Volume 1: Farming Chapter 33 Devil-level Snow Wolf Cub
Winter has ended for a month and a half, and the temperature has warmed up slightly, but not much higher. It is still around ten degrees. You will feel cool when you go out, and even the sunlight is cold.
But even in this spring when the weather is still cold and warm, the weeds in the fields have already sprouted. Xiao Yun stepped on the still hard ground after the thaw, and looked around. All he could see were the green weeds sprouting from the withered yellow, and the thorny vines that had sprouted green again after surviving the cold winter.
"Huh...Okay, everyone, get ready to open up the wasteland!"
There was no response. The twenty adult members of the tribe, including the tribe leader, all looked at him with confused faces.
Well, Xiao Yun was the only one who was excited about farming. The tribesmen had no idea about it, so Xiao Yun couldn't say anything...
Based on what Xiao Yun had seen and heard on Earth and the experience passed down by the Minotaur, he knew that in the grassland, a cold temperate region with a low altitude and low temperature, the earlier wheat is planted, the better. So the first thing to do is to reclaim the land - the land here is indeed fertile, but it is all virgin land, and there are no herbicides or pesticides in this world. To avoid the embarrassing situation of "grass growing thickly and wheat seedlings being sparsely populated", more effort must be put in.
The wheat planting area that Xiao Yun chose is the land to the south of the tribe, between the tribe, the river, and the swamp. The crops need to be fully irrigated, and of course it is best to be close to a water source.
Xiao Yun had walked back and forth on this piece of land countless times before and after winter. He had already conceived in his mind the land he wanted to reclaim. Now that he could finally start, he was confident and in high spirits. He immediately ordered his tribesmen to prepare to burn the land.
Ahem, we have to burn it. This place has abundant natural water resources, and there are dense thorns and vines. It will take who knows how long to finish digging with a hoe...
Since there was plenty of land, Xiao Yun planned to open up two square kilometers of wasteland as an experimental field in the first year of planting. Xiao Yun would be unwilling to open up less land, but if he opened up more land, he would not have enough seeds, fertilizers, and manpower to take care of it.
The wasteland was divided into eight parts of varying sizes according to the terrain. Isolation zones were dug out piece by piece, and the tribesmen were asked to watch over them. Then the wasteland was set on fire. During the burning process, special attention should be paid to areas with dense weeds. These things may not be noticeable at ordinary times, but they will be a big trouble when it comes to farming.
After burning the wasteland, they had to follow the planting habits of the Snow Wolf People, which was to scatter bean seeds over a large area and then leave it alone... But it was not so easy for Xiao Yun. He carried a hoe and divided the land into "large fields" of an average of ten acres each, then distributed the hoes given by the Minotaur and asked everyone to plow the soil.
Normally, since there are cows in the tribe, they should try cow plowing, but there is no iron plow. Relying on a wooden plow to plow this hard ground, the workload of repairing a broken wooden plow may be more laborious than turning the soil manually... At first, Xiao Yun also thought about asking the tauren for an iron plow, but the problem is that they are also very tight and can barely make enough... He can only hope that the dwarves can find a mine to make an iron plow this year, so that they don't have to go through so much trouble in the future.
There were tools for digging the soil, and the tribesmen thought it was a simple job at first, but in the end... they only dug a large field after half a day of digging, with all the adults in the tribe working together and their tongues hanging out from exhaustion...
Even so, Xiao Yun was still not satisfied:
"Didn't I tell you to dig evenly and deeply? How can it be that some places are deep while others are shallow?"
"Don't dig around the roots of the thorns! Dig out all the roots and throw them away!"
"Fuck, why don't you just pick up such a big rock and throw it away? You're just leaving it here!"
The tribesmen stared at him with shame and grievance. Dahe showed him his claws that were rubbed red by the hoe, with tears in his eyes. The tribe leader rubbed his old waist hard with his mouth pouted.
Xiao Yun glared at this bunch of losers for dozens of seconds, then turned back to the tribe and called over all the dwarves who had not left yet.
The dwarves had their own food now. The Snow Wolf gave them two hundred sheep to lead as meat during the prospecting. They were very grateful to the Snow Wolf. When they heard that the Snow Wolf wanted them to turn the land, they rolled up their sleeves without saying a word...
