Infinite Farmer

Once Tulland had the area planted with as many briar seeds as he could manage, he sat back, tried to let his regeneration do its job, and ate. When he was ready, he used Enhance Plant over every planting in the farm, thankful that he had preloaded these seeds with power before he had left the first floor. Then he sat back and let himself recharge and repeated the process, driving the growth of the briars a bit each time.

His farmer's intuition was telling him that he was going about this all wrong. The swamp had been too wet to try and farm in, which he had known just from looking at it. This place, his skill said, was too dry. Even if the briars got going, they wouldn't thrive here. He'd grow low-level plants at best, if they survived at all.

But it's my only choice right now. I have to get something going. I can't just burn out all the resources I brought with me without any way to replace them. And I need somewhere to fall back on.

The hours wound on as the briars got taller and taller, however slowly. At some point, they reached a height of about a foot, which was about a half or a third of what Tulland needed them to be to feel confident they'd do anything for him. If he could just get a few more hours, he would probably get there, even if the bar for getting there was just having enough visual cover that he was truly difficult to see from the outside.

It was not meant to be. Tulland had just bottomed out his magical powers when he heard the noise in the distance. It wasn't a snuffling or growling, which would have almost been more comforting. Instead, it was a scraping noise, like a knife being drawn across a whetstone. That scraping was layered over a soft thumping that occurred just before every rasp. For the life of him, he couldn't imagine what it could be.

And then, as it rounded the corner, Tulland was well and truly frightened, shocked beyond anything he had expected or any level that his frazzled nerves could tolerate. In front of him, bloodied and barely keeping their feet, was what looked for all the world like a human person, clad in partial plate armor and propping themselves up on a broadsword.

"Oh. Hello," the woman rasped. "Could you watch me for a bit while I heal up? I'm afraid I'm going to become unconscious for a bit."

And then she did, clattering to the ground like a bag of scrap iron. Tulland had just enough presence of mind to command his little vines to stop eating the woman and drag her inside before he let himself react to the shock and the adrenaline of the surprise.

An hour went by as Tulland sat facing the nearly-dead woman, petrified. She wasn't necessarily an enemy in the same way the monsters around him were. She might even be a friend. This might even be great, he thought.

But if any of that isn't true and she wants a single thing that you have, she'll be able to cut you in half like an ax through kindling and there won't be a single thing you can do about it.

As terrible as it was, Tulland had a choice here. And he could almost sense what the Ouros System was going to tell him to do before he reopened the channel to hear what it had to say.

Kill her.

Why?

Because she's a much higher level than you. She's been doing something to assure that. She's likely returning to this floor from another one, trying to gain experience she missed on her first trip through.

You can do that?

Once you reach the boss floor before the first safe zone, yes. The rules vary depending on how high you've climbed, but that much has always been consistent.

Just because she's a higher level than me doesn't mean she'll kill me. Not everyone is like you. Some people are good.

Debatable, but the level of danger she poses is not why I told you to kill her. She's experience, Tulland. A mass of it ready to be taken. Likely several levels worth, uncapped.

That's horrible.

So is life. I didn't design that one, and thus cannot apologize for the other.

Tulland was more tempted than he wanted to admit when the System mentioned several levels worth of experience. He had seen what just a few did to help him survive against the Lungers on the first floor, and had experienced how sudden the tipping point between barely surviving a fight with something and easily handling it with minimal danger could be.

Several levels all at once might abruptly catapult him to being survivable in this new place. And with how weakened the woman appeared to be, it might be as simple as sending a single vine over to her and turning away.

As much as that might actually help him, Tulland was thankful to find he was still several steps removed from being quite that desperate. Instead, he took a deep breath, waddled over, and squeezed the juice from three or four of his cultivated briar fruits directly into her mouth. If his experiences with Strong Back were any indication, regeneration skills liked to be fed. He hoped the sugar would supercharge the process for her, at least a little.

Whether it was because of the nourishment or some other factor, the woman began to stir not long after that. Tulland noticed simply because it was hard to miss as she opened her eyes, gasped, and jumped to her feet with her sword in hand before getting a better look at her environment and Tulland's terrified, quickly-backing-away place in it.

Grimacing apologetically, she sheathed her sword.

"I'm sorry about that. It's not often that I fall asleep outside of one of my safer spots. When I woke up here, I was a bit startled."

"Not a problem." Tulland was just glad she had put away the sword. "I'm glad you made it through."

"So am I. And thank you for resisting the urge to make sure I didn't. Not many would have, especially with all it might have done for your class." The woman squinted at Tulland, then took another look around her. "Which is… what, exactly? I mean, if you don't mind telling me."

"It's… well, I suppose there's no harm. I doubt I look very deadly armed with this." Tulland gestured with his sharpened stick, which looked much less deadly and much more pathetic alongside the woman's shimmering, clearly magical sword. "I'm not a combat class at all. There was a bit of a betrayal involved. It's a long story."

"Was the betrayal 'When you are gone I can finally have my money' or 'I was betrothed to someone the rich man wanted' in terms of plot?"

Tulland tilted his head to the side, confused. "The first one, I guess. How did you know?"

