Now that we’re back in the city, I think I know what our next course of action is. While we were riding back home on Lina, I got to thinking that we really didn’t even get a taste of how quality the wheat seeds we bought actually is, apart from the visual examination. It’d be a shame if the wheat it came from was bad, thus altering its saturation, so as any good person would do, I thought that we should be Havana’s official taste testers in this scenario.

“Hey, what are you doing, Schnell?”

“I’m just grabbing a small amount for us!” I defended my actions hastily, “We bought it with our money, so we at least deserve a single bread’s worth.”

“Put it back.” He sighed, “Wheat isn’t something that can grow overnight. It takes four to eight months at least, amigo.”

“You’re kidding.” I groaned as I put the wheat seeds back into the sack, “Dammit…”

“That being said, I’m already way ahead of you.” He smiled as he went to get something from Lina’s other pouch, “Here. I asked the farmer if he was willing to give us some flour from this wheat. As a taste test of sorts.”

Shaid, I’m so glad we’re on the same wavelength! I can’t believe that both of us thought of the exact same thing! Actually, what even are the chances of such a godly thing happening?! This must be fate! It’s decided, I’m gonna make the best bread the World has ever seen! That being said…

“Uhh…” I stared at the bag of flour Shaid handed me, “How exactly does one make bread from flour?”

“Oh brother…” He facepalmed as he looked away.

“Oh, come on! I’m a blacksmith, not a baker! Obviously I won’t know how to make bread from wheat!”

“No, you misunderstood.” Shaid elaborated on his earlier reaction, “I didn’t say that because I’m making of you for not knowing how to, but rather because I don’t know either. I was really leaning on you knowing how the whole process went, what with your mother always making the food back home and all.”

“Again with my mother… Would you stop that?!” I got off the ship after tying Lina up tightly, “The jokes are starting to stale, y’know?”

“I was serious this time!” He shot back, “Your mother makes the best bread! I really thought you knew how to replicate it!”

“How the hell does that work? If that’s the case, then can you also sleep wi-!”

Sleep with countless men, is what I wanted to shout back, but I quickly realized that would’ve been too horrid of a diss. It’s not alright to make fun of others’ family issues, especially if that someone is your best friend. Add to that the fact that he literally didn’t even want to anger you in the first place, and you’ve got yourself a perfect way to lose a good friend in life. Really, that was way too close, I should change the topic as soon as possible.

“Schnell?” He tilted his head, “What’s the matter? You suddenly got quiet.”

“N-No, it’s alright…” I bit my tongue as I continued walking faster, “In any case, let’s just go ask the baker near our place.”

“Ah, good idea. Why didn’t we think of that in the first place?”

“No clue.”

And so, another argument was averted as we walked past the inn and instead made a detour to the bakery. Entering the place, we had kindly greeted the somewhat plump but all in all cheerful person as he rung us up. We were rather sheepish in our way of speaking to him, as we were about to ask him something I’m sure he’s never been asked before, but he took the whole thing rather gracefully.

“You want me to make you the bread with your flour?” He tilted his head with a confused smile, “Alright, what’s this about?”

“Sorry if we’re bothering you, sir!” I loudly apologized, “We got our hands on the flour, but neither of us know how to bake it into bread. Could you show us?”

“Alright, I’ve got time. But just know that making this isn’t gonna be free.”

“Of course! We’ll pay for all the ingredients used!”

“No, no, you’re gonna be paying way more than that.” He chuckled.

“What do you mean?”

“Let’s see – the ingredients, the time I’ll be wasting on teaching you, the actual baking class you two will be attending… That all amounts to a pretty penny, don’t you think?”

“Urk…” I cried inside as I whipped out our money pouch, “Please teach us well…”

In the end, it seems we really didn’t know how to bake at all. He started off with asking us what all we knew, to which Shaid raised his hand weakly and replied “Put the flour in the furnace?”. Needless to say, the baker laughed in our faces and properly explained the process like we were a bunch of five year olds.

