The festival, or whatever it was called, if anything at all, was in full swing under the light of the night lanterns, with streets bursting with life. People were singing, dancing, drinking and brawling, bumping into and trampling over each other with complete disregard for their surroundings, stumbling over their own feet in an intoxicated daze.

There was, after all, just a few days left before it was time to close shop for at least a week or two to weather the coming storm. Consequently, everyone was trying their hardest to squeeze in just one or two more bottles, land just a couple of punches, or stick their junk into just one more rubber hole, a fleshy one if they were feeling spicy.

Animals, snorted Berg to himself with a tiny smile full of irony plastered on his face, glancing over the various scenes of unapologetic debauchery. He wasn’t in the mood for any of that bullshit, but… All this felt right, somehow. Felt free. Everybody just enjoying themselves with no brakes, no stops, no rules or limits. Nobody to stand over him and nag. Nobody to bother him with idiotic commands, or threaten him for who knows which little thing he did wrong. Well… Everyone here could try, but they didn’t have the balls to do so. And that, too, felt right.

He much preferred the rowdy night atmosphere to the somewhat grey and sad mornings and afternoons. Sure, you could have all sorts of fun on Porriga every single hour of the day, but the reality of the island that sometimes seeped through the thinned crowds early on in the day just killed the mood for Berg.

Yes. Nights are the best, he nodded to himself, each bump on his shoulder reminding him of the busy dinner times at the canteen, when there was no time to think. Just to eat. To live. A battlefield in its own right, he chuckled in his mind. Nights truly were unreal here. Almost magical, if one could ignore all the scum that roamed the alleys.

Out of the corner of his eye, Bergamont could see dozens of them at any given moment, scouting the crowds for their next pray. Thieves, extortionists, sadists and even some mugs who he could have sworn he’d seen on posters wanted for murder. Or maybe not. They all looked the same, after all. A bit like him in the mirror.

But what really plagued the streets this time of day – the bottom of the barrel – were the drug dealers. They skittered between people like roaches, unseen by most as they tempted the weak-willed with their shitty produce and rehearsed phrases. Their pockets were laden with death. Powders, syringes and pills for those old-school types, cartridges with simulations and neural imprints of the most ecstatic brain patterns for the techies, and worst of them all, Powdered Death, though those worms always called it something else. Something with flare, like Stardust, or some other bullshit.

But if one knew what the stuff was made of, it wasn’t exactly hard to figure out the reason for the real name. In reality it was just Ambers, extracted and ground up into dust, probably mixed with some fodder like glass or wooden mulch. Nobody would notice anyways… Not that Berg cared. Let people kill themselves the way they see fit. He didn’t care about the drugs themselves… But their sight reminded him of all the times he’d seen the boys at the barracks pumped full of the nasty mystery juice if their performance during drills ever lagged behind.

He reached for his flask on reflex to muddle his thoughts, only to immediately remember that it was empty. Right… He could just grab something on the way, but all this warm piss would only make him want to piss. The stuff Gaidegen served him was pretty nice, Berg felt, but that guy’s place was ways away and the Forester didn’t feel like going.

Instead, feeling a grumble in his stomach, he turned his attention to all the crappy food stalls that stuck out from between the brothels. He wasn’t a picky eater, having been brought up on gray slop and murky water, which he had to sometimes fight for, too, so usually he’d just grab the first thing he’d come across and stuff his face with that. Today, however, something was different. Among all the nauseating smells there was a hint of something… good. Something almost nostalgic, but what it was exactly? Berg couldn’t quite put his finger on that.

This abhorrent sense of smell finally came in handy as he followed the scent off to one of the side alleys and down a winding path that took him far away from the main streets into what seemed like a small square market, hidden between four tall buildings.

Here, the orange light of lanterns, blasted with the ever present neon rays gave way to colder blue tint that just barely illuminated various stands under the open sky full of what Berg could only describe as rubbish. Metal parts, herbal medicine, fish, small animals, scrap, exotic tools, primitive weapons, talismans, vases, spices. Everything and nothing at the same time. And behind every stall, a shape, not quite human, but not a beast, either.

Mutants. Some short and stubby with wet, glistening skin, others tall and skinny, some furry, others scaly with multitudes of appendages armed with talons, claws or simply misshapen fingers that looked like they could take a man’s head off with a flick, and much more. It must have been some sort of mutant enclave or ghetto. But Berg paid it no mind, following the sweet scent of food like a bloodhound stalking its prey, completely oblivious to the perplexed an agitated looks of the twisted creatures, which only grew in intensity the deeper he dove into the alien land.

