Chapter 11
‘Horned Rabbit, huh.’
To talk about Horned Rabbits, I felt I needed to explain a bit about the situation in our territory.
As I ntioned once before, our Johnson Castle completely blocked off the southern entrance of a massive basin.
And at the northern entrance of the basin, a gateway had been built, and beyond that gateway stretched the Monster Mountains.
Even with just this much of an explanation, you could probably guess.
From the castle’s northern side to the gateway—
That this vast basin would be incredibly useful land.
And that was true.
Before the Great Cataclysm, nearly thirty thousand people lived in and around Johnson Castle, and this wide basin produced enough food to not only feed those thirty thousand but still leave a surplus.
In other words, before the Great Cataclysm, our Johnson Territory was a land that exported food.
At that ti, there weren’t even any monsters in the Monster Mountains, so this was an extrely safe region.
‘And then the Great Cataclysm struck.’
Not long after the Cataclysm, a massive Dinsional Rift opened deep within the Monster Mountains, and through it crawled forth terrifying monsters.
The Catastrophe-Class Monster ‘Fallen Yggdrasil.’
This plant-type monster, Fallen Yggdrasil, settled in the northern Monster Mountains and claid that area as its domain.
From then on, the situation of Johnson Territory began to deteriorate rapidly.
The basin north of Johnson Castle lay at the very edge of Fallen Yggdrasil’s domain.
The cursed trait of this monster’s territory was that plants underwent abnormal growth, and the northern basin was no exception.
Strange, unidentified plants crept down from the northern mountains, rooted themselves here, and began growing at a monstrous pace, ruining all farming.
These plants, believed to be of another world, were the mortal enemy of crops and far stronger than any ordinary plant.
No crop could withstand them long enough to yield a harvest.
Worse yet, these plants were incredibly tenacious.
No matter how many tis we dug them out, they grew back endlessly. Even if we set fire to the fields, it only worked temporarily.
Even when we uprooted them entirely, they soon returned to cover the basin again. Truly, we had no solution.
In the end, the only real way to get rid of them completely was to destroy Fallen Yggdrasil itself, since it was the source spreading its influence here.
‘As if that’s even possible.’
The size of a monster’s territory was proportional to its strength.
For Fallen Yggdrasil, which claid land the size of an entire country, being classified as Catastrophe-Class was inevitable.
Honestly, I couldn’t even imagine just how strong such a monster really was.
And yet, was I supposed to deal with it? Unless humanity increased its numbers tenfold, defeating a beyond-ranked monster like that was nothing but a hopeless fantasy.
‘What else can we do? We just have to adapt and survive.’
The people of Johnson Territory called these invasive plants “Evil Spirit Grass.”
The na ant “plants possessed by demons,” and just from that na alone, you could tell how much people hated them.
But we had no choice.
For Johnson Territory, the only options were to move the entire land, completely eradicate the Evil Spirit Grass, or find a way to coexist with it.
‘That’s exactly what Peter has been agonizing over.’
So far, the choice for the territory had been to sohow find a way to survive here.
The crop breeding Peter struggled with had the ultimate goal of developing plants that could grow even in soil where Evil Spirit Grass had taken root.
Relocating the whole territory wasn’t sothing that could be done rashly, so there was no other choice.
‘But breeding wasn’t the only thing we relied on.’
Though crop breeding was Johnson’s top priority, that wasn’t the only strategy.
There had been attempts to find other solutions as well.
And the first of those was the Horned Rabbit.
The plan was to raise Horned Rabbits to solve the food shortage.
\[Appearance almost identical to a rabbit, but about twice the size, with a small horn between its ears. A herbivorous beast widely inhabiting the Monster Mountains and the Forest of Illusions, believed to have crossed over from another world along with monsters.]
Unlike monsters, beasts thought to be from another world did not hold blind hostility toward humans.
Depending on the type, they could even be dosticated like livestock.
Especially the Horned Rabbit, which was particularly docile and perfect for food. Its flavor was so exceptional that, when it was first discovered, the people of the territory were overwheld with excitent.
Since it was omnivorous and could even feed on Evil Spirit Grass, people expected they could increase their livestock without much cost.
‘But it failed.’
The problem was that no matter how many pairs of males and females were captured and released, they never bred.
Even if it had horns, a rabbit was still a rabbit, and if rabbits were known for anything, it was their fertility. Yet these ones never reproduced—a ridiculous reality.
No matter how resourceful we were, we couldn’t force them to breed. In the end, hopes for Horned Rabbit farming had to be abandoned.
‘The disappointnt Iron’s father and the people of the territory felt back then… really….’
And yet now, to talk about raising Horned Rabbits again—it was absurd.
I was starting to wonder if this man even knew anything about Horned Rabbits.
“Ha, well then. Dr. Nickel, have you ever actually seen a Horned Rabbit?”
“Oh my, how could I have seen one? You can’t find them anywhere in the south.”
“Then you must not even know that Horned Rabbits don’t breed.”
“Ha, is that so? As I thought.”
When I explained that farming Horned Rabbits was impossible, this fellow actually looked pleased.
“Did you even understand what I just said properly? They don’t have young.”
