[Kudzu Root of Overflowing Strength]
→ Unlike other kudzu roots that absorb life force from living hosts, this kudzu root strangles and kills surrounding kudzu roots to absorb their life force.
→ This root is powerful, as it needs strength to strangle and kill other kudzu roots.
→ It has absorbed the life force from dozens of robust kudzu roots, enhancing its medicinal properties.
→ Consumption increases strength by 50 or potential strength by 25.
→ It has an extremely bitter taste.
→ Cultivator: Tower Farmer Park Sejun
→ Expiration Date: 210 days
→ Grade: A+
“Absorbing the life force of other kudzu roots…”
It was an unusual kind of kudzu root. It seemed like a survival strategy to win the competition with other kudzu roots.
As Sejun examined the white kudzu root brought by Cuengi,
Krueng!
[This is definitely not because Cuengi doesn’t want to eat it! It’s for Big Brother!]
Cuengi made an excuse, as if caught red-handed.
But,
‘Don’t lie. I know you brought it because you didn’t want to eat it, Cuengi.’
Sejun saw through Cuengi’s motives, whether it was due to Sejun’s penetrating gaze or Cuengi’s reluctance to be seen as a bad bear making lies,,
Krueng!
[Actually, it’s true that Cuengi didn’t want to eat it! But it really will help big brother!]
Cuengi soon confessed his true intentions.
“It’s okay. I was looking for a herb to increase the Black Rabbit’s strength anyway. Let’s give all of this to the Black Rabbit.”
Krueng! Krueng!
[Good! This is for Daddy!]
Pleased with Sejun’s response, Cuengi happily pulled out ten blue kudzu roots from its snack pouch and handed them to Sejun.
“Thank you.”
Sejun accepted the kudzu roots from Cuengi and ate them right away.
Chew. Chew.
Gulp.
[You have consumed the Blue Kudzu Root of Potential.]
[All stat potential stats increase by 5.]
“Hehehe. It’s sweet. Sweet. Here, Cuengi, have some honey.”
While eating the kudzu root, Sejun gave Cuengi a jar filled with honey.
Kuuehehehe. Krueng!
[Hehehe. Tasty!]
Thus, father and son, having decided to give the extremely bitter kudzu root to Black Rabbit, indulged themselves in the sweet taste.
“I’ll be working, so Cuengi, you wait and eat your snacks. Crop Gigantification.”
Sejun filled Cuengi’s snack pouch with enlarged sweet potatoes and headed to the brewery.
‘Theo is working hard to earn money, so I should work hard to earn money too.’ 𝑖𝘦.𝑐𝘰𝘮
Seeing how fast Theo was burning money, Sejun felt the need to earn more.
Arriving at the brewery, he found 50 monkeys cleaning the jars used for Samyangju.
As the amount of liquor brewed increased, more monkeys had been dispatched from the 77th floor to help.
Of course, since this meant fewer laborers in the monkey village, Sejun decided to send crops regularly to the village in addition to paying the monkeys working in the brewery.
Ook! Ook!
The new monkeys, busy working, noticed Sejun’s arrival and bowed to greet him.
“It’s okay. You don’t have to do that here.”
Sejun calmed down the monkeys, feeling overawed by his presence, and
“Let’s work, guys.”
He started brewing Samyangju with the monkeys, filling the cleaned jars with rice flour.
***
“Meow, meow, meow!”
Theo hummed a tune as he took the light speed merchant passage to the 41st floor of the tower.
And,
“Humans, I have arrived, meow!”
He announced his arrival at the camp where the hunters were gathered.
Then,
“Vice Chairman Theo, you are here?!”
“Vice Chairman Theo, please come this way!”
Interns who were selling cherry tomatoes to the hunters hurriedly stood up to welcome Theo.
“Have you been doing well, meow?!”
“Yes! Please come this way!”
“Humans, Vice Chairman Theo has arrived, meow!”
The cat interns led Theo to the center of the camp, announcing his arrival to the hunters.
“We need to contact the hunting teams quickly.”
“Yes! I’ll return quickly. Theo’s here.”
