I watch outside as I eat, Willing my anchor around as the cart keeps moving. My appetite is gone, but I’m pretty sure my recovery times are tied to my foods, so I head to the kitchen to set some nuts and berries to dry. As I get the batch going, -- just the one, not automated, -- I remember that I used to drain moisture instead of just using heat, and wonder if I can drain juice, not just water. Probably ruin the taste. Can’t I get oils? I remember milling and frying stuff in oil…

I wander aimlessly around the kitchen, just waiting for more insights and inspiration as ideas pop into my head and are immediately discarded. Wait. What? I stop and try to remember what I’m seeing. Candied berries on fried sweet dough. Sounds nice. Why can’t I do it? Because the berries I have are toxic. So…?

Oh! Absorbing, soul digestion, got it. Someone knows the recipe, but the hunans at the back of my consciousness are like, meh, that’ll never work --.

Why do the berries taste sweet? I turn to stare at the dryers. I understand they have sugar, but they don’t always taste sweet. Some fruits taste like meat, usually rotten, and I’m pretty sure I’ve eaten a seed or leaf that tasted like fish… So is it just subconsciously this makes me happy, and I consciously decide “oh, it must taste good”, then make a list of tasty things? I remember thinking I had multiple levels of thoughts, -- technically I do, but I thought they were like body, brain, and spirit, not poison bug manipulator. -- and my body responded to stimuli in whatever manner would get me what I needed the most.

I sit and mull the idea around for a bit, still waiting for an epiphany to give me a full insight into how my taste buds work. Sampling the Red Silk Sect’s materials, I’d preferred the sweet and tangy sugary things, but I hadn’t thought why I’d moved on from savory. Besides just, “ooh, dessert!”, so what gives? I’m tempted to ask Spring Cow what his thoughts are, taking a peek out around my anchor, and then cursing as I transfer out.

It’s night time, and I don’t see the priest, mule, or cart. I cross my fingers, toss out a quick prayer, dance in place to psych myself up, then shift to the cart hoping there’s no one else besides the priest to see me show up. He’s alone at a campfire, the mule unhitched, the two sharing some of his travel rations as he casually watches the flames dance.

“Mm,” he grunts in acknowledgement, obviously not worried about my disappearance or sudden reappearance. Or he’s super deep in his own thoughts and isn’t registering my presence at all.

I sigh in relief then transfer back to my void, leaving my anchor on the back of the cart. I tense as I remember that I didn’t actually look around, panning around outside to see if there’s anyone staring in stunned recognition or surprise. He appears to be alone besides the mule. Another relieved sigh and I bend forward, then stretch my back a little as I bend back slightly, just stretching to release the tension in my body.

Back to the kitchen to see what else I should do for food, but this time I keep an eye on the priest. Would rather not have a repeat after just resolving my earlier inattention. I lean back against my center counter, a quick peek at the priest to make sure my anchor is still in place around the cart and he’s still at the fire, then I go back to wondering if I can make anything taste like anything I want.

Can I make berries taste like steak fajitas? What about rotten vegetation tasting like a tasty curry? Some sticks tasting like pork chops and gravy? Ooh! Soft, fluffy, buttery dinner rolls… Imagine eating a rock and getting soft, almost cotton candy like, melty dinner roll vibes.

Am I drooling --? I scrabble to wipe the drool off my chin and from my mouth. Yep. I throw my hands up in irritation before turning back to my musings.

“Can Winter Hawthorne and I maybe spend the night in your void?”

I don’t know what I said but I come to with my hear burning, teeth bared, throat raw. I’m panting and nauseous so I rest my head against the counter in my kitchen and just try to collect myself. What the fuck happened? Logs!

He asked if he could come into my void with the mule and I went off. I went off about Broadband Chicken, I went off about the emperor, I cursed Spring Cow as I reminded him of the bears. I told him my suspicions of Eager Heart and the Black Rock Company, about how my portals to my void might be my mouths. How sometimes those mouths eat what walks into them. How quickly I healed, and my suspicions on how --.

I told on myself. I had a mental breakdown and told on myself. Very aggressively. I was contemplating attacking him at one point for even making the suggestion, as a way to stop it from possibly happening. I very aggressively told him to fuck off. I literally told him to fuck off.

