The time was midday when the medical team returned to camp. They greeted everyone upon their return and headed into the cave to put their herbs into containers to let them dry for later use.
Then the two went to report to Urist who just finished up a bowl. Who was proceeding to rub sand within it with a stick to smooth the insides. While doing this, Urist was mumbling to himself about black pepper when he heard footsteps approach. Curious, he looked up to see the girls walking towards him. His eyes naturally drifted down towards their baskets and his mouth began to water.
“Did you find them?”
Briana replied with a shake of her head. She reached into her basket and pulled out a handful of flowers, the color of the petals were a rich brown with a white running down the middle. Urist gave the petals a sniff, the smell of oranges and lemons in a mixed fragrance wafted through his nostrils.
“Sorry boss. These were the only things we could find.” she sighed defeatedly.
Grabbing a petal from Briana’s hand, Urist put one in his mouth to taste the flavor. As soon as the petal settled on his tongue, the flavor exploded his taste buds away. The taste was hard to describe; it was like a mix of different fruits he could best describe as a holy union between apples, oranges, grapes, mangos, and pineapples!
Urist was in utter bliss savoring the taste, At first, I was a little disappointed in them not finding the ingredients, but this gem more than makes up for it.
With these flowers, they could make some tea that tastes like juice! He was so moved by the thought that he started shedding tears of joy, ‘Finally, something to wash away the dreaded taste of corndog out of my mouth.‘
The boss' sudden outburst sent Uroa and Briana knowing not what to do. ‘Were the petals that bad to eat?’
‘Did the petals cause some unknown bodily reaction?”
As the girls worried with equal parts worry and curiosity, Urist woke up from his stupor and grabbed Briana and Uroa by their shoulders and announced with glee. “Let’s make tea!”
“Okay?”
“What is tea?”
The two girls replied with bewilderment wondering why their boss was so worked upon these petals. Urist asked and received the basket full of flower petals then put in two cups of petals inside the pot that just got a change of water.
He figured it was a good ratio to experiment on this batch since they had gotten a good amount of water stored up already. The dwarfs, watching their boss do a strange thing, came over to watch more closely his madness at play knowing whatever he did usually have some purpose.
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Watching the water filled with woozoo petals start to boil, the dwarfs watched on as the once clear water shifted into an amber hue as a tangy aroma filled the air around them. Whoever got a whiff of the scent started to drool uncontrollably.
Urist started scooping out the petals when the tea had finished boiling with a wooden ladle. A strainer would’ve been better but with all the clothes he had been using for other projects, this was a better method.
Looking over at the dwarf's eyes that had turned wolfish from the scent made Urist awkwardly smile. He didn’t put on airs and started to pour everyone at camp a cup then one for himself.
Before giving them the drink though, he warned them, “Remember this is very hot so blow on it for a bit then drink it”
Blowing on the tea for a minute, Urist then eagerly took his first sip and his suspicions were correct. It was delicious, very delicious. It didn’t have any of the pulp of juice but the taste was so similar he could hardly believe it.
Suddenly, an idea sprouted from his head. An ambition so great that it called to him from his previous life, ‘I want to taste some good booze.’
Urist knew that petals wouldn’t be a good fit to make booze. He knew on a basic level something like hops, potatoes, or barley was used to make booze. Although he knew this, much to his regret, he never learned how to make alcohol from scratch. Given he was a nature expert, not a booze-making expert. He could only dream of it for now and be content that he had finally found something tasty to drink. The dwarfs around him were greedily sipping the tea in small amounts savoring the flavor the best they could.
Knowing it would be in poor taste if the dwarfs working outside the cave didn’t get a taste of the tea, he decided to bottle up the rest and deliver the tea to them. He could also kill two birds with one stone if he had them come over with him to check the traps to make sure they were still good and if they caught anything.
Filling up a tube of bamboo, Urist headed out of the camp where the dwarfs were disheartened after finishing their one cup of bamboo, they wanted more! Seeing their pitiful expressions as he headed out of camp, Urist laughed, “Haha! Don’t worry guys we still got a lot of flower petals. We can make some more tea after dinner today so work hard!”
"“““““OHHHHHHHHH!!!”””””"
Everyone cheered together exuberantly and got to work with even more passion than before.
Urist headed over to the river’s shore where the bare-chested, muscular Rork and Rat were pulling in one of the bamboo traps catching three fish.
They would usually pull in traps later in the day to get more fish for dinner but with the smoke rack now set up, Urist decided to smoke some fish for later food supplies. They would be saved in green leaves inside the wooden bowls they made and kept deep inside the cave in a dry area.
Walking over to the two chiseled dwarfs showing off their bountiful muscles made Urist inwardly cry inside.
‘Why is life so cruel? Why can’t I have a rocking body? What did I do in my past life to deserve this?’
As he lamented of his lack of muscles, Rork noticed him and gave off a huge smile waving his hand, “Boss! What's up?”
“Do you need anything?”
Seeing how happy these two dwarfs were and how much respect they gave him, making it hard for him to hate them by having a better body definition. With a smile, Urist pulled out two bamboo cups, “Come here guys we made something pretty good in camp. I thought you’d want a taste so I came over. It’s called Woozoo Flower Tea.”