Gran Voyage Type: Level 1 Turf
Gran Voyage Name: Harvesting Arrangements Part 3
Gran Voyage Location: Sabaody
Level: 1
Gran Voyage Description:

Continued from:

• Harvesting Arrangements Part 1
  
• Harvesting Arrangements Part 2
  

After managing to figure out a technique via the which they can bait the monsters away and successfully harvest sap, Sofia will try to figure out a way to establish a more permanent camp within the Forgotten Jungle, so that she can better and more reliably do the harvesting business.

What she's going to do is try to clear out an area from any monsters, or find a place with none, to then try to seal if off. How she does the latter will depend on the circumstances, though. Maybe she tries to make a barricade around a place and set up a small fort, or she tries to set up an adjacent bubble somehow.

NPCing: None.

Registration thread: https://strawhats.rpg-board.net/t1884-harvesting-arrangements-part-3

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Sofia had set up a small bubble-sap farming business over at the edge of the Forgotten Jungle, but she wanted to take it a bit further. If she could secure a spot in the Forgotten Jungle temporarily with her technique, what if she tried to do so permanently?

That was what she was thinking about as she stared into the depths of the jungle as she stood a safe distance away from it, from another bubble. She held her chin. The issue was, how would she be able to secure an area in the forest?


A barricade perhaps? Probably not. Given how she has been attacked the first time - the dinosaur falling from a branch up high - they could just do the same thing and fall down on top of them. And to make a wall that could block off an entire section of the bubble would take way too much wood and work - it had to be so tall in order to do that.


So, she had to figure out another way.

Then, she snapped a finger as she got an idea.

Maybe she shouldn’t try to fight them off directly, with something like a wall. Maybe she could just try to get out of their senses instead - if they didn’t know that she was there, they couldn’t attack her. So, the idea would be to make some kind of hideout, and from there, try to harvest.

She then got a bit closed to the bubble’s edge and started to look more closely at the trees. Perhaps she could make some kind of shelter at the roots, either an addition to them which is camouflaged somehow, like a room that is made to look like a root; or she could make use of a natural and pre-existing structure on the tree to make the shelter. Maybe something like a convenient root structure.

The issue with that would be to scout the location, though, because in either case, she would have to find a place where setting something like that would work. And that would mean to get inside the jungle again.

Sofia looked upwards. Would she hire someone else to do it? She had already been betrayed before when it came to business ideas like this, by Mr. Mint none the less, the doctor of the Sabaody Marine Station. Would it be wise to trust someone else again for this, or could she just do it on her own this time? Or maybe just go with Anna.

The girl rubbed her chin with a hand as she thought about it.

She could go in there on her own, she thought. Even if she knew it was dangerous, she had survived it a few times now, which gave her confidence. And like that, she avoided any possible betrayal situations that might occur. Then, she nodded to herself. Yes, she would do that, she thought.


The next day, she bought a ghillie suit for herself from the pirate-controlled area of Sabaody, before making her way into the Forgotten Jungle through the usual gate. As she stood in the entrance, she quickly pulled the suit over her head and got herself dressed in it, to then creep inside, slowly.


She didn’t want to attract any attention. She had even bathed herself three times before coming here to make sure that they wouldn’t be able to smell her - hopefully.

Just in case, and now that she was in this gillie, she rubbed herself against a tree gently, trying to get a bit of its dirt and smell onto her. Then, she started to wander around this tree, as stealthfully as she could, to study its roots. And she found that all of them were tight against the ground, and pretty small; so there wasn’t a natural space she could use as shelter, nor would it be viable to use one of the roots as a wall or the sort to make a place next to it.

Apparently, next to the edge of the jungle were she was, the trees were pretty young, so most of the roots and trees here weren’t particularly robust, unfortunately.

She had to go deeper.

Sofia narrowed her eyes as she looked towards deeper into the jungle. She didn’t really want to get in so far, it could become a bit impractical for a base to be there. Plus, it would be dangerous for herself. So, she decided to just continue to sneak around the edge, trying to find another tree which might yield a better spot.

After a few hours of menial searching, she finally found a place that was promising. It was facing the exit, had two thick roots which could serve as support so that she could then add just a roof and an extra wall, which she would then hide with leaves and dirt. Then, from within there, they could harvest sap from the tree uninterrupted, and when it was time to leave and go back with the loot, they could easily do so, given the position.

Excited with her finding, she took measurements of the two roots and the, she returned back to the usual bubble she lived in, to then start to plan out what she needed in order to make that first little base, drawing plans into paper and making calculations for how much it would all cost to do. She even hypothesized that she could perhaps do the same little nook-room for the entire tree, all around, but that would be only once she managed to make one of them. But, it was an option for expansion that she had considered.

Once she had mathed out everything she needed, she visited a carpenter, and got all of the pieces she could need to build this, for a low price. It was quite simple, she just needed big boards of wood with the ends cut off into a custom shape to close off that corner, hence how she could get it done so quickly (and cheap). Nothing out of the ordinary.

However, to get those glued into place, she would need the help of the men she had gotten before. It was nonviable for her to do this alone - the wooden pieces were way too big for her to carry alone, and if she was attacked by a beast, escaping would be difficult, let alone activating the "trap" she had invented previously so that she could get away in the first place.

Ah, that trap. Or bait, rather. That "invention" of hers - it was thanks to it that she was able to be here in the first place. It was quite simple too - it was just a bubble full of fish, disguised with leaves. When a monster came too close, it would be popped with a knife and all of the delicious fish would fall to the ground, which would hopefully distract the attacking beast and let them escape.



