Chapter 14

It is now the second year that Yuto and Jennifer are living in the farm in Mineral Town. At six a.m. sharp, they jump out of bed to get ready for another spring day at the farm. They do their usual morning routines before heading out to the field to care for the spring crops Yuto worked hard to plant.

He pulls out his mithril watering can, then swings it wildly to splash as many as fifteen crops at one time. As he is watering the crops, Jennifer walks around the field pulling up weeds and looking for edible colored grasses. Yuto’s upgraded tools really help him work more efficiently and allows him to grow more crops.

Yuto then pulls out his hoe, and begins to till the other half of his field to plant some grass seeds for his cows and sheep. The mithril hoe is so sharp, that he can till as many as six plots of dirt in one swing. Quite an improvement from Tony’s original tools. Jennifer does her best to follow behind him scattering the grass seeds.

They look at the field about a week later, proud of all the plants sprouting up from the ground. Half of the field dedicated to crops are filled with turnips, potatoes and cabbage. The other half has cucumbers and strawberries growing. Jennifer does ask why does Yuto plant such a variety of crops instead of focusing on the most profitable ones. Yuto then explains that if he does it that way, it will lower that crop’s value and hurt his profits. Mixed crops keep the cost balanced, demands high, and his farm’s reputation solid.

They can’t stop at the crops. Yuto’s farm now has a variety of animals they care for. Each morning, Yuto rings a bell at the coop and barn to call out the animals to enjoy the sunny spring days. Chickens move out to the yard to look for worms in the dirt. Cows and sheep go outside to graze on the grass Yuto grows in the field. In the field; Yuto brushes, pets, and milks the cows, or sheers the sheep. Jennifer collects the eggs and plays with the chickens, dog, and horse.

Despite the field having a lot of crops growing, there is still so much potential that they can’t tap into. Even with Yuto’s upgraded tools, harvesting and replanting new crops has become an issue. When the first wave of turnips are ready to harvest, they spend a lot of hours just pulling up and cleaning them to ship. Once the cucumbers and strawberries get ripe, they have a hard time keeping up to make sure each crop was picked and shipped. On heavy harvests, Yuto has no choice but to stay up extremely late at night watering crops.

Dusty is now a fully grown horse. With Yuto and Jennifer’s help, it grew up to be quite strong and healthy. Yuto can now ride it’s back to travel around town in a fraction of the time. Even though Dusty is not fast enough to win the horse derby, Yuto equips saddle bags to make shipping a bit easier. To practice on lighter days, Yuto would ride around the field while Jennifer uses the cell phone’s stopwatch app to time them.

One day in mid-spring, Yuto checks his ledger to see how far along he is to reach their goal. As he finish punching the numbers in the calculator app on his phone, Jennifer walks in carrying some groceries for the week. She places the groceries on the table, then looks at Yuto who is hard at work crunching the numbers. She walks up to him to ask, “So, how are we doing?”

He looks up at Jennifer before answering, “according to the numbers, we’ve already passed a million. Looks like we’re officially millionaires!”

“That’s so amazing!” cheered Jennifer.

Yuto then sighs stressfully, then continues, “problem is that even if we can make four times that much each year, that still won’t make enough money to save this town from the Joja company. I know that we worked so hard making money all year long, but I had no idea how expensive it is to run a farm. I spent a few grand buying feed for the animals, that green house costed a fortune, and I just paid Gotts a lot of money to fertilize the soil before planting the crops for the season. All that before we add in the cost of food and utilities.”

Jennifer places her hand on his shoulder to reassure, “don’t be discouraged. Once we get the assistance of the Harvest Sprites, things will get better. I promise.”

Yuto smiles. Even though he feels that their mission is impossible, having her comfort him eases his worries. With Jennifer by his side, he feels that they can conquer anything. He only wishes that her enthusiasm would reflect in his numbers.

The next day, Yuto walks out of his house to start the morning chores in the farm. As soon as he opens his door, he finds Mayor Thomas waiting outside his door with a big announcement. “Good morning Yuto! I came by this morning to invite you and Jennifer to participate in the annual Cooking Festival!”

“Cooking Festival?” asked Yuto.

Thomas nods, then continues, “once a year, a traveling gourmet will visit our small town to judge our cooking ability. It’s a great way to attract visitors if the gourmet gives our town a positive review. We are one contestant short, so I was hoping that you can help me out.”

“We accept!” announce Jennifer who is walking from her tent.

Thomas smiles cheerfully, “wonderful! I’ll assume that the two of you will be joining as a team. We normally don’t do teams, but I can convince the gourmet to make an exception.”

“We’ll be there!” cheered Jennifer.

After filling out the necessary paperwork, Thomas leaves the farm to make the preparations for the cooking festival. Yuto then looks at Jennifer who is smiling cheerfully, then asks, “what’s up? Why did you enter us in the cooking contest? I don’t think we have time to participate in it, we’re always busy.”

Jennifer claps her hands together to announce, “I’ve just received another vision from the goddess.”

“You did? Does it have anything to do with the cooking festival?” asked Yuto.

Jennifer thinks for a moment before answering, “I’m not too sure. In my vision, all I saw was us cooking together. As far as what or why is unclear. But when I heard Thomas mention the cooking festival, I felt that this was no coincidence.”

“I get it. . .” Yuto then looks at the farm, wondering how will he make any time to participate in the cooking festival tomorrow. He knows how much extra work he will have to do to make time, but he also knows that Jennifer has yet to be wrong. He smiles proudly, then announces, “well, I guess we’ll have to work twice as hard today to make time for that cooking festival tomorrow!”

