Chương 4: Local Yokels

When I first arrived at the village, making my way up to the Iudex's estate, I had taken the time to examine the wooden signs that loomed over the stores and businesses of Tiode. Though they were all written in the eastern language, the Babel stone translated them for me. I only had to stare at the text for a brief period before the magic kicked in, rewriting and shaping the words into something I could read.

I noted a blacksmith, a general goods store, a dye shop, a tanner, a pawnbroker, a butcher, a fishmonger, and a tavern. All things one would find in a small village out west. They even had a temple on the eastern edge of the building, distinct for the bell tower off to one side and the red tiles of its roof. The gods back home had never done me much good, and I doubted the gods of Tsukio would change things for me.

The pawn shop was my first stop, the old woman behind the counter watching me with eyes that pointed off in different directions. She didn't have a large amount of money, nor could she buy anything she did not think herself capable of reselling, but I was still able to get some extra coinage by giving her a pair of pearls from the depths of my bag. I'd have to make it to a city if I wanted to make real money off pawning goods, and she'd said as much to me herself.

"Where's the nearest city to here?" I'd asked the old woman as I counted my coins.

"You speak our tongue like a drunkard," she'd said, sighing and shaking her head. I frowned at her.

"Not what I asked." And again I had to remind myself that choking people for displeasing me was not an appropriate course of action.

"Low Moon would be the nearest to our village, but it is a journey of several days. And risky, with bandits and wolves being rife these days." She had pulled an ornate pipe from her robe, filled it with crushed black herbs, lit it up, and stood blowing thin streams of dark smoke from her nostrils while she puffed upon it.

"I ain't a cartographer. The goods store might have a map for sale, one with the roads and such on it. But that's on you if you are interested." I'd left her, then, and went down the village's main road toward the general store. I had business there, after all, even without factoring interest in a map. The wooden door creaked as I pushed my way inside, and my eyes quickly took in the abundance of... stuff on display. The shelves that flanked me on either side were laden with goods.

Herbs in mason jars, tinned goods, alchemical reagents in corked bottles, bags of dried meat. This place didn't have everything, obviously, but it had more than I would have thought from outside. My gaze drifted to the counter at the back of the store, where a young woman sat leafing through a leatherbound book. She looked up, briefly, at my approach... then, seeing me, she did a double take and nearly dropped the book entirely from her fumbling hands.

"Great Goddess, there really is a giant westerner roaming about!" she gasped, as if she had just seen a mythical creature walk through the door. I frowned, ducking under the doorway and making my way inside.

"I'm not that giant."

"Compared to the ones I have seen and known? You're something else!" She must have been in her late teens, by my reckoning, with an almond-shaped face and dark brown hair worn in a loose bun. She was short and slim, and her emerald eyes gleamed with mirth.

"This your shop? You seem a touch young to be a merchant," I said. She smiled at me, a twinkle of mischief in her eyes.

"This shop... belongs to my father." There was no shimmer from the Babel stone, to my shock. She had spoken those words in heavily accented Yvigrosian.

"You... know my language?" The girl shrugged at me.

"A little," she said, returning to her native tongue.

"Father has had dealings with westerners over the years, usually those who sell goods in our port, I have picked up words and phrases from them. I am Mikan. I had heard a westerner bought land outside the village, but I did not think such a thing to ever happen." I grunted, glancing over my shoulder.

"Judging by the looks I have been getting, I'm sure you're not the only one," I said. Mikan chuckled, resting her hands on the varnished wood of her counter.

"Don't take it too personally. An outsider, and a foreigner at that, moving in is just... a surprise to people. I'm sure people will get used to you if you don't do anything to offend them." This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon. Easier said than done, by my reckoning.

"I'm Eamon," I said.

"I was hoping to buy a map, one that shows the roads over to this Low Moon place I've heard about. And... I was wondering if you could direct me to the nearest stone mason and carpenter."

"I suppose a house doesn't just sprout from the ground," Mikan teased. I watched as she stood upon a stool, reaching for a shelf behind her. Several scrolls were upon it, and she browsed a few of them before seeming to find the proper one. I leaned in for a look, noting the roads drawn in fine dark ink. Low Moon was many leagues northward, passing a few other small settlements, distinct on the map for its size. And, further north still, there seemed an even larger city called High Moon.

"This is good quality," I murmured. Mikan grinned broadly, giving a glimpse at a small gap in her front teeth.

"We know a good cartographer." I slid a few coins over the counter and folded the sturdy canvas into my satchel. I could make it to Low Moon quick enough on foot.

"So... you're a cultivator, right?" Mikan asked. I raised a brow at her, my mouth set in a frown.

