[Cozy Fantasy] [Farming LitRPG] The Chronicles of Emberstone Farm

Chapter 149 - I'm the heroine, not a grain-stander

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It was the earthquake event! This probably meant that the mountain pass was now open, and I could access Cypress Town, which was a magical place full of immortals…

Or, rather, their ghosts!

Shivering at the thought of seeing a bunch of ghosts in real life, I waited until the earthquake subsided before going back to playing with my slime pet.

“Good girl!" I petted Cutie on the top of her head. She was now proficient in forming appendages that she could use to pick up objects.

“Chu!” Cutie extruded another slime “arm” and used it to hold my hand and rub it against her head until she was satisfied. “Chuuuuu.”

Maybe I should bring Cutie with me when I visit the ghost town. Her cuteness might help me deal with the scary stuff.

“Lady Violet!”

I saw Yinuo running towards me with a worried look on her face.

“I’m here. I’m fine,” I said.

“My lady, I was worried you might have been frightened by the White Tiger’s rumblings.”

“Hmm? Oh, the earthquake. Yeah, it was a little alarming, but there’s no harm done. Was anything in the house broken?”

“Yes, but it was only a few pots with nothing important inside. We lost some flour and pickles.” Yinuo smiled mischievously. “The wine is all safe. That was the first thing the men checked!”

“And my apprentices?”

“All unhurt.”

“Great. How is your search for a husband, by the way?” I picked Cutie up and started walking back to her [Slime House].

“The first matchmaker I went to refused to take me on as a client because she said I was too old. I know I’m twenty-eight, that’s why I’m spending a lot of money on a matchmaker!” Yinuo’s voice rose in indignation. “The second and third ones’ fees were too much. The fourth agreed, but…”

“What?”

“She said I should give up on finding a handsome husband!”

“Excuse me?! Why would a matchmaker say that?” I gave her a horrified look.

“She told me that other qualities were more important.”

“Well, to be fair, I guess they are. Personality is very important.”

Yinuo rolled her eyes. “I told all the matchmakers I don’t need someone who has money since I’m working for you. All I want is a husband to work with me here.”

I gave her the thumbs up. “Yes, Fengying has been complaining that we need more staff. We could definitely use a footman or two.”

“So I stood firm on wanting a handsome man. He doesn’t have to be a world-class beauty.” Yinuo raised both her hands to the heavens in a pleading gesture towards fate or whoever might be listening. “Just someone decently attractive. I’ll be meeting two people after the planting season.”

“Oh?”

“But I can tell from what the matchmaker told me that they’re not good-looking. ‘They’re both nice people’ is what she said when I asked her what they looked like.”

“Oh come on, you never know, you might like them when you meet them.”

Yinuo sighed. “I hope so. This is taking a lot of time and money…”

I commiserated with her and tried not to act smug about my situation. It was nice to have a handsome boyfriend, even if we did have a long-distance relationship right now.

Once I got Cutie settled in her house, Yinuo and I went to the outer courtyard which was in chaos as everyone was running here and there checking on all the rooms to see if anything might fall if there was an aftershock. The things on the shelves and tables were all put down on the floor.

Not wanting to add to the hullabaloo, I left after making a plausible excuse. “It looks like Fengying has everything in control here. I’ll check my [Ranch House].”

I went to my house and tidied up as I thought about the pros and cons of going to the mountain pass. My place was mostly unscathed by the earthquake. A few things had broken when they fell off the kitchen shelves, but it was easy for me to drag and drop the items into the System trash can.

On the one hand, I was very fond of the cute jewelry the player got from Cypress town.

On the other hand, how scary were the ghosts likely to be?

I decided to focus on farming for now and go to the town when Prince Baiyu returned, which was likely to take some time, unfortunately. He had sent a letter to me saying that his mother had taken one of the Paramount Serendipitous Celestial Pills and was with child. This was a top-secret piece of information since it was very early in her pregnancy. He was unable to come and visit me since he feared upsetting her since folk beliefs said that emotional distress could cause a miscarriage.

He didn’t say so directly, but the fact that he wrote that his coming to live with me might cause emotional distress obviously meant the Lady of the West was not in favor of further progressing our relationship. Prince Baiyu did promise that he would at least visit “soon” though he didn’t name a specific date.

These thoughts made me feel a little depressed though he did say that his father, Lord Yulin, was on his side and had hired an expert marital tutor to instruct Prince Baiyu on how to become a good husband to a human.

I wanted to see him soon to tease him about the lessons. Was the tutoring structured like university classes back on Earth? I smiled at the thought of Prince Baiyu going to a lecture on “Love Languages 101” or “Financial Partnership Strategies”.