Then, after a minute or two he found his goal at last. A humble little stand pushed up against a concrete wall. Its interior was separated from the outside only by a curtain of black and beige beads arranged into a strange pattern, hung on a waterfall of long strings, through which a truly tantalizing smell seeped through in a column of smoke and steam.

Having a look inside, the first thing Berg saw was the slimy back of the chef inside, who was busy working the crammed place with three pairs of tentacles. He didn’t even glance as his limbs operated the whole kitchen with impeccable precisions, searing, slicing, chopping and mixing various meats, herbs and other ingredients.

The mutant’s bluish-purple body looked like a slimy bloated sack that seemed like it could hardly move from one place to another. And yet it did, and quite quickly too, for his size, aided by yet more tentacles splayed out on the ground, which wiggled like dozens of slithering snakes as he moved his body around. His head, fused with his torso with all the excess blubber looked like a bump on a rubber ball, at least from the back.

Berg took one of the only three seats, the rightmost one, and took a deep, long sniff.

“What’s that?” he asked, wiping the corner of his mouth.

The mutant just glanced back for a fraction of a second and gurgled back. “What do you care?”

“Smells good.”

“Obviously. I’m the one cooking it,” he smirked to himself without letting Berg see.

“How much?”

The chef glanced once again.

“Not selling,” he mumbled, pouring some oil onto a pan.

“What does that mean?”

“Means I’m not selling. The city’s big. Go eat somewhere else.”

“What, you gonna eat it all yourself?”

“So what if I am?”

“You playing hard to get, huh? Fine, I’m game. Let’s try the easy way first” he snorted, placing a full little pouch on the counter. “Copper. Should be plenty.”

“I said that I’m not selling you anything, human. Money doesn’t–“

“Silver then?” he feigned surprise, placing another bag next to the first one. It wasn’t often that he found good use for all the money old Ol gave him, so he didn’t really mind overpaying. He was hungry.

The mutant was now half-turned towards Berg, but his expression was not that of a business man striking the best of deals. It was bitter and full of faltering determination. One of his bulging, yellow eyes staring at him fiercely.

“I think you’re lost, boy. Tourists usually know better than to wander in here, so I’ll give you a tip. Get out of my sight before I lose my temper,” he hissed threateningly, the little tentacles that covered his mouth like a dense mustache flapping wildly. He then whacked his knife on a wooden board, chopping a head off of a fish like it was made of butter, before slicing it into pieces and tossing them onto the pan.

“C’mon you greedy bastard. I know you won’t pass up on some gold,” another bag landed on the counter.

“Out! Get lost!” he finally snapped, slamming down two of his tentacles, sliding another down below the counter.

“So the fun way it is. You know, it smells good as is, so I’ll just borrow a bowl and eat it on the go,” he jerked his body to a standing position with a clang of plates and pots as he shook the whole place with just this one movement.

“Try me, you–”

“May your path be…” a scratchy voice interrupted the chef as a ghostly-white hand pulled the curtain open. “Were you perhaps in the middle of something?”

The cook curled up his tentacles as if he was clutching his fists.

“Was just about to finish, o, venerable guide,” he answered with much restraint, becoming quite tense all of a sudden.

“May I be of assistance?”

“You have my unending gratitude, but there is no need. I was just about to show a lost guest the way out.”

“Lost my ass. This damn nose of mine doesn’t lie. I’m right where I wanted to be.”

“Don’t you dare–“

“Yes, the fragrance is quite mesmerizing. Seems not only our path was bent towards it,” the voice laughed, making the chef even more visibly nervous.

“Wise one, he’s an outsider!”

“Hmm…” there was a brief pause. “Were we not outsiders on this island, too, once? Drowned in the dark of the night, when we lost sight of the road we treaded on, did we not wash ashore here?”

“But…” he wanted to say something, but froze, when the beads clacked and the man finally entered.

He was tall. Even taller than Berg, as he had to bend almost in half to fit under the rusty roof. His skin was pasty-white, leathery and dry, sticking close to his tense muscles and pointy protruding bones. He wore a loose black robe to his ankles, split in half at the waist by a white sash. His right was completely covered by a long, almost blanket-like sleeve, while his the upper left part of his torso, along with the shoulder and a pair of stretched, lanky arms were left in plain view, each one ending with three pointy, talon-like fingers.

