Chapter 28. Increasing Agility

Chapter 28. Increasing Agility

Squawk!

"Ugh..."

Sejun woke up to the cry of the baby bear.

Lately, the mother Crimson Giant Bear's work hours have been getting a bit earlier. It feels like she wants to leave the cub here as quickly as possible? Come to think of it, the time she comes to pick up the cub has been getting later and later. What's going on?

Swish.

Sejun got up and added another mark to the cave wall. Five completed 正 in the fourth row. The 175th day of being stranded started with the baby bear's cries.

Squeak!

Clang!

Buzz!

The rabbits and venomous bees greeted Sejun in the morning.

Sejun washed his face and walked over to the sweet potato jerky drying on the leek leaves.

The sweet potato jerky he had made had run out, so Sejun had baked and sliced 50 new sweet potatoes to make more jerky yesterday.

Naturally, yesterday's menu was baked sweet potatoes, which he enjoyed very much with the rabbits and the tower's manager.

Thanks to this, everyone ate the even sweeter baked sweet potatoes with their faces covered in soot, not even noticing.

Chomp.

Sejun picked up a well-dried sweet potato jerky that had been drying while he slept and put it in his mouth.

Munch.

"Ugh..."

The jerky, full of sunlight, released a sweet and warm flavor in his mouth, signaling to his brain that energy was entering his hungry post-sleep state, waking it up.

Swallow.

"Hmm, hmm, hmm. It's well-dried."

Sejun confirmed that the sweet potato jerky was well-made and whistled a tune as he took out the amount he would eat for breakfast and put the rest in a leather bag.

Crunch. Crunch.

The rabbits were eating carrots while waiting for Sejun to give them the sweet potato jerky.

"Let's eat the sweet potato jerky."

Sejun gave three pieces of sweet potato jerky to each rabbit.

And he gave six pieces, twice as many, to his wife rabbit, whose appetite had increased as her belly grew.

After eating the sweet potato jerky for breakfast, Sejun started the morning farming. He cut leek leaves and immediately harvested the cherry tomatoes.

"Oh, this is a good one!"

Snap.

Sejun cut a branch full of cherry tomatoes.

[You have harvested 10 well-ripened magical cherry tomatoes simultaneously.]

[Your job experience has increased slightly.]

[Your Harvesting Level 3 proficiency has increased slightly.]

[Your Harvesting Level 3 proficiency has increased by an additional 5% due to the Level 1 effect.]

[Your Harvesting Level 3 proficiency is full, and your level has increased.]

[Your Harvesting Level 3 has gained a new effect.]

[You have gained 200 experience points.]

"Oh!"

Sejun hurried to check his skill when he saw the message that a new effect had been added to the Harvesting skill.

[Job Skill - Harvesting Level 4]

-When harvesting, slightly under-ripe or over-ripe fruits are brought to their optimal state.

-There is a very low probability of harvesting a crop one grade higher than the one you can normally harvest.

Although the very low probability is ambiguous, the idea of harvesting a higher-grade crop made him feel good, just imagining the taste of even sweeter cherry tomatoes.

"Does a new effect get added to the job skill when it reaches Level 4?"

Sejun decided to check if other job skills would gain new effects when they reached Level 4 and then continued harvesting cherry tomatoes to bring to his wife rabbit.

While harvesting the cherry tomatoes,

Squeak!

The black rabbit called Sejun. It was lunchtime.

"Got it."

Sejun went to the pond, moved the piranhas caught by the black rabbit to the fire, seasoned them with salt and pepper, and grilled the fish. Of course, the white rabbits couldn't eat pepper, so he only seasoned their fish with salt.

As the grilled fish was almost done,

Squawk! Squawk!

The baby bear, smelling the delicious aroma, started crying from hunger. But Sejun and the rabbits, now experienced, quickly gathered their things without panicking.

Then,

"Pull!"

Squawk! Squawk!

The baby bear started pulling Sejun and the rabbits up.

On the ground, about ten branches as thick as Sejun's arm were piled next to the baby bear.

Sejun had asked the baby bear to bring branches of similar thickness to his arm, and it had been gathering a few at a time since yesterday.

He had planned to make ladders and other necessities, but he hadn't had time due to farming.

With the baby rabbits soon to be born, the workforce would increase, but with Sejun's many plans and the desire to plant more, the fields would expand even faster.

He had thought that farming only required strength and stamina, but speed was also necessary. Therefore, he planned to increase his agility stat from now on.

Squawk?

The baby bear looked at Sejun with a proud expression, as if asking for praise. Did I do well?

"You did well."

Plop plop.

Sejun patted the baby bear's buttocks, which were already larger than his own height, and started eating lunch.

"Here, try this."

Sejun gave the baby bear a sweet potato. Since the baby bear had gone home early yesterday and hadn't eaten the sweet potato, Sejun had saved five sweet potatoes for it. This made the tower's manager pout, wondering why he had set them aside separately.

Nom.

The baby bear put the sweet potato in its mouth without peeling it.

Squawk!

The baby bear chewed the sweet potato and shook its body, showing how delicious it was. Yum!

Nom.

Nom.

Nom.

The baby bear kept putting sweet potatoes in its mouth.

Then,

Squawk...

The baby bear, holding the last sweet potato, got up after a moment of thought.

"Huh?"

Squeak?

Sejun and the black rabbit, who had never seen the baby bear get up before finishing its meal, looked at it.

Plop.

The baby bear went to the field, dug a hole, and buried its sweet potato. Then it covered it with soil and patted it down.

The baby bear, having learned planting, thought that anything planted in the ground would grow, and had planted the sweet potato.

"Ha ha!"