It's no wonder that dwarves are short in stature and don't need to bend down to hoe the ground. They are also natural miners and are particularly good at digging holes. Their efficiency in turning the soil is much higher than that of snow werewolves.
"Hey!" The female dwarf Sarah shouted, and with her short and thick arms, she waved the hoe and dug, and the hard clod of earth weighing several kilograms was turned over by her.
"Hey ha!" The refreshed dwarf Charles followed behind and broke up large clods of compacted soil with a hoe.
"...You guys are really skilled?" Xiao Yun wiped his sweat and looked at the dwarf leader Baru.
Baru smiled innocently: "When the Tauren are reclaiming the wasteland, they will ask us to help and give us food."
Feelings are still skilled.
The dwarves were kept for a few more days to help with plowing the soil and solve the problems that the tribesmen were not good at. However, Xiao Yun did not plan to let the tribesmen sit idle. He ordered them all to clear the roots of weeds and stones in the ground, and learn from the dwarves how to plow the land more efficiently. It was impossible for their own farming business to rely entirely on others, right?
After working hard from dawn to dusk for a week, they turned over two square kilometers... uh, almost three thousand acres of raw land. Then the dwarves left to look for the mineral veins they urgently needed. The rest of the work had to be done by the snow werewolves themselves.
The ground that had been hardened for who knows how many years had been dug deep by the dwarves, so it was not too much of a hassle to let the tribesmen continue to plow it. This time, the cubs did not have time to rest, and all of them took up the field, using tools such as hoes, homemade wooden shovels, and homemade long-handled stone hoes to plow the dug land in the fields again and again, ensuring that the large lumps of soil were turned into small powdery lumps and became relatively soft.
Well... all the young and old in the tribe were left to work in the fields, and they were so tired that they rolled their eyes. The daily work of the tribe had to be handed over to the cats. Fortunately, it was just grazing cattle and sheep near the tribe, fetching water, cleaning and cooking. No matter how weak the caracals were, they were always stronger than humans. The older cubs could wrestle with Thrall, so they could still take care of it.
As for Xiao Yun's previous promise to let the non-farming tribesmen build houses for them, it is still on hold for the time being... Xiao Yun thought that the Snow Wolf people's physical strength, like that of animals, could also be used in farming, but he didn't expect that there would be a period of adaptation and learning if the major was not suitable... The main reason was that he was too careless and reclaimed such a large piece of land in the first year. No matter how beasts the Snow Wolf people were, they were still human beings after all.
Finally, the land was reclaimed to look like a farmland, but the work was not over yet. Although the soil was plowed several times and turned over and over and exposed to the sun several times, who knew whether the insect eggs inside were killed ? When the wheat seeds were sown, they would all be eaten by insects and no buds would sprout. All the hard work of these days would be wasted... well, fed to the insects.
There was no pesticide, so Xiao Yun could only make his own insecticide. Those who grew flowers at home probably knew that soaking garlic in water could kill insects, but Xiao Yun had nowhere to find garlic - but it didn't matter. Before starting the burning, he asked Hongye to take the cubs to the edge of the jungle to dig up a lot of wild garlic, so they could make do with it for now.
Soak wild garlic in water in a ceramic jar for more than five days, then dilute the soaked solution with water and wrap it in a wild boar skin with fine holes poked in it and sprinkle it once; then, mix soap made from wild boar oil without any chemical additives (even if you want to add it, you can't), make soapy water, and sprinkle it again - Xiao Yun doesn't know whether this homemade insecticide is useful, but it won't make her pregnant if she tries it anyway.
Even applying homemade pesticides on 3,000 acres of land was not an easy task. The whole family worked all night and it took two days to complete the task. Next, the soil and fertilizer that had been prepared before winter came in handy.
Bird droppings, human and animal feces, humus in the woods, silt dug from the swamps, and domestic garbage generated by the tribe, such as various bones, hair, and wood ash, have been piled together and fermented for several months. They have been thoroughly fermented and mature, and although they have a peculiar smell, they are not smelly. These natural fertilizers are shoveled up and transported to the fields, spread as evenly as possible, and then repeatedly plowed twice to ensure that the soil and fertilizer can be quickly integrated.
The last tillage cannot be done randomly like before. The ridges for sowing must be divided. This was a technical job for the Snow Wolf people before. Now, the whole tribe, young and old, has turned the soil countless times. The ridges divided in each field are relatively straight...
