Foreign Land Reclamation By a Vegetable-growing Skeleton

This might be an unavoidable problem for every young and promising wizard. Over-thinking, staying up late, eating food high in oil and salt, having unclean habits, and excess oleaginous secretions clogging the hair follicles…

Hiludi doubts whether her hair can last until she’s forty. Many of her seniors barely pass thirty before they start to bald.

To outsiders, wizards appear elegant in their floating robes, high collars, and pointed hats. However, Hiludi knows that once the hats are removed, most of them are bald.

She doesn’t want to become a bald person like her seniors. If it were actually to happen, she would rather shave all her hair off.

However, the more she doesn’t want to be bald, the more anxious she becomes, and the more her hair falls out. She has consulted many wizards, regardless of schools, all claiming to have no solution.

“If there was a solution, would we still be bald?” One irritated senior yelled at her. He felt that she was poking his wounds, just because she still had her hair.

Now, Hiludi has learned to not dwell on this issue. If it happens, she’ll just shave it all off. Unexpectedly, Lisa brought up this topic suddenly, causing all her worries to resurface. With a reproachful look towards Lisa, she complained, “Why did you bring this up? It can’t be cured.”

Before she could finish her sentence, she heard Lisa say, “Hair is a bit difficult; it needs adults to handle it personally. The effect will also be slower, needing a whole night. How about this? Rest here tonight? Sister can arrange a sand bath for you?”

Hiludi swallowed her unspoken words and asked with a stunned tone, “Can… can it regrow hair?”

Lisa replied as though it was the most natural thing in the world, “Of course, this is the Goddess of Beauty City. If there was no hair, where would the beauty come from?”

“I… this… Sister, let me catch up for a moment.” Hiludi took a deep breath, contemplated for a moment, and suddenly asked, “Sister, if I start believing in the Goddess of Beauty now, will it be too late?”

…

On the barren land between East River and Goddess of Beauty City, Ange had obtained a lot of water velvet fluff. It was used to improve the water retention capacity of the sandy soil, and bird droppings and dragon soil were mixed in as fertilizers to enhance the soil properties. Different kinds of crops were planted in different plots, with the breadfruit tree accounting for the majority.

This new crop, obtained from the druid, had the potential to become a new staple crop. It is particularly suited for desert environments due to its drought resistance, and can survive in sandy soil.

During high moisture periods, it collects water in its trunk and fruit, and then consumes this stored water during the dry season to survive.

It doesn’t have many leaves, hence a low rate of evaporation, making it suitable for large-scale planting.

Bamboo was planted in small amounts for experimental comparison. However, even if it survived, he has no plans to plant bamboo in the desert; they consume too much water.

After dropping Hiludi off with Lisa, he was kept busy here. Both he and Negris unanimously agreed that in terms of manipulating people’s hearts, Lisa’s skills were 120 times superior to theirs.

If even Lisa couldn’t handle it, the person was definitely either resolute or a desirous dead object.

To his surprise, while Ange was busy with planting, a transparent flame suddenly blazed before him.

What was this thing? Ange tilted his head, about to reach out to touch it, but the Bronze Dragon rushed over and firmly held him back.

“The… Fire of Mass Faith! What did you do!?” Negris asked, his voice trembling.

Ange tilted his head.

Negris quickly retreated two steps, dragging Ange with him. Yet, the transparent flame floated over, following their retreat.

“Sure enough, it’s your Fire of Mass Faith. What did you do to cause it? Did you plant something on the farm again?” Negris rushed back to the Resting Palace quickly, took a quick round around the farm but didn’t notice any particular changes.

“Nothing has changed, so why is there Fire of Mass Faith? What did you do?” Negris was babbling incoherently, having repeated ‘What did you do’ three times, but Ange was still dumbfounded.

“What is this?” Ange tilted his head, and asked in bewilderment.

“Kvada, how can you not know what this is if you could ignite it? It’s the Fire of Mass Faith! The precursor to Divine Fire, the precursor to divinity. If you can ignite it, you have the potential to light up the Divine Fire, attain divinity, and become a true deity!” Negris exclaimed in a frenzied manner.

