Part 65: Chapter Sixty-Four: Gather Cluster
---------------------------------------------------------------Part Sixty-Four: Gather Cluster
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Music: Herb Gathering
On his way out of the forest, Jesus stops by the local herb spot for some herbs in case the Drunken Bear’s Bruise didn’t heal well.
With the bear meat in hand, Jesus figured this fur shop’s spicy lover won’t give up the Soil Red Peppers for some bear fur, and we really need those peppers before that Zhao guy decided to eat it all, so let’s go straight for the desperate Plan B.
You are Zhao Fifth?
Real men walk with his first name and sit with his last name! Zhao Fifth is me! You are?
I-I am what people called the Super Spicy King, Jesus.
Never heard of ya, what do you want?
I heard you love to eat spicy things and especially the best spicy treat, Soil Red Peppers, so as the Spicy King, I come personally to visit and invite you to our Spicy Friendship Society.
Spicy Friendship Society?
Yes, our Spicy Friendship Society is to make friends with spicy hot spice and any spicy lovers are welcome to join with the admission fee of ten slices of Soil Red Peppers. With that, you will become our official member and eligible for all future spice gourmets like the all you can eat Spicy Pot, Killer Spicy Noodle, etc…
Ten slices of Soil Red Peppers! That’s more value than my life!
Very well, seeing you are a fellow spice lover, I will give you a discount of five slices to join.
I can afford that much, but that depends on how capable you are.
What do you have in mind?
Look at all these rare furs I own, yet I lack a rabbit fur.
That’s easy, I will go catch one now.
Hold on! The fur I need is not from the regular kind of rabbit.
What kind of rabbit do you need?
The pet rabbit of the herbal store next door. If you can get your hands on that pink rabbit then I will join your something Spicy Friendship Society.
Very well, we have a deal!
H-holy sweetness, that rabbit is so cute.
Wow! That pink rabbit is so cute!
Yes it is!
Sir, I have a proposal, can you sell your rabbit to me?
I brought this rabbit all the way from Miao territory and we have developed bonds that can’t be traded for money!
I really need this rabbit, my good man. Please make a deal just this once.
As I said, my bond with this rabbit can’t be weighed by money!
Please sir… please…
[Sigh] Just because you seem to need this rabbit so badly, I will make you a deal.
What’s the deal?
Get me ten Hairyvein Agrimonia.
Hairyvein Agrimonia?
It’s a very precious herb. Ever since the Hundred Herbs Sect monopolized Chengdu’s local herb gathering spot, this herb has become much rarer.
See why I decide to skip herb translation? It’s not even in the species list of the English Wikipedia.
So you are saying that I can have the rabbit if I give you ten Hairyvein Agrimonia.
Yes.
Alright, I will figure something out!
Obviously, the Hairyvein Agrimonia is currently sold out at the Hundred Herb Sect, so Jesus have to gather it himself or already brought it in other city/sim-mode shop, which he did both for the heck of it.
Sir, I have ten Hairyvein Agrimonia right here!
Young man, you are quite amazing to get this much Hairyvein Agrimonia! Splendid, this rabbit is yours.
Thank you sir!
Obtained Pink Rabbit
I won’t have made the deal if I wasn’t in such a bad state of affairs!
Yeah, yeah, you are a wonderful exceptional person.
Hahaha! Take a look at this!
You caught one, amazing! In that case, I will join your something
Congratulation, you are now officially a member of the Super Spicy Friendship Society; please pay the membership fee of
Take it.
Good, there will be a grand welcome party to welcome you soon, and we will inform you of the time and location as soon as possible, so please attend.
I will be there!
Obtain Soil Red Peppers
Lastly, the rice store should have some Fragrance Rice.
This
Ma’am, do you sell Fragrance Rice?
Fragrance Rice!!? You mean the kind that releases an aromatic fragrance when you cook it!?
Yes! You have in stock!?
