Chapter 25 – Three farmhands acquired!

🙞❤︎🙜

[Loyal]

That was the one quality my apprentice absolutely had to have. I didn’t care if he or she was lazy, rude, arrogant, bossy, and so forth. As long as they were loyal, I could tolerate most other faults, except for dishonesty.

I spent a few minutes confirming which of the orphans had the [Loyal] attribute. There were five, but only three of them looked old enough since I wasn’t about to adopt a toddler. I told the matron which ones I wanted, and one of Prince Baiyu’s attendants said that she would take care of it. Shuye would take the three chosen ones with him on his cart when he traveled to the farm the next day after selling the potatoes. I didn’t want to go out from behind the screen to choose, since I felt slightly guilty at not being able to help all the children. I did leave a generous donation, of course.

“I’m so glad we finished early,” I said to Prince Baiyu as we walked out of the orphanage.

He helped me into the carriage, and we spent the ride back to the West gate in a more relaxed mood. He pointed out some of the city’s landmarks to me, and I tried to seem interested while inwardly vowing to avoid returning unless I had urgent business in the city.

Once we had exited Anwei, Prince Baiyu took me in his arms again, and we flew back. This time, I was able to see that we were indeed being followed by his five attendants. I don’t think he was being deceitful by never mentioning them. I suppose that since he is a prince, he found it natural that he always had people around him, but I was a bit spooked by the thought that every time he had visited me, they had been there, too, just out of sight.

It wasn’t that strange, was it? I mean, even back on Earth, the wealthy and powerful often had bodyguards or even a full entourage of staff with them wherever they went. How many times had I browsed the Internet and seen paparazzi pictures of this or that power couple who were accompanied by nannies, personal assistants, bodyguards, and hangers-on?

Prince Baiyu had been so easy-going in this manner that I had somehow thought of him as just another friend, but today’s incident had taught me that F. Scott Fitzgerald was right. The rich really are different from you and me.

***

That night, I had another dragon dream, and the next day, Shuye arrived with a logbook detailing the merchants he dealt with and how much each of them had paid for a kilo of potatoes.

“There was a big commotion when I arrived in the central market with the goods,” said Shuye. He seemed extremely pleased and proud of himself, as he should, because the total amount he showed us made Fengying’s eyes almost pop out of their sockets.

I had asked my housekeeper to join us because I had absolutely no idea what a good price for my harvest would be.

“Why? Are my potatoes better than the other spirit farmers’ produce?” I thought that was extremely unlikely since I was just a newbie and the potatoes were just low grade ones.

Shuye guffawed. “You-you-you’re just too much!”

“What?” I was baffled by his reaction. Deming had evaluated the potatoes himself, and there was no way that the Demon Chef could be wrong about food.

Fengying smiled at me benevolently and said, “Miss, you do know that you’re the only source of spirit food, right?”

“What?” I said again.

… Come to think of it, in Adventure Incarnate there had been thousands of players and, therefore, thousands of spirit farmers, but this was not the game.

Shuye was laughing so hard that he had to wipe away tears. I patiently waited until he had finished before saying, “Is that true? Am I the only spirit farmer in this area?”

“Yes. I thought you knew,” said Shuye. He shook his head as though he couldn’t believe how ignorant I was.

It’s not my fault that I was born in a different world and didn’t know how things worked in this one.

“There must’ve been a bidding war,” said Fengying.

“Next time I might use an auction house instead of selling it myself,” said Shuye. “I just thought it would be best to give the merchants a good taste of the products first. I was able to sell the rice to the White Tiger clan because everyone is familiar with spirit rice, but no one knew what to make of the potatoes.”

“What? People don’t know about potatoes?” I would’ve thought that potatoes were pretty common in this world.

“The previous spirit farmers have always grown rice, wheat, or herbs. The Lady will buy all the rice that you produce, but I don’t think she’s realized yet that the potatoes are just as good,” he said.

“But the human merchants liked it?”

“They didn’t know what to make of it either, but I set up a cauldron and boiled some. After I sold a few people one eighth of a potato for a gold piece, the word spread, and all the big merchants came running to buy my wares,” he said. “They’ll definitely want more in the future.”

“How clever of you! Well, I guess I am rich now?” I gave Shuye and Fengying a questioning look.

