Chapter 187. District Progress (1)

Chapter 187: 187. District Progress (1)

Lydia stopped beside Rowan and looked at him for several seconds.

"I can understand your shock," Cedric said. "Carlos told me, but I still had to look twice." He spoke with a smile.

She nodded and walked around the Dryad once before setting her bag down. Rowan waited with an expression Carlos remembered very well from his older face.

"Can we work now?" he asked.

"I like that you are floating," she spoke jokingly. "You have stopped pressing the soil I need to lift."

Rowan frowned at her. Did he look like a person who would enjoy such jokes? Carlos moved back just in case she really didn’t want someone standing on her work.

The two Clayborn Masons placed their tools beside the bed. One of the Clayborns examined the exposed crown, then took a pinch of the surrounding earth and worked it between its fingers.

"It has packed around the outer roots. We loosen a strip here first. Which part must stay supported?"

Rowan showed it the fine roots beneath the green ring. Boro kept the leaves lifted while the Clayborn explained the work to the other mason and Lydia.

Cedric had brought boards and empty harvest baskets. Rhea kept the carrying path open, sending the curious workers back to their own duties after Carlos told them they would see the result later.

He wanted to watch every part himself, but there was already somebody standing wherever his hands might have been useful. He held the basin instead, pouring a little water where Rowan pointed.

The first Mason worked a narrow opening through the hard outside soil. The other supported it as Lydia lifted the loosened section. A pale side root appeared, thick as Carlos’s forearm near its upper end.

"That is food?" he asked.

"If the record is right," Rowan said. "Keep the basin steady."

Carlos looked down. He had tilted it toward his own boot while trying to see.

Lydia cleared enough room for Rowan to put two fingers beneath the sheath. The green ring tightened around them, and the leaves bent inward.

"Wait," Boro said.

Everyone stopped. The Dogman pointed at the leaf he had shown Rowan earlier.

"That one is caught under the ring. It pulls every time you lift it."

Rowan followed the narrow leaf down. Its tip had folded beneath a dry strip and become trapped there. He held the ring in place while Boro used the flat tool to ease the leaf out, lifting a little at a time.

The leaf came free with soil clinging to its underside.

Rowan put his hand against the crown again. This time the ring loosened slowly, exposing a pale seam between the rounded roots and the central plant.

"There," he said. "It is letting go."

Carlos leaned forward before remembering the basin. He set it down safely and watched Rowan cut the mature side root along the exposed seam. The severed surface shone with a faint green moisture, while the parent stayed firm in the ground.

Boro caught the root in a folded cloth.

The System panel opened above Carlos’s hand.

--

[Crownroot recovered]

[Rare Grade]

[Condition: Suitable for food preparation]

[Dense stored nourishment]

[Raw consumption unsuitable]

[Parent crown preserved]

--

"We got it," Carlos said.

He looked at Boro, whose hands were still holding the cloth beneath the heavy root.

"Bring that one here, Boro."

The Dogman carried it over with his tail moving behind him. Carlos helped settle it in the basket, then inspected the parent again. New pale tissue covered the cut seam while the leaves began opening farther than before.

Lydia checked the support before allowing the Masons to move to the next side.

The second root came free more easily. By the third, Boro knew where to stand and which leaf Rowan wanted held aside. Cedric began preparing the next crown while they worked, keeping his people outside the root line Lydia marked.

Carlos watched the baskets fill over the afternoon. Six living parent crowns remained in the bed when they finished. Rhea brought the store’s scale and weighed each basket, moving the full ones aside so Cedric could copy the amounts. Together, the roots weighed eighteen kilograms.

He had expected a small sample. But the baskets looked like the beginning of an actual supply.

Near the final crown, Lydia found a narrow stone label caught beneath an old support. She brushed it clean and handed it to Carlos.

He opened its record using his Crop Keeper authority.

--

[Cultivation maintenance note]

[Crownroot preservation procedure]

[Mature side roots retained to sustain parent crowns during suspended cultivation]

[Resume harvest by releasing preservation sheath]

[Clear folded growth before release]

--

Carlos read the last line and looked at Boro.

"Boro, you figured out the part we needed before finding the instruction. Good job."

Boro rubbed soil from his fingers. "It was a coincidence, my lord. Hearthpod gets upset when its leaves are caught. I thought this one might too."

"Keep thinking that way. It helped quite a lot."

Rowan took the label and read it himself. He looked satisfied, then returned it to the support beside the parent so the workers could copy it.

"They left the food attached to keep these alive," he said. "Taking the whole plant would have ruined what they saved."

"The previous owners really were crazy. How they got these plants to stay alive all this time is still a mystery," Carlos muttered.

"My goal is to one day get that answer, my lord. You won’t have to wait long, I swear." Rowan spoke, making Carlos nod. He had confidence in him.

He wanted to see the rest of the preserved fields producing just as badly now.

Two smaller growths remained beside one parent. Rowan examined their leaves and the roots beneath them before asking Lydia to loosen the outside soil.

"Young crowns," he explained. "These can be separated with their own roots. We keep one here and take the other to Ironroot."

Carlos agreed at once. Lydia lifted both with damp soil around them, and Boro carried the travelling crown to a separate container.

The final inspection recorded the recovered bed as productive. Its parent plants would grow new side roots; their base regrowth period was seven days, with the actual interval dependent on cultivation conditions.

Carlos did not know what Mira could make from eighteen kilograms of Rare food. He did know she would ask how much would come after it.

But one thing was clear, they were about to witness some new types of harvest whose advantages were still unknown.