Chapter 22: Resting Days. Part Two
Coal wakes up feeling a lot better than he did yesterday. The room is quiet, and he realizes that Gwen and Gary must have already left.
He stretches his arms and legs, feeling a newfound energy in his body.
As he gets out of bed, he notices that the sun is shining brightly outside, and he can hear the sounds of people going about their daily business in the street below.
Coal takes his time getting dressed, feeling more awake and alert than he has in a while.
He decides to head down to the tavern for breakfast, hoping to catch up with Gwen and Gary and make some plans for the day.
When he gets to the tavern, he sees Gwen and Gary sitting at a table, talking excitedly about something. They notice him and wave him over to join them.
"Hey, Coal! Feeling better today?" Gwen asks.
"Yeah, much better," Coal replies with a smile. "What's the plan for today?"
“Well we thought about just having a stroll to take in the sites around the kingdom since we will likely be pretty busy taking our time doing anything once we start going to the academy tomorrow.” - Gary
“Yeah, maybe stop at the bakery!” - Gwen
Coal, Gwen, and Gary set out to explore the area surrounding the inn, taking in the sights and sounds of the city.
They stroll through the bustling market, watching merchants selling their wares and bargaining with customers.
They stop at a small bakery and buy some fresh pastries to snack on as they walk.
The aroma of freshly baked bread and sweet pastries fills the air, making their stomachs growl.
They come across a park with a small pond and benches scattered around.
They take a seat and enjoy the peaceful atmosphere, watching ducks swimming in the pond and children playing on the grass.
After a while, they continue their exploration, walking down winding streets lined with colorful houses and shops.
They stop at a bookstore and spend some time browsing through the shelves, picking up books that catch their interest.
The books with more information about history, magic, martial techniques, and cultivation techniques usually could not be found in a common bookstore like this one.
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The few they did have either had very limited information or were low grade since most of that information is monopolized by the nobles, kingdom, and rich.
The academy would likely give them access to all of this so buying anything now could be seen as a waste of money since they would be starting the academy tomorrow, but there was nothing wrong with looking around.
The party primarily sought out some beginner books so that they could shore up their more lacking knowledge on their own time once in the academy.
They ended up buying Common Tongue for Commoners, Basic Runes, and a small encyclopedia on different monsters.
As they leave the bookstore, they continue their walk, chatting about the books they bought and speculating on what they might learn in the academy.
They eventually make their way back to the inn, feeling tired but content from their day of exploration.
They head up to their room, and Gwen pulls out a deck of cards from her bag.
"Anyone up for a game of cards before we turn in for the night?" she asks.
“So start off with some RatScrew?” - Gwen
“Yep, just like always pass the cards!” - Gary
“Remember! No cheating, trying to sense the cards before we put them down or just plain looking isn’t allowed.” - Coal
“Yeah, yeah! Just try and see if I’m cheating.” - Gwen
They do a quick game of fire, earth, and wind (It is just rock paper scissors, with rock being earth, fire being paper, and scissors being wind.) to see who would start as the dealer.
Coal and Gwen both hold out Fire, but Gary holds out Wind which beats Fire.
“Gah, aw man here you go Gary.” - Gwen says as she hands him the deck.
“Man, I still do not understand who made this game. How does wind beat fire, fire beat earth, and earth beat wind? Like it’s all circumstantial, a big enough wind could blow out a fire, but smaller winds would just make it glow brighter or spread it, and fire can just harden earth or make it darker, blah go ahead start.” - Coal
The rules of the game RatScrew that the Dthic party is playing is simple and can be played with a standard fifty-two card deck.
The cards are split evenly to all the players and if there is a card left-over it is flipped over into the center.
None of the players look at their cards and hold them in the stack they were given.
They can shuffle their cards, but once they start they can only shuffle it again once someone picks up the pile.
Starting with the dealer and then going clockwise each player takes a card from the top of their stack and places it face up in the pile.
If the cards make a match, sandwich, the jester, or couple the first person to slap down onto the pile takes all the cards in the pile.
A match is two of the same cards back to back, an example being someone putting down a seven and then the next person putting down a seven on top of that one would be called a match.
A sandwich is when the same card is placed down with only one different card inbetween. An example would be if someone puts down a seven and then the next person puts down a six and then the next person puts down a seven. This would be a sandwich and you could slap down.
If a jester is put down the first person to slap down gets everything in the pile.
Lastly a couple is when a king and a queen card are placed down back to back. The order does not matter, just that a queen and king are touching in the pile.
The last few rules are if the person whose turn it is to put down a card puts a card down before anyone can slap on
pile you can not slap and claim the pile since it is no longer a match, sandwich, jester, or couple.
The final rule is that if someone slaps the pile without any of the slap rules being applicable that they owe a random card from their stack to the person whose card the slapped, or if it is their card they give it to the person whose turn it was before theirs.
Coal, Gwen, and Gary play three games before realizing that it has become quite late.
It was always a nice pastime that let everything pass quickly especially for the competitive trio who full force slapped down and even used their elemental affinities to speed up their movements.
Gary, sadly the least mobile was usually last in these games, but his spirit would not let him give up and he always gave his all.
They took turns to go clean their bodies and then went to bed ready to attend the academy tomorrow.