Chapter 290: 289 Botanical Exploitation

Bokuboy

Victoria and I worked tirelessly as we gathered up the best parts of the plant discards to transplant up to the third floor of the growing area. I wasn't surprised when she eventually became overheated and took off her shirt. She gave me plenty of views at her breasts in just her push-up bra as she kept bending over towards me, even when she didn't have to.

I also saw her slight smirk each time that she caught me looking at her jiggling breasts. Her demeanor relaxed as the time ground on and she somehow managed to make her baggy pants bunch up on her thighs. It let the cloth highlight her toned ass and she made sure to straddle a few of the growing areas, trying to not step on the plants, and gave me good shots of both her front and her backside at different times.

By the time supper was being served, Victoria was almost back to her old self around me. She was still careful around the crewmen and the liberated slaves, though. She didn't know them and wasn't going to give them the same opportunities that she gave me.

“I can't believe this was even more fun than this morning was!” Victoria said happily as she gave me a hug, then she pulled on her shirt. She only buttoned one button near the middle and then took a minute to shake out her pants to loosen the bundled up cloth. She sighed wistfully as the tightness around her lower parts was eased and she wrapped her arms around mine for me to escort her.

I ignored the press of her breasts against my own bare skin. I was wearing the traditional sleeveless work shirt and she took full advantage of that.

“Tell me that you didn't enjoy that.” Victoria challenged.

“I didn't enjoy that.” I said with a straight face and it made her pout at me. “You told me to say that.”

Victoria laughed a little loudly and swatted my forearm, then hugged my arm tightly. “Be honest, you scoundrel.”

“It needed to be done and you enjoyed it.” I said and she smiled warmly at me. “I also put to practical use the notes you gave me a few days ago.”

Victoria's smile grew and she grinned. “You really did read them over! I just realized I didn't have to help you along like I usually do!”

I nodded and she leaned in to give my bare arm a full rubbing between her breasts. “You're getting soil and dirt all over your creamy white and soft breasts.”

Victoria laughed and nodded. “Sometimes it's worth it.”

“Only sometimes?” I asked and she wiggled her eyebrows. “Ah, I see.”

“Yes, you did.” Victoria said and leaned in to kiss my cheek. “Thank you, David.”

We went inside and cleaned up before going to the dining room and eating another meal with the others. Victoria talked boisterously about all the work we had done and how everything looked like it was going to remain intact after the transplantation. It was always chancy when moving plants, especially with the way they had been previously handled by the guild.

“I can't wait to get the right spells and enchantments in place.” Victoria said and gave me a pointed look. “I hope you've raided the old offices for the right spells and enchantments.”

I gave her a knowing smile and she laughed.

“Of course you did.” Victoria said, happily. “When can we get started on that?”

“I need to reference the books we brought back with us.” I said.

Farra nodded. “I'll bring them up to you after we eat and you can grab the right tools.”

“Should we get a crew as well?” I asked.

Victoria thought about it and shook her head. “No, with the way we've set things up, each section is going to need slightly different things. One with more heat, one with more light, one with moisture retention, and a few with air flow spells.”

“We already ran the pipes across the ceiling for watering the whole floor.” I said and Victoria looked surprised. “We did it for the other two floors as well.”

“With individual settings?” Victoria asked and I nodded.

“You can also activate them individually with switches and dials on the walls.”

“Oh, my.” Victoria whispered and waved a hand at her own face, as if she needed more air.

“We came up with the idea when making the expanded spaces on the frigate.” I said.

“Once everyone found out that we could get water into an individual room like we did for the captain's cabin for a private bath, they all wanted it.” Farra said. “There's only so many times that someone can use a pulley and buckets to fill a tub before they're sick of it.”

That comment made Gella and Hanna laugh as they nodded.

“There were a lot more baths and much happier people after that.” I said and everyone nodded.

“My lord made the rounds to heat the water for everyone, too.” Hanna said, clearly amused.

Victoria's smile became a smirk as she looked at me. “Oh? Did no one else have the ability?”

I sighed and didn't say anything.

“No one else could do it as quickly.” Hanna said. “We eventually had to schedule half an hour in the evening as a ship-wide bath time, just so he wasn't running all over the ship to different rooms all day!”

Victoria laughed, as did the others. “You poor thing! Taking care of others when you didn't have to.”

“I did have to. They chose to follow me, even though they didn't have to.” I commented.

“Our lives changed and improved so much when we did choose to... and we would do it again.” Gella said as Farra and Hanna nodded. “If it wasn't for you...”

