While the school Emp passed his time training, lazing around and learning about languages the Emp remaining in the village had his own adventures.
After the passage of the knights protecting the carriage, many other people started passing through the village again. Apparently, some sort of natural catastrophe had happened on the road between Dark-glint and Starfall and had stopped merchant and travelers alike from passing between the kingdom of Windbow and the kingdom of Artefine. From what the travelers told the villagers, Starfall had almost been destroyed and survived only because the knight's group happened to pass by at the right time.
This meant that every settlement on the main trade route between the two kingdom were in a bad shape. Since he had lost many soldiers to the blood-spitter's attack, the village had to request reinforcement from the capital. They decided to send one of the remaining soldiers as messenger and had him accompany a caravan of merchants to Bêtéclair. He had for mission to request reinforcement to be sent to the village and to put an announcement asking for more hunters or workers.
Such notices were common practice according to Marcellia. It wasn't rare to see people leaving their villages or the cities they grew in to find a place for themselves in the world. Sometimes, they couldn't bear to stay close to a tragedy they had lived through, sometimes, a girl couldn't find love and wandered off to find a husband, sometimes, it was just to find a sense of accomplishment. In those times, they would gather in inns and taverns in large cities and look at notices and announcements posted on large boards like those the death-seekers used. There would always be someone knowing how to read standing nearby, ready to read the notes aloud for those willing to pay a small fee.
Notes like that usually spoke about the conditions in the village, if there were walls or not, the fields, soldiers, what kind of people were lacking and any other important information. In their case, the village had lost many men in the defense of the village, mostly hunters and this would be what they requested but anyone else was welcome to join. After all, when every village was always lacking in workers, it would be insane to turn someone away just because they were not proficient in the job you requested.
People took a look at all those notices and went somewhere they thought would be a good living place for themselves, if it wasn't to their liking, they could always start over again. Like that, some new blood was injected in settlements around the empire and villages rarely were erased from the map, more so when they were situated on a big road like Dark-glint was.
To go back to those passing through the village, they were mostly merchants carrying goods from one kingdom to another. They would stop a short while in Dark-glint to buy some and sell some before they left for the next town. Sometimes, they brought new villagers with them and Bor, the village head would do his best to help them settle themselves down in this place.
Emp also saw the group of knights coming back ridding on their big horses toward the howling hills. It seemed like they were done with whatever they went to Artefine for and were now going back home. They had not been away for long so Emp felt really curious about what they were doing but when he asked the book of answers for it, he only got a vague answer.
<They were escorting a group to their destination.>
Damned book, never helping out. Since he didn't really need it, he left the question be for now but this wasn't the only interesting visitor they got. There were a whole bunch of men and women wearing all kinds of arms and armors that came to hunt. All of them were Death-seekers and most of them were turned away by Bor.
"What is the difference between a hunter and a death-seeker?" Emp once asked Marcellia. "Didn't we just send someone to request them to come help? Why are we turning them all away?"
At the time, his teacher was hammering a large knife into shape. She wiped her forehead with her sleeve to remove the sweat from it and turned her head toward the spot were he usually sat to observe her work.
She had not let him try forging anything yet, she insisted that he sat close by to watch carefully instead. She wanted him to imprint all the details in his head before trying to teach him involving metals and precious materials. She didn't have an infinite amount of them to have him practice after all.
She furrowed her brows at him and pointed with her large hammer.
"Are ya paying attention at least? How is that at all related to what we are currently working on?"
"Sorry, I was just curious. Plus, you are just stretching the steel right now, I already saw you do it many times."
"It's not because ya already saw that ya can slack off. My boy, what a bad apprentice ya make."
She wasn't disappointed in him, she was just a bit angry to be interrupted for something unrelated to what she was trying to teach him. After he apologized profusely and promised to pay better attention from now on, she accepted to answer his question.
"There are many differences between the two. First of all, hunters go out in the woods looking for food while the death-seekers search for materials, treasure and glory. Sure they can hunt something edible but they will not only go for that, they will attack anything at all. That's great and all but the village can't pay for all the crap they bring back from their trips. What's more, they go kill creatures upon creatures but come back with barely any meat because they were gone so long most of it spoil before it can be treated. Finally, the death-seekers can't stay in place, they are always moving from place to place as long as they live. What we need is someone reliable to feed the village, not some vagabond who will be gone in a couple of months. Bor will only let them in if they say they aren't planning on having us buy all the things they bring back."
