The next morning, I rose bright and early, ready to face the day. First, I put my iron ore into the furnace while berating myself for not doing that yesterday. The thought of getting food had completely distracted me from my prized new materials. Once the ore smelted down into ingots, I removed it from the furnace and considered all of the things I could make. I could make new tools, which would be nice. The stone ones were clunky and breaking fast. Armor was another possibility. It'd help keep me safe from monsters. Then there were a few random items like a bucket, a cauldron, and iron bars. As much as I wanted to make everything, I just didn't have enough to do so. Fourteen ingots wouldn't even get me a full suit of armor. I settled with a new set of tools: a sword, pick, shovel, and an axe. That used up nine of my fourteen pieces.

The remaining five pieces got crafted into a helmet. The cool metal slipped onto my head and felt surprisingly lighter than I expected. With all the iron that went into making it, I thought it would weigh a lot more, but it felt like nothing was there at all. I had to check my reflection in the water outside to make sure that it was actually there, and it was. I put the stone tools in my chest and proudly examined their replacements. The iron tools gleamed in the morning light and they looked much sturdier than their predecessors.

Satisfied with my new equipment, Sigrid and I went into the field to start working on my goals for the day. I had two: plant the pumpkin seeds and build a chicken coop. At the moment, I couldn't decide which one would be easier. I still didn't know what the pumpkin seeds wanted, so I decided to start with the chicken coop. All I had to do for that was build a pen. That would be easy!

I decided on a spot on the western side of my hill near the side door. This way it would be close, but not too close. I cleared some of the trees in the area to create some extra room and collect wood for the fences. During this time, I made several trips back and forth from the tunnel to craft fences, and to the spot where I was building the coop. I quickly grew tired of ascending the three-block height difference from the field to my tunnel, so I laid down some cobblestone steps to make the short climb up the hill easier.

Meanwhile, Sigrid stayed close by but wandered the woods on this side of the hill and basically made herself comfortable. She rolled in the grass, sniffed at trees, and splashed through the stream. Every once in awhile she'd bark to let me know that she was still there.

As the sun neared its noonday height, I stood before my latest creation with my head in my hands. When I decided I wanted to build a chicken coop, I don't know what I had in mind when I started. It definitely wasn't what I ended up with. Building still continued to confound me. Just like with my room, I had no idea what I wanted the coop to look like. I had hoped it would look like more than a five by six box made of fences on a slope. Building didn't give me the same sense of pride and joy that I got after crafting my new tools.

Sigrid trotted over and offered a reassuring bark.

Thanks, girl.

I reached over and scratched her head a couple of times with a sigh. This wasn't what I'd envisioned when I started, but it would keep the chickens in. Next, I just needed to find some.

Come on, let's go find some chickens to relocate.

Sigrid and I wandered through the field, keeping our eyes open for any signs of white and listening for any clucking. After a little while, we found two pecking away at a clump of grass. I approached with caution, but the chickens didn't seem to fear me. They didn't listen to me either. No amount of coaxing or pushing could get them to willingly go toward home. I hit one out of frustration, which turned out to be a terrible idea. The act of aggression sent the bird into a panic and caused Sigrid to hunt it down. I tried to stop her, but she was just too good. That poor chicken never stood a chance.

I groaned as I picked up the bit of meat and the single feather. My faithful companion looked so proud of herself that I didn't have the heart to yell at her. I caused the whole thing anyway. By hitting the chicken, I signaled that we were hunting, even though that hadn't been my intent. Still, my fault.

If the sight of watching its companion get slaughtered upset the remaining chicken, it didn't show it. The bird just clucked away, wandering through the grass and occasionally pecking at the ground.

What will it take to get you to follow me?

The chicken didn't answer.

Why is this so difficult?

My gut insisted that this shouldn't be as difficult as it was turning out to be, yet I had no idea how to get this chicken into the pen other than just waiting for it to randomly make the decision. I didn't feel like waiting an eternity for that to happen.

Farming is dumb and I hate it!

I took my frustrations out on the nearest clump of grass. It shattered into bits and a cluster of six green seeds remained in its wake. My head cocked to the side as I studied the item.

Well, at least I found something new, though I probably won't be able to plant these either.

I picked up the seeds, and something surprising happened. Suddenly the chicken cared about me. It's black, beady little eyes locked on to me, or more precisely, the seeds in my hand.

Oh, so you want these?

I moved the seeds all around and the chicken never even blinked as it tracked them. A grin spread across my face as I took a few steps back and the chicken hurried to keep up. With bait in hand, I led the chicken across the field back to my pen, along the way, we ran into another chicken, who like the first, followed the seeds with hungry little eyes. I lead the pair to the pen, opened the gate, and stepped inside. The chickens didn't even think twice about following me into the fence. The only trouble they caused was trying to walk over each other to be the first inside. They soon sorted that out and were captured in no time. I quickly exited and closed the gate behind me. The chickens seemed only mildly confused about the disappearance of the seeds. They simply returned to their aimless wandering, though in a much more confined space. I felt a little bad about that, so I offered the seeds to one of the birds. I didn't know how to plant them anyway and if they came from grass, I could probably get more.

The lucky chicken quickly scarfed them down, and then hearts began to float off of the bird.

What the heck?

I waited for something to come from the odd occurrence, but nothing did. After a while, the hearts went away and the chicken seemed none the wiser. This needed to be investigated further, and I needed more seeds, so I wandered the field, breaking every bit of grass that I came across. When I had ten seeds, I returned to the coop and offered them up to the chickens. They each ate some seeds, hearts began to fly, and they began pushing their faces against one another. They only stopped once a baby chick appeared between them along with some more of the green and yellow orbs.

Oh. I looked away, slightly embarrassed over what' I'd just watched. So that's what the hearts meant.

The orbs tickled at my legs as the new family became acquainted with their home with plenty of clucks and cheeps. That was one thing off of my to-do list, now onto figuring out how to plant the pumpkins, and these new seeds too. With the sun high overhead, I searched the field, trying to plant the seeds on every surface I saw, no matter how weird it seemed. I figured the seeds wouldn't take to leaves, but I had to try. Just to be sure. After several failed attempts, I huffed and sat on the ground beneath a tree. Sigrid planted herself down next to me and watched some sheep grazing a few meters off.

I was missing something. I had to be. Maybe I was looking at the wrong thing. Maybe the ground wasn't the problem, but I was missing some tool. I ran through every possible crafting recipe I could think of, and that's when I saw it. I was missing a tool! When I made my first set of stone tools, there were five tools I could craft, but I only made four. At the time, I hadn't understood what the fifth tool could be, but its name suddenly came to my mind. A hoe. That's what I needed to plant the seeds!

I jumped to my feet and raced back to the tunnel with Sigrid hot on my heels, barking excitedly. I stood before my crafting table and used two pieces of cobblestone to create a hoe.

This is it, Sigrid!

I hurried outside and picked a spot near the stream. While I didn't know a lot about farming, I knew plants needed water. Using the hoe on the grass resulted in it converting into light brown tilled soil, within seconds, the soil grew damp from the nearby water. With anticipation, I touched the pumpkin seeds to the patch of soil, and immediately they disappeared from my hand, leaving a tiny green stem in the ground.

I did it!

I jumped for joy with my hands in the air. Sigrid lifted her head back and howled to the sky. After my celebration, I tilled up some more spots and planted three more pumpkins and the remaining seven grass seeds. I didn't know what they'd grow into, but I wanted to find out.

That night as I ate dinner, I studied my home with pride. I had seeds growing, a family of chickens in a 'coop,' and a faithful canine companion. I was a farmer.