Thanks to the passing Gem Merchant, Mike was able to get a Jewelers Loop. It was an object that he had originally sought out, along with mechanical timers. There was a time he was considering the use of a magnifying glass and a pin hole camera but he couldn't even find a decent magnifying glass. Obtaining the looking glass turned out to be a stroke of fortune, with in his hands, he would get at least a 10x view.
Mike was down in the tunnel, looking over the large plant that was cresting the ceiling. In his downtime, he chose to examine the plants pistils and resin heads for answers to why it was blue. When he couldn't find anything abnormal on the plant itself, he dug out some dirt and sifted through it with the help of the Jewelers Loop. He was looking for anything out of the ordinary, but its what he didn't find that alarmed him the most.
In his search of the soil, he was unable to find any microbes or microscopic fungi. Even through a simple pinhole camera, a portion of them should have been visible. No, instead he found there was a lack of any sort of microbes in the soil. He was sure that he should have been able to find a few, however when he found none, his head spun. "Zero? This is just too weird."
Mike found a dead insect outside, it was being eaten by other bugs of the tunnel and even after inspecting it, there were still no trace of microscopic life.
Cara came up to Mike and asked what he was doing, he had been preoccupied during the break in class and was late to return. "What are you looking for exactly?"
Mike's default attitude was to answer any question unreserved, "Tiny Snake slaves, Microbes in the dirt. They take the nutrients and bring it to the plant, making growing so much easier when they are present. Usually when they aren't around it means there is something terribly wrong with the dirt."
After going outside he saw the garden, it was getting bigger than anyone could have intended, the addition of concentrated water made dramatic improvements to their growth rates. He could cut them down and store the excess for later use but there was also the new contract proposed with the Nyankin Village Chief. Their implied willingness to grow crops and raise the Dragoons could turn out to be the boon of industry that Lonestar City needs.
Mike decided to put the loop away and worry about it at a later time. There were an abundance of things that needed or required his personal attendance. A few of the girls were sent out to gather anything with seeds that could be grown and used; seeds, produce, herbs and any plant they could find were bought up.
The Day passed fast, then another and immediately after that, a week had flown by again. Mike's plants were nearing their final days before harvest, teaching the girls how to hang plants was only necessary as an exercise. Drying the plant was only useful for curing, if they wanted to keep fresh material a storage ring would suffice.
Standing around in the classroom, he wished that he had a physical representation to show them but he was forced into drawing on the wall again. "Okay Class. We were talking about how to harvest, I'm going to draw a couple plants up here. I want you to remember what I said before, then I want you to come up here and draw a line across where the plant should be cut up after harvesting, so that you can dry and cure the flowers."
Taking his time, he made stick figure plants with branches, nodes and tiny little buds all along the ends. When he had drawn several, the girls came up and each marked a line.
"Hmm." Mike looked their markings over, there were some areas that needed explaining but they were not getting it. Mike drew one of them upside down like it was hanging then drew arrows to where the stick would have been located on the plants stem. "Its really easy, you just need it to have a small elbow at the cut end to hang it with. Its also easy to tie them to a string but that means bouncing them around and tying them. Personally, I'd rather skip the extra work. If you make them into long J's, they turn into hangers without extra things."
If plant matter is left out, it generally accumulates dust, other pollens, even bugs or mildew. Mike knew this lesson all too well, some of his first plants had huge powdery mildew issues. It was a learning experience, until it wasn't. "The worst thing you can do is repeat a mistake and have it cost you again." He gave some advice and Mona's stomach started to growl. She had been walking through the City everyday with Seidei.
"Mona, if you're hungry just say something. If you make everyone else hungry all the time by proxy, it still cuts into the classes. Did you eat late again last night?" Mike had been paying attention, Mona knew it but didn't want to ruin his fun. Poocha had excellent hearing, even if her hearing didn't surpass Mike after the transformation.
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Having sent the girls out to gather as many seeds and plants as possible, Mike delivered them, along with about 700 lbs of meat. He made sure it was all seafood, if they were not cats or at least looked like cats, he wouldn't have made such an offer. Plowing their fields had only taken one day and by the end of the week, there were so many plants neatly planted in a row that the village would never be able to keep up with them all.
Mike had to figure additional manpower out and quickly.
The Nyankin were a Tribe, a small one at that. They lived on a Ranch and kept to themselves. He considered asking people at the docks but that would be a conflict of interest. Most of the people who actually came to Lonestar City were just passing through and enjoyed their stay.
Pretty much no one wanted to live in the region, the Sea Beasts were one problem but there were many more things to worry about than the things below the deep water.
Mike was thinking about things below the water, then thinking about things underneath things and his mind clicked into a single thought.