Thinking of Prince Baiyu’s letter reminded me that I should let Shuye know that the farm was okay after the earthquake, so I quickly wrote a short note to reassure him that everything was fine, then I spent the day resting and planning my next moves.

***

The following morning, I woke up bright and early and greeted the dawn with my apprentices at the westernmost rice paddy.

“Rice day is the best day!” I hugged everyone. “We’re gonna get so much exp.”

It was nearly summer but the air was still cool. In the rice paddy which had been drained of water, the mature plants stood tall, their slender stalks swaying gently in the breeze. Each plant bore an abundance of heavy, golden-hued grains, hanging in dense clusters, that promised our biggest rice harvest ever. I inhaled deeply, enjoying the scent of ripe rice. The rhythmic rustling of leaves brushing against one another was pleasant to the ear. I put a hand on my chest, overcome by a feeling of quiet contentment and belonging.

Mo took my other hand in hers, and in that moment I could see in her eyes that we were both filled with the same emotion. We shared a moment of silent communication before the household staff arrived.

“Good morning, my lady.”

“Good morning!” I greeted everyone. They were all here to watch the first rice harvest of the year and had brought food and drinks with them.

We ate toast with herbed butter and soft, sweet cheese, along with some demon pork sausages, washed down with either water or tea. I stood on the sidelines as Deming and his assistants walked around the perimeter of the field waving a bundle of flaming herbs while praying. The smoke from the burning leaves was supposed to spiritually purify the rice.

I thought it was weird that they were doing this now when they had ignored it before, but Fengying explained that they simply hadn’t known what ritual to perform seeing as my farm was different from others. Now that they had consulted some wise women, they appeared confident that these prayers would help.

I figured there was no harm in keeping the staff happy, so I permitted them to conduct the ritual.

They completed circling the field and bowed to us before going to the other rice field. We had three of them. The biggest one was for the white rice and two smaller ones for the purple and red rice varieties.

“Guys, shall we start?” I said to my apprentices.

“Yes! I love rice!” said Lari.

“Me, too,” said Kharli.

“I’ll go first!” Mo scampered off to the far side of the field.

The rest of us scattered. I also went to the other side since I didn’t want to work with the rest of the household watching my every move. Yinuo followed behind me though I’d told her earlier that I wouldn’t need her help since I would be using the System’s automatic harvest mode.

I bent down to touch the rice panicles. They were the only thing we needed, but the System would uproot the entire plant for me automatically. I mentally clicked on the empty sacks in my inventory and took out a sickle which I then swung at a rice plant. The nearest plants disappeared, and a sack of rice and a pile of crop residues appeared in two previously empty spaces in my inventory. The crop residues, meaning the rest of the rice plant excluding the rice grains, could be used for various purposes, but we used them in making [Animal Feed].

My energy bar was partially drained.

Manual harvesting was much more satisfying but also much more physically tiring. The vegetables were pretty okay to harvest by hand, but rice was a different matter. I didn't want my household staff to have to do all of the threshing, winnowing, drying, etc. when I could separate the grains from the plant myself quite easily.

Of course, before the rice grains could be eaten they had to be milled. This time, however, the clans had requested rice seedlings and unmilled seed rice for planting instead of milled rice for eating because they wanted to try growing their own spirit rice.

I continued swinging my sickle until I ran out of energy. The System did all the work and I didn’t feel tired at all though my energy bar indicated that I was running out of energy very quickly. After only a few minutes, I was out of energy.

“I’m done. Let’s go to the ox carts,” I said to Yinuo.

My apprentices waved at me and pointed in the direction of the house. It seems that none of us had leveled up today. We all started walking back to the house where we put the sacks of rice in the carts for the clan members to transport to Shuye’s warehouse.

As usual, the Demon Chef identified our crop as [Miracle Pearl Rice], low grade.

Lari opened a sack and took out a handful of the grains. The short-grained rice was a light brown color since they still had their husk, and were slightly rough to the touch. I picked up a single grain and peeled off the outer layer, revealing a smooth brown rice grain with a subtle pearlescent sheen. This was what white rice looked like before the brown rice bran was polished off the grain. I’d tried to convince my household staff to switch to brown rice, which had more nutrients and fiber compared to white rice which had the bran removed, but I was mostly unsuccessful. Everyone still liked fluffy white rice rather than the chewier brown or red rice.

“Teacher, no one leveled up today,” said Kharli.

“Don’t worry, you guys are close, right?” I smiled when they all nodded. “Me, too. I think tomorrow all of us will level up!”