Group Performance: Mishil the Vegetable Seller
The strange-looking young man first visited Mishil’s shop on the twenty-third of the green month.
“Excuse me, I’d like to purchase some gigo and chatchi. Would that be possible?”
He looked even younger than Mishil’s grandson. Despite having skin like that of a westerner, he had black hair and eyes like an easterner. He wore a friendly smile on his face, like someone who made a living through sales, but he was accompanied by a boy and a woman from the forest’s edge, who were standing behind him. His lanky frame was clad in the attire decorated with swirling patterns that was typically worn by their kind.
“What, do I look like I have all these vegetables lined up here on a whim?” Mishil shot back, furrowing her brow as firmly as she could.
The black-haired youth looked perplexed.
Mishil continued, “I have vegetables lined up here in the area set aside for stalls. Of course they’re for sale. If you want to buy some, then show me some coins. Don’t waste my time with long-winded greetings.”
Mishil loathed the people of the forest’s edge. They were heretics who threatened the peace in town. She had spoken to them harshly with the intention of driving them off...but for some reason, the confused look on the boy’s face had disappeared, and he was once again smiling pleasantly.
“If you say so. I do have money, and I’d like to buy some vegetables, please. Um, I’d like as much gigo as I can get for one red coin.”
“Ah, we’ll take two red coins’ worth of gigo and three of chatchi!” the boy from the forest’s edge loudly interjected from behind his companion. He was shorter than the black-haired young man and had a youthful face, but he had a sword and a hatchet dangling from his hip and was clad in a giba pelt cloak.
Mishil sighed heavily, then cut a gigo longer than she was tall in half and held it out toward the black-haired kid first.
“One red coin will only get you this much.”
“Thank you.”
Mishil then placed another gigo and six chatchi on a cloth. “This covers your order, so pay up.”
“Huh? Three red coins only gets you six chatchi? You could buy twice as many poitan for that price,” the young hunter with the yellowish hair complained, but before Mishil could start shouting back, the overly voluptuous girl from the forest’s edge next to him interjected in a sleepy voice.
“Yes, chatchi are expensive... My apologies, but could we change our order to just one coin’s worth of gigo and get a couple more chatchi instead?”
Mishil silently took back the gigo she had just cut and added two more chatchi.
“I had no idea chatchi were so expensive! I’ve never looked into the cost of vegetables before now, so I had no clue,” the young hunter remarked while holding out his coins, not looking the least bit unsure of himself. It seemed they had already bought vegetables from another seller, as he then tossed his eight chatchi into a bag that already had some other produce in it.
Then the black-haired young man chimed in again beside him, “Um, I’d like to ask you a question... How many days do gigo last?”
“I cut that one, so it’ll start going bad after two or three days. A whole gigo will last for around ten days or so, and if you bury it in the ground, it’ll stay good for around a month.”
“Oh, you can preserve them by burying them? They must be similar to burdock, just like they look,” the kid muttered cryptically with a pensive look.
However, then Mishil added, “But since you live in the forest’s edge, the giba and giiz are going to dig them up no matter where you try to bury them. Still, I suppose if your goal is just to make the giba fatter, go ahead and bury as many as you please.”
“Is that so? Thank you for being so generous with your advice,” the kid said with a smile, as if none of her sarcasm had made it through at all. “Oh, and would it be possible to buy gigo from you regularly?”
“Regularly? What are you planning on using all that gigo for?”
“For cooking, of course. By mixing gigo and poitan together, you can make some really delicious stuff with them.”
That was a person of the forest’s edge for you, mixing gigo with poitan of all things. She had poured her heart and soul into growing these gigo, so Mishil felt pretty dejected about them being eaten in such a miserable way.
“I’m actually planning to open a stall here in the post town to sell my cooking soon, so I’ll need gigo each time I want to make poitan bread for that... Would it be possible for me to come by at the end of each day to let you know how many I’ll need the day after and ask you to set them aside?”
“Ordering a day in advance shouldn’t be any issue at all. But if you need that many gigo, shouldn’t you buy from a bigger seller instead?”