He looked at Berg, or so the brute felt, when the man’s white, almost featureless head poked in, turned straight towards him. His face looked like a twisted mannequin’s, with no eyes, nose or ears. Just tiny scar-like slits here and there, interspersed with sporadic age spots, and a terrifying row of pointy teeth, going from one end of his face to the other, menacingly peeking out from behind his dried, thin, black lips. He seemed to be just barely smiling.

“The man you’ve refused fivefold now is more like us than different. Not every gift is visible to the eye, after all.”

The octopus man stood there for a moment, dumbfounded, as if just now realizing a terrible mistake.

The faceless monster then turned towards Bergamont.

“But even if we are of one substance, you have stirred too much, friend, and brought eyes upon yourself,” he discreetly pointed back towards the other stalls across the alley.

Berg turned his attention there without much restraint, and amongst all the junk on display noticed a bearded figure who was staring daggers at him, polishing a small rifle so as not to be too obvious about his intents. But he was just one amongst many. Practically all the merchants were now carefully monitoring each of the giant’s moves.

“They wouldn’t even tickle me with those sorry little peashooters,” Berg scoffed. “But I’d like to see them try.”

“Perhaps. But you’ve come here to quench the hunger of your body, and not your ego. Is that not the case?”

“What would you know?”

“Even if life brought me naught but uncertainty, I’d know that lead simply tastes bad.”

It took Berg a second, but he cracked up at that little quip and decided to sit down.

“Please, feed out friend here. It would be unbecoming to not repay his generosity,” the white one gestured towards the money sacks.

He looked at them with hesitation, then at Berg, who was staring back daggers at him, but not taking any of the bags away, as if challenging the mutant to take them. He reached for them, but stopped, rolling his tentacle into a ball, abashed.

“What will it be?” he asked with reluctance.

“The good smelling stuff, obviously,” Berg rolled his eyes and nodded his head towards the money, prompting the cook to stop dawdling and take it already.

“Coming right up…” he mumbled, hurriedly snatching the three sacks into a pocket on his greasy apron and turning back to work.

“How heartwarming,” the tall one pursed his lips into a somewhat normal-ish smile, before turning away. “Come. Come,” he quietly beckoned, looking almost straight down to the ground on his left, and slowly took a seat.

“And what’s your deal?” the brute couldn’t help but ask, looking at the weirdly dressed monk, who towered even over him.

“The sweet scent of massal has led us here, same as you.”

“Is that what it’s called?” he raised an eyebrow in genuine surprise. It smelled familiar, but the name didn’t ring any bells.

“Indeed. It’s a creamy porridge made with fried Sha’ki mushrooms.”

“Never heard of it,” he waved his hand dismissively.

“No wonder. It is a dish associated with death and poverty. Sha’ki are not much different from common weeds. They grow everywhere, but prefer corpses,” he explained somberly. “Truly a shame, because their taste is one of a kind… ” he sighed at the thought.

The cook has finally finished the dish and placed a steaming bowl of light-brown cream mixed with a tad overcooked rice, some herbs and side of pickled berries. Berg could almost taste it through smell alone. It was bitter-sweet and nutty. He took a big wooden spoon into his hand, but dared not dig in quite yet, delighting in the amazing fragrance.

“What may I serve you?” the octopus asked the white one with utmost respect.

“What would you like?” the monk turned his head to the left again.

A high-pitched voice, either that of a small boy or a girl, answered. “Same as the outsider.”

Berg looked away from his bounty. That got him curious, and so he leaned forwards to have a look. Behind the monk there sat a small figure, covered almost head to toe in a khaki hooded cape with numerous straps around the thin arms and waist. Looked like a child, but even some grown men gave that impression when one was as big as Bergamont.

“That your kid?” he asked without inhibitions.

The monk smiled again with that strained smile of his. “Oh, she’s–”

“Don’t indulge the stranger, Master. He’s suspicious.”

“How you’ve grown to lecture me, child,” he noted with unhidden fondness in his voice. “But he’s only a stranger until we get to know him and the path he walks,” he lectured the girl in a soft tone, then turned to Berg. “Excuse her harsh words.”

“Careful when you open that big mouth there, shorty. I’m a bad guy, but there are worse. Much worse,” he warned, only half-jokingly. He actually preferred when people spoke their mind. Made things easier.

“Massal, please,” she disregarded the brute completely and grabbed a spoon not unlike the one Berg had in his hand, turning her attention to the chef, who was fiddling with his tentacles.

“Sorry, but that was the last serving for today. There are no more ingredients,” he tried to bow his head in apology, but it just comically sunk into his fat torso.