“Right, right, I understand. And isn’t that exactly why I ca here? If it were as simple as capturing a few and letting them breed on their own, then why would there even be a need for a doctor of Otherworld Studies like ?”
‘What’s with this confidence?’
Could it be… this guy actually knew a way to make Horned Rabbits reproduce?
‘No, calm down.’
I forced my heart, which had started to pound with excitent, to stay steady.
Nothing had been confird yet.
“So, are you saying you know the reason Horned Rabbits don’t breed?”
“That’s right. Until now, I wasn’t completely sure either. But after trying all sorts of experints here and seeing them fail, I’ve actually beco convinced of my theory.”
“Fine. Good. Let’s hear it then. Tell your theory.”
Dr. Nickel hesitated for a mont, then spoke.
“In that case, I want a promise from you. If you think my theory is valid, then you’ll allow to raise Horned Rabbits here, and from now on, Johnson Territory will fully support all of my other research as well.”
“If Horned Rabbits can actually be bred, then there’s no reason I wouldn’t agree to that.”
The forr lord, Iron’s father, had put a great deal of effort into raising Horned Rabbits and carried out many experints.
He had even brought soil from the Monster Mountains, where the rabbits were captured, and spread it in the pens, in case the environnt was the issue. And since their breeding cycle might have been far longer than expected, he once even spent an entire year just quietly observing them.
‘But every attempt ended in failure, and in the end, he gave up on breeding Horned Rabbits.’
I didn’t know what Nickel’s theory was, but chances were high it was sothing we had already tried.
So, I wasn’t particularly hopeful—but seeing how confident he was, I decided I might as well hear him out.
“Go on then. Tell about this thod of yours.”
When I gave my word, Dr. Nickel wasted no ti sharing his thoughts.
He seed completely convinced that I would keep my promise once I’d heard him out.
‘For soone who looks like that, he’s unexpectedly bold.’
For a mont, Nickel—who had seed nothing more than a fraud—looked a little different to .
But that impression didn’t last long.
“To make Horned Rabbits breed, you need their droppings. They only give birth near places where their own droppings are present.”
“Droppings? You an… rabbit poop?”
“Yes, I’m certain. For Horned Rabbits, droppings are like a symbol that the place is safe.”
He was speaking so confidently about the absurd idea that Horned Rabbits required their own droppings in order to breed.
‘Is this seriously true?’
Could I really trust this guy with such matters?
It was so ridiculous I didn’t even know where to begin arguing against it.
“So, Dr. Nickel.”
Though I was montarily flustered, I regained as much composure as I could and pointed out the flaws in his reasoning.
After all, his theory contained so fatal errors.
Truthfully, the disappointnt ca because the Diary had raised my expectations too much. Being ignorant wasn’t exactly a cri.
So if he listened and admitted his mistake, I intended to let him go without scolding him too harshly.
“You’re saying the reason the Horned Rabbits we raised didn’t breed was because there weren’t any droppings nearby?”
“That’s right.”
“Do you know how many years we kept those Horned Rabbits in the pen? Three years. Doesn’t that tell you sothing?”
“Should it?”
“Ha… tell , what creature goes three years without defecating? Any living being that eats, naturally excretes. In three years, wouldn’t they have left behind at least one pile of dung?”
The ti Johnson Territory had spent attempting to raise Horned Rabbits was three years in total.
And it was only natural that a living creature, once it ate, would excrete.
Which ant that if the Horned Rabbits ate Evil Spirit Grass, then they must have defecated sothing as well.
If they hadn’t eaten, they wouldn’t have survived in the pen for three whole years.
‘We never bothered to search their burrows to collect droppings, but after three years, they should have produced more than enough themselves. The theory that they didn’t breed because there weren’t any droppings is nothing more than a flawed hypothesis.’
“My lord, I believe you are mistaken.”
“I’m the one mistaken?”
But even though I had just pointed out sothing so blatantly obvious, Dr. Nickel’s attitude didn’t change in the slightest.
“That’s correct. You are viewing Horned Rabbits as ordinary animals. But they are not creatures of this world. They are beings from another realm. You must cast aside the prejudice that every living being must excrete simply because it eats.”
“So what you’re saying is that Horned Rabbits spent three years eating but never defecated?”
“Then let ask you this, my lord. Have you ever actually seen a Horned Rabbit’s droppings with your own eyes?”
“That is…”
Truthfully, no.
Even after combing through Iron’s mories, I couldn’t recall ever seeing rabbit-like droppings near the pens.
It had been so long ago that I couldn’t say for certain, but I had no clear mory of them at all.
Still, that didn’t prove Horned Rabbits never defecated.
For all I knew, they could have buried their droppings underground.
To claim that they only defecated in places where droppings already existed—what kind of creature worked like that?
Not even an otherworldly one, surely.
“Well, fine. Let’s say that’s true. Let’s assu Horned Rabbits only defecate and breed in places where droppings already exist. If that’s the case, then how do they move or expand their territory?”
“Why, of course they would carry their existing droppings with them—just like humans bring their belongings when they move house.”
What kind of nonsense was this?
Was he being serious?
I was starting to feel dizzy.
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