《SSS-Rank Farmer's Daily Journal》


 Day 0

    I¡¯m currently trapped in a dark underground space. I''m using the illuminate spell, and I can¡¯t even see the borders of this space except for the ceiling.


    As far as my senses can sense: There¡¯s nothing in the ceiling; It¡¯s only a bleak stone roof. The air is damp. The ground consists of ground soil. Darkness. Darkness all around.


    I wanted to use the radar spell to get more sense of this place, but that also means giving up my location to all creatures that may lurk in the distant dark.


    Mana exhaustion aside, I¡¯m exhausted, exhausted. Writing in this book right now may be the only thing that keeps my mind from going¡ªThat¡¯s right! Where am I exactly, you ask?


    Same question. I am curious about that too.


    It was supposed to be the same dungeon scouting routine for us, for Blue Canary.


    Blue Canary. That¡¯s the name of a mercenary unit under the management of the public guild, which I am a part of. The members of Blue Canary consist of several veterans of the field, personally picked by the Guild Master herself. Under her direct orders, we travel around the continent, delving deep into newly discovered dungeons with the purpose of scouting it¡ªclassifying their safety class before opening them to the public, so to speak.


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    However, even though I am the Magician of such an elite team, I can¡¯t even escape from this current predicament.


    Don¡¯t get me wrong. I¡¯ve mastered all kinds of teleportation spells. But, here¡¯s the thing, I don''t know where I am currently. Without being able to see the stars in the sky, I can¡¯t pinpoint my exact location in the world. And without pinpointing my exact location, I will risk being displaced by the spell, and stuck in a stone wall somewhere. That''s a risk I''m not willing to take, not while I''m in this state.


    In the first place, the mission was supposed to be a safe one.


    After all, it was the typical newly grown undead dungeon. Located inside an abandoned mansion near a big city. Approximate age of the dungeon is 10 years or so. Observed monsters are walking skeletons, ghouls, zombs, and the like. Predicted boss monster is a lich or two class level above.


    Nevertheless, how did I end up here? I don¡¯t know. I can¡¯t think. My eyes feel heavy. Wake up. Wake up. Wake up. Wake up. Wake up. Wake up. Wake up. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Open your

 Day 1

    I was lucky. I don¡¯t know how long I was out for, but the fact that I¡¯m still alive and kicking is fortunate by itself.


    One thing that I noticed after waking up is that the space that I¡¯m currently trapped in is actually a cavern as big as or more than the Capital¡¯s Olympiad Stadium. I tried to fly around the border once to search for a gap to escape to, and it took a considerable long time just to get around. The only things that I discovered were occasional air holes in the walls, which are not very big. I could probably try to force my body in one of them, but my butt will probably get stuck on the way.


    Holes aside, at the center of this place is that humongous magic heart in the ceiling. In terms of size, it may even rival the magic heart used for the Royal Holy Shield protecting the Imperial Capital.


    Considering the size of the heart, my guesstimate is that it was probably from a dragon that was dead and abandoned a long time ago or some other magical creature along that line. I can¡¯t exactly tell since when I tried to get close to it to analyze it a force field of magical nature deactivated my flying spell. My back still aches after that fall this afternoon.


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    Another thing that I noticed about the heart is that Its glow is so bright, it illuminates the whole cavern like a sun. Its glow gradually changes color, resembling the time of the day. It was yellowish when I woke up, then turned into a bluish glow, and yellowish again before it turned off for the night. I¡¯m not sure how the change interval differs from real daytime, but since it¡¯s pretty much in time with my biological needs, I hope this won¡¯t be a problem long term.


    Moving on, on the topic of biological needs, I decided to start rationing myself. After the futile attempt of analyzing the mana heart, I figured I won¡¯t be able to escape from this place anytime soon, and it¡¯d be a good idea to ration as early as possible. Because, while magic spells can help me create water by condensing humid vapor in the air, it can¡¯t help me create more food.


    The supplies on my bag were packed to last for at least a week of dungeon delving. It consists of mostly dry food, such as hard breads, meat jerkies, salted fish, and assorted nuts. In normal situations, I¡¯m supposed to eat all of these three times a day with a full portion each, but considering the current situations, I may need to manage with only twice a day with half a portion each. That will last me about a month of food, which in turn buys me ample time to figure out a way out of this place.

 Day 2

    Most of the food is gone. I woke up in the morning and noticed that a slime had been helping itself through the supplies bag all night. I attacked it with a fire spell out of panic, and ended up burning more of what the slime could have digested.


    The results? The dry bread is gone, turned into ashes. The remaining meat jerkies and the salted fish got a burnt aftertaste on it. Only the nuts weren''t affected by the fire because it was put in its own pouch. With this accident, my plan of one month rationing turned into a seven days plan.


    I once heard that people in the north consume dried slime remains because they lack fertile soil to keep ranch animals. I never properly learned how they prepare it over there, but I¡¯d assume drying the remains is the bigger part of it. And that¡¯s why, after putting out the fire of my own making, I propped the slime remains on top of a big flat stone nearby. The temperature of this cavern fluctuates between the day and the night, similar to the outside world, so I hope the slime remains can be dried in this situation, and most importantly, edible too.


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    Afterwards, I spent the rest of the day mapping out this place using the radar spell. While there seems to be nothing aside from the sporadic big stones in my bare eyes, I need to be meticulous in my approach. I learned this the hard way from the master scout of Blue Canary that everything is not always as it seems in an enclosed space like this. That¡¯s how we were always able to escape from any trap rooms in the past.


    However, I couldn¡¯t find anything through the radar spell. There¡¯s no hidden trap door, no hidden trigger, no cracks in the stones that will reveal hidden stuff or the like. In this room, there¡¯s only the soil, stones, and that big ass mana heart in the ceiling worth noting.


    Should I try increasing the spell radius beyond the scope of this room? Nah, no way. It¡¯d be a pain if a bunch of strong monsters got baited by the sudden mana wave, and came at once through those holes. Which reminds me of the slime this morning¡­ I should probably prepare for another one incoming.

 Day 3

    As expected, another slime appeared. I¡¯m glad that I took the time to put a magic barrier before sleeping last night because the slime was loitering near the food pile, looking hungry. I killed it before it could do anything else, and propped its remains near its predecessor. I checked the first slime remains, and it seems to need another day for it to dry properly.


    Moving on with the day, I once again did a thorough scan of the cavern. This time, instead of using the radar spell, I manually explored the nooks and crannies of this huge place. Perhaps I might have missed something obvious, I thought. After all, the radar spell cannot tell color or smell. But similar to yesterday¡¯s result, I couldn¡¯t find anything. This cavern is barren of man-made mechanisms, magical or physical means, which makes me more curious on how or why exactly I ended up here.


    In the afternoon, tired from all the walking around, I ended up taking a nap. I dreamt of flying freely out in the open sky before waking up in the middle of the night to have dinner, fulfill my toilet needs, and write in this journal.


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    Oh, right, in case anyone is wondering, I¡¯ve been fulfilling my toilet needs using a makeshift toilet a distance away from where I sleep. I called it a makeshift toilet, but actually I just dug a deep hole into the ground using the dig spell. I dug at least two meters deep near an air hole in the wall. To further prevent the resulting smell from covering the whole cavern, I sacrificed one of my old shirts on top as a cover. It was already ragged from all the dungeon delving I had, so I won¡¯t miss it that much.


    Excluding set of equipments that I¡¯m wearing, here¡¯s a rough image of my current inventory: a sleeping bag, a pouch of dried medicinal herbs, some bandages, two bottles of lesser health potions, a bottle of lower mana potion, two sets of clothes to change (incl. undergarments), this journal, a coat, a raincoat, a case, a magical stationery kit for basic rune, a dagger knife, a bar of soap, twenty meters rope, two water pouches, two sheets of towels, a metal cup, silver cutlery set, pouch full of silver powder, ¡­¡­

 Day 4

    The dried slime was edible. It wasn¡¯t bad or anything. It¡¯s just that while its texture is so fun to chew, it mostly tasted bland. When I ate it, I imagined how delicious it could be if I added some seasoning or garnish to top it off. Perhaps a fruit or an ice cream?


    Gosh, I miss Gloria¡¯s cooking very much. She¡¯s the master defender of Blue Canary, but her way with a cooking knife is as good as her way with a shield. I wonder if she misses me? What if the whole group is running around looking for me right now? Well, maybe not a lot of them, since it has only been four days since I¡¯m gone, after all. Most of them wouldn¡¯t worry before, what, a year or two? But at that point, Guild Master Helena will write me off as¡­ Yeah, no point thinking about that now.


    Anyway, today, I made a water source in the center of the cavern. It''s such a pain to always cast a water condensing spell whenever I need water, and that¡¯s why I decided to do it. I created the water source by digging a twelve meters hole just below the mana heart, and engraved a water rune at the bottom of it. The water rune will act as a water generator, accumulating water overtime to fill the hole with water. I also put a trigger rune near the top of the hole, connected it with the water rune below to prevent overfill.


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    If I do say so myself, it''s definitely a well-made well.


    Anyway, anyway, I received a sudden burst of inspiration after I finished the well. It¡¯s about the radar spell. What if, instead of increasing the radius of the radar spell, I condense the mana wave and make it travel into the air holes one by one? It will be a tedious and time-consuming process for sure due to the high amount of air holes in this cavern, but I could probably manage if I prioritize the bigger ones first, right? I mean, there are only four bigger holes and there won¡¯t be any fresh air coming in if those holes aren¡¯t connected to the outside, right? Also, if I only bother with one hole at a time, and if I accidentally bother some hidden monsters with the mana wave, at the very least, the monsters will only be coming in small numbers from that one hole, right?