“Well, I’ve heard that the gigo you sell are especially plump and sweet, so...”
“Who’s been going around running their mouth like that?!”
“Dora, who sells vegetables a little north of here.”
“That brat Dora, eh? He should know when to keep his mouth shut.”
“You call Dora a brat?” the black-haired young man asked with an amused smile. To someone who had lived to the age of seventy like Mishil, pretty much everyone seemed like children.
At any rate, after that, the troublesome trio headed back to the settlement at the forest’s edge for the day. However, for Mishil, this was just the beginning of a terribly obnoxious, long-lasting association with the people of the forest’s edge.
◇
“Um, sorry, excuse me, but would it be possible to triple the amount of gigo I purchase from you starting tomorrow?” the black-haired kid—who was apparently named Asuta of the Fa clan—asked Mishil six days after their first meeting.
“Triple? Did you just say you want to triple the amount of gigo you buy?”
“Yes. I’m really sorry for the sudden request. My cooking has been selling better than expected, and it looks like I’m probably going to need that much gigo from now on.”
Of all things, this Asuta kid had started selling food made with giba meat in the post town. It had only been three days since he’d opened his stall, and he was already coming to her saying things like this.
“Hold on a moment. You said you prepared just ten servings on the first day and that you only decided to increase that number to forty today. Are you honestly telling me you’re going to triple that already?”
“Yes. Depending on how sales go tomorrow, the day after that, I may add a second stall and prepare sixty servings for each of them.”
It was utterly unbelievable. A stall here in the post town was doing great if it could manage to sell fifty servings. There were lots of passersby, but they had no shortage of options when it came to stalls and inns serving food. In spite of that, he claimed he would be able to sell 120 servings of something as repulsive as giba cooking... It beggared belief.
“If I do manage to sell out each day, I’m going to keep needing to buy this amount of gigo... That won’t be too much, will it?” the kid asked, looking worried.
Feeling irritated, Mishil shot back, “I said I’d sell you whatever you ordered, didn’t I? Don’t go thinking so little of me.”
“A-All right. Sorry.”
“Still, didn’t you get taken away by the guards earlier today? Are you still going to keep on doing business even so?”
“Oh, you saw that? That was pretty embarrassing... Well, what happened was we had a bunch of customers show up all at once from both the south and the east, and I didn’t have enough food for all of them, so they kind of started quarreling. That’s why we need to be sure to prepare enough tomorrow,” Asuta replied, finally getting a serious look in his eyes. Those were the eyes of a full-fledged merchant.
Mishil stared back into them for a moment, and then snorted. “I just prepare the vegetables as they’re ordered. But if you break our business agreement, I won’t sell you so much as a single chatchi after that.”
“Got it. Thank you,” he replied with a childish smile. He really knew how to get on Mishil’s nerves.
Two days later, that irritation grew even stronger. Once again, Asuta was visiting her place looking all apologetic.
“Um, I’m so sorry, but...would it be possible to buy more gigo than we agreed upon for today?”
Apparently, even 120 servings hadn’t been enough.
“If you want gigo, then stop with all the pointless blathering! Just show me your coins!” Mishil shouted as she took out her vegetable knife to start cutting gigo.
“Huh? You want to take even more gigo to the post town?” her son asked when she returned home, sounding astonished. Giving her worn-out hips a pat, Mishil furrowed her brow and stared at him.
“What, are you going to complain about it? The number of orders has gone up. I don’t see why that would be a problem.”
“But ma, we’ve also got a lot of customers who buy our gigo in the castle town. If you take too many of them to the post town, we could eventually run short, so isn’t it best to hold back a bit?”
“Whether we sell them in the post town or the castle town, it’s not like the price changes.”
“No, but we can get tips in the castle town, and if things go well, we might find someone willing to purchase everything we grow. Then you wouldn’t need to go to the post town anymore.”
“What, you’re trying to steal work from this old bag of bones now?” Mishil questioned with a glare, only for her son to helplessly shrug.
“I’m worried about your health. You pull a wagon to town every day without even using a totos to help out, which is not something a seventy-year-old woman should be doing.”