Apparently, it goes a little something like this – First you take the flour, put it in a bowl, put in some eggs, milk, salt, and maybe even some water if you’re so inclined. He then showed us this little powder he called yeast, and couldn’t stop stressing just how important it was for the bread to actually rise. We didn’t understand what he was getting at, so he offered to make two breads, one with it, and the other without.

The entire mixture has to be whisked the entire time while you’re adding all this stuff into it, and in the end you end up with something that’s supposed to be bread batter. The batter was to be placed in an oven by way of this large wooden shovel like thing. Heh, I was actually the one to put it in, because Shaid was too weak to accurately and carefully lift the thing with the bread on it without the batter dropping.

“And there you have it. Wait like 15 minutes and you’ve got yourself some fine bread. But judging from the batter, I can already tell that this flour you guys got was amazing.”

“Really?” We wiped away the sweat from our foreheads as we took five, “That’s good. We actually bought a ton of the seeds for it from a farmer just outside of town. We wanna make ourselves a field to grow them.”

“Is that so? Well, it’s nice to see some younglings find themselves a productive hobby. Do call me up in the future if you succeed. Maybe we can strike up a nice deal between us.”

Wow, this guy’s actually a lot more pleasant than we thought. When we first entered the place, I can imagine just how suspicious he was of us, since we had asked for such an odd request of him, but he seems to really enjoy hard working kids. Now all we have to do is wait for the bread to be done.

“Alright, it’s time.” The baker said as he had me take out both the breads out of the oven.

“Woah! Look at the difference!” Shaid immediately noticed, “It’s night and day, amigo!”

“Right? That’s what yeast does.” The baker explained, “Without it, the bread stays all flat and barely rises at all. It’s not at all an overstatement to say that you need yeast when baking good bread. Alright, now take both of them and give ‘em a good sniff.”

Doing as we were instructed, we couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity of the situation. The bread with the yeast in it smelled just like you would expect bread to smell – fresh, a tad bit salty, and warm. On the other hand, the bread without the yeast had barely any aroma, and I can imagine that the taste is very much the same thing.

“I guess we’ll need to look into how yeast is made, then.” I turned to the nodding Shaid, “No yeast bread just won’t do!”

“Oh, that?” The baker laughed, “Fermented wine and fresh beer.”

“What?!” We jolted, “You’ve gotta be kidding! Tanathos…!”

For a moment, I thought of Havana, and recalled an important detail we learned about the Old Man that served as its leader. Tanathos was a huge alcoholic. He’d always have some wine in his caravan, and he’d often take it out for a swig. He had bought water for the other residents, but the wine was all his. He didn’t even drink the water, he’d practically live off of wine and wine only. Obviously, since he’s got so much to spare, he must have a good seller, which means it’s not that difficult to take some for the bread. It’s perfect!

“Thanks for everything!” We took the bread and started walking back to our inn.

“Hold it.” The baker stopped us before gesturing for us to pay up.

“Ugh… We forgot about that…”

***

Alright! With the wheat having been properly tested, the results are in – a whopping success! It’s got the perfect conditions to make a flour worth turning into bread and eating! Yep yep, that’s what it’s all about! Honestly, I couldn’t be more ecstatic after this, but we shouldn’t be too hasty now. Shaid and I took turns eating the breads the baker gave us on the way back to the inn, literally passing them between us, taking a chunk out, then exchanging them back. By the time we had arrived home, we had already eaten the entire loaves, so since we already ate, we decided to just skip rest and immediately head out. Where were we going, you ask?

“The forest!” I pointed my index finger to the sky.

“The bazaar!” Shaid refuted, “Schnell, what the fuck are you thinking?”

“Well, we need soil, right? ‘S our next thing to tick off the list.”

“Yes, and so, to ensure the best quality soil and advice, we should ask a professional, just like we did with the baker.”

