Protect Our Patriarch

Chapter 13: Talented! Spirit Insect Master!

“Fourth brother, you don’t believe me?” Wang Luojing felt disappointed.

“Fourth brother, I suggest you listen to her.” The older Wang Luotong also joined them, “Although Luojing is young, she has been very fond of playing with bugs since she was a child. She has a deep understanding of insects and can attract them.”

“Interesting…” Wang Shouzhe suddenly regained his energy and his eyes sparkled with excitement, “Tell me, how would you solve the problem of the honey bugs? Don’t be anxious, tell me slowly. We have plenty of time.”

“In recent years, I’ve always heard grandfather complaining that there were many honey bugs and there weren’t as much grains as in the previous years.” Wang Luojing said, “So I thought that if I could resolve the honey bugs problem for grandfather, he would be very happy. I can then beg grandfather not to marry my sister off. I don’t want my sister to leave…”

Wang Luotong turned pale instantly, she lowered her head and dared not speak. The decision on her marriage is out of her hands.

“If you can solve the honey bug infestation, fourth brother promises to protect you.” Wang Shouzhe sincerely promised, “No one has to get married if they don’t want to.”

“Thank you, fourth brother.” Wang Luojing said joyfully, “In fact, I have long read from the Insect Classics that the ancients used lacewings to control the honey bugs, but in recent years, the number of lacewings has progressively reduced.

“Last year, I raised some honey bugs and lacewings, and it really worked. So, this year, I commissioned my brother to go to the mountains to catch two lacewing kings. I took some time to tame them…”

“Hold on…” Wang Shouzhe’s expression changed, “What is the “Insect Classics” and how were you able to tame the lacewing kings?”

“The Insect Classics are the Insect Classics, it’s an ancient book I found in the family’s library.” Wang Luojing said innocently, “The classics talked about ways to domesticate insects. It’s not very difficult. If fourth brother wants to learn, I can teach you.”

Not very difficult?

Wang Shouzhe’s expression darken slightly. He had fused with his predecessor’s memories and has a good understanding of the Xuanwu world. There was a handful of people in this world who liked to produce or fight by controlling spirit insects, and they are usually called spirit insect masters.

However, spirit insect masters are rare and are exceptionally gifted/ talented. The requirements are higher than that of alchemists. The reason for this is also simple: a smart ordinary person could learn alchemy with much effort and difficulty. At most, they would consume a lot of money, and their achievements would be limited.

However, for a profession such as spirit insect masters, you would not be accepted as an apprentice by any of the spirit insect masters unless you have the unique gift of being able to communicate with spirit insects.

As a result, spirit insect masters were so rare that the children of ordinary families had never even heard of them. As far as Wang Shouzhe knew, only the Xu family in Changning and the Liu family in Shanyin had secretly trained two spirit insect masters.

If Wang Luojing has the unique gift of a spirit insect master…

For a moment, Wang Shouzhe’s heart thumped with excitement.

“Fourth brother, what’s wrong with you? Fourth brother?” Wang Luo Jing waved her hand in front of his eyes and pouted angrily, “You don’t believe me either?”

“Believe, believe.” Wang Shouzhe nodded vigorously, “Luojing is the smartest in the family, and fourth brother is very interested. Let’s go slightly further away and you can demonstrate this to fourth brother.”

“Mmmmmm, those two lacewing kings are in fourth brother’s carriage.” Wang Luojing was very pleased with her fourth brother’s response, “My sister and I will go get them.”

Wang Shouzhe immediately remembered that when he saw the sisters this morning, they were each carrying a large, oddly shaped box.

At that time, he thought they were carrying their belongings. It was not appropriate to ask about the girls’ personal belongings, so they were simply told to place the boxes in the carriage.

It looked like the girls had plans to experiment in the farm.

“Let the family’s generals go.” Wang Shouzhe beckoned.

The family’s generals who were waiting in the distance rushed over immediately and respectfully asked, “Patriarch, what are your orders?”

“Wang Wu, Wang Yong. Go to the carriage and bring Miss Luojing’s two boxes.”

“Yes, Patriarch.”

The two generals dashed off; they were extremely fast. Within 15 minutes, they were back, carrying a box each.

“Wang Gui, Wang Wu, you guys go to the fourth elder and see if there’s anything you can do to help.” Wang Shouzhe dismissed all of them. Anyway, he saw that Wang Xiaozhi seemed to be thinking of ways to control the aphids by using plant ash and other methods. They would need help.