-No vacancies,- I send tiredly as I gather myself.

It was a test. I scream and curse him again, this time knowingly. He wanted to see what my mental state was, if I understood what I had done, or might have done, if I had sympathy towards hunans at all. When I point out that he’s discounting the numerous spirit beasts that had suffered similar fates to the hunans, he apologizes.

Part of me gets it. It makes sense to check. Wouldn’t want to find out that I’m innocent of any malicious intent just to find out I’m a sociopath, and I’m not doing anything out of maliciousness, but I am doing it intentionally, and will continue to do so. Would be kinda hard to find me guilty if everyone agrees that I, personally, did nothing wrong, then find out later that I did it on purpose. Bug am hungry, bug open mouth, people walk in. Bug doing bug things, people should be smarter. Bug goes back to densely populated areas, bug am hungry, bug open mouth, people walk in. Same story, but different implications.

And why the fuck do people keep picking me up in bug form? I’m a giant fucking bug. A talking one. Ew. Yeah, I’m shiny as fuck, and useful as all hells, but ew. The people offended by me aren’t even offended that I’m a bug half the time. They just like pointing it out when I stop being a pretty wallet. Or eat their shit. Or curse them out. Or eat their other shit…

I look out again to see Spring Cow casually chewing on a piece of dried something or other for fucking ever and feel bad about my earlier outburst. Ss. Outbursts.

“I can share some fish, if you’d like,” I say slowly. Pretty sure the fish isn’t poisonous. Mostly. Have to make sure I don’t drop a mutation on him. … Ugh.

“No, thank you,” he laughs and I realize he’s still reading my logs. “Did you forget you put a miasma condenser over your fish farm?

If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.

“The miasma has sunk through the bed. I don’t even know if the fish is safe for you to interact with.”

I blink as I process the chain of events. Yes, I put the miasma spewing thing down. It’s called a condenser?

No! Focus.

“My fish!” I yelp and transfer to the aquifer. I don’t know how the fuck I pick up on Spring Cow’s laughter, but why do I have an audience no matter where I go? “Fuck off!”

Something slithers past me and I yelp and try to spread my wings. Nothing Happens. Fack!

I perk up as I smell – fuck! I’m under water! Am I trying to die? -- something delicious. How the fuck am I smelling anything. Don’t think about it. Don’t jinx it. Just look at the pretty --. Are those dragons?

There are miniature fortune dragons winding through my lake. Some of them have fish fins and others have a fin running down their back, down their tail, and back along their underside. When I look closer I notice that they don’t all have whiskers, and some of them look more snake than sacred lion, all of them dragon-like, but not true dragons. Not yet. But surely these are treasures.

[Piercing Shot]

[Successful Use 106/100]

[Qi -30]

[Karma -5]

[Current Condensed Qi: 1,831,227/23,824,871]

[Current Qi: 1,846,651/957,945,100]

[Current Karma: 95,299,487/107,275,977]

[Max Will: 9,579,451]

[Mortal Wallet: 12E,692K,180P,687R,179Da,155De,105k]

[Spirit Wallet: 0Dr,0Ph,0Th,1325Di,126Co,10680St]

-Tch!- I grab the snake-like fish or scaled eel and stride to the priest’s fire while shaking my head.

I completely forgot to go to the boards or meditate to access the insight I gained from performing the skill. And I’ve got a couple of corpses to strip down. Tch! What was I doing this whole time?

“How much are these worth?” I ask, clutching tightly to the dragon-headed eel.

“Dragon eels! No, that’s not a true dragon eel, not yet, but it’s still a treasure!” the priests says, staring at it with eyes wide as he keeps licking his lips.

“Oh? Thought you didn’t want any of my mutated produce,” I say as I slowly turn away.

“That’s not a mutation! It’s learned to cultivate! And you have more? You’ve forced a lesser enlightenment on the creatures in your void!” He says, slowly working himself up as he turns from me, eyes shining and hands open like he’s holding the strange thing.

“Did you want to eat it or nah?” I ask.

I learn to regret. I don’t know how I can still be squeamish. A holdover from when I was hunan--? No! Shit! Human! Not hunan. That’s a this world thing.

