My Stardew Journey // week 11

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Fall 17-21

Well, as it turns out, the fair wasn’t the end of this week’s excitement.

Something pretty neat happened today, and there’s so much I could write about it, but I should probably start with the rest of the week leading up to today first.

The farm’s progressing pretty well still. They aren’t lying when they say fall is the harvest season; I’ve been collecting a ton of different crops just about every day.

Plus, my apple tree finally finished growing! It’s been producing apples pretty fast, and they’re tasty, too!

Off of the farm, I made a pretty interesting discovery. Over on the far end of Cindersap forest, there’s this little opening between trees that’s been blocked by this gigantic log. Well, I decided to take my axe to that log to try and get through.

I was just curious about what kinds of forage and stuff I could find in there. What I found, however, was much different than I had anticipated.

The little forest glade was COMPLETELY different from the one I had just stepped out of. The way the sunlight peeked between the thick foliage above made the area seem like it was glowing… and maybe parts of it actually were. There were tons of trees, and a bunch of big stumps and forage. There were even some slimes bouncing around.

At the far end was a big statue surrounded by some sort of ruins. The statue was inscribed with the title of “Old Master Cannoli” (?), and claimed to be “still searching for the sweetest taste”. Whatever that means…

I’ve dubbed this little area ‘the secret woods’. Seems fitting, yeah?

Well, moving on to other developments… I took another request from the big board, this one from the elusive Wizard himself. He was requesting some “prismatic jelly”, which apparently comes from an incredibly rare variant of slime. So I knew it was slime-hunting time.

I spent the entire day at the mines, and I didn’t get home until one in the morning, but I managed to get that jelly on Monday!

I… regretted that severely the next morning. But, well… the 5000g was so worth it.

Oh yeah, the other night I stumbled across something… interesting, to say the least.

I was heading down to the river for some late-night fishing when I heard whispers coming from the direction of the Mayor’s mansion. I peeked around the corner and saw Lewis and Marnie talking.

Long story short, they caught me. As it turns out, apparently they’re in a secret relationship?? I guess that explains the “lucky shorts” thing.

They made me promise not to tell anyone. Apparently Lewis is afraid of some sort of scandal, him being mayor and all. I don’t see it ever becoming an issue, but I promised anyway. I at least had to write it down here, though.

Still… Marnie and Lewis?? I’m not sure I see it.

Well, that’s probably about the extent of this week’s excitement. Which brings me to the part I really wanted to write about…

This afternoon, I popped by Marnie’s to run an errand. She wasn’t there, but Jas was hanging out in the entry. She told me Shane wanted to show me something, and she led me to a room attached to the kitchen.

It turns out this room was a little coop. Shane was standing in there, tending to a handful of chickens. There were several, but what stood out to me was over half of them were BLUE. Like, literally blue in color. That’s not natural, right?

Anyway, Shane was excited to show me his little project. He’s been working on caring for these chickens for a long time, and I guess the blue hue was something he’d figured out how to produce (again, I have no idea how??). His big goal was to produce the finest eggs in the valley, and it seemed like he was definitely close to accomplishing that.

He explained that he wanted to use this as something that would leave an impact. It’s his own project, and it’s something he could do good things with. He spoke very ionately about his goals, and I could tell this meant a lot to him.

It’s incredible seeing him so ionate about something. I can tell this is a big contributor to his improving mental health, too.

I told him I was proud of him. I really am.

After that, I stuck around for a little while. It was close to dinner time, so the three of us split a frozen pizza and just hung out. Afterward, Jas went off to do her own thing, and Shane invited me to watch the gridball game with him.

I don’t know a thing about gridball, but Shane loves it. I figured I’d humor him, especially if it meant spending more time with him. So we headed to his room and watched it on his tv.

There really was something to sitting on the floor, sharing some joja colas and chips, and watching a game together. I think tonight was the closest I’d ever felt to him.

By the time the game was over, it was dark out. I only live a short walk away, but Shane offered to walk me home anyway. Of course I accepted that offer.

Things are going well. Really well.

Is it bad I wanted to stay longer?

There’s just one week left of fall, and from what I hear, winter comes in full-force pretty quickly in this area. I’m gonna make the most of the remainder of the harvest season so I’m ready for the cold.

Ready to end the season on a high note,

~Maddie

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