“Alright, I think we have done enough damage.” Grey was satisfied with the destruction the Jacks had brought to the farm.
The tent was ripped into pieces and any equipment related to farming was broken. Instead of just kicking up the nicely ploughed land, the Jacks went an extra mile and dug massive holes all around the farm. They even scooped up the topsoil of the entire farm and put them in sandbags.
“I did not expect that such good quality soil was hidden in this barren area for such a long time,” Brown observed the topsoil with its clawed hand before carrying the large sandbag full of it away. Despite being werejackals, they were also experienced farmers in the Farm World so they understood the importance of good soil and fertilisers.
“Yellow, you hated that novice farmer right? Then stay here until he appears. Howl and we will come to your assistance.” Grey gave Yellow specific instructions before ordering the rest to carry the bags of soil back to their new hideout.
At that instant, the large ancient tree at the centre of the barren land rustled and Sakura flower petals started falling to the ground. Some of the petals even fell into the sandbags of soil.
All of the werejackals immediately looked up at the tree and saw that there was no threat above them. They did not even bother to ask why there was a blooming tree in the middle of the barren land. They saw too many weird things sprouting in the Farm World and a blooming tree in a barren land was nothing compared to the miracles they had seen.
“I will climb up just to be sure.” Brown volunteered and easily jumped up to the highest branch of the tree to check for any movements. As it landed on the tree branch, he suddenly felt a prick from where he was standing
“Ah darn it, I did not notice that at all.” Brown immediately tried to remove the wood splinter and he caused a lot of ruckus on the tree branch while trying to do so. More the Sakura flower petals were shaken from the tree and fell onto the werejackals and more were mixed with the topsoil.
“Anything there?” Yellow was excitedly anticipating to see if that useless farm boy was hiding up in the tree but Brown signalled to them there was no threat.
“Just a splinter.” He finally took it out and jumped down from the tree.
“Let’s go then. Yellow, be careful of him. He might have some things up his sleeves if he can disappear just like that.” Grey warned Yellow but Yellow sort of ignored his kind advice.
“Hahaha, I know what we should do.” Yellow gestured to his two fellow trusty werejackals as they took out beer and meat from their rucksack and started to use the campsite near the big ancient tree. Grey shook its head and ordered the rest to return.
Shu was standing there as stationary as he could. He knew he could kill the three werejackals but that would be a waste. It was obvious that Jin was their target. “Hohoho, let’s see how Seedling reacts to this when he gets back. It will be a nice show to watch.”
Separately, Jin finally returned to the shop and the cool air conditioning blowing at his face was very comforting. He looked at the time and realised he still had 45 minutes to an hour before he opened his store.
“You should take a shower.” Yun was at the side of the bar counter drinking her black ivory coffee again. She subsequently passed a plastic bag to Jin. “There is a set of fresh new clothes in here, go up and shower.”
“Thanks, Yun.” Jin took the plastic bag and noticed that he felt lighter. The living armour was finally not moving around him when he was in the store and did not suppress him with training weights.
He immediately went to take a refreshing shower and found that all four bands that were on him suddenly shifted and turned themselves into one digital watch after his shower. “Wow, quite a handy feature.”
“It helps act as your storage space too. Very convenient, is it not?” Yun smiled at Jin as she knew Jin did not have a personalised storage item for some reason. All he had been using was a simple storage ring that was bestowed upon him by his grandfather, Ming. However, Yun did not tell Jin that it was her who gave Zeru the living armour bands.
“When it is not trying to put you down with weights, probably.” Jin nodded his head and saw the time on his new watch. “But I liked the black sleek design. I should thank Shifu Zeru for it.” Jin smiled a little and looked at his to-do list on his phone.
“45 minutes left. I should start doing the coupon booklet before the submission deadline by Friday. Oh no. This is pandastic. My training ends on Friday too.” Jin suddenly developed a big headache.
“Perhaps you can finish Zeru’s training by today and you have more time for the coupon booklet,” Yun suggested.
“But won’t that mean I need to close the store for a day?” Jin started to ponder if it was really worth it to close his shop.
“Quite a number of shopkeepers take off for cultivation purposes, more so for dungeon suppliers. Besides, it’s oddly weird for a lazy person like you to not take a day off in weeks.” Yun replied with slight curiosity.
“True, alright. I will just post an announcement to say we are closed for today.” Jin chuckled at Yun’s indirect praise of being hardworking.
“Already did!” Yun stuck her tongue out at the side of her mouth and gave a peace sign.
“You planned this, didn’t you ?” Jin rolled his eyes up and his head was titled sidewards as he sighed once more. Jin knew that Shu was prepping the lands with fertilisers so he figured he could take a short lunch break which consisted of a plate of delicious curry rice and a can of invigorating bamboo juice before going back to Farm World.
“All the best, Jin.” Yun snapped her fingers and a portal appeared.
“You must be kidding me.” Jin arrived back at Farm World and saw three wolfish looking humans sitting at his campsite drinking beer and eating barbecue meat. Not to mention, the fields were utterly destroyed with holes and hills of soil. Jin’s dejected expression was so priceless that Shu could barely hide his laughter.
“Oh, so our little farm boy is back. Alone.” Yellow bit a large piece of meat from his barbecue stick. He signalled his two underlings to attack Jin and they smashed their bottles and sticks on the ground before dashing towards Jin.
“Now I am really mad.” Seeing that they are monsters, Jin thought he might as well capture them and get the truth out from them. With his phone on his left hand, the living armour transformed to their usual shapes and turned heavier again. Fortunately, it was not randomly shifting itself around the body so concentrating chi to support the weight in one area was much easier than before.
The werejackal underlings were going for a two-pronged attack on Jin but he was not going to defend. Instead, Jin was greedy and bolted towards Yellow.
“Stupid farm boy, know your limits!” Yellow bit the last part of his meat and he howled as loud as he could before swiping his claws at Jin. Jin quickly unsheathed Bam, the katana form of his weapon and clashed with Yellow.
Yellow laughed when the katana did not make a single scratch on its claw hand and thought this was the perfect opportunity to counterattack. Just as Yellow was about to bite Jin’s neck, Jin opened his mouth first and a large beam of chi energy was directed at Yellow’s chest. A gaping hole appeared in the middle of Yellow’s chest as the chi beam momentarily pierced through the skies before it dissipated.
“What! ” Yellow tried to back off as he coughed out a large amount of blood but without any delay, a left hook was sent straight into at his face.
“Lazy Panda Swipe!” Jin delivered a deadly combination of his swipe technique infused with chi along with the support of the living armour causing Yellow’s head to be flying off for quite a distance. At that particular moment, the phone had already touched Yellow’s body and the phone started its capturing process.
“Capture complete,” Yun said in his thoughts.
Jin looked at the other two underlings and they were shaking. What useless farm boy? This farm boy just took care of a senior werejackal and they tried to run away.
“Oh no, you don’t.” Roots suddenly extended from Shu and grabbed the underlings by their legs. It then dragged the two werejackal underlings towards it while the werejackals desperately tried to run away from it. “The soil that my Seedling ploughed tenaciously was destroyed and taken, I think some repayment of fertilisers is needed.” The roots pulled the underlings a few metres above the ground and brought them to Shu’s mouth.
“Thank you for the meal.” Shu opened its tree barked mouth wide and stuffed the two underlings inside its mouth before closing it. All Jin could see were helpless claws trying to hold onto the edge of Shu’s mouth but it was futile as Shu munched on them.
Shu later gave a loud burp. “Gah, beer battered Jackals.”
