Chapter 532 Forest-Scaled Farming
\"So, in the end, we have grain-based stuff like wheat, barley, rye and corn, as well as other things like, potatos, carrots, tomatos, onions, turnips… Then there's also melons, pumpki-\" Jyuuk counted as he looked at the mountain of seeds in front of him to see if they really had everything they needed, but the old man stopped him with a light smile.
\"Let's just plant everything one at a time, alright? So first would be wheat then, right?\" Eisen suggested, and the monkey-beastperson slowly turned his head toward the old man, quickly nodding his head, \"Oh yeah, sure. Then just wait a bit, we'll vitalize the soil for now.\" Jyuuk suggested as he stood up and looked over toward Xenia, \"You ready to go?\"
\"Ah, of course. If we properly gather the ambient mana into the right places, and then use your element to artificially 'fuse' it into the soil, that should give it a bit more energy, right?\" The High-Elf asked. Jyuuk thought about it for a few moments and then looked toward the fields that Eisen had already fully plowed.
\"Definitely. I'm going to be planting a bit of grass around the area and then make it rot again, just so that we can use it as something like fertiliser as well. Shouldn't take too long, though.\" Jyuuk pointed out.
With a satisfied expression, the old man then watched as the two of them swiftly stepped onto the field and Jyuuk started spreading grass-seeds around before the brown floor soon turned vibrantly green. But a few moments later, after the wave of green, it once more turned dark brown, nearly black, and then green again. It was as if there were really waves of grass spreading out with each step that Jyuuk and Xenia took.
And while it was a pretty interesting sight, Eisen was more excited about actually seeing the giant wheat grow in a bit. The seeds that Jyuuk had brought with him were already ones that he had specially prepared and created to naturally grow into giant versions of themselves.
It seemingly didn't take too long for Xenia and Jyuuk to finish what they wanted to do with the field, and they soon returned back to Eisen who was waiting to get started. Once they returned, Jyuuk quickly grabbed the large bag of wheat seeds and then waved his hand to the side. On his arm, an eagle appeared that Eisen actually hadn't seen before.
It seemed like its body was similar to something like wood, although the feathers on its wings and back were similar to leaves. It was pretty large, so much that it seemed somewhat unnatural for it to be sitting on Jyuuk's arm. But either way, it grabbed the bag of seeds that Jyuuk handed it and then flew of, ready to spread the seeds around.
\"A new eagle?\" Eisen asked with a smile on his face, and Jyuuk chuckled a bit and just nodded, \"Yeah, I've been working on him for a little while. Similar with the 'Undeath Eagle', it's a special creation. I was hatching the egg of a regular eagle and infused it with the essence of different plants.\"
\"I see, so it's basically your helper when it comes to plant-control stuff now?\"
\"Basically, yes. While the eagles don't really have such amazing combat strength when compared t o their rank, they all have pretty amazing special abilities. For example, Akatori is now officially a Phoenix, and he has a rebirth ability. For one, when I have him help me out, I can resurrect my tamed monsters really easily should they die. Well, it's not that hard to anyway, but it's even easier and faster, and nearly has no repercussions.\" Jyuuk explained to Eisen, who looked at the 'Nature Eagle' flying over the fields.
\"Then that means this one has an ability to accelerate plant-growth?\" The old man asked him. Jyuuk quickly nodded again.
\"Yes, although it's not just a speed-boost, it's a general ability-buff. So he's going to also make it possible to make the plants a little bigger than I usually would be able to, and that while keeping it much more stable.\"
\"Interesting…\" Eisen muttered quietly as he watched the eagle return to Jyuuk's arm, quickly climbing over him to just grab onto both of his shoulders. Jyuuk just turned over toward Xenia, before the two of them headed out to the fields again. Xenia tried her best to properly feed the ambient natural mana into Jyuuk's plant-control efforts.
And before Eisen knew it, stalks shot out of the ground, immediately developing into wheat that was just towering above Eisen. They grew to be roughly ten meters tall in total and had stalks thicker than both of Eisen's arms combined. So that Eisen could properly watch this all happen, he properly increased his size from the sidelines and as such was able to see the wheat grow. In anticipation, it seemed like even Eisen's multitool was ready to go as it quickly changed itself into its scythe mode so that Eisen could properly farm all of this.
