Chapter 212
The First Seed [Part 2]
"Ahh, I slept well!"
"The catbu... cat carriage has already surpassed a Te*pur-Pedic bed level of comfort, huh?"
[T/N: Catbus from My Neighbor Totoro.]
The family had brought the cat carriage they had once used when they moved from Palace to the Royal Capital to Imperial Japan. They had unknowingly slept like a log while being swayed inside the carriage full of fluffy cats.
To satisfy the comfort requirements of Koumei and the other three cats, Joshua fully utilized his financial power and made every effort to build this cat carriage.
"Huh? Where's Father?"
The three siblings and Melsa had gotten off the carriage one after another swiftly, but only Leonard hadn't come out.
When Emma poked her head inside the narrow entrance of the cat carriage, she could see Leonard being crushed under one big lump of four cats.
"Cough, u-ugh... Chou-chan, why do you always... get on top of me every time?"
Leonard struggled to crawl out from under Chou-chan, who was currently grooming the fur on his belly lazily.
"Meow♪"
"'It's because Papa's stomach is my special seat♪,' he said."
"Then... it can't be helped... I guess..."
"Yeah, it can't be helped~"
Leonard heard Emma's translation and sighed at this 'sweet dilemma' he faced.
Emma, too, seconded her father's words as she lent him a hand.
This family always puts their cats first in everything.
After Leonard finally came out alive from under Chou-chan, he got off the carriage and looked around to see a dry rice field without irrigation.
"We have already entered the predicted landing range of Over's seeds. Please stay close to us, samurai escorts."
Fukushima spoke to the head of the family, Leonard. It was because the seeds could really fall on their heads anytime now.
"The rice fields around here aren't being planted in anymore, huh?"
Leonard shrugged his shoulders regretfully as he looked around the place.
Fukushima's POV
As expected of the family who brought that much food aid in exchange for rice. They knew that this abandoned field was a place to plant rice.
Imperial Japan was the only country left in this world that ate rice as their staple food.
There used to be a large country called the Hua Kingdom between the Empire and Imperial Japan. I heard that the people there also ate rice, but that too, was a story of a long, long time ago.
The Hua Kingdom was one of many countries that were destroyed by monsters. It was said that before the national isolation policy was enacted, Imperial Japan had the friendliest relationship with the Hua Kingdom, and our country had modeled their culture, letters, and ideology.
The Empire, the Hua Kingdom, and Imperial Japan were the oldest states among countries that existed within the barrier.
If you were patient enough to spend decades looking through the old documents in the Great Library of the Empire, you might be able to find a single sentence related to [rice].
However, soon after the Hua Kingdom perished, Imperial Japan decided to close the country.
My head was only full of question marks when I wondered about how the Stuart family, which was purely the Kingdom people, learned about rice. Because the Kingdom was supposed to not even be able to map the location of Imperial Japan.
"All the locals have been evacuated. If the seeds land here, a crater will be formed on the cultivated fields and the planted rice fields, and another branch of Over will sprout after a few days."
The seeds must be of considerable weight to be able to make even the hard stems bend backwards.
The seeds would fly while still being wrapped in a hard capsule, and the impact of the fall would leave a deep cavity in the ground. With the momentum of the capsule bursting open when it hit the ground, the seed would continue to tunnel through a vast area underground. So even if we dug the crash site, the seed wouldn't be there. Because it had already traveled underground to god knows where. The things we could find in the landing area would only be the debris of the capsule and a soft cushioning material that protected the seed.