Thanks to Theo, the hunters resting at the camp could call their colleagues out hunting a bit earlier.
Then,
“Vice Chairman Theo, I’ve been waiting for you.”
Han Tae-jun approached Theo.
“What’s the matter, meow?”
“Purple Locusts have appeared on Earth.”
“What, meow?! Chairman Park is working so hard to help, and what are the humans doing, meow?!”
Upon hearing Han Tae-jun’s words, Theo became angry. This news would make Chairman Park anxious, meow! That’s not okay, meow! It was unacceptable, meow!
“Huff, meow…”
Theo took a deep breath. Whenever there was a problem, Chairman Park used to take a deep breath like this, meow! It feels a bit refreshing, meow!
Certainly, following Sejun’s example had an effect, as Theo felt more composed.
“From now on, I’ll supply Detoxifying Green Onions. Plant them in a 9 to 1 ratio with the sturdy blade green onions!”
Theo passed on this new method to Han Tae-jun, handing over all 10,000 Detoxifying Green Onions from his bag.
Even a single Detoxifying Green Onion could easily annihilate tens of thousands of Purple Locusts around it, thanks to its potent detoxifying effect.
Therefore, Theo anticipated the purple locusts would rapidly devolve back into red locusts and did not reduce the number of sturdy blade green onions.
“Understood.”
Receiving the Detoxifying Green Onions from Theo, Han Tae-jun hurried back to Earth to plant them for Earth’s defense.
“Vice Chairman Theo, all the hunters have gathered, meow!”
While Theo was talking with Han Tae-jun, the hunters who had gone out returned, and Mark, a cat intern practicing the Granier dialect and using Theo as a role model, reported to Theo.
“Got it, meow!”
Theo confidently walked to the center of the camp and climbed onto a platform made of stacked wooden boxes, prepared by the cat interns.
And then,
“Let’s start the auction, meow!”
Theo began selling Sejun’s crops.
A short while later,
“Magical Peanuts, sold out, meow!”
Today’s auction was successful again. The total sales amount was almost reaching 10 million Tower Coins.
As the auction was about to end,
“Vice Chairman Theo, aren’t you selling Detoxifying Green Onions today?”
Hunters who had been waiting to buy Detoxifying Green Onions asked Theo.
“That’s right, meow! Today, I’m not selling Detoxifying Green Onions, meow! And for the time being, I’ll be reducing the quantity of Detoxifying Green Onions for sale since they need to be supplied primarily to the Earth Defense Force to protect Earth, meow!”
“What?! How can that be?!”
Some hunters objected to Theo’s decision not to sell Detoxifying Green Onions. .
“How rude, meow! How dare you question Vice Chairman Theo, meow!?”
Mark and other cat interns quietly took those hunters aside to ‘persuade’ (??) them. These cat interns were once ruffians who ruled Granier Village, but they had been taming their tempers recently.
“Now, I’ll be going, meow!”
With the auction concluded, Theo hurried back to the 99th floor of the tower where Sejun was.
“Puhuhut. Wait for me, Chairman Park, meow!”
Theo was excited to lie on Sejun’s lap, eat Churu, and burn Sejun’s money.
***
“It’s done.”
After finishing the base brewing in 1,500 of the 3,300 jars that had been cleaned.
“Now, it’s time to make noodles.”
Noodles are a must for a wedding. Sejun decided to make banquet noodles (TL: Janchi-guksu) for the Black Rabbit’s wedding.
And he intended to do it properly. Sejun, always dissatisfied with the bland food served at wedding venues, thought,
‘I can’t let the Black Rabbit’s wedding be criticized for its food!’
Sejun planned to make delicious banquet noodles to ensure that no one would complain about bad food at Black Rabbit’s wedding. Even if your wedding is forgotten, Black Rabbit, I’ll make sure the banquet noodles are remembered!
Thump. Thump.
Sejun kneaded the rice dough, obtained using Tower Coins from the Relic: Wealth-devouring Rice Dough. Since there was no flour, he planned to use rice for noodles.
He put the finished dough into a hollow tree, and began pressing it with another piece of wood that fit the hollow tree.
