Umuton let out a snicker to Mei's reaction as Mark watched over the potatoes carefully.

The potato fragments were soon cooked to crispy golden perfection. He took the deep drying baskets and shook off the excess oil before pouring the fries into the jars. Next, he sprinkled seasoning and salt into each of the jars.

Upon seeing that he was done, even the children that were busying playing came to collect their jars.

"Shake it well to spread out the flavour!" advised Mark.

"I found this weird blue carrot!" shouted one of the young rabbitmen as he waved the plant energetically.

"I found this giant red potato! Make this into fries next time!"

Mark took the carrot and passed a jar to him. Mei watched as the little elves and rabbits lined up in a queue to trade various weird plants in exchange for the jars. She found them quite adorable, despite their attitude. They sat down in groups to eat afterwards, giving some to the greenish wolves too. 

After the last of them made the trade, Mark walked to where Mei stood at the side with jars of fries in each hand. She was a bit shy, so she just stood at the side and watched the children instead of talking to them.

"I got quite a lot of great ingredients today." beamed Mark as he passed one of them to Mei. "In the past, they handed me a lot of inedible or horrible tasting stuff... even poisonous plants and mushrooms at times!" 

Mei gave the jar a quick shake before lifting it up and tipping a whole mouthful into her mouth.

"Why not just look for what you want yourself then?" she asked with her mouth full.

"It takes forever!" sighed Mark. "Before I got this deal with them, I could spend an hour and barely find any."

He took a few quick looks at the elves as they ate. Seeing that all of them were a distance away and engrossed in eating, he leaned towards her ear.

"Potatoes are also super cheap..." he whispered.

A few of the bunnies turned their heads towards him.

"If you call hundreds of gold cheap..." he continued, covered in cold sweat.

The rabbits stared at him with suspicion for a few seconds before resuming their meal. Mark made a mental note to himself to not forget that rabbits had exceptional hearing.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

Mei smiled.

"By the way, why didn't you cut the potatoes first? Maybe they'll like the fries more and find better plants in exchange!" she asked.

"I cut up the fries properly at first! But then they were so impatient and kept asking me to be faster!" Mark complained. "So to mess with them, I just crushed the potatoes into bits with my hands and fried them just like that! But they said there's no difference in the taste, so they told me not to waste time in the future! Hah... these kids..."

"Heh, you sound like an old man talking like that!" teased Mei.

"That's because I'm mature for my age," answered Mark.

"Uh huh," Mei answered with a grin. Mark had always been good at ad-libbing.

Mei didn't talk more afterwards as she was busy stuffing her face with the fries. They were oddly shaped and kind of ugly, but Mei still liked the taste a lot. They didn't taste at all like the fries she got at WacDonalds or any other fast food restaurants she ordered them at. These fries were a lot more crunchy but still soft inside, with a strong salty oniony flavour that seemed to go well with the taste of potato. Seeing that Mei was eating, Mark began slowly eating his.

Meanwhile, Umuton just watched with nothing in his hands, as he was unable to eat. One of the elves ran over to the lonely skeleton, holding out one of the larger chunks of potato from the jar.

"Here, Mr skeleton! Eat up!" the little boy smiled.

Umuton stared at him for a second, unsure if he was being mocked or pitied. He took the fry after a second of hesitation and chewed it, getting potato bits and oil all over the inside of his skull and ribcage. Bits of chewed potato dropped all over the inside and outside of his armour and jeans, getting them oily. The skeleton immediately regretted his decision to humour the little elf.

"Yay!" the elf cheered.

A few of his friends came over and began offering their fries too with bright smiles.

"Mark!" spluttered Umuton as he reluctantly chewed on a few more pieces. "I think we need to go!"

"So soon? Why not play?" whined one of them.

Mark looked speechless for a moment.

"Alright kids, something important has cropped up. We have to go, okay?" said Mark.

"Awww!" said a few of the elves.

Mark beckoned to Mei who was still munching with her mouth full. They walked off with Umuton in the lead.

"Bye!" said Mark to them.

The elves and rabbits waved goodbye to them.

After they made enough distance, Umuton began complaining.

"Gah! Those stupid kids! I don't even know how to wash this off in the game!" he shouted.

"Jump in a river?" suggested Mark with a smirk.

Umuton seemed to think about it.

"Come to think of it, there's a river nearby according to the map, isn't there?" he suddenly said. "Maybe we can try fishing there. You barely even used that rod you bought a week ago!"

"Fishing?" Mei asked, interested. It had always seemed fun to fish to her, but she didn't have any opportunities to do it in real life.

"I don't know, the last time we did it, we barely caught any first after an hour. What do you think, Mei?" asked Mark.

"Yeah, why not?" she answered.

"I guess we'll try again then," said Mark.

"Third person's the charm!" Umuton commented.

"You know what, Tom?" Mark said to the skeleton. "That's the first time I heard you not make a dirty joke in a while."

"I don't make them that often. It's like how people go for balanced diets!" answered Umuton.

Mei wasn't sure if that was even a joke, but she didn't comment. It was then when something occured to her.

"I thought you always added 'Umu' to the end of every sentence?" she asked.

"Umu umu, umu umu? Umumumu! Umu." the skeleton answered.

"Dammit Mei, you jinxed it!" shouted Mark.