V1C14

Parsed with an automated reader. The content accuracy is not guranteed.

Old Man Japan and Tarō talk about the past while snacking on shooting beans. When Old Man Japan gets up to light the stove, I realize it’s probably time for me to head on home. It’ll be dark soon, and I still have to pick up my dinner at the market.

I’m going to go to the plaza and buy a bunny-meat skewer and some bread. This is my standard dinner. But, since I had a windfall today, I decide I’m going to buy a cooked sausage too.

As I make my way to the stall, I can’t help but overhear the conversation of two people walking through the plaza:

“A wyvern attacked earlier today. Do you know if anyone got eaten?”

“No, I’ve looked, and I haven’t found a blood splatter anywhere.”

“You too? I guess odd things do happen. Can you believe it just left of its own accord?”

“I mean, I imagine we all just did such a good job dispersing that it couldn’t find anyone to take?”

“If that’s so, it might very well come back. Guess we should be on the lookout for a while.”

That’s a relief. It seems that nobody saw me kill the wyvern, since it looks like they think it just gave up and left.

Feeling lighter now, I make it to my intended stall and buy the first part of my dinner. The freshly cooked sausage smells so good that I can’t help myself and tear into it right then and there. The warm juices fill my mouth, tasting like happiness. Without a moment’s hesitation, I buy another.

Then I pick up a bunny-meat skewer and bread and turn homeward, so I can relax while I eat.

At this point, you probably want to yell at me that it’s unhealthy to eat nothing but meat, right? Heh heh, don’t worry. I’ve got something to help me out with that.

*****************

My stomach is comfortably full once I finish the food I brought home. But I will probably get indigestion if I eat nothing but meat.

I step away from the table and cross the dirt floor to the corner of the room. Lined-up there are numerous cheap-looking jars. I grab the one that’s farthest back and return to the table.

I set the jar on the table and pull off the lid. A waft of sweet-smelling air tickles my nose.

The pot is filled to the brim with skill fruits. Specifically, skill fruits that I’d picked up seven days ago.

I pick up a pink one—the same pink one Tarō had called an ‘apricot’ before taking a bite. The now-soft fruit fits perfectly in my small palm, and it’s easy for me to peel it by hand before digging in.

As I do so, I can’t help but let out a small squeal. “It’s sooo good!”

The ‘Improved Critical Chance’ fruit is so fresh and juicy. It melts in my mouth, filling it with sweetness after a single bite. In this moment, I can truly feel joy.

Everyone in town thinks that you’re supposed to eat skill fruits as soon as they drop. People say they have an expiration date of one day, maybe two if you’re feeling brave. And I can’t blame them for thinking that, because that’s true for all of the skill fruits sold here—they’re already rotten three days after they drop.

Other skill fruits are even worse, apparently. Old Man Japan found in his research that the skill fruit commonly thought of as the rarest, the ‘Rapid Combo’ skill fruit, starts to rot not even an hour after it drops. Of course, Old Man Japan has only read about that and hasn’t verified it himself.

Another thing he’s read is that the royal capitol was built where it is because of that fruit. In the heart of the royal palace, where all but royals are forbidden, is said to be monsters that drop them. The royals raise up the monsters, so they can each hunt several of them and consume their fruits daily.

Apparently. Nobody’s ever actually seen it for themselves, so it’s hard to say whether it’s fact or fiction. It is, after all, something that supposedly goes on the royal palace. Old Man Japan said that he found that information in some document he once found in some library in some city a long time ago.

In any case, the story is that they built the palace where they did so they could actually eat the fruits, since they go bad so quickly you can’t transport them elsewhere.

But Old Man Japan claims that this definitely is true: the ‘Rapid Combo’ skill fruit does exist, though he’s never seen it for sale, not even in the royal capitol. This suggests, he says, that the royal family is keeping the fruits all to themselves.

It is also true that you almost never see any of the rare skill fruits for sale. He says that all of this country’s big cities are built where monsters drop valuable skill fruits and that, in the center of most of these cities, behind looming walls, are royal villas or nobles’ manors and, most probably, valuable monsters and their valuable fruits.

*****************

That’s all to say that it’s common knowledge that you have to eat a skill fruit as soon as you can once it drops. The people in the city believe it; Old Man Japan, with his wealth of knowledge, believes it; and even my own dad used to tell me the same thing.

But, it turns out, that that’s not always true. Not for every skill fruit. More specifically, it’s not true for the skill fruits that I’m currently eating—the ones that shooting beans drop.

If you eat them right after they drop—like Tarō did a few hours ago—they’re all, without fail, unbelievably bitter. And worse, everyone calls the skills they give you ‘garbage.’ So nobody even gives them a second glance.

I mean, it makes sense. They’re super gross, and they give you useless skills. Of course nobody would try to eat them.

But I figured it out. I figured out that the skill fruits shooting beans drop are actually delicious.