Gun Girl from Another World

Farm

*Guire*

I did, in fact, bring it up with the guildmaster, yet another mistake. I had expected an administrator familiar with pushing papers, and whom I could perhaps convince, by tins if necessary, of the veracity of my modified list. Instead, a great gray bear came out and growled at me until I accepted my fate.

Now, I'm staring down at pallets of boxes, all wrapped in waxed paper and sealed with a rice paper sticker on either end. Each box is labeled in code, but all are nearly identical in size and are impossible to see into. Any attempt to get into the box would tear the sticker, and steaming the sticker off would ruin the fragile rice paper. Either way, the attempt would be revealed and the goods suspect.

I've moved packages like this before, certainly. The kind you don't ask about and deliver without curiosity. I have never, in all of my years, however, seen such steps taken for mere foodstuffs.

"What is the meaning of this?" I finally have to demand. "How am I to verify the shipment when I can't see the shipment?"

The receptionist, introduced to me as Dina, has been left in charge of overseeing the transfer of goods. "Not to worry, Geary, the guild takes this business very seriously. Every item was checked, cross-checked and counted. Everything is exactly as Yellow asked for, not one grain more or less."

"It is understandable that security would be so tight," Sacred Yorin contributes far more soothingly, and without demeaning nicknames. "These are the belongings of a Hero, after all."

I blink away my confusion at that statement. "You mean she has already paid for them, as well?"

But she shakes her white head. "No, this produce belongs to Hero Remmi Lee. She is the one that sells them."

Of course. Of course the little Hero had already been plying her merchant background. I'd assumed her barely more than a child. I hadn't even considered she'd be canny enough to already be using her newfound status. Oh, how I've underestimated this whole affair …

But if they're for sale …

"I see," I recover, setting aside my shock and indignation. "Then how may I go about purchasing some for myself?"

"You will need to seek a permit from the Throne." Sacred Yorin immediately and gracefully dashes my hopes against the rocks. "I'm afraid trade of Hero Remmi's goods is tightly regulated."

"... I see," I say again, far less positive. But it means there is, in fact, something special about them, after all.

I step out of the way of my workers. "You lot get this loaded, we're done here! I'm going to go see what I can do about restocking our own provisions for the trip back."

Sacred Yorin steps up to me right away. "Would you care for my assistance, Master Guire?"

"No, no," I assure her. "You've been such a thorough help already, and this will be incredibly dull and tedious. The most exciting thing will be a little haggling over salted meat. You should stay and make sure these dullards don't break anything."

She dips her head respectfully. "As you wish. I will make sure the loading proceeds smoothly."

Good girl, I think as I slip off into the village. At least she knows her place, Hero Lee's trickery be thrice-damned.

Of course, we don't need provisions. As if I would pay someone else for what I could get out of my own stock without the mark-up. No, once I'm out of sight of the guild's warehouse, I break in a different direction.

I had originally thought the road must go to the mayor's estate, but if Hero Lee is running an industrial farm out of this village, a secluded place like that is the only place it could be. If I'm going to get to the bottom of what this big secret about the produce is, I'll clearly have to go to the source.

I hardly set about this subterfuge before it feels like I'm drawing all of the eyes in the village to me. Obviously, it's all in my head. Any eyes on me are no doubt because of how I'm dressed relative to them. They don't know what I'm about, or whether or not I'm permitted to do so.

Certainly enough, none rise to stop me as I head toward the far end of the village and set foot on the road that curls down from the forest. It's a well-built road, though I question why it spends so much time meandering back and forth. Certainly, a straight line would have been easier.

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Of course, the answer occurs to me almost immediately. It maintains the treeline, so that nobody may see directly into the estate. That such cunning is so subtle I almost missed it shames me. I clearly must stop taking that child so lightly.

The first thing I see besides road and trees is the house. It must belong to Hero Lee. Its design is too alien to what I expect to be normal to have been designed by a native. It's also built entirely out of hardwood, as bizarre as such a thing is to see.

It's not as big as I expected, either. Perhaps she simply hasn't had a proper estate built since she has been on the road for so long since coming here. The Heroes, by my understanding, have only been in existence for a few months. If she has spent much of that traveling, then, yes, she wouldn't have had the time to build anything grander. Nor the funds. She may have only had time to start her business and get it operational before leaving.

How helpful it must have been to have the Throne's ear to get around all of the fees and paperwork us mere mortals must endure to get government to do anything for us, or to meet its demands for endless permits and licenses.

There's signs that someone is staying here, regardless, however. The yard is maintained, for one, not showing a month of wild growth, and the fields, as they come into sight, are neatly maintained and clear of weeds.

