It was planned to set sail at midday, but with some delays they only anchored up in the late afternoon. It was still at least two hours till dark and the crew expertly managed to navigate the huge “Queen Elizabeth” through reefs of Aurora bay when they were met by two smaller, but still impressive battleships.
“Our escort.” Kate pointed at the two ships and explained, “Although there shouldn’t be any dangers in the northern seas, those Sand bastards or even prates from the Nestri continent sometimes come into our waters.”
Nick nodded. There was no gunpowder invented in this world, at least not yet, therefore all the naval battles were abordages in close combat. Despite this big merchant ship being quite fast, quick pirate battle boats could easily catch up during the night while it sailed near the coastline and even having almost hundred crew members, it was unlikely to be able to hold off the attackers. Thus having two escorting battle ships was not only a form of showing off power, but a real threat to any potential aggressor.
Youths enjoyed the fresh sea breeze for a while and when the girls finally felt cold, they proceeded to have a dinner inside their cabins. While playing a host as an excuse, Kate already had taken command over this little group and everyone had to join her into her lavish cabin to have warm meal and chat some more.
Nick knew it was his life now for the upcoming days and used a moment when Kate was not paying attention and quickly sneaked away to meditate a bit and then to sleep. Steven and Conny were not so lucky. Kate pretended to not notice their wish to be alone and tortured the poor couple till late at night when they finally escaped, completely exhausted.
In the morning the newlyweds payed her back in fullest. They didn’t leave their room the whole day and even in the afternoon they only sent a message saying they were not feeling too well and would join them the next day or the day after. Kate furiously cursed them, showing off her vocabulary as a proud daughter of a maritime family. Beata was blushing at her rude words describing the couple’s current activities while Nick wanted to kick himself for not thinking of such an easy and obvious plan.
When the lunch time came, Kate had mostly calmed dawn and, following Nick’s advice, together with Beata tried to think of a new fashion design for their travel wear. Nick played an easy trick – he praised the beauty of both girls, only to express his regret that these ‘common city clothes’ don’t really fit the marine adventure. Thus he got few hours of free time for training.
Later, when the girls seemed to run out of inspiration, Nick went to make acquaintance with off-duty officers and have a chat. He learned few things about seafaring and, as it turned out, it was not a very romantic way of life at all. Not everyone could stay away from home for months and even the entertainment they got in harbor cities was very short and superficial.
The sailors from poorer backgrounds used this job as an opportunity to make a quick money and then drank themselves half to death as soon as they stepped ashore. But officers were mostly from aristocratic families or just more talented commoners who didn’t want to sink that low. Of course, they also drank and spent money in brothels, but not as much. The food on the ships was not of particularly good quality and the ‘fresh’ water they were bringing with them was not as fresh after a couple of weeks. Therefore alcohol was the cheapest and most accessible cure for these seamen.
Although the cabin was luxurious, to train there was annoying and Nick didn’t want to spend too much time with Kate and Beata. Therefore he began to help out in the galley. He would’ve practiced alchemy and even use unsteadiness of the ship as an additional training element, but the risk of burning something down was too great. On the third morning he got an inspiration to try and use his Qi while preparing a regular meal just like he would refine a paste or elixir in alchemy.
This was the reason for him to come to the galley in the first place. The chief cook granted him a permission to help out and was a little surprised when the young man wanted to cook for the crew members and not for the princesses. While it went against everything he understood about the world, the chief cook shrugged and welcomed the free help.
Other cooks were busy satisfying many needs and caprices of the passengers, but Nick experimented around the easy recipes and tried to figure out ways to ‘enhance’ them using Qi. And the crew was delighted with the results.
While they didn’t always get their meals prepared by this weirdo from the palace, the ones they got were much more tasty compared to their food at home. It was no wonder – any ingredient that held rich Qi was valued high and the food cooked with infused Qi was obviously tastier than a regular one. A good example was the meat from a common animal compared to that of a rank three or four beast. And when Nick infused Qi in regular bean stew, it tasted exactly like it was cooked with a high quality meat.
Chief cook didn’t pay much attention to this. He thought Nick added some expensive ingredient or spices that they used in the palace and didn’t even ask to share, since youth’s help was already a blessing and he didn’t want to scare the cost-less employee away.
When Clayton thanked his niece for bringing Nick, she was confused at first, but soon realized what was going on and got furious. Everyone in the palace knew the open secret of pizza being Nick’s creation. Who knows what other tasty dishes he could think of!
Kate immediately ordered couple of officers to help her catch the little ‘thief’ and threw a small tantrum. It didn’t help when Nick explained he was only practicing Qi and alchemy skills. In the court hearing held by Kate and with Beata as the jury, it was decided that from now on he will cook for them.
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Thus Nick learned the meaning of expression ‘no good deed goes unpunished’ the hard way. He thought for a bit and said that he didn’t care, they might as well starve and he would just smile while watching them suffer. It didn’t matter it they threw him off the ship – he would swim towards west and get to the shore sooner or later.
