Barbra turned out to be even meaner than Leo thought.
After kicking his butt several times she announced, “No food for you today or tomorrow!”
Fortunately before she went too far she realized the boy was probably simply slower than the rest and it was normal considering the fact that he was several years younger compared to the others. Of course, the other inner sect disciples were going to laugh at her later since Leo’s failure was in a sense her own, but she could always offer someone else to play the role of a nanny or just punch them in the face if she ran out of arguments.
After the light schooling Leo found a remote place and sat down to meditate. He had never experienced such public embarrassment before and didn’t even know what to do or what to think.
There were few guys who had similarly bad results to Jack’s, but Barbra made it clear that in order to not find a single herb one had to deliberately miss them or sleep the whole day! According to the others the bamboo groves were full of spirit grass, but somehow Leo managed to bring back only what can be considered stew ingredients!
The next morning for the first time Leo attentively observed Barbra’s every move and listened to each of her words while she guided the group to the next spot and fortunately in the evening he was rewarded by whole three contribution points. Compared to the rest the amount was still pitiful, but at least Barbra didn’t abuse him and Leo saw some hope for the future.
He still could not grasp the principles of differentiating spirit grass from regular herbs and up until now went by the gut feeling, but as it turned out – it was mostly wrong. Leo’s initial idea was that the grass beasts would find the most delicious should’ve been the most precious, but after getting laughed at last night, he changed the tactics and methodically threw in the basket those stalks that resembled the ones senior sister Barbra picked and ate the rest himself.
After being forced to skip cooked meals for two days he kind of returned to the period he lived with the apes, except this time he had clothes on and there were other humans in the vicinity. Feeling nostalgic and because the whole endeavor of picking herbs was somewhat boring Leo began to climb the bamboo trees and look for herbs from the above. Obviously it didn’t increase the efficiency, but at least the work was not as tedious and he could feast on the soft bamboo stalks below and seeds above just like he did back in the day.
During the next fifteen days Leo managed to earn whole fifty seven contribution points. That was laughable amount compared to the others, especially Luna who for some reason always managed to get more points than anyone else and currently not only held the lead in their group, but in the whole expedition as well.
Leo, of course, was not bothered with the success of others, but was mostly happy because he only needed forty three points to get back to the sect. All he had to do was to continue to gather more herbs during the day and meditate through the night.
Unfortunately it was not meant for things to go that well. There were only fourteen days left till the departure when Leo somehow got lost. The bamboo groves looked the same everywhere and he strode lost in thought for who knows how long until no one responded to his shouts.
At first he was stressed about it, but then realized that the stay in the Sacred Order might’ve been temporary just like in the Voodoo sect and his real home was probably somewhere in the wild. In addition, no one said there were no people in this mortal realm and if he found a good sect, he could join them – if they didn’t force him to gather herbs that is.
From that day on Leo began to explore not fussing about the herbs or the Sacred Order. Fortunately the weather was nice and he didn’t lack any water. He didn’t encounter any ranked beasts either – only some rabbits and deer.
Who knows how long he would’ve wandered if not stumbling on a particularly weird grove after battling his way through a thicker jungle for half a day.
Even though Leo had decided to not return back to the sect, the herbs growing in batches under the strange looking bamboos of reddish color made him change his mind. He was completely certain those were one type of spirit grass he had successfully turned in previously and in time it takes an incense stick to burn he picked the whole place clean.
Looking at the large basked with the haul that was at least ten times larger compared to what he had previously gathered, Leo decided to give the Sacred Order sect another chance. He was certain that the amount of spirit grass he now had should bring enough contribution points for him to afford the sword he wanted in addition to paying for cleansing baths and successfully passing the Body refinement stage.
The obvious problem now was to find his way back to the group and whether senior sister Barbra would kill him for getting lost.
While thinking, purely out of habit Leo began to dig out the nearby bamboo shots and munch on them. Only after the third one he realized these red sprouts were not only sweet and crunchy, they had this pleasant hot flavor as well. It wasn’t too strong, but felt so addictive Leo began to methodically look for more. Unfortunately not every bamboo tree had sprouts growing nearby and by the time it got dark, there were no bamboo shots left in the grove at all, or at least he couldn’t find any.
The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
When Leo sat down to meditate as usual, a strange, but pleasant sensation washed over him. It felt as if his heart turned in to a hot spring and made the blood continuously carry warmth around his body. In the pleasant comfort Leo even forgot the annoying lightning bolts darting all over his consciousness and spent the night in full relaxation.
