Chương 8: Chapter 7: Nature's Bounty

He looked at me. I looked at him. He furrowed his brow at me, eyes going huge. I inspected him. Torch Axebright, level 7 Scout, Wide Awake, Terrified. What do you even do in a situation like that? Put yourself in his situation for a minute. You're alone, at this random river in the middle of nowhere with nobody for miles around but this ruined town full of the haunted dead. Then you see a blood-soaked woman walk up across the river from you with a rusty frying pan, as naked as the day she was born.

On the dead town side of the river. He ran. Couldn't say I blamed him. He didn't even scream - he saved his breath for running away. First living person I saw in this world, and he ran from me like I was some kind of wilderness cryptid.... Fair's fair, I suppose, I kind-of... was that cryptid. It wasn't worth dwelling over, not with the hunger burning in my belly.

"Yes, I think that was a reasonable response, all things considered." Gelidia said softly, watching him go. I just grunted, and slipped into the water, discovering the river to be... well, pleasant. The water was so clear and pure, lined with cool sand and smooth pebbles. Little silver fish swam around me to my delight, and deeper in I could see waving water grasses caught in the gentle current.

The water near me turned pink in a trailing line as it washed away the evidence of my work on the deer, taking the tacky sticky feeling along with it. Some river sand helped in this, giving me some grit to work with. My hair was beyond that though - I did the best I could and lamented the absence of things like brushes. Gelidia followed me, but she did not get into the water - she walked on the surface of the river, floating above me. Why not make a brush? People made brushes with bits of bone, right?

I'd have to work on that. Onto my list of things to do it went. Once I was clean enough to be getting on with, I set to work on the skillet. A river stone was easy enough to find, and I began to work it in gentle circular strokes, trying to break up the rust that had gathered there. I was scraping it, exposing raw metal in so doing, but that was better, wasn't it? Besides - I had fat from the deer. I could... I dunno, coat the skillet in fat to keep it from going rusty again, right?

I was surprised when a notification popped up on my screen. Ding Ding Ding! Your [LIFE] Peasant core has reached level 1! You have gained 1 skill point! Health +10, Stamina +15 Whoah! What for? I was confused by that - why did I level? None of my skills ranked up? I wasn't even doing anything special.

"I just leveled my Peasant core!" I said, and Gelidia blinked down at me, standing above the surface of the water as she was.

"How curious... that's a... Life-tagged class, right?" she asked, sitting on the water's surface.

"Yeah, it has a green Life tag thing on it." I affirmed.

"Those are called Tags?"

"That's... the common parlance, yes. It's not really surprising it leveled - that type of class should just level as you work its skills and do 'life' things, I suppose. As far as I know, the Peasant class is just a general laborer core, made for helping what you might call normal people just get along - it's all about caring for a house, cooking, cleaning, caring for animals, that kind of thing. It's not an artisan, but it can pick up crafting skills.

It's not a politician, even if that is also a Life-tagged class, but you can pick up social skills too." she explained, and shrugged. I didn't have any skills that actually took a skill point - that happened at rank C. Inspect was getting closer to that point, but Knapping was still chugging along. I'd need to knap some more stuff to get that good and high! Bestial Might had ranked up just by using it alot, and... it did say I could use it in any form, right?

I'd used it to dress the deer almost without even noticing I'd done it. Maybe I could grind it a bit on the way back to the town? Maybe save myself some daylight in the process? I resolved to do so. My Peasant core also needed leveling, and I still had an empty skill slot. Maybe cooking would fill that gap? I'd always liked cooking! I'd certainly try! And then there was the castle! I promised my new friend, Gelidia, that I'd look into that. I looked to the ghost in question, and gave her a smile.

"What?" she said "What are you giving me that look for?" The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

"I'm just thinking about... like, how to grind my skills a bit, you know? And I promised you I'd help you check on your family - I mean to keep my word on that." I said "I think today, I'll see if I can't sort out some stuff - I need to eat and rest a bit, maybe sweep off that bridge so I don't gouge myself to pieces on poisonstone." I said. She sighed.

"Right... you do need to eat and sleep and things. I can't say I miss that part of being alive." she said. Still smiling, I clambered out of the water. Werewolf strength or not, that's a little awkward! The water clinging to my body made me a little slippery, and the grasses that grow tall on the river bank aren't exactly what you'd call easy to grip! They laid flat and made a slippery surface, but by fits and starts I climbed halfway onto the bank before slipping in again with a huff of frustration!

