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Chapter 4
“Rock climbing is definitely out.”
Based on what happened with coding and photography, the moment I acquired a hobby, I gained professional-level skills in that field regardless of my current condition.
But exercise still had one major concern.
My herniated disc.
I had seriously injured my back during a judo competition in my third year of high school, and I felt that my back would still hurt no matter how good I became at the sport.
“Then it’s either guitar or gardening…”
I was twenty-one.
Wasn’t it a little too early to take up gardening as a hobby?
I did like plants, and when my father was still alive, we had put more than a dozen flowerpots on the balcony and taken care of them together.
We watered them, repotted them, and so on.
Those were good times.
They were truly wonderful memories.
But still, wouldn’t gardening make me look just a little, juuuust a little, older than I was?
More importantly, the essence of this ability was that it allowed me to make a living from my hobbies.
I couldn’t help wondering how I was supposed to make money through gardening.
If I opened a flower shop, then gardening would no longer be a hobby. It would be my actual job.
“Hmmmm…”
But now that I thought about it, I was curious.
How would I make money if gardening became my hobby?
“Ah, damn it. Now I’m curious…”
Then again, it wasn’t as though guitar was necessarily better.
Music?
Of course I liked music.
But I only liked listening to it comfortably.
The idea of playing guitar in front of other people made me hesitate a little.
After all, if I wanted to make money through a guitar hobby, I would have to perform or record something.
“Ughhh…”
I agonized over the three choices in front of me.
Which one is better? Which one will make people say I made the right choice?
Wait. No.
I definitely don’t want people talking about me.
After thinking for a long time, I realized that it was almost time for the evening care of the elderly residents.
For now, I decided to postpone my choice and finish my public-service work first.
[Your third hobby is ‘Gardening.’]
After returning home, I looked at the family photograph hanging in the living room and chose gardening.
Even if I couldn’t make money from it, I wanted to take good care of the plants my late father had raised.
= = =
[Third Hobby: Gardening]
-Description: All plants you cultivate will remain in optimal condition, and you can accelerate their growth.
-Maximum number of applicable plants: 1 pot
= = =
How much does ‘accelerate their growth’ actually mean?
[The growth acceleration ability cannot cause a plant to skip growth stages.]
“Growth stages?”
[A seed cannot immediately bloom into a flower, and fruit cannot immediately grow directly from a stem.]
Ah~ So that’s what it means.
[In addition, the gardening ability cannot reverse irreversible conditions.]
“What does ‘irreversible conditions’ mean?”
[You cannot turn a germinated seed back into an ungerminated seed, nor can you revive a plant that has already died.]
So I can make something grow faster, but I can’t turn back time.
That made sense.
[The maximum number of applicable plants can be increased through quests.]
I had already confirmed through the previous two quests that quests were an important part of the Hobby System.
I guess more quests will keep appearing.
Ding!
Sure enough, a notification rang inside my head.
[You have a new quest.]
[Quest (Gardening): Take care of a plant owned by another person.]
[Reward: Maximum number of applicable plants +1 pot]
I had been planning to take care of the plants at home first, but the System had given me a quest to take care of someone else’s plant.
I guess it can’t be helped.
I would have to look after my father’s plants a little later.
The next day, when I arrived at the institution, I noticed the small garden the grandmothers had been tending.
Calling it a flower garden was actually a stretch.
There weren’t any flowers.
They had only planted some lettuce and perilla leaves.
Even those had been left unattended, so the garden was in terrible condition.
Should I try to save it?
The elderly residents were currently doing some activity with an outside instructor.
I had a little less than an hour before I had to go pick them up again.
So I decided to try working on the garden.
“Hoyeon, what are you doing?”
I had gone to the supply room on the floor and taken out work gloves and a small hoe.
One of the caregivers asked me what I was doing.
“I’m going to clear out the weeds over there.”
“Ah~ The vegetable garden? Come to think of it, it was made so the grandmothers could grow things, but nobody really pays attention to it.”