In the morning he got up completely certain he had found ‘the good stuff’. Unfortunately for breakfast he managed to dig out only few more red bamboo shots and was faced with the reality that the better quality spirit herb, the rarer it was. After glancing at the basket filled with the common spirit grass, Leo sighed and went back to the yesterday’s problem – how to find the way back to the group?
After a brief consideration he decided to try the ‘good old way’ and climbed the nearest bamboo tree. Unfortunately the only view he had was on the tops of other bamboos since the surrounding jungle was towering over the grove.
On his way down Leo noticed seeds growing on another tree right next to him so he jumped over like an agile monkey, picked one, but the moment he put the rice grain sized seed in mouth, his vision swam and he fell down hitting the ground with the head and loosing consciousness as the result.
Back on the ape island Leo fell from threes on a regular basis, therefore he was not particularly worried after waking up the next morning. What surprised him was the lack of headache and feeling of warmth washing throughout his body – just like after eating the sprouts, except more distinct.
Turns out he did waste the bamboo shots by directly eating them, but the seeds would definitely give him massive amounts of contribution points! Without a second thought, Leo climbed back up the tree, gathered all the seeds he could and began to look for more.
Unfortunately in the whole grove only two more trees had seeds, but it was no wonder. Even regular bamboos may produce seeds once in a decade – who knows how rare these things were.
At first Leo thought of throwing the seeds in the basket together with the spirit grass, but being afraid to loose some on the way, he made a small sack out of his shirt. The weather was warm and he had gone shirtless for more than a year, therefore it didn’t bother him one bit.
Afterwards he went back to the jungle surrounding the grove, picked the tallest tree he could find and climbed it to the very top. The view was breathtaking with distant mountains at one side and endless sea of treetops stretching to the horizon on the other without a sign of humans anywhere. But before Leo could enjoy it or think of the next step, he suddenly got a distinct feeling of déjà vu.
With the corner of his eye he noticed a large shadow plummeting to the earth like a meteor and purely on reflex he jumped off the treetop trying to hide between branches to not get carried away once again. This time there was no angry ape patriarch below and he didn’t need anyone to save him, thus the prospect of becoming eagle food was not that enticing.
Compared to his time on the ape island, Leo had grown quite a lot and was stronger as well. Thus he didn’t directly fall down the tree, but quickly descended by jumping from branch to branch. Unfortunately the moment he landed he saw a huge bird looking angrily back at him.
“Motherf*cker! You almost scared me to death!” Leo shouted at it, recognizing elder Clark’s silverwing eagle.
According to what senior sister Barbra said, there shouldn't be any ranked beasts around to not speak about rank five chicken that was almost double his size, therefore it was not that hard to guess the bird’s origin. Obviously elder Clark sent the eagle after him and that meant the Sacred Order was not going to leave him behind.
Warmed with the thought Leo picked up the basket full of spirit grass, put on his back, grabbed the sack made of his shirt with the bamboo seeds inside and said, “Alright! Lead the way!”
It turned out just as his father once told him – high ranked beasts were often smarter than humans. While the eagle couldn’t speak human tongue, it understood it pretty well. He proudly snorted towards the boy and with a single flap of wings was already somewhere above the treetops.
Leo didn’t mind the attitude – all he needed was the approximate direction. He battled through the jungle for some time, but when he got to the bamboo groves journey became much more comfortable.
Unfortunately it also became much easier for the bird to target the boy through the sparse trees. The eagle began to torture Leo making short swoops and relieving himself right on his head. Its precision was so incredible, not even a drop of sh*t landed anywhere else but in Leo’s hair.
The boy cursed and threw rocks at the bird in anger to what the eagle replied with joyful cries. The little human had no clue how hard it had been to find him and how pissed the bird was, but Leo didn’t care. He had never been sh*t on nor literally nor figuratively therefore the hate that grew inside of him towards any flying chicken knew no bounds.
Another problem was that for some reason the eagle’s ‘ammunition’ seemed to be never ending and after finding a larger tree to hide under Leo refused to make another step.
Only the next day after a lot of mutual cursing and gesticulating as well as wordless persuasion Leo agreed to proceed. On the way he spend almost half a day washing off the disgusting smell in a nearby brook without much success, but at least he wasn’t covered in feces anymore.
Obviously Leo swore to pay back tenfold one day, but unfortunately for now he was too weak and the damned chicken was granted a temporary pardon.
As it turned out, Leo had wondered quite far. They had to spend another night in the open and only the next afternoon Leo was brought back to the camp.