“You’ll definitely never need to worry about money as long as you keep on farming,” said Shuye.

“Great! And how are my new apprentices?” I said.

Shuye smiled. “The boy is a mouthy one, but the girls seem sweet.”

“Is everything ready?” I asked Fengying.

“Yes, and they’re already waiting at the meeting hall,” she said.

“Would you like to join us and witness the ceremony?” I asked Shuye.

“I’d love to,” he said.

When we arrived at the main hall, I saw the three teenagers standing at attention in the middle of the room in front of a small table that had a tea set on it. Deming and the other staff were standing behind them.

I sat down on the wooden couch in pride of place at the far side of the room, and Shuye took his seat next to me on a hardwood chair. He would be serving as the chief witness to this ceremony.

The three orphans each took a porcelain teacup from the table and walked forward until they were right in front of me. Then they knelt down and offered me the cups.

“This apprentice greets master,” they chorused.

I took each cup and drank a sip from it, placing it on a side table when I was finished. The three apprentices then bowed down until their foreheads touched the floor.

“Rise,” I said.

They stood up and bowed yet again, this time from the waist.

Shuye and the others clapped and congratulated me on acquiring three new apprentices.

“Thank you, thank you,” I said to them. When the applause had died down, I continued, “I’ll just take these three outside and show them the ropes.”

I gestured for the three teenagers to accompany me outside. The ceremony was nice, but now it was time for me to use the System to truly make them my apprentices.

The three of them were silent as we walked out of the house and into the forest. I wanted some privacy before I revealed the secret of the System to them.

The boy was of average height and was a little stout, with short, brown hair and brown eyes. His lackluster brown hair was long and stringy, falling just above his shoulders in an unkempt manner. His eyes were small, and his nose was slightly too large for his face.

As for the girls, they looked alike enough that they could be mistaken for sisters, though I knew from the records that the matron had sent that they were not related to each other.

They were both of average height and build. The two of them had shoulder-length brown hair that was straight and unremarkable. Their eyes were both brown and their faces were fairly plain.

I guess you could say that all three of them looked like typical Adventure Incarnate NPCs.

More importantly, their attributes were pretty good. The boy was [Loyal], [Ambitious] and [Lazy], which was okay since [Lazy] didn’t mean that he wouldn’t do a lot of work. It just meant that he would do less work than the average apprentice.

The two girls were both [Loyal], but one of them was [Diligent] and [Shy] while the other one was [Helpful] and [Bossy].

“What are your names?” I already knew, of course, but it was traditional for people to receive new courtesy names when they went under a mentor’s tutelage.

“Please give us new names,” they chorused.

I had thought long and hard about what names I would give my precious apprentices and I had come up with the perfect ones: Larry, Curly, and Moe!

One of my favorite Chinese idioms was 三個臭皮匠，勝過一個諸葛亮 which literally translates to "Three mediocre talents are enough to overcome Zhuge Liang," meaning even ordinary people can equal a genius if they work together. The "three mediocre talents" in this idiom can also translate to "The Three Stooges."

Though they wouldn't know what their names referred to, it was enough that I knew that these names encapsulated my expectation that these three ordinary orphans will one day equal a king.

“Very well,” I said solemnly. “From now on you will be called Lari, Kharli, and Mo. You’ve been told that I have a bloodline inheritance?”

All three of them nodded.

I said, “I have a way of letting you share in my skills. Now I will grant you a portion of my inheritance.”

I walked in front of the boy and a screen popped up in front of me when I chose the [Apprentices] tab.

[Do you want to make this orphan your apprentice?]

I mentally chose the [Yes] button.

The results were dramatic. The boy jumped back and lost his balance, falling on his ass on the ground.

“The, the, that-” He tried to say something, but most of it was incoherent.

“Don’t panic. Focus on the screen in front of you and think of choosing the ‘Accept’ option,” I said.

After a few seconds, the boy’s expression changed to a look of wonder. “I did it. I can see something in front of me-”

“That’s good, but don’t do anything. I’ll finish with the others first.” I moved to the older girl and did the same thing. She was able to accept the System’s offer with no problems, but when it came to the second girl, I hit a snag.

When I tried to make her my apprentice, she fell down on her knees and started crying.