“We’re going to trust this man with our product?” Moritoshi looked over at me with a sneer. He was a thin man with a stern jaw and green eyes that always seemed to glare behind his round glasses. “He’s not even a cultivator,” he accused before he looked at my stomach, examining me.

  I felt a little uncomfortable and tried to look away as the man examined me. He was Erana’s master and teacher and I didn’t really want to screw up this opportunity to make some money and contacts in this new land. I looked around the workshop Moritoshi had.

  It looked almost like what I imagined a modern day chemist lab to be. There were little jars and beakers everywhere, some over some flame. They even had tables like I used to sit at in high school science classes. I was sure the tables weren’t made with the same materials, but they had wooden legs and black slate countertops. A small herb garden sat in a corner of the room, and I sensed an emanating presence. I wasn’t sure what the feeling was, but there was something about the herbs that tingled something inside of me.

  “Oh, hm…” Moritoshi straightened and put his hand on his jaw in thought as he looked at me. “He is a cultivator?”

  Now I looked at him with a cocked brow. “I am?”

  He ignored the question and moved closer to me. “A weak one, he must have just grown his core, but I can’t tell…” he trailed off and up to this point, he ignored my confused sounds and questions and looked me square in the eyes.

  We stared at each for a few minutes until he finally came right out and asked, “what element do you cultivate? Which of the kami do you try to grow your power from?”

  “Uhhh,” I blinked and looked over at Erana and Hiragana for help.

  Hiragana smiled and took a step towards the pair and came to my rescue. “Come now Moritoshi, he is our new guest. Don’t be so….” The grandfatherly man paused and waved his hand around, trying to think of how to put it. “Well, don’t be so you.” Hiragana smiled and put his hands behind his back.

  I held back the snort of laughter. Even though I had just met the alchemist, I knew exactly what Hiragana was talking about.

  When Moritoshi went to retort, Erana entered the conversation as well. “You know, it isn’t proper to ask a cultivator about their techniques and cultivation. In fact, Master, please forgive me, but it is quite rude,” she said this last part with a soft bow of her head in respect to her master.

  Moritoshi narrowed his eyes at her, but sighed and looked back at me. “Oh, my apprentice. You are correct. Where would I be with you?” Still, he narrowed his eyes back at my stomach.

  “Fine. You are a cultivator, albeit a weak one of something strange, if Hiragana trusts you with his tea and Erana thinks you’ll work for the job…” Moritoshi shrugged and then looked back at the pair for confirmation.

  “It’s a simple run to Meguro. It’ll be a test for him. If he does good, maybe we can trust him with more work later,” Hiragana said. “Besides, I have other things for my workers to do.”

  “I think he’ll be fine. He has a nice big carriage,” Erana said with a confident nod and snuck a wink at me.

  Hiragana nodded his head. “I’m sure he doesn’t crash that often.”

  Before Moritoshi could stammer out his all new objections, Erana was there with a reassuring hand on his shoulder. “Master, we need this stuff to go to the capital so it can get sold to go on boats and cross the ocean. We need the money,” she said. “This is the best and quickest way to get it there. Maikeru has a lightning spirit beast as well pulling his cart. So it should be quick.”

  “Oh?” The alchemist sounded surprised, but he looked back over at me with his eyebrows raised. “Maybe I underestimated you,” he said with an approving nod.

  I’m a cultivator? I thought. I didn’t let anything show on my face, but my mind was running wild while they went back and forth. Erana’s quick defense of me was a bit puzzling. Hiragana, I understood, was just good business sense for the man. He needed tea moved to the city, and I was here and ready to transport goods.

  I’d have to dig into the whole ‘I’m a cultivator’ thing when I had time alone. Would I have to find some master or something to teach me the ways of aura and qi and all that? I mean, I had definitely listened to my fair share of cultivation novels while driving, but that didn’t mean I knew how to do it. I’d just have to hope I didn’t run into some young master or something and piss him off, so he murdered me. That couldn’t really be a thing like in the books, could it? I shook the thought away when the master alchemist spoke some more.

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  “Very well. Give me some time to gather everything. When Erana said she had someone to transport our goods, I didn’t think she was serious. Bring your cart around in about an hour and we’ll load you up,” Moritoshi said before he walked away from me to get to work. “Come Erana,” he called as he walked.

  I felt Hiragana walk up behind me and put a hand on my shoulder. “That will give us time to get your clothes squared away,” he said and smiled when I looked at him.