I heard about it, but never seen it before.
How can your stomachs never seen of it before!
Then do you know where I can find it?
I am clueless about that since I am not an expert on food.
How can your stomachs not be an… never mind. That’s why you fail to regulate your calories intake.
With no more lead to go on, Jesus resorts to asking the local restaurants of its whereabouts.
The useless waiter only knows about his Mapo Tofu that probably gave the emperor a royal diarrhea.
On the second floor however, these two gentlemen seems to be talking about rice.
Old buddy Liu, I was passing by the Lin family front door and puffs of wonderful rice fragrance that I never smelled before captivated me.
Is it really that aromatic!?
Indeed!
May I ask if you two are talking about Fragrance Rice?
Never heard of this Fragrance Rice.
It’s a type of rice that releases aromatic fragrance when you cook it.
Ah yes, the smell from outside Lin family really is unique.
Where is the Lin Family?
It’s the poor residence next to the abandoned temple.
(Next to the abandoned temple? I better go take a look) Thanks for the info.
On his way there, Jesus visits the local pawn shop and identified a bunch of these treasures.
Your I.D. skill increased, it is now 99
The temple is off screen to the right, so this house should be the one.
(Ah! It does smell great!)
Ma’am, can I ask if the rice you are cooking is the Fragrance Rice?
Young man, there’s no way poor people like me can eat such a good rice.
Then this unrivaled aromatic rice is?
These are just rice I found in the mountain and not something I stole. In fact, poor people would be satisfied to have something to eat rather than care about whether it tastes good or not.
You misunderstood, ma’am. I am not from the government.
Then what do you want?
Ma’am, it’s like this………. .so can we make a deal for your bag of rice?
So you are helping old man Felicity, actually I own a great debt of kindness to him, as back in the old days where Lotus Square is famous and popular, he treated me to many meals for free, and now is a good chance to repay him in his time of trouble.
Please take this bag of rice and send him my regards for me. I will wish for him to wins the cooking competition, defeats everyone and regains the former glory of the past.
I will thank you in his stead, good bye.
Oh, young man, please don’t tell anyone about the location of this rice or I will lose my source of rice.
You gain a bag of Fragrance Rice
Jesus wonders what’s in the abandoned temple.
Nothing of interest, let’s go back to Felicity.
This idiot Nix just decides to wait for Jesus to do the rest while chatting with his girlfriend, but at least someone is here to guard those two.
I will be here Jesus, you go look for the ingredients.
Wahhh….
Everyone look! I have found all the ingredients!
Fantastic! Dad, look, all the ingredient we needed is here!
Hm………..AHH!
What it is!?
Dad…something wrong...?
I…I suddenly recall…we still…mi-missing…one sp-spice that can re-remove the wild bear o-odor…
Dad….
Sir…sir…
YOU CAN’T BE KIDDING ME, WE NEED ONE MORE INGREDIENT AND HE FAINTED!
Didn’t he say something about missing some spice that can remove the bear odor? What is it called?
I didn’t hear it, only something about spice.
Very well, Nix buddy, you stay here to take care about him while I go out and search for it.
Detective Jesus figure the most likely place to find the info is to ask around in the nearby restaurants.
Been a while since I have some local Chengdu cooking.
Yeah, ever since Master Wu retire.
I crave for more of his brilliant cooking, especially the one that added the Hundred Mile Aroma, which doubles the wondrous taste.
Fun Fact: The mile is called Li or Chinese mile, which is actually 500 meters, 1500 Feet, and one-third of a mile.
Enough about that, hearing it alone makes my mouth water.
Can I ask what this Hundred Mile Aroma is?
Hundred Mile Aroma is a spice, not only does it smell good, it can even drag out the full taste of the meal while removing the odors.
(Remove odors…? Then this should work with the wild bear meat!) Do you know where I can buy this Hundred Mile Aroma?
No clue, we only care about eating, who cares where it came from.