I immediately lower my profile, alert for any signs of movement. Obviously, Hero Lee has hired a groundskeeper. It could lead to awkward questions if I carelessly bump into them.

But, no, it's all still, and I creep forward toward the crops, themselves.

The garden is almost alien in a similar way to the house. I can recognize it as a garden, just as I can recognize the building as a house, but it's not done in a way I've ever seen a farm done. But then, I'm no farmer. It could simply be that I don't know any better.

One thing I'm certain of, however, is that this is nowhere near a big enough operation to field even the order the guild filled for Hero Lee, though I'm fairly certain everything she ordered is represented. There's an outright eclectic variety of plants and produce, several I know for a fact are out of season. It will be half a year, for example, before apples are ready for harvest, yet here are several trees practically bending under the weight of their yield.

That's another problem. I don't know by what means she made apples grow and ripen out of season, but there is certainly no way that she could have been the one to plant them. These trees are at least several years old, by their size. They had to already exist.

A third problem is that I simply don't recognize many of the plants here, and it's my job to move all manner of merchandise. I've seen nearly every herb, fruit, vegetable and berry in the Empire cross my counters at some point in my career. But this has a simple explanation: Clearly, she brought some foreign plants from her homeland.

Really, it's a simple and ingenious strategy. Even if farmers immediately caught on and could get a successful crop on their first attempt, it would be a solid year to establish herself as the source for exotic crops. More likely, it would be several years of monopoly for her before anyone managed to duplicate her crops.

Was this just a test bed, then? That would explain why it was so relatively small and absolutely eclectic, the establishing of an initial bed of crops with mass production occurring elsewhere. Further into the forest, perhaps, or maybe at a secondary location.

Was it that simple? Is the big secret just that Hero Lee brought crops from another land and some secret for accelerating production? The latter would certainly have the Throne's interest, as well as that of every other industrial farmer in the Empire.

But would that explain the secrecy with the packaging? No, that could be concealed easily enough with labels from the southern territories, where it remained warm year round even as the northern territories froze.

No, that can't possibly be the answer, not alone. There must be more going on here than I'm seeing. I can't let myself get distracted by what's happening at the surface, as outrageous as it already appears to be.

I creep toward the field of crops, feeling foolish in the bright, early afternoon sun. Essence, hide me, I beg you, don't let the groundskeeper pick this time to come out.

I reach a row of vertical, green vines with little, yellow flowers. It's hard to imagine, but they must grow into the great, big, red berries hanging from the stems. I take one in my hand, and it fills my hand completely, easily larger than my palm. It comes loose with a light twist, and its skin is so glossy that I can nearly make out my face in it.

This is clearly one of the foreign plants she brought with her. I'm positive I've never seen its like. It resembles a pomegranate at first glance, though it isn't as firm and I doubt its skin is so thick. It smells tangy, rather than the sweet smell I expect. I wish I wasn't sneaking around so that I could ask someone its name.

But I've already determined the exotic nature of her plants can't be the sole reason for all of the overprotective fervor around it. What to do next? I must test it. Can one eat this berry raw? Do I have a choice? I don't exactly have a kitchen at my command, ready to dissect and examine it.

Despite myself, my mouth starts to water at the impending taste of this utterly foreign fruit. I slowly bring it toward my mouth …

There's a rustling nearby and I'm snapped out of my daze as I whirl about on the spot ... only to see one of those accursed rodents watching me from the bushes. Watching me quite sternly, in fact.

I still my spiked heart with a deep breath. Let the damnable thing watch. What's it going to do, tell its rodent friends? No, I turn my attention back to the fruit.

"Kyuuuuu ..."

Well, that is the most threatening sound I've ever heard from a rabbit. I turn my attention once more to the horned beast and narrow my eyes at it.

... Is it glaring at me? Can rabbits glare? Is that even possible?

It's just a rabbit. I could punt it if it even dared to get within reach. I wave a dismissive hand toward it. "Begone, rodent. I've no time for your nonsense!"

Again, I turn my attention to the fruit. I lift the berry to my mouth. I open wide, salivating.

"KYUUUUU!!!"

What can only be described as a battle cry rips from the bushes a moment before something small and hard connects with the side of my head, sending me rolling head over tail away from the crops. My back slams into a tree, and something red and hard lands on my head.

The world is spinning around me, but some barely stable part of my mind hears the door to the house clicking open.

"Kyuuga?" a woman's voice calls. "Is something out here?"

I flail to get my feet under me and dash off into the underbrush, my only sense of direction being, "Away."