After all, it was the first time to farm, and the seeds given by the Minotaur were not many and could not be wasted. The spacing between the rows was left at more than 30 centimeters, so that the Snow Wolf people could walk in between and not easily step on the seedlings. After the ridges were piled up and water was roughly sprinkled to ensure that the soil was moist, sowing could begin.
The Minotaur gave the Snow Wolf Man about three tons of wheat seeds, and also gave him a homemade measuring tool, which was an object similar to a bucket made of wooden boards, and instructed him to sow one bucket of seeds per acre of land.
Xiao Yun weighed the load of the measuring bucket with his hand. It could hold about 20 kilograms of wheat seeds. However, the Snow Wolf Man did not have the farming experience of the Minotaur, and he left the ridges wider. Naturally, he could not sow the same number of seeds as the Minotaur. About half of the seeds would be enough.
Of course, even if only half-mature wheat seeds are planted, that is, about 10 kilograms of seeds per mu and 100 kilograms of seeds are planted in each field, this amount of wheat seeds is not enough to plant all the fields, but other crops still need to be planted, so it won't be wasted.
At midnight, he woke up all the tribesmen and took them to the fields. Before daybreak, he patiently and carefully planted wheat seeds on sixty large fields. Xiao Yun was merciful and allowed the whole tribe to rest for half a day. He then woke up the tribesmen, who were so tired that their legs were shaking, and sowed black beans.
The minotaur didn't give that many bean seeds, so Xiao Yun planted all the black beans kept by the tribe, regardless of whether they were degraded or not. No matter what, there was no reason to leave the land that he had worked so hard to serve idle, right?
The fields with the most fertilizer were used to grow wheat and black beans. The remaining farming work was much simpler. The three kinds of vegetables given by the Tauren were all planted: radish, green vegetables, and cabbage. The remaining more than 100 fields were all planted with alfalfa. The Tauren raised sheep but did not graze them, so where did they get the grass? Of course, it was grown. The fresh alfalfa could be eaten, so it was also a dish.
Well, we have to plant the plantain seeds that Xiao Yun kept. This thing is still useful in preventing and treating dysentery and so on. We can't rely solely on collecting it from the wild.
Finally, all the reclaimed fields were planted with seeds. Not only were the tribesmen screaming with exhaustion, Xiao Yun almost couldn't stand... It was not like he just had to be a supervisor and talk. He did all the work that the tribesmen had done, and also did all the work that the tribesmen had not done.
But... it was far from the time to rest and relax. For crops to grow well, watering was essential. He had to dig ditches to divert river water from the empty spaces between each large field, and also dig ponds to store water. Otherwise, let alone the three thousand acres and three hundred large fields, just carrying water to irrigate the more than one hundred fields planted with important wheat seeds and black beans would be enough to drive the tribesmen crazy.
There was also the issue of additional fertilizer. Black beans would grow well as long as weeding was done properly, but wheat and alfalfa needed phosphorus fertilizer. The fertilizer that had been saved for the winter was all used up before planting. The tribe didn't have that much natural phosphorus fertilizer, so each and every one of them was a big project.
However, Xiao Yun is not a devil. Considering that his tribesmen are on the brink of collapse, it is appropriate to give them a few days of rest... Well, the most important thing is that he is almost unable to stand now. If he doesn't take a break, he will not have the energy to recruit strong men.
Thin and transparent clouds float lazily in the sky, and the sun hides shyly behind the gauze-like clouds, revealing only a silhouette. There is a little warmth in the sunlight, but it still doesn't feel warm. This is the third day after the sowing work was completed. The drizzling, fine sun shower as if competing with the sun to see who is more shy falls on the earth shyly.
Xiao Yun was lying at the door of the mobile home in Ge You's cosplay style, his feet stretched out to the outside were sprinkled with a light layer of rain, but he was too lazy to move. Hongye, who was leaning against him and lying dead at the door, was aware of the situation. When she heard the sound of rain, she reluctantly tilted her head and said with no strength in her voice, "You got wet, Ayun."
"I saw it." Xiao Yun said weakly.
"You won't take your feet back?"
"Just think of it as washing your feet."
"You only wash one foot?"
"..." Xiao Yun turned his head and raised his chin, "Qiuqiu, come and help me carry my feet in."
