Chapter 15 - The Value of a Note

“I think I need some jammies,” Holly mused aloud. It was another thing to add to her ever-growing shopping list.

If she planned on traveling, she’d want a bag to carry incidentals. She also had to see if she could find a seed shop. Realistically, that should be her first stop – considering if nothing else, she needed to secure her combat capabilities for tonight.

“Okay! Seeds hoi!” Holly cheered to herself before setting out on her day trip.

Hitting the streets once again, the little plant girl delved deeper into the city center as many traveled her opposite – headed toward the lush beaches of Pietri. “Humans and Resonators really like the beaches huh?” she observed.

Either way, it wasn’t as if she was alone in her destination. Holly noted quite a number of people moving towards the shops.

“What’s this?” asked Holly on a breath as she stood in front of a particularly large building. Painted red, it was at least two stories tall with multiple massive entrances. The second floor had many large windows for those trapped within the walls to take in the rest of the city. At its peak was a simple sign, white with black text labeled “Duemila - Triumph Market.”

It was labeled as a market, and peering inside didn’t solve the mystery for her, so with curiosity blooming, the fruit tree wandered in.

Her eyes got a visual workout as there was so much to take in. Reds darted back and forth, unable to keep up with their owner’s wonder. Clothes, food, toys, anything and everything was seemingly on sale. It was just like the market district back home! People selling their wares, what luck!

There appeared to be a second floor overlooking the base level with shops built into the walls; even more to explore.

“Oh, this is going to take a while,” the little plant mumbled to herself. The first order of business was grabbing a bag.

Thankfully there was a stall near the door with exactly what she was looking for. After browsing the wares, she settled on a backpack in her signature colors of white and pink – it was as if Sage Lanvi herself blessed this trip!

A cool ten notes parted with, Holly delved deeper into the market. It was packed even with the crazy number of people heading down to the beach – that said something about the population of Pietri, which dwarfed her humble home. It was humbling to consider.

Holly desperately needed to find a place with seeds. Her aimless wandering was fruitless and eventually, she settled on a produce stand.

“Excuse me, sir!” The zalavan flagged down the Resonator running the stall. He was a small thing like she was, with circular furred ears and a long, but thin wispy tail behind him.

“How can I help you?” asked the Resonator.
“I’m looking for seeds – do you know where there are any for sale?” Holly inquired.
“Hm?” The stall Resonator looked over his fellow vertically challenged counterpart. “Oh! You’re a zalavan!” he realized.
“That’s right!” Holly chirped.
“Hardly see many people looking at plants like I do,” admitted the Resonator, leaning on the stall counter.

“Like you?” Holly tilted her head.
“Sure, I’m a honey possum. Some people call us discount zalavan with how we use magic,” the man chuckled.
“Eh?” Holly had never heard of a honey possum before.

Thankfully said possum picked up on that and elaborated. “Lanvi’s Flowerbearer, that’s the name of my trait, I can pull the magic out of flowers,” he explained.

“Oh! That’s like seedcraft!” Holly understood.
“Bingo!” the man clapped. “So if you can use seeds, I might have something for you,” the honey possum disappeared into the back of the booth. He returned moments later with a plastic bag. “We were gonna throw these out since they went bad before we could sell them, but the seeds are probably still good for spellcasting,” he explained.

Holly opened the bag and her eyes went wide. Sure, the browning mushy carcasses of the once proud veggies made her nose curl in revolt, but what they contained within their failing husks was a prize worth delving into.

She had fire magic now – these were peppers.

---

Holly couldn’t believe her luck! Riterrans just threw away powerful seeds like this?! She had hundreds of fire seeds to work with. To thank Mr. Honey Possum for the valuable magic, she purchased several fresh cacao and a couple of passionfruits to replenish her stocks of those magic types as well.

She also picked up a pocket knife to help her in her seed-sowing efforts.

To say she was beyond excited to have so much fire magic at her fingertips was an understatement. She basically ran back to the hostal with her purchases tightly in her grasp.

After this, she needed to talk to more people and see if they’d just throw free seeds her way like the nice honey possum did. She was so tickled by how well everything had gone that she found herself skipping gleefully down the streets.

Bounding up the steps to the hostal, she passed by the chinchilla who checked her in the night prior.

“You’re in a good mood,” he noted.
“A nice man gave me his seeds!” Holly beamed.

A look of perplexion washed across the larger Resonator’s face as he processed what his smaller counterpart was trying to convey. It clicked after a moment. “Should be careful how you phrase that,” he grumbled, pulling out a box of cigarettes and making his way down to street level.

Holly shrugged and continued to her room.

Sitting on the bed, she took inventory. She had the small brown satchel which currently stored her few remaining seeds. “Whew, at least I don’t have to worry about my seed situation just yet.” Her eyes snapped to the waiting fruits of her trip.

She grimaced as the pungent odor of rotted fruiting bodies wafted gently from the plastic bag. “Better make this quick.”

Grabbing a pepper from the bag, she noted its distinctive shape. “A bell pepper,” she observed. She cut around the calyx and easily popped the entire seed-bearing portion of the pepper out. While the exocarp was rotting, the seeds were in perfect condition – she could feel the hot rhythm radiating from the tiny bundles of potential life. From there, she ran her fingers down the extracted portion of the fruit, dumping the seeds onto the sheets of the bed in a little pile.

This process repeated for all ten of the peppers she had gotten, leaving her with an overabundance of fire element seeds to cast with. “I shouldn’t take my entire stock of seeds with me,” she considered aloud. To that end, she partitioned out a small cluster of pepper seeds to add to her pouch before moving the rest to the side.

Fire magic secured, she now moved to replenish her stocks of lightning and healing spells, following the processes she had before to extract their precious cargo.