The master Wu you mentioned must have known.
Master Wu retired and left Chengdu long time ago, no one know where he is.
I see.
Hope master Wu would come for the cooking competition tomorrow.
Detective Jesus is clueless and has no lead to find this spice. All he can do is walk around and ask for such spice until…
Mister, did you smell that aroma?
What aroma?
I don’t know what is it, but I can tell it’s pretty close to the broken temple and become stronger into the forest at the right.
Without much thought, Jesus dash to the forest to look for the spice…
…and finally found the ever elusive spice that grows on the trunk of a tree.
Thousands of other players: SO THAT’S WHERE THE SPICE IS!
This must be what the kid said; I will pick a piece of this and show it to Felicity.
You Obtain Hundred Miles Aroma
Sir, is this it?
Yes, t-this is the Hundred Miles Aroma, excellence!
Dad…take care of your body.
Dad, these two helped our Lotus Square so much, we can’t let their sweaty effort be wasted.
NO, Nix just stood there and
Indeed, tomorrow we father and daughter team will give a good show, and we will make sure you two won’t be disappointed. Now let us go prepare the ingredients.
I will help out.
Jesus boy, who would have thought that your cooking is also pretty good, and with your help, tomorrow’s championship will definitely belong to Lotus Square.
The bird is tired from following Jesus around, so it decides to go to sleep.
Next day…
Ah! I overslept! I wonder how the competition went.
: “Congratulations, master Felicity.”
: “I knew master Felicity can handle it.”
: “We will be here when the new shop is open for business.”
: “That’s right, that’s right.”
Thanks for everyone’s support, we father and daughter will do our best to live up to your expectations.
: “Then we will go back to work.”: “You keep up the good work.”Take care, everyone.
Congratulation for becoming the champion, master Felicity.
Hohoho, it’s all thanks to you and Nix Summer that we are here today, so let us treat you two to some gourmet meals later.
No need to go through the trouble, I will be going back to Carefree Valley in a moment.
Boy, why the rush?
I’ve been staying for too long, and I don’t want my master to worry plus I have such good news to tell him.
I see, please wait a moment.
(Felicity goes in the house to get something)
This is the cooking guide for my other specialty, Mapo Tofu. It is the dish that your master loved the most, please take it home and make good use of it, and I am sure it will be very useful. Also, bring these Sausages to your master.
Fun Fact: The sausage here is call La Chang, a Chinese sausage that’s dried, harden and usually made from pork with a high content of fat. It is normally smoked, sweetened, and seasoned.
Thank you master Felicity, good bye.
Take care, youngster.
Take care, sir Jesus.
Take care, Jesus.
Your relationship with Nix Summer increased.
Which idiot’s yelling in the hall! I was having such a nice nap…
Master, I am back.
You are back, have you seen Felicity Year?
Yes master, and I have given him your cooking knife.
Well done, how is he?
It’s quite a long story…
Then tell me from the very beginning!
I reached Chengdu one day prior to the annual cooking competition and on that day, master Felicity’s ingredients were sabotaged and he become wounded…
Ingredients ruined! Person wounded! What next!?
Luckily it was just scratches and no real big deal, and with the help of my nimble thinking, I have gathered all the ingredients to successfully allowed him to participate in the competition and he won.
I knew his cooking skill are marvelous, it is obvious he would win.
(Why didn’t he praise me, I helped with finding the ingredients…)
Then…
???
Did he……
Did he what, master?
Did he tell you to bring me something?
Ohh! I almost forgot! Master Felicity tells me to bring your favorite Sausages to you.
Why didn’t you take it out earlier!
The sausages are here.
I am going back to my room! You go take some rest!
Your relationship with Master Flawless increased
Meanwhile…
I-I can’t do it...it’s just too…cute.......
………….*squeaks*
Gahhhhhhh!!! It’s melting my manly black heart away!!!
The Fur guy’s heart size increased, it is now three times larger.