Farm Management Game (3)
I was ridiculously good at games. Everything except Bubble Bobble.
Eons passed. After labor so brutal it felt like washing blood with blood, I became the richest man in Sprout Village.
There was no point counting potatoes anymore. High-performance sprinklers watered the fat, fertile soil in my place every single day. I was still woefully short of what I'd need to reach Mars, but at least I was no longer drowning in rent and taxes.
And that wasn't even the half of it.
"So you're 956223! The village owes all this prosperity to you, my boy!"
The Village Chief, front teeth gleaming with gold caps, showed up wearing his friendliest face and laid the flattery on thick. Impressed by my achievements, he handed me a Red Hare out of nowhere. The Demon King snatched it immediately, of course.
And who was I, exactly?
The person who had dramatically raised the quality of the village's annual produce exhibition. The person who had punched a road through a backwater nobody from out of town would even glance at, and opened up trade with the city. The person who had built a school and a labor center, giving the residents a sense of purpose and a healthy life.
The person who had come outside to buy caviar ice cream on that Demon King brat's errand.
That was all me.
Slurp, slurp.
The Demon King's pink character was holding a caviar ice cream in each hand, devouring them with obvious delight. And how many potatoes had gone into those silk clothes wrapped around her from head to toe? Goddammit. All that grinding had given me a habit of measuring the value of everything in potatoes.
"I want a calf."
The Demon King, riding Red Hare behind my character as I trudged along on foot, said it like she was commenting on the weather.
"Buy it. How much?"
"Twenty million."
"What?! Are you shitting me? Is it a Golden Calf? What kind of calf costs twenty million?"
"It is a Golden Calf."
".....We have to buy it, don't we."
"My old character had two hundred Golden Calves."
"......Let's go get one."
The reason we couldn't reach Mars?
More than anything else, the Demon King's spending was completely out of control.
She had built a palatial house right next to mine, then lived in my house every single day. Every time my income went up, she wanted more luxury goods — all while spamming that "previous character" cheat code of hers.
Does this brat even actually want to go to Mars?
Every time I tried to take the extra money and make it work, a countermeasure would come in with supernatural timing.
...No. She doesn't.
What the Demon King wanted was to keep living with me in this backwater. The proof was how she'd designed it so that a Mars city built up over decades would be wiped clean.
Can I even do this...
Satisfy her demands, and at the same time get rich enough to send her to Mars. That was the only way this hell would end.
It's going to take forever.
Life had gotten a little more comfortable, sure. But at best I was village-rich. In what lifetime was I supposed to build a rocket and found a city on Mars? The mountain of stacked-up tasks made everything in front of me go dark.
"Oh my! It's 956223!"
"Really, how does he look so refined?"
"956223! Look this way, just once!"
The village women squealed, blissfully unaware of anyone else's suffering. They really shouldn't have been doing that, though.
A potato arced through the air with a long, lazy whistle. Thunk. It hit the ground and rolled.
Huh? What's th—
KABOOM!
The women vanished without a trace in the Demon King's Potato Bomb. I had no idea why a farming game even had bombs, but any NPC who so much as eyed me — man or woman — got pulverized by one of those things.
Crazy bitch.
How she'd gotten her previous character all the way to Mars was obvious without looking. She'd used violence and war, no question. A truly Demon King way of doing things.
"We're here. Get down."
We arrived at the calf farm, and I helped the Demon King's character down from Red Hare, same as always. After stuffing herself with every elixir and expensive fruit in existence, her character was healthier than mine. Getting escorted like some noble lady she wouldn't lose to came completely naturally to her.
Even in the game I'm getting my ass handed to me.
Whether I was making money or not, whether I had any ability or not — getting thrashed like a rented mule and shaken down by the Demon King was no different from real life.
The shop door rattled and creaked open.
"Oh my, if it isn't 956223! Come in, come in!"
A regular had arrived, and the owner came scurrying over, rubbing his hands like a fly. He'd been eating well — the skinny frame from the early days had packed on layer after layer of fat.
"What can I get you today?"
Calf
Horse
Pig
· · ·
Golden Calf
The Demon King snatched my gamepad and dragged the cursor all the way to the bottom.
Beep.
"Whaaat?! A Golden Calf?"
The shopkeeper put on a ridiculous show, seagull-eyebrows shooting up his forehead.
"A Golden Calf, you say... ahem..."
Then he pulled out an old map and pressed it into my hands.
Yeah, I can see where this is going. He's going to say the materials you need are over here, so go fetch them. And there's going to be some kind of backstory.
