Farming in the Magical World

"Projection array?"

When Lanny heard Melissa mention the name, the first thing that came to mind was the high-tech product from science fiction movies, which people usually call "holographic projection".

Sure enough, as Melissa explained in detail, Lanny realized that this thing was indeed a holographic projection.

Of course, upon closer examination, there are some differences, and they are not entirely the same.

This projection array, like the mica conch shell, is a mother-child array that must appear in pairs.

However, unlike other projection arrays, this main array can connect to up to five sub-arrays, and the distance between them is much greater than that of the mica conch. She had heard that someone had directly contacted the capital of the Kingdom of Andrew from the Kingdom of Bauhinia.

She had never heard of any further distances, but even so, it was already incredibly impressive, covering almost half of the Saint Tor Continent.

Once activated, this formation can project the figures of both parties onto the other side of the formation in real time, forming an identical phantom image on the other side, hence it is called a projection formation.

Of course, this thing has many limitations; it can't be all advantages.

First of all, it's expensive. A complete set of mother-child arrays costs at least a thousand gold coins. It's almost impossible for a small noble family to afford such a high cost. Even if they gritted their teeth and spent that many gold coins to build it, they still couldn't afford the subsequent daily maintenance.

Therefore, these things are mostly found in royal families, military strongholds, religious sites, and other such places. Only these places are worth investing so much in building this formation.

Secondly, there are limitations in terms of usage.

Although the array can project images in real time at the other end, it cannot transmit sound, only visuals. Therefore, both parties need to write down what they want to say beforehand, and the text cannot be too small, otherwise it will be impossible to read.

To put it simply, the resolution is insufficient; small text becomes blurry.

In case of an emergency, you can certainly write on the spot, as long as you are quick.

Therefore, when this formation is activated, you will often see this scene: one side is lying on the table writing furiously, while the other side is craning their necks and looking on with longing eyes, and both sides maintain an eerie silence.

To outsiders, the scene looked like a poorly made pantomime.

Finally, this thing isn't something just anyone can activate. It actually has certain requirements for magic power supply; at least a level nine mage can barely activate it, but to achieve truly effective information exchange, it still requires a grand mage.

A level nine mage can only activate an array using their own stored magic power, as their total magic power is insufficient. Only archmages can manipulate external magical elements, using special methods to guide them and reduce their own burden.

Even so, the magic power consumed by this formation every moment is quite astonishing, so even a great mage cannot sustain it for long. Therefore, every second after the formation is activated is precious.

“I was fortunate enough to activate it once during the gathering of grand mages in the capital…” Melissa swallowed, her voice somewhat hoarse. “To be honest, the feeling of having your magic drained is not pleasant!”

Seemingly feeling thirsty after talking so much, she picked up Lanny's teacup and took a sip without hesitation.

The moment she took a sip of the tea, her expression changed. She raised the cup to examine it closely, a hint of surprise on her face. "Huh, this is bitter tea?"

It wasn't surprising that Lanni recognized the tea leaves; after all, she had spent quite a while in Black Mountain Village and couldn't have been unfamiliar with the villagers, so she would naturally recognize them.

Melissa, on the other hand, seemed somewhat surprised. "How did you get this?" It was something she had acquired by chance after escaping to Black Mountain Village years ago!

Unlike Andrew, Bauhinia is much wealthier and more luxurious, and its afternoon tea culture is much more popular.

They would grind various spices into powder, then mix them with goat milk, cow milk, and other ingredients to make a fragrant and thick soup.

Heishan Village certainly didn't have the means for her to live such a luxurious life, but she fondly remembered the days when she would bask in the winter sun, sipping fragrant afternoon tea, and chatting softly with her family.

However, Lanny seems to miss her former comfortable life and her longing for her long-gone family. Afternoon tea is just a concrete expression of that longing.

Later, for some reason, she discovered that the leaves of the low trees on the mountain smelled of a strange fragrance. On a whim, she created this strange bitter tea.

"So, you found this thing?" Lanny had always assumed that the thing was found by the local hunters, but she never expected it to be her.