    Alright. Let¡¯s do that tomorrow.

 Day 5

    There are four big air holes in the wall of this cavern. I called them big but only in comparison to the hundred other air holes here. The average size of the air holes are five to ten centimeters in diameter, while the four bigger ones are at forty to fifty centimeters. The positions of the bigger ones, starting with the one near the makeshift toilet, are at three o¡¯clock, six o¡¯clock, nine o¡¯clock, and twelve o¡¯clock.


    First, I tried to use the modified radar spell in the three o¡¯clock hole. Apart from being narrow the further the mana wave went, the air path of that hole is winded, branched, and long. It took me half-a-day, and almost all of my mana just to reach the end of the path. The resulting distance from the hole to the outside connection is about ten kilometers, and that proves I¡¯m definitely trapped deep, deep underground.


    These past couple of days, I¡¯ve been thinking about something. I didn¡¯t write it out because I think what I think of is not such a good idea, but considering the current situation, I decided to plant the assorted nuts in the ground.


    I know that the rate of germination of many nuts is pretty low with a slow growth rate, but what else can I do? My ration is running low, and I need a way to secure renewable food for my survival. Sacrificing half-a-day worth of nuts in exchange for that seems like a good trade to me.


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    The nuts that I planted in the ground consisted of several blue nuts, yellow nuts, and red nuts. All of them are part of the root fruit family, and according to what I remember from when I was in the magic academy, they grow for about one to three months into maturity in the right soil. If I get lucky, it will take about one week for most of the seeds to take roots, and at that point, I could survive for another month by eating the roots while leaving some planted seeds left to grow into maturity.


    I planted them in groups based on their type, and gave some distance (approx. 30 cm) between each patch. The field is spreading to the nine o¡¯clock direction, starting from the well. After planting, I tied the water pouch with a rope, took some water from the well with it, and showered the nuts with water.


    In total, with two nut seeds per patch, I planted 50 blue nut patches, 35 yellow nut patches, and 15 red nut patches.


    O Petani, God of Farming and Agriculture, if you are there and not drunk on cheap rice wines, please answer my prayer and bless this field in front of me.

 Day 6

    Today, I woke up with a familiar system notification in front of my face. I was a little bit surprised because it has been a while since I saw them, but the thing that got me taken aback the most is the content of the notification.


    [ Acquired a new skill: Seed Sowing Lv. 1 (10%) ]


    [ Acquired a new skill: Watering Lv. 1 (2%) ]


    Never once in my life have I ever imagined that there¡¯s a system skill related to farming, but here I am having two of them at the same time. It has been the general belief that the system only covers skills related to combat such as magic, alchemy, and swordsmanship. But farming? Really? People in the magic academy are going to be nuts over this discovery.


    However, this makes me wonder. How could I, a magician, who just randomly planted nuts in the ground, receive farming-related skills from the system, while farmers, who clearly dedicated their life to planting stuff, who are also abundant in the Empire''s long history, never been recorded to have received such skills? What¡¯s the difference between me and the Empire''s farmer? Is it because I learned magic first before planting stuff, or is it because of that humongous mana heart in the ceiling of this place?


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    Yeah, it¡¯s probably the doing of the mana heart. It''s always the big ass mana heart in the middle of the room that you can blame things on, right? I mean, even the most prestigious Imperial Magic Academy in its hundred years of research operations hasn''t been able to confidently say they 100% solved the mystery behind the mana heart and the system; Who am I to theorize any further? I left the magical research field to join Blue Canary in the first place because those high ranking snobs at the academy always went ¡®mana heart this, mana heart that¡¯ or ¡®system this, system that¡¯ whenever I tried to propose any new unrelated theory for general publication. ¡°Everything needs to connect back to the mana heart or the system,¡± they said. Yeah, whatever.


    Rant aside, after being taken aback by the system notification, I noticed two dozen or so slimes were ransacking the nuts field. Of course, I quickly killed them and prop them up for drying, but the damage has been done. Most of the field was ransacked, and about 40% still intact. I spent all day reorganizing the field. Now, I only have 25 blue nut patches, 10 yellow nut patches, and 5 red nut patches.


    Well, at least, I don¡¯t need to worry about food for some time because the new slime remains will dry up in two days, but still, my nuts¡­ how dare those slimes do this to my nuts!


    I decided that I will stay up all night tonight to find out which air hole these slimes came from. Wish me luck.

 Day 7

    After spending the night using radar spell covering up the whole cavern, I found out the air holes where the slimes came from. It was a little air hole in-between the three o¡¯clock hole and the twelve o¡¯clock hole, a little distance away from the makeshift toilet. I am calling it the slime hole for the purpose of this journal.


    When I was with Blue Canary, there were two main ways to deal with a hole in which monsters came out from:


    <ol>


    <li> Plug them. </li>


    </ol>


    Following this, I, of course, plugged the slime hole using earth and stone as soon as I discovered it at dawn, and left to take a nap. However, the plug was undone once I woke up and found several slimes roaming the field (which I killed swiftly).


    <ol start="2">


    <li> If plugging is not possible, bait the monster out to eradicate them.</li>


    </ol>


    I tried to agitate the slimes by using the modified radar spell, purposefully sending a long mana wave into the hole. It took me a couple of hours for the first slime to come out, but they came out indeed.


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    And by ¡®indeed,¡¯ I mean an endless lot of them. The rate at which the slimes came out of the hole is like trickling water¡ªonce I¡¯m done dealing with one of them, another is already out, ready to take its place.


    It took me a whole day of stabbing slimes repeatedly to realize that the slimes are never going to stop coming. And by that point, I just dug a big, deep trench along the wall to receive the slimes, engraved a slippery spell on its sides to prevent the slimes from getting out, and called it a day. The trench is 2 meters wide and five meters deep. Its length, following the shape of the wall, covers about a quarter of the distance between the three o¡¯clock hole and the twelve o¡¯clock hole.


    The slimes are, by no means, endless. Even tonight, I can still hear the trickling and popping sound they make as they come out of the slime hole.


    Sluuurp pop~! Sluuurp pop~!


    What a nightmarish sound echoing this whole cavern tonight¡­

 Day 8

    While slime can coexist with each other, they inherently are territorial beings. The number of which they can coexist with each other is dependent on the size of the area they are living in. In open areas like the forest or an open grass field, after their population number hits a certain point of density, the slime will naturally disperse to expand and discover new territories. That¡¯s one of the reasons why we can almost see slime everywhere in the world at the same rate as cats and dogs.


    Then, what happens to slimes living in a confined area? They will kill and then consume each other. In exchange for losing reproductive capabilities, slime that has already consumed other slimes will be able to evolve into a higher rank. It is theorized that they do this for the sake of breaking out of the confinement. As long as there¡¯s decent food supply, the higher rank slime will keep several slimes alive to keep reproducing new young slimes while it consumes the older ones. In recent history, the biggest slime recorded was the King Slime which was approximately as big as 65,536 slimes* bundled up together coming out of the Capital¡¯s sewer three decades ago. That¡¯s also the reason why new and or lower-rank adventurers these days are given a mandatory sewer slime extermination quest once every month.


    With that established, the trench that I dug to contain outpouring slime from the slime hole was found to be chock-full of slime when I checked it this morning. It was beyond expectation, really. I thought that it was going to be about quarter-full or half-full before I fell asleep, but at this point, casting a thunder spell over a large area to annihilate them once and for all feels like a waste of potential for lasting food stock. And so I decided to expand the slime trench and connected it to the makeshift toilet near the three o¡¯clock hole to make a Northern-style slime trench.


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    Northern-style slime trench. It¡¯s the name people in the Empire used to call the trench Northern people used as their slime farm. It also has the double meaning of a long toilet, as Northern people feed their slimes with feces and urine.


    After the construction, I harvested about half of the slime from the slime trench to be dried up. I positioned the drying slime in the triangle formation, with the base part following the trench and the tip pointing to the center of the cavern.


    Afterwards, I tended the nuts field and noticed several nut patches were beginning to sprout.


    O Petani, God of Farming and Agriculture, if you are there and not drunk on cheap rice wines, thank you. But also, please keep the blessing on this field intact. Once again, thank you.

 Day 9

    After feeding the slimes in the early morning, I headed toward the six o¡¯clock hole. These past few days have been hectic, but it¡¯s time to continue looking for a way out of this place.


    Almost similar to the results of the three o''clock hole, it took half a day for the mana wave from the radar spell to reach the end of the path. The difference was that the path was pretty much straightforward and connected to what I assume is a large area. I''m not sure if it''s connected to open air or another cavern as big or bigger than this one. But one thing''s for sure: it''s far, about 20-30 km away with a steep climb, which is more than double the distance between the three o''clock hole and the surface.


    My plan for escape for now is to break rocks following the shortest¡ªtime-wise, and lengthwise¡ªpath with the least risk of being buried alive. Therefore, the three o¡¯clock hole and the six o¡¯clock hole are definitely out of the equation.


    I know I¡¯m magically gifted and all (not bragging), but it will take me a year or two to create a safe tunnel covering those lengthy distances. Digging above is a no-go as I don¡¯t even know how much distance I need to cover or what kind of earth I need to deal with. Yeah, getting trapped in an earth bubble after a tunnel collapse would be a hilarious result, but I''d literally die. So... no.


