Happy friday, Mistakes below, will be fixed!

Chapter 23 - Spices and rocks

Riin's POV

Asperd Isles - Spring, Flinty Village

Never ever in my life has I been so overly happy to see a bed, just getting up here, was like getting run over by a truck, each step was like, someone trying really hard to cut my legs off, so painful, shoot me, cut me, stab me, I don't care, anything but this kind of pain. Note to self, muscle pain is a bitch, a fucking pain in the ass.

We reached our destination with the setting sun greeting our entry into the village. I said my goodbyes to Baul and his men, as they would be leaving again at sunrise, I booked a room for the night, a cheap one, the bed was pushed to one side and a space to walk along it was just to the other side, it was more like a cabinet for cleaning items than a room, around eight feet in width and around twelve feet in depth, with just enough room for the bed and stepping inside to the room once the door was closed. It would do fine for the night, and of course I also got a stable spot for my newly acquired horse, I named it,Coal, since it's black and all, great right, the small room and the stable spot cost me one silver coin, so I did save a bit of money in the end, around fifty copper if I got the prices right. As the morning sun began to light up the room I was staying in, I decided that it was time for me to get up and start doing something with my day. I went out the backdoor, which I found out was just a door leading to the stable, and not really a backdoor used by the staff of the inn, so anyway I went outside, to check on Blackie, before heading out to scout the surrounding forest area. The horse was eating someone that hay or wheat thing they get, I need to find out where to buy that stuff before riding out alone, I gave him a pat on the neck and went towards the small gate leading towards the forest.

As I neared the southwest gate, I got greeted by a guard, better to polite here.

“Good morning, sir.”

The guard looked at me, as I greeted him.

“Morning to you too, young one. What brings you to the gates so early?”

Ah, I thought that this might be the case, them needing to know, why one wants to leave the village so early, I saw no reason to lie as I had plans to be going out often during my stay here.

“I wish to gather herbs in the forest, sir.”

“Herbs… you are a young herbalist then.”

“Still in training, sir.”

“Well, when should I expect you back?”

Hmm, let's see… a few hours should do the trick I think.

“I plan to be back within a few hours hopefully, sir.”

“I see, off you go then and good luck in your hunt.”

“Thank you very much, sir.”

I have a last goodbye wave to the guard, as I entered the more overgrown forest area, with the village to the north and the [Flinty Mountains] south, with the rising sun in the east, I found it easy to move deeper into the forest, with all the guiding done for me by mother nature, and so my little journey into [Flinty Forest], started. As I walked on the trail formed by the villagers I soon found myself by a small river flowing down from the mountain, I find the well known lilac flowers [Amrans], hanging over the river stream, walking over I pick a good stack, as I can both boil and grind them. After picking up a good amount, I continue my walk into the forest, along the way I find a few of the more easy to spot healing herbs, getting my hands on a good stack of [Coltsfoot] and [Adder’s Tongue], both are used to heal and treat infected wounds. As I set my sight for the village, my backpack, is filled with [Kelventari], [Base Mullein], used to treat burn wounds, but I must say that I shed a tear when I came across a small growth of [Larnurma]. This herb is used to relieve muscle pain, so I was over the moon with happiness when I spotted them, only downside is that i need to grind them into a paste that need to then be boiled into a fine cream, which can then be applied to my poor legs and ass.

The walk back goes in a slow pace as I keep my eye out for anymore herbs, I spot a pound, with a few deers drinking. I stop and slowing lower myself into a crouching position, getting my bow out, in a slow movement, I hook and arrow, waiting, just as I am going to shoot the bigger of the deer's raises it head, looking to my far left, then sets off in a run for dear life… so much for my free dinner, out and away they are. I soon find out why the was in such a hurry to leave… so, I think i said this once before, but just so we are completely on the same page here, bears are fucking huge animals! A quick sucking on my finger, tells me that I'm against the wind, thank fuck for that, I tell you. So here I’m, sitting like fifteen feet from a freaking brown bear… I know for sure that I have no chance of outrunning it, climbing a tree is a no go too, I mean, they a known to be extremely good climbers, so thats leaves me with two options, one, hope it just walks away after drinking its fill, two, killing the bitch. So, the only reasonable thing to do is of course to kill it, I hear bear meat is good eating, and I can use that pelt, my problem here is in the distance between us, the first arrow will be the counting one, that for sure, here goes everything and my life, if this goes badly, so crossing my fingers.

