HTLCCBFT Chapter 29

Has The Lord’s Career Chart Been Filled Today? – Chapter 29

The scene of the lord collapsing without warning was likely witnessed only by the golden eyes of the God of Wealth throughout the entire territory of Laina City.

The golden beckoning cat’s expression remained stern, but its originally dull, round pupils suddenly contracted into vertical slits due to shock.

It silently watched the beautiful lord, who had collapsed on the cold, hard ground and completely lost consciousness, as if somewhat at a loss or caught in a dilemma.

After an unknown length of time, the still utterly naive newborn deity—or rather, a faint, hazy golden shadow that had just begun to sprout—drifted leisurely out of the Cat God’s statue.

It had not yet taken on a specific appearance or limbs, resembling more a shimmering golden mist floating aimlessly in the air.

Still completely unaware of its identity as a “God” and unskilled in utilizing the energy of faith, it was like a toddler learning to walk.

It took a long while before it finally grasped how to mobilize the divine power within itself.

Without hesitation, it drew closer to the lord lying unconscious on the ground.

In truth, after witnessing numerous divine miracles, the Laina citizens had sincerely worshipped the elusive Cat God and praised its name with devout hearts.

It was the nearly ten thousand people’s utmost devout prayers that allowed it to quickly acquire a vague form.

However, the time since the “Cat God” had appeared in people’s hearts was still too short—even this rare, intense, and pure faith energy was still too meager to condense a true divine body and Divine Soul.

It could have waited naturally, allowing time to accumulate more faith energy, gradually shaping the majestic and grand form befitting the true God of Wealth.

But when it saw its most beautiful believer—the one who offered fresh flowers daily, gently embraced it with a faintly fragrant hug, and whispered prayers in a voice more melodious than a nightingale’s—collapse from sheer exhaustion…

The God of Wealth, whose heart had always been as calm as still water, uncontrollably fell into a state of panic.

After much effort, it finally learned to painstakingly mobilize its meager divine power, gently lifting the person lying on the ground.

Then, it placed them on the bed where it had so often seen its most beloved believer rest over the past many days.

As the soft golden hair touched the snow-white pillow, the divine power it had accumulated over so many days was completely depleted.

The golden mist, now much thinner than when it first appeared, slowly gathered back onto the statue of the God of Wealth before dissipating.

And the fortune cat’s golden vertical pupils gradually returned to their lifeless, round shape.

—Oliver, of course, knew nothing of what had transpired that night.

Even though he had fainted from staying up too late the previous night, his body would unfailingly wake up the next morning at six o’clock as determined by the game system.

He had actually forgotten to keep track of time. How careless.

Sitting up in bed, Oliver glanced at his only half-replenished stamina bar and sighed, running a hand through his slightly disheveled hair. Fortunately, the accident had occurred when he was alone in his bedroom, just before falling asleep, and he had automatically awakened before anyone else could discover him.

If the ever-attentive butler Fosse had witnessed it, it would undoubtedly have caused quite a commotion.

Oliver reflected on this briefly.

But shouldn’t he have been lying on the floor?

Why had he woken up in bed?

Quite certain there was no one else in the room, Oliver puzzled over it for a while before attributing it to the all-powerful game system.

Perhaps the system had made his body automatically and unconsciously crawl back into bed, as if sleepwalking… Although the eerie image alone was enough to make his scalp tingle.

Oliver didn’t dwell too much on how he had automatically moved to the bed.

He checked the previous day’s settlement interface, which he hadn’t had time to review before suddenly fainting, and confirmed that the massive amount of experience points gained from harvesting over 800 ears of corn at once had indeed been just enough to level up his long-neglected farming skill to level 4 in one go. He breathed a genuine sigh of relief.

From level 0 to 4, a total of four items/skills were unlocked: the crafting methods for a scarecrow, a low-level sprinkler, a beehive, and a pickle jar.

However, the desolation of Laina City fully illustrated the old saying “not even a bird would drop dung here,” which had once been treated as a joke. This meant the scarecrow would be of little use for the time being.

—Even if any bold birds had passed through here before, they would have long been hunted down and eaten by the slaves, who were starving and desperate. After all, only these “special guests” passing through the sky did not belong to the Lord.

Although the low-level sprinkler was useful, on one hand, the materials to craft it were too scarce, and on the other, while Oliver was unwilling to stand by and watch the slaves starve to death, he had no intention of letting them develop the bad habit of getting something for nothing.

Unlike the farms in the game, where the player had to work alone and couldn’t be in multiple places at once, in the territory of Laina City, he was in no shortage of labor to help with tilling, sowing, and irrigation.

At this stage, although he focused on farming personally, the main reason was to level up his profession skill as quickly as possible and unlock more recipes for beneficial items, in order to avert the imminent famine threatening Laina City.

He couldn’t possibly handle everything himself forever.

Whether slaves or commoners, they shouldn’t abandon the farming skills they truly relied on for survival.

Crafting a beehive required iron ingots and maple sap… Although he craved the sweet, thick sensation of honey, he had to set it aside for now.

Indeed, the pickle jar was the most practical.

Oliver thought, turning his gaze to the fruits of his excessive obsession last night—the 40 pieces of coal added to his backpack, which had led to him fainting from charcoal burning.

Even without the fainting episode, he hadn’t planned to burn charcoal for much longer anyway, as the remaining lumber was already scarce.

Oliver checked all his current resources, then spent all the coal without hesitation, crafting eight pickle jars on the spot.

