Chương 29: Shower Thoughts

Jordan had filled his empty belly, but his night was far from over. The same sentry now ushered him across the courtyard and onto a large open area, which at first glance looked like an elaborate water feature at a botanical garden. It took Jordan a second or two to twig that the contraption was an open-air shower. Streams of water cascaded down rocky walls, to then fall upon paved floors graded for drainage. No complicated plumbing needed to make it work.

All you needed was a Hydromancer or two casting [Manipulate Water] at a large scale. Even now, droves of young men in a uniform state of undress huddled on one side of the walls, while groups of six at a time took turns at the communal shower. Some of the queuers looked up curiously as Jordan approached, but most seemed more focused on fending off the evening chill.

"You're lucky to have shown up on Heaven's Day night," the sentry groused at Jordan as he looked him up and down. He then sniffed the air and made a face.

"Or perhaps we your new comrades are the lucky ones. Otherwise, we would've had to breathe in a whole week's worth of your stink."

'Heaven's Day', as Jordan had already learned, was the Stormvaster name for Sunday (with the rest of the week being named after the six deities). And the sentry's spiel answered a question he'd yet to voice, about the economics of a shower ritual that required such extravagant VR spend. Makes sense to limit it to a weekly thing. In which case, yes, I am super lucky that the week lined up just so for me.

The upshot was that Jordan was made to strip down to nothing, with his (read: Hatchet of Copper Hill's) clothes dumped into a massive laundry basket. These were personal effects with sentimental value, he tried to argue, but the sentry shouted him down with a 'you'll get them back on the morrow!' With that bit of unpleasantry out of the way, Jordan joined the back of the queue. The experience wasn't for the faint of heart.

Not since his high school basketball days had he been surrounded by so much naked testosterone. He felt self-conscious about two things in particular: 1) his obvious unc status next to a group whose average age couldn't have been much higher than 20, and 2) the moderate yet definitely visible paunch around his tummy.

'Central adiposity' was his family doctor's term for it, while he himself called it 'adulting tax'. Between work, life, and general bullshit, he couldn't remember the last time he'd been to a gym. Presently, in another stroke of luck, he found himself lined up behind a fellow with a somewhat similar BMI. Slightly shorter and considerably paunchier than Jordan, the man turned and greeted him with an effortlessly friendly smile.

"They got you too, huh?" the man said as if sharing an inside joke.

"So, what are you in for?" <Character Sheet> Name: PEWTER SAPLING Race: Human Age: 28 Class: Tetherer, Lv. 4 Vessel: Gourd of Tenacity 28 years old. Out-unc'd by Jordan, but still one of the older recruits. At any rate, the presence of this Pewter Sapling helped to alleviate Jordan's self-consciousness.

"I guess it was kind of a wrong place wrong time type situation." He decided to keep things vague. Pewter gave him a look as if to say: don't I know it.

"What a coincidence! That's my story, too, and I'm sticking to it." Pewter gave his answer, unprompted. He then went on to do a lot more than just answer his own question.

"Well, that's if you count family as wrong place and birth order as wrong time. See, as the third oldest Sapling, it fell to me to work the military service angle. You won't believe for how long Father pressured me to join the Army, before I finally got sick of his nagging. I mean, it's understandable, of course. Having a soldier in your family does play well with the common folk." Jordan merely blinked at his companion. If this was still an elaborate inside joke, he'd missed his cue to be let in on it.

"Oh." Pewter's eyes widened in realization.

"You don't know? Forgive me, it's rare that I have to explain my family background. Sapling and Sons Ironworks. My grandfather was the founder. And now, my two older brothers are apprenticing the family business while I serve the Emperor in their stead." Ironworks, eh? I wonder if they were responsible for the bars of my jail cell. Also, if you come from a family of Metallurgists, then why are you yourself a Te— The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

"Again, apologies," Pewter again, seeming to take Jordan's silence as invitation to keep talking.

"When they told us we were to welcome a Lv. 30 cauldron-bearer to our ranks, I naturally assumed—""Wait, you guys knew about me already?"

"Why, of course! The rumor spread like wildfire as soon as Rangers Catchgrain and Quiverwing returned from their mission. It's not often… well, it's more like never that we get a Lv. 30 anyone joining the Army as a lowly recruit, though I'm sure there's a good reason for it. I have to assume you're the Imperium's answer to the Garuda? Here to finally put an end to her reign of terror?"

