While the entire continent suffered through a famine, my domain was greeted by a bountiful harvest.
The wheat field swayed shyly in the breeze, scattering golden light everywhere. Above it, the farmers' laughter rang out high and clear. Like the sound of sacred bells. The women traded crude jokes as they swung their sickles.
It was like watching dolphins swim through a yellow sea... Oh no, I was getting too sentimental. Working the fields lately had really softened my edge. It was the first time in my life I'd seen something I had grown and harvested with my own hands. It wouldn't be strange if my heart went a little soft.
A tiny field.
It was such an unremarkable patch—barely larger than a kitchen garden, you might say—but it was a place I had cultivated entirely with my own strength. The ears of wheat were packed so densely they swelled and rippled.
Something tightened in my chest with a quiet ache.
"Heh heh heh."
As I was standing there, moved in silence, Parsi laughed beside me. He patted my shoulder lightly, as if he understood everything.
"I was incredibly moved during my first harvest too. Still am, for that matter. You're no different, Sir."
"Ah. The wheat grains are just as adorable as Goblins."
Parsi made a disgusted face. He handed me a sickle.
"......I can't say I understand that aesthetic of yours. Anyway, good work, my lord. Now it's time for the final bit of labor."
"Hmph, my farming skill has already broken through the Heavenly Zenith."
I scoffed.
In truth, I was feeling confident. Sure, I'd been clumsy at first, but now that I'd learned all sorts of things from Parsi, I was starting to think that maybe farming was my true calling after all.
For the record, a Farmer class had even appeared on my status window.
It wasn't just that it appeared—it had an overwhelmingly higher grade than any other class!
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
True Name: Dantalion
Race: Demon Lord | Affiliation: Dantalion Demon Lord Army
Alignment: Neutral (-10)
Level: 36 | Notoriety: 4543
Class: Farmer (C), Demon Lord (D), Dungeon Operator (F)
Command: 34/37 | Combat: 11/22 | Intelligence: 32/37
Politics: 35/35 | Charm: 20/20 | Craft: 8/17
*Titles: 1. Demon Lord of Terror 2. Innate Farmer
*Abilities: Farming Technique (C), Tactics (E), Marksmanship (E), Mining (F)
*Skill: Acting
[Achievements: 3]
[Subordinates: 54 entities/260 entities]
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
[Titles]
1. Demon Lord of Terror. Shattered the grand order of the world. Commands reverence from Demonkin and fear from the Human race: Command cap +10, Intelligence cap +10, Charm cap +10, Subordinate entity cap +100, Notoriety +500
2. Innate Farmer. Granted to one who has raised their Class (Farmer) and Ability (Farming Technique) levels in a remarkably short period. Respected by those who work in the relevant field: Combat cap +10, Craft cap +5, Affinity +10 (only for those with the <Farmer> Class)
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Compared to an F-rank Dungeon Operator and a D-rank Demon Lord, that name blazes with dazzling brilliance. A grade so sacred one hardly dares to speak it… Level C.
No matter how many bolts he fired from that crossbow, his Marksmanship stubbornly refused to budge from E-rank, yet his Farming Technique had shot up from F-rank to C-rank in a straight vertical line just from toiling through a single summer and autumn. Thanks to that, his Combat ability score had climbed by a full 4 points in the span of just a few months.
Truly a man born for farming. A genius—no, a prodigy of the uncanny kind… that wouldn't be an unfair way to put it.
Even a title had appeared. The system of this world had officially recognized me as a born farmer. A talent so undeniable the world itself had no choice but to acknowledge it. It gives me chills. I'm terrified of myself. Is it really okay to be this terrifying, Demon Lord Dantalion!
Ho ho ho.
A laugh escaped my lips all on its own. Parsi was giving me that "what's gotten into him now" look from the side, but I didn't care. So what? He's just a commoner after all. A medieval mind could never comprehend how great I am… I shall magnanimously forgive him, as befits a ruler's generosity.
"You know what? You're terribly unlucky sometimes, my lord."
"Hey, that's too much!"
Even if he felt that way, isn't it basic courtesy to just let it slide for your lord?
I know it myself. That I'm unlucky. But still… what's wrong with a little bragging?
It had been a year and a half since I fell into this world, and the highest cap on any of my abilities was still 37. Not even 40. Yet in just the past few months, I'd pushed my Physical Strength cap all the way into the twenties. That's insane speed. A little boasting is perfectly fine, right!