He placed these eight freshly made, identical jars on the ground, arranging them neatly in a row, and then put eight portions of corn into them.

As soon as the corn entered the jars, each pickle jar would visibly swell a little, quite vividly. After finishing all this, Oliver contentedly picked up the nearby statue of the God of Wealth.

He removed the gold ingot from the smooth right paw pad as usual and prayed: “Thank you for the blessings, Cat God… Huh?”

Oliver blinked in confusion.

His hands holding the cat god statue paused, and he instinctively turned it around to examine it carefully.

For some reason… he felt that the Cat God seemed a little lighter today than yesterday?

With some concern, Oliver lifted the beckoning cat statue and inspected it thoroughly from head to toe.

After confirming that the most important statue remained intact and the so-called “lightness” must have been his imagination, Oliver couldn’t help but sigh in relief.

“You absolutely mustn’t have anything happen to you.”

A trace of heartbreaking melancholy appeared on the beautiful face of the golden-haired Lord.

He slightly lowered his gaze and affectionately planted a kiss on the Cat God’s paw pad, speaking in an unconsciously soft, almost coquettish tone:

“—My dearest Cat God.”

After breakfast, Oliver looked down from the window at the people busy working in the fields, pondering what to do today.

The toilets and new houses were basically completed. While a luxurious mansion wasn’t realistic, they could at least provide basic shelter from wind and rain.

There were still 121 corn plants that had been planted a day later waiting to be harvested in the fields, but that wouldn’t take much time and wouldn’t consume any energy, so doing it later wouldn’t matter.

As for finances… the 8 experimental pickle jars had been made, but the first batch of pickles would take 3 more days to complete.

Whether selling pickled corn could become Laina City’s early wealth secret needed to be verified after the finished product was ready, before deciding whether to mass-produce more pickle jars.

Among the basic materials for making pickle jars, lumber was the most demanded and essential resource.

Even Oliver, who had been obsessed with tree-cutting just days ago to the point of forgetting to eat and sleep, had reached his limit after cutting trees nonstop for ten days to accumulate materials.

Since it wasn’t urgent yet, he decided to take it easy these days to avoid getting too tired of logging and to change his mood.

Oliver quickly made a decision.

—He would start a short vacation today.

He would go fishing in the woods, visit the Summer Market when returning to the castle near dusk, and then harvest the remaining corn in the fields.

The Lord, accustomed to high-intensity work, didn’t realize at all that this habit of scheduling every moment of his “vacation” seemed somewhat unusual.

When Oliver set out from the castle with his attendants toward the Laina River he hadn’t visited for many days, Wynn and Bir were suffering another unimaginable new blow.

They had been brooding over their incompetence in failing to fulfill the beautiful Lord’s wishes when the next moment, they frowned tightly at the noisy commotion around them.

“Quiet!” Wynn snapped impatiently at his servant. “Don’t cause trouble on His Highness’s territory.”

“But, master,” the servant mumbled nervously, after holding back for a while, still offering a quiet explanation: “I really didn’t mean to cause trouble.”

He had only been taking a piss! Before Wynn could angrily question the servant who dared not directly say “urinate” to him, the Laina City commoner who had just clashed with the servant indignantly called over a guard first: “It’s him! He actually dared to urinate on the sunflowers personally planted by the Lord!”

Upon hearing the words “personally planted by the Lord,” not only did the servant who actually committed the wrongdoing break into a cold sweat, but even Wynn was terrified.

“Su—sunflowers?”

Wynn nervously repeated the name of this flower he had never heard of, then anxiously explained under the guard’s unfriendly gaze: “This foolish wrongdoer absolutely deserves punishment, but please believe us, we definitely had no malicious intent to offend that honorable Lord!”

The guard listened silently to his explanation, his expression unchanged, which made Wynn and Bir, who had rushed over later, even more tense.

Fortunately, among the onlookers, someone quickly recognized Wynn and Bir: “These two were invited into the castle by the Lord just last night.”

Hearing this, the guard’s tense expression finally relaxed a little.

He scrutinized the uneasy Wynn, Bir, and their companions with a sharp gaze and explained in a deep voice: “Considering you are outsiders and this is your first violation of the rules, no punishment will be imposed… Didn’t the innkeeper explain to you that defecating and urinating are not allowed on the land or in the rivers? You must use the chamber pots in the inn or the toilets outside.”

Wynn and Bir exchanged glances, vaguely recalling a faint memory: “Yes, he did mention that.”

But they had no idea what the “toilet” the innkeeper mentioned last night was!

Although they had been slightly puzzled at the time, on one hand, they were still dazed from the shock of the Lord’s stunning appearance, and on the other hand, their pride as people from a larger, wealthier city made them disdainful of asking.

How could these country folk, most of whom couldn’t even afford food but were fortunate enough to have such a wonderful Lord, possibly possess something they had never heard of?

After listening to the guard’s explanation and being taken to see the newly built “public toilet,” the expressions on Wynn and Bir’s faces turned into a bizarre mix of colors.

No wonder, even after spending over a day in Laina City, aside from the pastures, they had not smelled the persistent stench of feces and garbage that lingered even in big cities, nor had they seen the nightmare-inducing “river of filth.”

But.

Wynn watched as a slave, rushing back from working in the fields, naturally opened the door and entered the “toilet.”

This scene… left him feeling incredulous, but more than that, it made him want to cry without tears.

—How could he have imagined that he, who was treated as an honored guest even in big cities, would one day find himself less dignified than a slave when it came to answering nature’s call!

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