The family generals are all Xuanwu practitioners. They are much more efficient than the ordinary tenant farmers when put to use effectively.

Most importantly, Luojing’s matter has yet to be confirmed and he didn’t want to make it public knowledge.

After Wang Gui and the four other generals left, Wang Shouzhe personally carried the two large boxes, led Wang Luotong and Wang Luojing, and ran all the way to a remote wheat field.

The 3,000 mu (1 mu = 6.67 acres) or so land was like a vast ocean. There was no one around, so Luojing could demonstrate in this isolated place.

Wang Shouzhe turned over the wheat ears and sure enough, there were a few green aphids in this wheat field as well. The tiny bugs gave him the chills.

“Luojing, let me see what you can do.”

“Hmm. The honey bugs infestation this time is earlier than expected.” Wang Luojing’s expression was somewhat grave and apprehensive as she carefully opened one of the boxes.

Wang Shouzhe glanced at the box curiously. He suddenly suffered from trypophobia and goosebumps because the box was full of leaves covered with a filament, with dense round dots hanging from them.

“Fourth brother and elder sister, help me out here.” Wang Luojing took out a piece of “leaf”, “Place a leaf in each zhang (3.34m).”

The corner of Wang Shouzhe’s mouth twitched. This little girl was so bold that she dared to boss the patriarch around. But he obeyed Wang Luojing’s instructions. As a cultivator, he just held a piece of “leaf” in a pincer grasp, flung the “leaf” casually and the “leaf” landed perfectly in place.

According to Wang Luojing’s “instructions”, 10 leaves were required for each mu of the wheat field. Presently, she has only opened one of the two boxes, and there were only a few hundred “leaves” which would cover only 10 mu of land. This was just a drop in the bucket considering that the farm covered thousands of mu.

After spending 15 minutes completing the task, Wang Shouzhe and Wang Luotong stood near Wang Luojing, and listened to her instructions to wait patiently.

“Four brother, these lacewing eggs are three days old.” Wang Luojing explained, “They will hatch slightly slower in a dark box but will hatch faster once exposed to the sunlight.”

Well ~ you are the technical expert in this area, we’ll go with whatever you say.

Wang Shouzhe has always been honest about his lack of knowledge in certain areas and has never tried to be a know-it-all. In less than half an hour, the few leaves placed on the ground began to transform as small, odd-looking insects broke out of its shell with difficulty.

The leaves were right in front of them, and they could clearly observe the small insects, which were probably less than two millimetres in size, shaped like long striped beetles, but with two large pincers in front of their heads which made them looked very ugly.

They were motionless and just hung quietly on the filaments.

It took another 30 minutes before they finally began to move, sliding down the leaves in a silky fashion and slowly spreading out in all directions, as if they could naturally sense where there was food. They lazily made their way up the wheat.　　

Suddenly!

When one of them came across an aphid, it swooped down fiercely, struck the aphid with its pair of pincers, pierced its mouthparts into the aphid and began to suck. In 15 minutes, the poor aphid was sucked dry, and flew away with the wind.

The lacewing larva then continued to climb forward in search of its next prey.

“Awesome!” Wang Shouzhe exclaimed, “This little bug is really ferocious.”

“Fourth brother, I did the calculations when I raised the lacewing larvae that it would pupate in just 10 days and it could eat nearly 1,000 honey bugs during that time. It is still relatively small when newly hatched and could only eat around 10 honey bugs for the first two days.”

Wang Luojing had been playing with these kinds of insects, and she remained unperturbed at what would be considered strange happenings.

“If that’s the case, the wheat fields will be less productive, but they will be saved.” Wang Shouzhe sighed in admiration, but at the same time, he was worried, “But we have thousands of mu of wheat in our Fenggu farm alone.”

“Don’t worry, fourth brother, I was just experimenting.” Wang Luojing opened the other box, which was no longer densely packed with lacewing larvae, but with small, brightly coloured beetles.

“Aren’t these ……” Wang Shouzhe was surprised to see those rather familiar looking beetles, “the seven-spotted ladybugs?”

“Fourth brother, do you recognise them? But the Insect Classics said these are nine-spotted insects, not seven-spotted.” Wang Luojing took out a fist-sized giant beetle with nine spots on its body and caressed it joyfully, “Let’s call you the Nine-Star Insect King from now on.”

– End of this chapter –