Ange tilted his head and said blankly, “Aren’t I one already? So are you.”

Oh, right, why am I so excited? I’m the God of Knowledge, a true deity, aren’t I?

Negris abruptly came to this realization with a start.

It couldn’t be helped. This kid had barely enjoyed a few days of godhood before getting captured. He could boast about it often enough, but he didn’t truly perceive himself as a deity.

Upon realizing this fact, Negris’ temper quickly cooled down. He no longer lost his composure, but he was still very excited. The Fire of Mass Faith – besides the time he ignited his own divine fire, this was the second time he’d witnessed the ignition of the Fire of Mass Faith.

This… is the beginning of godhood.

The Fire of Mass Faith is the first step to becoming a god. If a powerful being already has many followers in the world, like Negris used to, yet they still cannot ignite the divine fire, it’s because they do not possess the Fire of Mass Faith.

This flame is quite mysterious. It can ignite on its own, or someone else can ignite it. This “someone else” doesn’t even need to be its devoted follower.

According to Negris’s understanding, the Fire of Mass Faith is like a fulcrum; when it ignites, scattered faith coalesces together like they’ve found a fulcrum, amplifying the Fire of Mass Faith.

Once the flame grows to a certain extent, it transforms into a divine fire, changes into a divine category, and creates its own network of faith.

The Fire of Mass Faith is essential, which is why Negris was so envious when Ange got fervent followers – because the Fire of Mass Faith would often ignite from the most fervent believers.

But it’s not always this way. For instance, Negris’s Fire of Mass Faith ignited on its own. The Fire of Mass Faith of the Harvest Girl Goddess was ignited by nobles and landlords. In short, it’s all very puzzling.

Ange hadn’t done anything; he just kept tilling the fields, yet for some unexplainable reason, his Fire of Mass Faith was ignited out of nowhere. Was he the Goddess of Fortune? Was the flame lit by the Goddess of Fortune?

“Touch it and see what it is,” Negris said.

Ange extended his hand and gently tapped the transparent flame.

The Fire of Mass Faith whooshed into Ange’s body, with countless pieces of information flooding into his soul.

After remaining dumbstruck for quite a while, Ange turned around with a strange expression.

Negris asked eagerly, “Well? What’s the situation? Who ignited the Fire of Mass Faith? What divine category? Any awakened Divine Technique?”

“Hiludi, Goddess of Beauty, no Divine Technique,” Ange responded.

As he spoke, Ange held out his palm. Hiludi’s face appeared on it, her eyes full of hope. A voice rose, “Such a good thing, we should share it with our senpai. Is it too late to believe in the Goddess of Beauty now?”

“This sentence ignited the Fire of Mass Faith?” Negris asked skeptically, “Why? What’s the key? Good thing? Sharing? Or ‘believe in the Goddess of Beauty’?”

Negris speculated considerably but without more samples for comparison, he still couldn’t understand how Hiludi had ignited the Fire of Mass Faith.

“So, now you have dual divine category? Goddess of Beauty? What use is that?” Negris inquired.

Ange shook his head, “Three, God of Knowledge.”

“The God of Knowledge category is mine…” Negris raged, stomping in frustration. So pitiful, he was down to one category and this guy was still trying to steal it.

But right after he said this, he remembered that, yes, he was Ange’s subsidiary god, so theoretically, his divine category belonged to Ange as well.

“Kvada…”

Things got a little out of control because Hiludi has ignited the Fire of Mass Faith. This was a huge gift and as per the principle of equivalence, Lisa couldn’t use the ‘free package’ to entice the other party, she’d have to opt for a direct giveaway.

Lisa, who received Ange’s instructions, was a bit taken aback, but she soon laughed and said, “Hiludi, how about a lifetime all-inclusive free package?”

Hiludi was clueless that this was an equivalent offering. She thought Lisa was making demands, so the girl who had previously insisted she wouldn’t even glance at the Magic Crystal Mountain immediately grabbed Lisa’s hand, “No problem, sis, I’m up for anything.”

PS: I seem to have the same problem as Harvey, a little disc protrusion in my waist, it hurts when I sit down.