There can't be a Harvest Moon in the RimWorld.

"Give me a cucumber!"

...Am I hallucinating?

Was it saying "Aaaaaughibbrgubugbugrguburgle!"? Because I was momentarily distracted, I misheard it as "Please give me a cucumber?"

Ok……

That must be it!

But this creature, which barely reached my knees, didn't give up. It opened its mouth wide and kept shouting, "Give me a cucumber! I'm cute, please give me a cucumber!"

I snapped back to reality as if struck by lightning, punched the "fishman" on the head, and exclaimed in surprise, "Kappa! It's you! What happened to you?!"

While I was observing it, its attribute panel popped up instantly. The species was clearly marked as "Kappa," and the relationship panel below thoughtfully stated "Master: Marcus."

I picked up the kappa and unexpectedly found the last missing member of the ranch here!

Including the emoji pony, the two fighting chickens, and Gray, all four kings of the ranch have returned to their positions, and there are exactly five of them, which is very much in line with the tradition of having five kings!

The kappa, looking aggrieved, climbed up my arm, nimbly spun around, and straddled my neck, all the while saying, "Master, what are you doing here? Did you come to bring me cucumbers? I've been waiting for three months!"

"No cucumbers! Tell me first, how's your farming technique coming along?"

I casually dismissed its question, but it was another incessant, brainwashing nagging that I filtered out. I looked up and saw a row of people on the city wall, all standing there dumbfounded.

They originally planned to unleash their dogs to bite someone, but the ones they released seemed to be having a lot of fun with the other person. Who would have thought that?!

Ugh, I knew it couldn't be that coincidental! Azeroth and Draenor are all fake. Anyone who tries to find a sense of reality in a virtual world must be out of their mind!

After grumbling, I looked up again and saw a familiar figure on the city wall...

"Marcus! It really is you!"

…………

A makeshift wooden ladder was lowered down, taking me from the ravaged battlefield into the city.

Before I even reached the city wall, I heard a familiar voice reprimanding the guards without any politeness. Amidst the torrent of reprimands, not a single person dared to refute, as if a pause button had been pressed.

How brutal... Is this really the little girl who visited my ranch before?

With the kappa in my hand, I quickly climbed up the high wall, stepped over the stone embankment, and landed steadily on the ground.

"Jay! I've finally found you!"

Overwhelmed with excitement, I waved enthusiastically even before landing, intending to exchange a few pleasantries with my long-lost friend. What incredible fate it is that we two have survived so much chaos, crossed the Milky Way, and reunited on the grasslands!

Unfortunately, the two greeted each other in slightly different ways, and there was also a clear misjudgment of the distance.

As a result, just as I turned my back and stepped off the stone stack, before I could even lower my raised hand, I saw the jay running towards me and crashing into my chest like a cannonball.

After a long time, I took another wave of damage with my chest, triggering the characteristic of being killed by a corner once again—luckily, I was wearing wooden armor, and this time I could finally use the armor instead of the structure to withstand the damage!

The jay that bumped into my arms collided violently with its head against the wooden armor, bounced back with a "thud," and sat down on the ground with stars in its eyes, stammering, "Marcus...you...how can you have...three heads..."

...Oh no, I'm afraid I might accidentally turn our meeting into a murder!

I rushed forward to help the jay up, but I immediately saw the city walls and the soldiers who had been fighting for a long time looking at me with disbelief, as if the sky had fallen.

This perplexing scene didn't last long. The jay recovered from its dizziness and flew to my side again, then said with some disgust, "Marcus, you're so dirty, and you even smell bad..."

I laughed and said, "Of course! To get up this mountain, I first infiltrated a tribal siege camp that was like a cesspool, wearing these filthy tribal clothes every day, and then lying in the mud for hours pretending to be dead. How could I possibly be clean?"

The jay covered its beak with its hand and gasped softly, its eyes slightly red, "You...you came here to save us?"

I ruffled the stray hairs on her head. "We're allies, right? If I'm in danger, you'll come to my rescue, right?"

Then I gestured to show her height and added, with a hint of teasing, "Long time no see... You don't seem to have grown up at all?"

The jay, still feeling touched, was taken aback by these words, then scolded angrily, "Don't talk nonsense! I have grown into a fully-fledged shaman!"

Then, huffing and puffing, he ordered the guards to continue patrolling, and dragged me toward the camp behind the city wall. "Hmph, I'll show you what I've accomplished! Hurry up, Ulises, you get out of my way too! It's not like growing taller is the only thing that counts..."

Seeing how energetic the jay was, I followed her and walked towards the Brown Pool tribe's settlement.

Although we've only been apart for a few months, the time difference between our two planets seems to be over a year. The tribal girl in front of me hasn't changed in figure; she's still perfectly flat-chested, and even when she lowers her voice, she sounds no different from a boy. However, her personality has become noticeably more outgoing, and she even seems a bit impatient when she speaks.