Her answer satisfied his curiosity for now and he didn't think more about hunters and death-seekers until another tragedy occurred. As Emp understood it, it was an all too common occurrence, one of the hunters didn't come back.
Hunting was a very common job across the empire because the impressive amount of forest covering it was detrimental to farming and animal husbandry. There wasn't enough secured space to grow a satisfying amount of fields and very few were willing to spend this valued space on crops to feed animals or simple grass to let them wander. Just making sure they wouldn't get eaten was a real problem.
That being the case, The empire as a whole imported large quantities of goods normally obtained from domesticated animals, like wool, cheese and, mostly in Artefine, milk.
Another effect of the lack of fields was the large amount of hunters that became the base of the empire instead of farmers. On the lake and the coastline, fishermen were more prominent but in Dark-glint, the main diet of the villagers was made of meat collected from the woods and a minimal amount of greenery taken from personal gardens.
Likewise, the amount of flax grown was minimal and most of the clothing the villager used was made with linen or large bundles of unprocessed flax traded from traveling merchants for skins taken from the forest.
Contrary to larger cities surrounded by fields and armies to protect them, simple bread was a luxury good here. To sustain the village, a fair amount of hunting was needed and the endless forest surrounding them never seemed to run out of prey to deliver. Of course, it was never running out of predators either.
Sometimes, someone would go hunting, alone or with a large group, and never come back. Groups usually tried to bring back the corpses but in some cases, it was lost to the wilderness. This was one such case.
One of the hunters went off one morning and didn't come back for the night. He had went alone because the rest of his usual group died in the attack. Two days later, Marcellia and Emp were looking towards the village center where his wife was going to every other hunter around to ask if they had news of him. Marcellia had a pained look on her face as she spoke to Emp, still turned towards the wife.
"We're making hunting equipment today my boy." She said in common.
"I thought you wanted to make another batch of nails today." He answered in the noble tongue
As the only smith in the village, she was often tasked with making everyday tools, pots, nails, and that sort of things.
"Look at her, we all know Dean isn't coming back, I know that feel. She will have to do something soon if she wants her kids to live. Vale will come here in less than a week for equipment to go hunt herself, by then, we have to have something to give her."
"Do we not have some spare equipment?"
"Na, we used them all to replace the broken ones in the attack."
"Right, then what are we working on exactly?"
"Ya, ya'll be doing leather all day my boy. I still have a lot of cured leather to process and skin to prepare and ya'll be the one doing it all while I work on a hunting knife."
Emp made a disappointed face as he was pushed towards the back. He disliked tanning leather, it was dull, repetitive and the smell was terrible. Still, since he was asked, he had no choice but to do it.
In big towns, all the tanning process was done by a tanner but here in the village, it had to be done by the one that needed it. Most of the time it was Marcellia and she had Emp do it in her stead.
Maybe he would be rewarded afterward by seeing how she processed the leather into something useful.
Vale would need an armor to protect her, but anything too heavy would hinder her instead. It was best to make her a leather armor to start as anything able to bite through it would probably kill her whether she wore armor or not. Since it was Marcellia, even simple leather would no doubt become greatly useful.
They first went to the storage and Marcellia pondered out loud what would be best to use as material.
"What should we use... not this one, it doesn't fit her, this one I need for later, this one will end up too stiff for what we need... (1) What is it going to look like at the end? Remember this my boy, this is always the first thing ya need to ask yourself when ya start something, ya can't just go haphazardly or ya'll end up with something that wasn't worth it. Ya have to think about it first and picture the end result in your head. Here, let's take this, that one and this one too."
Emp was surprised by what she chose. One of the two she had selected was a skin from an unnameable creature that had been sent to her by her brother.
"Was this one not really expensive? Is it okay to use it just for a leather armor?"
"It's not about what ya use it for my boy, it's about for who ya use it for." She declared proudly.
That seemed very reasonable, Vale had five kids to feed after all, she needed to stay healthy for them. But, wasn't the thing happening outside now often seen?
"If that was really the case, wouldn't everyone in the village wear some incredible armor too?"
Marcelia's face scrunched up a bit.
"So ya saw right through me heh? Fine, would ya be more inclined to believe me if I told ya I was suddenly inspired?"
"That seems more like you yes."
He didn't understand the common tongue very well yet but he had heard many times already by many different people how she became when an idea struck her.
"What does that mean? I have a heart too ya know! It's just that if I was to cry about every widow, it wouldn't be long before I ran out of things to sell. Now listen, that one ya'll just put it up to dry, that one you will harden and the last one, we need for the fur so don't damage it, keep it clean on that side got it?"