Then,
Squeeze.
Under pressure, the dough began to come out through the small holes that had been drilled in advance.
“Hehehe. It’s working! Yeah!”
Sejun pressed harder on the dough as he watched the compressed rice noodles coming out.
Two hours later,
Shaking.
“That’s enough for today. Ah, I can’t feel my hands.”
Having made noodles for a thousand servings, Sejun sat down to rest, his hands trembling.
While taking a short break,
Krueng!
[Daddy, Cuengi’s hungry!]
Squeak!
Ook!
It was dinner time, and the animals gathered at the cooking area.
“Just wait a moment.”
Having regained some energy, Sejun quickly prepared the meal. Today’s plan was to eat banquet noodles, so he had already prepared the broth and toppings of locust meat, green onions, and other vegetables. So, all he needed to do was boil the noodles.
Swoosh. Swoosh. Swoosh.
Sejun used his dagger to make small holes in several small pots, creating something similar to the mesh strainers used in ramen or udon restaurants.
And then,
Swoosh.
He began boiling the rice noodles.
“Done.”
Waiting by the pot until the noodles were cooked,
Swish. Swish. Swish.
Sejun shook the pots in the air to drain the water and then served an appropriate amount of noodles into bowls.
Pour.
Finally, he ladled the warm broth into the bowls to complete the banquet noodles.
“Everyone, eat up.”
He distributed the banquet noodles to the waiting animals and
“Cuengi, you eat here.”
Sejun transferred his broth to another container and put about 100 servings of noodles into the broth pot for Cuengi.
“Still, 800 servings left.”
Sejun checked the remaining rice noodles and felt proud. He thought he could make up to 5000 servings for the wedding.
Slurp.
After checking the quantity of rice noodles, Sejun relaxed and began to eat his noodles.
“Hmm. Delicious.”
Even though the banquet noodles lacked some ingredients and didn’t taste perfect, they slid smoothly down his throat, perhaps due to hunger.
After dinner,
“I’ll go to bed first, so finish up here.”
Tired from making 1000 servings of noodles, Sejun went to bed first.
And then,
Kuuehehehe. Krueng!
[Hehehe. Tasty!]
Cuengi, left alone, continued to enjoy the banquet noodles even after the other animals had finished and cleaned their dishes.
Krueng!
[Cuengi will eat a lot and become strong to protect Daddy!]
Cuengi dipped the rice noodles Sejun had hung to dry, shabu-shabu style, into the broth, quickly devouring them. (TL: shabu-shabu is a Japanese style hot pot)
Krueng! Krueng!
[All done! Feeling sleepy now!]
Cuengi ended up eating all 800 servings of rice noodles Sejun had set aside, underestimating Cuengi’s talent: gluttony.
***
“Meow, meow, meow~meow?!”
Humming cheerfully, Theo was heading to the 99th floor of the tower via the light-speed merchant passage when he suddenly stopped.
“That’s right, meow! I have to do the lottery draw, meow!”
He remembered he had to do a lottery draw on the 75th floor.
“Puhuhut. I’m so smart, meow! Meow, meow, meow~”
Praising himself for remembering before passing the 75th floor, Theo resumed his humming and continued on his way.
Then,
“Meow?!”
Theo was startled to see a fork in the road that hadn’t been there before.
“Why are there two paths, meow?”
This place shouldn’t have a split path. Theo examined the crossroads carefully.
And then,
“Meow! This side’s floor is different from the usual path, meow!”
Theo noticed that the floor material of the left path was different.
“Puhuhut. Vice Chairman Theo won’t be fooled that easily, meow!”
Confidently, Theo walked down the right path.
Shortly after,
Thud.
The right path closed behind Theo, revealing a giant serpent’s face. It was a trap set by J?rmungandr, a fragment of the 3rd seat among the Twelve Apostles of Destruction in the light-speed merchant passage, waiting for prey to enter its disguised path.
-Kekkek. It’s a double trick, you fool.
Theo, outwitted, had unwittingly walked right into the enemy’s maw.
*****
5/5
*****
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