The walk was faster than William expected, only a five minute walk from Serendipity into the Agriculture section of Everglade. The creatures were astonishing to behold. Rellzin were large. Several inches taller than a typical horse and twice as wide. Six legs protruded from beasts, muscular and dense. The Rellzin were covered in black and brown scales. Their wasn’t any particular pattern to the different scales, and the hues between black and browned varied in between the two colors. It wasn’t enough to be incredibly pronounced, but up close, it almost looked like a cross between desert and digital camouflage that he had seen in some FPS games he had played.
The chests of the beasts rose and fell slowly, as if every breath was taken deeply. The exuded breathing of the creatures was powerful, demonstrating the capacity of large lungs. The Rellzin had small tails that starkly contrasted the large limbs, head, and torso of the beasts. The tails were no more than half a foot long and William was unsure if they were clipped at a young age for whatever reason, but he doubted that Wylton would allow such cosmetic changes to natural creatures. The tail interestingly had no scale coverage, but instead had a chitinous shell around it that was jet black and seemed to absorb a large quantity of sunlight, making the surface of the appendage look almost abyssal. Moving his gaze up the beast, he made a note of the brown claws on each leg. They were thick and appeared to have serrations with the edges pointing in the direction of its hind. The claws were a particular peculiarity, William thought, wondering on what purpose they had. Carving meat of a kill? Were they carnivorous?
William’s gaze shifted up the creature’s neck and focused on its head. A lizard like expression presented itself, looking like a cross between a salamander and an alligator. The head was somewhat flat and ridged like an alligator, but had the eyes, and mouth of a salamander or similar lizards. The sight was fascinating to behold. The yellow eyes were slitted and had a faint yellow glow. Suddenly, the Rellzin sneezed and two horns sprouted from its head, seemingly from thin air. That got surprised gasps from William and his companions, except Maya who watched the reactions with genuine mirth.
William continued watching as Denlar watched the beasts with pride. The Rellzin let out what William hazarded a guess was an annoyed hiss and lowered its head. The creature used one of its frontal legs to snap the horns off, surprising William’s group once again. That elicited laughs from Denlar and Maya, as two pops of snapping bone sounded, at least, that was what William thought the horns were made of. The two freshly grown horns now lay on the ground and the Rellzin felt at the horns with its forked lizard tongue before snorting and turning its attention back onto its surroundings like before. One of the staff at the paddock came over and collected the horns giving a respectful nod to Denlar before leaving again.
“What’s with the horns deal?” William asked, conceding defeat to his growing curiosity.
Denlar looked at the departing man holding the collected horns and replied, “Rellzin sometimes grow horns due to part of their evolution. If they were left in the wild from youth, they would grow into the first set of horns that emerge. These however often have a bad habit of curling and slowly impaling the creatures, inevitably leading to slow and painful deaths. When rearing the young creatures from hatchlings, horns are regularly collected to prevent them becoming permanent. Over time as the creatures grow, they become unaccustomed to having horns and find the emergence of them irritating. As you saw, at adolescent and adult ages, the creatures can remove their own horns. The horns don’t go to waste either. Jane, do you remember using powder as an antiseptic when you aided our healers?”
Jane thought back to her previous task, then her eyes widened in memory of something.
She clicked her fingers and replied, “Yes. For the injuries that didn’t need Mana related healing, we used a white powder to sterilize any wounds. The powder also increased the clotting speed of the wounds.”
William cut in then and said, “Why do you need medicine when you can cast healing spells?”
It seemed a weird time to ask, but he was in a curious mood.
“Isn’t it obvious, William? When there are larger numbers of injured people, there isn’t enough Mana to go around, for lack of better phrasing. I don’t get to adjust the MP cost of my healing, so a scrape is as costly to heal as a severed limb. Medicine even in this world is essential and needs to be used often.”
William smirked, seeing sense in her words and understanding the point completely, but he felt playful and replied, “Spoken like a wizened old healer of many years. Were your words verbatim?”
Stacey and John faintly smiled, and William noticed them have the same expressions whenever William and Jane teased each other.
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Jane turned to look at Denlar again and said, “You were saying? What function do these horns have in the powder we used?”
William felt hung out to dry and looked back at the Rellzin, envious of a simple life. Stacey lightly patted his arm in solidarity, but failed ot keep the amusement off of her face.
Denlar spoke and drew the attentions of William and Stacey again.
“The horns are ground down into powder along with several other medicinal components and mixed together. I don’t know the details, but I know enough to say that at least.”
Jane smiled and rubbed her hands together as if she had found the crown jewels.