"Well, I…" Jordan trailed off, remembering the 'terror' bit very well but nothing of the 'answer'." Yu … Yu… Yu?" Pewter murmured, mind obviously churning at a different gear to Jordan's.

"Forgive me, I'm not familiar with your surname. Could it be Basinsider in origin? Or even Cloudgate, perhaps? What does your family do, Gatekeeper Yu?"

"I, uh…" My dad's a chemistry professor and my mom's a semi-retired librarian. Also, I'm what you'd call a Westerner but not really, and getting into the 'really' part of it is gonna be a whole can of worms. Jordan wondered if he'd have to do this every time he broke the ice with a stranger. An exhausting prospect, one that already had him wanting to run for the hills. He was saved, at least on this occasion, by…" Next!" The final batch of shower-takers was up, and Jordan was among them.

He eagerly followed his fellow nudists into the fray, only to—" Ahh! Cold, cold, cold!"

"You there, Yu! Control yourself!" —be blasted from head to toe in an ice-cold torrent! And at an ungodly water pressure to boot! It felt less like a shower and more like going through a car wash, minus the car. It was all he could do just to stay on his feet, even as his head went completely blank under the constant barrage.

"All finished! Now, get dressed and be quick about it!" The 'shower' vanished in an instant, leaving the recruits shuddering in the night air. Whoever had been casting [Manipulate Water] clearly wasn't one to waste a single cc of mana. Or to work with a Pyromancer to maybe offer a heating component. Jordan could barely see, wet hair dripping before his eyes. His teeth chattered violently as he was once more funneled through the assembly line.

Next thing he knew, someone slapped a coarse cotton sheet onto his back, which soaked through immediately upon contact. A horrified moment later, he realized that this was how he was expected to dry off. But not expected to succeed, clearly. He was still a sopping, shuddering, chattering mess by the time he made it to the next 'station' of the humiliation ritual: a long table on the courtyard where someone had laid out changes of clothes. The Featherifter version of a pyjama.

A loose-fitting one-piece tunic, with only the one sash to hold everything together and valiantly protect the wearer's decency. This too soaked through as soon as Jordan put it on. Well, 'put it on' was perhaps being a tad generous. Charisma DC 5: success N üwa: "You've done it, lordlet. An accomplishment truly unique in the annals of the universe. Namely, you've left me speechless." Just like that, the ordeal came to an end. In time, Jordan might even find it in him to be grateful.

At the very least, being hosed down like a common criminal had finally washed away the days-old Grandelope stank. After every recruit had showered, 'dried off', and changed, the time was well past curfew. Jordan decided to turn off his brain for the first time since arriving in Stormvast, simply following the crowd as they trudged their way back to the dormitory. The beddings had already been laid out in a dense row, all sitting atop a platform raised roughly waist-height from the floor.

It took a bit of effort to climb onto, and as soon as he did, Jordan was surprised by the palpable warmth radiating from the platform. Exactly the salve needed for his freezing body… and it also reminded him of an obscure factoid from his childhood. This is called a kang, he recalled what his father had taught him when they visited some of their more rural relatives in China. It's basically a heated floor. All the exhaust from kitchens and whatnot get channeled into a hollow chamber inside the platform.

That's why it's so nice and toasty in here. Intelligence DC 10: success Fuxi:"You surprise me, pupil. I thought for certain you would need my help with this one." Hey, I know more than just video game mechanics, okay? I've traveled. I've read books. Case in point: I already know the basics of what to expect from this here training arc. Which it obviously is, don't even deny it. For example… For example the fact that the sleeping arrangements had been pre-assigned, down to the individual recruit.

Jordan found himself at the very last bedroll on the far end of the dormitory, direct neighbors with…

"I for one am excited, Gatekeeper Yu." Pewter Sapling whispered in lieu of 'good night'.

"Two scions of a noble house, together undertaking a grand adventure. Before all's said and done, I daresay you and I will become very good friends."

"Sounds like a plan, buddy. Now, get some rest." Jordan didn't have the heart to correct Pewter. Neither the part about him being from a noble family, nor the part where the two would become good friends. Because Jordan knew. Training arcs were a mere sideshow, never meant for forging lifelong friendships. No, this was purely for the montages and power scalings, the better for a lowly recruit to crawl, hustle, and climb his way to the top.