“Mmm, what a great way to wake up!”
I logged in to find my mascots and monsters playing in the yard, with ears of rice swaying in the distance...and a kappa raising its arms up at me.
“Gwak gwak.”
“Figured I’d find you here.”
Not only had this happened with the Sunekosuri, but I had learned about it through Hamakaze’s information, so I was fully expecting the Kappa to be at my house.
As I thought, whether a yokai appeared at your home depended on its favorability score. In my case, I had formed a bond of friendship with it without hurting it, so its favorability towards me was already high. It was also possible that there were other ways to befriend it that didn’t raise its favorability as highly. Plus, in my case, I also had the skill called Yokai Whisperer. It was a skill that helped raise my favorability with yokai, so that probably gave me a leg up with this one.
“You know, you seem a little different.”
“Gwak?”
The creepiness that was present during the fight had vanished to the point that the creature was kind of charming now. The biggest difference was its eyes. The piercing gaze from last night had been replaced with big, round eyes. Its hair was glossy and sleek, and its claws were more rounded than sharp. Even its voice had lost its threatening edge and sounded more silly and cute. It had gone from being the monster starring in a Japanese-style horror flick to being a character in a kids’ cartoon show.
“Anyway, this is for you.”
“Gwak gwak!”
I handed it a cucumber, and it happily started munching on it. It was nice to have a new companion that fit in with my Japanese-style house. Incidentally, Kappas were capable of doing farmwork. Only when it came to cucumbers, though. I decided to entrust growing cucumbers in my garden to the Kappa. I wasn’t sure how the Kappa’s cultivating skills compared to someone like Olto, so I decided to start it off slowly.
Once the Kappa was finished eating the cucumber, it went back to play with my monsters. They were sumo wrestling each other.
“Hmmm!”
“Gwaaak!”
Um, is that gonna be a problem? There’s not going to be any shirikodama taking if Himka loses, right?
“H-Hmmm?”
“Gwak gwaaak!”
Phew. Nothing to worry about. The Kappa had flung Himka away, but he just went right back for round two with a happy look on his face. It looked like they were wrestling purely for fun.
Once I was satisfied that the Kappa was settling in, I headed for my farm.
“I gathered a lot of materials from farming bosses and exploring the Squire’s Forest. Today, I’m going to focus on making fertilizer to use on the farm.”
While I was formulating plans for the day, I saw Olto come running over. He was full-on sprinting, which was unusual for him. Did he miss me that much? No, he did not.
“Mmm-mm! Mm-mmm!”
“Whoa, Olto?!”
He tugged hard on my robe, an action that I could only guess meant that something unusual had happened on the farm, so I followed him there.
“Whoa! What’s that weird thing growing there?!”
“Mmm!”
Among the Firestarter Plants had bloomed a mysterious plant with blue flowers. As I stared at it, I remembered something.
“That’s where I applied the elemental fertilizer and plant booster, isn’t it?”
“Mm!”
My experiment had evidently been a success. I inched closer to the mystery plant and appraised it. The name “Freeze Plant” appeared.
“Come to think of it, we applied water-type fertilizer and plant booster to Firestarter Plants, right?”
Fire and water made ice? I wasn’t sure that made a whole lot of sense to me.
“Only one ended up changing.”
One set of the fertilizer and plant booster could cover up to a quarter of a field, but only one plant had turned into a Freeze Plant. There was probably only a very small chance the fertilizer and plant booster would make a plant mutate, rather than it being a surefire thing.
Name: Freeze Plant
Rarity: 4 / Quality: 1★
Effect: Ingredient.
“Okay, let’s propagate this and grow more of them. Can you take care of that?”
“Mmm?”
“Huh? Is that a no? Can you not grow it here or something?”
“Mm-mm.”
“Hm? So you can grow it? Ah, but it’ll be low quality.”
“Mm.”
After more prodding, I learned that this plant couldn’t reach beyond a one-star level of quality if grown on a regular farm, and I would need to apply water-type fertilizer and plant booster to it. Nevertheless, the fact that it was an undeniably exceptional plant hadn’t changed. I decided to use a corner of a field to grow them for now.
“Hmm. If the Freeze Plant grew here, what does that mean for the other spots? Did things grow there too?”
“Mm.”
“Really?! Show me!”
“Mm-mmm!”
The Freeze Plant wasn’t the only mutation that had occurred. Most of the plants that I had experimented on by applying the fertilizer and plant boosters had undergone some sort of change.
I had applied air-type fertilizer to the Air Plants, which had turned into Breath Plants. The Gale Plants, which I’d applied earth-type fertilizer on, became Desert Grass. The Medicinal Herbs which had received the holy-type fertilizer turned into Purified Grass. This elemental fertilizer is a force to be reckoned with.
“Only the Lantern Pumpkins were duds.”
“Mmm.”
I had applied fire-type fertilizer to the Lantern Pumpkins, but they hadn’t changed at all. And their quality was already maxed. Maybe it was pointless to use it on vegetables?
My plan was to make fertilizer and plant booster in mass quantities today, so I could do more experimenting with those.
“Let’s clear out some space to use for experimenting. Could you refrain from planting anything in the herb garden?”
“Mm-mm!”
We’d been spending a lot of time adventuring lately. It was nice to have a day dedicated to crafting sometimes.
Once we had squared all that away, I tried to head back home for a brief moment, but apparently Olto had somewhere else he wanted to take me. The moment I tried stepping away, he clutched the hem of my robe, which almost made me topple over. He then led me to a spot where a plant I had never seen before was growing.
“Oh! The Unknown Seed I got at the auction!”
“Mm-mm!”