The turned earth, dark and rich with promise, was a daily consolation. The Lin family would stand at the edge of their labor each evening, surveying the ever-growing patch of prepared soil. It was a physical map of their effort, a quiet rebuttal to the village's lingering doubts. The pullets, thriving in their whitewashed coop, rewarded them with a steady, if modest, stream of eggs. The Debt Bowl clinked with a reassuring, if slow, regularity. Forty-four coppers now.
Spring deepened. The willows by the stream erupted in a haze of tender green. Wildflowers dotted the meadows. The air lost its knife's edge, carrying instead the scent of damp soil and growing things. In the Lin household, the rhythm was one of guarded optimism, a careful dance between tending their existing gains and pushing the frontier of their reclaimed land.
Lin Yan spent an afternoon with Lin Qiang, using the tinker's wire to craft a series of more sophisticated, trigger-sensitive snares. They placed them in a wider perimeter. The goal was no longer just the fox, but rabbits for meat and fur, and any other small game that could supplement their diet or be traded. The system's 'Basic Tanning' knowledge lay ready.
One morning, Lin Xiaoshan came sprinting back from the morning trap check, his face alight. "Second Brother! We got one! A big one!"
In his hands, held carefully by the hind legs, was a fat, brown hare. The snare had done its work cleanly. It was their first sizeable game.
The hare became a minor festival. Wang Shi, with skills born of a lifetime of making do, skinned and butchered it with efficient grace. The pelt was stretched on a frame to dry—their first potential trade good beyond eggs and reed work. The meat, a luxury they hadn't tasted in months, was stewed with wild onions and the last of their stored turnips. That night, the hut was filled with a rich, savory smell that made their mouths water. They ate slowly, savoring every mouthful, the simple stew tasting like a king's feast. The shared protein was a tangible boost, a fuel for their weary muscles.
The success with the hare felt like another corner turned. They were not just crop farmers or poultry keepers; they were providers from the wild as well. A diversified survival strategy.
Two days later, Lin Yan decided it was time. The prepared soil was warming under the spring sun. They couldn't plant their main grain yet—they needed every scrap of barley for feed and their own emergency store—but they could plant the rest of the Enhanced Foraging Seed Mix as a cover crop. It would protect the soil, fix nitrogen, and provide massive amounts of green fodder for the pullets and, he dared to hope, for any future livestock.
The family gathered for the planting. It was a simple, almost sacred ceremony. Lin Yan scattered the tiny seeds by hand across the dark earth, walking carefully in the furrows Lin Qiang had made with a hoe. Xiaoshan followed, lightly raking the soil to cover them. Wang Shi and the women brought water, sprinkling the seeded rows to settle them.
"Grow well," Lin Dashan murmured, echoing some long-forgotten blessing of his own father. "Grow strong."
The work done, they stood in silence, looking at the seeded plot. Hope was a physical thing, buried just beneath the surface.
That night, lulled by full bellies and the satisfaction of progress, they slept deeply. The world outside was peaceful, the only sounds the whisper of the wind and the distant chorus of frogs from the marsh.
The theft was discovered at dawn.
Lin Yan was the first to the coop, as always. He opened the door, expecting the usual frantic greeting. Instead, he was met with an eerie quiet. The pullets were huddled on their highest perch, not cheeping, but making low, distressed clucks. His eyes went immediately to the nesting boxes.
They were empty.
All of them. The straw was disturbed, but the five eggs laid the previous day—a near-record haul—were gone. The small basket they used to collect them, which he'd left just inside the coop door for the morning, was gone too.
A cold, hollow feeling opened in his gut. He checked the latch. It was unfastened, but not broken. The wire reinforcement had held; the mechanism itself was intact. It hadn't been forced.
It had been opened.
He stood frozen for a long moment, the violation washing over him. Someone had come onto their land, into their enclosure, and stolen the fruits of their most precious labor. The eggs represented not just food or coin, but their discipline, their care, their hope.
"Father! Gang!" His shout was raw, ripping through the morning calm.
The family tumbled out, their faces shifting from sleepiness to alarm to grim understanding as they saw the empty boxes, his expression.
