章 7: First technique
First of all they needed a place to temporarily settle down. The sun was more or less in the direction of the stairs. Considering the time of the day, that was west. With that in mind, they descended the ridge. As expected, there was no path excepted for animal trails. The sister was already struggling against brambles. Her clothes were not made for such treatment. Each step worn them out so much that they soon became unrecoverable. A shame. Moss hoped that she did not held them too dear, but if it was the case, she did not let it show.
The vegetation was dense and the land craggy. At least trees were not high. The sun light could reach trough them and hold them warm. After a few minutes of walk, Moss stopped in front of a seeding of yellow flowers.
-'Sister, take a look. This is a dandelion. Every part of it are edible, even the root. Since we do not have anything to eat, I would suggest we start to reap what food we can from now on.'
He pulled it out cleanly and showed it to her.
-'Those are easy to recognize. If you can spare the effort, please try to get some as we walk.'
She looked, smiled and nodded.
-'Brother, I am truly happy to have been paired with you. The others are probably going to be hungry.'
-'Do nobles not hunt ?'
-'They do, but not by groups of two with only a sword each.'
-'You worry me there. Will they be fine ? The elders seemed pretty harsh to me. I am not sure that they would help if those folks were to eat something bad. Or starve.'
The girl thought about Torim and Marchen.
-'It should be fine. The ones I know of are tougher than that.'
They made a few other stops in order for him to introduce new plants. He even showed her a tree from which berries, leafs and bark was edible. The old commoner had a big pouch on the outside of his coat and it became their pantry. When the princess grew a bit more confident about her finds, she directly stuffed them into it. That startled him several times before he got used to it.
Finally, they found a place flat and clear enough. The ground was covered with low rustic grass. It opened directly on the left size of the hill and offered a fair view of the land lying beyond. They both gave a sigh of relief.
-'There.'
After a small rest, they both got they job started. Moss took out his change of cloth. He just needed to tighten existing garments, that was pretty simple. Lauren opened his scroll, after he took some measurements by placing the coat upon her.
-'How come yours looks so ancient ?' She noticed. An association crossed her mind.
-'Wait... Don't tell me you chose it because it was old like you ?!'
-'Hehe... Herm.'
It was a little deeper than that actually. But not much. Now that he thought about it, Moss felt a bit like a fool.
-'You should have asked... I am sorry I did not help you. I was focused on myself and Torim, and at some point you looked like you knew what you were doing...'
-'Yes... Next time I definitely will ask.'
She smiled at him and sighted. Then she took a look inside the scroll.
Truth be told, Moss was growing nervous and impatient. Time had come to discover what technique he had randomly picked. The girl's eyes roamed quickly over the parchment. At last, she stated it.
-'Your technique's name is "Dual state moon cultivation art".'
Moon ? Dual state ? She kept silence while continuing to read. After short and fruitless wait for the follow-up, he resumed his task. One thread loop after the other... Finally she gave her more to grind, without lifting her eyes of her lap where the parchment stood unwound.
-'Like its name implies it, your cultivation art is separated in two practices. They are to be performed depending on the moon phase. One is for the light and one is for the shadow. The light part is about conveying energy. It can be used to heal or to reflect attacks for instance. The shadow part is about stealth and assassination skills.'
-'Assassination !?'
Moss flipped on his rock. The sister laughed at him.
-'Yes... If you really don't like your technique you can learn mine. I would understand. The elders said nothing against it either.'
-'I don't know... What is yours anyway ?'
-'It is named "Three mind seals". It can be used to connect with other's mind, to materialize intent and to animate objects.'
-'Oh, that seems rather specialized. Animate objects ? Like giving life ?'
-'No. It is only a basic skill. The described applications are limited.'
He took some time to consider, but his thoughts got cut short before he could reach a conclusion.
-'Do you want me to read your technique to you ? That may help you choose.'
He smiled. The old commoner could not remember the last time someone had read something for him without charge. And this time, it was a princess ! How better could it be ?
-'Yes, please.'
And so she did. The style was rather solemn and old fashioned. Sometimes she had to explain a term to him. Physical exercises were prescribed for the day and meditations for the night. There were some schematics as well. She showed them to him. This technique focused on the mastery of four fundamental skills: disappearing in the dark, redirecting energy, giving consistence to shadow and shifting weights. Make your body become a shadow and make shadow become your body. Direct the energy and shake the motionless. That was the gist of it. The applications suggested by the author were rather battle oriented but the scope seemed larger. There were also draws of several moon related plants, said to be of great help for this cultivation art. The peasant had never seen most.
-'Not bad, I would say.' Lauren commented after she was finished. 'It seems rather complete.'
-'Agreed. If we ignore the assassination part, the rest still holds up pretty well to me. I think me training it will make us a more complementary team.'
-'Well said. Then it is decided... How about new set of clothes ?'
-'Almost done !'
The work needed not to be beautiful. Moss had finished the coat and was sewing the last stitching of the pants. He tightened the knot.
-'There. You can try it.'
She moved away to change while he stayed and stared at the landscape.
-'Does it fit alright ?' He asked without moving.
-'The pants are fine but the coat feels skew. I think that the right shoulder is too tight.'
-'No problem, I can fix that.'
He tried, and the second round won her approval. She finally came back before him while swinging her arms and knees.
-'Thanks a lot, brother ! I feel way better now.'
-'You are welcome.'
Her new cloths were very rough compared to the last one. The fabric was brown and a simply weaved, but clean. Some would even have called it passable before Moss's pass. She ripped a shred of her previous dress to attach her hair in a pony tail. With that her hairstyle matched her new look a bit more. Even with this clumsy garment, she was still very pretty.
After this, she came and sat beside him.
-'Now that we are all set, what do you suggest we do ? Seems like we have a few hour of daylight left.'
Moss stroked his beard, looking at his scroll on the floor.
-'I think that bluntly moving forward would be unwise. My take would be to gather some more food. Also I need to inspect this environments life a bit more close. Some things interpellated me on our way down here.'
-'What sort of things ?'
-'Foot prints. Those I saw mostly belonged to boars, rabbits and birds. The last two we may want to hunt, but the boars prints were deeper and sharper than those I am used to. Also, a lot of good plants that I know of have resembling but not identical variants here. It would do no harm to take closer look. We can watch out for predator prints as well.'
-'Brother is right. But don't you think we also need to start our cultivation ?'
-'Yes. We also want to find water and to prepare our encampment before night falls. What about that: we make some food and inspection for about an hour. That way we will have provisions. Then we train until the sun turns yellow, after what we set up the camp. What do you say ?'
-'I say: let's get started.'
And just like that, they packed and left the small glade.
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