“All the hard work I do every single day is the only reason I’ve been able to stay in good health at my age! But if you no longer have any use for an old fool like me, then I guess you should go ahead and do as you please.”
“You’re so stubborn...” her son grumbled while withdrawing back into the house. Mishil snorted at him, then went to stow the now empty wagon in their storehouse.
Mishil had been born to a family that ran a fairly large field here in the Daleim lands. She awoke with the rising of the sun, dug up gigo, chatchi, and nenon, and sold them. That was the life she had lived for as long as she could remember.
Her son and grandchildren had grown up healthy and strong, and now worked alongside her. And as for herself, she planned to keep on working until her legs gave out on her, and then, when her strength was gone, her soul would depart. That was all there was to it. Mishil’s husband’s soul had already gone to the western god like that ten years ago.
I’ve lived for such a long time now, and I no longer have any regrets.
Still, what was the western god thinking, throwing the people of the forest’s edge into her path so close to the end of her long life? Mishil despised the people of the forest’s edge. They were incapable of living in harmony with the townsfolk. The lord of Genos never should have granted their request eighty years ago. He ought to have sent them straight back to Jagar.
Some folks said that without the people of the forest’s edge, giba would lay waste to the fields in the Daleim lands, and the farmers who worked there never would have been able to achieve their current level of prosperity. Mishil, however, thought all of that should have been left up to fate. Starving to death or getting run through by a giba could be part of a person’s fate too, and having that fate snatched away by the people of the forest’s edge just didn’t sit right with her.
If they had just stuck to living in their settlement at the forest’s edge, she wouldn’t have had anything to complain about. They were more like barbarians than hunters, but as long as they stayed away from ordinary folks, there was no way they would ever be able to become a problem. However, they had been forbidden from eating the fruits that grew in the forest, which meant that they had to sell giba tusks and pelts in town so they could afford to buy produce. What sort of a life was that? Both the people of the forest’s edge who had accepted that condition and the lord of Genos who had forced them into it had been utter fools.
If they had been satisfied with living like that, then Mishil wouldn’t have had any issue with them. But the people of the forest’s edge had done so many horrendous things time and time again. In the past, they had pillaged fields, attacked travelers, and kidnapped young women on numerous occasions. Lately, however, they had just been causing a bit of commotion in the post town every now and then. In the end, though, what mattered was that they kept doing these things because they weren’t happy with the way of life the lord of Genos had decreed for them.
The people of the forest’s edge hated the townsfolk.
And the townsfolk hated the people of the forest’s edge back.
The Genos domain never should have accepted them in the first place.
Many people of the forest’s edge had fallen to giba or starved to death in place of the townsfolk, and over time, the survivors had come to hate the people they were supposed to be protecting, who hated them just as much in return... None of that sat right with Mishil at all.
Sooner or later, that kid’s gonna get hurt real bad by this situation too.
If he would have just closed his stalls and stayed in the settlement at the forest’s edge from then on, it really would have been for the best. To Mishil, that was clearly the only good path for him to take.
◇
“Hello, Granny Mishil!” Tara called out while stopping by the old lady’s street shop several days later. She was the daughter of Dora, a vegetable seller who came from the Daleim lands just like Mishil. The girl had an adorable little face, not at all like her father’s, and wasn’t even ten years old yet.
“Hey there.” Mishil nodded back to Tara, but then she noticed that the girl was holding something unusual in her hands. It was a wooden plate carrying what looked like a snack from a stall, split in half. “What’s that there? If you took a plate from a stall, you’re gonna get chewed out for it.”
“Oh, no, I just borrowed it from a stall that belongs to somebody I know, ’cuz I wanted you to try Asuta’s cooking too, Granny Mishil!”
The dish consisted of meat and vegetables between two pieces of what looked like white fuwano bread. The meat was coated in a red tarapa sauce, and there was finely sliced tino poking out from the sides. It was larger and looked more filling than a kimyuus manju, despite having been cut in half.
“Asuta’s that black-haired kid from the forest’s edge, right? Ain’t no way I’m gonna eat something made with giba meat.”