"A weasel? A raccoon?" Lin Qiang asked, already inspecting the coop's perimeter.
"No," Lin Yan said, his voice flat. "The latch is unhooked. Not broken. And the basket is gone. No animal takes a basket."
The implication hung in the air, more chilling than any predator. Human theft. From within the village.
Lin Dashan's face turned to stone. He walked to the gate, examined the simple loop of rope that held it shut from the inside. It was loose, as if slipped free. "They came over the fence," he said. "Or through the gate when we forgot to loop it tight."
A sickening sense of vulnerability descended. Their fence kept out foxes, but it was no barrier to a determined person. Their lock was a child's puzzle. Their trust, naïve.
Wang Shi sank onto a stool, her hands shaking. "Who? Who would do this? We have so little…"
"Someone who knows the value of five eggs," Lin Qiang said, his voice tight with anger. "Someone who saw our basket at Auntie Sun's or heard the clink in our Debt Bowl."
Suspicion was a poison. It made them look at their neighbors differently. Was it the shiftless son of the Zhao family, known for petty thievery? A desperate mother from the even poorer huts on the marsh edge? One of Village Head Li's men, testing them, or extracting an informal "tax"?
There was no evidence. No footprint in the soft earth distinct from their own. No torn cloth on the fence. Nothing.
The loss was more than nutritional or financial. It was a blow to their spirit. The morning routine felt hollow. The pullets, sensing the tension, remained skittish.
Lin Yan forced himself to move, to act. Inactivity would let the despair take root. "We need a better lock. A bar that slides across the gate from the inside, that can't be reached from outside. And a bell. Or something that makes noise if the gate is moved."
Lin Qiang nodded, his clever mind already working. "I can make a bar. And we can hang old metal scraps from the gate with twine. It will clatter if it's opened."
"Do it," Lin Dashan said, his voice grim. "Today."
While Lin Qiang worked on the gate's security, Lin Yan took a walk around their perimeter, his eyes seeing it not as a boundary, but as a challenge to a thief. The woven vines were climbable. They needed a deterrent. Thorns. They needed to plant a living barrier. Hardy, thorny shrubs. Blackthorn, maybe, or wild roses. It would take years to grow. But they had to start.
The theft also forced a strategic reckoning. Eggs were a high-value, low-bulk product. Perfect for theft. They needed to diversify their assets into things harder to steal. Larger livestock. Or stored grain. But grain required harvest, which required more land, which required more labor or an ox.
The ox. Old Chen's promise felt more urgent than ever.
That afternoon, Lin Yan went to see Old Man Chen. He found the old man sunning himself outside his hut, his recovering ox grazing contentedly in a small paddock nearby.
"Grandfather Chen," Lin Yan greeted, offering a small reed basket containing two of their remaining eggs (hidden under some leaves) and one of Wang Shi's best sitting mats.
Old Chen's eyes, milky but sharp, took him in. "Heard you had some night-time visitors," he grunted, not one for pleasantries.
News traveled fast. "We did. It's… clarified our priorities."
"Hmph. A man's wealth should be in things that can fight back, or are too heavy to carry." He patted the side of his hut. "Or in the earth itself."
"The earth is our goal," Lin Yan agreed. "Which is why I've come about the ox. The debt payment deadline approaches. We have broken ground, but to plant enough to make a difference, we need to turn more, faster. We would be grateful for his strength, as soon as he is fully fit."
Old Chen studied him, then looked at his ox. "He's fit enough for light work. Tomorrow. Bring him at dawn, return him at dusk. You provide the yoke and the man to guide him. And the basket of eggs… when you have them."
"You have our thanks. We will be ready."
It was a victory, but a somber one, purchased with the sting of theft.
The next morning, Lin Gang and Lin Dashan went to fetch the ox. Lin Yan and the others prepared the field. They had no proper plough, but Lin Gang had fashioned a heavy, forked drag from a sturdy tree limb—a ripper that could be pulled behind the ox to tear through the unbroken sod.
