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Chapter 136: 131 Mid-Level Farmer_i

The Ant Queen now produces a hundred eggs a day, and with the base number up, almost every day there are special ant species emerging.

Keep in mind, these special ants can all be promoted to Grade Three after a secondary cultivation.

However, special ant species like Fourth have not appeared again.

But from a probability standpoint, there should be special ants like Fourth emerging in the future, just in even smaller numbers than elephant-nosed Soldier Ants.

After cultivating the termites, he came to the beehive, looking at the Queen Bee that had become a Grade Three War Bee, along with a group of Grade Two Green Ring Worker Bees, he felt equally satisfied.

Now, the Queen Bee produces a hundred eggs a day; just wait for a dozen or so days, and he could cultivate a hundred special bees each day.

By then, he should be able to achieve great things.

There might even be special types of bees to appear.

After the ten newly eclosed bees came out today, he discovered one of them had a notably large size and a deeper color.

After careful identification, a wave of disappointment.

It was a male bee.

The Queen Bee would mate with the male bees numerous times, but she wouldn’t mate with those male bees that were related to her by blood.

This was particularly miraculous.

When she released pheromones to attract other male bees, the ones related to her by blood seemed not to feel it at all.

Only those non-blood-related male bees would be attracted.

Qin Niu did not cultivate this male bee, letting it fend for itself.

His time, energy, and resources were limited.

It was impossible to cultivate two bee colonies.

There was no need for that either.

So, cultivating this male bee would essentially be meaningless.

Having completed cultivating the insects, he naturally went under the banyan tree to cultivate without mention.

When he emerged from under the banyan tree once more, his Everlasting Spring Technique had broken through to the mortal’s Eightfold level, and it seemed there would be no issue for the Medicine King Sutra to break through to the Fivefold level tomorrow.

This frightening speed of cultivation made his strength rise very quickly.

When he returned to the village with a large group of special termites, he found that Wang Furen had already bought the ducks back.

“Master Qin, a full three thousand ducks, please count them! We arrived just in time, as a locust plague hasn’t occurred there yet, so the ducks didn’t go up in price. After haggling with the owner, I bought them each for six Wen Money,” said Wang Furen, looking travel-worn, as did the other villagers who went with him.

He managed to buy the ducks for only six Wen Money each, Wang Furen was truly a businessman, even after over a decade of not working, he still had an amazing business acumen.

“It would be great if these ducks could really prevent the locust plague! I rented nearly twenty acres of land this year, eighteen acres of which are in our village, and my whole family is depending on the yield from these eighteen acres,” said Liu Shengli, another villager who went along.

The locust plague was so severe that despite many measures taken on his family’s land, none were effective.

Few villagers had their own land, and many were tenant farmers.

Those who rented less had only three to five acres, while those who rented more had twenty to thirty acres.

Xu Zhenchang must be the biggest tenant farmer, renting at least a hundred acres. If the crops are really eaten up by the locusts, many might consider hanging themselves with a rope.

“Hasn’t the locust plague occurred over in Ping Shui yet?” Qin Niu was more interested in this piece of information.

“It seems the locust plague is sweeping in from the north. Once we left our village’s boundary, we saw locusts ravaging everywhere, but Ping Shui was still calm for the time being. So, I surmise the locust plague must have originated from the north,” Wang Furen provided an important piece of information.

“Thank you all for your hard work! Just put all these ducks into the buffer zone!” Qin Niu said, looking at the semi-grown ducks brought back in layer upon layer of bamboo cages. Each cage should hold about a hundred.

They had bought back more than fifty cages in total.

“Master Qin, I bought two thousand ducks myself, and the villagers who went with me bought dozens or hundreds. In total, the number of ducks bought back is five thousand four hundred and sixty. We rented five ox-carts, which cost five Wen of Silver Money. We ate our own dry food when we were hungry on the road, and drank from natural water sources when we were thirsty. So, there were no other expenses. You had three thousand ducks, and if we calculate the ox-carts as three, that would be a transport cost of three Wen of Silver Money.

The ducks were six Wen Money each, three thousand ducks in total cost eighteen taels of Silver Money.

Adding the transport fee, the total comes to eighteen taels and three Wen. You gave me twenty-six taels, and this is the remaining Silver Money. Please count it,” Wang Furen calculated the account very clearly.

The aim is to save as much as possible.

This is also a good tradition of country folk.

You have to be thrifty; earning money is too hard, and it hurts to spend it.

“You’ve worked hard! You are the lead leader, so I am giving you a hundred Wen Money a day as wages, and for three days that totals three hundred Wen,” Qin Niu said, taking the returned excess silver and immediately handing three Wen to Wang Furen.

“Oh, I can’t take it, I can’t take it. I bought two thousand ducks myself. Besides, this is for the good of the whole village; I can’t accept this money,” Wang Furen hurriedly refused.

“Take it if I tell you to take it, why so much nonsense!” Qin Niu said, his face darkening slightly, which frightened Wang Furen from refusing any longer, and he honestly accepted the silver, showing an expression of covert joy on his face.