"Cultivator?" Now that was a new one to me. Mikan glanced to the ceiling, as if in thought, then she snapped her fingers.

"Wizard! That's the term!"

"Aha... no, no, I'm not a wizard," I said, forcing a small smile. Which was entirely the truth. I could do magic, the energy in my body allowing me to do incredible things. But I was not like Novos or his ilk, able to master a vast repertoire of different skills. The powers Novos had given me when he pulled my raging soul through the threshold of undeath, that was the limit of my magical ability as best I could tell, save for a few tricks of basic sorcery he'd given me. Not that I could complain.

When it came to raw strength, I had been able to shatter many wizards who vastly bested me in skill. Being a revenant was no joke.

"Why do you ask?" Mikan shrugged, "That's what the gossip going around town is. That you're a foreign cultivator, visiting our land to find worthy opponents." I snorted, giving her a sideways glance.

"Believe me, Mikan, fighting is the last thing on my mind." Still, there were already rumours swirling around about me? A worrying prospect. And a damn annoying one too. But that was life in a small village for you. Gossip was as valuable as coin.

"Fair enough, fair enough. Your business is your own. Anyway, you said you wanted a carpenter and a mason?" I nodded at her, and she started to stroke her chin in thought.

"Ichiji, the smith, also does carpentry. He'll tell you it's a lesser passion, but..." She motioned to the shelves, then to the stool and counter, "he's still damn good at it."

"Noted," I said.

"As for a stonemason, if you go north along the coast you'll eventually reach a small town called Strayport. They have a quarry there."

"Thank you, Mikan. Truly." I turned, leaving her, and stepped out onto the creaky boardwalk. I noticed, at that moment, a notice board set up just beside the general goods store. It was covered with a litany of pieces of paper, each one a request from someone in Tiode. People who wanted pelts, people who wanted flowers for dyemaking, things of that nature. Each job offered a little bit of money, too. I stroked my chin, humming in thought.

Pawning things in Low Moon, or doing these odd jobs, would give me more money to work with. Better than nothing.

"Hey, you! Foreigner!" The voice was young but deep, full of the kind of youthful anger only a stupid teenager could summon up. I turned slightly and found myself staring at a trio of young men, dressed in the tunics common to the people of Tiode. The head of the pack was a few inches shorter than me, but broad shouldered and with rather sculpted arms. His black hair was shaved short, and he had a... prominent chin. Probably wasn't eighteen yet, but his eyes blazed with indignation.

"That's not my name," I told him bluntly.

"I don't care what your damn name is! I ain't learnin' the name of some blasted westerner!" the young man shouted, jabbing a calloused finger my way.

"Types like you ain't welcome to live in our village!"

"You tell him Haita!" one of his flunkies, shorter and scrawnier, said. His face was thin and pinched into an irritating sneer. A small flicker of anger started to boil in my gut, and I just barely smothered it before it could spark into something worse.

"I don't care if I'm welcome or not," I said, narrowing my eyes at him.

"I live here now. And you're just going to have to make peace with that, Boy." I put extra emphasis on that word, and mentally kicked myself for fanning the damn flames. Still, I'd be lying if I said the indignant flush on Haita's cheeks didn't make me want to smirk.

"Oh, you're a smug one aren't you?" Haita growled. He reached up, loudly cracking his knuckles. The kid was built like an ox. I might even have been a little worried about fighting him, if I couldn't fold steel like paper.

"We'll see how smart you are when you're picking your teeth up off the-""What're you guys doing?" Mikan's voice cut through the air like a knife. The shopkeeper's daughter was poking her head out of the door, an irritated frown on her face.

"A-ah, Mikan!" Haita said, forcing a grin as he turned toward her. I couldn't help but notice the little hint of pink on his cheeks. Ah, so that's what this was about.

"We were just... introducing ourselves!"

"Definitely!" said the other flunky, a portly young man with burly arms.

"Absolutely. Young Haita here is so very friendly." I clapped a hand on his shoulder, and the boy struggled not to wince.

"Such a fine young man." My grip grew tighter, and a faint hiss of pain rose up in the depths of Haita's throat. He grinned at me but I could see the icy hate in his eyes. Let him hate. If he tried anything, he'd be lucky to have eyes left to glare with. I knew all about bumpkin village boys like Haita, because I had been a bumpkin village boy myself. Eager to prove their own toughness, singling out the outsider to harass because few would care to defend me.

My stature, if anything, probably made me appear like an even more appealing target.

"Well... good," Mikan said, though she didn't look wholly convinced.

"Don't go harassing Master Amon. He's a nice man."

"Of course, of course." He looked as if his grin was on the verge of cracking his teeth. I walked on, my own smile never fading, but I was sure I could sense Haita glaring daggers at my back.