Chapter 48: Dimensional Farmer

I turned the apple in my hand this way and that.

It looked like an ordinary apple.

But it was different.

“So this is what the Dimensional Farmer grew.”

Plants personally cultivated by the Dimensional Farmer are not restricted by dimensional travel.

The moment I confirmed that fact, I deployed the Dimensional Farmer to the orchard dimension.

And the result…

“The efficiency is insane.”

I set the apple down and looked around the house.

I had slept exactly six hours.

In those six hours, the entire house had become filled with apples.

“Roughly a little over one year has passed over there, right?”

This much is the harvest of one year.”

Since one day here equals five years there,

this amount meant I could get five times more.

“If I had known it would be this much, I wouldn’t have told them to offer everything as tribute.”

Looking at the mountain of apples, I slightly regretted the order I gave last night.

Very slightly.

“Anyway, everything the Dimensional Farmer grows should be offered to me.”

Normal tributes only give me 1% of the total.

But the Dimensional Farmer’s produce?

100%, completely, comes straight into my hands.

“If I don’t take it, the loss would be enormous.”

Even if I leave some for that dimension, the right thing is to take as much as possible for myself.

After just one confirmation step.

I looked again at the apple in my hand.

“System.”

[Is there anything you need?]

“You said a blessing is applied, right? To things personally grown by the Dimensional Farmer!”

[Correct.]

Until now, all the magical things I’d seen had only happened on the other side of the dimension.

Calling down lightning, killing someone with disease, creating lakes.

I had watched them all from one step away.

But now a fragment of that magic was literally in my hand.

“Can you tell what kind of blessing it is?”

[The blessing granted is the one the Dimensional Farmer earnestly wished for while cultivating the plant.]

“What exactly is that?”

[It cannot be confirmed.]

“Ugh.”

Even though the fragment was in my hand, I was a little scared.

I had no idea how this blessing would affect me.

Still, I can’t just keep worrying forever.

“Dimensional Farmer, I trust you.”

Please let it be a good blessing, not some curse-like blessing.

Crunch.

I took a big bite of the apple.

Immediately, the sweet taste of the apple spread throughout my entire mouth.

They said the quality improves—this was on a whole different level from the apples I ate from the orchard dimension before.

“It’s practically like biting into honey.”

Is this what eating a lump of honey feels like?

The apple fragrance was also rich; the more I chewed, the more enjoyable it became.

An apple that makes the eater this happy—its commercial value alone is already more than enough.

“But where’s the blessing?”

I finished one apple in no time, but I didn’t feel anything I could call a blessing.

If it weren’t for the system, I might have suspected I’d been scammed.

I ate two more just in case, but it was the same.

“I really don’t feel anything.”

In times like this, you need more samples.

I grinned at the heaps of apples filling the living room.

“The office is going to smell like apples all day today.”

***

I brought boxes of apples to the company and let the employees eat freely.

As expected, everyone raved about the taste.

“Is there no more?”

“Nope, all gone.”

“Next time bring a lot more. Two per person is too little. So sad.”

Yuha grumbled, but I took it as praise.

After confirming every employee had eaten an apple, I started today’s work.

The work never seemed to decrease, no matter how much I did.

“Why did Kangseong Foods start so many money-losing businesses?”

“They look like vanity projects.”

“I guess I’ll have to order them all cut. How many are in the red? And what’s this? Juice Idol? That should be under entertainment, why is it here?”

“Because it’s juice?”

“Idiots.”

Just how badly did that Han Kyungsook woman manage things? 

Money was leaking from everywhere.

And when I dug deeper, there were more than a couple of projects clearly started to siphon company funds.

“Send all of this to legal and slap them with embezzlement charges.”

“Is that really okay? The stock is already in free fall; everyone inside will probably want to handle it internally.”

“We have to set an example. So they know I won’t let the same thing slide. Oh, has the working-hours adjustment been checked?”

“We’re still checking. It takes time to grasp all the tasks.”

I spent almost the entire workday just fixing the creaking parts and cleaning up Kangseong Foods’ internal mess.

“No leaving on time again today.”

“Nothing we can do. Now it’s our job.”

I stared at the mountain of files piled on the computer.

The business-planning department was still passionately churning out new proposals.

If Yuha hadn’t filtered them several times… I don’t even want to imagine.

Where does that passion come from?

“It’s all money, money. They do it because you pay them, right?”

“That’s true too.”

It’s the incentive I set up, but the effect is almost too strong.

“I’ll have to tell them to self-screen and submit only the best ones next time.”

“That makes sense. But President…”

“Yes?”

“You look a lot less tired today?”

“…Do I?”

Now that she mentioned it, my body did feel lighter today.

The past few days I’d always felt overwhelmed by the sheer amount of work.

But today that feeling was gone.

I actually had some margin.

There shouldn’t be any other reason…

Other… oh.

“Yuha, before everyone leaves, casually ask how they’re feeling physically.”

“Physically?”

“Yeah. Just lightly ask.”