A hundred Wen Money a day as wages, such high-paying work is hard to find anywhere.

“There were seven of you in total. Each person will be paid twenty Wen Money as wages. Sixty Wen each,” Qin Niu said without hesitation.

Don’t even mention him; even the Yan Family has to pay wages if they want someone to work for them.

That’s the rule, and it’s the most basic social norm.

If you try to use your status to push people around and expect them to run errands for free, the next time something comes up, everyone will avoid you like the plague. Either they’ll pretend to be sick or hide and not show up. What can you do about it?

The seven people took the wages from Qin Niu with an outward appearance of trepidation, but inwardly they were just as overjoyed as Wang Furen.

Everyone is naturally happy to reap benefits.

“The contributions you eight have made to Shuangfeng Village will not be forgotten by everyone. Once the locust plague in our village subsides, I’ll ask the village chief to erect a merit stele and engrave your deeds upon it. Now, let’s put these ducks into the buffer zone.”

After Qin Niu finished speaking, he turned to look at Wang Furen.

“Uncle Wang, please make a clear record of how many chickens and ducks each household has put in there, so it will be easy to account for them when they are taken back.”

“No problem, I can handle this task and make sure everything is recorded clearly.”

Wang Furen, having received three hundred Wen Money for his work, was now truly obedient to Qin Niu.

So many half-grown ducks with hearty appetites were being released into the area.

Upon seeing the delicious locusts, the ducks, their feathers not yet fully grown, flapped their wings madly and feasted on the pests.

Everybody watching the ducks gobble up the locusts was immensely pleased.

These harmful insects finally met their nemesis.

The surrounding villagers were all showing expressions of hope and joy, chatting and discussing among themselves.

Qin Niu had already quietly left the scene.

Two days had passed, and very few locusts were entering the village anymore. The vast majority had died in the buffer zone, consumed entirely by the ducks.

Qin Niu, along with Xiao Qing, was harvesting millet in his own field.

With each stalk of millet harvested, his Farmer Experience Points would increase by o.oi.

At the same time, he acquired a new farming skill.

Gathering, a skill for picking fruits and harvesting various crops and herbs.

Every time he broke a cob of corn from the stalk, his Gathering skill proficiency and his labor points both increased by o.oi.

So far, he had accumulated over three thousand labor points.

That’s because every time the Termites went into the field to catch insects, and each time they successfully killed one, he would also gain o.oi labor points.

Without a second thought, he directly spent 100 labor points to raise his Gathering skill from beginner to somewhat skilled.

As a result, he found that not only did his harvesting efficiency improve,

but now while picking the millet, he could gauge their internal conditions based on their weight and size through touch.

It seemed that as the Gathering skill continued to improve, it would bring even more abilities in the future.

“Xiao Qing, take these harvested millet back home to dry! I’ll let Xiao Niu carry them back.”

Qin Niu said to Xiao Qing.

“Xiao Niu, come here!”

There were now two more helpers for work at home.

Qin Niu hung a basket on the ox’s back. Then he filled the basket with millet cobs and had it carry them home.

At first, it seemed eager due to the novelty, working quite hard.

But after several trips, the lazy ox started to slack off. It lay down in the field and simply refused to get up.

Seeing that it was still young, Qin Niu didn’t have the heart to whip it and just let it be.

By the time he finished harvesting all the millet,

his Farmer level experience had increased by a total of 39.75, and his level had successfully advanced from Low Tier to Mid Tier as he had hoped.

This meant that he was officially a Mid Tier Farmer now.

In terms of farming techniques, he had actually reached this level long ago.

However, after his level went up, he found that his knowledge and experience in planting had greatly improved. Faced with different planting problems, his approaches to solving them became more diverse.

This was unexpected.

It made sense, though, since the salary of a Mid Tier Farmer was more than three times that of a Low Tier Farmer.

If there wasn’t some real skill involved, the landlord would not be willing to fork over such a hefty sum.

Qin Niu thought to himself that many people spent their entire lives stuck at the Low Tier Farmer level, but he had managed to raise his Farmer level by one tier just by planting one mu of millet this year.

This was a ‘shortcut’ for steady progress.

As long as you work hard, you can improve.

So far, he had deduced three ways to increase the Farmer level experience: sowing, transplanting, and harvesting.

Even though sowing a single plant only added 0.01 Farmer experience, the effort would accumulate over time. As long as he kept planting continuously, he could keep improving his Farmer level.

This was an advantage that no one else had.

“Now that’s great, my Farmer level has reached Mid Tier, and I can upgrade various planting skills as well.”

Previously, due to too low a level, his planting skills were stuck at somewhat skilled and couldn’t advance any further.

No need to worry about that now.

In his opinion, planting skills were just as important as the Farmer level.

Because no matter how high the Farmer level, it’s just a strong foundation.

But to actually improve crop yields, you have to rely on planting skills.

For example, even if you have reached High Tier Farmer, but your sowing technique is poor. If few plants germinate after sowing, and among those seedlings, there are diseased and weak ones, can the yield be good?