“None of us would be here.” Farra said, her voice soft. Gella reached over and hugged her, then Hanna was there and the three of them held each other.

I put my hand on Gella's shoulder and let my magic flow through her and into the other two. The three of them sighed and held the embrace for several moments before letting go.

Victoria's face was completely blank when I looked at her.

“Are you all right?” I asked and stopped sharing my magic.

“I'm... fine. Just fine.” Victoria said, her voice as soft as Farra's.

“Shall we get back to work?” I asked and Victoria nodded.

We left the dining room and split up to get what we needed, then we met up in the floor with the new plants and transplants. Farra stayed and helped as Victoria told us what needed to go where and to what degree. We worked for several hours and several crewmen brought me more wildwood pieces when I needed them. We finished late at night.

Victoria was exhausted as she looked over the finished expanse of the entire floor growing area. “By the Father's Grace, David.” She whispered and took my dirty hand with her own. “How did we do the entire floor in only a single day?”

“Magic.” I responded.

Victoria blinked her eyes at me for several seconds, then she huffed and barked a laugh. “Of course! It all makes sense now!” She said, sarcastically.

“It should. That's a great reason.” I said and she laughed.

“If I didn't love you so much, I'd smack you upside the head.” Victoria said and then she looked surprised. She schooled her face and took several deep breaths. “Do you have a spare room? I don't want to travel back to the academy this late.”

I nodded and led her and Farra back down the the floor we were staying on and showed Victoria a room not far from mine. “Breakfast is whenever you get up.”

Victoria chuckled and entered the room, then stopped walking to look back at me. “Are you taking a bath?”

“I am. I can no longer stand going to bed without cleaning up first.”

Victoria smiled demurely, then her hands went down to lightly brush over her womanhood. “I'm taking a bath as well.”

I smiled and nodded, reached for her door, and shut her inside the room and myself and Farra in the hallway.

“Well, it didn't take her long to start seeing it for what it could possibly be.” Farra said and took my hand to bring me to my room. “Jill! Double bath!”

“You're lucky the tub is big enough.” Jill said and opened the bathroom door for us.

“We could get Hanna in if she doesn't mind sitting on our laps.” Farra said and suddenly a naked Hanna was there with us.

That made Jill laugh as she stripped me off. “Well? Don't just stand there! Grab a sponge and soap!”

Hanna and Farra both helped and I was soon scrubbed down completely and had the ritual performed. Jill and I scrubbed down Farra first, since she was much dirtier, and then we washed Hanna. They were both rinsed off and then we settled down in the tub to relax.

“Where's Gella?” I asked as Hanna settled down on my lap.

“She's training some of the new guards.” Jill said. “You've got another twenty minutes to soak.”

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“Thank you.” I said and held her hand briefly.

“That's not a subtle hint for another ritual when you get out, is it?” Jill asked, teasingly.

“Only if you want more practice.” I responded.

Jill thought about it and nodded. “I'll be back when it's time.”

“This is really nice.” Hanna whispered and snuggled to my chest.

“I agree.” Farra said and her hand pet Hanna's drying hair. “When was the last time we got to just sit and relax like this?”

“I don't remember. It's been a while.” Hanna said and then her lips found my neck. “Thank you for this, my lord.”

I lightly stroked her back. “I can make a bigger tub.”

They were quiet for a moment.

“No, I think I prefer it this way.” Farra said and leaned against me to hug me with one arm.

Hanna nodded and her lips gave my neck several light kisses before she sighed in contentment and closed her eyes. I kept the water hot and the three of us soaked there for the rest of the time and didn't speak until the bathroom door opened and a sweat-soaked Gella came in.

Gella stripped off her clothes as she walked towards the tub and then slid in behind Farra. Farra laughed softly as Gella propped her up on her lap and then made her take the same position as Hanna on my lap.

“Do you want me to kiss your neck, too?” Farra asked with a huge smile.

“You need to wash it first.” Gella said and laid back against me, then closed her eyes. “Ohhh, this feels so nice. Thanks for keeping it hot for me.”

Farra chuckled and lathered up a sponge to give Gella a quick once over to get the majority of the sweat off and then cuddled in and kissed her neck. “I thought Jill was supposed to come in.”

“I told her to wait and let me join you.” Gella said without opening her eyes. “Oh, and she warned us to take our potions when we get out of the tub.”

“So, in an hour.” Farra said and Gella's soft laugh shook her slightly.

