297: Agriculture

True to his word, Lital introduced me to every priest that we walked past, and internally, I hated being introduced as Lord Ashmoon to so many people.

When we finally left, I felt exhausted after having shaken the hands of at least a dozen people, and despite being told all their names, I couldn’t remember a single one.

I couldn’t help but smile though, because Clacks chirped at every single person during the introduction, what I believed was a hello.

Once on the path out of the tree though, I let out a big sigh.

“I can’t remember a single name,” I said.

Jen laughed, “Don’t worry, I’m sure they won’t expect you to remember everyone; I certainly wouldn’t. It’s just polite that way.”

My attention now turned to the market itself. “Should we get Liane for the market?”

“Not a chance. I’d wager a gold that she’s already there or on the path there waiting for us, and if she’s not, I may make it out of the market without any bugs,” Jen said.

Crisplet let off some sparks, but Clacks hopped on my shoulder and gave Jen some loud chirps, before turning to Crisplet and doing the same.

“You wouldn’t want poor Clacks to starve now, would you?” I said, putting on my best fake sad tone.

Clacks flapped her wings.

“That’s not fair and you know it! I would never let poor Clacks starve,” Jen said, defending herself.

“I know, I know, but she really did love those water beetles, and honestly, they were not bad,” I said.

Approaching the market, I was in awe of the river that I could see. I struggled to believe that the small stream I saw just a couple of days ago was this body of water; it was so large now. Out on the water itself, I could see boats that appeared to be fishing.

Then came the smell of the market: fresh breads and pastries, mixed with what could only be described as animal manure. It made for a conflicting series of smells.

“You get used to it, then all you smell is the bread,” Jen said knowingly.

There was a stream of carts going to and from the area the markets were in, which surprised me just how busy it was also.

I got startled when Clacks started to chirp next to my ear, turning around to see Liane appearing there.

“No fair, how did you spot me, Clacks?” Liane said.

“She spotted you?” I asked, confused.

Liane nodded. “Yeah, she started chirping as I was sneaking up behind you.”

I felt pride pushed across from Crisplet, which I had to agree with.

“Well done, Clacks, that’s really impressive to see through her stealth like that,” I said.

I gave her a little scratch on the head which she seemed to enjoy lately.

“I’m upset you didn’t come get me though,” She said, looking at me.

I shrugged. “Jen said you’d already be on the way.”

Jen had a knowing grin on her face.

I just started to make my way towards the market, now able to follow the traffic and noise to easily find my way.

Arriving, it was rather unlike other markets I had visited; there appeared to be fenced-off areas that contained Buvul, horses, a couple of Drakhals, a single massive Grovul, and I even spotted what looked like some Grumfel that looked to be in smaller locked pens.

Then came what must have been the piles of manure, and there was so much of it, what must have been wagons’ worth dumped only a short distance away from the animal pens.

“That’s all seed for the crops,” Jen pointed to the wagons and wagons worth of sacks.

“I expected to see more food,” I said.

“We’re getting there, but all the farming stuff is first; animals, fertiliser, seed, tools, everything you need to run a farm is here,” Jen explained.

Looking back, I said, “I saw Grumfel back there; why are they with the farm animals?”

“It’s mostly what you think; they are raised for meat, but some farmers also use them as they do a really good job of turning the soil,” Jen said.

Looking back to the river, I had to ask, “How are there no monsters in there?”

“It’s believed to be the Tree of Life’s doing; however, it’s unclear if it will continue to do so while the world’s being flooded with mana. We can only hope the leaders of the town will take heed of the warning that I’m sure will go out,” Liane said.

Clacks let out some chirps at Liane, who seemed to have a grin on her face.

“What did you do?” I asked.

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“She didn’t see me that time!” Liane said happily.

“I didn’t even know you vanished again!” I said, surprised.

Liane had a giant grin on her face. “You were not supposed to; I had a decoy following you. I just wanted to surprise little Clacks there.”

Clacks seemed outraged by this as I could feel her hopping on my shoulder and chirping.

“You’ve set a challenge now, you know that,” I said.

Liane smiled now. “I do, but it’s great practice. I had no idea her perception was so high already, and if she’s looking for me, perhaps it will give me another evolution option.”

We’d been walking the entire time, and we had moved into tools and equipment now; there was everything from wagons, carts, and shovels to some stuff I had simply never seen before.

“You know, I really always believed they used magic for all the planting,” I said honestly.

Jen shook her head. “No, farmers get some useful skills; they can tell soil condition, weather conditions, and crop conditions at a glance, even increased yield. But they still have to do a lot of manual labour.”

Next, we started to walk into what must have been bulk grain, and I was eager to see it already. I was already running low on rolled grain for my porridges.

“Not yet, Trev, this is animal feed, basically crop that doesn’t make the cut for what they sell to people. They then sell it for the farm animals; nothing goes to waste,” Liane said.