  I wasn’t sure about taking clothing advice from a guy in a farmer’s robe and a loincloth but the next thing I knew I was standing in a T-pose like a glitched out video game character while a stern older woman was taking my measurements. We were standing in a clothing shop, which had little since she apparently made most of everything to order. There were some various robes and kimonos hanging on half body mannequin sort of things and then there were shelves of every fabric you could imagine in many colors. Behind all that was a counter where her attendant stood writing the measurements she called out. Then further back was where we were.

  It was a small, little sectioned off area filled with more of the half body mannequins and some half done robes and kimonos. As cluttered as the entire shop was, you could tell this woman had a place and a reason for everything she did. Even her mannerisms were very precise, severe, but precise.

  She knelt before me, taking my leg measurements, when she looked up. “Do you want cultivator robes, a kimono or a yukata?”

  “Oh, he’s a cultivator, so he should have the robes to match, I’d think,” Hiragana said.

  She narrowed her eyes at me from under her gray hair, that was pulled back tightly in a bun. “Bit round in the middle for a cultivator, no?”

  I frowned, but then grinned. “The bigger gut just means I can have a bigger core,” I said as I patted my stomach.

  Hiragana snorted, and she sniffed. I just smiled at her when she glared at me.

  “Well, if Mr. Imai says you’re a cultivator, then I won’t doubt him,” she said as she stood up. She gave her attendant a couple more numbers, which he wrote quickly before she looked back at me.

  “What colors were you thinking, and did you want the basic material or something made from reinforced fabric?” she asked me.

  I looked around a little and instantly thought the reinforced fabric would obviously be better. I couldn’t imagine how rough life would be on the road as a carriage driver.

  “Oh come now Auntie, don’t you have something with spirit silk? The boy needs it. Look at him. He’s going to be on the road for who knows how long, and he’s a cultivator,” Hiragana said.

  The woman scoffed and looked me over. “Can he afford it?”

  What was with everyone talking about me like I wasn’t in the room? I frowned, but understood her point. I didn’t know how much something like spirit silk would be, but it sounded expensive. I didn’t even have any money. I checked my pockets. I never carried cash with me, so I doubt anything was magick’d into my pockets when I came to Fantasyland.

  “Put it on my bill,” Hiragana told her.

  Her eyes went wide in response and even the attendant made a choking noise.

  “Are you sure?” She asked him.

  Hiragana nodded his head. “Yes, of course,” he replied before he looked at me. “He’ll pay me back, I’m sure.”

  I nodded my head. I mean, I’d try? “So, spirit silk?” I asked questionably.

  The tailor snorted and went over to some piles of fabric. “So what colors, and when did you need these robes by?”

  Hiragana ignored the question and patted me on the shoulder once more with a soft smile. “Yes, from spirit silkworms. They’re cultivated by people and cultivators who develop them so they can make the best fabrics men know. I thought they had such things out west?” He asked with a knowing grin.

  I eyed him. More and more, I thought this old man was figuring out more and more about me. Maybe that’s why he was taking such a keen interest in helping me? “You…” I was about to say no. Like he knows my actual story, but the tailor who stepped towards us with arms full of fabric interrupted me.

  “Well, how fast and what colors?” she asked impatiently.

  “Oh, our boy will need the clothes now, unfortunately. He has a job he’s leaving on right after we leave here,” Hiragana explained and looked over at the woman with a smile.

  She sniffed once more. “Now?!” she exclaimed with a high-pitched squeak. The attendant once more gave a choking noise and rushed away from the counter.

  The attendant was digging through some fabrics and robes on shelves. “I’m sure we have some things close to being ready ma’am, he’s tall enough that the things we have that were just waiting to be hemmed won’t need to be.”

  After that, it only took a few minutes for me to be fully dressed in what reminded me of robes of the famous movie about space knights that cultivated the force. One of the best cultivation movies ever, in my opinion. The old tailor huffed a little but could hem up a black outer robe and I had grey inner robes.

  “Don’t worry about paying me back, she owes me a little and we’ll just take it out of the money for delivering my tea leaves and call it even,” Hiragana said as we walked away from the shop towards the main intersection where they found me crashed.

  I thought it over and what he said made the most sense to me. Who knew when I’d actually be able to pay him back properly or how much he’d actually be paying me to begin with? I shrugged, not sure it really mattered. It was more important for me to make connections in this new world I was in. Finally, I nodded my head and followed him as he walked along.

  “Now, let’s check out your carriage and make our way back to Moritoshi’s lab, then we’ll pick up my tea leaves and you can be on your way,” Hiragana said as he led me along while I was lost in my thoughts.

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  Hiroshi, Tale of a Sumotori

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