To be honest, I’d taken it for granted that all synthesized slimes would get the Farming ability.
After watching Mark Two work the field, it was easy to mistake slimes for monsters whose natural job was farming.
“Poison, seriously?”
Did that mean the ability a slime gained from synthesis was random?
When I thought about it calmly, though, randomness was actually better.
If they could only learn Farming, my options would be limited.
If they could acquire all kinds of abilities, I could put them to use in many different ways.
Squirm…
Of course, the sight of the creature slowly wobbling about reminded me that a single Poison ability wasn’t enough to take it hunting yet.
[Poison LV.1]
Emits toxins that poison the target.
A poisoned target becomes paralyzed after at least 10 minutes.
Just as I’d expected, the effect was underwhelming.
A paralyzing poison might have its uses, but taking ten minutes to work was another matter.
‘There might be ways to use it, but I don’t even know how strong the paralysis is.’
For now, I decided to be happy about the possibilities.
Who knew?
Perhaps the Poison ability would level up and become genuinely powerful one day.
“Your name is Dokdoki.”
Squirm?
“I said I’m naming you Dokdoki from now on.”
Squirm!
I was gradually reaching the point where I could understand the slimes’ gestures.
Could it be another effect of Slime Lord?
“Dokdoki, how do you use your poison?
Do you spit it out, or are the secretions from your body poisonous?”
Squish…
Blaaah!
For a moment, something resembling a mouth appeared on Dokdoki, and it spat something out.
“Oh, so you spit it?”
Squish…
“No?”
Squirm, squirm!
“You can do both?”
Squirm!
I was amazed that we could communicate even this much.
I watched Dokdoki’s poison demonstration for a while before noticing how much time had passed.
“Hold on.
Let me make you a friend first.”
Slime Lord’s cooldown had just ended, so I used it to summon a Level 1 slime.
Pop?!
A familiar-looking slime appeared and wriggled around as though wondering where it was.
Dokdoki promptly approached the newcomer and began squirming.
Squirm, squirm.
Squish?
While the two carried on a high-level conversation beyond my understanding, Mark Two returned from tending the vegetable patch.
Squish!
“Hm?
Don’t tell me it’s harvest time already?”
Squirm!
Mark Two wriggled as though urging me to hurry, then crawled ahead.
Just as I’d suspected, it stopped in the section where the carrots were planted.
“Ooh!”
The leaves were unusually large.
Most of each carrot was still concealed beneath the soil, but the little patches of orange already protruding from the ground were enough to tell me they were nothing like the size I was used to.
Gulp.
Maybe it was because this was my first successful crop and my first harvest, or perhaps because of their extraordinary size.
Whatever the reason, I found myself staring at the carrots with inexplicable nervousness.
Oblivious to my feelings, Mark Two pulled one straight out of the ground.
Pop!
“Ooooooh!”
An exclamation of wonder burst out of me.
The entire carrot was revealed, gleaming with a brilliant orange hue like a precious gemstone.
It was much larger than I’d expected, though not impossibly enormous.
It was the sort of carrot that would make you say, ‘Oh?
Carrots can grow this big?’
“But the color…”
I wasn’t using a metaphor or exaggerating.
Its faintly translucent body caught the light and glittered like glass, as though it really were a jewel.
“Is this even safe to eat?”
Just then, Mark Two proudly brought over the carrot it had pulled.
When I accepted it, the slime made a great fuss, almost as if warning me to be careful with it.
Pop!
Squirm!
Squish!
“All right, all right.
I’ll be careful.”
It was only a food ingredient, so I wasn’t sure what exactly I was supposed to be careful about.
Still, I held it gently in both hands.
[Mana-Infused Carrot LV.1]
Contains a faint amount of mana.
When consumed, enhances eyesight for 3 minutes according to the user’s mana capacity.
Afterward, permanently improves eyesight by an extremely small amount.
What was this?
I couldn’t be seeing things, could I?
“A mere carrot is being recognized as an item…?”
I stared in amazement at the item window that had appeared.
The fact that it had an item window meant the carrot was officially classified as an item.
Not every object from Earth qualified, and even things found inside dungeons weren’t automatically recognized as items.
“Is it because it’s infused with mana?”