The greedy priest is entirely focused on preparing the food, splitting it open and peeling back the skin, scales still attached. He leaves the fin intact as best as he can, pulling the body from inside and leaving a mostly intact outer figure. The meat doesn’t look like fish at all, seeming more like wild rabbit. I don’t know how I know, therefore I thank Silent Howl for his insight. I find it strange that I’ve got an “evil” cult member in my head with full access to abilities I don’t even know about, guiding my cultivation, and the priest hasn’t said fuck all about it.

Spring Cow prepares thin slices of the meat, plating them on a shallow bowl. Once he gets the amount he sees fit, he wraps the rest in broad leaves and stores the wrapped body in a travel sack. He rubs the inside of the “hide” with hot ash and coals, withstanding the heat and scraping the inside clean. He washes up as the temperature of the meat falls, then gestures for me to eat while plucking a fold of the raw meat and eating it directly.

“You’re not going to cook it?” I ask in surprise.

“That would destroy the Qi!” he looks at me, absolutely scandalized by the suggestion.

Vegan eating raw meat says what? He starts blushing, stammering that there were certain exceptions, and dragon eel falls under that category. The taste of the “fish” is something I don’t know if I’ve had before. Apparently my body doesn’t need it nor care if I get more in the future, because it just tastes like meat and sweetened lake water, not clean, but not stagnant, with a fruit-like juiciness.

“These are not true dragons yet, but they are most definitely a treasure,” Spring Cow says, eyes closed as he reclines, apparently full from so little.

“There’s many kinds, but I don’t know how to tell if they’re ready or not.”

“We still have several days on our journey,” Spring Cow waves languidly, dismissing my ignorance. Bitch, what? “You’ll learn many things along the way. Do not concern yourself overly much.”

“No, seriously. What?” My face keeps twitching without any say from me, and I don’t know if I’m just pissed or if Silent Howl is working on something. “What the fuck is going to take that long to do that we can’t just get there yesterday.”

“I’m supposed to observe you and investigate your true nature, aren’t I?” he snarks back, and I want to be angry. But he’s right.

“I’ll be in my trailer,” I grumble, transferring back to my void. Didn’t I just remember I had shit to do?

Now I want grilled eel… I’ve got memories of a sweet, sticky sauce, juicy, flavorful meat, and a lovely smokiness.

“Ugh!” I was fine, but now I’m hungry!

I go to my logs to learn that I haven’t been absorbing the grains, grasses and stalks I’d thought I’d trashed. I was wondering if I could put rice or wheat in the water, or if it would harm the fish, and apparently I’d been feeding them scraps from almost everything I’d eaten. I had no idea. Silent Howl suggests I check to see if any of the crops mutated. I wonder what he’s talking about, transfering to the hedged garden to see what’s happened, and he sends me a frickin’ emoji. I’m tempted to close the party chat, but he’s got good info. And I have to hunt him down for a bigger nom.

Through whatever spiritual link we share, -- this can’t all come from the party interface, it feels too much like the personal bond I made with randoms, true, but there’s a lot of subliminal subtlety. It kinda feels like there’s a mental voting system and I have a habit of abstaining, so his vote counts more. But I rarely know what we’re voting on.

I wonder if I can breed the pseudo-dragons into something hardier and a message pops up from Silent Howl.

Silent Howl:

Vote to breed eel?

Yes or No?

I can’t help it, I laugh. I snicker, thinking yes down our weird link while setting up permissions. I immediately get a WTF in response. Apparently I’m breeding seaweed from moss? According to Silent Howl that’s what I tried to set. And it was accepted? I don’t know, I just want another salad. I thought of crunchy seaweed chips when I was trying to determine if I liked raw pseudo-eel or not, but I don’t know anything about moss and seaweed.

So what if I’m a glutton? I glare at several lines of little piggies. If he wants to control my shit, then I get to eat him. If he doesn’t, but he wants me to live, shouldn’t there be safeguards in place to stop me from crossbreeding potatoes and nuts if it was dangerous?

What would happen if I tried to crossbreed potatoes and --? Nope! First find out what abomination I already set up.