"It's Qiu! Qiu!" Qiu complained as he put down his knitting needles, stepped over Hongye's lying corpse, picked up Xiao Yun's knees, and dragged his legs that were stretched out of the door into the room.
"Ayun, aren't you afraid of being tired? You are so tired that you can't move, but before that you were forcing us to work as if you wanted to force us to die." Hongye couldn't help but say.
"That's not right." Xiao Yun said slowly in a drawn-out tone, "Farming can make you work yourself to death, but you won't die. Hunting can make you die if you encounter a very powerful monster, or if you can't kill any prey and go hungry. So, do you think it's better to be tired but not die, or to really die? This is a simple choice."
"...I can't beat you anyway." Hongye glared with dead eyes.
"This is nothing, the Long March has only just begun." Xiao Yun recited the words slowly like an old man, "Have you seen the canals and ponds dug by the Minotaur? They want to grow rice, and farming requires more water resources than us. We don't grow rice, but we also need water, so we have to do the water conservancy they do, and we have to do it better than them. For example, as for the river channel, after we have finished the canals and ponds needed for the fields, we have to prepare to build the river channel, so that we don't have to worry about the river flooding in late summer and early autumn and washing away our fields..."
"...Please, don't say anymore..." Hongye's eyes were filled with tears...If she hadn't personally devoted herself to farming, she would never have known that working was so hard.
Xiao Yun, who had made Hongye, a snow wolf warrior, cry, closed his eyes and rested. The caracals in the room who were listening to their conversation were trembling with fear...
The caracals were the first to understand how hard the snow werewolves worked during the period of land reclamation and sowing. When they first arrived, these snow werewolves were so energetic that every morning while they were still sleeping in the tent, the snow werewolf cubs would run out to play and their laughter could be heard from far away.
After the snow werewolves started farming... especially after the snow wolf cubs were called to work in the fields, the caracals never heard their laughter again, nor saw them playing again - the snow werewolf cubs who came back from the fields all looked exhausted, with their eyes rolled up, their tongues sticking out, and their steps unsteadily. They were so numb that they even ate, with no expression on their faces. It was as horrifying as it could be.
The cubs were so exhausted, not to mention the adult werewolves... At first, one person could carry all the horns of the caracals, and he was so tired that he could fall asleep wherever he fell...
The entire Snow Wolf tribe has become so exhausted, so the Caracal tribe, who are eating for free at the Snow Wolf tribe, will naturally get one...
But the Snow Wolf Man never said from the beginning to the end that he would bring the Manul tribe to the fields to borrow their cat claws. He was so tired that he vomited blood. He only let the Manul tribe do the lightest work - sitting in a warm house that was not exposed to wind and rain, spinning and weaving, cooking food and driving sheep. Compared with the farming of the Snow Wolf Man, it was too easy - this kind of preferential treatment was fine at the beginning, but the more it went on, the more uneasy the Manul warrior Qiu felt... They were all exhausted, and we were still so leisurely, was it really okay? !
But Qiu did not dare to say casually that we would do the same thing as you. First, the Snow Wolf was the master after all, and it was unreasonable for them to make decisions without the master's order; second, the Snow Wolf was so tired, Qiu was really afraid that his people would be exhausted to death within two days... really exhausted to death.
With the complicated mood of wanting to take advantage but feeling guilty at the same time, Qiu felt more and more unconfident when speaking to Xiao Yun - Qiu was really afraid of Xiao Yun, the culprit who caused the Snow Wolf to be defeated.
Hearing the slight snoring sound from the two people who were blocking the door and enjoying the breeze from the floor heater, Qiu stood up and took two pieces of animal skins to cover Xiao Yun and Hong Ye's stomachs. He gestured to the tribesmen to speak in a low voice so as not to wake them up, and jumped out by clinging to the door frame.
It wasn't just Xiao Yun and Hong Ye who were "standing still". All the Snow Wolf tribe, young and old, were now lying on the big bunk bed and sleeping soundly. Qiu entered the big bunk room and first glanced at the head of the bed - the human who was specially taken care of by the Snow Wolf like the caracal was not there. He must have gone to the mushroom house to grow the delicious Flammulina velutipes.