"There are a lot of stories like that in here. You hear them, even if you never meet the people. They tend not to last very long." The woman winced her I'm-so-sorry face at Tulland again. "I suppose I shouldn't say so."

"No, it's okay." Tulland waved at his farm. "I'm getting by with these briars for now. But I'm trying to be realistic about my chances."

"Good. I suppose, anyway." The woman looked down at a bag on her hip, one that glowed with magic all by itself. "I do have some extra weapons and armor on me. I don't suppose…"

"No, I'm afraid not. The System made sure I couldn't get much utility out of that kind of thing. The only workaround I've found so far is growing my weapons myself. And I'm not sure how long that's going to last."

"Ah. Well, I still owe you a favor, if there's a chance to repay it. Maybe I can save you back if there's an opportunity. Or something." The woman looked sheepish. "And with that, I had better leave. There's still hunting to do, before nightfall."

So there was night here. That was good to know, although not the main thing on Tulland's mind at that moment. "Are you sure? I could… I mean, if you wanted to rest more, the briars are pretty good cover."

"No. I'm afraid not." The woman shook her head. "Look, I'd like to help. I really would. But I'm here training because I'm not doing so well myself. You can't possibly imagine how strong the boss on the fifth floor is. I was a pretty big deal in my world, but…" She shrugged, helplessly. "It turns out my world was a pretty small place. And people made me seem like I was stronger than I was. I'm not sure I'm going to make it, and I can't spare the time to guard you when eventually I'm going to leave and…"

She paused helplessly.

"And I'm just going to get killed anyway. No, I understand. You should go. In fact," Tulland rooted around his bag until he found the fruits he had squeezed out for her, "you might as well take these. I'm guessing food isn't that easy to come by out here. And I can always get more."

The woman looked at him confused for a moment before her mouth fell open in shock.

"You can make food? Like, just make it?" She pointed at the soil. "From dirt?"

"I mean, yes. That's typically how growing things works," Tulland said, falling into the sarcasm mode that he used with the System. "It's not that exciting once you've seen it happen a couple times, and I can tell you that you're going to get tired of these sooner rather than later."

"No, you don't understand. How do you not understand? You must have seen how much experience it costs to buy food here," the woman said.

"What?" Tulland asked.

"Food. When you buy it. How much it…" The woman's hand hit her head with her palm. "Oh, for the love of the gods. It's because you can grow it. The Infinite never even gave you the option to buy it."

"Listen, lady, I mean this nicely, but you are going to have to fill in some of the gaps for me here. To buy food? No, it never did that. Am I missing something?"

The woman sat down heavily on the ground, here eyes moving back and forth as she did some kind of mental calculation.

"It's like this. When I got here, I was offered a special option to spend some of my day's experience to buy food. It's not cheap. The Infinite said it was because a fighter can't be expected to do battle on an empty stomach, or something like that. It's the same for everyone I've talked to…" The woman's eyes went blank for a moment. "At least five people in the lower levels, over the time I've been here, not counting the few I had to fight. It's the same for all of us."

"And I didn't get that because I can grow food. But can't you hunt, or something?"

"We can forage, but there's not much food to find. And hunting is no good. The beasts are poisonous. I only survived because my vitality is high." She went to touch one of the briars before thoughtfully pulling her hand back. "If you could make food, enough for me too, then we might be able to work something out."

"Like?"

"Like maybe I guard you when you sleep. Or something like that. I can't be here all the time, but I'm trapped on this floor for a week from the timeout. Not having to spend experience on food would get me at least a few days worth of hunting."

Tulland thought about that for a bit.

"And it's just that easy? I agree to feed you, and you spend some time on me? Just like that?"

"Just like that."

Tulland stood and wiped the dirt from his pants. "Then come on. We have to get started."

The woman blinked at him. "Started doing what?"

"Planting. This place is trash for growing. So is the swamp. But I had an idea about that. How's your strength score?"

"Mine? I'm an armor-bearer. It's as high as anyone's, I guess."

"Good. That will help with the shovel." Tulland shook his head as she shot him a questioning look. "Don't worry. It's simple to do. I'll show you."

—

The badlands were too dry, and the swamp was too wet. The answer to where Tulland should farm had hit him like a ton of bricks earlier, far too late for him to take the risk of trying to start his farm again. But now, with a guard, he could take more chances. He was taking full advantage of that.

"That's as big as your farm can be, right?" The woman leaned on the shovel and heaved in a deep breath. "You said those were the dimensions."

"Yeah, although if you can do a little ten-by-ten plot over there, I'd appreciate it. The way my class works right now, the farm isn't really for harvesting entire plants from. I need an annex," Tulland explained.

"Sure. But after that, I'm done. It's going to be dark pretty soon, and I want to be up one of these trees before that happens."

"Fair enough."

Tulland packed the last of the wolf-flesh around his briar seeds and sighed. His farmer's intuition wasn't telling him he had invented the best soil possible, but this hybrid mix of the organic-material heavy swamp soil and the dry dirt from the badlands was at least not something it was actively complaining about. That was the trick he had come up with. If the swamp was too wet and the badlands were too dry, he needed to build right in the transition area to take advantage of that.

The briars were already indicating that they liked the soil better, too, mostly by growing about three times as fast as they had done in the badlands.