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    Bad thoughts aside, all the nuts in the nuts field are sprouting. Granted, it¡¯s not that many nuts to begin with, but what are the chances? I was expecting that out of the remaining 25 blue nut patches, 10 yellow nut patches, and 5 red nut patches, only about 50% of them would be sprouting. But to think it''d be all of them!


    Is it due to the soil that I¡¯m planting them on? Or is it due to the water from the well that I used to water them every single day? Or¡­ is it due to the humongous mana heart that¡¯s in the middle of this cavern¡¯s roof?


    Yeah~ It¡¯s probably due to the soil and the water. I mean, in passing, I have read a lot of academic research publications about applying mana heart to accelerate plant growth, but nothing actually succeeded yet. There was one that almost succeeded, but the plant turned into a monster, so¡­ Wait. Does that mean my nuts will turn into monsters when they¡¯ve grown?


    I want to check if that will be the case, but my current tools aren¡¯t exactly used for magic research either. I guess that can wait, the nuts just sprouted after all. I¡¯m going to sleep now.

 Day 10

    As I walked to the nine o¡¯clock hole to analyze it this morning, I encountered a snake in the middle of the nuts field. The snake had white scales with a body as big as my forearm, and its length was about five or so meters. It almost bit my leg as I tried to kill it.


    There¡¯s a saying among farmers in the Eastern part of the Empire that it¡¯s a sign of fortune if a white-scaled snake appeared in your field in the middle of farming season. However, I can¡¯t help but see this one as an omen since I don¡¯t know where the snake came from, and are there any more snakes that I need to be wary of.


    I carefully skin the snake and thoroughly clean its guts by the well. The skin is put out to dry, the poison sack is set aside for later use, and the entrails are thrown into the slime trench. I grilled some of the meat, and dried the rest.


    I¡¯m glad that the snake appeared because I¡¯m actually getting tired of eating dried slime without any garnish or seasoning. Because, you know, while dried slime is fulfilling and all, after some time of eating them one after the other, it feels like eating leather¡ªa bland, tasteless leather.


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    Should I make a pot to boil them or something¡­?


    Nevermind. I forgot that my alchemist skill is abysmal. Anything complex that I created with alchemy will never stay in shape long enough to use. Moreover, if I want to cook, I will need some wood or charcoal, which are not here, to keep the fire long enough for cooking. Magical fire won¡¯t cut it for long-time use. I can probably do it, of course, but it¡¯s much better to use my mana to look for a way out of this place, and a backup for some unforeseen circumstances too.


    Oh, talking about looking for a way out, the nine o¡¯clock hole is also a no-go. The radar spell result is very similar to the three o¡¯clock hole: The air path of the nine o¡¯clock hole is winded, branched, and has about 10 km in distance to the surface.


    Let¡¯s check the twelve o¡¯clock hole tomorrow. I¡¯m going to sleep.

 Day 11

    There is good news and bad news.


    The good news is, as I used the radar spell on the twelve o¡¯clock hole, I found out that there¡¯s a man-made tunnel connected to it in a few meters distance. The tunnel is rectangular with wooden supporting beams along the way. It¡¯s dark, damp, and reminds me of an ancient mining operation in the Western part of the Empire that I visited on a quest a few years ago.


    Now to the bad news part: There¡¯s an ancient door at the end of the tunnel, and I can¡¯t seem to open it.


    I have tried everything in the book. I tried pushing it open with all my might. I tried pushing it open with all sorts of magical means. I tried to look for hidden triggers all over the tunnel. The ancient door won¡¯t budge, not even once.


    I even tried to dig a separate tunnel in the wall to circumvent the door, but it led me back to where I started, twice. I guess this confirms that I¡¯m either trapped inside a dungeon or an ancient ruin, the question is¡­ which is which?


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    If by some chance I¡¯m trapped inside an ancient ruin, that means someone purposefully transported me here, but for what reasons? I don¡¯t think anyone in the Blue Canary would have the gall to do this to me, so is it outside enemies? Who would dare enough to do this to me?


    On the other hand, if I¡¯m currently inside the dungeon, the answer is simpler. I just need to destroy the mana heart in the center of the dungeon to destroy it.


    And look how convenient it is to see that there¡¯s an obnoxious mana heart dangling in the ceiling of this cavern. If this place is a dungeon, then that mana heart is definitely the center of it. Just look at the size of it. It could pass as a dungeon center for all I care.


    But then again, if I destroy that mana heart, how will I escape this place when the roof starts raining down on me? I assume the mana heart is the one supporting this whole cavern structure, so destroying it might as well bury myself alive, right?


    How should I progress with this, I wonder.

 Day 12

    As of today, I decided on two plans to get out of this place: Plan A and Plan B.


    Plan A is to look for a way to open the ancient door. As long as I can get the ancient door to open, I will be able to access the inner part of this dungeon/ancient ruin, map it out, and get out through the front door. My years of dungeon delving experiences tells me that the key to opening the ancient door must be related to the engraving on it, the four-winged dragon biting its own tail. But what does that engraving mean? Is it some kind of puzzle related to the undead dungeon that I visited prior to getting trapped in this place? What do I need to do to get the door to open? I¡¯ve been thinking about it all day, but I still can¡¯t figure it out. That¡¯s why Plan B comes into play.


    Plan B will cover just-in-case scenarios, such as if I can¡¯t open the ancient door or if anything beyond that door is something that I can¡¯t deal with. While we usually can¡¯t enter or circumvent a dungeon/ancient ruin from outside by digging into the ground, we definitely can leave by digging an escape tunnel from the inside. Of course, it¡¯s frowned upon to leave a dungeon/ancient ruin using this means due to the damage it will cause to the local ecosystem, but never mind that.


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    The escape tunnel will be made by expanding the air path of the six o¡¯clock hole. I chose the six o¡¯clock hole precisely because the air path is much more straightforward than the branched, and winded air path of the three and nine o¡¯clock holes. The estimated length of the air path is about twenty kilometers. And if I dig about a hundred meters every day from today, it will take me about two hundred days to reach the surface. It¡¯s a feasible plan as I already dug a hundred meters tunnel into the hole, and it only took me no more than four to six hours. I placed all the digging debris¡ªpast digging endeavors included¡ªin the space along the wall between the three o¡¯clock hole and the six o¡¯clock hole as I¡¯m sleeping near the well now.


    Escape plan aside, in the afternoon, I noticed that the snake skin that was left alone to dry was exuding a rank smell. I threw it into the slime trench for the slime to deal with it. The slimes looked so ecstatic towards the snake skin, and with that I realized that my stools alone haven¡¯t been enough to feed them all. It seems like I can expect a Bigger Slime or two to appear in the slime trench by tomorrow.

 Day 13

    As expected, I found two Bigger Slime inside the slime trench this morning. They are slime''s next evolution that doubles the size of normal slime. I killed them and propped them up for drying. Looking at how many slimes are in the drying field and in the dried pile, I think I don¡¯t need to worry about food for a while, especially when I also harvested the nuts field today.


    While the rapid growth rate of my nuts is definitely suspicious, fortunately, they didn¡¯t turn into monsters or anything like that. On the other hand, when I taste-tested each one of them, they tasted beyond any nuts that I have ever tasted. As I chewed on them, the blue nuts had this refreshing icy feeling, the yellow nuts were sugary sweet, and the red nuts were spicy. I immediately replanted 50 blue nut patches, 50 yellow nut patches, and 50 red nut patches in the field.


    O Petani, God of Farming and Agriculture, I don¡¯t know if you actually blessed this field or not, but thanks. Please bless this field once again.


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    Now that I''m getting a steady food supply from the slime trench and the fast-growing nuts, I figured it''s time to stop rationing, and add lunch to my daily schedule. For lunch today, I tried making a grinded nut paste to spread it over a piece of dried slime, and it was delicious. I think I¡¯ll keep it on my menu for the next few days or so. And I think I should start training my alchemy skills again when there¡¯s nothing to do in the morning.


    Alchemy is a skill that runs heavily on concentration. It¡¯s the polar opposite of magic that runs on very little concentration, but relies heavily on the wielder''s knowledge and their mana gift. There are three basic steps on making things using alchemy: ingredient extraction, restructuring, and finalization. I don¡¯t want to get too into it, but, case in point, I¡¯m suck at all of them. Well, probably not at the ingredient extraction step, but still¡­


    My goal for now is to create a stone pot that will last when I try to boil dried slime into mush. Although I still don¡¯t have any firewood or coal here, I can probably keep a fire going long enough using the nut leaves and branches once they dried up.

 Day 14

    A four-winged dragon biting its own tail. It¡¯s a symbol that I haven¡¯t seen anywhere with the years of being a mercenary dungeon delver under my belt. Also, although it¡¯s a regal four-winged dragon, I wouldn¡¯t dare to assume it¡¯s a noble family insignia as the act of biting one¡¯s own tail signifies stupidity for them. However, it does remind me of that one creation myth from the Eastern part of the Empire.


    Borosouro. It is said that in the dawn of time, there¡¯s this giant white snake that ate its own tail to create our universe. It would be a relevant story if Borosuro was a dragon instead of a white snake, but¡­ Wait. A white snake?


    Nevermind. It¡¯s too late now. I already ate all of its meat, and its rotting skin was left to the slime trench to deal with. Let me go test something for a bit.


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    ¡­ It didn¡¯t work out. I just tried rubbing its poison sack all over the ancient door and nothing happened. Either way, I don¡¯t have any choice but to wait for another white snake to come out again to test some other theories.


    If only I didn¡¯t disregard Ethan whenever he talked about his dragons¡­ He might be famous for being the eccentric beastmaster of Blue Canary, but his knowledge about dragons is second to none. I¡¯d bet he would solve this ancient door in seconds.