Qingyan, who was sitting at the end of the kang, sat up and was leaning against the wall to rest... Qingyan was stronger than the caracal, and was classified as one of the cubs of the snow werewolves. He had to do whatever work Yangmao and the others did, and he was exhausted.
"Qingyan, are you feeling better?" Qiu walked to where Qingyan was sleeping, sat on the kang with his body turned away like the snow werewolf, and spoke softly in a low voice.
Qingyan's usually lively golden pupils were now dull. He turned his head stiffly to look at Qiu, and his voice was so weak and powerless: "It's okay... I didn't get much rest before, and my whole body aches when I relax... Farming is really not easy, it's much more tiring than herding and hunting... No wonder only the Tauren are good at farming..."
Qiu's eyelids twitched when he saw Qingyan's frail appearance. The black panther tribe was the strongest tribe among the cat tribe, second only to the tiger tribe. Qingyan, a warrior, worked with the cubs of the snow wolf tribe, but it seemed like he had been squeezed dry after only ten days...
The cat tribe would capture weaker tribes to serve as slaves, and they would naturally exploit the slaves as much as they could. However... looking at the miserable state of the Snow Wolf people and the exhausted look of Qingyan, the Black Panther Warrior, Qiu really felt that the cat tribe was quite gentle when exploiting the slaves...
"The snow werewolves are so cruel to themselves." Qiu sighed from the bottom of his heart.
Qingyan was silent for a moment, his face twitched: "No...it's Ayunhen."
"..." Qiu recalled the scene in his mind when Ayun drove the howling snow wolves out of the house in the middle of the night and dragged them to the fields to work. He agreed very much, "...What a terrible cub." After thinking for a while, Qiu climbed onto the kang and approached Qingyan, "Just now I heard what Ayun said to Hongye, saying that next we have to dig ditches and ponds in the fields like the minotaurs--"
Qingyan took a deep breath, rolled his eyes, and slid down the wall.
The drizzle stopped after half a day. The caracals, who had been knitting for the whole morning, came out of the activity room to tidy up the tribe's sundries and cook lunch. None of the snow werewolves could move. Thrall, the human, was small and weak, so the caracals were not confident in letting him cook food that would feed the snow werewolves, let alone the snow werewolves.
After lunch, Qiu took the adult tribesmen to graze, while the four cubs continued to spin and weave in the mobile house. Amid the creaking sound of the spinning machine, Xiao Yun, who had eaten his fill and had taken a nap, woke up, crawled to a certain spot inside the house, grabbed the nearest cub and dragged him over to hug him, then snored again in a daze.
The caracal cub that was hugged by the waist: "..."
The other cubs: “…” Silently, they pushed the hand-cranked spinning machine to a place where the tribe members could reach it.
The young manul sighed like a little adult, and continued spinning in an awkward position, whispering to his friends: "Qingyan is right, the snow wolf has a terrible sleeping posture."
The friends nodded repeatedly, and one of them said, "Yes, last time I saw Qingyan being held tightly by Niu Jiao like this."
That one said: "So we can't sleep on their kang, it's too dangerous."
Xiao Yun: “Huh…Huh…”
On the fourth day after the sowing work was completed, Xiao Yun, who had slept like a dead pig the day before, was fully revived. He jumped up before dawn to wash and dress, then took the iron hoe in one hand and the iron sickle in the other, and banged the back of the sickle on the hoe: "Get up - get to work -!"
"Ahhh~~~~~~" The snow wolves, who didn't want to move at all, howled in rejection and covered their ears.
Xiao Yun jumped onto the kang and made noises directly above the heads of the tribesmen: "Get up - and work -!!"
"Are you a devil? Awww!"
How could the Snow Wolf, with his highly developed hearing, bear this kind of brain-piercing demonic sound? He cried bitterly while accusing Xiao Yun and reluctantly got off the bed...
Outside the tribe, the tent area of the caracal tribe.
Qiu, who was woken up, stuck his head out and looked in the direction of the snow werewolves' house. He had seen the snow werewolves running out of the house in panic with their heads in their hands many times, so he was no longer surprised.
"...What a terrifying Snow Wolf cub." Qiu sighed again.
Author's words:
Labor (non-combat) ranking:
Adult Snow Werewolf
Gray Dwarf
Snow Werewolf Cub, Qingyan
【wall】
Adult Manul
Manul cub
Sal