Some dungeon fruits and berries counted as items, while others didn’t.
Most that did were plants or fruits used as ingredients in exceptionally powerful elixirs.
“Don’t tell me every carrot I planted here is an item?”
I didn’t dare expect that much, but the possibility flashed through my mind.
“It’s all right to harvest them now, isn’t it?”
Squirm!
With Mark Two’s approval, we started pulling up the carrots.
My vegetable patch was only about a hundred pyeong, so the crop wasn’t enormous, but I’d planted more than three hundred carrots.
Harvesting all of them still took some time.
“Phew.”
For every carrot I dug up, Mark Two harvested three.
I was slow because I was trying not to damage them, but Mark Two pulled them out like an expert, without leaving so much as a scratch.
‘Mark Two really is a blessing.’
Thanks to this slime, it felt as though my life was finally turning around.
By the time we’d harvested the entire crop of just over three hundred carrots, flowers had begun to bloom on the cherry tomato plants as well.
“Huh?
Come to think of it, have you been pollinating all the flowers by yourself too?”
Squish!
Mark Two had been tending the whole field alone, and with the plants growing so quickly, it must have had to work at a frantic pace.
It really was amazing.
The slime gave the harvested carrots a nudge as though telling me to take responsibility for them now, then went back to the tomatoes.
“It’s more reliable than it looks.”
From the outside, it looked slow, not terribly bright, and rather cute.
But when it came to work, it got things done properly.
That left me wondering what to do with the sudden harvest.
“I never imagined I’d be harvesting so soon.”
After three years of struggling to get even a single sprout, who could have predicted that I’d go from planting to harvesting in just two days?
“Dokdoki, and you too, new guy.
It’s time for you to work.”
I summoned the two slimes, who were still carrying on their incomprehensible conversation, and had them sort and move the carrots.
Worried that they might become contaminated with poison, I instructed Dokdoki not to release any toxins unless I specifically ordered it to.
“Wow.
Every single one is an item?”
It was true.
All 309 carrots were recognized as items without exception.
They were large, too.
I set ten aside for my quest, then wondered what to do with the rest.
“Should I try eating one?”
It almost felt like a waste to eat one myself.
After all, I’d spent three years and enormous resources just to reach this point.
It was only natural to feel reluctant.
“Come on, I’ve got Mark Two now.
I should be able to grow more whenever I want.”
I had to believe in myself and trust my slimes.
Having made up my mind, I picked up a carrot and moved to take a bite, only to stop short.
Squirm…
Mark Two, which had been tending the tomatoes, was staring at me as I prepared to eat.
“What?
What is it?”
Squirm…
“You don’t want me to eat it?”
Squirm…
Mark Two approached and picked up a carrot of its own.
It was surprisingly good at holding things for a creature without hands.
“You want to eat one too?”
Squish!
“Of course you can!
I can’t let you eat all of them, but…
let’s say you can have ten.”
At that moment, Dokdoki and the new recruit each grabbed a carrot too.
“…You two get five each.”
Squirm!
The slimes wobbled as though thanking me, then started eating before I did.
I’d thought they didn’t need food, but apparently that wasn’t the case.
“Hey!
Your lord hasn’t even taken a bite yet!
How can you start eating before me?”
Crunch!
After making that little joke, I bit into my carrot.
Juice immediately flooded out, wetting my hand.
“Mmm?!”
Was this really a carrot?
Yes, there was no doubt about it.
It had the texture of a carrot and tasted like a carrot.
But the sheer quantity of juice, the rich carrot flavor, and the heightened natural sweetness overwhelmed my tongue.
[Your eyesight is enhanced for 3 minutes.]
As if to drive home the fact that I’d eaten an item, a system window appeared at the same moment.
‘No.
Who cares about eyesight right now?!’
A heavenly vegetable.
That was the only name worthy of it.
Its taste was on an entirely different level, to the point that comparing it with an ordinary carrot felt insulting.
Crunch, crunch.
Somehow, it grew even sweeter the more I chewed.
Yet the sweetness wasn’t cloying or overwhelming.
Instead, it left a long, lingering impression.
‘If I had to compare it to something, perhaps coffee or tea with a naturally sweet aroma?’