    It has only been two weeks since I''ve been trapped in this place, but to think that I¡¯m getting sentimental over Ethan, the dragon maniac, of all people.


    I noticed some grass growing surrounding the well. It has been awhile since the last time I touched grass. I don¡¯t know who or what it was that got me trapped in here, but I hope they rot in hell.

 Day 15

    My eyes were puffy when I woke up this morning. I shouldn¡¯t have cried all night last night, but in hindsight, I did need the release. All of my life, I¡¯ve never spent alone as long as I¡¯ve been trapped in this cavern. From the orphanage, the magic academy, and to the Blue Canary, there were always a lot of nosy people surrounding me, so that¡¯s that.


    I spent the morning creating a lot of stone pots to train my alchemist skill. Including yesterday¡¯s results, there are about two dozen lowest-quality stone pots piling up near the well. It¡¯s rather a waste since they can¡¯t even contain water properly, but I¡¯m intending to keep them just in case I may need them later.


    On an unrelated note, this might be because I noticed the grass growing near the well last night, I started noticing other small natural changes happening through the cavern. Worms in the soil. Tiny fish in the well. Grass sprouting all over. The cavern that was barren since the first night I arrived here is starting to show lives.


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    Where did those lives come from? I don¡¯t know for sure, but I have several guesses.


    First guess, the humongous mana heart dangling on the ceiling. Second guess, the numerous air holes in the wall. Third guess, God¡¯s blessing. Fourth guess, the tunnel mining operation that¡¯s waking up the stagnant environment.


    I myself am banking on the fourth guess. I know I¡¯ve been praying to God Petani for a blessing, but that''s an entirely different matter as I¡¯m not an actual believer. That, and the fourth guess is the one that¡¯s the most ecologically sound so far.


    On another note, the bigger slimes have dried. They are like double the size of regular slime, and I wonder if I can make a bag out of this. An edible bag. Now, that¡¯s funny.


    I¡¯m lonely.

 Day 16

    I don¡¯t know if I need to write this, but I decided to put Plan A into the backburner. It has been a couple of days since the last aha moment with the white snake. And I don¡¯t see any signs of  white snakes appearing soon, so¡­ yeah¡­ I guess I need to keep the daily digging going.


    In the first place, aren''t white snakes kinda rare in the world? I heard that about one in a hundred thousand snakes in the continent will be born white. But what did I know: I was just a hungry magician craving for some fat.


    Anyway, I found out today that dried slime is actually a great substitute for leather. I thought it was just its texture, but if applied with alchemy, dried slime can actually be tough, elastic, and waterproof. I tried to create a simple water pouch using it for alchemy practice, and it turned out better than I expected. I wonder why other mercenaries don¡¯t bring slime water pouches around. It saves space. It¡¯s like packing water and emergency food at the same time. I ¡°accidentally¡± made tens of them.


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    Huh? What? How about the stone pot practices? Yeah, they are still there¡ªpiling up in a corner of this vast cavern. Nevermind that.


    I think I shouldn¡¯t have done this. I shouldn¡¯t have split my concentration by trying to do alchemy training, digging the escape tunnel, and wall banging my head to figure out the ancient door in the same day. I might be able to do it if there¡¯s anything fun to do in the meantime, but nope.


    Why are you beating yourself up, me? It¡¯s not like it¡¯ll help anyone, right? There¡¯s no one here beside you, after all.


    Look at those nuts in the distance. You planted them.


    Look at the slime trench. There are slimes there.


    This is not working. I need to drink¡ªalcoholic drinks.

 Day 17

    Nut wine. I remember hearing its recipe once from a blacksmith in the back-alley of the capital.First, grind a palm of nut. Make it into a juice by adding water. Let it sit for a while in a container¡ªI used some of the piled up stone pots layered with dried slime to prevent leak¡ªuntil all the nut oil surfaced. Skim the oil. Spit on the batch to promote fermentation. Cover the batch using a cloth¡ªI used dried slime as replacement¡ªand let it ferment.


    Due to the low sugar content of the nut, I suppose this first batch will be ready in about three-four days. For this, I prepared one pot each of red nut wine, yellow nut wine, and blue nut wine. Let¡¯s hope this will go well even though I never tried to make the drink myself prior to today. Though, who am I kidding? I just wanted to get drunk to make me forget about this situation at least for a while, and the nearest tavern is more than twenty kilometers above the ground soo¡­


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    Gripping aside, I think I¡¯ve hit a soil layer in the escape tunnel digging effort. It¡¯s not stone anymore, so the digging and debris removal became easier to do, increasing the digging speed to almost double.


    On the other hand, I just remember that I should at least note the random stuff that I threw at the ancient door just in case anything sticks and opens it. Nothing does so far, of course, but here¡¯s the list: dirt, water, live slime, dead slime, dried slime, slime¡¯s liquid, human¡¯s excrement, rock, pebble, yellow nut, blue nut, red nut, stone pot, yellow nut whole plant, blue nut whole plant, red nut whole plant, grass, moss, rope, water pouch, lesser health potion, lower mana potion, coat, raincoat, dagger knife, bar of soap, towel, metal cup, silver cutlery set, silver powder...

 Day 18

    I broke my back all day today, and I don¡¯t mean it as having sex with someone. I mean I spent all day today digging the escape tunnel.


    The process of digging the tunnel usually goes like this:


    I scan the air path using the radar spell about ten meters ahead to measure shape and stability. I break the rock surrounding the air path using sharpened mana hands until I reach the end of the scanned area. I scoop all the debris using big mana hands, and transport the debris and pile it up with the rest of the debris inside the cavern. I place the pile of the debris in the space between six o¡¯clock and three o¡¯clock holes. It has been a hell of a work, especially when I finally hit more than a kilometer today. Walking back and forth for hours makes my legs sore afterward. I guess there¡¯s a reason why mining operations use minecarts, huh.


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    That aside, nothing really happened. I¡¯m just here writing, looking at the humongous mana heart above my head, and playing with illuminate spell orbs. Thinking back, it¡¯s rather weird, isn¡¯t it? I was scared the first time I found myself here. I thought this place was dark, and scary. But now, I got used to the darkness, and I don¡¯t mind getting mauled to death by monsters that came inside this cavern during my sleep. Just kidding. I still don¡¯t want to die, of course. But I don¡¯t want to keep living here forever. I hope another white snake appears again soon. Staying in this place without any new stimulus is killing me. I know complaining won¡¯t help anyone out of here, but¡­ Nevermind.


    The nuts field will be ready to farm in two-three days. The slime trench is full of activity as usual. The ancient door is still closed, also as usual.


    ¡­

 Day 19

    There¡¯s still no white snake today. However, there were some pigs ransacking the nut field. They damaged about half the field before I rounded them up in the space south of the nuts field, and dug the ground to create a pig trench¡ªwhich is similar to the slime trench, but this one took half-a-quarter of the southwest area of the cavern.


    As a note, writing the six o¡¯clock hole, the three o¡¯clock hole, the nine o¡¯clock hole, and the twelve o¡¯clock hole every time to refer to a direction in this cave is such a pain, I¡¯d just use cardinal directions regardless of the real directions from now on. Twelve o¡¯clock hole in the North. Three o¡¯clock hole is in the East. Six o¡¯clock hole is in the South. And the nine o¡¯clock hole is in the West.


    There are twelve pigs in the pig trench. Out of them, eight are sows, and the rest are barrows. After investigating, they are a part of mini pig species, which is half the size of a normal pig, but quadruple-quadruple more of its reproductive capabilities. I¡¯m not sure what kind of mini pig specifically, but if a normal pig¡¯s gestation period takes about 3 months, 3 weeks, and 3 days to complete, then I heard mini pigs only need 1 week of gestation to be born normally.


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    They are creatures that are always in heat all seasons, and as long as they are being fed well¡ªwhich they did by preying on my precious nuts the night prior¡ªI expect at least a couple of them are copulating right now.


    I wanted to find out where they were coming from to prevent more accidental damage to my nuts, but at this point, I¡¯d just construct a stone fence surrounding the field. Yeah, let¡¯s do that tomorrow.


    About half of the field survived the pig invasion today, it¡¯s still a good number considering the last expansion. Though, it might not be enough to sustain my nut paste diet and nut wine production at the same time. Hell, these past couple of days I¡¯ve been eating dried slime and starting to remember how awful it tastes. Should I also look for mushrooms growing in the walls of this cavern, just in case? I mean, I could see mosses starting to crept up the wall, perhaps I can find some mushrooms too. It has been awhile since I looked around this place, anyway.


    Not a bad idea, not a bad idea.

 Day 20

    Today I constructed a simple stone fence circumventing the nuts field, covering two-third of the eastern half of the cavern. I built the fence by stacking medium-sized stone debris from the escape tunnel digging effort. It¡¯s primitive and took me the whole day due to how vast this place is, but whatever.


    The height of the fence is about 1.5 m. It should be able to deter any small and medium animals, such as slimes or mini pigs, from entering and ransacking the nuts field. I¡¯m not sure about bigger animals, though. While considering the average size of air holes here might not be able to be entered by big animals, such as deer or leopard, who knows what would happen in this mysterious cavern.


    I mean, hello, I¡¯m here. I¡¯m sure as hell cannot fit myself into one of those air holes, but I¡¯m here, trapped, by myself. That means someone or something trapped me in here using some kind of teleportation-based trap. And, as far as I know, teleportation-based traps are blind as long as it stays activated, and something stepped on it. Who knows what kind of animals would be teleported in here, and when. I just need to prepare everything to protect my nuts, don''t I?


