Chapter 6. Start of money-making plan.
***
After walking around for a good enough time, Jake still has not found any herbs. Although he found nothing yet, he still made sure to take note of the things around him.
From this, he found there was a small running creek to his left and even a bunch of small puddles to his right. Since it was still early in the morning, he had a hard time seeing things with the small mist covering the ground.
With the accumulated mist over the night, the grass he was walking on was slippery. If he was not careful enough he would fall to his feet.
Thanks to the clothes he had when he got to this world, he found it easy enough not to fall to his knees. "I'm glad these leather boots have a tight grip on them. If they didn't have it, I would surely have fallen multiple times already."
In the corner of his eyes, he found something growing in one of the puddles around the forest. Going towards it he found small flowers growing.
"Finally found one." From the normal perspective, the flower before him would seem a normal one. It has normal colors of white in its seven petals and a tiny spark of yellow in the center.
"Does this even make sense to call this a herb?" He questions still flocking it out in the ground. He didn't know what the name of the flowers was, but he saw people coming back with them, filled with a smile.
And from the places where these flowers were sold, he found them being used in creating a potion. With over seven of them growing he was glad to be this early. If he had waited much longer, people would have found this before him.
"Good, I already have five of these things." He said, stretching his arms. "Time to go around and find more."
Jake was satisfied with his find, but he knew this was not enough for him to earn profits, so he started roaming around once again to find some more.
From there his harvest turned out to be good. Finding more and more herbs every now and then. From more of the same flowers, weird-looking ones, and even some monster-like ones.
He made sure to take all of them with him. And after an hour of going around the area of rank 1. Jake had over 37 herbs with him. He wanted to take more but couldn't do so, since he lacked the equipment to carry them.
Jake came to the forest wearing the clothes he had when he got to this world. A plain white long-sleeve shirt, brown pants, and leather boots. Adding up what Roth and Allen gave to him, all five of these were his only possessions in this place.
"This should be good enough to earn something for today. I'll come back later on, after I exchange them." Muttering those words, he made his way back to the gate.
Taking his time to go back, he made sure the tied-out herbs were still good. With nothing on him, he could only tie the same herbs together and put them in the rope he had.
If he was not careful with how he walked, and made them lose some petals and break them apart, their worth might get halved.
Once the gate was in his sight. Jake pulled out the water pouch around his neck and the dagger around his waist to give them back to their owners.
"Here, thanks for letting me borrow them," Jake said to the two, as he gave them back the things they had given him an hour ago.
The two glance at each other before pushing their hands away. "That's yours now," Allen said, examining the herbs he got on his back.
"Damn, is this what you call beginner's luck?" Roth muttered gazing at the herbs on Jake. "Allen, look at this." He called him out.
"Isn't this the starflower used in the strength potion?" Pointing at the first herb Jake found in the forest.
"That's right. Look, isn't this the rare parasite root used for an antidote?" Seeing the things Jake was carrying, the two ordered him to place the rope on the ground to examine them.
On the ground, seven different kinds of herbs lay. Each one is different from the others. There were four flower herbs, one root, and two monster-looking ones.
"Starflower, parasite root, glass worm, hermin flower, and both ice and water flowers." Looking at the last one, Allen did not expect to see one of these from Jake.
"Do you know what this one is?" Allen asked Jake, holding one of the sphere-like grasses in his hand. Jake shook his head, not knowing what it was.
He only picked it up, since it was a sphere that was growing in the forest. From the time of his observation, he did not find anyone carrying this. Thinking it was just a rare thing, he just took it without a worry.
"Haha." The two let out a small laugh at Jake's reaction. To think someone would find this and not even know what it was.
They were glad that he went to them first before showing anyone this. If he were to show them to anyone inside the town, the people would surely scam him for their worth.
Grabbing all seven of them, Allen held them up to Jake's eyes. "Jake, listen carefully. These seven spheres you found are what we call system flowers."
Hearing this, Jake's eyes widened. Just by their names alone, he knew they were not normal. Especially since their name had a system in it.
"By their name alone, you're probably expecting something big with them." He nodded to Allen's words.
"Well, you're right. Normally, finding one of these things alone is already considered good luck. But you found an entire batch of it."
Allen looked around making sure that Roth covered their conversation as they crouched in the side. If anyone found this, things might go south.
"Eating one of these things can increase your stats by five points permanently. And you found seven of them in total. You're probably thinking you can increase your stats by 35 points by now."
Jake did not disagree with him. The moment he heard (increase) and (five points) he was already high by them.
Seeing Allen's stern expression, he wondered what the difference was between a single one of them and seven?
Allen let Jake take his time to imagine what the seven spheres could do before continuing. "With seven of these or an entire batch. You can— wait no first, pull out your Status Card."
Pulling out his card Jake asked: "Why do I need this?" Grabbing his card, Allen pointed to his empty skill section.
"Wha—!?" Before he could even finish his words. Allen suddenly forced the spheres into his mouth and swallowed the entire batch.
"What the fuck!? Why did you do that for?" Jake roared out to Allen. Allen only glared at him and pointed at his Status Card.
Looking at his empty Status Card. An empty one should be, there were words written on it.
"Didn't I need to drop a saliva or blood first before this card works?" Jake muttered looking at his Status Card.