“Huh? But why? Asuta’s cooking is really tasty!”
“Even if it is, I’ve just got no interest in eating giba.”
“There’s nothing wrong with it, though. You won’t grow tusks or have your skin get darker or anything!”
Obviously, Mishil didn’t believe in those ridiculous superstitions at all. However, she was well aware of just how frightening giba truly were. She had set up a number of pitfalls around her field, and from time to time managed to catch one or two, if they happened to be especially foolish.
Those beasts were more like monsters than animals. They had terrifying horns and tusks, and their cries were like thunderclaps. Some grew to be as big as karon, and from what she had heard, they would even eat people if they got hungry enough.
Nobody from the south or east would have been nearly this stringent about shunning giba, but Mishil was a natural-born westerner. She had lived in Genos’s Daleim county all her life, so she couldn’t imagine anyone with their head on straight ever eating giba.
“But Asuta used your gigo to make this. My dad says he’s really happy the tarapa and tino he sells are being used to make such tasty food.”
“Hmph. That’s quite a change of heart, considering how much Dora’s always feared giba and the people of the forest’s edge.”
“Yeah! My dad’s been saying that westerners and the people of the forest’s edge should get along better!”
They would never be able to get along. The citizens of Genos and the people of the forest’s edge hated one another. No matter how desperately that Asuta kid tried, sooner or later it was all going to end up turning into a tragedy that could never be undone.
“Aren’t you interested in finding out what sort of cooking your vegetables are being used for, Granny Mishil?” Tara questioned, tilting her head. “My dad said that someone as proud of her work as you would definitely want to know...”
That Dora sure was cheeky. After glaring down at the food atop the plate for a bit, Mishil suddenly reached out and grabbed it. She could feel the warmth of the meat and the tarapa sauce through the white doughy outside. The old woman then took a bite as Tara watched.
Instantly, the abundant flavor of the tarapa spread throughout her mouth.
It was surprisingly sweet.
No, wait, that sweetness had to have come from aria, without a doubt. The tarapa sold in the post town were quite sour, so he must have mixed in some finely diced aria as well.
Then there was the meat. Folks said giba meat stank and was too tough to eat, but Mishil found the meat to be remarkably good, and quite tender.
Its taste and tenderness were just as good as the karon torso meat she’d been able to eat a handful of times in her life. Actually, it was even more tender than that, by quite a bit. It seemed to almost melt in her mouth, making her wonder if it was truly even meat she was chewing. And then there was the hot meat juice and oil that were gushing out of it.
It was incredibly delicious meat.
The taste of the tarapa was also superb.
The dish also had those pieces of bread that looked like they were made with fuwano and some finely chopped tino to moderate those powerful flavors.
That Asuta kid had said he was mixing her gigo with poitan. That had to be the origin of this springy, fluffy bread. Only the people of the forest’s edge, travelers, and soldiers on the field of battle ever ate poitan, and yet he had somehow made it into something similar to fuwano bread.
Mishil was left at a loss for words for a moment, wondering just what in the world this dish even was.
“It’s delicious, isn’t it? It’s called a giba burger! It’s my favorite!”
At some point, Tara had begun chowing down on the dish as well, and the area around her lips was all stained red from the tarapa now. Mishil met the girl’s adorable smile with a sour look, then grabbed a single red coin.
“How much does this dish cost?”
“Huh? Two red coins...”
“Then half of it would be one red coin, right?”
“Huh?! I don’t need any money! Giba burgers are so big that if I ate a whole one myself, I’d make my tummy hurt!”
“That’s still no reason for you to give it to me for free. You bought it with the money your father gives you for helping with his job, right?”
“I don’t want it! My dad’ll get mad at me if I take it!”
Tara stepped back, and Mishil returned her coin to its original place.
“In that case, why don’t you take some chatchi back with you in exchange? You can have your mother boil them for dinner.”
“Huh? But...”
“If you refuse even that, I’ll have to return the food to you from inside my stomach.”
“O-Okay. You sure are stubborn, Granny Mishil.”
