Leon went to the cave that contained the mushrooms, once the sun had risen in the sky the following day, in order to gather a few to repay his debt to Mino. He wanted to keep on the young man"s good side, his help had been much appreciated and Leon hoped to continue to rely on him. He remembered, while there, that the spring water was salty and wondered if he could extract the mineral from the water. He didn"t have time to test this theory today, he decided, so mentally added it to the list of things he wished to do, along with gathering crustaceans, which he noticed had increased in size as they scuttled about in the freshwater river that he had to cross.With the mushrooms and pills in hand, he went to the central area of the school to visit the Herb Hall, where he exchanged his average pills for a bunch of fresh herbs. He then visited Mino to give him the mushrooms, before filling his stomach with a lunch time meal. Then he wobbled (swollen stomach first) back to his small hut, where he proceeded to separate the herbs. He needed ones for the new potion, ones for the normal pills and ones for the improved pills.
Then he completed the basic purifying potions and created pills, until his spiritual energy was weak. For the last hours of the day, he planted seeds, removed weeds and watered the garden, before dragging himself to the lake for a bath. He was feeling too weary to bother filling the bath tub with buckets of heated water. He ate a light meal of rice and peas before falling asleep.. alone.. in his bed.
The next few days fell into a routine; cultivating in the morning, exchanging pills for herbs before grabbing a large lunch at the food hall, making pills for the afternoon and doing ch.o.r.es until dark. His ch.o.r.es were anything from tidying his home, gardening to fixing the shed. And when all that was done, he might carve a few pieces, before settling down for the night.
A week pa.s.sed before the request came from the warriors school for him to create 20 clear spiritual pills and 40 blood pills. The reward was a pair of new boots, apparently Pike had seen the state of his, and a leather belt to with a knife length scabbard. Fortunately, he could ask for herbs to fulfil a teacher"s request without need to provide proof of his pill and potion practice.
By the end of the second week, his cultivation had stuttered to a halt as he struggled to rise from his bed and he felt too lazy to return to the Herb Hall more than once every three days. He potted around a bit, sometimes making pills, sometimes carving talismans or decorations. He added soil and seeds to his new pots and left them to their own devices. His food supplies began to dwindle.
Even at his slower pace, he completed the number of pills for the request by the middle of the third week, but on the day that he was due to take them from the Hall, he found that it was raining. It was a persistent light rain, the type that refused to be tamed by means of an umbrella and would managed to leak through each seam of your outer clothing until your skin was as wet as your clothes. His hut was in a somewhat sheltered area, but much of the woodlands was open to the elements and he didn"t feel like risking falling ill.
So instead, he sought to ease his low mood by heating many pots of water and filling the bath, which he had moved beneath the dubious shelter of the shed. He felt slightly more invigorated after his bath, having washed his hair and cleared his mind. Despite the fact that Jin Li was one high maintenance type of man, Leon missed his company, missed eating together with him and missed bickering with him. He washed his clothes and hung them to dry in the shed, while pa.s.sing the time by writing the new recipe into the half finished diary that Leo was never able to complete himself. He also made a note to fix the shed better and clear out the rubbish; making it his own personal miniature bathhouse.
Refreshed, he decided that he would take the pills to the Herb Hall the following day. If only the unexpected didn"t happen.