"The Golden Calf is buried in the mountain behind the village, in the Frozen Pepper Field. However... that place..."
Don't give a pepper field a name like that.
The shopkeeper's face went blue as he tried to go on. He shuddered from head to toe, as if even remembering it was too horrible to bear. Even at this stale, old-fashioned production, the Demon King swallowed hard and locked onto the shopkeeper's words on the monitor.
"In that place..."
Choices appeared.
1. What's there?
2. It's okay. Tell me.
...Those are the same choice. You moron of a director.
I mashed whichever one.
"In that place is the Death God, Ryuk... He's the watchman guarding the Golden Calf buried in the pepper field."
A strangely familiar name for a Death God. Why was he guarding a pepper field, of all things. I didn't care about the petty lore of this shitty farm game anymore. What mattered was the Demon King's choice.
She asked with a serious face.
"Ryuk is strong. Think you can win?"
"...No. Want to just go back?"
"My previous character had two hundred Golden Calves..."
Why did you even ask, you little shit!
I hit Go to the Pepper Field. Thinking about it, this was actually a decent situation. I'd saved twenty million in cash. One step closer to Mars...
Map fee: 20,000,000
"Ah, fuck."
Someday I would have to send the Demon King to Mars. But it didn't have to be today.
We've gotten this far...
I made the suggestion carefully. Once we got the Golden Calf, how about we stop here and eat dinner?
"It wouldn't be fun if we finished everything in one go. I want to stay here with you for a long, long time."
She could consider my feelings here. She was the one who'd deleted the character, not me. We'd done enough — just say yes. If she had a conscience.
".....Fine."
YOSHIIII!!!
Sunlight hitting the eyes of a prisoner who'd been digging an escape tunnel with a spoon.
Goddammit... how many days has it even been...
On the day it turned into a week, I gave up on sneaking out. Finally, it was time to bring down the curtain on this insufferable farce.
The weapon shop door rattled and creaked as I shoved it open. The owner came walking out with a crutch under one arm.
"If you've come to this ramshackle shop... then as a man, you must have found something you want to protect."
He put on airs right out of the gate, then shifted his gaze to the Demon King.
She's stronger than me...
"Go ahead and pick one."
A spread of weapons unfurled across the screen with a clatter. No flamethrower or shotgun, huh.
A Death God would almost certainly be dark-attribute. I paid for the most expensive sword imbued with holy power and walked out. Fifteen million... if this guy was moving swords like that, why did his shop look like this? He was definitely into crypto.
As we stepped out the shop door, I asked the Demon King.
"Hey."
"Hm?"
"Think you could help me take down a Death God?"
"Obviously. We're a team."
"Team" was a word that came out of the Demon King's mouth a lot. She must have taken a real liking to me.
"Once we get the Golden Calf, let's eat. I'll make something good."
"Okay."
"And I'll grant what you want, too."
...Just quitting this would be enough.
"I can even let you leave here."
!!!!
...It's a trap. Who would fall for that?
"It's okay. I like living here with you..."
"I know, I know."
"But you want some fresh air now and then, right? So I'll let you go out."
....This is actually genuine?
Really?
"....Really?"
"Yeah. Once we get the Golden Calf."
?
We get to leave? Just like that?
"...Heh-heh."
The Demon King snickering for no good reason got under my skin, but an opportunity like this wouldn't come twice.
🏛 Type: Mountain Dungeon
⚔ Difficulty: Unknown
📍 Location: Behind Sprout Village — 5 minutes on foot
💀 Boss: Death God Ryuk
The Frozen Pepper Field was a five-minute walk. We'd been living next door to a Death God this whole time.
There he is.
A Death God in overalls, scythe in hand, was sweating buckets harvesting peppers. As a fellow farmer I felt a little guilty, but I had no choice — I had to throw the first punch. I had too much riding on this. The least I could do was bury him in that field.
I crept up, nice and quiet, then rammed the sword straight into Ryuk's back.
Shunk!
He shot into the sky and delivered his line.
Then he threw the scythe away and started shooting peppers from midair.
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Bang! KABOOM! KABOOM-BOOM!
....!
What the hell is this insane pattern.
Pepper bombs poured down indiscriminately, like a merciless shooting game from the nineties. There was almost no safe angle to dodge into.
"...Heehee... uh-heehee."
!!!
So that's it! You fucking bitch!