That quickly gave way to what I was really looking forward to. Instead of wooden stalls, as most of the market I’d visited so far had, most of this was made up by farmers laying out their goods straight off the backs of wagons, with baskets arrayed on the floor. Some had little tables set up with sacks of goods piled behind them.

“Don’t worry about overbuying here, Trev. These farmers would be over the moon to sell their crops and head back home, especially since often merchants wait until stock starts to age before they swoop in and buy it cheap,” Jen said.

“It’s just as well everything lasts longer under the tree, or it would be a problem,” Liane added.

So far, it all looked to be very basic ingredients, but I still purchased plenty, buying all my base vegetables by the sack.

I was also happy to finally find rice again; I had not had this since Greenstone, when I had left Dunhearth originally.

There were different varieties they were selling, which were intriguing, and at only five silver a sack, I got one of each to try. One was a long grain, one was the regular short grain, while the third one was purple and was probably the one I was most curious about.

We then walked into the area with all the ground and rolled grain. I stocked up on grain flour, as well as the rolled grain I was looking for, but I also found some interesting ones here too, like corn that had been ground into flour, and several different kinds of root starches.

As I was putting them away, Clacks seemed to notice something, and when I turned around, it was clear what she saw even from here. We were nearing the market that had all the river food.

“We’ll go there in a moment; we have to get some fruit for everyone first,” I said, giving her a scratch.

Several more chirps.

I got the feeling a moment later for Crisplet. One I’d never felt before from him, so I knew it must have been passed on directly from Clacks.

‘Hungry’

Instinctively, I pulled out a small fish, not thinking until too late as she started tearing into it on my shoulder.

“You can’t eat from the stalls down there, you know, Clacks. We have to buy it first, or it’s stealing,” I tried to explain.

I was fairly sure she ignored me. I turned to Crisplet. “Could you explain it, Crisplet?”

He just sent back confusion, then turned around and started to float away. This caused both Liane and Jen to burst into laughter.

I was now dreading Clacks diving straight into the first pile of small fish she saw, especially since she was sitting high up.

There was no need to worry in the end. I purchased all the fruit I needed. Berries were starting to come back into season. I also got plenty of citrus fruits and lemons, but there were several others called stone fruits. Essentially, they had one giant seed inside that I got, again for everything I purchased by the sack, and everything so far was surprisingly cheap; nothing had gone over that five silver mark.

Entering the fish market, I was amazed at the variety of creatures on display. Some of the stuff looked like monsters, and it was incredible that dangerous ones didn’t develop.

There were creatures with long tentacles, while others were covered in spikes, just a solid ball of spikes.

“How does anyone even eat that?” I asked.

“You crack it open and eat the inside,” Liane explained.

I just heard Jen behind us saying, ‘Yuk.’

“For this one, I have to agree with Jen, though; it’s an acquired taste. Personally, I find it to be muddy,” Liane explained.

In the end, I still purchased one, for the simple reason that I wanted to know what buffs it offered, and right now I was on the hunt for more water buffs to help Clacks.

I purchased several varieties of fish. I really had no idea what was different about them, and most of the stores seemed so busy that the merchants didn’t have time to explain it to me, which was fine; I was happy to experiment.

There was one particular store that didn’t appear busy at all that really caught my eye.

It looked to be covered in dried green plants, of so many different varieties.

“Hello there!” the lady said, sitting on the ground.

“Hi! What are these?” I asked, looking around.

“River plants! Super good for your diet and gut health!” she started to say.

“Uh, how are they used?” I was looking mostly behind me, hoping that Jen or Liane would save me.

The lady, however, was still telling me about health benefits, though I did catch certain things, like sticky rice, and that they could be used in a salad or a soup. Also, again, this wasn’t for me; this was buffs for Clacks.

“So all these plants are from the river here?” I asked.

“That’s right! Picked them myself,” she said proudly.

“You should be careful; someone found drownweed in there recently,” I said.

“It’s fine! I grew up in these waters, know them like the back of my hand,” she said, waving it off.

It didn’t feel right dropping it there, but I was torn now. I wanted the plants, not for any health benefit, but for clacks. However, if I bought them all, she’d obviously head straight back out to pick more, where I knew there were dangerous plants now.

“I’ll get a small bundle of each type please,” I said.

I made a note that we really needed to make sure the warning was spread, and soon.

As soon as we stepped away, I voiced my concern to the others. “People are going to get hurt if we don’t do anything,” I said simply.

Jen nodded.

“You can always pull rank in town and visit the Lord as a fellow noble. You’ll likely get the same resistance you got in the pinch though when telling them to stop chopping the dark forest,” Liane explained.

“We’ll talk to the others about it tonight, especially when Lewie gets back,” Jen added.

“For now, Trev, the store that Jen’s trying to have you avoid is over this way. It’s got all the fun critters that Clacks will love,” Liane said happily, already heading off that way.

“Wait! But desserts are over here!” Jen tried to call.

I felt Clacks had said all that needed to be said, chirping at her once with a single flap of the wings. It felt like she put her foot down on the matter.

Who knew such a young bird would have so much attitude?