This was our third year, and we all knew what to do. Tilling, fertilizing, sowing seeds, and watering the soil were second nature to us by now.

My [Hoe] lightly embedded itself in the ground, and the System automatically tilled the soil. Then I took a sack of [Mysterious Goo] which I opened and waved over the ground. The fertilizer oozed from the sack and spread itself over the land. The funniest thing was the seeds. All I had to do was pour it into the [Seeder] and the seeds flew out of it and embedded themselves into the soil. Lastly, I held the [Watering Can] over the ground, and water sprinkled out over a wide area.

As usual, our main crop was [Rice], with a much smaller amount of [Tea], and we were growing various grains and vegetables for our household needs.

Shuye arrived in the middle of our work and watched our System magic until we finished.

“Shuye! Great day for a visit! How is your family?” I said as I handed him a [Crocus] flower.

He put it on his belt and smiled. “They’re thriving.”

I turned to my apprentices. “We’ll use the [Wild Seed Mix] on the empty fields before we talk to Shuye.”

The areas that had been planted with crops had all been harvested now. Since it was not a good idea to leave those areas bare, it was necessary to plant a cover crop to prevent soil erosion.

[Wild Seed Mix:

A mixture of seeds, mainly wildflowers, grasses, and legumes, that are used as cover crops. These plants protect the soil from erosion, improve soil structure, and add nutrients to it. The flowers also attract pollinators, and the grass is good for pasturing animals.]

Unlike the normal crop seeds, sowing this mix gave no exp. Cover crops were incredibly low-maintenance, requiring no fertilizing or watering. All we had to do was plant them, and they would grow on their own to protect and nourish the soil and serve as a good food source for the birds and bees.

This was our normal routine, and thus, I was shocked when I got a System popup.

[Free upgrade available: Would you like to turn the [Wild Seed Mix] into [Ancient Forest Hill Seed Mix] that is composed of local wild seeds?]

What?!

I hastily read the new item description to my apprentices. “Wow, this is incredible! I can’t believe the System is offering this for free!”

[Ancient Forest Hill Seed Mix:

A mixture of wild seeds, harvested from the Ancient Hill Forest’s most biodiverse regions. This unique blend includes specialized local varietals of wildflowers that promote soil health, resilient grasses that thrive in varied conditions, and legumes that unlock hidden potential in the earth. The plants will also serve as a source of food for native pollinators like bees, butterflies, and other insects.]

I immediately took 999 [Wild Seed Mix] packets and converted them. “Guys, this is wonderful!”

Lari, Kharli, and Mo crowded around me as I handed them 99 packets each. We each ripped one open and poured the seeds into our hands.

“Let’s compare them with the regular ones.”

I placed a table on the open field and we poured two piles on it, one of each mix.

“They’re different. The new mix has a lot more variety,” said Kharli.

“Look at these two seeds, there’s only one of them in the pile of the new mix,” said Mo. “I think this has more rare seeds.”

“Don’t get too excited,” I warned her. “Rare doesn’t mean valuable. It could be a rare legume no one has bothered to collect because it doesn’t taste good.”

“And we should test it,” said Lari.

“For sure, for sure.” I nodded my agreement, gathered up the piles of seeds, and put the table back into my inventory. “Let’s sow half the fields with the old mix and half with the new to see if there’s any difference.”

Shuye, who had been silently watching us until now, offered to draw the field map for us that indicated which parts were planted with each type of mix, a proposal that we accepted.

Sowing them was an easy task. It would be faster with a Seeder but we simply poured the seeds into our hands and flung them into the fields because it was more fun. The seeds shot out from our hands and buried themselves into the earth. We were done in almost no time at all and had to wait for Shuye to finish drawing.

“Where did the System get the seeds?” asked Mo. “Has it been going around collecting them? How?”

“Maybe the System got it from the fairies,” said Kharli.

“Or the qilin. Teacher helped them hatch. Maybe this is one of their gifts,” said Lari.

“Or the worms. They could be crawling everywhere when you’re not looking,” Kharli said to Mo teasingly.