I take aim for its softer head parts, that in this case being the eyes, okay let's make this shot count, I wait for it to raise its head, as it finishes its drinking, than I draw back as much as I can, to get the much needed power in the first shot, I shoot to kill, aiming for its right eye. As soon as the arrow is released I reach to grab a new one, the first one hitting its target but sadly not killing it on the spot, I’m once more made aware of just how weak a child's body is. The bears roar resound in the quiet forest, releasing my second arrow as it turn fully towards me, hitting it in the chest area, it rears to the side as the arrow burrows into the flesh, spilling blood as it moves its head, baring its teeth at me. As it roars once more at me, I release my next arrow hitting it dead center in its open mouth, the roar is cut short as it falls down breaking the arrow in half. I stand there for a short time, staring at the dead creature, not really believing it to be dead. Only as the blood paints the surrounding ground red, do I move closer with a new arrow hooked and ready to fire, for good measure I fire the hooked arrow into its neck as I move near it, all that does is puncture its skin, leaking more blood. It's dead, the arrow that hit its open mouth must have reached its brain, killing it on the spot, luckily for me.

You have slain a [Brown Bear], you have gained 100 experince and +1 [Dexterity] for your quick reacting in combat against an overwhelming odds!

So here I'm with a massive dead bear… my problem? how in the world am I going to get that back with me… okay let's see here.

You have gained experience in [Tanner], by collecting a [Brown Bear's] hide.

One rolled up bear hide, check, lots of good meat… or at least I think it's good, I mean in base, it should work the same as a cow right, with how the good meat is placed, I sure hope it is since I went with it like that, cutting the prime meat like it was a cow, I also cut some smaller pieces of meat to use as bait meat. Putting it all on a stick and then carrying it like that, so not to mix the fresh meat with my newly acquired plants. So with a backpack full of plants and a stick with bear meat on it and carrying the bear pelt on tree sticks tied together, into ‘A’ form with fresh branches from bushes, I once again made my way back with the sun starting to set in the west. Reaching the forest gate, I was greeted by the same man for the morning.

“Oh, the young herbalist returns, I see.”

His face took on a kind of funny look, as the got a better view of what I was carrying with me.

“Boy… i-is that a… bear pelt?”

I had to give a smile at the look on his face, like he just got cheated from getting his favorite meal.

“Yes, sir. I got attack on the way back, so it was either me or the bear, and the bear lost.”

The guard stares at me for a short while, he then smiles at me.

“Well, young one, I'm truly glad that the bear lost.”

I smile back at him.

“Me too, sir.”

He opens the gate and I walk in.

Getting back to the inn, I rebook my room from last night and a stable spot, after a few words with the innkeeper I find my way to the kitchen, there I'm greeted by an women in her mid-forties.

“Ma'am, I was wondering if I could borrow your fireplace for the night?”

Smoked meat, is best when smoked over a steady and even low flame, and the camping fire is just not cutting it, I want to smoke some of the meat, if I can trade some of the large cuts for other meat that would be great. The kitchen lady stops her chopping and turns to look at me, her eyes have a sharp look in them, so very unlike mothers kind eyes.

“Ma'am? I'm no ma'am, kid.”

I must have been looking a bit confused since she does a ‘snort’ sound and a small laugh mixed together into a weird sound.

“I don't to that formal stuff, in my kitchen, kid. I'm Greta, and who might you been?”

Looking more closely at her, she looks as if she might not have come from this kingdom, but I can't really be sure. Oh well, since she said she don't like all the formal talk I can relax a bit on that end.

“I'm Riin, so can I borrow your fireplace?”

Greta made her weird laugh once again and wave me into the kitchen itself, and walked over to a big fireplace, made of large stones place against the wall in a half circle with a small overhang made from hard leather, - the kind use in the blacksmith's blowers, - leading out the side of the wall. The setup made it the perfect meat smoking fireplace, just want I needed.

Five hours into my meat smoking progress, Greta came to check up on me or her kitchen, don't really know which one but who cares.