“Hanna's already asleep.” I whispered and the other two looked to see her happy sleeping face.

“You're not even using magic.” Gella whispered.

I shook my head and we all rested and relaxed.

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Montage Mode engaged. Skipping miscellaneous details. Speeding up time. Done.

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I was up early the next morning and went to the potions room to get back to work. Farra joined me at lunch to get me to eat and then she helped with some of the preparation work. It was a very complicated recipe and was going to take a lot of work to get even the initial sample for testing, let alone a working creme for people to use.

Farra was a little lost and had to call in the old man to help. He looked over my notes and proclaimed me a genius, which made me laugh. I wasn't any smarter than someone that had a lot of practice with potions. I just had years more experience than he did.

We kept working on just the parts we could do, including preparing some of the dried grass into the binding agent I would need for several of the weaker ingredients. I was happy that Victoria had brought over some for me to transplant, because I had to use quite a bit for just this initial step. At least I didn't have to go far to get more ingredients.

Farra would happily run down to the floor below to the storage area and retrieve anything that I wanted. She knew how important this project was and wanted to help as much as she could, even though potions were not her specialty.

“There you are.” Victoria said as she entered the room. “Oh, are you busy?”

“Just doing some preliminary mixing.” I said and cleaned off my hands before leaving my workbench and going over to her. “What can I do for you?”

“I was just... um...” Victoria looked a little guilty. “I don't want to take you away from anything.”

I waved at Farra and the old man. They both nodded and kept working. I already told them I would need several sets of updated and modified ingredients before we could make the full creme. It was the easiest part for them to handle and I left them to it.

“Do you want to take a walk around the discard area to see what you might have missed?” I asked and Victoria's face brightened up.

“How did you know I wanted to do that?” Victoria asked and took my arm to escort her.

“You're forcing yourself to stay here a lot longer than you should.” I said and she blushed. “I wasn't complaining. You've got things to do back in the botany building at the academy.”

Victoria sighed and nodded as we walked down the stairs. “I do need to check on things and to make sure everything's fed and watered.”

“You've done a lot of good work here this weekend.” I said and she smiled.

“I honestly thought it would take a week, maybe more.” Victoria admitted and then she blushed again. “I'm a little sad that it didn't, actually.”

I smiled. “Well, considering there's only two botanists currently available, having you over to consult occasionally would be the smartest thing for me to do.”

“Consulting?” Victoria asked and then she beamed a smile at me. “What a wonderful idea!”

“You'll be paid an appropriate fee, of course.” I said.

“David, you've already done so much for me by letting me bring all of my work back inside...”

“Which you will be paid for.” I said and she opened her mouth to protest. I put a finger on her lips to stop her and her eyes widened. “I'm paying everyone else that's working here. Why wouldn't I pay you, too?”

“Hmm mm mmm hm!” Victoria said through clamped lips.

“What did I do? That's a sealing spell.” I said and moved my finger. Her lips stayed sealed and she looked at me with angry eyes and her eyebrows bent downwards menacingly.

“HMM. HMM. HM!” Victoria spat.

“How else am I going to make you accept your due?” I asked and she glared at me. “Just say yes, take the gold crowns, and update things in the botany building.”

Victoria gave me a cold gaze for several seconds, then she sighed and nodded.

I smiled and reached for her lips. I saw her ready to bark at me, so I dropped my hand and kept walking.

“HMM! HM!” Victoria said.

“Promise to not be angry or to argue. I'm trying to help you.”

Victoria rolled her eyes. “Hmm.”

“Okay.” I said and tapped her lips with a fingertip.

“I should kill you for that!” Victoria spat.

“Here we are at the fields. Did you get that plant?” I asked and pointed.

“You're not going to get away with distracting...” Victoria stopped talking and looked at the little sprig of a plant. “How did I miss that?!?” She exclaimed and let my arm go as she dove for the thing. “Hand me my tools!”

“They're on your belt.” I said and knelt beside her.

“Just do it!” Victoria said as her hands gently carved the dirt around the thing with her fingers.

I handed her a little trowel and a tiny rake after unhooking them from her belt.

“Oh, you poor little thing. Momma's going to take good care of you.” Victoria said and carefully dug around to find the roots with the rake and then used the trowel to pry up the thing from the loosened dirt.

“I'll grab a small hand cart.” I said and she nodded.

We continued to work for quite some time and found several little things that she had missed the first few times through the discard fields. She was going to take some of them back to the academy to nurse them back to health, including that first sprig one. She really did care a lot about her plants.

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