Chapter Two Hundred and Fifty-Eight - The Melancholy of Broccoli Bunch

The old quarry still had a road leading down to it, a switchback path on the end nearest the quarry headquarters. That’s where the guards came from, both to inspect the body of the amphiptere, and then to start butchering it.

I felt my nose twitch in disgust as the guards started to chop into the poor amphiptere. I had to swing my ears down to cover my eyes.

“Are you well?” Bastion asked.

I was glad for the distraction. “Yeah, I think,” I said. Physically I was mostly fine. A bit sore from all the running around, but that wouldn’t last. And if I was a bit tired, I could always just take a nap. “How are you?” I asked.

Bastion seemed a bit banged up. His armour scuffed and scraped here and there, with a small dent around his lower chest where the metal seemed thinner. The thick cloth padding he wore under his armour was singed on the corners, likely from a bit of that acidic spit. “All things considered, I’m quite well. Good experience.”

Oh! I’d forgotten to look at my system messages after the fight.

Ding! Congratulations, after a hisstoric battle, you have defeated Sid, Lord of Acid Snakes, Level 32!
EXP reduced for fighting as a group!

I blinked at the level. That was huge! I’d never fought something so strong before. Though, to be fair, I had had a lot of help. A glance back showed some of the soldiers looking very happy. I figured a few of them had just levelled up from all of that excitement.

The name of the amphiptere... that saddened me. Was Sid named by someone? Was the amphiptere someone’s pet at some point?

Congratulations! Through repeated actions your Proportion Distortion skill has improved and is now eligible for rank up!
Rank E is a Free Rank!

That skill again! I still didn’t know what it did, or for that matter how I’d used it in the last fight to get it to level up at all.

Proportion Distortion
E - 00%
The ability to fit in and fit out. Your ability to squeeze into tight spaces and fill rooms has improved.

That wasn’t all that much more helpful. Was I able to naturally squeeze into smaller spaces now? That sounded kind of useless as far as skills went!

I’d have to see what it changed into at Rank C, I guessed.

I’d gained a heap of experience with Captaining and with Makeshift Weapon Proficiency, though not quite enough to get either to rank up. I’d need to practice more. The worse thing was that Captaining was actually getting ahead of Hugging Proficiency, which... what kind of terrible friend was I being?

“Anything good?” Bastion asked.

“Nothing too special,” I said. “No level ups, but I imagine I’m pretty close to my next one.”

“Well done,” he said. “This entire battle will be quite the tale, I think.”

I sighed. “It didn’t feel like an entirely fair battle,” I said. “It was more like... I don’t know, really. Bullying?”

Bastion nodded slowly. “I can see how you’d think that. But I suspect it needed to be done. If the amphipteres didn’t harass civilians so often, maybe we could just leave them be. But that’s not in their nature. They are as prideful as their draconic parents.”

“Yeah.” I said, for a lack of anything better to say. “What’s everyone going to do now?”

“The Inquisition under Major Springsong are still poking at the crevice the amphiptere came from. The presence of juniors hints that there might be a nest nearby.”

“She was a mommy?” I asked.

“Uh,” Bastion said. “No, no I’m sure that’s not the case,” he lied, poorly.

I tightened my jaw. I wasn’t going to break out in tears or anything like that. I was a big girl. I’d go back home to the Beaver and hug the stuffing out of my friends until I felt better instead.

“I suspect that a lot of the meat will find its way back to Granite Springs. If you want you could stake a claim on some of the body. You did participate, and it would be hard to argue that you didn’t do your part.”

“Why would I want anything like that?” I asked.

Bastion rubbed at his chin. “I’ll take a small portion of the leather on your behalf, if you want. It’s valuable, and given to a good tailor, you could make something nice out of it. Additional armour, or some clothes.” Bastion made a dismissive gesture. “It’s a fair reward.”

“I don’t know,” I hedged. It wouldn’t feel right.

“Accept it, please,” Bastion said. “It will smooth things out with the commander, and the general as well. They’ll be quite busy in the coming days, I suspect. Moving the quarry over, likely dismantling that dam, and cleaning up the battlefield.”

I nodded. There were a lot of guards coming over, with Captain Ward calling out orders from atop the back of a cart loaded up with equipment. The few soldiers that had been injured were being tended to by medics in lighter armour with white marks over their arms and around the top of their helmets.

Things seemed calm. “I think... I think I might go back to the Beaver,” I said.

“Are you certain?” Bastion asked.

I nodded.

“Then let me find someone that can carry you back.”

I appreciated the gesture. It was a bit rude to not stop and talk to all the new friends I’d made, but sometimes... well, sometimes even my social batteries were spent. I needed a few minutes to myself, maybe with just a close friend or two to cuddle while I got over my blues.

