CHAPTER 156 - WATER YOU WAITING FOR? LET'S MAKE A SPLASH AT THE PARTY!
🙞❤︎🙜
The chief’s attendants sent one lady-in-waiting for each of us and told them to help us prepare.
“You can call me Dawn. I’m the eldest child in my family’s generation and I was born at dawn,” said the tallest one, a real beauty with charming dimples that showed when she smiled, which she did frequently.
“Please call me Day,” said the shortest lady-in-waiting. She must come from a wealthy family because, unlike the others, her necklace was not made of flowers but of colored glass beads and baroque pearls.
“I’ve taken the nickname Dusk,” said the third lady, the one who had led me to the chief’s house, the one with the cherry-red lips.
Lari went off to the men’s baths while I, along with Kharli, Mo, and the ladies-in-waiting, were loaded onto ornate wooden sedan chairs hung with brightly-colored bark cloth. This was considered necessary for us since the men’s baths were near, but the special VIP-only baths were quite a distance from the chief’s house.
The sight of the tall-strapping young men bearing the sedan chair’s poles on their shoulders gave me pause, and I was about to protest, but Kharli and Mo climbed in before I could say anything.
Was this normal in this world? As a person from modern-day Earth, this felt a little inappropriate though I at least knew that there were no slaves here, so the men were presumably paid for this job.
“I could just walk…?” I tentatively suggested.
“You’re our honored guest!” said one of the men.
Shrugging, I got in, mentally vowing to tip the bearers generously. Silver and gold coins weren’t used much on Peach Blossom Isle, where bartering was the norm. Thankfully, I had planned ahead and had Fengying buy a few good gift items from Anwei.
image [https://i.imgur.com/rramDTp.png]
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I leaned back against the back of the sedan chair and relaxed. The day was hot and humid. Once we left the village and into the forest, I drew back the curtains to view the scenery. At first glance, it looked like we were traversing a path through an overgrown tropical jungle, but when I used the System to identify the vegetation around us, I realized that this was a food forest containing fruit trees, lumber trees, food crops, medicinal plants, and quite a few interesting nitrogen-fixing trees and shrubs. This must be a jungle that the islanders planted and managed.
There were so many lovely plants that I hardly knew where to look.
[Pink Powderpuff:
A drought-tolerant shrub with striking pink fuzzy flowers and delicate, feathery foliage.]
I liked its cute pink pom-pom-like flowers and wondered if it was worth it to ask for seeds or cuttings since it seemed that it was pretty but not super useful. Likewise, I thought the flame tree looked majestic though perhaps not special enough to pay silver for. Adventure Incarnate had a lot of ornamental plants that completionist players collected, but I was always too lazy to do that.
[Phoenix Flame Tree:
A tree commonly grown for its shade and beautiful bright red flowers that bloom year-round.]
The plants that did seem useful were the ones I already had in my inventory, like the banana, coconut, and papaya trees.
I decided to stop thinking of work and just enjoy the ride as we ascended. I reckoned we were climbing up a small mountain or a steep hill. The jungle was fragrant with the scent of water, wild orchids, and the earthy aroma of damp foliage. It must have rained recently. Sunlight filtered through the dense tree canopy, casting long shadows across the tree-lined path we were traveling. Shafts of golden light illuminated patches of moss-covered rocks and vibrant bromeliads nestled in the crooks of trees. Exotic birds darted here and there, their iridescent feathers flashing like jewels.
About an hour later, we arrived at a stone marker where we all got down from our sedan chairs. I handed the bearers a dozen rolls of silk cloth as a tip, and the ladies instructed them to return in time to take us to the feast at sunset on Tranquility Bay.
We continued on foot until we reached a set of stone stairs and I finally saw the “VIP baths” that were our destination.
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
I took out a folding fan from my inventory and tried to use it to cool myself. “Wow, it’s a house? I thought we were just going to bathe in a natural pool.”
image [https://i.imgur.com/pOU9f3o.jpeg]
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The ladies ushered us in without further ado. The house was surrounded by a solid stone fence made of some white marble-like material that had a faint blue glow.
Dawn smiled when she saw me touching the wall. “Ah, you noticed? This place is a very special one where the shyer female demigods used to bathe before the Immortal Assembly. Legend says that the Verdant Sovereign with a Crown of Blooming Orchids and Vestments of Eternal Spring magicked up a hot spring and built the wall for privacy.”