"Saying you've grown fast is all well and good, my lord, but how old are you now, if I may ask?"
"Uh… I'll be exactly twenty-five next month. Why?"
"I am seventeen."
Parsi snorted.
"I'm sorry, but when someone a full eight years my senior starts going on about how fast they're growing, it's hard to relate. At twenty-five, shouldn't a man have harvested at least one chō of land before he can call himself worthwhile?"
"……."
Yeah, I'm old. You bear of a bear, you little bear brat.
"Go on and clear some land yourself then. While you're plowing the earth, I'll be molding people."
"I can practically see the words 'I said something cool' flashing through your head right now, and honestly my dearest wish is that you'd stop, because it wasn't cool at all."
"Seriously, you're the worst!"
On top of Lapis and Laura already giving me grief all the time, now Parsi's piling on too. I am, for your information, a Demon Lord… a territorial lord…
Well, granted, I'm ranked seventy-first and my domain consists of only seven villages and eight hamlets.
I shrugged my shoulders.
"Hmph. No matter what anyone says, I'm a seasoned farmer now. Growing wheat was hard — why would harvesting be any harder? I'll have this whole field done in a single day."
"It would be sufficient even without this servant's assistance, then?"
"Obviously."
"Oh my."
For some reason, Parsi smiled with a playful, teasing look, as if she found the whole thing amusing.
"I shall look forward to it, then, my lord — the seasoned farmer."
"Naturally. Just watch from behind!"
I gripped the sickle tightly in my right hand. Then I strode forward boldly toward the wheat field stretching out before me.
It took me less than three hours to understand what Parsi's smile had meant.
A short while later—.
"M-my back! My back!"
Clutching my lower back, I rolled across the wheat field.
This was no joke. Bending at the waist to cut the wheat, roughly gathering it, bundling it tight and carrying it to one spot — I'd repeated this for three hours and my back felt like it was going to snap in two.
The monsters nearby watched me with worried expressions. The golem had shown tremendous ability when it came to plowing fields, but unfortunately, it was useless at delicate tasks like harvesting. At least Blingi was helping me out.
"Helping" was generous — Blingi actually had better efficiency than me. Since goblins are shorter than humans, he could swing the sickle more comfortably. While I had stacked five bundles of wheat, Blingi had managed a staggering ten. There was no comparison.
"No — the dignity of a master...!"
I tried to force myself back to my feet. In that instant, a violent wave of pain crashed over me.
"Gaaahh!"
I collapsed right there in the wheat field. Why? My back had held up perfectly fine for four or five hours with Laura during sex, but three hours of harvesting had completely destroyed it. Even if the muscles used were different, this was just absurd.
─ Kyarurur!
While their master was dying, the fairies were having a grand time fluttering above me for reasons that utterly escaped me. Our fairies radiated criminal levels of charm 365 days a year, but right now their giggling was insufferably annoying. You lot were no help at all during the harvesting, unlike the golem!
The fairies apparently found a new playground, because they declared the wheat field a designated hide-and-seek zone. They dove straight into the golden wheat, daring me to come and catch them. From between stalk and stalk, they poked their heads out one by one, taunting the one who was "it."
That looks like fun… I want to play hide-and-seek with the fairies too… I want to hug a fairy and lie down in the wheat field…
Even after all that suffering, I had only harvested a quarter of the total area.
"Ugh. At least nine more hours ahead of me."
Despairing numbers flickered before my eyes.
Today was already a lost cause. With my back in this shape, I couldn't work even if I wanted to. I'd probably be bedridden with muscle soreness tomorrow too. I had bragged about finishing the entire wheat harvest in a single day, but it might take not one day but four.
"There you have it. What did I tell you? A seasoned farmer? Keh keh keh."
Parsi's sneering figure appeared vividly in my mind. That little brat. I indulged him because he was clever, and now he was trying to climb on top of my head. One day I'd stomp on that punk's nose… Ngh. He was looking more insufferable by the day.
"My lord? What are you doing on the ground?"
A voice reached me. When I turned around, Laura was standing there. She was dressed in a yellow commoner's outfit, looking just like a young lady painted by some Dutch master.
