CHAPTER 74 - A RICE-SPECTABLE HARVEST
🙞❤︎🙜
We made it, but just barely. On the last day of the fall harvest season, all three of my apprentices collapsed as a result of using up every bit of their energy. However, we were able to bring in all of the crops.
The kids' levels had risen quite nicely.
[Apprentice Name: Kharli
Farming Skills:
Farming Level 14, Fishing Level 6, Woodcutting Level 11, Cooking Level 2, Herblaw Level 1, Foraging Level 6, Hunting Level 5]
[Apprentice Name: Lari
Farming Skills:
Farming Level 14, Fishing Level 10, Woodcutting Level 10, Cooking Level 1, Herblaw Level 1, Foraging Level 4, Hunting Level 8]
[Apprentice Name: Mo
Farming Skills:
Farming Level 14, Fishing Level 4, Woodcutting Level 11, Cooking Level 2, Herblaw Level 1, Foraging Level 10, Hunting Level 4]
My own levels were nothing to brag about. Yet.
[Player Name: Violet
Farming Skills:
Farming Level 19, Fishing Level 12, Woodcutting Level 19, Cooking Level 5, Herblaw Level 15, Foraging Level 6, Hunting Level 3, Mining Level 1]
I had done a little bit of everything this autumn, except for hunting and mining. My foraging level was really lagging behind even though I liked the skill. The problem was that Mo, Kharli, and I had to venture further out every time we foraged since we had exhausted the resources near the farm.
Woodcutting, as usual, was easy for me to do since I was living in the middle of a primeval forest. Fishing would’ve been harder, but I had the cheat, so I leveled it up pretty quickly compared to the other skills.
I whistled as I walked around the empty fields that had been sown with the [Winter Seed Mix]. The cover crops that had been planted during the summer and fall were full-grown by now, though they were already turning brown, and the flowers were wilted. The winter cover crops would grow for a few weeks until the first frost. All of them would die off by the end of winter and nourish the soil. I had high hopes that this would improve the soil enough that we would be able to produce medium grade crops soon.
When I was done inspecting the farm, I returned to the house and saw that everyone was busy preparing the feast.
“How are the kids?” I asked Fengying.
“They’re sleeping in their rooms,” she said.
“Is the rice ready for pickup?” Shuye would be arriving this afternoon to collect the rice that I was selling to the clans.
We now had three different kinds of rice, and the white one was the only one they were interested in.
[White Pearl Rice:
The Fox goddess taught humans the art of cultivating rice. Seven gods are said to inhabit each grain of rice, so wasting this precious food is a sin.]
The new red rice looked great, but the others simply weren’t interested in it.
[Tiger’s Blood Rice:
Short-grained red rice. According to a local legend, one day a tiger lord found wild spirit rice growing near his home and informed the human villagers about it so that they could enjoy this bounty. Over many generations, humans cultivated and consumed the spirit rice until the crop was stricken with disease. They went to their lord to get his advice. When he saw that the rice was dying, he watered the paddy with a few drops of his blood, which cured the disease. Since then the rice turned red.]
As for the black rice, when it was milled, it turned out to be a dark purple rather than a true black.
[Purple Orchid Rice:
A magnificent and exotic variety of rice known for its floral aroma. Beloved by the Fox goddess, it is used in many rituals.]
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The moment I retrieved the sacks of rice from the mill, I expected a quest to pop out from the System, but no such thing happened. That was just as well since planting season came right after the harvest season, and we were all going to be very busy preparing the farm for the upcoming winter.
But first, the Harvest Feast!
I went to my room for a nap, then had a bath in the hot spring before fixing my hair and changing into a lovely new set of clothes from the Cash Shop. The [Winter Dream] set, made of spider silk, was made of five layers of clothes: underwear, innerwear (pants and robe), skirt and robe, vest, and a loose filmy coat to drape over it all. This all wouldn’t have been necessary if the others hadn’t protested when I tried to turn on the climate control for the entire house. They said they felt stifled when the wind wasn’t allowed to enter the courtyard. I had to admit they had a point, so we only heated the rooms, not the rest of the house.
When I was ready, I made my way to the banquet hall.
Everyone was really used to eating together in the outer courtyard, but I had been able to persuade them that a big feast like this one would be better in a more formal setting. Therefore, I had placed banquet tables and chairs in the main hall. The advantage of this was that the place was heated, so we wouldn’t have to eat wearing padded jackets or thick coats.