“Hmph. I don’t wanna hear that from you.”
With that, Mishil forced Tara to accept a pair of chatchi. The girl stood there with a troubled look on her face for a while, but eventually she said, “Thank you!” and disappeared into the crowd.
At that age, she hadn’t yet learned to fear the people of the forest’s edge or giba. Giba were said to be living natural disasters, and the people of the forest’s edge who ate them were a vicious tribe whose members possessed inhuman strength.
Even discounting the exaggerated way people talked about them, though, Mishil knew very well how terrifying both of them were. Mishil’s father had been killed by a starving giba that had wandered into the Daleim lands, and she had seen how frightening the people of the forest’s edge could be with her own eyes, though just once.
Even so...Mishil couldn’t help but acknowledge that this dish was delicious.
What a thoroughly obnoxious little boy...
The obnoxious little boy in question visited Mishil’s shop just a few hours later.
“I’m sorry about this, but my stall contract ends on the sixth of the blue month, so I’m planning on taking the following day off.”
“Hmph. So, that means you won’t need any gigo that day, eh?”
“That’s right... But I get the feeling that I’m going to have even more customers than usual on the days before and after that break, so I was thinking of preparing 170 meals the day before, and two hundred for the day after...”
Holding back a sigh, Mishil shouted back, “Fine! You can do whatever you want!”
◇
Asuta continued coming to Mishil’s shop to purchase gigo almost daily, and when he eventually started selling his cooking to an inn, he added thirty chatchi to his order every other day as well.
Several serious incidents did happen along the way. Some criminals who had escaped from the forest’s edge attempted to raid a merchant caravan heading for Sym, and then they had attacked Asuta’s group working in the post town as well, but they had been swiftly brought to justice. Even so, Asuta never stopped working, and gradually, people around town seemed to start looking more favorably upon the people of the forest’s edge. The authorities had long turned a blind eye toward any crimes the people of the forest’s edge had committed in the past, but this time, the castle had passed proper judgment upon them, and one of the criminals had supposedly even been dealt with by a person of the forest’s edge too.
Apparently, all the crimes that had been committed against the townsfolk were the work of the members of the leading clan of the forest’s edge alone, and most of their people had had no idea any of it had even been happening. Furthermore, the ones who had been most responsible for everything that had happened had been tried and convicted, and three new leading clan heads had been appointed. This was the story that everyone was spreading around, and it seemed plausible enough.
In the aftermath, it seemed that many of the younger townsfolk had been shocked to learn just how impoverished the people of the forest’s edge were, to the point that some of the tribespeople were even starving to death. But Mishil had to wonder why they were so surprised.
Giba tusks and pelts didn’t sell for all that much. Supposedly, they had been highly prized back when the people of the forest’s edge had first moved here, but now there was an oversupply due to how many giba were being hunted each and every day. Horns and tusks could only be used to make accessories, and not many people had a need for rugs made from their pelts unless they lived in much colder, harsher lands. The most you could possibly get out of a giba was two white coins.
Of course, two white coins was nothing to scoff at. Mishil would have had to sell ten whole gigo to make that much. However, growing and selling gigo wasn’t a dangerous job. The people of the forest’s edge risked their very lives, working together to take down vicious giba, and that was all they got to show for it.
They were forbidden from gathering the bounty of Morga or cultivating fields, so they just kept on hunting giba after giba. There was no way anyone could acquire much more than an average amount of wealth like that. After they had finally realized that fact, the folks from the post town were starting to reevaluate how they should treat the people of the forest’s edge.
However, that wasn’t all that had occurred.
Just when it had started to seem like relations between the townsfolk and the people of the forest’s edge had been warming up, that Asuta kid had gotten himself kidnapped. According to the rumors, a man dressed like a noble had been behind it. The amount of upset this news had caused in the post town was hard to believe. The previous disruption from the other day hadn’t even come close.
The day after Asuta had been taken, dozens of people of the forest’s edge had descended upon the post town, and for a moment it had looked as if they had been about to cross swords with the guards.