Holly found herself snacking on the pulp of the cacaos as she freed each bean from their pods. It was like the ones… that bird… found. They had a fruity sweet taste with a hint of tang to them. It kept her occupied as she gathered her lightning ammunition together. Like with the pepper seeds, the zalavan partitioned some to take with and some to leave in her room.

Finally, she freed the seeds from the passionfruits she obtained, making sure to add some to her seed satchel and the rest to her reserve stock.

“There we go, that should be good.”

The little zalavan beamed with pride at her work. A nice full seed satchel with three distinct magic types contained within, and plenty of spares to last her a good couple of hunts if she so desired.

Turning her head to the window, she noted the afternoon was quietly waning into evening as the brightness of the sun began to fade. That didn’t stop the beach from being packed, but it did give Holly an idea.

“I should go to a restaurant!”

---

“Hey, mister!” Holly called to the chinchilla employee.
“Is that my name now?” he asked, before taking a drag on his cigarette.
“Well no, but you never told me your name,” giggled the little plant girl.

The chinchilla hummed as he considered it. “Right, its Â̵͉̝̾̈́̄͘j̷̮̠͔̖̒̿͛̑͜͜a̷̮͑̎̈́̆͝ẏ̷̳̰̞͈͉͎,” he mumbled.

“Okay, Mister!” Holly cheered (and earning a grimace from the chinchilla man). “Do you know a good restaurant around here?” she asked.

The question threw the fire element off guard. “I thought you people like ate sunlight or something? What is it? Phogo synchrosis?” he guessed.

The nature element giggled. “No silly, it’s photosynthesis.” Holly then opened her mouth and pulled her cheek showing off her pearly white teeth. “We can eat food just fine!”

“Sounds like it’s cheaper to just stand around for a bit to me.” He took in a bit more of his cigarette as he mulled over the plant’s inquiry. “What’re you in the mood to eat?” he asked.

“I dunno,” sang Holly. “We don’t have very many restaurants where I’m from, so anything will do.”

“Anything good huh?” The man flicked the remaining cigarette butt into the street. “Yeah, I know a spot.”

---

“This looks like the place,” Holly mumbled to herself, looking between the handwritten directions and the building she stood in front of.

There seemed to be two entrances, and she couldn’t tell which one was where the food was. One part looked dark and kind of radiated a sense of danger. The other portion looked plain and so Holly went into that part.

Thankfully she was rewarded with a small room which seemed to be the right place. Her suspicions were confirmed with a “Good afternoon!”

A Resonator approached Holly, holding a menu in hand. For a moment, the waitress stared at the small girl, looking around for a Maestro. “Is it just you?” she asked.

“Yep! I heard you make good food here!” Holly beamed.

The Resonator woman nodded slowly before she opened her mouth to break the bad news to the demure nature element in her midst.

Holly thankfully recognized where this was going and held up her green watch. “I wanted to buy a nice dinner for myself before I go hunting tonight,” she said with a bright smile.

The waitress Resonator allowed herself a small sigh of relief. “This way.”

Now seated at a table, Holly was given a moment to look over the menu, before the waitress returned.

Unfortunately, the menu might as well have been in a different language. Holly had no idea what anything was, so just pointed at one of the pictures at random. “I want this.”
“Ah, the Polverian saltato, sure.”

Taking the menu, the waitress Resonator made her way into the back, giving Holly plenty of time to drink in the ambiance. The restaurant part of the building she was in was quite small. Only around ten total tables. Surely the rest of the building wasn’t a kitchen? She could see the kitchen from her seat, and it wasn’t that big.

With that mystery lacking a conclusion at the moment, she took in what else was in her periphery. The walls had hand-painted murals showing rivers flowing through a city as well as another portraying a stylized image of a lone city street. Other pictures hung on the walls, as well as one of the screens.

Oh, how the screen drew Holly’s attention. She stared unblinkingly at the box as it showed various images on its flat surface. There appeared to be people talking in some form, and what they said was displayed in an ever-scrolling text box that appeared at the bottom of the screen. Holly was a fast reader, but she couldn’t follow along with what was being discussed. Names of people, places, and things she lacked familiarity with read like gibberish to the poor zalavan.

She shook her head and allowed her curiosity to wander to the other patrons. Of which there was only one other table. A Maestro and their Resonator were eating in silence. The Maestro was a woman, probably young? Holly had no reference to what an older human looked like. The Resonator opposite of the human was a similar build to what’s his name, except their element and ears varied from the fire element she had a passing familiarity with. Much smaller fluffy ears graced the man’s head, while his fur and hair were blue. Even from Holly’s seat, she could tell he bore the distinct humidity of the water element.

Her food soon arrived and she was distracted by what she had ordered. The hungry plant’s eyes lit up as she saw thin strips of fried potatoes made up the base of her meal. Atop the delicious crispy spuds were many strips of peppers (thankfully not rotted), beef, and red onion. There was a sprinkling of some kind of green herbs over the whole affair and a scoop of sticky white rice to the side of it all.

It was warm and the fried potatoes soaked up the juices of the seared meat and veggies wonderfully. The meal was not long for this world as Holly eagerly cleaned her plate. The flavor profile was so interesting, but with her limited experience, she couldn’t specifically pick out how the meal was made.

Overall, the meal was tasty and left her content, which was all that mattered.

The waitress soon returned and took the empty plate away. “You leave room for dessert?” asked the Resonator.

Oh, that was something to consider. “What do you have?” asked Holly.

“We have a passionfruit cheesecake right now,” offered the waitress.

Holly ruminated on the sole offering. She wasn’t a fan of the passionfruits she had already eaten, so she politely declined.

The bill soon came, and with a tap of her watch against the portable screen provided to her, Holly had successfully paid for her first-ever meal.

It felt… good.