Shrugging, Melissa said with a hint of disdain, "What do country bumpkins know about afternoon tea? Only an oddball like her would be crazy enough to think of boiling those bitter leaves in water."

After smacking her lips and taking a moment to savor it, she noticed the difference!

"You've improved it? Why does it taste different from bitter tea? It seems... it seems more fragrant and less bitter."

"Hehe, I made a slight improvement. After all, the original taste was too bitter. I was even thinking of selling this stuff to nobles, but it can't be this bitter!"

Lanny spoke of this with a hint of pride, and seeing the inquiry and appreciation in Melissa's eyes, he thought to himself, "You probably don't know what tea ceremony is, do you? If it weren't for the fact that I really don't know it, I would have given you a whole 'Phoenix Three Nods' routine!"

As Lanny explained the tea-making process in detail, from how to kill the green and control the temperature, Melissa's eyes lit up. She hadn't expected that such a simple bitter tea could have so many intricacies, which gave her a sense of familiarity.

What is luxury? It's when a simple task is performed with unparalleled complexity, and every action is explained in a specific way. That's luxury.

The afternoon tea culture of Bauhinia has developed over nearly a century and naturally has its own set of rules, such as the golden ratio of milk and spices, and the golden recipe.

Although Lanny's description of the bitter tea-frying process didn't seem particularly sophisticated, she was no naive person and could tell that it required skill in the details, which in turn tested the maker's abilities even more.

The more she listened, the more interested she became. In the end, she even grabbed Lenny's arm and prepared to drag him to do it himself.

Lenny, however, did not share her excitement. He simply patted her arm calmly, signaling her to calm down.

"No rush, no rush, there's plenty of time later, you'll eventually see it with your own eyes."

After thinking for a moment, Lanny asked again, "Are there many tea trees in the Black Mountain area?" He had heard Jimmy mention it before, and it was said that there were quite a few there. He had been thinking about going to see for himself sometime, and now that he had found the discoverer, he would naturally ask him.

Melissa nodded, indicating that there were indeed quite a few of these things; they were practically covering the entire mountainside.

It turns out that in the area of ​​Little Black Mountain, this kind of tree, which Lanni calls a tea tree, is very common.

Hunters used to call this thing the bitter dwarf tree because its leaves were so bitter. Who would be stupid enough to eat it?

They usually cut down these low-lying saplings in winter, take them home to dry, and use them as firewood.

"Oh?... ..." Hearing that they were burning tea trees as firewood, Lanny's heart ached. He was even more eager to go and see for himself, in case these guys had cut them all down.

Are you free tomorrow? Can you take me to see it?

"You seem to value this a lot?"

Melissa understood the pain in his expression, but she couldn't understand why. In her mind, would a nobleman like this? Wasn't he afraid of the bitterness?

She wouldn't have put herself through this if it weren't for certain reasons.

“Of course, this is a treasure.” Lanny paced excitedly around the room, his words sounding like he was explaining to her, but also like he was talking to himself. “If we could promote this tea to the whole continent, if we could get all the nobles to like drinking this stuff, wouldn’t that Black Mountain be even more like a gold mine?”

Seeing Lanny's unusually money-grubbing demeanor, Melissa didn't interrupt him. She just smiled and watched him walk around, thinking that Lanny seemed even cuter and more genuine in this state.

“When we have the money, we’ll hire a few great mages. There are so many great mages on the continent, surely someone can solve your curse problem. I refuse to believe that a Black Vine Seed can stump me.” As he said this, Lanny looked like he was gritting his teeth, as if he was determined to win this battle.

"At that time, we..."

Melissa, who had initially been looking at the little money-grubber with amusement, suddenly felt a sharp pang in her heart as Lanny spoke through gritted teeth, and a wave of sorrow welled up in her nose.

Feeling Lanny's concern again touched her deeply, something she hadn't expected.

Since her family was destroyed and she had been on the run, she had witnessed the coldness of human relationships and tasted all the hardships of life, and gradually became somewhat self-destructive.

She had thought that with her father's death and the decline of her family, no one would ever truly care about her again. But she never expected to feel such long-lost warmth from this nobleman who was much younger than her.