“Can you, the guards of this town, swear to us that you will be able to return our comrade to us in good health by yourselves?!” a large fellow who was one of the new leading clan heads of the forest’s edge had bellowed. He was a giant of a man with a frightening appearance like that of a wild beast.
The people of the forest’s edge had claimed that a noble of Genos had abducted Asuta. Something to do with a quarrel between them and the lord of the house of Turan.
It really had been mayhem in the post town that day, with most feeling a jumble of fear toward the people of the forest’s edge and anger at the foolish nobles.
I figured things would end up like this eventually... Mishil thought to herself as she opened her vegetable street shop in the post town just like always. The people of the forest’s edge and the townsfolk are just plain incompatible. Trying to force the matter and live alongside one another is the reason all this bedlam is happening.
Back when Mishil had still been young, right around the time her oldest son had finally managed to find himself a bride, an incident had occurred in the post town. Some scoundrels who had come wandering into town from elsewhere had crossed the people of the forest’s edge. They had tried to go after some women of the forest’s edge who had come to the post town, supposedly, and when an older woman with them had tried to stop the men, they had knocked her down and injured her terribly.
The scoundrels had been taken in by the guards on the spot, and after interrogation, they had been given tattoos branding them as criminals and had subsequently been exiled from Genos. It had been a weighty punishment, banning them from ever setting foot in this land again. However, it hadn’t been enough to quell the anger felt by the people of the forest’s edge. The clan head of the woman who had been injured had then come to town on his own and slaughtered the criminals as they had been leaving Genos.
“The leading clan head of the forest’s edge had told us we must obey the laws of Genos! But I cannot ignore my rage at the humiliation and injury inflicted on my mother! If you say I am guilty of a crime, then judge me as you please, in accordance with the laws of Genos!” the hunter had shouted while tossing his bloody sword to the ground. After that, he had been taken into custody by the guards and sent away to the castle. Mishil had watched this happen with her own two eyes.
In the end, the man had been given the death sentence, and because he had also broken their own laws, the people of the forest’s edge had offered no objection to that judgment. But ever since then, the townsfolk had started to look upon the people of the forest’s edge with more and more fear, as any trouble they had caused in town after that point had always seemed to get overlooked.
He really was a beastly man... After seeing something like that, anyone would believe that the vicious strength of the giba dwells in the people of the forest’s edge, who consume their meat.
A single hunter had beaten down all of the guards who had been present and cut down five criminals, one after another. It had been such a dreadful sight that she still remembered it perfectly even now, decades later.
But those nobles hiding behind their stone walls don’t know anything about how frightening the people of the forest’s edge can truly be. That’s how we ended up in this situation.
The people of the forest’s edge wouldn’t forgive the nobles of Genos, and if they injured a noble, they would never be forgiven either. Things were very likely heading toward an unavoidable breakdown between Genos and the people of the forest’s edge.
Without the people of the forest’s edge around, half of our fields will probably become feeding grounds for the giba. Her sons and grandchildren could end up living far more difficult lives than her. Maybe that was just their fate, but she still found the thought regrettable.
Even when the sun hit its peak and beyond, things remained noisy in the post town. The people of the forest’s edge had ignored the guards and were now rushing about all over the place. They must have been searching for Asuta and the scoundrels who had snatched him. Since they weren’t able to set foot in the castle town, that was pretty much all they could do.
It didn’t seem like Mishil was going to get in a proper day’s business. And so, with the gigo she had brought for Asuta still in her wagon, she got ready to leave. However, a voice called out to her from behind just as she was about to start pulling her wagon.
“Um, please hold on. Are you closing for business for the day?”
When she turned to look, Mishil found two young women from the forest’s edge rushing over to her. One was a pretty girl with her black hair tied up on both sides, while the other girl looked strong-willed and had her red hair in a single tail on top. Mishil recognized the two of them. They were two of the girls from the forest’s edge who helped Asuta run his business with the stalls.
The black-haired one spoke to Mishil in a fluster, “Could you please sell the gigo and chatchi reserved for Asuta to us?”
“You plan to keep doing business despite what’s going on right now?”
