the berries back in my inventory, I walked back home, shivering at the thought that I had almost poisoned myself because of carelessness.
***
The next day, the entire household got up one hour before dawn, and we all ate a quick, hot breakfast before heading out to the vegetable plants.
“Yes! Can I please go first?” asked Mo. Her cheeks were red, and her eyes were shining with excitement.
“Of course not! Don’t be silly. Teacher always goes first,” said Kharli.
“Thank you, thank you. I will go first, and I will harvest the potatoes, as is traditional,” I said.
Carefully putting on my gardening gloves, I walked over to where the potatoes were waiting. I used a spading fork to loosen the soil around the plants, then dug underneath them to lift the potatoes from the soil.
Deming held out his hand, and I placed a potato on it.
I think we were all expecting him to say “Alabaster Spirit Potato, low grade” again, so everyone was shocked when he made his assessment.
“Spirit Potato, unknown inedible variety. Low grade,” he said.
“Unknown!”
“What does he mean by ‘unknown’?”
“It’s a totally new variety.”
“It’s not even edible.”
“It looks the same as a regular potato.”
“This farm doesn’t grow regular potatoes. You mean the Alabaster Spirit Potato.”
The assistants and maids were still busy gossiping about it when I handed the Demon Chef another potato.
This time he gave the expected assessment. “Alabaster Spirit Potato, low grade.”
“Phew!”
“Thank goodness!”
“I was worried about nothing. It was probably just that one potato that’s weird.”
My apprentices crowded close to me to poke at the “unknown” potato. It was a very weird potato indeed.
[Thunderbolt Tuber:
A special potato infused with the spirit of lightning.
Type: Ammo]