“You’re a worm!” Mo flicked Kharli’s forehead.

“No, you!” Kharli took out a piece of cloth twisted to form a long worm-like shape and playfully whipped it at Mo.

I let the kids have their fun.

“How wonderful to think the System is always improving itself for us!” I fanned myself with my hat. Spring was over, and summer was here. Working on the farm was now a much hotter and sweatier prospect. When Shuye was done, I said, “Come, let’s freshen up and discuss the spring and summer seasons with our Farm Sales Manager.”

We chatted while we walked to the main house where Shuye went to wait for us in the room in the second courtyard that I had set up as an office. My apprentices and I showered the dirt off and changed into new robes before joining him for our scheduled business talk.

“So I hear the auction was quite lively,” I said to Shuye.

The modern conference table I had placed in the middle of the room was big enough for all of us and the office chairs were knockoff Herman Miller Aeron chairs. The maids poured tea for us and served snack plates. We were going to be here for a while.

“It was the most insane auction I have ever been to. People tried to fight each other.” He placed a couple of scrolls in front of me, and a copy in front of my apprentices. “Now, I think we should go over the sales numbers line by line.”

“Tedious, but necessary.” I looked around and saw that Lari, Kharli, and Mo were willing, though not eager, to get started on the boring task of reading and understanding all of the reports. “Okay.”

“These are just the early sales. Not all of the crops have been sold yet.” Shuye unrolled a scroll and pointed at the first line. “One chicken was sold to the Weasel clan of Fairmeadow…”

As we went through the list, he gave me a pile of papers which I stamped with my seal to approve the sales contracts. I needed to do this once to get a feel of what was happening, but I had already authorized Shuye to take care of this type of minutiae during the next summer harvest season.

The position of Farm Manager was still vacant. At the moment, Shuye was in charge of sales, Fengying was in charge of the household salaries and expenses, and Prince Baiyu was making sure we paid the correct taxes.

Deming, Fengying, Shuye, Scholar Wu, and Prince Baiyu were also constantly using their network of contacts to find whatever or whoever we needed for various farm-related and personal tasks. This place wasn’t like modern-day Earth where I could google which boots were good for farm work. One had to know which cobblers made the best shoes for different occasions.

With everyone’s support, the farm was doing great.

What we were lacking was a person who was overall in charge of the entire Emberstone Farm enterprise. I’d asked my boyfriend to look for someone who could do this, but he never got back to me, and I realized that the answer was staring me right in the face this whole time.

Obviously, I should train one of my apprentices to do the job. That’s what apprentices were for!

Thus, Lari, Mo, and I told Kharli to volunteer for the position. In the future, I wanted to work as the owner of the farm, the one who took care of the long-term vision and strategies for the farm while Kharli implemented my ideas.

I mentally sniggered at the thought of future me relaxing in my room reading gossip magazines as future Kharli pored over the accounts in the manager’s office.

Of course, we all needed to know the basics of the business, and thus we were now in the process of learning many things, a lot of them mind-numbingly boring but necessary.

“Looks like the bulk of the profit was from the [Diamonds] this time,” I said after we were done. “But that’s because of the demon extermination war. If we exclude that, the biggest moneymaker is rice.”

We discussed some of the details. Kharli asked some surprisingly insightful questions about the projected growth of the spirit rice export business, and we ate the snacks while we waited for Prince Baiyu to arrive. He was at his office taking care of clan business.

At around noon time, he and Scholar Wu joined us. The maids served a simple lunch and the others munched on roujiamo, a type of traditional sandwich made of a wheat flatbread sliced open and stuffed with spiced pork and vegetables, while I made my presentation using the System video projection function.

“Welcome! Today I will show you my vision for the farm’s future.” I showed them pictures of crops, taken by the System camera, which I then overlaid with an animation of a hand drawing an X mark over them. “Very soon, within a few more seasons, we will completely stop growing spirit crops.”

Shuye almost choked on his food. “You’ll stop growing crops?! Why?”