“Yes,” the black-haired girl replied with a big nod. “Asuta is sure to return. Until then, we intend to keep the business he’s built here in the post town going in his place.”
“Hmph... I can’t imagine you’ll manage to sell much with all this commotion.”
“Actually, our customers from the east and south came by just the same as always. And when the westerners saw that, a few of them started cautiously approaching us as well. We can’t let the bonds Asuta forged here in Genos be severed.”
Despite her childish face, there was a strong light shining in her eyes. Even though she was a woman, and a young one at that, she was still a person of the forest’s edge all the same. Mishil took her hand off her wagon and held it out toward the girl.
“Two gigo and thirty chatchi will be nineteen red coins.”
“Right, thank you. Could you keep bringing the same number of vegetables you promised Asuta for the next few days as well?”
“All right,” Mishil replied, accepting the girl’s coins.
You could only ever sell this many vegetables all at once here in the post town to an inn that especially favored you. That Asuta kid had undoubtedly earned a great deal of money using this gigo, chatchi, and giba meat. He had often said that he was just trying to bring prosperity to the settlement at the forest’s edge, where so many were suffering in poverty.
“Okay, we’ll be counting on you from tomorrow on... Lala, let’s return to the stalls for now and drop these off.”
“Yeah, got it.”
With that, the girls swiftly departed. They must have been on their way to the inns. After all, that was where Asuta always went next after stopping by Mishil’s street shop at around this time each day.
But will it really be possible for someone else to take that foolish kid’s place?
Mishil once again grabbed onto the handle of her wagon and started pushing it back to the Daleim lands.
When she made it home, she found her son waiting there for her, his face pale.
“You’re finally back, ma! If you had been out any later, I would’ve sent someone to go get you!”
“What are you doing, lazing around at this hour? What about the fields?”
“The others are taking care of them. But I’ve been busy asking around about what’s going on in the post town.”
Apparently, news of the morning’s commotion had already made it out here to the Daleim lands. Whether he had heard the news from soldiers on patrol or merchants who had visited the castle town, her son seemed to know more of the details than she did.
“Supposedly, the people of the forest’s edge have been searching both the post town and the Turan lands looking for their kidnapped comrade and the guys who snatched him. But if the culprit’s a noble, then they’re just wasting their time no matter where they look... Ugh, what’s going to become of Genos?”
“There’s no point in whining about it. The most we can do is make sure all the giba traps are properly set up.”
“A-Are the people of the forest’s edge really going to leave Genos? If they do, it’s going to make a complete mess out of our lives!”
If the people of the forest’s edge disappeared, the men of the Daleim lands could be forced to start fumbling their way through trying to act as hunters. Or they could build a fence, like the one in the Turan lands. Either way, they wouldn’t be able to continue on as they had until now.
“Damn it. Why is this happening to us? Is the lord of the house of Turan behind this after all? They’ve got a sturdy wall protecting their fields, so does he just not care what happens with the people of the forest’s edge?”
“As if a wooden barricade could actually hold back a giba for long. The only ones who will truly be safe are those who live behind the castle town’s walls of stone.”
“But they fill their stomachs with the vegetables we grow too! You can’t live on just the fuwano and mamaria from the Turan lands alone!”
That was obvious to just about everyone. Everyone except the people who lived in the castle town, that is. Mishil could easily imagine them thinking that all the vegetables they could ever want would always be available, just popping up out of the ground, no effort required.
“Whatever. Stop complaining. It’s pointless. Making a fuss about it before anything has even happened won’t do anything to change our fates, now will it? We just have to keep quiet and do our jobs.”
“Wh-Where are you going, ma?”
“To the fields, of course. It didn’t seem like I’d be able to do much business in the post town, so I came back early, but I still have to dig up the gigo for my next trip.”
“You’re not planning on going tomorrow, are you?” her son asked, looking completely shaken as Mishil glared up at him.
“I still managed to sell a whole lot of gigo and chatchi today, even with everything going on. There’s no telling what might happen from here on out, though, so I’ve got to sell what I can while the selling is good.”
“B-But...”