“Farm work is pretty annoying, after all.”
As I carried the tools outside, the caregiver called after me.
“Make sure you wash your hands when you’re done~ You have to bring the elderly residents their snacks.”
Another day passed.
It was Wednesday.
As soon as I arrived at work at 9 a.m., I went straight to check the garden.
“Oh..!”
Just like with coding and photography, the moment I went outside and touched the soil, I immediately knew how to take care of the garden and bring it back to life.
I cleared the weeds, replanted the lettuce at proper intervals, and watered everything.
It took less than thirty minutes.
Did I really bring everything back to life?
The lettuce in the garden had become so healthy and lively that it was hard to even remember how wilted it had looked before.
“Hoyeon, what are you doing outside?”
One of the caregivers working the day shift came out into the yard and asked me.
“Look at this. I brought all the lettuce back to life.”
“Huh? Oh my, you really did! Wasn’t all of this practically dead?”
“It wasn’t dead. It was just all wilted because nobody had been taking care of it. I gave it some attention, and it came back to life.”
“Wow, Hoyeon. You have a talent for this, too.”
I didn’t before. I do now.
Once again, my Hobby ability had proven itself.
Its effects were real, and there wasn’t a single flaw I could find in it.
[Quest (Gardening): Take care of a plant owned by another person.]
[Reward: Maximum number of applicable plants +1 pot]
But why hadn’t the quest been completed?
Do I have to wait until everything grows fully and is harvested?
Ding!
[The garden is not entirely owned by another person.]
“What?”
“Huh? What’s wrong, Hoyeon?”
I was so surprised by the System’s words in my head that I accidentally spoke out loud.
The caregiver thought I had been calling her and asked me again.
“Ah, no. I just remembered something I forgot. Anyway, I’m going to vacuum.”
“Okay~”
I hurried back inside and started vacuuming while asking the System in my mind.
Why isn’t that someone else’s garden?
[Ownership of the garden belongs to the institution as a whole, and you are also affiliated with this institution.]
“Ah…”
That was true.
After all, I was the one who had originally put the potting soil into the garden.
I couldn’t say it was entirely mine, but there was certainly some ambiguity regarding ownership.
“Aw, what a shame.”
I muttered to myself while vacuuming.
I had thought I would complete the quest in one shot.
Of course, I was happy that the dying lettuce had been revived, but since I had another objective in mind, I couldn’t help feeling disappointed.
I don’t know if other institutions did this, but ours held a public-service worker meeting every Wednesday evening.
After finishing the evening care, we had twenty minutes before leaving work.
During that time, the social worker in charge of us and the public-service workers gathered together to discuss what had happened over the past week and what was scheduled for the coming week.
“You can still take the elderly residents out for walks in the yard until this week. Starting next week, talk to the caregivers on each floor before doing so. If anyone wants to go outside on a chilly day, make sure they wear an outer layer and a hat.”
“Yes.”
There were six public-service workers in the four-story building.
One was assigned to each floor, while the other two handled support work without having a fixed floor.
I was assigned to the first floor.
There were fewer elderly residents there than on the other floors, but since it was connected to the yard, I still had quite a bit of work.
“Oh, right! I heard Hoyeon brought the garden in the yard back to life??”
Just as the meeting was ending, the social worker looked at me and asked.
“You knew how to take care of the garden?”
“Yes. I used to take care of flowerpots at home with my father.”
“You never mentioned that when we first made the garden.”
Well, back then I didn’t know anything about gardening like I do now.
And more importantly, why would I volunteer for extra work?
“The whole point was for the elderly residents to take care of it. What would be the point if I did it myself? I only took care of it this time because the lettuce was dying.”
I smoothly brushed off the question, and the social worker nodded.
“That’s all for the meeting. Hoyeon, could you stop by the office before you leave?”
“Yes?”
“I have something I want to ask you about the garden.”
This feels like it’s going to become a hassle.