There was short drumming noise as the wooden spoon fell onto the counter.

“That’s most unfortunate. It just was not meant to be, my dear disciple.”

“ I can prepare many other dishes,” the cook tried to save the situation, but to no avail.

“Let’s go home, Master,” the girl said, sounding just a little dead inside, slid off her seat like a teaspoon of jelly and parted the curtain of beads.

“If she wants it so bad, aren’t there any other stalls?”

“I’m afraid only Goran here cooks massal on the whole island,” the monk shook his head, preparing to leave. “Maybe some other day, my child.”

“Wait.” Berg stopped him, clutching his spoon almost to the point of cracking it, his gaze sinking deep into the brownish mass. He took one last whiff. “She can have it.”

“Oh, we couldn’t–“ the white one wanted to refuse, but before he could finish, the girl had already jumped back onto her seat, beads clacking violently behind her back.

Berg snickered wryly and started shoving the bowl to his left, but then jerked his hand back when he felt a strange sensation under his gauntlet. The space around the bowl seemed to bend and then momentarily collapse in on itself, consuming the dish in an instant. Or so it would seem for a brief moment, but then it reappeared in much the same fashion in front of the girl, just in reverse, as nothingness expanded into a steaming meal. She wasted no time and dug right in with a suppressed noise of utter satisfaction.

The monk let out a big sigh and bowed his head to Berg before slumping back onto the seat.

“I’m sorry,” he said, defeat oozing from his voice. “And thank you.”

“It’s fine. I know how it feels to go to sleep hungry. Besides, gotta have that energy to run after that big mouth gets her in trouble” the giant shook his head, not questioning the magically disappearing bowl. “Hey, tentacle. Whip me up the second best thing.”

The chef looked like he wanted to retort, but the white one cut in.

“Allow me to recommend, then,” he suggested earnestly.

“Be my guest.”

The men talked for a while, trying to pinpoint what would suit Berg’s tastes, and while the monk was weirdly knowledgeable and enthusiastic about all the various dishes, the Forester was just hungry for anything warm at that point. The monk’s detailed descriptions of tastes were rather endearing, however, as he would often liken specific flavors to the sensations he’d feel in specific places, like the sea, the forest, the mountains etc. But ultimately they went for a shared fried eel tray with spicy sweet-and-sour cabbage plus rice. Berg’s treat, since he’d already overpaid anyway.

And Berg thought it was surprisingly good! Certainly better than the oily meat scraps he’d been gorging himself on for weeks, if not months at this point. They enjoyed a beer or two, then a bit of something harder. And then at last came the best part when the monk, a bit tipsy, reached inside his robe and pulled out a small opaque canteen.

“Have you ever heard… of the Doran wine?” the white one inquired.

“A word or two.”

The monk unscrewed the cap and dripped just a single drop of the beautifully vibrant emerald liquid inside onto the last two pieces of eel.

“This shall… enlighten you.”

Berg didn’t really believe those words, but it only took one bite for him to understand. At first he felt just this tiniest drop of alcohol burn his tongue with increasing strength but just as it was about to become unbearable, it was replaced by the most intense taste he’d ever tasted. It was as if the eel’s flavor has increased a thousandfold for a fraction of a second. And in this millisecond he could truly appreciate all its nuances, all its details. A true epiphany. It was amazing… for a moment. And then it burned again. Berg coughed. He didn’t remember the last time something burned his throat this hard. It was like swallowing glowing-hot rods laden with spikes.

“Holy hell,” he yelped, his eyes getting watery. “What’s that thing made of?”

“Doran emerald seaweed,” he answered, nonchalantly biting into his piece of eel. “It’s only slightly radioactive,” he smiled the creepy smile for the third time, and that seemed to be their cue to leave.

“That’s enough, Master. Let us rest for today,” the girl prodded the man’s side. As he rose to his feet, she even tugged at his sleeve to warn him not to bump his head, and led him out.

“May the roads… ahead of you be shmooth and wide,” he bid his farewell.

“Hey, monk,” Berg called out, about to leave himself. “What’s your name?”

The white creature turned back, wobbly on his feet, his needle-like teeth shimmering in the faint bluish light. “Kharboga. What’s yours?”

“It’s Bergamont. If we meet again, I’ll want another taste of that wine, Kharboga.”

The white mutant laughed quietly, but the girl seemed to shoot Berg one last look of… what exactly? Concern? Anger? Surprise? The man couldn’t tell. And he didn’t care. It was time to go back.