“You’ve really got no guts at all, do you? Those girls from the forest’s edge have far, far more spirit than you seem to be able to muster.”
With that, Mishil headed to the gigo field, leaving her son standing there looking completely pale.
The people of the forest’s edge hadn’t given up on doing business, so why should she? It didn’t make sense to just give up now, when she hadn’t even lost any money yet.
We’ve just got to keep going with our own work.
It wasn’t as if she was thinking something like, “For the sake of those who can’t anymore.”
What was that black-haired kid with goofy smile doing right at that moment, wherever he was?
Giving her aching hips a pat, Mishil walked forward along the dry dirt path.
◇
Four days passed, and on each one, those girls from the forest’s edge stopped by Mishil’s shop to buy vegetables. Meanwhile, the other people of the forest’s edge were still running about all over the place.
On the fourth day, the culprit’s identity was finally revealed. Apparently, it wasn’t the lord of house Turan himself, but rather his daughter, and a rumor was quickly spreading that the second son of the house of Daleim had aided the people of the forest’s edge in their efforts to rescue Asuta.
How ridiculous. The Turan and Daleim are both noble houses, but in terms of strength, they couldn’t be more different.
The head of the Daleim was nothing but a yes-man when it came to dealing with the house of Turan. It had long felt like it was actually Count Turan who determined how the vegetables grown in the Daleim lands were to be sold, and it was rumored that the reason no fence to protect the Daleim lands had been built was because the house of Turan had forbidden it, so it was impossible to imagine the second son of the house of Daleim being able to do anything about the tyrannical acts of the house of Turan. This would surely lead to the complete collapse of the relationship between the people of the forest’s edge and the nobles of Genos.
Even so, it didn’t change what Mishil had to do: leave the turbulent post town behind, work in the fields until it got dark, eat dinner with family, and sleep. Then, the next morning, she would spend a few hours after the break of dawn working the fields, load the necessary number of vegetables into her wagon, head to the post town, deliver vegetables to the inns she was connected to, and finally open her street shop. She set up her leather canopy on its thin wooden posts, spread a cloth out over the ground, and laid several sample vegetables on it. Then, after a fair number of customers had come and gone, they finally appeared.
“Sorry about how long it’s been. And for disappearing so suddenly.”
It was a certain young fellow from the forest’s edge who seemed to be a foreigner, judging from his odd combination of ivory white skin like a westerner’s, with black hair and eyes. He was also wearing the same goofy grin as always. In other words, it was Asuta of the Fa clan, accompanied by six hunters from the forest’s edge.
He had such a foolish-looking smile on his face. His cheeks seemed to have grown a good bit thinner, but his black eyes were shining just as brightly as they had before.
For a good long while, Mishil was left at a loss for words, but eventually she gave a flustered snort. “I never figured I’d see your face again. You sure do have some terrible luck, kid.”
“Yeah. But thanks to everyone from the forest’s edge and the post town, I made it back safely.”
Mishil hadn’t done a thing. She’d just kept running her business, the same as always.
“I heard that you’ve been selling the gigo and chatchi that I had been ordering to the women from the Ruu clan while I was away. Um... As long as things go well, I should be able to go back to work tomorrow, so could you sell that amount of gigo to me again?”
“Huh? Those girls already bought the gigo for tomorrow while they were moving their stalls.”
“Ah, no. Since the Ruu clan has been running the stalls on their own, I figured I should open a new separate business, so we’re going to need a lot more gigo than before...”
He looked incredibly apologetic and worried, as he always did when asking for something. And so, Mishil went ahead and shouted back at him the same as always too.
“How many times do I have to tell you not to think so little of me or my farm?! As long as you have the coins, I’ll sell you ten, twenty, or however many you need!”
“Thank you,” Asuta of the Fa clan said with a beaming smile.
It was currently the tenth of the white month, so it had already been more than a month and a half since she had met this young fellow with the strange appearance.
Her life, or this kid’s luck: which one was going to run out first? Ultimately, as Mishil retrieved some especially fine gigo from the wagon behind her, she decided it wasn’t really worth thinking about.
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