The next day, she got the team assembled next to the Forgotten Jungle's entrance - the men from the second expedition as well as Anna, her Marine friend, who has always been with her during all of the expeditions so far.

"So, this is the trip to end all trips, huh?" the small Marine asked, with a grin and her hands on her hips. "We go in, glue up this little hut place thing, and then cover with it crap. Right?"

"...Yes. Correct." Sofia mentioned with a soft chuckle. "And if things go wrong, you already know what to do."

"The fish-balloon thing." one of the men then said, as if he was answering a question.

"Yes." the noble then replied. "Our lives are more important that setting up that place, so keep always your ears and eyes peeled. They don't only attack from the ground - they can also drop down from the treetops, so be careful about that too."

"Got it." Anna then said. "How long do you think we're going to have to be out there?"

"We could practice here, actually." Sofia said. "Before going out there and doing it for real. Of course, please don't glue the boards anywhere. Just pretend to and put them in a pile."

The Marine then slapped her ankles together and made a salute. "Yes, ma'am!" she mentioned, but then relaxed her stance back to her casual self again. "It's going to be just like a drill! Like the ones we had back at the Marine's academy. Man, I loved those. So nostalgic."

The hired men then looked at each other and nodded. "Sounds reasonable, Miss Sofia."


After a short practice session of how they would approach this ordeal, the group got all dressed up in Gillie suits and made their way to the place that Sofia had found, as stealth-fully as they could. Thankfully, they already had experience in how to approach this and get around the Jungle, because they have had practice from before, so they managed to arrive to the destination successfully, without getting detected (apparently). No attacks so far.

Once they were there, they started to set up the shelter. With one man at each end of the wooden board, they put it into its right place to then glue it in, and so with the rest, until the basic structure of the shelter had been built. With the balloons on standby, always ready to be burst, they went and started to cover it with foliage and dirt.

And as they covered it with dirt, a group of small deer-like animals approached them and started to look around, curious. They were very close too, as if they weren't scared of them. Perhaps they didn't know that they were actually people because of the camouflage, and just some very weird-looking bushes.

"Uh, boss." one of the men whispered. "Do we pop the balloon with these guys? What do you say?"

"They don't seem harmful." Sofia said, turning her eyes towards them. "It's hard to tell. I think they're not carnivorous either, so the fish trick wouldn't work against them."

One of them then sniffed Anna's suit, to then take steps back suddenly.

"They didn't like the smell of it, huh." the Marine then chuckled. "I think they think we're food or something."

"Wait." Sofia then said. "These would be herbivores then, right?"

"Yeah." Anna replied. "I think so. Just look at them."

"These are the elusive herbivores of the Forgotten Jungle!" Sofia hissed in excitement. "Remember how we couldn't find evidence of any? But that the carnivores around here had to eat something?"

The little one nodded.

"These are the ones! W-we should... Take photos? But I don't have a camera... This is such an opportunity!"

Anna then shrugged. "We could always try to catch them later, perhaps? I don't see what the big deal is, really. They're just animals."

"Just animals, yes, but a rare finding!" Sofia brought up. The sort of rare finding that could be work some generous coin, but none if she couldn't get evidence of these things.

"So, what do we do?" Anna then asked.

Sofia looked to a side for a moment, and thought. An option could be to just kill them and bring their bodies with them. But trying to hunt and fight them could be loud, and they don't have any hunting tools with them here anyways. Maybe the balloon's knife? No. These deer would be way too fast for that, besides, it would be unlikely that they would be able to kill them in one clean blow, she thought.

It was going to be a pain to do, but they were going to have to let them go for now. She could report them later.

Sofia shook her head. "They're going to have to go for now." she stated. "We don't have a way to take something of them back with us."

Anna then shrugged. "As I thought. Let's finish up this, then."


After setting up the shelter, a few days later, Sofia had managed to establish a small harvesting group to start to get sap from the tree from within there. Then, with the profits she got from that, she set up five more little huts with a perfected design (with more space, due to the frontal wall being vertical), all around the tree. Additionally, scattered around the place, there would be guards with the fish-balloons. If a monster ever got too close to the main tree, they would pop it and try to divert from away from finding the place.

Initially, it was hard to get people to work for this apparently suicidal enterprise - who dared go into the Forgotten Jungle without a death wish? But, thankfully due to the people she had hired before, they managed to recommend a few people to get in on the job, as they explained with their own testimony that there wasn't that much of a risk, that it was a viable way to work. Still risky though, but definitely not to the level that the stories about the place alluded to. And so, slowly but surely, she started to build up a staff to run the "farm" of sap.


With that and over the course of the next days, she managed to set up her own brand of raw material sap: Sofiasap, which was the sap that she got from these little camps. To promote the brand, she started to invest into advertisement around Sabaody. But, that only wouldn't be enough. Advertisement was a bit impersonal - it worked to get herself known, but to really connect with people and get the brand moving, she had to use word of mouth. Her workers had already started on that front themselves as mentioned, but she also started to get it moving herself. After all, talking was one of her biggest talents. She would go to meetups and social gatherings related to Sabaody's elite via being a noble herself and through that, get in contact with bubble manufacturers and guildmasters which were interested in wild raw sap.

And thus, the journey of Sofia to set up her own sap business from the ground reached it conclusion, and the story a small bubble-sap company began. From her humble beginnings to figure out how to make the fish-bubble, to the first expedition to get the first buckets of sap from the trees with Anna using the technique, to then go with a larger group to do the same; but more ambitiously, to then go with the larger group to secure a permanent location in the Forgotten Jungle to harvest sap from.


[EXIT]