[Farmer] Mage
B2 - Chapter 10

Cal cast [Rainfall] to pass time as he waited for people to return. Strangely, he had cast the spell several times already, and Tavia still wasn’t back. He wasn’t sure what could delay her for hours.

Even more surprisingly, Nibbles and her group weren’t back either, and they had been gone since yesterday. Of course, Cal wasn’t concerned about them at all. He doubted if there was anything in the Northern Wastes that could threaten them.

Unless the golem did something unexpected again.

Cal felt a sudden urge to search for them before he reminded himself that the golem was too slow. Even if something catastrophic happened, they could escape without issue.

It was well into the evening when he heard the sounds of wheels crunching over gravel, and by the number, it was too many for it to be Tavia’s carriage. He extended a mana tendril and sensed Merin within the group.

Ah, right. The house is going to be expanded today.

Cal let [Rainfall] run its course before standing to greet the new visitors. Miren’s carriage stopped close by as the carts with the building materials parked near his house.

“Welcome back to my farm, Miren, Torin,” Cal greeted.

“Apprentice Cal.” Torin smiled, looking around the farm curiously. “You have transformed it, and in a good way. Impressive.” Miren nodded in agreement beside him.

“Thank you.” Cal supposed that having his work complimented by two designers was an accomplishment. “Are we still going by the original plans?”

Torin nodded. “Yes, we brought everything needed for a bedroom on the second floor with a possibility for more expansion in the future.”

“Good, good,” Cal said. “Seris is inside the house. Give her a voice in her room’s design, but keep it within our guidelines.”

“Of course. We’ll get started right away,” Torin said before leading Miren to the workers preparing themselves.

Cal’s eyes flickered in thought before he shook his head. He would speak to them about building a smithy after the expansion was complete.

He watched them speak with Seris through the window for several seconds before returning to the pond. Casting [Rainfall] was getting repetitive, and he would rather work on improving other magic, since farming wasn’t an option yet, but the pond was the key to his future power.

Several hours passed, and the crew Miren brought was as efficient as he remembered. The crew dismantled the side of his house opposite his room, and they began building the second floor.

They had already lit multiple extremely bright lamps to compensate for the reduced sunlight, so he assumed the work would continue all night until completion.

Cal smiled before casting [Rainfall] again.

Another hour passed when he heard the loud steps of the golem in the distance. The sun had set, leaving the moon the only source of light, but he could see several beasts surrounding the tall golem.

This must be the reason for the delay.

Cal stood and appeared before the traveling group in a few seconds, scaring the unknown beasts into jumping back with their black fur raised.

They look like large cats.

His eyes scanned them a few times before landing on Nibbles, who was relaxing on the golem’s head. “Well? What’s all this?”

The pack leader and Nibbles spoke to each other in growls and squeaks before the latter translated everything to him in charades.

Cal stared at Nibbles before shooting a skeptical look at the large cats. He found it hard to believe that these were the beasts that annoyed the pack leader so much that he personally made a trip to end it once and for all.

He wasn’t idle while trying to understand Nibbles. Mana tendrils had already taken account of all the large cats and found them to be weaker than the wolf pack, with a single, battle-tested cat standing above the rest.

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However, the cat that looked like it had been through hell was at the peak of the Initiate-equivalent stage at best, so it posed no danger.

“Since you wanted to bring them in, it’s your job to keep them in line,” Cal said to the pack leader. Nibbles immediately made a loud protest, making him pause. “Nibbles, you want to keep them in line?”

When she nodded rapidly, he noticed she was giving the pack leader a smug look. He wasn’t privy to whatever competition these two had between themselves, but he wasn’t against it since it seemed innocent. Besides, he didn’t miss the look of relief on the pack leader when Nibbles volunteered for the job.

“Fine, you’re the boss of these cats. I’m counting on you, Nibbles.”

Nibbles stood straight and gave him the most solemn look she could before jumping down from the golem’s head. She started giving orders to the cats, and Cal considered the matter out of his hands.

“Golem, go back to your previous position by the pond,” Cal ordered, watching to make sure it actually followed his orders. He made a much more leisurely return to the farm, with the pack leader right beside him.

“Did it give you any issues?” Cal asked the pack leader casually. He didn’t expect the wolf to immediately shake his head and huff.

