After being volunteer-obligated to help Kenneth with his trees, I followed him around the forest as he explained how I would do the job. Apparently, Ryuu is not allowed to help. So I was the only person who would be doing the work here.

The job itself was fairly simple enough. The trees had taps hammered partway into the tree to make an outlet for the extra sap. A bucket hung underneath it to catch the drippings, similar to a maple syrup farm.

All I needed to do was to gather the full buckets and replace them with empty ones, then empty the full buckets into one of the two large cauldrons that were set up in a small clearing.

The larger cauldron was sitting on top of a roaring fire, boiling the sap down into syrup. The other one sat to the side with a fine screen over the top to keep bugs and small creatures out. I had to put twice as much sap in the boiling cauldron than I did in the other cauldron. But it seemed no matter how much I poured in those two, the liquid level remained the same.

Ryuu didn’t instigate me much while I was working. Instead he had become super quiet. But whenever I looked at him, he had his demon lord smile on him. To be honest, I stopped looking after the first day, because every time I looked it was just getting worse and worse.

After a while I was afraid that if I kept looking, I’d start seeing hallucinations about his demon kingdom in the background…Well, it’s all good I, guess- so long as he wasn’t pulling rat mobs towards me again. *shudders*

You have gained 1 strength You have gained 1 Dexterity You have gained 1 Vitality

Ah, did I mention the large amount of walking and heavy lifting I had to do?

The buckets were the large five-gallon kind that I’d attach to a wooden yolk made to fit across the shoulders like in the Netvids (online movies) about the ancient times. Carrying two of those buckets, plus keeping my balance while walking through a forest where the path was strewn with tree roots really helped me to raise those three stats.

Suspiciously, I didn’t see a single mountain lion on my way to and fro. After the first three days, it became rather monotonous. So I started counting the number of buckets I managed to empty.

To be honest, I lost count after around five hundred, though. And if this syrup had the same coversion rates as maple syrup…Since one bucket equals five gallons then 23 gallons of sap is equal to one gallon of syrup… So, divide 2,500 by 23, and...that’s a lot of syrup. If I factor in the fact that I lost count yesterday morning…yep. That’s a LOT of syrup.

I honestly didn’t know what I am going to do with over 110 gallons of syrup. I guess I could simply just let it sit in the bank unless I need it. I could also sell it, but this was a rare chance to get a sweets recipe from a game, so I put up with it. There was also the possibility that I'd only receive a fraction of what was made.

Did I mention there aren’t many sweet foods here? Most of the foodstuffs are Tanpopo specialties, which means they have dandelion leaves, stems, roots, flowers, etc. included in them. Only the bakery had sweet things, which were mainly made with dried fruits or honey. Even then, those were super expensive, so maybe it was a good thing to stock up on sweets now.

I heard that the capital has a large sweets market. It seems that produce from all over the land makes its way there. Fresh fruit parfaits, pies, tarts, puddings: I can’t wait! But first….I have to hurry up and finish up here! Most of the quicker players had already made their way to the capital without finishing the quests here, although many still succumbed to the monsters they encounter on the way there.

I admit, maybe I should have followed in their footsteps and struck out early, but I seriously hate not following through with what I have resolved to do in the first place! Pro Gamers don't stop until they've checked out all the routes, too; so why should I leave because of a few impatient buggers jumping the gun?

It wasn't too boring, either. Every now and then Kenneth would show up and show me a particular plant that he was gathering. It became an interesting side job to gather plants while I was working. If I managed to gather a plant perfectly, I’d gain experience points when I handed them in to Kenneth. I was able to gain experience points for doing something which didn't involve me, a sword, and rats. What luck!

But, in order to gather the herbs, I'd have to place down my yolk and the buckets. If I left the sap for too long, bugs would gather around. So I had to do gather the plants quickly if I wanted to bring clean sap to the cauldrons. If more than ten bugs got inside, the sap’s title was changed to ‘bug-ridden sap’ which the boiling cauldron refused. But, oddly enough the other cauldron accepted it, so all was well.

But still, by the time a whole week was almost up, I had gained enough experience points to level up twice. My status was looking pretty good at this point, too.

Name Jade Class Rookie Level 16 Title Rat's Nightmare, etc. HP 140/140 MP 324/324 Stats: Points: Strength 20 Attack Power 10 (+15) Defense 10 Vitality 18 Intelligence 18 Wisdom 18 Agility 12 Dexterity 22 Charm 10 (+2) Luck 16 Reputation 15 Unallocated Stats: 12

Yeah, I know. I should have invested the unallocated stats, but I wanted to figure out how the system works, so I was going to wait until I accumulated about 22 points before investing, to see how the system calculates these things.

Appraisal: Beginner Lvl 5

Unlike [Inspect] one does not have to be in contact with an object, monster, NPC, or player, in order to know its stats. Range is dependent upon level

Range: 5 ft

[Substitution]: 0

can switch two designated targets instantaneously. It can also supply for a missing ingredient in alchemy or cooking by using mana points. Range between the user and the objects in question will increase with levels. Don’t use this to steal, please.

Overkill: Beginner Lvl 5

Boost your attack power against any creature over five levels higher than you whom you bear an immense hatred for. Active: +10 strength +10 attack st: 10 mana per cast time limit: 10 seconds(x level) cooldown: 60 seconds

Cooking: Beginner Level 0

The wonderful ability to process raw foods into dishes. includes [Cookbook]. Gather recipes and master them to increase your level. Current level: your food will mostly burn.

Blacksmith: Level 5

Able to handle most normal metals. can make a decent sword.Includes subskill [Repair: level 2]

Herbology: level 2

Helps find and identify local herbs and plants. Includes Book of Plants.

Local plants that have been described to you will have a white outline.

Gathering: level 2

Now you can gather plants that you have identified. With higher levels, you will be able to gather higher ranked herbs and plants.

The last two skills I had acquired by listening to Kenneth when he explained what he was doing while gathering herbs. He was looking for mainly two kinds: Amethym- a small purple bell flower good for antidotes, and Heart Moss- a silver moss that is used mainly in health and mana potions. It seems he gathered great amounts of these and dried them.

It’s too bad I couldn’t get an Alchemy skill. It turns out, Kenneth doesn’t have an Alchemy skill either. Instead, he takes them to an alchemist friend he has in the capital, who paid completed potions for ingredients.

But there was also one other herb that I managed to discover during my treks back and forth. It was a rather conspicuous mushroom with a red cap and white spots. When mashed into a paste, this created a poison that took away three hp per second for twenty seconds.

I was never more thankful for appraisal than I was then.

Just think: without appraisal-san, I would have had to try it on another creature, or myself. Not knowing how much damage It would give me could potentially have killed me in one dose if it was a powerful poison. Not to mention I would have used it while not knowing if there would be other side effects as well.

Appraisal is now level 6

And all of that identifying raised it yet another level. I smiled as I poured yet another bucket of sap into the cauldron. When the bucket was empty, a blue box popped up.

You have helped Kenneth collect the extra sap for one whole week. Please see Kenneth for completion of the quest, and your rewards

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“A-re? Why is she collecting those red-cap mushrooms?” Ryuu wondered to himself. “Doesn't she realize those are poisonous?” He shuddered at the thought of her cooking the mushrooms up in a disastrous soup.

“I must keep a close eye on her to make sure that does not happen!” Ryuu decided immediately, ignoring the fact that he was simply using that as an excuse to observe Jade more.

Usually, AIDs remained out of sight unless they were called by their owners, or needed to give system prompts. But Ryuu had not gone into standby mode at all since becoming Jade’s AID.

Oddly enough, Jade didn’t notice any of this.