RFC-Miniarc-An Average Day (Gajin)-1

Days started early for Gajin.

The mistress of the house was an enthusiastic gardener. He had no idea where the woman got the strange plants populating her garden or what she used them for. Such wasn’t his concerns as a simple servant. As her student, it was still beyond his concerns. He was in the first stage of his instruction, which consisted of learning of the plants and how to care for them.

It went beyond the normal needs of good soil, nutrition, sunlight, and water. There were rootless plants that could only be watered by pouring a thin stream directly into their buds that opened during certain times throughout the day. Plants that acted as parasites to other plants and keeping them both alive meant maintaining a delicate balance. Plants with sharp teeth that would take his fingers if he wasn’t careful.

In other words, a paradise for the former bandit with a love of all things botanical.

Humming slightly, he rose from his bed of dirt and vines, having to fight to escape their grasp. The white lullaby vine was a predatory plant but not in the usual sense. Two different flowers grew along its length. One, a pink bloom with a white stripe going down the center of its petals that enticed animals with a sweet scent. The other, a pure white bloom that remained closed until the vine ensnared its victim. Then it released a colorless gas that could knock out a warhorse with a single whiff.

Incredibly, the vine was able to release just enough of the gas to knock its victims out for a period between 8-10 hours, adjusting for each individual it ensnared. Perfect for a good night’s sleep, hence its name.

They were prized for their medicinal uses, herbalists and apothecaries plucking the flowers and harvesting the liquid that produced the gas. Kierra claimed that such a process ruined the flower’s many other beneficial qualities and insisted he inhaled the gas from the source.

Normally, the white lullaby held those it captured until death. It craved heat sources and held onto its prey until their bodies went cold. However, somehow, Kierra had trained the vines she raised to stop their constriction in response to a specific breathing pattern, making them safe to sleep on…safer, at least.

His mistress could trainplants. Gajin was almost happy about the betrayal that led to him becoming a bandit. Meeting Lourianne Tome on a lonely stretch of the King’s Road was undoubtedly the best thing that would ever happen to him.

The garden was quiet in the early hours of the morning, the silence only briefly interrupted by the calls of birds and the hum of insects. He was little more than a shadow as he moved through the garden, a good thing as he didn’t bother to get dressed before breakfast, which consisted of edible plants throughout the garden as he took his time moving through the hedges that divided it.

His steps became more careful as he reached the mistress’ personal garden. His gaze bounced between the trees, his mind shaking off the clingy hands of sleep. There were signs outlining ways of safe passage through the treacherous greenery, but one had to pay close attention.

After a pleasant ten-minute walk, he reached the pond in the center of the garden. The mistress, along with the thrall, had built it as there were certain plants that needed a water source to grow. Chiefly, her wyvern-blood lotuses that floated on the pond’s surface. Gajin had no idea why they were so important, or even what they looked like as they had yet to bloom, but the mistress had assured him that if anything happened to them, she would fuse him to a tree for the rest of his life. A life she would extend for as long as it amused her.

Grabbing one of the bristlehead weeds that grew on the pond’s muddy banks, he stepped into the water, sinking down to his chest. He scrubbed himself with the prickly head of the plant for several minutes before climbing out. The sun was quickly rising but it did little to warm the chill autumn air. He was already accustomed to the frosty mornings but he quickened his pace to reach his hut. Accustomed did not mean comfortable.

His home was rather small, as people did not tend to think extravagantly when building quarters meant to house servants, but it had everything he needed; a bed, pots to hold the plants that required more special care along with his personal collection, a stove, a small cellar for storage, and another room for his gardening tools and clothes.

He quickly dressed in his uniform, a pair of dark pants, a simple shirt that was a little too big for him now, and his long, dark purple jacket. He smiled as he felt its comfortable weight on his shoulders, the lower pockets filled with dirt and sprouting plants while the highest pockets contained some of the more useful seeds he owned. He didn’t bother with boots or gloves but grabbed a small shovel and watering can before leaving his hut.

His duties consisted of many things, all of them more interesting than someone would initially assume. Routine weeding could end in a brawl with sentient plants who shot thorns. Flowers spat the water he showered over them back in his face if they didn’t like the taste. Loosening the soil required smacking away roots that liked to get a little too friendly.

He was in the process of trimming bushes that shyly tried to dodge his shears when he heard the smooth alto of his teacher. “Good morning.”

Gajin turned to see Kierra walking towards him, dressed in her usual leathers and a light brown cloak. He bowed deeply at the waist. Usually a perfunctorily gesture but the gardener had nothing but the utmost respect for the elf. “Mistress.”

She waved for him to continue his work. “How is my garden?”

“Everything is growing well, mistress. The sun fans have been drooping more with the worsening weather…” He reported on the state of every flower in the garden as he continued trimming the bushes and went about the rest of his duties, the elf trailing him silently like a second shadow. “In conclusion, I think that many of the children will suffer through the winter. Quite a few will die,” he said sadly.

“An accurate assessment,” Kierra responded lightly. “I am preparing for such. Come, take me back to your hut.”

Inside his home, Kierra shrugged off her cloak, hanging it on the door. On her waist, she wore a belt with several pouches hanging from it. She opened one, taking out a small box with seven horizontal slits on its face. “This is a heatbox. A simple name for a simple tool. It is used by noble elite to warm their homes during the cold months.” She passed her hand over the top and the enchantment on the artifact lit up as it was charged with her mana. She placed it on a shelf and it rapidly warmed the cool room.

“We will be using something more advanced than this for the garden. Using and maintaining the artifacts will also be a part of your duties.”

Gajin scratch his beard, which had grown long and scruffy. When he started his work as a gardener, his hygiene had gotten away from him until Lou raised her concerns. She had however, asked him to keep his beard, claiming the look suited him. He’d grown fond of it eventually, though he constantly found himself pulling out the strangest debris.

“Forgive me if this is rude mistress, but the box is a little small for the whole garden and I don’t have the coefficient to be powering up dozen so them.”

“Which is why we will be acquiring a large amount of affinity stones but that’s nothing for you to worry about. Now, let’s see how your projects are going.”

She took a seat on the bed as Gajin spoke about his personal projects. They were the most interesting of the plants by a long shot, which meant it took unusual methods to raise them. The six suns flower needed precisely six minutes of sun on each petal and not a second more, or else it would wither. It also glowed with the light of the sun at night, far better than any lantern.

Then there was the red phoenix flower, a plant that could keep a man alive on the brink of death for hours if he drank a tea made from its roots. Even if there was a hole in his chest and his intestines had been ripped out. Unfortunately, it had to be watered with lifeblood at sunset. Lifeblood, as in blood from a still live donor. Gajin kept a cage of rats in the corner just for it.

It took over an hour to go through all of them and by time he finished, his face was flushed with excitement and he could do nothing about the wide smile on his face. Kierra chuckled at the former bandit who looked as happy as a young boy surrounded by his favorite toys. “Good. Let’s progress to today’s lesson.”