“I’m looking forward to learning the recipe. If we can produce enough of the stuff, we can start making something like a first aid kit for people who don’t have a healer nearby,” She said, having took on the role of a healer with vigor.
“First aid kit?” Asked Denlar, his eyebrows furrowed in confusion.
“It’s a pack that would have essential medical items for minor injuries and stop gap measures for serious ones. Things like anti septic, bandages, sterilized medical tape, and so on,” Jane replied, in a tone that made her sound like a lecturer.
The comparison amused William somewhat, and he was quite surprised that they didn’t seem to have first aid kits in Everglade, maybe even in GAEA as a whole. He wasn’t learned enough on the lands of this new world to make that assumption. Maybe Greenwell could start making first aid kits to sell. If they were going down the weapon selling route, why not add medical supplies into the production line? The people that bought any weapons they had made would probably need medicinal supplies in the days after.
“That’s a fantastic concept, Jane. It makes me wonder why we hadn’t thought of some medical pack to give to the guards we send out on patrols,” Denlar said, fingers tapping his chin in thought.
“Well, when we start making them, you’re more than welcome to purchase some,” Jane replied, in a cheery tone.
Denlar laughed mirthfully at the retort.
“Of course. And here I thought I was so clever with my idea.” William thought, but conceded that it wasn’t too unique a thought, if he was being honest with himself.
The Rellzin beside the group let out a quiet hiss and probed at Jane’s outstretched hand with the forked tongue that had made an appearance before. Jane’s bond, Lily was perched on her shoulder staring at the creature. William wondered if the little Falcon was jealous.
It was an amusing thought, and he wondered if Echo would act the same way. Echo had flown off to hunt some insects but wasn’t far above, in the nearer branches of the tall trees. Denlar spoke once more after a moment of letting Jane interact with the beast. A beast that made Jane look tiny in comparison.
“These are the breed of Rellzin that typically pull carriages-” Denlar pointed over to the back section of the paddock. “- Those are the Rellzin that function as livestock.”
Everyone looked in the indicated direction and William was surprised at the difference.
The livestock breed were incredibly muscular, as if they were participants in a Rellzin body building competition. They were not as tall as the Rellzin near to William’s group, but their bodies would definitely provide a significant amount of meat. As William looked on, he noticed several lumps of white bone scattered across the paddock. He guessed that they must be more shed horns. His thoughts were confirmed when several men staffing the paddock entered the area of pasture with baskets and started collecting the scattered horns.
The rest of the trip saw the group arrive at an area that had rows of cylindrical hives that were constructed of wood. Most likely this world’s version of the hives bee keepers on Earth managed. They watched as one of the keepers approached with no protection whatsoever. William assumed that the keeper would be stung in a million places, but the surprise only grew more pronounced when the woman used her bare hands to lift a slat of honeycomb as tiny green bees crawled over her hands and flew around her person. No cries of pain or excessive buzzing sounded however, and the woman tapped a rhythmic sound with her index finger on the top of the slat she held. The bees quieted down further and allowed her to scrape the honey out with a small scraper tool of some form that the woman had pulled from her jerkin and poured the liquid into a small bucket that was hooked to the bottom of the hive. The keeper then put the slat back inside the hive and started on the next, gradually working her way through the row of hives. Denlar looked like he was about to explain the process, when a man dressed in a guard uniform ran towards them.
“Sir Denlar! It’s bad!” The unknown guard said, fear plastered on his face.
Denlar turned immediately and William saw the body language shift into one of a leader.
“What’s bad, Soldier?” Denlar replied, his voice stern and serious.
“War. Stonegate war bands have been seen approaching Everglade. Furthermore, we just received a Courier Bird from Haven. They are under siege from other Stonegate war bands, and need help. It looks like Stonegate is besieging the region.”
William and his friends panicked, fear on their face. Greenwell wouldn’t be able to hold out against a trained military force. Denlar started issuing orders to the guard and with a curt nod, the man ran off to fulfil his mission.
Denlar then turned and with the same stern posture and expression said, “If you want to return to Greenwell, you may be able to leave now before we are attacked, but you will have to leave now if that is your choice, otherwise we could use your aid in holding here. Sorry to rush your choice but I need an answer quickly.”
William’s mind raced. He wanted to just say yes and start running for Greenwell, but part of him figured it was logical to stop them here then try to muster a troop to assist Greenwell if it was under attack. He came to a decision and was unsure how he truly felt about it.
William cleared his throat and loudly said, “We go to Greenwell. We’ll sort favors later.”