Does the golem only try to find loopholes with me? I’ll give it another chance.

He waited until they were back at the pond before giving a new order. “Golem, cast Rainfall over the pond until I tell you to stop. You may do nothing other than casting the spell.”

Cal felt the pull on his mana reserves as the golem used it top cast [Rainfall]. The golem had done this before successfully, but his distrust caused him to forgo the benefit of being able to do other things instead of filling the pond.

He hesitated as he stared at the golem before turning away. Casting [Rainfall] did nothing to increase his [Mage] class, so he would take this opportunity to work towards that.

Cal intended to test [Mist Walker] after he felt the pond was ready to act as a supercharged hearthstone many times over, but for now, he wanted to create another spell.

Unlike [Mana Sense], which gave him access to the oft-used mana tendrils, the next spell he intended to create would help him with farming in the Northern Wastes.

The surface layer that had given him so much growth as a [Farmer] was now useless to him and could be considered a pure time-waster. Creating a spell that would remove it without disturbing the soil underneath shouldn’t be that difficult.

Cal already had a high affinity with the Earth element, and he knew spells that would make it easy to create what he wanted. [Mana Sense] would help him separate the soil and the surface layer, and [Earth Barrier] already included steps that required him to identify the composition of the ground.

Those two spells combined would help him greatly.

He moved outside the farm, away from the wolf pack and the large cats that just joined, and knelt down to place his hand on the surface layer. He extended several mana tendrils into the ground and easily encompassed the surface layer, and the next step was to remove all of it.

Cal winced when a sizable chunk of land shot up in a spike, pulling away much of the soil underneath. It would not be as easy as he thought, but that was fine. He was in no rush.

His subsequent tries weren’t much better, but that there was still some improvement. He estimated it would be successful after a day or two of experimentation, and it would be even faster if the golem wasn’t drawing on his mana reserves at the same time.

Cal kept trying when he sensed someone approaching him. He never pulled away the mana tendril on Seris, though it was mostly focused on tracking her reserves rather than what she was doing. She hadn’t moved in sometime so he had assumed she had gone to sleep.

“What are you still doing up?” Cal asked, halting his spell.

“I couldn’t really sleep with the noise.”

“Use my room. You won’t hear any sound with the door closed.”

Seris shook her head. “I’m not that sleepy, anyway. Do you think I can use the new bow until I get tired?”

Cal thought it over for a second before agreeing. Seris ran to the house to get the bow and arrows before returning.

He extended several more mana tendrils to Seris to make sure he wouldn’t miss any detrimental changes.

She looked around at the dim landscape before pursing her lips. “I don’t have any targets.”

Cal tilted his head and considered a solution. “How far can you see?”

“Uh, farther than I can shoot an arrow.”

His eyebrows shot up in surprise. He wondered if this was a benefit of her accessing her essential mana reserves.

“Let me see if I can make you something.” Cal spent the next few minutes zipping around, casting [Earth Barrier] at various distances. “How about that?”

“Thank you, Cal!” Seris said with a wide smile.

She pulled the bowstring back; the sinew creaking under the tension. He felt her breath slow until it came to a stop. Her fingers let go.

Cal didn’t look at the arrow which leaped from the bow. Instead, he put his full attention on her mana reserves, which trembled as it threatened to connect to the arrow. Thankfully, the training they had put Seris through worked as intended.

“Yes!” Seris cheered. “Look at that, Cal!”

Cal followed to where she pointed and saw an arrow stuck in a barrier that was nearly four hundred yards away. That was impressive. “Do you need me to make targets that are even further?”

“No thanks. I don’t have the strength for that. It’s already amazing the bow lets me shoot that far!” Seris said with sparkling eyes.

“Hm, well done. And retrieve the arrows yourself. That should tire you enough to get you to sleep.”

Seris’s mood dropped a bit, but she still had an excited smile as she agreed.

Cal slowed his practice to keep a closer eye on Seris. To his surprise, she never missed an arrow, hitting every barrier he set up as a target several times. She retrieved her arrows twice before her arm was basically boneless from the effort.

“Good night, boss,” Seris mumbled as she trudged back to the house.

Cal sensed her enter his room and collapse on the bed, falling asleep almost immediately. With his room occupied, it gave him the excuse to continue with his practice for the rest of the night.