“Seems as you gave the gate guard a good shock, this evening, kid. Killing a bear, I was told.”

She looks over at the meat smoking, than looks back at me.

“That bear meat, kid?”

I turn to fully look over at her.

“It is, just small pieces, I have yet to cook the bigger ones.”

With that said, I turn back to keep an eye on my meat. Greta stares a bit at the meat, then turns to me again.

“What you say to trading the bigger meats for some spices that are good for smoked meat.”

Hmm, well how can one say no to that offer.

“Sounds like a deal to me.”

Greta laughs, then turns and walk into her kitchen and starts pulling some small wooden containers out from different shelfs.

“Okay, I have a few here.”

I walk over to the kitchen table she was standing at, looking down into the containers in front of me.

“I got some black pepper, onion, rock salt and ginger powder. So what do you say, boy?”

Pepper and ginger… how did she get hold of tropical spice plants., the trade wagon, maybe? I walk over to my backpack and find four small leather pouches, - the once I made a few years back, that I have yet to find any use for, since I have not yet gone and made any herbal creams or collected any herbs that needed to be held in a small container.

“Where did you get the pepper and ginger from, our weather is not warm enough for that kind of fruit to grow here.”

She smiles down at me.

“Smart kid, you are. They are brought from the trading ships that comes from the eastern lands, the bring many goods with them, and we trade our iron and copper for some of the rare items that they sell.”

I see, the onion powder, I can make myself if I can get her to show me how to make it, I mean the name is really self explanatory.

“So the rock salt is from here?”

She does that snort laugh again and nod her head.

“Yes, a group of hunters sometimes bring back a few pounds of it, they seems to get it from the south coast caves.”

Your skill, [knowledge - Asperd Kingdom, Asperd Isles], has gained new information.

I got Greta to give me, a pouch full of the ginger and black pepper, in return I gave her the rest of the bear meat, that being most of the bear really, not that I lost anything since I wanted to trade it anyway, and getting tropical spices for some meat seems like a good deal to me. She also told me how the onion powder was made, all the while roaring with laugher, so much that the innkeeper came to check on her. It seems that she found it extremely funny that I knew about the required temperature for growing pepper and ginger, but not how onion powder was made. Well, she explained that it was made by leaving thin sliced onions to dry, like sundried tomatoes really, then the dried onions are grinded into powder and there you go, onion powder on demand. For the knowledge I obtained a small stats boost.

Your extraordinary wisdom on foreign plants and growth temperatures, has gained you, + 2 [Intelligence].

So as I sat there smoking my meat I was really satisfied with the day or the morning really. The morning sun, marked the end of my cooking, I took of a price of freshly smoked bear meat to get a taste of my hard work, a good amount of chewing later, that I was smiling to myself, not bad for my first try of anything other than hare and small wild, not bad at all. Now time to clean up and get a hour or two, before heading forwards the mine.

After my short nap, I set my sight at the mine, why it was called [Flinty Mine] is anyone's guess, since it produced copper and iron on the most part, bad naming sense, I guess. Walking along the road leading southeast, I made my way up a small hill where I was met with a big two door gate, with four men guarding it. Confusing me for a moment, before one of the guards spotted me, and made his way down from the wall towards me, stopping in front of me.

“Kid, this is not a place to be playing at so move out of the way.”

Ah, the image of his head on a stick, a few deep breaths later and I was ready to talk to this stupid grunt.

“Ah, sir. I'm not trying to play on the road, I'm heading to the mine to see if they c-.”

My voice and drowned out by the yelling and massive dust cloud from the other side of the wall, the grunt spun around amazing fast for his amount of brain mass, setting of in a run towards the gate as two of the other guards pushed it open. In the confusion I took the time to run after them to see what all the fuss was about, I soon got my answer, a collapsed entry blocking the whole mine. A few people was already trying to remove some of the fallen rocks, while others was dragging a few wounded away from the collapsed area, one voice sounded over the noise of the still falling rocks and yelling.

“Get the wounded the the gate! Bring the fallen rocks to the quarry site, don't block the road, move it!”

Locating the owner of the voice, I found a fucking hulk of a man standing near the mine entry, yelling orders as he took some freaking huge rocks off to the side.