“Got it.”

Yuha immediately went around checking on the employees’ conditions as I asked.

It didn’t take long, yet to me it felt quite long.

If my guess is correct…

“President.”

“Yeah, how was it?”

“Everyone says they feel great. No one is tired. They said it feels like they got a full rest.”

“…I see.”

A small smile crept onto my lips.

Our office staff has kept growing and is now close to eighty people.

Not a single one of them is tired?

After working a full day?

Even if the VP asked, it’s unlikely everyone would give the exact same answer.

The only hypothesis I can draw from this is:

So this is the power of the blessing.

The blessing reduces fatigue.

And it relieves accumulated fatigue.

It’s not an effect you can see with the naked eye, but the influence is definite.

If I can keep securing these apples—no, wait. These apples…!

I immediately printed one of the stacked business proposals.

“What are you printing?”

“Sit down. Review this one first.”

I handed Yuha the freshly printed proposal from the printer.

We sat face-to-face and went through it meticulously.

We had skimmed most of the piled proposals at least once before.

We just hadn’t reviewed them properly.

After several rounds of marking with a red pen, I asked Yuha,

“What do you think?”

“It looks decent… but a lot of companies entered this market and failed, right? The ones that remain have slightly changed direction.”

The proposal I picked was none other than a new beverage franchise, a fresh-fruit-juice specialty chain.

“Do you know how the existing chains failed?”

“I do. They started with real fruit but switched to frozen fruit because of cost, quality dropped, and they spent too much on aggressive marketing and securing locations.”

“R&D was neglected.”

When product development lags and the fundamentals weaken, it shows immediately.

But what if the fundamentals are rock-solid?

What if that itself becomes the merit?

“We already have franchise operation experience through <Neighborhood Bakery>. And we can keep supplying fruit of this quality.”

“We have beverage-making experience too. <Neighborhood Bakery> collaborated with several famous cafés.”

“We have a distribution network. We can use the convenience-store business that Kangseong Foods is running.”

Kangseong Foods had already laid the groundwork for transportation and distribution for their sub-brand Kang Mart 24.

We just have to use it.

And here I added one more hypothesis.

If we juice the fruit grown by the Dimensional Farmer and the effect still remains?

We could even mix it with other fruits.

The blessing might be diluted, but if every drink carries even a weak blessing, it’s still profit.

Customers won’t be able to forget our taste and will come back.

That is a powerful fundamental that no one else has.

We have the resources, the technology, and the infrastructure.

And almost all the competitors have already dropped out of the market?

This is the perfect business to launch right now.

“Who submitted this proposal?”

“Uh… Assistant Manager Sung Jihoon.”

“Contact him immediately. Tell him the proposal is adopted and to start preparing the project tomorrow.”

The rule is not to contact people about work after hours, but good news has to be delivered fast.

That way he can pop open a nice bottle and celebrate tonight.

“Ah, also contact everyone who helped build the proposal. They’ll get incentives too.”

“Got it.”

“And give every member of the business-planning department an extra paid day off. Even if there’s no monetary incentive, they deserve at least a participation prize for this effort.”

They were just doing their jobs as employees.

Still, if I acknowledge their contribution even a little, they’ll work even harder next time.

Praise makes even whales dance, and rewards make even bears perform tricks, right?

Or not.

“By the way, President, if we go ahead with this, what about staffing? Are we hiring again?”

“Hmm…”

I could almost hear the sound of money flying away.

But wait—there’s a better way.

“Let’s pull people from Kangseong Foods.”

Whether dispatched or collaborative.

We can just bring over the surplus staff there.

After all, we’re pruning a lot of unprofitable projects at Kangseong Foods, so quite a few people will be idle.

We can reorganize them into a new business division and have them handle this franchise.

“Somehow this project feels like everything is already prepared.”

“Right? There were times when we had to start from absolute zero.”

The more cards I can use,

the faster Ribbon Corporation grows.

And the closer I get to my goal.

“Phew, I can finally escape this mountain of proposals. Time to go home.”

“Ah, Yuha.”

“Yes?”

“There’s something important we need to discuss before you leave.”

“What now? Did you cause another incident?”

“It’s not an incident.”

As if I only cause incidents.

I sat Yuha down and gave her the gist of my conversation with Han Yeri.

I glossed over the “revenge” part and framed it as Han Yeri wanting to stand on the same side as us and offering the hotel and department store.

“What do you think?”

“It’s good… but the schedule will be brutal. Will our funds hold? Absorbing all of Kangseong Foods’ shares and converting them will cost hundreds—no, thousands of billions.”

Thinking about it made my head spin.

But.

“If we just get past that hurdle?”

“If we can get past that…”

Yuha answered as if asking why I was even asking.

“Of course we take her.”

“Right. That’s the right answer.”

With Yuha’s answer, I reached my conclusion too.

I’ll have to contact Han Yeri separately.

We’re going to board the same ship.

The ship that aims to crush Kangseong Group.