Emp thought it was both impressive and strange how she was willing to let him take care of that one of a kind skin but not willing to let him hammer a piece of iron. Still, she trusted him and he was pretty sure he would be able to do it just fine.
"Yes, leave it to me."
She left Emp alone with his work, only coming back to see how the job was progressing twice throughout the afternoon. The large band of kids came as well to see him but when they saw what he was doing, they all ran elsewhere, not willing to endure the smell.
Aside from the armor, Emp wondered what would Vale need exactly for tools. She would no doubt need a bow but there where bowyers in every village so Marcellia wouldn't be the one doing it. Maybe they would need some arrowhead though.
Many only used simple sharpened wood as the heads of their arrows because the cost was much lower than iron, steel was rarely used by others than knights. He guessed Vale would use the same wooden heads as the rest of the village's hunters.
Many hunters equipped themselves like death seekers with swords, shields and anything else they were comfortable using, just in case they ended up becoming prey themselves. For someone like Vale who would just be starting out, a knife would be enough, she wouldn't dare go too far from the town and most likely, she would join larger groups to be safer. Not doing so would be reckless and pointlessly dangerous.
In that case, was this really it? A knife and some armor? He was so used to buying a large quantity of random things when going shopping that he felt those two things were a bit lacking. If it had been him, he would have brought along a dozen types of weapon but he guessed that without a bottomless bag, it would be hard to carry it all. She needed to bring back the catch too after all.
Thinking about this, he finished his work and left it to dry.
Days later, once the leather was ready to be worked on, Marcellia entered the workshop with Emp and closed the doors to the kids.
"Come on Marcy! We want to see too!"
"That's unfair, I want to be thought too!"
"At least let Emp out so we can play!"
"Stop yelling out there or I'll go kick all your butts! I'll be working on something now so don't disturb." Said Marcellia through the door.
There were a lot of disappointment heard on the other side but they ended up giving up and went away. Now that Emp understood what they were saying most of the time, he had started to think they were a lot of fun as well.
The guys back in school were almost all very serious, they had a goal and worked hard to achieve it. Here though, even being around the same ages, they were more trying to run away from work. Any and all excuses were good to slip away from the shores they were given and play around.
Most of them would end up being hunters anyway so they didn't have that many things to learn. Once they knew, the only thing left for them was to actually do it but for that, they would need Marcellia's equipment and they wouldn't get any until they defeated something. Emp was still unsure on whether they were scared of trying, waiting for a good opportunity or just lazy.
Whatever was truly the case, he was happy to see them often. it was funnier to do the shores Marcellia gave him while listening to all those people around him.
Now though, things were different. It had not happened yet since he arrived in the village but he had heard many people talk about it. When Marcellia had an idea, she didn't like to get distracted. She locked herself in the workshop or glared at anyone coming close to the smithy when she worked outside. No one was allowed to disturb her.
Now though, she had dragged Emp with her. He needed to at least see if he wanted to learn so she had no choice but to bring him in.
"Sit there and watch carefully. Do not get in the way, do not ask questions and don't touch anything unless I ask you to. I will tell you all you need to know."
Emp sat on the bench like he was told and let his eyes wander around the room. The main metalworking station was outside where the huge furnace was but it was often too hot there to work on things and too dangerous to cause a fire. Because of that, when all the smelting and hammering was done, they would usually go into the workshop to finish.
There were all sorts of tools hanging from the walls here. She was a smith, yes, but not only a smith. She knew a wide range of skills and techniques to let her build almost any sort of equipment and here, she had all the tools she needed to do just that.
She had prepared a lot of small metal bits in advance, like rivets and eyelets and had placed them all in nearby pots with random bits of creatures collected over the years. She really had a lot of those, spines, bones, scales, feathers in bulk, teeth and fangs of all sizes and a bunch of other unrecognizable things. Everything was placed close by in case she needed them.
The room was very well lit by close to a dozen lamps hanging and strewn all over the working table. If she was to work in between so many lamps, it would have been easier to work outside, or at least close to a window, but she really didn't like to be disturbed. Emp had also heard that when she was like that, she would sometimes stay there an entire day and night before noticing she had been there a while so the lamps were quite useful in those cases.
By the times his eyes had scanned the room once, she had already started working. The only way to describe her work was focused. Her eyes would never leave her project and everything seemed to find its place as if it had been made to be there from the very beginning. From a large roll of dark grey leather and a smaller roll of white fur, it quickly became a complex work of art expending itself across the whole workshop.