“But then they’ll ask us to pay up again!” I explained, “Look, I’mma give it to ya’ straight, Shaid. We don’t got much more funds left, y’see? It’s about time we left this place, but before that we gotta get the soil.”

“Mnn…” He groaned, “Alright, there is a forest nearby to the west. It should be close enough for us to not even need Lina.”

“Now you’re talkin’!” I patted him on the back as we put our boots back on, “Once again – to the forest we go!”

Now the thing here is, we don’t actually know what the soil is like there. Unlike the bread, we kinda know more or less what we’re dealin’ with given how long we’ve been playin’ in the dirt for our entire youth. Even still, it’s not up ta’ us if the soil is good or not. See, that part’s all luck.

“You doin’ alright?” I said as we made our way up the mountain, “We’re halfway there, c’mon now.”

“Phah, haah…!” He heaved and coughed, “Ugh, I envy your bulky stature, amigo. Unlike you, my skinny ass just isn’t cut out for this level of mental and physical strain.”

“Oh right, now that you mention it, we haven’t really rested all that much at all ever since we woke up from that nap.” I chuckled, “Y’know, back when you and Olya…”

“Do not talk of that subhuman.” He clicked his tongue before shutting up.

“Hey.” I stopped to address the issue.

“…”

“I don’t care if what he did offends you or anything, but the least you could do is tell me what he did that made you react like that. I’m yer’ best friend, dammit.”

“…He had illustrations.” He muttered, “Illustrations of girls.”

“Eh?” I tilted my head, “That’s it?”

“It is not it.” Shaid glared at me, “The girls, they were… No, the illustrations were extremely lewd. And the girls were underage. That is the issue.”

Wait, our pal Olya’s like that? Hold on, how young we talkin’ about? ‘Cause if he was drawing girls around mine and Shaid’s age, I would give him the pass, I think. I mean, he’s done enough for us, and I’d say anyone wants a girl who’s in the prime of her life, vice versa of course. But no, even I can’t be that naïve. Shaid’s reaction wouldn’t be like that, not unless it’s something so horrid that it would drive him to a blind rage. I need to accept the facts, who I thought was my good friend ended up being a groomer, or at least one who fantasizes about it.

“But hey, he did a lot for us.” I squatted to Shaid’s Eye level, because of the upward curve, “And he did mention he never had plans to act on his fantasies.”

“Amigo, you’re defending a criminal.”

“I know.” I smiled back, “But isn’t it kinda’ cool to say we’re friends with a criminal?”

“You… if you saw what he drew, you’d absolutely despise him too.” He warned.

“Yeah, but because of a certain someone, I didn’t get to see it.” I teased, “So blame yourself on that front. Look, I just dun’ wanna hate on someone if they didn’t do anythin’ to me. It’s that simple. That being said, he’s an important figure that’ll make our journey a thousand times easier, so what say you at least act like you forgive him for now?”

“That’s a horrible idea.” He spit on the floor, “Screw him. He’s a damn pedo and we shouldn’t enable him. Best we stray from those people, Schnell. They’re sick in the head.”

“Hey, remember what our goal is on this journey?” I sat down, gesturing for him to follow suit, “We wanna unite the World with the power of kindness. That ain’t gonna work if you’re gonna be like that.”

“…Tch.” He sat down next to me, “You’re gonna regret it, but alright. If we see him again, I’ll be sure to apologize and tell him to come back.”

Yeah, this is how it’s supposed to be. Forgive, no matter what. I know it’s a difficult topic, but I know Olya as the jokey, kind of sly Revisor who knows his way around the legal system well. He can have all the fantasies he wants, as long as he keeps them to himself. Of course, if he does one day decide that simply fantasizing isn’t enough, then all ties are cut immediately. But that’s where Shaid and I come in to keep him in check. We’ll be the chains that’ll keep those thoughts of his tightly secured in his mind.

“Bjorn.” Shaid quietly spoke, “Shit, Schnell, run! It’s a Bjorn!”