The arrival of the ox in the Lin family's field was an event. The great brindled beast, docile now, plodded into the enclosure. Lin Gang, with a natural, calm authority, fitted the simple yoke. Under his guidance, the ox leaned into its harness. The forked point bit into the earth. Where the digging stick had labored for hours to pry up a single wedge, the ox, with a steady, powerful pull, tore a continuous, ragged furrow through the matted grass roots.
The difference was not incremental; it was transformative. The sound was a deep, satisfying rrrrrip. The smell was of freshly exposed, damp earth. They worked in a new rhythm: Lin Gang guiding the ox, Lin Qiang and Lin Yan walking alongside, using hoes to break the turned sod into smaller clods, Xiaoshan and Wang Shi following behind, raking and spreading manure.
By midday, they had done more than the previous two weeks of hand labor. The sun was warm on their backs, the work hard but imbued with a new kind of hope—the hope of mechanization, of leverage.
During a water break, as the ox drank deeply from a bucket, Er Niu arrived, his face uncharacteristically serious. He pulled Lin Yan aside. "Yan-ge. I heard about the eggs. I think I know who might have done it."
Lin Yan's pulse quickened. "Who?"
"Young Zhao. Lazybones Zhao. He was bragging at the stream yesterday about having eggs for breakfast when everyone knows his family's hens stopped laying last autumn. Said he 'found' them." Er Niu's face was tight with anger. "He's always been a sneak, but this…"
Lazybones Zhao. The suspicion solidified into a cold, hard certainty. "Is there proof?"
"No proof. Just his big mouth. But I believe it."
Proof or not, it gave the thief a face. It was both better and worse. Better than a random, faceless malice. Worse because it was a neighbor, someone they would see every day.
"Thank you, Er Niu. Keep this to yourself for now."
"What will you do?"
Lin Yan looked at the ox, at the newly turned earth, at his family working. "We will secure our gate. We will plant thorns. And we will make sure that anything we have of value becomes harder to steal than it's worth." He met Er Niu's gaze. "And we will remember."
They worked the ox until dusk, as agreed. A full third of the remaining field was now broken and amended. Exhausted but exultant, they returned the ox to Old Chen. True to their word, they gave him a basket containing three eggs—every one they had that day.
"The land feels different," Old Chen remarked as they handed over the ox. "It breathes." He took the eggs, nodded. "You keep turning it. You keep putting life back in. It remembers."
Walking home in the twilight, their bodies aching in new ways, the family was quiet, but the silence was of shared accomplishment, not despair. They had faced a theft, a violation, and had responded not with helpless anger, but by doubling down on their most fundamental task: mastering the land.
That night, after the new, stout wooden bar was slid across the gate and a collection of rusted metal scraps was hung to clatter at the slightest movement, Lin Yan lay awake. The system interface glowed. No new quests. But he felt a shift. The theft had been a brutal lesson in scale. Chickens and a small plot were vulnerable. They needed to think bigger.
As if in response to his thoughts, a new notification appeared, not for a quest, but a market alert.
[System Advisory: Local Resource Opportunity Detected.]
[Commodity: Weaner Pigs (2).]
[Location: Teng Household, Western Willow Creek.]
[Context: Old Teng's sow farrowed late winter. Piglets are healthy but he lacks feed to raise them all. Seeks immediate trade. Preferred Barter: Grain or service, not coin.]
[Risk: Pigs require significant feed, secure enclosure, and management. High reward potential (meat, lard, manure).]
Pigs. The ultimate converters of waste and forage into rich meat and unparalleled fertilizer. Their manure was legendary. But they were escape artists, rooters, and hungry. They needed a strong pen, and more food than they had.
Yet, the opportunity was glaring. Old Teng was desperate. They had a small store of barley they could spare… maybe. And they had the beginnings of green forage. And they had a family desperate to build something thieves couldn't carry off in a basket.
It was a huge risk. But so was everything.
The next morning, he called a family council and laid out the opportunity. The reaction was polarized.
"Pigs?" Lin Qiang's eyes lit with calculation. "The manure alone… it's black gold. And smoked ham… bacon…"
"They eat more than all of us combined!" Wang Shi protested, her practical mind seeing the drain on their precious stores. "And they'll root up our field if they get loose!"