“The house was built later,” added Dusk.
Inside, the house turned out to be a series of small buildings scattered on the side of the hill. The one we first entered was a simple cube with a thatch roof and walls made of latticework wood that were designed to let the cool air circulate. The western door had been slid open to allow us to take in the view. On the opposite side of the hill we were on was another hill with a magnificent waterfall. Below us was a curved three-layered infinity pool. Water cascaded down its sides into a stream that flowed further down the hill.
I whistled in admiration. “Wow, that is some bathing pool!”
“That's the soaking and relaxation pool. We need to go to the cleansing pool first,” said Dawn.
They led us down to a small pool on the lower part of the hill. All of the pools here were fed by one hot spring, so each area on the hill was reserved for a specific purpose. The highest point was used for drinking and cooking water. The middle part was for bathing, and the lowest part was for people to cleanse themselves and do laundry.
We scooped up buckets of hot water to wash ourselves and the ladies showed us how to make a natural cleanser using the bark of a vine called gugo. Rubbing the bark’s fibers together created a foam that we used as soap and shampoo. I contributed a few [Dewy Glow Potions] to add to the soap.
[Dewy Glow Potion:
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To use, simply apply a few drops of the potion to your face and body after cleansing. Gently massage it into your skin until it’s fully absorbed. You can use this potion morning and night for best results.]
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We finished quickly and donned sarongs to walk back up to the relaxing pool. I slowly waded into the biggest pool until I was submerged up to my chest.
“This pool is very soothing,” said Dusk. “The one your other apprentice went to is an invigorating one.”
I put my arms on the side of the pool overlooking the waterfall and laid my head down sideways on it. “That’s great, I like being soothed.”
Kharli and Mo were splashing around at the highest, hottest level of the pool with Dawn and Day while I was down on the coolest one with Dusk.
“We arranged private sessions because we heard that you mainlanders are quite shy. The best bathing pool is quite large, but it's out in the open for everyone to use,” she said.
I smiled at the thought of mixed open-air bathing in this world. My apprentices would faint in shock!
“The water feels great.” I took out several inflatables from my inventory and offered them to the others. Then I used an inflatable ring to dreamily float on my back, drifting away into blissful tranquility.
An hour later, near noon, more ladies arrived, bringing food packed in multilayered lunch boxes. I was going to get out of the pool, but they told me to stay put. The reason became clear when they arranged the dishes on top of a bed of leaves and flowers in a large floating basket and served the food to us in the pool.
I couldn’t believe how pretty it looked. “A floating meal! What a delightful way to eat! Thank you, this looks awesome.”
Mo was too overwhelmed to say anything, so Kharli spoke for both of them. “Thank you very much!”
The food was served on leaves and coconut shell cups. Instead of chopsticks, they used wooden spoons and forks. Knives were not provided, but the food was cut into small pieces, so we didn’t need any. There was rice cooked in coconut milk, ginger pork, fish stew, and an excellent spicy grilled chicken coated with a sauce made of garlic, ginger, chili, shrimp paste, and a dozen other herbs and spices whose names I didn’t recognize. Dessert was sliced fruits. I was famished and finished everything I was given, washed down with papaya juice and spring water.
“That hit the spot.” I rubbed my tummy. If I had been wearing a belt, I would’ve had to loosen it.
We rested for a while after lunch then emerged from the water and went inside the beauty pavilion where Dawn, Day, and Dusk proceeded to treat us to a bewildering array of traditional skin and hair treatments. Using natural ingredients like fragrant oils, herbs, and clays, they coated our skin with a clay mask. Next, they massaged us to “balance our qi” and applied a hair tonic and nourishing oils to our hair.
It was so good that I almost wanted to just stay in the pavilion and sleep, but I didn’t want to miss the feast.
Kharli, Mo, and I put on our summer robes and rode the sedan chairs back down the hill to Tranquility Bay, which was an expanse of azure waters that was open to the sea on one side and was cradled between lush green hillsides. The sun was about to set, but it was still light enough for me to see that a dozen large wooden tables full of food were spread out in the open.
I turned to Dusk to remark that I was still quite full from the earlier meal when I heard the loud ringing of a bell. The people who had been sitting on picnic blankets all jumped up and everyone exclaimed a variation of “She’s diving!” or “She’s going to dive!”
Dusk put an arm around my shoulders and said, “Brace yourself, the Great Turtle is about to dive underwater.”