199: Flourish
While the man was closely inspecting the fire statue in awe, Crisplet was proudly showing off the statue he received in return, first to Jen, before bringing it over and offering it to me to inspect.
The crowd behind us had only grown as people craned their necks to see the statue made of fire, but I took the small statue, and sure enough it was a small intricate fireplace with a cat curled up sleeping in front of the carved stone flames. Inside those flames now sat an unmistakable depiction of Crisplet.
I was going to offer to store it; however, Crisplet had already taken it back and was now showing Liane.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name the last time I visited,” I said.
“Oh, I’m sorry. Clifford,” he said, holding his hand out.
I took it, giving it a shake. “My name is Trevor, and this is Crisplet,” I gestured down.
“Yes, I remember his name. How could I forget? It’s not every day you have a fire elemental shopping at your stall,” Clifford laughed.
“You should come visit the house sometime and see Crisplet’s large statues. I think you will really appreciate it,” I offered.
“The house?”
“Ah, yes, sorry. The Ashmoon residence, in the upper noble area. Just tell the guards Trevor sent you. They’ll be expecting you,” I said.
Clifford bowed his head. “Thank you, sir. I would very much like that.”
Looking behind me, we had somehow gathered a larger crowd than even the confrontation, so I felt it was best we moved on.
“Ready to go, Crisplet? I have invited Clifford to the house to see your other statues,” I said, getting a burst of sparks.
I noticed then he handed the small statue to Jen to hold again.
Soon we were making our way into the parting crowd, with Crisplet giving Clifford an extra burst of sparks. We were only a short distance away when Liane let out a chuckle.
“What’s funny?” I asked curiously.
“People were already offering to buy that statue.” Liane commented,
Crisplet turned around immediately.
“Relax, Crisplet. He won’t sell it,” I reassured, being fairly confident I was telling the truth, what I wasn’t confident about though was that someone wouldn’t steal it, perhaps I should have Lily check on it occasionally to make sure it’s still in the right hands.
“You know, it’s going to become a status symbol of stores the Ashmoon house recommends if Crisplet makes a couple more,” Jen said with a laugh.
“I think we should go back to using that cat head we had on the cave in the mountains,” Liane mused.
I had completely forgotten about that. I just shook my head. “Absolutely not.” I quickly walked on ahead, trying to ignore the laughter.
I was soon distracted by another store. From what I could see, it was a variety of cooking equipment, from regular utensils to pots and pans, but what caught my attention were the larger utensils at the back of the shop.
Looking through it all, I saw a variety of things that looked interesting but not what I was looking for. I was really hoping to find the tool the chefs described to me to help turn chunks of meat into mince.
“Hello there! Are you looking for anything in particular, sir? Perhaps a new stovetop for your friend there?” a friendly voice called.
“No, sorry. I was looking for a mincer to make sausages,” I said.
“Ah, unfortunately, they are usually too large to bring to a stall like this. We have sausage fillers, though,” she smiled.
The lady pulled out what looked like a smooth metal pipe with a plunger at the top, and at the bottom of the pipe there was a nozzle.
“You just fill this part with your mince, hold your casings onto the nozzle, which has a rib there to make it easier, and push down to force it into the casing. It also all comes apart to make cleaning easy,” she explained.
“How much?” I asked. I was absolutely interested in this.
“Two silvers,” the lady said, holding up her fingers.
I had the money. That wasn’t a problem. But looking at it, it didn’t look that difficult to make, so I had to assume two silver was far too expensive, and looking past her, I saw Jen shaking her head.
“Sorry, that’s far too expensive,” I replied, shaking my head.
I began to walk out of the shop. “Wait, you’re a noble, right? It’s just two silvers.”
I let out a sigh. I suppose this was to be expected when I’m wearing the scarf and the armour, but still, getting the filler would have been nice. Perhaps it would be best I send Archie down to buy it instead.
“How about one silver, then?” She called as we were leaving the shop.
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“Just so you know, Trev, usually about fifty to seventy coppers for something like that,” Jen whispered.
As we continued to walk through the muddy streets, we made our way to a familiar side of the markets, and I was happy to see these stalls had not changed. Standing at a snow-free salt stall stood Salito, surrounded by his piles of salt. I still had plenty of normal salt, but I remembered when we were here last, there were a variety of other salts in the back of his store that I never had enough time to really browse.
“Hello again, sir! Pleasure to have you back again,” Salito called as soon as he spotted me.
“Thank you for the delivery, as you said,” I smiled.
“No, no, the pleasure is all mine. Do you need more already? I can have it delivered later this afternoon if so.”
I waved it off. “Not today. I don’t need bulk. I came to look at your speciality salts.”
“Absolutely! I pride myself on my variety. Please, come have a look!” he said, gesturing for me to come inside.
Entering the store, I was once again overwhelmed by the amount of options they had, and the colours. I never realised just how many salt options existed.
“So, what sort of salts are you looking for?” Salito asked.
“Well, that’s just it. I don’t know. I love to experiment, though, and I only have three different salts myself: regular, fire salt, and pyrrhosite,” I explained.