Sejun burst out laughing at the baby bear's silly action.

The black rabbit quickly ran to the baby bear. It was time for a lesson.

Squeak!

When the black rabbit told the baby bear to dig up the sweet potato,

Squawk.

The baby bear tilted its head. Brother said if I plant this, I can eat more later.

Squeak.

The black rabbit shook its head and replied. Cooked things don't grow.

Squawk!

The baby bear, enlightened by the black rabbit's words, dug up the sweet potato, put it in its mouth, and returned to its seat.

After the pleasant lunch, Sejun gave his knee to the baby bear and the black rabbit, drank coffee, and took a short break.

Then,

"Get up now."

After waking the baby bear and the black rabbit from their nap, Sejun went to the field to plant the carrot tops left by the rabbits before going back to the cave.

Then,

"Huh? Why does the ground smell fishy?"

A strong fishy smell came from the ground.

Plop.

Sejun, sensing something was wrong, dug where the smell was coming from.

"Whoa!"

Sejun was surprised by what he found in the ground.

Grin.

A piranha's head greeted Sejun.

"Why did you bury it standing up?!"

Sejun, annoyed, looked at the culprit who had planted it.

Squawk!

The baby bear, full of energy after lunch, was digging the ground with its front paws like an excavator. It might have been thinking of planting piranhas there too.

The baby bear needed a supplementary lesson.

***

Floor 75 of the Tower.

Theo sat on Sejun's knee, thinking about eating a treat while moving quickly to reach the shop area.

"Teapot, blanket, 5 glass bottles for honey, tongs. Teapot..."

Theo repeated what Sejun had asked for to avoid forgetting and entered the general store to buy the items and left the store.

"Purrr. I succeeded in haggling again."

Theo had haggled 3 times and managed to get the price down from 2.1 Tower Coins to 1.7 Tower Coins.

On the way to the last stop, the blacksmith's shop,

"Mr. Theo, hello."

Someone called out to him.

"Huh? You?!"

Theo recognized the person.

"Isn't this the mark I almost got scammed by Scaram?"

"That... That's right. My name is Jeras."

Jeras, almost choking with emotion, managed to answer. He was already angry because he knew from the investigation that Theo had been scammed by Scaram. To be treated as a mark by a mark!

"But what's up?"

"I couldn't repay you last time, so at least let's have a meal..."

"I refuse. I'm busy!"

Theo passed by Jeras quickly. He needed to get the equipment from the blacksmith and return to Sejun. His instincts were telling him something.

'Something feels off. Someone is after Sejun's knee!'

"Mr. Theo, at least a cup of tea!"

Jeras hurriedly followed Theo.

"Why are you following me?"

Theo, who had arrived at the blacksmith's shop, asked Jeras, who was following him.

"Um... I also have business at the blacksmith's..."

Jeras had followed Theo without a plan after his offer was rejected.

"Alright."

Theo paid 13 Tower Coins to the blacksmith, as he had done before, and went to the lottery corner.

Theo carefully examined the equipment in the lottery corner.

Then,

"Oh, there it is!"

There was an item that caught Theo's attention.

As Theo was about to pick it up,

"Wait! Are you really going to choose that?!"

Jeras, who had been secretly watching, couldn't hold back. This was too much.

"Of course. Why not?"

"Why not?! How can you choose that from a blacksmith's shop?!"

Jeras pointed at the item Theo was about to pick, excited. It was a straw hat that didn't fit the blacksmith's shop at all. To Jeras, it was a 100% useless item.

"It's fine. Don't worry about it."

Theo confidently chose the straw hat and left the blacksmith's shop.

'Sejun told me to pick what I want.'

Sejun had given Theo full authority for the lottery.

"That's not right..."

Watching Theo leave the blacksmith's shop, Jeras returned to the Secret Investigation Bureau without any results.

"Jeras, did you hear the news?"

A colleague sitting next to Jeras spoke to him.

"What news?"

"Someone broke into Grid's warehouse on the 55th floor this time."

"Is that so?"

Jeras thought it was just a coincidence. Grid was a notorious landlord who exploited tenant farmers.

"And here's the list of stolen items. The director wants you to check it."

"Got it."

Jeras quickly scanned the list, flipping through a few pages.

Then,

"Huh?!"

He saw a familiar item on the stolen list. An ordinary straw hat, similar to the one he had seen at the blacksmith's shop.

But,

"No, it can't be."

There were hundreds of such straw hats in any general store.

Jeras covered the stolen list and thought about how to uncover Theo's activities.

***

In the afternoon, Sejun re-educated the baby bear about planting and harvested seeds from the carrot flowers, which he had been too busy to do.

The rabbits, seeing the amount of stored carrots halve, urged Sejun to hurry.

Rustle.

Rustle.

As Sejun shook the dry carrot flowers, carrot seeds fell.

[You have obtained 50 carrot seeds from the carrot flowers.]

[Your job experience has increased slightly.]

[Your Seed Harvesting Level 1 proficiency has increased slightly.]

[Your Seed Harvesting Level 1 proficiency has increased by an additional 5% due to the Level 1 effect.]

[You have obtained 35 carrot seeds from the carrot flowers.]

...

..

.

In total, they obtained about 2000 carrot seeds. Sejun and the rabbits planted half of the seeds in the cave and the other half in the field.

When the carrot planting in the field was complete,

[You have created a 250-pyeong carrot field.]

[You have gained 500 experience points.]

[You have leveled up.]

[You have gained 1 bonus stat.]

Sejun increased his agility to speed up his work with the bonus stat.

On the 175th day of being stranded, Sejun planted 2000 carrots and increased his agility.