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    Oh, right, I took a round circling the cavern this morning to find some mushrooms or new stuff. I didn¡¯t find anything, of course, yet. It¡¯s just moss and lightly grown vegetation all over the wall. But where there¡¯s moss, there are bound to be some kind of mushrooms due to the humidity. I just need to wait for a few days, maybe.


    That aside, the nuts field seems to be ready to harvest tomorrow morning, AND the nut wine too at night. It has been a while since I last tasted alcohol, let¡¯s hope the experiment goes well.

 Day 21

    I jinxed it, I think. The first batch of the nut wine didn¡¯t go as well as I expected. While there¡¯s some smell akin to fermentation smell, all of them tasted like juiced dirt water, bitter on the tongue. I can still make out the special aftertaste of each nuts species in the back of my throat, though, so not all is lost. How do I make this sweeter, I wonder? The alcohol content is not that high, either. Hmmm¡­ Whatever. No need to rush. At least now I can drink a little bit to help me sleep at night. I just need to keep the production going, and experiment a little bit one batch after another.


    And today is the nuts field harvest day too. Deducting the nuts needed for replanting, I decided to split the harvested nuts into two halves. One half is to make the second batch of nut wine, and the other half is to be turned into nut paste.


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    For the second batch of nut wine, I decided to just mix all the nuts¡ªyellow nuts, blue nuts, and red nuts¡ªand divided the mix into three pots, instead of the one kind each pot approach of the first batch. My intention with this is to see what kind of mixed aftertaste result will be made, and if that aftertaste can drown down the bitter taste of the nut wine.


    Still talking about nuts, in the field, I replanted 100 red nut patches, 100 blue nut patches, and 100 yellow nut patches. It doubles last time just in case some creatures appear, and ransack the field in the future. It happened twice so far, with the slime and the pigs, so what¡¯s going to stop the third time? The stone fence was made only to be a small deterrent, after all. If my nuts are going to be destroyed before harvest time either way, then wouldn¡¯t it be better to just plant a lot of them, and still be able to harvest enough for consumption after half of them got destroyed.


    Better to have more than less, I guess.

 Day 22

    I learned that today, no matter the species, pigs are still pigs. They eat a lot. It has been only a couple of days of me keeping the pig trench alive, I¡¯m already down to half of my dried slime storage, and it seems like it will keep going down.


    I suppose keeping 12 mini pigs at the same is still beyond my food producing capability. I tried to starve them by saving a bit of last night¡¯s feed portion, and they would squeak, and grunt all night; The noise disturbed my sleep, I had no choice but to give in to their demands.


    That¡¯s why, I decided to trim down their population this morning. Out of 12 mini pigs, which consisted of eight sows, and four barrows¡ªfour sows are in gestation. That left me the simple choice to butcher the four non-pregnant sows and two barrows. Before I butchered them, I tried to sacrifice a couple sow and barrow to the ancient door to try to open it. But they just added to the list of things that didn¡¯t work out.


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    I threw the entrails of the butchered pigs to the slime trench, constructed a simple meat smoker dome using stones, used nut branches and roots from the last harvest as fire fuels, and smoked the hell out of those meats for preservation.


    The smell of the smoked meat will fill the cavern the whole night tonight, but it¡¯s a delicious smell. I can¡¯t wait to taste the meat tomorrow.


    That aside, I wonder what I would do when the four pregnant sows finally gave birth? I mean, as far as I know, aren¡¯t sows supposed to produce eight to a dozen piglets per pregnancy? How do I take care of more than thirty piglets at the same time? Do I even have the heart to butcher and eat little piglets? Fully grown pigs are fine, but piglets¡­ Let¡¯s cross that bridge when that time comes.

 Day 23

    The taste of smoked pork meat with nut paste is heavenly¡ªat least, in comparison to dried slime and nut paste combination. I think I¡¯ll stop consuming dried slime for a while because of this.


    The grass that has been growing all over this cavern has grown tall enough to turn the barren soil landscape into a sea of grass. There are crickets chirping from between the leaves. Some snails hanging out near the well. The tiny fishes in the well are getting bigger by the day. I wonder if the fishes will be big enough to be grilled over an open fire? It has been a while since I have had a fish, after all.


    That aside, I received some notifications from the system throughout the day. Here¡¯s the summary:


    New acquired skills: [ Bountiful Harvest Lv. 1 (15%) ]


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    Skills that are leveled up: [ Seed Sowing Lv. 2 (10%) ] [ Watering Lv. 2 (2%) ] [ Alchemy Lv. 3 (2%) ]


    Yes. I finally hit level three of alchemy skill. Which means, I can theoretically create a low-quality pot suitable for boiling. Theoretically because I haven¡¯t tried it yet. I spent this morning tending the field, and lying around savoring the taste of pork meat in my belly. Wait a bit.


    I did it. I created a low-quality stone pot. This means that I can try making slime noodles at night as long as I still have my mana. Let me try making some.


    It¡¯s good. The dried slime absorbed the hot water well, and doesn¡¯t have its signature leather texture. I added some nut paste and slices of smoked pork into it, and a simple slime pork-nut noodle is complete.


    With this level of alchemy, I wonder if I could make a simple contraption strong enough to help me transport the tunneling debris. Hmmm¡­

 Day 24

    Bad news: There was a white snake in the nuts field today.


    It should be good news, but the thing is: It¡¯s with eggs.


    It had been about two weeks since the previous white snake appeared. There¡¯s also no guarantee that another will appear soon after that, considering how rare they are in the wild. So accordingly, I need to tread this one as carefully as possible or risk losing another big chance to open the ancient door.


    For now, I keep the white snake contained inside a stone pot to think about what to do next. (Don¡¯t worry, I put necessary air holes in the pot.)


    Do I wait until the eggs hatch and try to open the ancient door after? A regular snake commonly produces a dozen or so eggs, right? That means more little animals that I need to take care of. As far as I know, snakes also generally only eat prey they kill live. I wonder if they will have any problem eating slimes later? I can¡¯t possibly feed piglets into baby snakes, right? For the mother, I can probably feed an adult pig after the eggs hatch, but the baby¡­ I don¡¯t know what to do.


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    In the first place, dealing with baby animals, like pigs, slimes, or snakes, isn''t exactly my job. I¡¯m a mage, for crying out loud. If not for that ancient door being impervious to my magical knowledge, I¡¯d just bolt out of here. Fly in the sky or do whatever out there. But here I am, gripping again. I think I¡¯ll drink some nut wine and then go to sleep.


    Why does the long-awaited white snake have to get herself pregnant? Why?


    I wonder who¡¯s the father, though. Why is he leaving his mate alone in this cavern? Don¡¯t tell me. Will he come back tomorrow morning? I need to cast a barrier at myself tonight.


    I don¡¯t want to die in this place. I don¡¯t want to die in this place. I don¡¯t want to die in this place.

 Day 25

    There was no Papa White Snake coming last night. However, throughout the day I reflected on the error of my ways as a mage, and realized that a food supply crisis is coming. It¡¯s about the mini pigs in the pig trench.


    A few days ago, I trimmed down their population to half¡ªfrom twelve to six¡ªin an effort to decrease the dried slime needed to feed them. However, by the rate it¡¯s going, it¡¯ll be less than four days before my dried slime stockpile is gone, and I start butchering live slimes from the slime trench simultaneously to feed the pigs. Even assuming that the live slimes in the trench have around a hundred slime, that''s still only a non-permanent patch before the pigs eat them all in about a week or so.


    I need to look for a way to increase the slime production capacity or scrap the pig trench all together. And I don¡¯t want to scrap the pig trench yet, as it means dealing with four dozen dead unborn pigs after. It¡¯s bad luck. I guess it¡¯s time to start rationing myself, and luckily I still have some smoked pork in the smoker building. That will last me for the week, at least. I¡¯m going to think about increasing the slime production capacity all day tomorrow.


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    On a more cheery note, recently, I¡¯ve hit the two kilometers mark in the escape tunnel digging effort. Granted, there¡¯s still about eighteen kilometers to go, but progress is still progress. The digging effort is a long-term plan, after all. Let¡¯s keep this up, me!


    Though, it¡¯d be convenient if there¡¯s a way to transport the digging debris to the cavern much faster. I¡¯ve been walking back and forth while levitating the debris, after all. And, considering the tunnel¡¯s degree of elevation, I¡¯ve been thinking of creating a simple sledge out of stone to fasten my way back.


    Yeah, sledding with a sledge will be fun, I guess.

 Day 26

    I spent the day thinking of a way to increase the slime production capacity. While I didn¡¯t come up with anything that¡¯s working yet, I butchered the two barrows in the pig trench to save more dried slime.


    For now, I hang the two newly butchered barrows in the smoker building. I¡¯ll smoke them using the nut branches and roots from the nuts harvest in the next two-three days. Hopefully their meat won''t rot by then, or I¡¯d probably feed them to the slime.


    Slime burial. Hm. I wonder. Should I just butcher all the pregnant sows, and feed them to the slime trench? No more worry of dealing with dozens of unborn pigs. No more bad luck associated with it too. But that means there won¡¯t be smoked pigs anymore once the current stock is gone.


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    What are you thinking, me? You can¡¯t kill children of any species unless they attack¡ªor try to kill you¡ªfirst. Piglets are harmless, right? I just don¡¯t know how to feed them without compromising my own food supply.