In the end they agreed on a compromise. Nick would cook something nice for them from time to time and they will not bother him for the rest of the trip. Every party felt like they were winners in this situation although Nick felt that something was still off.
Nick’s Qi was not the only reason crew liked his food and it couldn’t be. He just physically wasn’t capable of enriching the amount of food required for the whole crew with his puny Qi practitioner’s abilities.
When he was in the Holy Order, he was fed only steroid fluids and occasionally milk and he had no idea about the cuisine of this world. Later, while he was doing his detox retreat at Ben’s place, auntie Maria mostly cooked for him. Then he found out how plain and simple the cooking of this world was. He hoped that at least aristocrats and royalties had it differently, but later sad reality told him it was not much better, even for the rich people.
From his mother’s, Marianne’s, teachings he knew how important it was for the food to have a richer taste so that the human body was able to process it more easily. And the pleasure of having a tasty daily meal should also be a normal experience for every person as well. But these people only recognized plain spicy, salty and sweet tastes.
Therefore, when Nick moved to his cottage, he started to gather spices, process those and then stack in his wristband. There were many simple things he could buy from the market and process, like drying up garlic or paprika and then grind those into a powder. But some of the common spices he was familiar with like cinnamon or even oregano that was almost vital for his own pizza project were not growing here, at least not on the Mainland continent.
Here came the Holy Order’s alchemy knowledge handy. The plethora of books describing alchemy ingredients allowed him to slowly create a small collection of spices that he used for flavoring his own food. In addition, most of these ingredients had some useful alchemy properties, like healing and alleviating fatigue or pain, therefore the food he made was not only delicious but more beneficial to the body as well.
Thus, while Nick trained the Qi manipulation skills and out of good heart added a bit of spices to the food, the meals he prepared soon became the main event of the day for the most crew members and the two moody young ladies on the ship.
While the warm currents coming from south allowed to have pleasant and warm winters in Aurora, it slowed down their sailing towards Ravi. When nine days later the ship finally anchored in front of the second biggest port in the Sun kingdom, passengers, exhausted from boredom, impatiently flocked out their cabins and boarded the small cargo boats to rush towards the docks and then to the city.
There was a special boat prepared for Kate and her company, sent by the governor with an invitation to dinner. Nick was dragged along, but this time he didn’t mind. They had three days time till all the silk was loaded and there would still be plenty of opportunities for him to explore on his own.
Ravi was simple, but beautiful city that reminded Nick of the small Mediterranean towns he visited before. Most buildings were in plain white color, two or three storeys tall. The streets were paved with cobblestones, and looked surprisingly clean, but Nick figured that the cleanness was mostly result of the recent rain.
There were few sealed high rank beasts on the streets, but those were rare and it seemed that people here were a bit less prosperous compared to the capital. Still, they were well dressed and many food stands on the sides of the streets and rich markets were evidence of decent living conditions.
Governor Edward’s mansion was in white color as well. It wasn’t really a palace, but it was much bigger than the other mansions they saw on the way. It was located on the hill on the southern part of the city and had a beautiful view overlooking it.
It seemed like the governor was waiting for the royal procession, because as soon as they approached, he immediately came out to receive the important guests. He was a chubby middle aged man with a fat nose and tiny eyes. His expensive robe could make one think he was the royalty receiving random travelers, but the insincere smile gave away his actual thoughts.
Governor Edward threw a glance at Nick and Steven who were traveling on feet, then at the two Qi masters who were guarding the princesses, ignored all of them and with an exaggerated gesture greeted both princesses and Kate. The girls were long used to such attitude in the capital, therefore didn’t think of it much. Boys didn’t care as well and the guarding Qi masters cared even less.
After inviting everyone in, governor made the necessary adjustments and all guests soon were able to refresh and even take a bath in their respective guesthouses. Obviously girls took a long bath to wash off everything they accumulated on their journey, while Nick, after quickly washing himself, finally could stretch his body and do some physical exercises on a solid ground.
Turns out the governor invited few of the richest local aristocrats to join for dinner. As per usual, princesses were used to this etiquette and Steven as well, only Nick felt a little out of place. But when the food was served, he stopped caring about it and just enjoyed the southern delicacies. The governor didn’t cheap out and provided a high quality wine as well, so the girls soon got a little tipsy and their chatter never stopped. If in the beginning they discussed some formal politics, then now everyone was questioning them about the latest rumors in the capital.
Despite the cheery atmosphere, since Nick was full, he excused himself, walked around the mansion a bit, admiring the many artworks that governor and his predecessors collected during the years and later returned to his own courtyard to meditate.
He woke up early and in a good mood practiced again. While doing exercises he was trying to figure out who will have a bigger hangover today – Kate or Beata.
The result surprised him. When everyone finally gathered for lunch, it looked like Steven yesterday, or rather – today had it the worst. The three girls were all fresh and lively while the poor lad had blue circles under his eyes and it seemed that every high pitched laughter made him twitch in pain.
‘If you don’t know how to drink, it’s better to never start.’ Nick smirked to himself and took out two small bottles of elixirs to help his friend alleviate the alcohol poisoning. Few minutes after drinking those Steven could finally smile.