Then it dawned on me - I was doing this like a human! I bunched my legs and felt something inside me ask me 'how much?' as I did so! I tried to analyze the feeling, and thought about the distance and just kind of winged it. I just wanted to get up - so I just used a little of my Stamina, and kicked with both legs. Like before, when I'd been changed, I propelled myself into the air much farther than I ever could in my world as a human, but I didn't use nearly as much stamina as I had then - just a little bit!

It was more than enough to propel me up to land on the bank, taking a couple steps after the landing to bleed off my momentum. Gelidia came up after me, blinking!

"How did you do that? You're human right now!" she said, and I shook my head.

"I have a skill from my Lycanthrope class! It synergized with my subsumed core too and became Bestial Might! I can apparently use it in any form!" I said with an excited little laugh knit to my words! I wasn't even out of breath! It had been... so easy! I could feel something else inside me - the Wolf. My Wolf. She was inside me still as well. I didn't know what that meant exactly, she felt a lot more distant, but she had enjoyed doing that, and I felt this... urge. The urge to run, because I knew it would be fun!

I knew it was the Wolf part of me that wanted that - I could just... feel the truth of that!

"That... alright, I guess that makes sense - Hey!" and I was off, laughing, bounding through the woods! At first, I tried to meet the ground with my feet for every step, but that wasn't quite right! I was strong enough that I could... bound! Bound like a deer, bouncing my way through the underbrush! And do you know what? It WAS fun! A lot of fun! I let out a woop of excitement and made it to the tree at least as fast as my hybrid form had from the town, from the river!

And when I got there, panting, drawing in huge lungfuls of cool late morning air, birds singing all around me as golden sunlight shone onto my skin from the canopy, I caught a whiff of something! Something... sort of familiar! It was part of the forest scent all around me, but there was a plant nearby with a particular scent! When Gelidia caught up to me, she found me thoughtfully walking along, sniffing the air, looking around, picking up little sprigs of plants near me to sniff them before tossing them down.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"Do you smell something, girl?" she said, teasing in her voice. I shot her a glare, only mildly annoyed.

"Yeah I do! D-don't talk to me like you're talking to a dog!" I said, cheeks heating!

"Well I'm sorry, you run around naked and sniff things like an animal!" she said, crossing her arms. I ignored her, because I was pretty sure I'd found what I was looking for! The next plant I brought to my nose. It had beautiful purple-blue flowers and the scent was heavenly, earthy, and... so familiar to me! It reminded me of the times before the great war, before the bombs, when I was young, helping my papa cook!

I sniffed a bloom and huffed a happy sigh as Gelidia looked on, chuckling in amusement at my antics, tilting her head. For the moment, I ignored her! This... this seemed the most important thing to me in this moment. Remembering myself, I inspected it! Sage plant, Common, Cookery ingredient. A common sage plant, The leaves can be used as an herb in cooking and in tea. The flowers have a slightly tart flavor and can also be used.

"Sage!" I breathed, as if greeting an old, old friend. This... this plant was a sage plant! It had sort of fuzzy leaves that smelled... amazing. I took some carefully, and as I looked around, I discovered that the Sage grew wild around here. If there was this herb, maybe there were others I could find around, too? Plants that were familiar to me even now, years and years after my childhood.

My pace slowed down a bit after that initial mad dash, and I tried to make use of my nose and eyes in concert to find maybe more plants! I found a squat little plant nearby, and crouched down beside it as the sun beat down on my back. I had just gotten clean, but... with only a little digging, I discovered little round tubers under the plant! This was another common little plant that grew in these woods! I inspected it too! Fairy Potato plant, common, Cookery ingredient. A common fairy potato plant.

The roots of the Fairy Potato are considered a delicacy in many parts of the world.

"Oh! Potatoes!" I said, picking some of the little gems out of the earth that cradled them! I started dropping them into the skillet I'd scoured. It didn't take me long to find a kind of onion, too! Ramp plant, Common, Cookery ingredient. A common Ramp plant. Every part of the Ramp plant that grows wild in the region are edible, and prized for their strong flavors. BOY OH BOY these stunk too once I'd gotten them out of the ground. By now, I was using my skillet as a kind of basket for all my veggies that I'd found!

"Oh I am SO making some stew!" I said, and set off through the woods again towards town! The forest provided me with lots of good things to cook! Maybe I could find some flour or salt or something in a cellar in town, too? That'd sure be something! I picked a crapload of the Ramps and the Potatoes, as many as I could fit in the skillet, and took a fair bit of sage with me as well.

"Well I'm glad you're happy about that." Gelidia said with a chuckle. I beamed!

"Oh, totally! This is gonna be great!" I cheered, and bounced my way back into town, arms full of nature's bounty!