One had to know that her working table was more than large, if it had been a dining table, at least fourteen persons could have been sat around it. Currently, what would become an armor was taking every bit of space on it.
She would cut pieces and remove excess material, hammer in pieces of metal, stitch other parts together and so on. All throughout the process, she would make small comments explaining why she was doing this instead of that, why use that part instead of this one and how to achieve the best quality and result. It was the first time Emp was seeing something like this so he was listening very carefully to everything that was said and done.
At some point, he thought she was done when he saw that it finally looked like something a hunter would wear but he was far from the truth. She was only beginning. She transformed the jacket she had made, added arms to it, then gloves, then another layer of shoulder armor, fur to keep the neck warm, padding, fixations, an integrated dagger sheath and even another layer covering the part where the armor was getting tied all together and then even more.
It took so long that in the middle of it, he suddenly vanished because the other him had recalled him. He came back almost immediately but still lost half a sentence of what she said because she hadn't even noticed he was gone.
After a lot of work and time, she finally hung up her tools. They were done. Both of them were starved and very tired but the armor was complete. It now looked really similar to Emp's usual armor, except that this one seemed a bit darker and less heavy.
Emp found it was really interesting but also, at that point, he wished nothing more than to go to bed.
"Hey, my boy, don't fall asleep yet, I need ya to go get Vale."
Could it not wait until after they had some sleep and a full belly? She opened the door of the workshop to let the daylight inside, a light from a different day than the one they started working. She asked him a second time while pointing outside.
"Go on, I want to go sleep too. Ya better not waste my time."
Emp had no choice but to obey. He groaned as an answer and moved into the village in search of Vale. The sun was high already, it must have been close to midday, no wonder he felt starved. He needed to hurry up and be done with this to earn his break faster. On his way to where Vale lived, he managed to see the mage from far enough to hide behind a house without being spotted. The magician Sophus was annoying, Emp didn't like him at all.
This was a rare occurrence, there were not many people Emp could say with confidence that he didn't like. There was the mouse who was disheartening to think about, Heida who was constantly angry to the point Emp just wanted her to go away and Sophus who was some sort of combination between the other two.
He always looked at everyone like they were trash, demanded things of everyone like it was natural, insulted people he came upon for no good reason, was unreasonable on everything and with everyone and in general, he didn't like Emp. Why Sophus disliked Emp was a mystery to him, all he knew is that it all started at the feast just after the blood-spitters attacked.
He had talked about it with Marcellia once but she just told him to ignore him.
"I don't know Why he doesn't like ya either but he doesn't like anyone anyway so it doesn't matter. Don't ya go pick a fight with him my boy. Ya'll loose and even if ya were to win, we need him to defend the village so we can't throw him out. Magicians willing to stay in a small village like here are hard to find."
So he did like Marcellia said and tried his best to stay away from him.
If he had crossed the path of Sophus on his way, he was certain he would have had to listen to a long ramble about how undeserving he was to be in the presence of the great magician that he was and that Marcy should just kick him out for his worthlessness.
Luckily, he just passed him without seeing him and Emp managed to reach Vale's door without trouble. he knocked on it a couple of time and she called from inside to say she was coming. After a short moment, she opened the door to him and greeted him.
"Oh, it's the new guy... Emp. What can I do for you young man?"
Emp understood the common language now but still had a hard time speaking it because he always had to search for the right word in his head. That was why he usually answered Marcellia in the noble tongue. He had some difficulty to relay what he wanted to Vale.
"Marcellia, ask, to see... uuhm, you."
"Marcy wants to see me? When?"
"Now, waiting in workshop."
"Alright then, I wanted to talk to her too. I wonder what she needs me for. Wait for me a second will you?"
She went back inside to tell her kids she was going and joined Emp on his way back to the workshop. They didn't talk on the way, mostly because it was too taxing on the tired Emp.
"Marcy?" She called when they got to the workshop. "You wanted something from me?"
"Vale, yeah, I was waiting for ya to come see me but ya took so long my apprentice and I managed to fill out your order before you even made it."
"What order, what are we talking about?"
"Here look, we made that armor for ya." She said proudly as she dragged Vale to the armor.
When Vale saw it, she was very impressed. She talked about it to Marcellia for a bit, saying how amazing looking it was and listening to what the smith had made into it.
"I was just about to ask you for a bit of equipment too. I didn't expect you to do something specifically for me beforehand. I simply love it."
"Glad ya do, I'm sure it will fit ya well."
Vale's fingers slid across the leather of the armor once before turning a serious gaze towards Marcellia.