Maybe I shouldn’t have touched the garden.
“…”
I stood in front of my apartment door holding a flowerpot.
It’s pretty heavy.
I put it down, opened the door, then struggled to carry it inside again.
The plant I was holding belonged to the social worker.
It was some kind of Monstera Albino, a plant that was extremely expensive among collectors because it had been designated as prohibited for import.
One leaf alone costs 400,000 won to propagate.
And that was apparently the minimum price.
The social worker had paid a whopping 1.2 million won to acquire this plant.
It just looks like someone splashed white paint on it.
The plant had vivid, dark-green leaves covered with patches of white that looked as though someone had smeared white paint all over them.
At first glance, it almost looked like a piece of modern art.
But I couldn’t get the image of white paint out of my head.
When the white appears in patches, it’s called variegation, and when half the leaf is completely white, it’s called a half-moon.
Half-moon.
That was actually a pretty fitting name.
To me, any green plant looked refreshing, and all flowers looked pretty.
But if a plant looked this unusual, it made sense that it would be rare.
The problem was that the plant in the social worker’s pot was neither variegated nor a half-moon.
Its entire leaves had turned white and died.
According to the social worker, this was called a ‘ghost.’
Basically, it meant the plant was dying.
Could you possibly save this, Hoyeon?
I could understand being entrusted with a plant worth over a million won if I were an experienced gardener.
But I was just a public-service worker who had managed to save some lettuce and perilla leaves.
Still, the social worker said she had already given up on it.
Even someone who’s really good at gardening can’t revive dead lettuce. And definitely not in one day!
She said she would be fine even if this Monstera-whatever completely died.
After all, it was practically dead already.
But if I managed to save it—
‘I’ll pay you 200,000 won for your work! And I’ll give you one of the leaves I save to propagate!’
That’s a pretty good deal, isn’t it?
I could save a dying plant, make money, and even receive a plant whose minimum value was 400,000 won.
Maybe this could keep producing new offshoots and become a steady source of income.
Since I had already brought it home, I decided to do my best.
I placed the plant in my room and began examining it.
“Hmm…”
As I carefully examined it, all sorts of knowledge I hadn’t known before suddenly flooded into my mind.
The phenomenon of albinism.
Fundamentally, it was a condition in which the plant lacked sufficient chlorophyll.
The first thing to consider was giving it enough sunlight.
I’ve already tried letting it get sunlight outdoors, using fertilizer, and even installing LEDs, but it still didn’t recover.
The social worker had tried various methods and had even asked for advice from communities where people grew plants like this.
Most likely, what I was about to do wouldn’t be much different from the methods they had recommended or the methods she had already tried.
But there was one enormous difference between those people and me.
That was my ability.
The overwhelming ability I possessed, powerful enough to make a living simply from gardening as a hobby.
First, order an LED.
As I browsed online shopping sites, I instinctively knew which company and which product would be the best.
Without hesitation, I bought a plant-growth LED light, iron supplements, and magnesium sulfate fertilizer.
57,000 won altogether.
It wasn’t particularly expensive.
One or two coding jobs would easily cover that amount.
Water…
It’s not time to water it yet.
The surface of the soil in the pot wasn’t completely dry yet.
More importantly, the pot itself didn’t seem to have good drainage.
It would be better to fix that problem first.
“I should buy a new pot, too.”
With that, I had finished everything I could do inside the house.
It was the beginning of autumn, and the days were getting shorter.
It was already almost 8 p.m., so there was no point taking the plant outside to get sunlight.
For today, I would just leave it in my room like this.
Serious gardening starts tomorrow.
The thought of working on something worth at least 600,000 won, with potentially limitless possibilities, made me strangely excited.
“Come to think of it, weren’t there plant-related requests on Gamja Market, too?”
Right now, I could only take care of one pot at a time.
But if I completed the quest and increased the limit, maybe I could turn this into an actual business.
Hobbies are freaking awesome.