    Talking about feeding, the white snake is still in the stone pot and pregnant. It doesn¡¯t move much throughout the day, I guess to preserve energy, since it can¡¯t hunt by itself. I wonder how many more days are needed for little snakes to start wiggling around inside the stone pot.


    I heard some animals like spiders or scorpions tend to eat their young after birth. I wonder if the white snake will do the same? Let¡¯s hope not. Hm. I might need to separate the young with their mother once they hatch.


    That aside, I found an edible mushroom today. It was growing inside the deep corner of the slime trench. I thinly sliced the mushroom and left it up to dry on top of a stone. Once it dries, I plan to grind, and make a condiment out of it. Hope it goes well.

 Day 27

    The sows have given birth. They gave birth to a dozen piglets each, so there are four dozen piglets here now. I split the pig trench into four rooms just in case the litters fight with each other.


    For now and probably two or three weeks ahead, the piglets will sustain themselves by consuming their mother¡¯s milk. After that, they will surely devastate my food supply.


    The mini pigs in the pig trench are species that have half the size of common pigs species. Naturally, their piglets are also half the size of common piglets. Holding one of their piglets, it feels like I can just squeeze it with one hand like a tomato or a sausage.


    Oh, no, I didn¡¯t, of course. They are just that cute and tiny.


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    Should I cook most of them once they are done suckling on their mother¡¯s milk? I wonder if a soup will¡ªNo. Let¡¯s cross that bridge later.


    It has been a while since I saw the sky and the sun. I know that the humongous mana heart at the top of this cavern provides light to the whole space. But I feel its luminous glow is kind of off putting sometimes¡ªI don¡¯t know. It just makes me miss the real thing more.


    That aside, I realized the sledding idea. I shaped the sledge using a stone slab and engraved a slippery rune at the bottom side of it. It was fun. Although I still need to carry the sledge up to the mining area, I don¡¯t need to walk back anymore.


    The sledge can go as fast as a sprinting horse downhill, and can go even faster if I cast a simple wind spell. I wonder how I can go faster? Should I smooth out the ground too? That¡¯d create less friction, right? Let¡¯s do that tomorrow.

 Day 28

    I think I went a little bit overboard. At first, I smoothed out the ground in the escape tunnel as I planned out last night. All two and a half kilometers of it. But then, I realized that the smoothed ground is too smooth and sturdy; It became too tiring to get to the mining area because my leg¡¯s grip on the ground is becoming unsteady handling the¡ªIt¡¯s a little bit slippery, that¡¯s what I¡¯m trying to say.


    That said, I carved stone stairs on the left side to help me climb. I also added a guard rail to keep me on the smoothed track when sliding down.


    To keep me hydrated when climbing up, I carved some holes on the wall of the tunnels and filled it up with some slime water pouches. The distance between them is about half a kilometer, and I intend to resupply them once every few days. I also installed a stone door on them to prevent debris¡ªthat I levitated while sliding down the path¡ªfrom filling them. Now that I think about calling those holes them is kinda weird, so let¡¯s call them drinking water shelves.


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    Anyway, the reason why I realized what I did a little bit overboard was because once I tried to slide down, the speed¡ªit was just too fast. I lost control of the levitated, heavy stone debris behind me, and it became a landslide situation. The stones got everywhere in the cavern. It was a mess all around.


    Fortunately, nothing died from being crushed by the stones. Small part of the fences surrounding the nuts field got hit a bit, but it was an easy fix. And the rest of the mess was just stones flying everywhere.


    Should I try to construct a wall just in case I lose control, and a landslide happens again? But that would leave me trapped between the debris when I lost all control, right?


    That¡¯s right. I could construct a wall with a hole on it so that I can slide through the wall, and leave the wall to deal with the gravity, and all that.


    That might be a good idea. Let¡¯s do that tomorrow.

 Day 29

    Bad idea. The wall with a hole was a bad¡ªNo, wait, it was a good idea. The execution of it was just that bad.


    I constructed the wall with a hole in it as planned yesterday. The wall was made of stone with a little bit of strengthening magic through alchemy. It¡¯s a straight wall placed a dozen meters ahead, and perpendicular to the tunnel opening. It held up pretty well for the first few waves of debris landslide, but it fell through after that.


    To fix this, I¡¯m currently planning to apply some curves and stuff for the new wall design tomorrow.


    That aside, today is the nut field¡¯s harvest day. Fortunately, nothing destroyed the nuts field this period, so I could harvest three hundred nut patches without any loss. In return, I replanted two hundred blue nut patches, two hundred yellow nut patches, and two hundred red nut patches; Totalling to six hundred patches in the field.


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    Due to the massive quantity of it, I didn¡¯t get the time to process the harvest in the morning, so I will do it tomorrow.


    At this point, you must be wondering how I could tend to hundreds of patches despite the fact that I''m here by myself. The answer is obvious: It¡¯s magic. Don¡¯t think too much about it. But if you pester me like that, let¡¯s just say that I¡¯m very good¡ªgifted, even¡ªwith my magic hands. While I can only control a couple of giant hands, if it¡¯s just a regular sized magic hand, I can control a couple dozens of them at the same time all day. Those hands are definitely helpful at digging ground for sowing the nut seeds, and harvesting too. For watering, I usually use the giant hands to carry water and pour a little bit at a time through the whole field.


    Oh, gosh, I felt so silly bragging like this. I better sleep.


    Another note, the mushrooms have dried and I mixed them up with a little bit of leftover nut paste from the previous batch. It¡¯s great, although a little bit lacking something. I wonder what.

 Day 30

    Today marks the thirtieth day of me getting trapped inside this cavern. After I joined Blue Canary years ago, I never would have imagined I could ever stay in one place for a month at a time with the never ending quests and all. But now, I don¡¯t have any choice but to stay in one place¡ªdigging and planting my nuts on the ground. How the turns have tabled!


    Jokes aside, today was a busy day.


    In the early morning, I spent several hours processing hundreds of nut plants that I harvested yesterday. Processing as in separating the nuts from the roots of the plants, and all that. I saved the nuts in three stone pots based on their color type¡ªred, blue, yellow¡ªand stacked the roots and the branches near the smokehouse to use as firewood later.


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    After that, I constructed the wall that I planned out last night. I constructed the wall curving from the West side of the tunnel¡¯s opening to the East. It was designed that way to help guide the debris as I slid down-and-out the tunnel to the designated place for the pile of mining debris. And the wall did its job well. Did. As in it crumbled down after a dozen sessions.


    It still held up better than yesterday¡¯s wall, though, probably because of the new design. Suppose I need to construct a stronger, and thicker wall tomorrow morning.


    Oh the efforts I need to put to have some fun in this darn cavern.


    That said, I spent the rest of the evening making nut paste from uhm¡­ the nuts. This has been like the third or fourth times I made nut paste since I was trapped in this place. I think I¡¯ve gotten the hang of it by now.

 Day 31

    A couple of things happened today. A couple of things beyond my control.


    First, I found out that the pregnant white snake that I kept enclosed in the stone pot is gone. I tried looking for it by scanning the whole cavern, and that was until I noticed the second thing: the ancient door had been unlocked.


    If there¡¯s anything more dangerous than a dungeon in this world, it¡¯s an unknown dungeon. As I highly suspect that the tunnel beyond the door is actually a deeper part of one, I set a blocking stone wall in front of it at least until I prepared myself to go into it. That said, I paused all activity regarding tunnel digging, and spent the whole day preparing myself.


    I butchered the whole pigs in the pig trench (4 barrows + 48 piglets) before I realized that the smoker building can¡¯t handle the sheer volume. So, I expanded the structure, which took a couple hours, and proceeded to smoke all of the meat. I saved half of the pigs'' innards in a big stone pot, and fed the rest to the slimes. I assume the smoked meat will be done tomorrow morning, and I will probably be able to feed myself for half a year with them, if I cut them up very thinly, and let them dry further for a whole day.


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    Despite the fact that I butchered the pigs due to the timely unlocking of the ancient door, I do think it¡¯s about time as I already can count the dried slime supply with my fingers, and the slime trench production capability cannot keep up.


    It¡¯s rather lonely, though, as I don¡¯t hear any pigs squealing in the dead of the night anymore. Or maybe they were snoring? I''m never sure what as I¡¯m usually too tired to move around at night to check on them, unless they made a ruckus.

 Day 32

    Spending a whole day cutting smoked pigs into thin pieces would never be a part of my routine as a magician, but here I am.


    I spent a day cutting smoked pigs into thin pieces and putting them into stone trays to air dry. There¡¯s nothing much to it, really. I cut, and cut, and cut, and cut¡­


    While I cut, my mind wanders into what kind of precautions that I need to hold onto before entering the ancient door tomorrow. After all, there''s a high chance that it¡¯ll be a dungeon. And I never tried to go inside a dungeon alone without a member of Blue Canary with me.


    Dungeon is, to say the least, a dangerous place. It¡¯s a place where treacheries, trickery, and a lot of other eerie things happen. You might not believe what kind of horror I¡¯ve witnessed inside to the point of wondering how I can still be up all this time, well, how should I put this. Let¡¯s just say it¡¯s a trade secret. Anyway, I¡¯m rambling.


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    After cutting, I put aside the bones, and the brains for slime feed later.


    Currently, the slime trench is populated by barely a hundred slimes. It¡¯s not much, considering they only produce about four new slimes each day. And when the pig trench was still there, it consumed at least a dozen dried slime every day. That was in the past, though, and now I don¡¯t have to worry about consuming dried slimes for a while because of the stock of the smoked meat, so I can let these slime populations grow once more.