She wore a colorful leopard-skin robe adorned with white stones, bone fragments, animal teeth, screws, and other decorations, which looked heavy and mysterious, tightly wrapping around her small body, just like the heavy burden that the tribe placed on her shoulders.

Nowadays, she no longer needs to carry a leather bag, herbs, and tinder over mountains and valleys, but you can still see the small backpack I gave her through the gaps in her animal-skin robe.

The jay led me to the tribe's living area. There were seventy or eighty tents scattered around, spread out in a circle, evenly spaced and facing in an orderly manner, with enough passageways in the middle. There was no mountain of garbage and debris like at the camp down the mountain.

“Marcus, this is the town management I learned from Mineral Town!” Jay said proudly, hands on his hips. “Right in the center are the shaman's council tent, the medical tent, and the kitchen tent—the public space is being used effectively!”

She pointed to the large tents in the four corners, "Those are warehouses, where the tribe stores all its remaining supplies! Outside there are vegetable gardens and outhouses, everything has been implemented according to the plan, aren't I amazing!"

Looking at the orderly campsite of the Brown Pond tribe on the alpine meadow, I clapped my hands and exclaimed, "Amazing! Truly amazing! I thought you would be lacking food and clothing and living in fear here, but you are living so leisurely under your command!"

Compared to the refugee camps at the foot of the mountain, this place can be described as a paradise. Not far away, there is a mirror-like lake, and elegant white clouds drift across the sky. On the grassland, groups of tribal warriors and women move in an orderly manner, constantly shuttling between the fields and their settlements, appearing extremely leisurely and content.

Jay smiled shyly and said, "Hehe, this is all thanks to Elder Grandma. If it weren't for her support, I wouldn't have been able to get everyone to do what I said."

Suddenly, I heard a steady snoring sound beside my ear. I turned my head and saw that the kappa had fallen asleep on my shoulders. It looked like a miniature Deepsea, and it was really scary to see it so close up.

Jay and I strolled along the path, as if transported back to the days in Mineral Town when we climbed Mount Mads. But the starkly different scenery reminded me of reality, leaving me full of questions yet unsure how to ask them.

"Jay..."

“Marcus…”

Before we knew it, we both started talking at the same time. We looked at each other and I said decisively, "You have a lot of questions too, right? Let's take turns asking, starting with you!"

The jay nodded: "Then I'll ask you first! How did you find your way here?"

Hearing this question gave me a headache; the physics involved could probably fill a warehouse. So I decided to start with something simple: "Here's the situation: I happened to come to this planet and spent a few months wandering around the desert. About two weeks ago, we rescued a group of slaves from pirates, and among them we found children from the Brown Pool tribe..."

Before I could finish speaking, I saw Jay grip my sleeve tightly with a serious expression, so I immediately added, "Don't worry, those children are all healthy. I'll find someone to take care of them as soon as I find out what's going on, there won't be any problems."

The jay, who was so anxious it was almost in tears, breathed a sigh of relief upon hearing this: "That's wonderful... Thank you, Marcus!"

I waved my hand and said modestly, "You have a lot more to thank me for, save that for the last time... Go on, as soon as I heard about the trouble in your tribe, I led my men over mountains and valleys to come here. My men almost developed a nervous breakdown, so in the end only a dozen or so people came. We infiltrated under the tribe's name, the others stayed at the foot of the mountain as inside agents, and I'm going up the mountain first!"

After I finished speaking, I took a breath and said to the jay, "It's your turn. How did you end up with the kappa after you were attacked?"

The jay, its face painted with oil paint, hopped forward a couple of steps and said in surprise, "I found it in the lake on the mountain. Is it called a kappa? I thought it was called a cucumber! It always comes running whenever I call 'cucumber'!"

"...Your name isn't wrong either. If you can give it a cucumber, you can call it a mushroom, a rice cooker, a motorcycle, or Kakarot."

The jay nodded as if it understood, "Is that so... But Elder Grandma said it is the son of Altana, the embodiment of the will of Mount Corilo, a unique divine beast!"

“Altana?” I asked.

The jay said slyly, "Hehe, this is the second question. I'm going to ask two in a row later! The elder is the shaman of the tribe. She told us since we were little that this planet has a consciousness sleeping in the heart of the earth, which is called Planet Altana."

The jay circled around, surveying the vast expanse of the mountain. "We, along with all animals and the plants and trees on the ground, are all descendants of Altana. Only the creatures most favored by Altana can be called children of Altana and come to the ground to perform their duties."

This is a very reasonable theory that explains the origin of all things while taking into account the differences between science and religion, leaving enough room for interpretation and development. Those who could create and implement this theoretical system are most likely remnants of the first advanced civilizations on the planet.

I couldn't help but complain, "You guys actually accept such an ugly mythical beast... This thing is basically just a broken record, except it can be placed at the door to ward off evil spirits."

The jay scratched its head and retorted, "But cucumbers are amazing! They're so small, but from a distance they look like giants! Last time they were on the city wall, they even scared off the enemy's attack!"

