The Kura herb

We continued our journey by following the river for almost an hour when Cleo stopped us.

"We are at the mountain. We have to start climbing from this point towards the mountain top. According to the map, the herb is all over the mountain but it is denser as we get closer to the top. It's possible that we will not find anything at the bottom since other adventurers would be more likely to have cleaned the place. Ren do you have a picture of the herb for me and Turek to look at?"

I took out the picture and handed it to Cleo. She really seemed like a natural leader. I didn't think that I needed to bring up a question of leadership anymore.

After studying the herb and its description, she handed the picture to Turek and reiterated the points so that we had shared understanding of the herb and how to find it. Then we filled up the water pouches again and started climbing the mountain. Climbing was definitely more strenuous than the walk in the forest before. Both me and Turek were out of breath in just 15 minutes. Cleo was still energetic but even she was now having a harder time.

After climbing for 5 more minutes we decided to take a short break. Just then, I saw something dark next to rock. I decided to check it out and it turned out to be the Kura herb! It looks like this time I am at the right place. I let both Cleo and Turek know and we started looking around for more Kura plants while forgetting our fatigue. Sadly, there were only 2 more plants of the Kura herb close to us. But at least we know that we were is the right location. We decided to continue our climb to find more plants.

It was almost noon and this was the right time to find the Kura herb. Since its dark, it would be almost impossible to find when the sun is down. We also realized that most of them grew close to the rocks and blended in with them. But thanks to all the sunlight, it wasn't that difficult to see them. In 45 minutes or so, we had found more than enough plants to finish the request. So we decided that we will take a short break and head back down.

We ate our remaining food and finished most of our water. Since we would follow the river back, we didn't really need to worry about water.

"Hey, what do two think this Kura herb does anyway?" Suddenly Turek asked this question.

"No idea. I just know that guild uses this herb for medicine. It must be quite good since they reward adventurers quite well for it." I told Turek what I knew.

"Really? I will give it a shot and see" said Turek.

"Give what a shot?" Suddenly I felt a bit uneasy. What was Turek talking about?

Next thing I know Turek plucks off a leaf of the herb that he was holding and puts it in his mouth.

"What are you doing?" I stood up and hit his hand to make him drop the herb. I had no idea what effect that herb has! Why is he eating it? He really is dumber than me!

Cleo also got concerned and came over.

"Hey! Spit it out! We don't know what that herb does"

"Alright alright". Turek started to spit it out but before he could he just collapsed on the spot. I was stupefied for a second before I grabbed him to check if he was still breathing. Thankfully he was still alive. If the Kura herb was poisonous, at least it hadn't killed him right away.