His sleeping stone subordinates. Very early in his adventure into Goger, he had unearthed Vella, beside her were more than ten similar sized rocks. He had put them into the back of his mind, forgetting about them until just then. Mike wondered how they would react given the time they'd been asleep. When he couldn't think of any other course, he flew to the back of the Casino.
Along the wall were 17 rocks, one had been reduced to powder by Vella's own hands. Mike took a deep breath, channeled his energy and placed his hand on the rock with his fingers spread out.
He fed it energy and the rock exploded.
A man stood there, naked.
Mike threw a sheet around the man's body and went to the next stone, repeating his actions. He was glad that they didn't fail to separate from the rock but they all stood there motionless while he was freeing the others. When all of the rocks had been reconstituted into his subordinates, Mike saw that of the seventeen present, only four were female.
"So many new subordinates, I wonder if any of them are like Vella." Mike had thrown table cloths over them all when he ran out of sheets. It looked like he had broken up an orgy if anyone were to have seen them, however, Mike was in the back of the Casino. No one even used that space to piss, he had no worries of voyeurs.
He did his best to communicate with them but they stood there like idiots for the first little bit.
Vella felt a disturbance out back, when she opened the back door of the Casino she saw them all. "You've finally chosen to revive them?" She noted aloud.
"Your idea from before about planting things other than cannabis, I found a place to grow them but there is a shortage of manpower. I was hoping that once these people wake up, they would be willing to work the fields and become farmers." Mike had his serious face on again.
Having seen them before, Vella was concerned. With the amount of time that had passed, they should have already been able to speak and respond to her in some way but they simply stood there like mindless dummies. "Something is wrong," her interest in their well being was a genuine one.
They were just like Vella was at one point, frozen and trapped in the rock.
Mike's head itched with the amount of strange that was coming his way. Things were doomed to happen, fated if you must. He had waded through troubles and kept his mind calm throughout all the misshapen times. Adding 17 more deadpan faces to feed to his overhead wouldn't kill the casino but it was a lot of work.
He wanted to snap them out of it.
Finally, Mike tried slapping them. Some of them began to blink more readily, he talked the whole time. Usually he was talking trash, something about them baking in the sun too long. Any egg left in the sun would begin to ferment after a while. There was a problem with this, if he treated them like eggs, then they should have been thrown out long ago and expired.
'I wonder what I should call them?' Vella had come with her own name already attached, Mike didn't know what to call these new stone people. He settled on something a bit juvenile but accurate.
"The Stoners." Mike tossed some fragments in his hand, they had writing all over them just like Vella's. When Mike put the fragments away there was a distinct change in all seventeen of the subordinates. They blinked and looked around like they had just been savagely confused and awoken to life.
Their eyes darted in all directions, some began to gesticulate and internally question what was going on turning their body parts in any direction that they could. They were going through a range of motion test but Mike doubted that any of them understood what it was they were doing by instinct. He kept talking and searching their features for changes.
Mike couldn't wait all day, he pointed to each of them and began giving them names to help himself organize and identify each of them more personally.
"Don, Ben, Alex, Jimi, Rick, James, Roy, Abe, Jack, Daniels, Jim, Rose, Tulip, Ivy, Indigo, Petal." Mike came up with names very fast and made his way down the line.
"Master, I don't think their names matter right now, they seem more like empty husks. Since I know what they are going through, would you like me to see what I can do?" Vella offered to help, it was good to see her volunteer. After half an hour, Mike went to find something to eat.
He came back to what can only be described as a miracle. The Stone'ers had regained some of their former knowledge like how to speak but none of them remembered who they were or what they were suppose to do. Mike's initial thoughts made him think that they had been baked too long under the sun? "Vella, exactly how much do they understand?"
As he patrolled around them, James responded with body language. He looked around with his eyes, suspiciously.
"You are like me, one of Master's Legion. As promised, you've been resurrected, reborn anew." Vella charmed them all one by one and told them how to act.
Even if it was something supernatural, he had to let it happen. Mike couldn't handle it if all seventeen of them turned out to be lemons.
"All of you, Master has a task he wants you to fulfill. You've only just awoken, its important to gather your mind and remember. Tonight, you will rest and acclimate. Tomorrow, you will go north and tend to the fields." Vella looked at all of them and went to ask what their names were.
"Don." Don responded with his name but it wasn't the answer Vella wanted.
"No, what's your real name?" Vella gave him a stern look.
Don repeated himself, "Don."
Vella sighed, "Its obviously too early, we can piece together the finer details in the morning."
The seventeen subordinates were not much for talking, when they followed Vella on foot from the backyard and into the Casino, they smelled food.
That was the moment when Vella immediately regretted her decision.