I didn’t drink alcohol, so I couldn’t say for certain, but people said the refined fragrance of expensive whiskey or wine lingered in the mouth for a long time.
This carrot gave me a similar feeling.
I’d taken only one bite, and the flavor stayed with me.
The funny thing was that the carrot was larger than normal, so I still had most of it left.
“…This is insane.”
I was certain this could work.
Farming might not just be a means of completing my quest.
I might actually be able to build a successful future through it.
“Of course, I still have to clear my quests.
The more my abilities improve, the better my chances of succeeding at farming.”
Everything I’d achieved had ultimately been possible because of my awakened abilities.
Liquid Synthesis had seemed useful only for potions and saddled me with a nearly day-long cooldown.
Slime Lord seemed capable of nothing more than commanding slimes and summoning one a day.
Considered separately, both were lacking.
Together, they created an astonishing synergy.
Squish!
And the little creatures responsible for all this were cute, too.
…Or was I the only one who thought so?
“Huh?!”
While I’d been lost in thought, the slimes had devoured every carrot I’d allotted them.
Their appetite was so alarming that cold sweat broke out on my skin as I wondered what would have happened if I hadn’t set limits.
“Y-you guys eat more than I expected, huh?”
I tried to sound casual, but alarm bells were ringing in my head.
‘What if slimes are actually creatures that need huge amounts of food?’
I’d only been interested in slimes for two days.
I still knew almost nothing about these monsters other than the fact that they were harmless to humans.
“Will you die if you don’t eat?”
It was a natural question to ask about any living thing, but I asked just to be sure.
Mark Two wobbled in an attempt to answer.
“Move right if you’ll die, and left if you won’t.”
Squirm…
All the slimes moved right in unison.
“Haha.
What a silly question.
Of course you will.
Hahaha.”
I forced a laugh, but cold sweat began trickling down my back.
“Then how much do you need to eat every day?
Show me using the carrots.”
Each slime started lining up the number of carrots it needed.
I had assumed it would be around ten, roughly what they’d just eaten.
But the growing piles were so far beyond my expectations that my face gradually stiffened.
“…Stop lying.
What kind of slime eats that freaking much?”
The harsh words escaped before I could stop them.
I couldn’t help it.
Mark Two was still moving carrots into its pile, which had already grown to more than thirty at a glance.
Dokdoki stopped at exactly twenty-five, while the new recruit stopped at twelve.
“M-Mark Two?”
Squirm?
At my call, Mark Two paused halfway through moving another carrot and tilted its body as though asking what was wrong.
“You mean that’s how much you need for a single day, right?”
Squirm!
I was doomed.
I’d barely harvested enough carrots to cover the slimes’ wages.
Of course, when I thought about it, growing more than three hundred carrots in two days meant it shouldn’t be such a serious problem.
I’d simply let the joy of my first harvest go to my head.
“Forty carrots, huh?
Well, you do work hard, so I guess you need to eat a lot.”
I decided not to be greedy.
All of this had become possible thanks to the slimes, so naturally their needs had to come first.
“That’s seventy-seven carrots a day.
You didn’t eat yesterday, so that’s a hundred and fifty-four.
Still, if we harvest the tomatoes tomorrow, you probably won’t go hungry.”
After finishing the calculation, I addressed the slimes.
“Leave me just the ten I set aside and ration the rest among yourselves.
We can’t have my little ones going hungry.”
Squirm!
Squish!
The slimes danced happily, then began wolfing down carrots as though they’d been starving.
Watching them made me realize how thoughtless I’d been.
“I need to head out right away.”
Until recently, I’d barely gone out once a month, but now I had to leave again immediately.
I wanted to have the carrots analyzed, buy a ladder for the newly discovered underground area, and purchase all kinds of seeds and seedlings.
I also needed more information about slimes.
While I was at it, I planned to bring samples of Mark Two’s secretions and Dokdoki’s poison for testing.
“Should I wait until the tomatoes are ready?”
They were growing so quickly that it looked as though I’d be able to harvest them soon.
If that happened, I could finally make the mana-infused fruit and vegetable juice…
“Maybe I should plant some fleeceflower root seeds too.”
After three long years, the day I could finally complete my quest was drawing near.