Salito’s eyes widened. “Pyrrhosite? How did you come across that? I thought the alchemy guild had a lockdown on it?”
I heard Liane snort from behind and whisper, “Not anymore they don’t.”
I shook my head, trying to hide the smile. Clearly word about the Valriths had not spread everywhere yet. “I can’t say, sorry.”
“If you want to sell me some, I would love to buy it, but no matter. I have nothing at the level of pyrrhosite. However, I have some great cooking and curing salts, like this one here.” He gestured to a salt that looked like dark grey flakes.
“This one has been smoked, and when used in dishes, it imparts a rich smoky flavour into your meal. Or this green one here, which has been infused with the oil of herbs to give it a rich floral and herbal flavour. I particularly like it on my root vegetables,” Salito explained.
I couldn’t believe how many options there were. Also, I couldn’t help myself in buying basically all of them. In total, I got eight different salts, and it was all for very reasonable prices since they were marked beforehand.
“Before you go, I have one more salt you may be interested in, though I will say it is very rare.” Salito pulled out a fist-sized bright yellow crystal.
Activating arcane foraging just to make sure, I noted it was glowing brightly.
“This is Jaratk Salt. It comes from deep underground near old extinct lava tunnels and is often confused with sulfur. This, however, has strong stamina properties, along with a tangy acidic taste.”
“Is it dangerous?” I asked.
I couldn’t help but be worried about it, given that I had already knocked myself out once due to the only other rare salt I had touched. Though I wasn’t about to lick this one, I suppose.
“Yes, and no. It, like all rare ingredients, should be treated with care, and I wouldn’t serve this to anyone below level forty or so, but I will sell this piece to you for one gold,” Salito said.
I winced at hearing the price, but so far he had not tried to gouge me on any other salts.
“I’m at seventy silver for the others right now. How about we make a deal and say one gold fifty for all of it?” I grinned.
“You have yourself a deal.” Salito held out his hand, shaking my own.
Leaving the store, I was happy with everything I got, and I would be sure to experiment with it all soon. I had no real direction on where to head next, but I was getting rather hungry, and the smell of fresh hot food was everywhere.
“Food?” I asked.
“I thought you’d never ask!” Liane said.
The search didn’t last long. I had passed up several roast meat stalls which served a variety of meat on sticks, to a straight-up bird leg that was the size of my arm. What really caught my eye, though, were mixed meat sausages, served on a roll, with what looked to be shredded leaf vegetables and plenty of sauce. Jen apparently didn’t enjoy the veg, saying it had a sour taste, but Liane was more than willing to try it with me.
“You should always know, anything Jen doesn’t like tastes especially good,” Liane whispered.
“Hey! I heard that,” Jen snapped back.
We had to line up to get it, but it moved quickly, and soon I was holding what could only be described as a giant long roll cut from the side, with a sausage that appeared to be a deep red. They had other options as well. Liane had one that almost looked white. On top was a good amount of shredded vegetable, which I learnt was fermented, and then finally on top was a mustard sauce.
With a shrug, I took a large bite, making sure I got a little bit of everything. The roll had a little bit of chew to the crust, but soon I had the savoury peppery taste of the sausage, which then was pushed aside by the sharp, tangy bite of the fermented vegetable, before finally a nose-tingling heat came from the mustard that gave it just a hint of vinegar.
I was instantly in love with it and wondered how I could reproduce it myself.
“Good, right?” Liane asked.
I just nodded, taking a second bite. We were soon joined by Jen, who had what appeared to be a bread disc that was coated in what almost appeared to be sticks, or a bird’s nest, and covered in sugar.
“What is that?” I stared in awe.
“They call it a fruit nest. It’s fried bread, filled with a fruit jam mixture, and on top it’s a mix of caramel, fried bread, and sugar,” Jen said between bites.
I had initially planned to get that after the sausage. However, by the time I had finished eating, I was entirely full. Liane, however, had no such problems and quickly got dessert as well.
Before we left the market to head back home, I collected several other supplies, notably all the melons I could find. I got some meat as well, including some whole fish and two monsters I had not seen before.
One was a sea monster that looked to be more tentacles than anything, but I was assured it was tasty. The other was a medium-sized reptile creature that looked a bit like a chunky snake. However, it had giant digging claws on its front paws and paddles on the rear ones, but what really stood out to me, the creature had no eyes.
Would you like to store [Uncommon] Krothtal x1 for 5 mana? Yes/No
Would you like to store [Uncommon] Durm x2 for 5 mana? Yes/No
Even the man I purchased it from knew very little about the reptiles, but I was always excited to experiment with something new.
Finally, making our way home from the market, I was happy the day had passed without issue. It felt like these days it was rare to just have a day to relax, and despite the weather, I had finally got to do that, even if some people tried to take advantage because they thought I was a rich noble.
I had to stop myself at that thought. I guess they were not wrong now.
Now, however, I was looking forward to going home and spending the rest of the afternoon practising my runes and hopefully getting some jerky smoked. Maybe I could even use some of this new salt.