    I finished the day by sliding down several times in the currently-on-hold gateway tunnel. I¡¯m surely grateful for the Gods who created gravity, because man, gravity is fun. Sliding down without having to dig anything is fun.

 Day 33

    Apparently, it wasn¡¯t a dungeon.


    I delved into the tunnel behind the ancient door, and after a hundred meters or so, found out that it wasn¡¯t a dungeon. It¡¯s a room full of books. Magical room. Magical books. Considering there¡¯s no dust nor spider webs in sight when I stepped in it despite how spacious the room is. Granted, it¡¯s not as spacious as the Blue Canary¡¯ library that I managed. Still, the kind of magic that¡¯s filling the room is mostly the same, and that makes me question a lot of things.


    Ever since I got transported into this place, I¡¯ve been wondering a lot of things. I never actually write it out because I know if I do it, those unanswerable questions will haunt me even in my sleep. Such as: What kind of manners this place is? Why is there a giant mana heart dangling at the center top of the cavern? Why did this place choose me to trap out of anyone else? Why even install a trap at all? I miss society, you know? Where is this place located? How come I can grow nuts on the ground with high efficiency despite there¡¯s no sun at all? I kinda surmised that it¡¯s because of the giant ass mana heart in the room, but surely, there must be some kind of detailed explanations in one of those books, right?


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    I suppose most of the answers lie in one of those books now. I just need to find the right ones out of hundreds of them. In which, the ones who seem to be of interest are handwritten by a literal chicken. So, yeah, it¡¯s just my luck.


    Talking about luck, I found this little storage room situated in the back of the library. There are some things that I haven¡¯t seen before inside of it, and let me tell you, I have seen a lot of things. Inside, there are some kind of springy bed which I can¡¯t explain how comfy it is; a strange playing card with symbols that I don¡¯t understand; and a wooden chest containing a magical grimoire, which I don¡¯t recognize the design of.


    On the cover of the grimoire, it says: ¡°Farm.¡± and I don¡¯t know what it means. I mean, I know what a farm is, like, I¡¯m literally farming nuts these days, but ¡°Farm.¡± in the magical sense? Never heard of it. Probably aside from the skill notification that I got around a week ago, which I also barely made sense of. Hmmm¡­


    For now, I suppose I will sleep well tonight in this bed, man, seriously, so comf¡­

 Day 34

    There¡¯s nothing special happening today.


    After feeding the slime trench, and checking on the nut fields in the morning, I went to the library to read the ¡°Farm.¡± grimoire that I found yesterday, and got enlightened in a lot of things.


    Despite only consisting of two rooms, the grimoire confirmed that this place is actually an ancient dungeon called, drum rolls please, ¡°The Farm.¡±


    Lame naming sense aside, it¡¯s said that, due to the combination of ancient druidic magic and the giant ass mana heart dangling in the ceiling, any seed that you plant in the main cavern will grow at a much, much quicker rate than normal, and also more bountiful. And I was right. I can always blame things on the giant ass mana heart in the middle of the room.


    The grimoire also stated a way to access farming skill lists, and apparently due to the nature of the dungeon, it boosted experience regarding farming skill too, which is pretty useful, I suppose. A bigger number usually means better.


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    This is currently the stats in my farming skill trees:


    [ Bountiful Harvest Lv. 2 (6%) ] [ Seed Sowing Lv. 5 (54%) ] [ Watering Lv. 5 (2%) ] [ Alchemy Lv. 4 (8%) ]


    It¡¯s pretty great, I guess. I¡¯m not sure how to feel because they are farming skills. For the record, I¡¯m a magician. There¡¯s no way I will continue farming once I leave this place. I don¡¯t even have a land outside of this place. I guess I can buy some? I don¡¯t know. Let¡¯s think about that later. For now, I¡¯m learning these druidic spells that let me summon seeds from the grimoire using the combination of water and earth.


    Smoked pork slices and nut paste are great and all. But sometimes I wanted to eat other things too.


    It¡¯s such a shame that the grimoire doesn¡¯t explain why or how I ended up in this place or the exact location of this place¡­ back to digging the tunnel tomorrow, I guess.

 Day 35

    I pondered too long about this. I pondered on what kind of plant seeds that I want, and it took me the whole morning to decide on some cherry tomato seeds.


    Now, why would I ponder too much when now I have the spells to conjure up whatever seeds, however much, whenever I want it to? Yeah, no, that¡¯s not how the spell works at all. According to the grimoires, once I conjure up some seeds with the spell, it will take me about a month or so before being able to conjure another. Which is understandable, considering how potent commonly known seeds conjured from druidic spells are, you can basically upset the balance of nature if the Gods didn¡¯t put any limitation on the spells.


    I suppose that¡¯s the reason why ancient druids built this dungeon deep inside the earth, disconnected from nature, so that it doesn¡¯t mess with the balance of things. Sucks to be them, of course, because I¡¯m here now and in the process of trying to dig my way out of here. I wonder, though, what would happen to this place once I connected the tunnel to the surface world? Yeah, let¡¯s cross that bridge later.


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    Back to the topic of the cherry tomatoes, I planted five three-meter rows of it north of the nut field. This makes the eastern half of the cavern now officially the farming part of the cavern. Looking at the abnormal growth rate of the nuts here, I predict the cherry tomatoes will take three-four days to fully grow, and I will be able to harvest them every other day.


    I hope that cherry tomato¡¯s sweet-sour taste goes well with the nut paste¡¯s ground-fusion taste. If that¡¯s not the case, I could make some tomato juice with it too. And probably some wine¡­ MY NUT WINE. I COMPLETELY FORGOT ABOUT IT.


    Good. It hasn''t completely gone bad yet. Let¡¯s drink some of it tonight, and throw the bad part of it to the slime¡­

 Day 36

    I¡¯m not sure if slime can even get drunk, but I think they got drunk last night and now they doubled in number.


    As far as my study into magical creatures goes, the only time a magical creature population seemingly doubles overnight is whenever they feel an inevitable doom that pushes them to reproduce violently to preserve their own species existence. Question is, how vile actually my homebrewed nut wine was to the point slime, a creature that¡¯s known for being able to digest anything, is driven to this point? Or perhaps is there something weird in my nuts that boosts their reproductive capabilities? Nah, no way, I fed them the nut branches and roots every time and nothing like this ever happened so far. Also, I drank that stuff too last night. By the Gods, what did I just make?


    Anyway, I butchered half of the slime trench to keep the population shy past the one hundred mark, and noticed something: The newly bred slime produced flimsier and more tender dried slime remains than the usual ones. Perhaps it¡¯s the side effect of the accelerated breeding process, I¡¯m not sure, nevertheless I have a bad feeling about this. I¡¯ll add expanding the slime trench capacity to my to-do list tomorrow.


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    Talking about my to-do list, I¡¯ve come back to my digging the getaway tunnel routine since yesterday. I finally finished reconstructing the wall to guide the debris that I have been holding up a few days ago, and it¡¯s probably my strongest construction yet. It survived the whole day of getting hammered by falling debris, and it still stands strong even until tonight. I wondered how long it would hold up, though. Considering the amount of debris that it needs to endure every day, I hope it lasts for a week at least.


    At times like this I regret not remembering the strengthening rune that Jessica uses to strengthen our weapons in combat, but whatever. I¡¯ll just fix all the damages the wall has as best as I can, and hope that it will survive the next day, and the next day, and the next day¡­

 Day 37

    This morning, I expanded the slime trench by digging the trench deeper into the ground and re-engraved the slippery spells covering all of its side. After what happened yesterday, I don¡¯t want to get overrun by slime in my sleep just because I fed them wrong or something.


    I began the expansion effort the first thing in the morning and was done with it just in time for lunch, and that was then I realized that it¡¯s about time to harvest my nuts. Considering now that I know that this cavern significantly speeds up plant growth using some ancient druids¡¯ magical knowledge, a thought came to my head: What would happen to six hundred of my nuts, if I harvest them a couple of days later than the usual time? Will they become bigger, and more bountiful? Or will they become smaller, but have stronger, more concentrated taste? Or will all of them become rotten or turn into monsters? These thoughts rustled my research spirit, and I¡¯m definitely looking forward to the next couple of days.


    That aside, tonight, I¡¯m picking up a new book called ¡°All You Need to Know About ¡®Farm¡¯ Farming¡± from the ancient library. It¡¯s the thickest book I could find there, and I hope that I will find some more information about this place more than inside the grimoire. I mean, from the cover it said that ¡°it¡¯s all I need to know¡± about this place, right? Ignoring the chicken handwriting, I fastly peek inside the books, and that seems to be the case. I¡¯m going to read it tonight, and highlight anything that seems relevant. Let¡¯s hope, once again, that I find what I need.


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    Oh, yeah, I forgot to put this detail the other day, but I created some simple stone sticks to support the cherry tomatoes plant growth. So far, they have done their jobs well, and I don¡¯t see them snapping.


    Also, I forgot to change the designation for Plan B into Plan A. There¡¯s no other solid way out now aside from digging the tunnel into the outside. There might be another way out if I find the information that I need to conjure a teleportation spell from the books in the library, but yeah, that¡¯s a future problem.


    Huh. It seems like I keep forgetting to write down stuff lately. Am I¡­ slipping?

 Day 38

    The cherry tomatoes are growing fine to the point that they might be ready to be harvested tomorrow. It doesn¡¯t matter if I know that it was magic that makes the cherry tomatoes grow or not, the speed of it still amazes me. And this goes as well to the growth speed of my nuts. Huh? Why am I wondering if those cherry tomatoes will taste as good as my nuts? Surely they will taste different, right? Right? It has been a while since I last ate a tomato, I kinda forgot how it tasted. Was it sour or sweet? It was something in the middle, right? Oh, no, I want tomato juice so bad right now¡­


    I just went ahead and picked some half-ripened cherry tomatoes to make some juice. It tasted refreshingly sweet, and I loved it.