For now, I needed to get in good with that man as he seemed to be the brains around the mining area. As I started to walk towards him, I found that he really was a freaking hulk… man…person? My five feet and three inches, - which I might add, I think is a good height for a ten year old, I would even say that I was high for my age, still made me look like a fucking dwarf compared to this guy's height, my guess is that he is well over six feet, I'm telling you hulk in medieval clothing and with muscle to go with the whole hulk look. As I finally got through the horde of bodies, I had to fucking poke the guy for him to notice me, hell, next time something like this happens I will fucking stab the guy in the kneecap. He stopped yelling long enough for him to look down on the source of the poking to stare at me for half a second, then looked away to continue his loudness, that this close up sounded more like a bomb siren going off non stop. Oh, did he fucking just ignore me… son of a fuc- mother fucking- you little bit- deep breath, take a deep br- fucking price of fucking shit, I will show you, you fuck- fucking ass hulk person.

I turned around and began to walk back towards the gate, not to leave mind you, no to help the wounded, so I can show that hulk that I'm useful, fucking bastard. As I reach the wounded that has been laid out in a line, set down my backpack and pull out the stack of dried [Amrans], I put them to dry when I smoked the meat, luckily for these guys, I find a large kind of flat stone and a small rounded stone that fits in my hand, amazing how fast I found the perfect ones for the job, since I'm kind of standing in a stone paradise, dragging the big flat stone back with me and having placed the small one in my pocket, I find a spot to set up camp. A man bringing over another wounded worker, and I think that he might be looking at me or down at the herbs that I have taken out and placed on my large stone, that I will be using as a base for my grinding, well at least his feet are pointing towards me, my guess is spot on, as he starts to talk.

“Kid, is that a medical herb?”

I'm focused on grinding down the dried [Amrans] to a more workable state, so I don't look as I answer him.

“Yes, if you got time to stand and talk, get me a fireplace going and some boiling water.”

Can you believe the laziness of people, here he is surrounded by wounded people and he stops to talk… what has the world come to…

“Eh?”

Hell, lazy and lacking brain cells.

“Fireplace, boil water, go.”

Why do I have to deal with this kind of people, why me… he turns around and runs off, leaving a faint.

“Right away.”

Fifteen minutes later and I have a fire and boiling water next to me, thanks to my newly found lackey, that has been running around getting all the items I needed to get a low fire going so I could cook the grinded up [Amrans] in a soup like texture, normally it would be a water like texture but time is lives as they say. I took a portion of the boiled [Amrans] of the fireplace and started to work on making it into a cream, to be applied directly to any cuts they may have gotten. While neither the cream or the soup is the [Amrans] optimal use, it will do the trick, since I don't have the time for a week long preparation to make it into the water like potion that it can be make into, right now time is of the essence, even if I can only get forty percent out of the plant like this.

I was my hands in a bucket of fresh water, grabbing a wooden bowl, I scoop up a small amount of the herbal soup and walk over to the closest person that looks able to drink the soup.

“Here, it will speed up the healing process of your wounds.”

The man looks at me then the soup bowl, then back at me.

“What in it?”

“[Amrans], a healing herb that greatly increase the neutral speed of healing wounds.”

I once more move the bowl towards him, he nods once and grab it, slowly drinking the warm soup. I walk back and find my lackey waiting next to the stack of bowls. Sitting down once more I start to scoop up more soup into the bowls and hand them to him.

“Give it to the ones who is awake and able to drink it by themselves.”

He nods eagerly at my order, running off with a bowl of soup in each hand.

An hour later and all the ones who was able to drink the soup, is now slowly being helped away, but just by looking at them one can see that the wounds are starting to heal up, not bad if I must say so myself, not bad at all. My herbal cream is just ready, so I stand and bring it over to the closest unconscious worker in the line.

Bringing the bucket of water and some linen bandage, thanks to lackey, I sit down next to him, I start to clean his wound of any dirt, then I apply a thin layer of the cream the help the healing along, I then carefully bandage him up with help from lackey. Looking over my handiwork I'm satisfied, so I move on to the next one, not that I get very far as the hulk gets in my way, by grabbing my arm.

“What do you think you are running around and doing to my men, you damned brat.”

I look up at him, then over to lackey and then down at the empty spots of the workers that I have already helped, and I just kind of snap, right there and then.