There I found that Shuye was waiting for me. I handed him the crocus flower as usual, which he put on his belt.
“Congratulations on another successful harvest,” he said.
We bowed politely to each other.
“Thank you. How have you been? How’s your wife?” I asked him.
“She’s doing very well! I have to tell you that I won’t be able to supervise you much when you’re in the desert. I have to stay near my wife because of her condition.”
“Of course! I never expected you to keep an eye on us there.”
“Let me know if you need anything.”
“Hmmm. I expect we’ll be bored if we stay there all the time. Any suggestions?”
“There’s not much to do during the winter.” He scratched his head as he thought about it. “Do you want to go to the beach again?”
“I probably will. Is the letter still valid?” I meant the letter he had given me before that gave me permission to build temporary structures at the Emerald Cove.
“It’s still valid.”
“Wonderful…”
“It will be cold there, but I think you’ll enjoy yourself.”
“I’m already shivering when I think about it! By the way, I have a little bit of a special rice here. Can you send some to the Fox clan’s temple? Anonymously, of course.”
“Of course.”
We made a little more small talk until the feast was ready, then he left to bring the sacks of newly harvested rice to the White Tiger clan’s warehouse.
“Good evening, Teacher,” said my apprentices when they arrived.
They looked pale and tired, with dark circles under their eyes.
“My lady, the feast is ready,” said Fengying.
She ushered us into the hall where we sat down and enjoyed the fruits of our labor.
First, we were served hot tea and a dish of cold cuts. It was a traditional starter, but never my favorite, especially now that the weather was cold. Next came a wonderful soup called One Hundred Birds Paying Homage to the Phoenix. It came in a big porcelain bowl, and when Fengying lifted the lid, I saw that it was a whole chicken surrounded by chicken-shaped dumplings in a clear broth.
Banquets were slow affairs, with dishes being served sometimes an hour apart. My three apprentices were beyond tired when we started but regained their spirit when we started eating. The table became lively with their chatter.
“Madame Fengying said that the banquet is rice-themed,” said Lari. Ever since he arrived at the farm, he had been a big eater and was always the first to learn about what food we were having next, though nowadays I noticed that he ate a lot less than he did before.
“The next dish will be the mushrooms I foraged,” said Mo.
“After that will be fish and rice,” said Kharli.
The three of them had definitely become foodies.
As dish after dish of delicious food was served, we became lively and a little sleepy. However, we all sat up to attention when Deming himself came out of the kitchen to place a small, steaming hot clay pot in front of me.
“Claypot Chicken Rice,” he said.
“Oh, I love claypot rice!” I said.
It was, as the name implied, chicken, rice, mushrooms, and vegetables cooked together in a clay pot.
I eagerly dug in and started eating. The moment I put a spoonful in my mouth, I was in rapture at the complex flavors and textures of the dish.
“If you weren’t already married, I’d ask you to marry me!” I said to the Demon Chef.
Everyone, even Fengying and Deming, laughed.
“That’s exactly what the Duchess said.” Fengying’s eyes twinkled. “That’s why we had to leave the Duke’s service.”
“A certain prince might cry if he heard you,” said Deming. That was the longest sentence that I had ever heard him say.
His assistants started going around and distributing the claypot rice to the others, and he went back to the kitchen to prepare the rest of the food.
“I think I must have saved the world in my last life to be able to eat this kind of food,” said Kharli.
My other two apprentices nodded.
“Maybe I was a great general, and now I’m being rewarded for my meritorious deeds in my past life,” said Lari.
“I probably was so pitiful in my last life that the gods took pity on me and made me lucky in this life,” said Mo.
By the time we finished the next two dishes, it was almost midnight, but there was one last thing served, sweet red bean soup made with beans, red rice, and sugar.
“Ah! Blood soup!” said Lari. I thought he was going to reject it, but he lifted it and tipped it into his mouth. He finished the small bowl in seconds and said, “Delicious.”
The two girls sniffed their food suspiciously while I ate. Lari asked for two more bowls.
Eventually, Mo dipped a spoon in it and then licked the spoon. “It doesn’t taste like blood at all!”
Reassured, Kharli tried it out, too. “Sweet.”
I laughed a little at their antics and continued eating.
At the end of the banquet, Deming came out of the kitchen, and we applauded his efforts.
However, it did not escape my notice that he hadn’t cooked the black rice.
Was there a problem with it? I decided to ask him tomorrow since it was already late, and he had been working hard since dawn.