Laura had three types of clothing. One was a dress—the one she had been wearing when I "kidnapped" her, exuding aristocratic charm. Beyond that, I had bought her several more dresses as gifts. Another was a black military uniform, worn when she served with the Crescent Alliance Army.
The last one was commoner's clothing. Once we started staying at the villa I had built in the village, the village women had gone out of their way to stitch garments from fine fabric and deliver them to us. "We used the most beautiful pattern passed down in our village," they said.
Mountain village fabric could only be so luxurious, but the effort behind it was extraordinary. It was a maiden's outfit in orange with white accents, and it suited Laura's golden hair beautifully. Laura had accepted this tribute with great joy.
"No woman in the world besides this girl could receive such a wonderful gift!"
Since that day, Laura wore commoner's clothes more than anything else. The outfit she had on now was one of those. Hmm, honestly, she had seemed happier about this than when I gave her the dresses… Women were hard to figure out, and Laura was especially hard.
A woman's heart is just like German—you can never understand it.
"I was feeling the energy of the earth."
"The energy of the earth…? Is there a gnome in there or something?"
"Gifting humans their daily bread is all the work of the earth, too. I always live with gratitude toward the earth. This is just my way of expressing that with a gesture."
Laura tilted her head.
"I didn't know my lord worshipped the goddess Demeter. Faith is all well and good, but how about we eat lunch first?"
"Oh. I've been waiting."
Laura was holding a basket in her arms. She brought snacks like this every lunchtime. I groaned, "Ugh, ugh," and hauled myself up.
Today's lunch was a sandwich. Not the kind made with pristine white triangular bread you'd commonly eat back in my original world. It was a sandwich stuffed with bacon and vegetables between wheat bread. Since Laura's cooking skills were far from excellent, she mainly stuck to dishes made from raw ingredients like this.
A snack eaten after hard labor tasted like honey.
"Delicious! You've outdone yourself, Laura."
"…As long as my lord is happy, I'm happy too."
Laura gave a soft smile.
At times like these, Laura's smile was truly beautiful.
When my throat tightened a bit from the wheat bread, Laura noticed like a ghost and handed me a water canteen. I gulped down the water. Was it groundwater freshly drawn from the well? The cool water ran down my esophagus and cooled my body, which had been baked under the blazing sun. Ahh!
Mealtime ended and I got to my feet. My energy was recharged.
"Ugh, ughh."
No matter what, I had to finish the harvest within two days. Otherwise, who knows what snide remarks Parsi would make.
Laura spoke up.
"Is your back hurting, my lord?"
"Cutting wheat is harder than I thought. Mmmng…"
"Hmm. You've been harvesting wheat with that sickle?"
I nodded.
Laura hummed thoughtfully, resting her chin on her hand in surprise.
"I see you deliberately chose the difficult path. Until now, the young lady thought my lord was an irredeemable lazybones, but it seems I must revise my opinion. My lord genuinely wishes to learn the farmers' mindset."
I tilted my head.
"I appreciate the praise, but I'm not sure what you mean."
"That is because you could simply cut the wheat with a fairy, could you not? Yet you choose to toil, and the young lady once again admires my lord's attitude."
A fairy?
"How would I use a fairy? They're too weak to even lift a sickle, let alone swing one."
"...My lord, did you forget about magic? You could simply cut it all down at once with wind blades."
"..."
I turned my head. The fairies were still playing hide-and-seek among the wheat fields. I silently issued a command to them in my mind.
'Fire in unison.'
The fairies jerked their heads up. They fluttered their wings and gathered at one corner of the field. Then, coordinating their timing, they shot wind blades. The transparent blades flew swiftly and neatly mowed down the wheat. A single spell had cleared a third of the entire field.
"I was so close!"
I grabbed my head and wailed. Why on earth hadn't I thought of this sooner!
─ Giggle-giggle-giggly.
While I wallowed in despair, the fairies flew over and laughed. My predicament must have been quite the spectacle for them. Damn it, stop pulling my hair! Don't climb on my back! It just makes me look even more pathetic!
Laura murmured in a dumbfounded tone.
"Could you really not have figured that out? My lord is truly... at times quite clever, but in moments like this, utterly foolish. Still, I did think it was strange that my lord was working so hard."
"My waist! My three hours of blood, sweat, and tears!"
Laura let out a snort.
"If you're not bright, your body suffers. I believe this was one of my lord's favorite quotes?"
It was extremely unlucky.
This is what you call a genius!