Bastion and I moved around the old quarry and to where the quarry workers were gathering to help butcher the amphiptere’s corpse. It wasn’t hard to find some carts heading back to Granite Springs. They needed a bunch of equipment that they didn’t exactly stock at a quarry, and there was talk of getting some local butchers over to help, since they’d actually know what they were doing better than the guards and soldiers.

I hopped onto the back of a cart after giving Bastion a quick parting hug.

The ride back was quiet. The sylph driving the cart paid more attention to the road than anything else, and with the late afternoon sun baking everything into a warm haze, it felt like the sparse forests and all the animals within were feeling too lazy to move about much.

I leaned back and stared up into the sky, bright blue, with a few long streaks of puffy white pouring out from the tops of the tallest mountains. This was the first time I was alone since... it had been a while, actually.

It was nice, and at the same time it wasn’t. Too quiet. Peaceful, yes, but I wanted to share that peace. To press up against Amaryllis, to hear Awen’s quiet murmurs as she thought about something and ignored the view.

I huffed, a very mighty huff.

The cart rolled over to Granite Springs, and I thanked the nice driver sylph for the ride before hopping off and making my way into the town. There were still plenty of people around, some of them gathering up in clumps to gossip and speculate.

It wasn’t hard to imagine what they’d be speculating about, I’d seen two dozen guardsmen at the quarry, and I couldn’t imagine a town this big having that many guards in all. Plus the army moving out in force. Someone had to have noticed that.

I plodded through the streets, a lone, strange bun ignored by just about everyone except for the few odd stares.

The docking tower where the Beaver Cleaver was waiting seemed less busy than it had been that morning. The ships being loaded up were mostly gone now, and the crews of sylph that had been working on them were gathered in the shadows of the docks, smoking stinky cigarettes and chatting between each other.

I climbed aboard the elevator, took a moment to figure out the controls, then shot up to the topmost floor where I disembarked and continued on to the Beaver. Awen was there to greet me, sitting astride the railing with a book in hand and her armour and coat on. “Hey,” I said.

She looked up from her book, and a quick, small smile graced her lips. “Hey Broc,” she said. “You’re back.”

“Yeah? Of course I am.”

“I thought you might be in trouble,” she said. “So I was ready to start mounting a rescue.”

“Why would I be in trouble?” I asked.

“Because you’re Broccoli,” Awen said. She giggled at whatever expression I made in response to such a terrible accusation. “I saw the guard all up in a tizzy, and then the army was moving and all the dockhands were gossiping about it and staring at them, so I knew you’d done something.”

“You can’t know that I was involved with all of that,” I said.

“But you were?” she asked.

I crossed my arms. “Maybe.”

Awen laughed and leaned to the side to place her book on the deck. Her laugh calmed down. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” I said. I put on a nice smile for Awen.

Awen looked at me for a moment, then she swung her leg over the rail, and heedless of the huge drop below, jumped over to land on the deck next to me. “Do you need a hug?” she asked.

“I could use a hug, yeah,” I admitted.

She raised her arms a bit, and I wrapped mine over her shoulders and pulled her close. I think Awen grew recently, maybe while I wasn’t paying too much attention. I saw her everyday after all. She was still shorter than me by a good bit, but now her head tucked into the crook of my neck just right.

“Did you want to talk about it?” Awen asked.

“Ah, maybe?”

“I think there’s some leftovers from lunch,” she said.

“Who made it?”

Awen backed out of the hug and gave me a look. Then she glanced aside. “It was Clive.”

“Oh, yeah, I haven’t eaten since this morning, I don’t think. I could use something to eat.”

“Come on then, you can tell me what you did that got the entire army deployed.”

“I didn’t do anything. Just ran a few messages and met some people. Did you know there are molefolk living in Sylphfree? They’re big people, covered in fur.” I bounced over to the Beaver then waited for Awen to jump over as well, just in case she missed the jump.

“Mole people? That must be weird,” Awen said.

“A bit!” I agreed. “They’re nice though. I think most of them are short-sighted, so they’re very squinty, and they have big teeth, but not the sharp, mean-looking kind. They’re nice though. I didn’t really get to hug them to see how soft they are.”

“Is their fur long?”

“No no, it’s more like short, rough fur, I think,” I said.

“Did you meet them in the city?” Awen asked as she led me down one deck and towards the kitchen.

“No no, they were building this big dam way upriver. If they finished it, then it would be terrible for Granite Springs, so Bastion had to convince them not to, which meant that we had to gather the army to fight this big monster called Sid.”

Awen tilted her head to the side as she considered all of that. “Broccoli, I think you’re skipping some parts of the story.”

“Well, yeah, I had to meet with this major from the inquisition. He wasn’t mean, but he was really inconsiderate. And the commander of the army base. He was nice, but a bit... bossy, I guess? I think he’s a bit of a grumpy older guy, but he still seemed like a good sort of person under all the grump.”

“Uh huh, so then what happened?”

I grinned and started over, this time from the beginning. It helped a lot, just being home with... my family, I guessed.

***