Jennifer nods in agreement. They then rush out to the fields to get a head start on the work. After doing the usual watering the crops, clearing the fields of weeds, and letting the animals out; they add extra feed in the troughs, and work extra hard harvesting any crops so they don’t have to do it tomorrow. Towards the end of the day, they feel that they’ve done enough work for two days. They still will need to water the crops in the morning, but the festival will start at ten in the morning, so they have time.

The next day, Yuto and Jennifer find themselves at Rose Square with the rest of the residents of Mineral Town. They take this time to socialize with the others who bombard them with questions of the state of the farm, and how well it’s doing. Everyone tries their best to avoid the sensitive subject of Joja and their plan to buy the village. Even though everyone knows the possible fate of the village, everyone tries their best to enjoy the festival instead.

At noon, Mayor Thomas stands on his podium to announce the start of the Cooking Festival. He coughs before adjusting his mic, “good afternoon residents of Mineral Town. I am pleased to see everyone attending the Cooking Festival today. I am your mayor, Thomas. This year, we have a couple of new contestants working together this year. I would like to introduce our farmer and his partner, Yuto and Jennifer!”

Everyone claps and cheers for them. Thomas then announces the other contestants one by one, then continues, “Now it would be my pleasure to introduce this year’s traveling gourmet. Please step forward, Bon Vivant!”

From behind the podium steps a heavily obese man that is wearing a strange set of clothes that resembles a cross between steam punk, a medieval castle, and a martian space ship. Yuto couldn’t help giggling at the irony of his taste in clothes and his taste in food.

Bon Vivant begins to speak in a french accent, “welcome residents of Mineral Town. I am your gourmet, Bon Vivant! I will taste all your gourmet masterpieces, then declare a winner. This year, I shall announce the theme of the dish you all will prepare for me. The theme is juice! Any drink is acceptable as long as you prepare it yourself! Now go, and prepare me the best drink you can make. Au revoir!”

As the contest begins, everyone rushes home to prepare their drink. Yuto and Jennifer rush back to the farm to begin their entry. As soon as they get there, Yuto realizes that he doesn’t know how to make any drinks from scratch. He then looks at Jennifer to ask, “I don’t have any ideas, what about you?”

“Don’t worry, I plan to make some relaxation tea!” answered Jennifer.

“Relaxation tea? Are you sure about that? Just about anyone knows how to make that. Just brew some tea leaves in hot water,” said Yuto.

“Just leave it to me! If I have any confidence in anything, my tea is the best!” cheered Jennifer.

Yuto nods, then allows Jennifer to lead. She starts by grinding a combination of blue, green, and red grasses into a pulp. She then places the mixture in a pot of boiling water with some relaxation tea leaves. As the tea simmers, she adds honey, milk, and sugar. As the fragrant tea continues to simmer, she begins to cut up some apples, grapes, pineapple, and oranges into tiny chunks into a tea bag before adding it to the pot. She lowers the heat, then the house begins to fill with the delicious scent of tea, fruit and honey.

As Jennifer continues to make her tea, Yuto watches her in amazement. She dips her ladle into the tea to sip and judge the taste. She adjusts the temperature, and adds more ingredients to make sure the flavor is perfect. As she cooks, he begins to imagine her outside in the wild with a pot over a fire. In his mind, she would cook the tea leaves while collecting wild fruit and grasses for her daily tea. He assumes that she must drink a lot of tea to keep herself looking young and healthy out there in the woods. At that point, he is sure she can win the cooking festival.

Later that day, everyone meets back at Rose Square. Everyone presents their drinks on their tables waiting to be judged by the gourmet. Yuto and Jennifer are the last in line to be judged. Yuto takes a look at the other entries to see a collection of juices, wines, smoothies, and blended milk. Jennifer is the only entry that features tea.

The gourmet Bon Vivant steps to each table to sample each entry. One by one, he takes a smell before tasting their drink. Some drinks he enjoys with a smile, while trying his best to not insult those that are not that good. His best compliments are from Dudley and Ran who own and runs the Inn at Mineral Town.

As he approaches Jennifer’s entry, he picks up the cup, and takes a whiff. “Hmm, relaxation tea? I also smell a strong mixture of grasses and fresh fruit.” said Bon Vivant. Jennifer nods cheerfully before inviting him to have a sip. As soon as he takes a sip, his eyes light up as he is taken to a land of flavors he has never experienced before. He blushes as he shouts, “c’est delicioux! Magnifique! I have never tasted un tasse de the’ so delicious in my life! Mademoiselle, I shall declare you the winner of the cooking contest!”

“You heard the man!” announced Mayor Thomas. The winner of the Cooking Contest is Jennifer and Yuto!” Everyone claps and cheers as they are presented their trophy from Bon Vivant.

Later that day, Yuto and Jennifer head back home carrying the trophy back to the farm. On the way back home, they admire the gold plated trophy that looks like a pot with a lid. Yuto then looks at Jennifer to say, “by the way, we never did find that piece of the jewel of truth like we thought.”

“I guess not,” answered Jennifer. “Maybe I was incorrect about the cooking festival after all. I am sure that it will show up soon enough, I trust in the goddess. We did have fun, and that’s also important.”

Yuto nods in agreement. Once they arrive at the house, they place the trophy on the display stand where they can admire their trophy. But as soon as they put it down, they hear a rattle coming from inside the trophy. They look at one another in confusion before lifting the lid of the trophy. Yuto reaches into the gold plated pot, then pulls out another piece of the Jewel of Truth.

“How did that get in there?” asked Yuto.

“I don’t think that matters,” answered Jennifer. “All I can say for certain is that we have another piece. We are almost there!” They then cheer and celebrate. Yuto plays some music on his phone so they can dance the night away. For a single evening, they forget about work and have a good time. They only need three pieces left to go, they can only imagine where they can be.