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    Anyway, when I made my way to the cherry tomato plants, I noticed some fireflies flying around the field, and they were so pretty. I wonder where and when they started to be inside this cavern. It seems like because I casted illuminate spells to write this journal every night in the other side of the cavern, they don¡¯t bother to show their lights near me, huh? Should I start making campfires instead of using an illuminate spell considering now that I have a decent production of branches and foliages? Yeah, sure, why not. With a real fire, I might be able to cook some decent food too.


    Maybe some nuts soup? Or slime noodle? OH. I can also put in some tomatoes for seasoning too. And if I can survive until the next time I can conjure a new seed, maybe I will conjure some pepper seed for better seasoning, or rice seeds to put in more energy into me¡­ hmm¡­ There''s nothing I can do but to think for now. I hate this.

 Day 39

    Today, I harvested the cherry tomatoes, and got five pots worth of them. Three pots I intend to save for snacks or juice ingredients later. Two pots I used up for¡­ well¡­ cooking.


    After sleeping on it last night, I decided to just throw whatever edible things I have in this cavern into a big cooking stone pot, and let them simmer over a fireplace. The cooking that I made, if this could be called one, consisted of a couple of normal-sized-pot-worths of mashed cherry tomatoes, some grinded nuts, some slices of smoked pork meat, and some dried slimes cut like noodles. I intend to keep reheating it before I eat, and adjust the taste as I refill it every time it is almost empty every other day. I call this food an eternal stew 1.1*.


    And with that said, this eternal stew 1.1 did make me cry the first time I tasted it this afternoon. Perhaps because I haven¡¯t tasted real warm food for awhile, but the taste did make me remember a lot of mundane things that I might have taken for granted when I was outside of this place. Things like showering or soaking in a hot bath.


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    Don¡¯t get me wrong, though. I do clean myself regularly¡­ but, you know... Should I¡­ maybe? Yeah, why not. Let¡¯s build a hole in the ground to soak myself into. I wonder where I should build it, though. Half of the cavern is filled with farmlands, and the rest of it is filled with slime trench plus the storage area for my craftings¡­ and not to mention the mountains of ground materials too¡­ There¡¯s also the choice of digging a bath in the ancient library, but it¡¯s a library and I don¡¯t want to do that. Hmm¡­ If I dig a bath near the well, there¡¯s a chance that the well will be polluted by the bathwater, right?


    That¡¯s right! I could create the bath by making a room inside the tunnel. I¡¯ll check tomorrow.

 Day 40

    I haven¡¯t thought much about this before, but being inside a giant cavern surrounded by more than half kilometers thick of solid stone layer before hitting normal soil kinda blurs some things. I first assumed that this cavern is deep underground because the result of the radar spell from the early days tends to go upward, but maybe this cavern is inside a mountain all along? I¡¯m not sure. The ¡°All You Need to Know About ¡®Farm¡¯ Farming¡± book doesn¡¯t really tell about it. I mean, it was still an interesting book, and I learned much about the technical aspect of farming from it. But it¡¯s still not the one I was looking for.


    In the first place, what I need to know is the exact location of the cavern, not if the cavern is inside some mountains or buried deep underground, to teleport out of this place.


    Anyway, I built a small three by three by three meters bathroom on the right side of the tunnel. I positioned the room a little bit away from the tunnel¡ªmaking an airlock hallway in between¡ªto prevent any debris from needlessly entering the bathroom when I slid down the tunnel with them.


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    Inside the bathroom, there is a big hole for soaking. It has its own water rune to produce water, and a simple drainage connected to a huge stone pot inside the cavern for me to use the used bathwater for watering my nuts.


    If there is anything that I wanted to add in the bathroom, it will be a system to heat the water. Because as enjoyable a cold bath as it may be, I can¡¯t use it early in the morning nor in the middle of the night. The water is very cold around those times.


    And although I could add one, I don¡¯t have any woods or branches to burn because I need to use those for cooking. Great! Just another thing to gripe about.

 Day 41

    I started the day with a quick soak in the newly constructed bath. It was cold, but it did its jobs wonderfully, so¡­ nothing to complain about.


    Today marked the fourth day I let the nut plants overgrow from its usual harvesting time. I harvested one plant each from the three nut species to check if anything changed, and it sure does.


    At first glance, the nuts per plant count become fewer than their usual quantity. Not sure exactly how, but I assume it¡¯s related to the changes in their taste and appearance.


    The red nuts became smaller, redder with spiciness level double than usual.


    The blue nuts became semi-transparent, like a little piece of dried slime, and tasted colder than ever.


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    The yellow nuts became somewhat crystallized to the point that I could have mistaken them for a sugar rock, if I didn¡¯t know any better.


    With so many changes in four days, I wonder what changes will occur to my nuts in the next three days*¡­ Looking at the samples, I assume they will have fewer nuts per plant, becoming more concentrated, and their taste will become much richer. But I¡¯d bet there¡¯s still a chance they will get ruined or stay relatively the same as today''s samples¡­ Either way, I don¡¯t feel the need to worry about this nut batch anymore as my food stock could last me for several months at this point with the slime trench, the stocked smoked pigs and the ridiculously short-harvest time of cherry tomato plants. In which, for the record, I also harvested five more pots today.


    I saved the newly harvested cherry tomatoes, and today¡¯s nut samples for tomorrow. I think it¡¯s about time I created a new batch of fruit wine¡­ My thirst for alcohol is starting to build up again with this much juicy fruit in my hands¡­


    *Regular harvesting time for the nut plants is every seven-eight days.

 Day 42

    As planned, I spent all morning today on creating a new batch of wine using all five pots of cherry tomatoes plus the overgrown nut sample from yesterday.


    This time, however, instead of splitting the nuts into separate pots and spitting on each of them to promote fermentation, I mixed all available ingredients, squeezed them up into one big pot full of juice, and smothered them up for several hours using the remaining heat-fire after I had my eternal soup lunch.


    By taking my time to prepare this batch, I seriously wanted the end result to be somewhat better than the previous one, especially in the longevity department. Using the general purification trait of fire, by heating the batch, I hope that this batch would be able to stay longer in storage, and the slime won¡¯t be as stimulated as the time I dumped the failed first batch on them.


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    In retrospect, I shouldn¡¯t have used my spit to promote fermentation in the first place. Just because I heard that some tribes from the eastern region use their own spit to make the famous Lacratian wine, I just thought¡­ maybe¡­ you know¡­ the stars somehow aligned for me or something, but it was an oversight.


    After praying for this new batch and the usual digging session, in the evening, I took my time to look around the ancient library again. Since there¡¯s no book here that¡¯s obviously screaming ¡°Read me! I contain all the information that you want about this place¡± from their appearances¡ªaside from the ¡°Farm.¡± grimoire, and ¡°All You Need to Know About ¡®Farm¡¯ Farming¡± book that I¡¯ve read previously, of course¡ªI chose the one that interests me the most the second I laid eyes upon it.


    ¡°In Regards of Slime.¡±


    After I skimmed through it, it¡¯s a book related to slime farming.

 Day 43

    The book ¡°In Regards of Slime¡± that I read the previous night contained old research notes regarding slime¡¯s habit and biology. It was handwritten and contained some decent detailed illustrations. Of course, most I already know or have seen before as they are a compulsory study material during my starting days as an adventurer, however, there¡¯s this one illustration in the book that piqued my interest the most.


    It¡¯s an illustration of a rectangular tall box with the length and width of one meter, and the height of three meters. It¡¯s some kind of design for a slime breeding box that theoretically could produce at least one extra slime per day in exchange for a handful of food.


    The design is pretty unique considering that the ones that I¡¯ve seen commonly are the wide-field, free roam type, and they looked so natural, I wouldn¡¯t have thought to optimize it. Theoretically alone, this design could increase slime production by more than a hundred percent, based on how much room is prepared. Problem is, why wouldn¡¯t this design be widely used today despite the enormous benefits it offers?


    The easiest guess would be the upkeep. A handful of food per day would be too much in the harsh climate of the Northern continent, where slime consumption is common. One can¡¯t even feed the slime another slime¡¯s remains while using this design because that would only make slime grow bigger, not multiply. The upkeep would be impossible to keep in a mass scale production if the keeper didn''t have a big farm with a stable high production capability to support¡ªWait. I might have been wrong. I shouldn¡¯t have jumped towards the centralized mass production method, but instead go to the decentralized method.


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    Toilet. This design could very well be used as a food-producing toilet. Let¡¯s say if every person in the North built their own slime box as a toilet, they wouldn¡¯t need to worry about the upkeep, as the slime would feed on their waste. This way, one person would be guaranteed to be able to eat one slime each day. Preventing any famine. But then again, to keep the toilet idea from turning into a disaster would need some safety measures in place so that there won¡¯t be any toilet that get abandoned to prevent countless toilet slime roaming the street. Hmmm¡­


    Anyway, I decided to replace the slime trench and build twenty-five slime boxes to save space. For the upkeep, I plan to use the cherry tomatoes for the first twenty-four boxes as they seem to be producing more tomatoes than I can store, and for the last box, I will use as my personal toilet. Come to think about the cherry tomatoes, if only I didn¡¯t smoke all the mini pigs previously, I might have a somewhat functioning pig farm right now¡­