48 - Questing

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An uneven rapport

May form a shaky support.

Their genuine effort

Still gave each other comfort.

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"What was that about?"

"Huh?"

On their way to the kingdom walls to leave the city, Aisia suddenly asked him. Kairo was confused about what she meant with her question.

"Where did all that intensity come from? You became all gung-ho about collecting mushrooms all of a sudden."

"Ahh. When the kind lady talked about overharvesting, it reminded me of my last conversation with my late father."

"Ah." This was one of the landmines that Grisia warned her about when asking too many things regarding Kairo.

Seeing Aisia fidgeting, he assured her, "It's fine. It's not too much of a big deal."

"Do you... want to talk about it?"

"My past?"

"Anything about it."

"Sure, we have a lot of distance to cover anyway until we reach the city walls."

She realized that after the fact that she didn't have anything in mind in particular. Instead, she said, "Well, if you want to talk about it, I'm free anytime."

Her worrying and kindness made him smile. "Thanks, Sia."

"Sometimes, she's not that bratty." he thought.

"We should hurry up then. The sooner we finish this quest, the sooner we can get our license."

Aisia nodded in agreement.

"Race to the walls then?" she asked.

"Bring it on!"

And so, they raced on their way to the city walls. They dodged the numerous obstacles and people on the busy street. Seeing that they might cause a mess, both of them went for the unpopulated areas without exchanging a single word. They weaved through the complicated and narrow alleyways.

Grisia was right, with their speed, it was much more convenient to take this route. They could take to the rooftops, but that might grab too much attention and break some roof tiles.

They reached the walls and presented their quest parchment to the guards. They were given a pass to return to the city with ease. From there, they passed through the refugee settlements and ventured out to the great plains to reach the nearby forest.

Within minutes, they arrived at the entrance to a forest kilometers away from the castle walls. Because of Grisia's endurance training, it was a cinch for them to travel such a long distance in a short amount of time without expending too much energy.

Aisia pointed to the trees. "Are those the evergreen trees the lady talked about?"

Thick trunks covered in moss, branches that spread out widely like veins in every direction, and great, green leaves. They were the greenest leaves they've seen, much like the ones they saw near the manor. No matter the season, even in winter or fall, they remained ever so green, hence the name.

Kairo nodded and pointed towards the trees. There were some mushrooms growing on the mossy parts of the lower trunks.

"Sweet. First one gets the biggest ones!" she said as she dashed forward, trying to get ahead of him.

"Sure."

Puzzled that Kairo let her get to the large ones first, she stopped dead in her tracks and looked at him. She saw him form a devious smile.

It was different from when she's the one doing it. Since he seldomly does smiles like that, it felt much more menacing. She knew that if Kairo was the one concocting schemes, it wouldn't be something to carelessly ignore.

"What's with the smile, Kairo?" she squinted at him cautiously.

Kairo bellowed a shoddy impression of a villainous laugh. "Hah-hah-hah! You never even considered the concentration of mana within each mushroom!"

Aisia clicked her tongue. "Shoot, that's right. They never said anything about size, but it's natural that they'd rather have a higher quality mushroom than a common one!"

Kairo repeated his poor laughing impression as she kneeled down dramatically and admitted her oversight.

"But don't you worry."

She looked up to him with hopeful eyes.

"The reason I said that is because... you still have a chance! A chance to redeem yourself."

Suddenly, his villainous act turned into that of a role of her guardian angel. She gasped, holding her hands together as if praying.

"Then would you please gather these mushrooms with me?" she pleaded with all her heart.

"No."

"What?!" she yelled in disbelief.

Both of them laughed over how they could casually act out an impromptu play together.

"But seriously, do you know how to distinguish between which has more mana?" Aisia asked after getting all the giddy out of her system.

"No, not really. But last time, I apparently picked up some herbs with mana and sold them to an apothecary. I had a distinct feeling when I chose those herbs, but I'm not sure. It may have only been a coincidence."

"Pops did mention mana and magic, but then we only trained with ki and chakra. We haven't made any strides in magic. I'd love to learn how to float."

"You don't think he forgot, right?" Kairo proposed.

The two of them looked at each other in silence before breaking into laughter.

"Nah, can't be. Right?" she replied.

"Well, maybe we can get a feel of it ourselves? Let's just try and see what happens." Kairo suggested.

They wandered around the entrance of the forest, careful not to go too far and get lost. When Aisia was about to pick a mushroom growing from a hollow, mossy log, Kairo immediately rushed to her and swatted her hand away from it.

"Ow! What gives, shorty?"

"That's a fake chanterelle. Don't pick the ones growing on wood, pick the ones growing from the ground. Also, you're shorter than me."

"How would you know anyway?"

Kairo explained to her that during his journey to the kingdom of Jamais, much of what he foraged were edible mushrooms. He added that he grew up in a remote village, so he was very familiar with what was edible and not.

Aisia couldn't offer a rebuttal seeing Kairo's confidence in his knowledge, and so she heeded his words with a single huff.

"Then, what else should I look out for?"

Kairo started to think for a bit, then said, "Don't pick the ones that are easy to pull out. True chanterelles are connected to tree roots, that's why we should only pick the ones from the ground. Pick firm ones, don't pick the softer ones that are easy to break. If it smells fruity, then that's good, if it smells like wood or if it doesn't smell like anything at all, then that's bad. I suppose those are the easiest things to remember."

With these in mind, they started their harvest.

While they were doing so, they realized that they should've visited a store to buy equipment before taking on a quest. More than supplies and weapons, what they needed was a container to store all that they gathered.

Luckily, Kairo brought his pouch with him. For now, at least they had some sort of storage. They planned to buy a proper container for each of them before finishing the quest.

After they've gathered what each thought to be the best-looking ones, they examined their haul together. They tried discussing which ones could be filled with mana, but without any knowledge on magic, they didn't see much progress in talking about it.

They kept inspecting what they could on the ones they saw, but they didn't seem to feel anything out of the ordinary. They tried touching and smelling it but to no avail. They didn't try tasting it since they didn't feel like dying today.

And so, they decided to simply take the largest and healthiest ones like Aisia thought of earlier. They sighed, realizing that they came back full circle to her childish idea.

They went back to the adventurer's guild with defeated spirits.