"So, does that mean you approve of me joining the hunters?"
Why would she need the approval of his teacher wondered Emp while trying to keep his eyes open despite his tiredness.
"Well, yes, he taught ya well after all. What else would ya do instead of going hunting?"
"I don't know, the village got a bit unsafe recently with the attack and all. Maybe it would be best if I left to a big town instead. For the kids."
"To do what?"
At that point, Emp was just leaning against the wall with his eyes closed, barely able to hear what they were saying.
"I'm sure I could find something else. Something less dangerous."
"Being a hunter is no easy job, ya're right. They are risking their lives to feed everyone, you know that well. Ya need resolve to do it. It's not for the soft hearted. But I don't think ya are that sort of weak, I think ya would do a great hunter. In the end, ya must do what ya think is for the best but if I was ya, I would go for huntress."
"Thank you. I think I should at least try, if not, I would feel like Dean tried his best to teach me things for nothing. I would have never planned on asking you for some equipment too if I didn't intend on trying. I'll do my best, how much do I owe you?"
"No need for money, just take it as a gift."
"Marcy." She said on a complaining tone. "I can't accept that. Come on, tell me, what is it worth?"
"I went way overboard with this, there is no way ya can pay. Seriously, just take it, don't worry about the money."
Marcellia seemed to be in a similar situation than what he had found himself in with Galana. She didn't seem to fare any better than him at that time.
"I can't Marcy!"
"But look." Insisted Marcellia. "I made it just for ya, I won't ever be able to sell that to the regulars. My bro won't be able to sell it either. I won't make money out of this any way ya slice it."
"Marcy..."
If they continued like that, they would be here all afternoon thought Emp. He couldn't let that happen, he needed this to be over.
"How about I pay then." He intervened, keeping his eyes closed.
"Why would ya do that?"
"You really want to give her but she can't pay." He explained. "The only way we're going to resolve this is if someone else pay for it and I really want to eat and go sleep now. This is taking too long and I want to go."
Marcellia laughed heartily at his nonsensical reason.
"Yeah? How are ya going to pay my boy?"
"What is he saying?" Asked Vale since he had spoken in noble.
"He said he would pay for it."
"Whatever is the price of that, I have enough, trust me." (2)
To prove it he just got a crystal plate out of his bag while yawning. Vale's eyes almost fell off from the surprise while Marcellia scolded him with a slap on the forehead.
"Don't wave that kind of money in the open out of nowhere! You're going to get yourself in trouble! Still, I knew you had some money because of the equipment you bought from my brother but I didn't think you had that much left."
"I told you I got a lot for the woodland horror. So, how much is it?"
"Fine then, I haven't calculated how much it's worth yet, give me a bit of time. Just so ya know, now that I know you have that kind of money, ya can be damn sure I will make ya pay the exact value. Ya're not getting any kind of discount my boy. Yar taxes as well, I'm not payin for those."
"That's fine, as long as we get to eat already."
"Both of you are crazy." Commented Vale.
"So, ya taking it or what? My boy here is paying so there's no reason not to, I'm not loosing anything."
"Yes, I guess you won't take no for an answer anyway. Thank you, the both of you. How can I repay you?"
"We made this because you have kids to take care of so don't die, they need you." Answered Emp sluggishly in common.
"He's right, that would be a huge waste of both the materials and his money so take care of yarself. As long as you live, we'll be fine. maybe bring us some good meat sometime."
"Sure, I'll bring back so much of it you'll burst from overeating."
"Haha! That's the spirit!"
"Can I go now? I feel like I will fall asleep at the table."
"By the ancestors Emp, why are ya so rude today? Fine, ya can go now. We'll need to toughen ya up against fatigue."
With that, Emp went to find himself something to eat and fell asleep with his face into his plate. The kids all came back and tried to move him but all their attempts failed and he only woke up the next day.
***
(1) Before someone attacks me on this, I do understand that an armor made of leather must be hard and stiff or it's pointless. She is not referring to the whole thing here but only part of it. In the end, the armor ends up being a mix of rawhide, fur and leather with the largest part being rawhide as it keeps it's effectiveness longer.
(2) Trust him, he's an engineer.
() As a last side note, I'd like to point out that from what I heard, padded armor was much more common than leather and rawhide because of the availability of material. I'd say both should be about equivalent in terms of protection if made properly. Here, In the Steelwood empire, the lack of linen and the high amount of hunters is a big factor as to why leather is more common but I would wager elsewhere on the continent, quilted armor or gambeson is vastly more used and common.