It didn't take long until the whole field had been properly covered in this giant wheat, and both Jyuuk and Xenia returned to the Wood-Giant.
\"Alright, you're ready to go, I'd say.\"
\"Perfect, thank you.\" Eisen said with a smile, and swiftly grabbed the multitool in both of his hands while commanding the wood-giant to pick up Jyuuk and Xenia so that they would have a good sight of Eisen's work no matter where he was.
And as the two of them sat down on the wood-giant's palm, Eisen got started. With swift motions, he quickly cut off the heads of the wheat where the actual grains were and had some of Melissa's bees collect them to have them piled up right next to the wood-giant.
But not only did Eisen rather easily and quickly cut off the heads, but he then also cut through the stems themselves to have them collected as well. They could be used for a couple different projects pretty easily too, so Eisen didn't want to just completely waste them.
Just like that, this old man started stepping through this giant field and cut down the just-as-giant wheat that had been grown here. After everything had been collected properly, Eisen switched places with Jyuuk and Xenia again and had them plant the next seeds, the ones for Barley, while the old man himself properly started bundling everything together.
With Sal's help, Eisen swiftly bound the stalks together into thick bundles that he then had Sigurd store inside of the dungeon. There was a fair amount of space to actually store everything, after all. Since the dungeon wasn't being used right now as an actual dungeon, it could be misused as extra storage space for the time being until they found a different place to keep everything.
Once Xenia and Jyuuk made the barley grow, Eisen once more went out to cut everything down, had it collected, and while Xenia and Jyuuk worked on the next seeds, he properly prepared everything to be stored.
This all continued until the part for the 'grain' based things was over. The corn was already pretty bothersome, since it had been grown to be roughly the same height as Eisen, so it wasn't just as easy to cut through everything smoothly. But in the end, he still managed to do so nonetheless.
Either way, the next things they would be going through were things like potatos, carrots, or onions. Simply things that grew in the ground and had to be specifically pulled instead of just cut down. This would also require Eisen to work a little more after he got everything from the field, since it meant he had to plow through everything a bit again. The ground would most likely be pretty dug up afterward, after all.
But in the end, that was fine. It also increased Eisen's farming proficiency, so the old man didn't really mind it. And so, Jyuuk and Xenia swiftly planted the last seeds that would be taken care of for the day, the potatos.
And so, Eisen just went through the fields and pulled the potatoes out of the ground. This time they were a bit too heavy for the bees to carry, so Eisen had to bring them back to the wood-giant every once in a while, meaning that it took even longer.
\"But this is nice too…\" Eisen muttered quietly to himself. This was definiteley more relaxing than just cutting down wheat or barley. And since Eisen was really just working constantly without taking a single proper break these days, this was something that he kind of needed.
The next morning was similarly relaxing, as Eisen simply took his time to re-plow the field and picking the carrots, although in the middle of his work, a notification appeared in front of Eisen.
[Farming has reached level 100 in rank 3, upgrading to rank 4]
\"Ah, there we go.\" The old man said with a smile as he cracked his neck, \"Guess the time to relax is over now.\" He chuckled to himself and then proceeded to summon as many mana-doubles as he could to finish up with this. As this would result in a lot of lost proficiency, Eisen didn't do this before now. But either way, for him, it was no longer about leveling up his farming skill, but about his Mana Double skill to get it to Rank 4. And to top it off, Eisen also used his mana copy skill to basically copy everything on the field at any time to 'update' the data and get a little bit more proficiency for his mana-copy skill. Sure, there may be ways to level them up more efficiently, but this whole thing wasn't only to make Eisen's skills level up, but also to actually get materials.
One of the other skills Eisen had to rank up one more time was cooking, so Eisen thought he should get started on making provisions for the trip to the giant-country. And not only that, they also needed rather big ingredients if Eisen was going to cook something for the Giants. They didn't seem to be necessarily all that happy with people just intruding on their land, but the old man was sure that a few good dishes should make it easier to gain their trust.
Of course, Eisen being the son of the first King of the Fire Giants should also help out with all of that, although Eisen couldn't be sure that they were really going to believe him that this was actually the case.
So, the old man just wanted to prepare by opening up a lot of different ways to befriend the giants.