Although she had previously thought, somewhat resignedly, that as long as Lanny didn't drive her away, she would be willing to submit to him, she never considered becoming his official wife. It wasn't that she didn't want to, but rather that she never even considered it.

Even though she had made several bold moves in front of him in the past few days, some of which were playful teasing of a younger brother and some of her rebellious thoughts of giving up on herself, what she really felt was fear of the uncertainty of the future.

But at this moment, as the little man spoke through gritted teeth in a declaration-like manner, she suddenly felt a sense of peace and warmth.

She didn't even want to remind Lanny that the continent's archmages weren't as numerous as he thought, nor were they simply a matter of money. Each archmag was precious and rare, almost like a strategic weapon for a kingdom.

Unconsciously, she slowly lifted her face with her hands, and her peach blossom eyes became watery, following Lanny's figure from side to side without blinking.

She didn't notice anything unusual about herself; she just suddenly felt that the little guy had become even more handsome, and she could look at him endlessly without getting tired of him.

"what happened?"

Lanny, who was looking ahead, was startled by Melissa's gaze.

"Uh"

Awakened, Melissa realized that her actions were inappropriate; she was just like a young girl in the throes of puberty.

Her face instantly flushed crimson with shyness. She guiltily avoided Lanny's gaze and hurriedly ran towards the door, her movements almost like an escape. "Tomorrow, right? It's settled then. I'm going to get busy!"

What happened? Why did they just run away when they were talking?

Lanny was also completely baffled. He had no idea what the other person was thinking. After thinking for a long time, he still couldn't figure it out. He could only shake his head and sigh helplessly, "You can't guess what a girl is thinking!"

After sitting down and calming himself down, Lanny listened intently to the noise outside the window. It seemed that the commotion outside had subsided considerably. Was the conscription almost over?

Sure enough, Tim knocked on the door and came in shortly afterward. "Here, this is my revised castle defense manual. Would you like to take a look?"

Lanny took it and looked at it carefully. Sure enough, it was different from last time. Several points he had raised had been written in.

While Lanny was looking at what he was holding, Tim also spoke up about the adjustments to the guard.

"Didn't you say last time that you were going to adjust the roles of a few squads? This is what I was thinking..."

After completing the recruitment today, he followed Lanny's suggestion and reassigned the original three squad leaders. The squad leaders of the second and third squads, along with several promoted members, were transferred to the new squads, and they will serve as squad leaders of seven new squads.

Black Tiger was directly responsible for the training and security of the original three squads, while the squad leaders of squads 1-3 were promoted from among the original members.

However, his question was: what is Black Tiger's current position? Or, what should be the names of the three teams after they were separated?

After all, if the name is not correct, the words will not be proper, and he also hoped that Lenny could personally announce the new assignments and work arrangements, since Lenny is the true owner of this team.

After thinking for a moment, Lanny made a decision: "Uncle Tim, your position from now on will be the chief instructor of the security guard. Before, when there were fewer people, we felt there was no need to be particular about these things, but now that there are more people, we need to make it clear."

"I didn't mean it..." Tim was about to speak when Lanny interrupted him, "I know that's not what you meant, but we really need to clarify positions and responsibilities. How did it get to this point?"

“As for Black Tiger…” Lanny stroked his chin, pondering how to define this position.

My beard, which I shaved a few days ago, is starting to grow back. It feels slightly prickly to the touch, but also somewhat comfortable.

"In that case, the old three squads will be reorganized into the First Company, mainly responsible for the defense of the castle, with Black Tiger as the captain. As for the new seven squads, let's call them the Second Company. As for the captain, you can take on the role for now, we'll talk about it later."

"Once we have enough people, enough for three companies, we can form a brigade!"

Hearing Lanny's last sentence, Tim looked at him uncertainly. "That would be several hundred people, wouldn't it? With our current training methods, that's a considerable force. You wouldn't be thinking of... ..."

Lenny grinned, revealing a row of pearly white teeth. "How could that be!"

If he had the chance, why would he give it up?

With an earl watching him from behind, he felt constantly uneasy. If there was a chance, it wouldn't be out of the question to let the old man retire early!