"We would build a strong stone and log pen, away from the field," Lin Yan argued. "In the wooded corner. We feed them on kitchen scraps, forage, the weeds from the field, acorns when they fall, and a little grain to supplement. They turn waste into meat. And their value is in their weight. No one steals a squealing, hundred-pound pig in the night."
The last argument resonated deeply after the egg theft.
Lin Dashan, who had been silent, rubbed his chin. "Old Teng is a hard man, but fair. If he's offering, his need is real. What do we have to trade?"
"We have maybe half a sack of barley we could spare," Lin Yan said. "And we have labor. We could offer to help him repair his own pigsty roof, or clear a field. And…" he looked at the drying hare pelt. "We have this."
It was a gamble, trading stored food for another mouth to feed. But it was a strategic gamble.
After a long, tense discussion, they decided to pursue it. Lin Yan and Lin Gang went to see Old Teng, bringing the hare pelt and an offer: a quarter-sack of barley, the hare pelt, and two days of Lin Gang's labor on his stone fence, in exchange for the two best weaner piglets.
Old Teng, a grizzled, taciturn man who lived on the village's western fringe, eyed them and their offer. His pigsty was indeed crowded with eight squealing piglets. His own grain stores looked low.
"Barley's good," he grunted. "Hare pelt is small. Your brother's labor is worth something. But two piglets…" He spat. "Make it the half-sack, the pelt, three days labor, and… five of those eggs people are talking about, over the next week."
It was a steep price. The half-sack was a significant chunk of their security. But they had the turned earth, the cover crop growing. They had to believe in future yield.
Lin Yan bargained him down to a third of a sack, the pelt, three days of labor, and three eggs. Old Teng finally agreed, his eyes glinting with a mix of relief and shrewd satisfaction.
Three days later, the Lin family's holdings expanded dramatically. In a sturdy crate carried between Lin Gang and Lin Qiang came two spotted, pink-and-black weaner pigs, each about the size of a small dog, with bright, intelligent eyes and curious snouts. They squealed indignantly at their relocation.
Their new pen, built in a shaded, previously unused corner of their wooded plot, was a fortress of lashed logs and stones sunk into the earth. It had a simple shelter filled with dry leaves. It was, for now, secure.
As they lowered the pigs into their new home, the animals immediately began sniffing, rooting at the dirt, investigating their surroundings. Their noisy, vital presence changed the very atmosphere of the Lin homestead. This was no longer just a chicken farm. It was a mixed holding.
The Debt Bowl was emptier, their grain store diminished. But as Lin Yan watched the two pigs shove each other playfully, then settle down to munch on a pile of chopped dandelion greens and kitchen scraps, he felt a surge of fierce possession. Let thieves come for eggs. These were assets that grew daily, that anchored them to the land, that promised a future of full bellies and fertile soil.
The theft had been a wound. The pigs were a scar, and a promise: they were here to stay, and they were building something too substantial to be stolen in the dark.
[System Milestone Achieved: 'Agricultural Diversification (Stage 1).' Poultry and Swine integration initiated.]
[Reward: 'Basic Swine Husbandry' knowledge unlocked. 30 System Points.]
[New Quest: 'The Cycle Deepens.' Successfully raise both weaner pigs to slaughter weight (approx. 6 months). Reward: 'Smokehouse Blueprint,' 50 Points.]
[Points Total: 105/100. Tier 1 Shop remains open. 195 points to next Tier unlock.]
Knowledge of pig care—feeding regimens, signs of illness, pen management—settled into Lin Yan's mind. The points were welcome. The new quest was long-term, daunting, but clear.
He looked from the bustling pigs to the contentedly clucking pullets in their whitewashed coop, to the dark, seeded earth of their field. The wound of the theft was still there, a dull ache. But it was being overshadowed by the squealing, rooting, growing reality of their expanding world.
Spring was a time for planting. They had planted seeds, and now they had planted the future itself, in the form of two spotted, hungry, magnificent pigs.
[System Note: Setback transformed into expansion impetus. Asset diversification increases resilience. Host is learning to think in terms of integrated systems, not isolated ventures. The foundation grows more complex and robust.]