The Demon King had no intention of letting this game end. Any gamer would know. This wasn't a pattern you could dodge by watching it. This was the kind you had to save-scum over and over and beat from memory.
"Heeheehee. Ih-heehee."
HP drained at a terrifying speed. Through the pouring pepper rain, I could see my character coughing in misery.
It looked a lot like me, weaving through the tight snares the Demon King had been laying all this time. Even in a moment this busy, her expression snagged at me.
The Demon King, cheeks flushed, delighted at the thought of binding me going forward — of spending day after day together.
...
....What, you think I can't do it?
A whip of motion. Footsteps tapping, rattling across the field.
I had crossed the line countless times since coming here. I don't think I had ever been this serious. This Death God was the final boss.
Right... the final boss isn't the Demon King of the 100th floor. It's this bastard. Take this bastard down and it's all over.
Tap-tap-tap. Tap.
When it came to games, I had stood out enough that you could almost call me a genius.
Let's do this.
Ryuk's pepper bombs cut my HP in half.
But those hits weren't worthless. I glued myself to the wall and poured every nerve I had into dodging his trajectories and watching.
"...You're not attacking?"
No matter how I dodged, my health bar kept shrinking the way a drizzle soaks through clothes.
"...Did you give up?"
The Demon King, who should have been hoping I'd die covered in peppers, asked in a voice full of curiosity.
Just a little... a little more...
Whoosh!
Found it!
Right as my HP was about to bottom out, the Death God reused the pattern he'd opened with. So that was one cycle. I had seen every trajectory of the pepper bombs.
Slash!
My character jumped and carved the Death God hanging in midair to ribbons.
GYAAAAH!
The Death God screamed in agony. But an indie-game boss changing its pattern just because of that? Not a chance.
The rest was moving the way I'd memorized, and attacking. Not making a single mistake.
"...Huh? Huh?"
The Demon King's bewildered voice came through. She must have poured dozens of attempts into beating this herself. She must have been sure I'd get wrecked in seconds.
Talent isn't yours alone.
If she had overwhelming talent for strength in the real world, then for me, it was games. I was going to use that talent to get out of here.
Slash! Slash! Slash!
Hack! Hack! Hack!
When Ryuk's HP had dropped to about a fifth—
A long whistle through the air. A potato hit the ground and rolled.
KABOOM!
!!!!
The Demon King had started throwing Potato Bombs at me.
What the hell kind of bullshit is this, you Rainbow Ultimate-grade bitch!
I almost reached over and PK'd her in real life without thinking. That rotten, irredeemable little— backed into a corner, so now she was trying to help the Death God.
Whoosh! Whoosh!
Ah, for real!
The bombardment was so fierce I turned to look at the Demon King.
"Hey. What do you think you're—"
"Sorry. I think my keys are broken."
Her face had gone pale. Completely flustered, she was frantically mashing buttons.
If it's like this...
Even for me...
...
You thought I couldn't dodge these?
I had watched her throw Potato Bombs at the villagers more times than I could count. The pattern had gotten a little harder, sure. But it wasn't impossible to dodge.
Whoosh! Whoosh!
Dodging the Potato Bombs on top of everything else meant I couldn't attack at all. But.
You can only carry twenty Potato Bombs at a time.
I'd dodged eighteen. Just two more...!
Whoosh! Whoosh!
Slash!
KABOOM.
Done. I'd dodged them all. She had nothing left to check me with.
This is it.
I closed in on the Death God, slipping through pepper bombs I was completely used to by now.
Hack! Hack!
The Death God was hanging on by a sliver. Just one more hit, one more—
"Hah!"
!!!!
"Wh-what the fuck!"
"Hnnn!"
The Demon King tackled me and tried to wrench the controller out of my hands then and there. You damnable little— at the very end she was showing her true colors!
There was no universe in which I was beating her in a contest of strength. She ripped the pad away from me on the spot.
"Hah... hah... n-no. I mean... I mean this is..."
For a competitive freak, she still had plenty to say after cheating, apparently. Sitting on top of me, face flushed red, groping for some kind of excuse — it was almost pitiful. So I answered her.
"I beat it."
".....What?"
The Demon King's wavering pupils snapped to the monitor. There stood my character, the Death God dropped to a sliver and then downed, holding the Golden Calf high overhead.
"...Huh...?"
I'd input the command at the last possible split second. It had been really close.
"......"
"......"
You said it yourself, a while back. You don't lie.
The Demon King's lips trembled.
"....W-when I said you could leave here, I meant you could leave this game room."
"Oh, for fuck's sake."