The Level 0 Biome Village

A biome is a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠single community — plants and animals gathered together according to climate.

In games like Farming World, different biomes, and the flora and fauna that come with them, typically branch outward in every direction from a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠central base. A tropical biome. A desert biome. Because each one can show a character all its own, the content can be divided among them, and by pinning a level to every biome the game can hand the player that particular feeling of climbing through the sensation of growth.

In Farming World, people had a habit of calling each biome by its level. The ground centered on your base, where the NPC village stood and F-rank resources could be gathered, was the basic Level 0 Biome.

The Level 0 Biome was, simply put, an ordinary temperate biome. A region much like Korea — four seasons cut cleanly apart, heat and cold that never swung to extremes, and a well-rounded spread of plants you could sow by the season and animals that lived among them. In a word, a climate that was unremarkable in the best possible way.

At low levels, just staying alive — scraping up food, finding something to plant — was already brutal, and a single monster met while you were barely keeping the ground around the house in order could turn the whole day into hell. If the land itself also let survival difficulty rise and fall with the weather, adapting became close to impossible. That was why Day 1 usually opened as the first day of spring, a season whose greatest difficulty amounted to a faint late chill, the kind that nips at early blossoms. As the days warmed, the monsters that had slept through winter were still half-asleep — sluggish, barely stirring, and safe to be around.

Inside each biome there were key locations which, once discovered, unlocked a fair haul of rewards and content. The Level 0 Biome's representative ones were the NPC village, the copper mine, the sewers, and the orchard. Break the search down finer still, and a map of this SSS+ ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Rank expanse surely held plenty of smaller key locations worth picking over. Comb through every last one of them, though, and the hours slipped away on their own until you looked up to find that, across the whole Level 0 Biome, the lit ground had come to outnumber the dark.

That was the method beloved by the real devotees — the completionists so fond of the game that they insisted on lighting the entire map to perfection before they moved on. Early on, it wasn't particularly recommended, and it wasn't efficient either. Revealing the map was a hundred times easier and more efficient later, once you'd raised your resource level high enough to secure a means of travel and could roam, rather than exploring in step with that biome's level. There was nothing to lose by putting the exploration off, either. The resources sitting there didn't lose their value just because you mined them down the road. If anything, the smarter choice was to gather only what you needed to skip that level quickly and move on.

Naturally, that had been my plan too.

"Clear every key location, then jump straight to Level 1."

The Secret Farming Map was, to put it plainly, a mother lode. There's an old saying — dig the ground and see if money comes out — but it didn't apply here.

The outside world was another matter. Even in reality, step into a dungeon and money comes out, but earning a great deal of it still means hunting rare monsters or finding a dungeon buried in precious resources. Why else would there be more hunters who mine, or tear dungeons apart in search of anything valuable, than hunters who specialize in the hunt itself? Of course, if you want to comb a dungeon carefully enough to confirm that something of worth is actually there, the place has to be empty first, which means wiping out every last monster guarding it so that ordinary people can survey it even without a hunter on hand — and that, naturally enough, drives up the asking price of the high-rank hunters who make hunting their trade.

Either way, I could rake in money just by exploring this world, a blue ocean in the purest sense, without going through any of that competition.

"Ten years? I'll dig up every last scrap and live off it until I drop dead."

Farming World wasn't work to me. People say that once you do what you love for a living, it turns into work and the love goes dull — a notion that was hard to grasp for someone who'd spent twenty-six years of his life as a complete and total deadbeat. Even so, I was certain. Even if this became reality and turned into my profession, I didn't think boredom, or the slightest unwillingness to do it, would ever cross my mind. Even now my enthusiasm was running out ahead of me; I begrudged the hours spent asleep and wanted to light the map instead.

Of course, a measure of restraint was in order. This wasn't a game. Die, and it was over.

"Ruru."

"Yes, Master?"

"If I die here, do I come back? Or do I just die?"

I'd have to live with that certainty either way, but there was a fairy named Ruru who served as something of a manager for this dimension, so I asked. She'd had one previous master; whether he'd died of old age or died because he couldn't revive was a simple enough thing to put to her. At my perfectly serious question, Ruru let out a bright, tinkling laugh.

"Master, didn't you already take a test about the Rift Dimension before you came here?"

"...Huh?"

Thrown by a fairy suddenly talking about Farming World, I faltered. Ruru was, in a manner of speaking, an NPC. A fairy, at that. In a game, ask the NPCs whether they know they're programmed, and not one of them will say yes. All they ever claim is that they're residents of this world. So was telling her yes the right call? I hesitated, and then it occurred to me that this place might not be Farming World at all.

"Uh... yeah. I did."

"Most of the rules that apply in the Rift Dimension you're in now were applied to the system there as well. Becoming master of a Rift Dimension takes qualifications. From what I know, among all the master candidates who sit through countless trials, only those qualified to hold a dimensional rift are chosen as master."

"And what are those qualifications?"

A letter that had arrived in my Farming World one day out of nowhere, and everything that followed after. This seemed to be about that, so I listened closely. Ruru propped her chin on one small hand and made a troubled face.

"How would I know that? It's something the god who governs the Rift Dimension decides... From what the Previous Master told me, I think the letter said his world was the one they liked best."

"..."

No way the standard was how nicely you'd decorated your world. Or was it playing for a long time and pushing your exploration rate close to a hundred percent? The latter sounded far more plausible than the former — if that really had been the test. Fully opening up this Secret Farming Map, this so-called SSS+ Rank Rift Dimension, would be my main mission sooner or later. Not that any of it mattered. I wasn't curious about that sort of thing anymore.

"Anyway, if you die, Master, you come back to life. Mmm. No — to be precise, when you reach death, you spend Farm to avoid death. Managing a Rift Dimension is difficult, so you can think of it as a power the god granted you. Which means Farm is an incredibly important resource, you know? You have to gather it with all your might!"

"It actually works?"

Honestly, I was surprised. I'd assumed it wouldn't. Reviving in Farming World was obvious — delete a character after a single death and nobody would keep playing, so they let you pay a price and come back. But this was reality, wasn't it? And they really brought you back to life? Even if the price was Farm?

"How many times can I revive?"

"As many times as you have Farm?"

"How much Farm does it cost?"

"Mm... it depends on your level. But right now, Master, you can come back once without paying any Farm. It's a gift from the god."

"..."

Ruru's words poured a tremendous courage into me, and at the same time a small anxiety took root — could I really trust a fairy no bigger than a mouse turd? I had no intention whatsoever of experimenting just because I had one free chance. The day I did run that experiment would be the day I met a death I couldn't dodge even by my own will, so belief was the only option I had. Even so, my mind felt considerably lighter. It actually worked.

"After that, the standard is a thousand Farm through Level 9, fifty thousand Farm through Level 19, a million Farm through Level 29..."

"Stop."

Maybe it would have been better not to hear the rest. I needed the exact figures if I was going to keep a reserve of Farm set aside, but if she was right, one death and my Farm would be scraped down to nothing — not a matter of a few days, but, at high levels, potentially throwing away months. I'll just have to work harder. If I meant to live a long life, even with fate itself kneecapping me ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠until I died of old age. I firmed my resolve all over again, for no particular reason, and started preparing to leave for the village.

Today I'd logged out and come back in, and between sorting my gear and loafing around with Ruru, night had already fallen. I figured I'd sleep and set out in the morning. It was about two kilometers, so I'd need to move with some purpose. I might not be able to finish in a single day. I might have to cut a path, come back, and sleep on it. I was still laying out that plan when a notification cut in.

A quest had appeared that blew my plans to pieces.