Upon hearing this, a ruthless pastor's face flashed before my eyes...

Father Carter once said that it had successfully sealed away the Deep Ones, turning them into animals to be raised on my ranch. Now, this seemingly unscientific phenomenon of the vast expanse being small in the near term has appeared—magic! It must be magic!

I suspect that the process of teleporting to the planet was too intense, or that this place is too far from Father Carter, which caused the seal on the kappa to loosen. Not only did it change from an ugly and cute appearance back to a horror movie appearance, but it also created a visual illusion, making people see its original size from a distance!

Seeing me in a daze, the jay suddenly remembered the order of the questions: "No, no, I should be the one asking! Tell me what's going on outside!"

"Outside... the sky is falling..."

Chapter 509 Military Might Shocks Geshuhan

The jay looked at me suspiciously. "Marcus, has something big happened outside? We've been hiding in the mountains for two months, and we feel like the attacks have been happening less and less lately..."

I nodded: "The area below the mountain is now under the command of Chief Berthold of the Giant River Tribe. He has suppressed the Scorpion Yakan Tribe's pro-war opinions and adopted a strategy of encirclement without attack, waiting for things to develop in their favor."

The jay snorted and kicked a pebble by the roadside in displeasure. "Then they've miscalculated! The Brownpool tribe is doing just fine; they have no intention of coming down the mountain to surrender!"

As we walked, we passed a well-planned vegetable garden, symmetrically planted with potatoes, cabbages, and pineapples. Compared to the sweltering heat down below, this mirror-like valley nestled between two peaks had a much milder climate. Apart from the occasional extreme weather event that swept across the mountainside, it generally met the growing conditions for crops.

"What stage of your crop production are you at?" I asked.

The jay counted on its fingers and said, "It should be...it should be the fourth round! The first three rounds were planted at the foot of the mountain, and most of the harvest was eaten. We brought a little bit up the mountain as seeds. As long as this round of crops matures, we can live on the mountain for the rest of our lives!"

Looking at her innocent and proud expression, I couldn't help but sigh, "Hey, little girl, you'd better not be so naive. Even if the crops are self-sufficient, can they provide warm cloth and medicine here? Not to mention the lack of salt, you must have seen a lot more people with weak legs walking these past two months, right?"

The jay pouted and whispered, "I'm just... I'm just angry! The Giant River Tribe deliberately made things difficult for us for so long..."

I watched the white clouds drift across the distant sky, and a cool breeze swept by, seemingly pushing the heavens and earth open up, making them even more expansive.

"Now it's my turn to ask a question. How did you escape? It seems there are quite a few more young and able-bodied men in your tribe now."

Upon hearing my question, the tribal girl began to recount the details with great familiarity.

"You noticed? Actually, in the first season the potatoes grew, the elder grandmother took the initiative to recruit the surrounding small tribes and refugees who had fled to the wilderness. We attracted several times more members with food and land, which is how we reached our current size! At our peak, we had almost a thousand people, much more than we have now!"

"You were prepared for that ambush, weren't you?" I suddenly asked.

Jay was startled by what I said, and then whispered to me, "At first, the elder didn't believe me at all. She just wanted to recruit members as soon as possible, increase our strength, and prevent others from bullying us."

I nodded. If it weren't for that toxic dust storm that wiped out the wild's humans, livestock, and plants, the Brown Pool tribe's rapid development could have truly spread like wildfire. But the risk of this plan lies in its ability to be contained from multiple sides. If it's publicized too much before a united front is formed, the final result will certainly be coveted.

And I suspect the tribal elder mentioned by the jay could also have guessed that.

"and then?"

"Then, due to a food dispute, two conflicts broke out in the tribe. The elder sent out all the fire keepers, summoned trusted allies, and organized a group of the most combat-ready youths to train every day to protect the common property of the Brownpool tribe."

"Is this the origin of these guardian warriors in the tribe?"

Jay nodded and said, “That’s right. People like Ulises are warriors who have joined the Brownpool tribe. Most of their families have encountered crises and have survived by relying on the Brownpool tribe. So when they heard our call, they joined us without hesitation.”

It's not that simple, little sister...

Now I no longer complain about the tribal elders' stubbornness. Technical talents like Jay are better off focusing on organizing farming; researching town planning is just a side job. Political and military plans between tribes must be judged by these experienced leaders.

We walked slowly along the path, gradually crossing the fields, and arrived at the tranquil lakeside.

The area is filled with pale, fragmented lake stones, and the crystal-clear water reveals the bottom at a glance. At first glance, it seems as if many fish are swimming in the water. But upon closer inspection, one will discover that the swaying shadows are actually reflections of the white clouds in the sky. It is only because the lake water is so clear and calm that it reflects all the scenery.

The source of this lake is the snow and ice of two mountain peaks that pierce the clouds.

Two snow-capped peaks, untouched by the snow for millennia, stand guard on either side of the mirror-like lake. Meltwater from the mountain springs gushes down, forming two streams that flow into the lake, creating tiny ripples.