Cooking with Wild Game (LN) - Volume 27 - Chapter 2.2

2

After wrapping up work in the post town, we returned to the Ruu settlement, where we found yet another commotion waiting for us, though not the same one that we had encountered in the morning. A big crowd was gathered in the center of the plaza, and I could hear women and young children chattering energetically. Though I already knew the reason, I couldn’t help but feel excited.

“Oh, you’re back! Welcome home, Reina and Lala!” the keen-eyed Rimee Ruu called out, causing the crowd to part so we could see through them to where Shumiral was standing with an entire pack of hunting dogs surrounding him.

“Welcome back, Asuta. How did, business go?”

“Well, we were able to sell everything again by the usual time. But man, that sure is a lot of hunting dogs you’ve got there.”

“Yes. There are, twelve of them.”

I actually already knew that because Shumiral had stopped by the stalls on his way back from the castle town shortly after the sun hit its peak. He had also told us that he was heading back to the Ruu settlement to get started on retraining the dogs. Since he had known that it would be too late to go hunting after returning to the forest’s edge, he had decided in advance to use the rest of his day on that.

I didn’t know exactly what the retraining was for, but I assumed it had something to do with teaching them to hunt giba. Shumiral had a giba pelt and a hunter’s cloak laid out in front of him, and the dogs were sniffing both thoroughly.

“I am currently, teaching them the difference, between these. If they make a mistake, and bite a hunter, it would be, a serious problem.”

“Ah, I see. It does seem like it’d be pretty easy for them to get confused, with their masters and prey both wearing the same pelts.”

“Yes. But the smells, are completely different, so it should be, no issue. When the hides, are tanned, sap and herbs, are used in the process, and the smell, of humans, also clings to them, so it is easy, for hunting dogs, to tell them apart.”

The dogs kept sniffing away as Shumiral explained that to me. Just like the hunting dogs I had seen before, they reminded me of western breeds. All of them had dark-brown fur, though the shades varied and there was even a spotted one in the mix, but they looked to be the same breed.

Their faces were square, and their ears hung down. They had big heads, thick necks, and sturdy builds. And yet, their expressions were calm and affectionate, and their round black eyes were incredibly cute.

These dogs had been thoroughly trained to never attack people or totos. It was crucial to be certain of that, so that if they got separated from their master and ran into another hunter, they wouldn’t pose a threat. As a result, though, they wouldn’t ever go after unknown intruders who entered their homes, so they would be of no use as guard dogs.

“So, when you include the original six, there are now eighteen, huh? Tripling the number of them we have all at once sounds like a really big deal.”

“Indeed. The merchants, from Jagar, brought fifteen dogs, but we did not, buy three of them. They were old, and their eyes and ears, had grown weak. In all likelihood, they were brought along, to determine if, we are customers, capable of, discerning quality.” That sounded rather nasty to me, but Shumiral was smiling with an expression that looked as affectionate as those of the dogs. “It is only natural, to test customers. They take pride, in their work, after all. And hunting dogs, are living beings. It is no surprise, they would not want to sell, the precious dogs, they raised, to just any customers.”

“Ah, I see. It makes sense you could see through all that, given that you’re the former leader of Silver Vase... So, did everything go smoothly with the merchants from Jagar?”

“Yes. I believe I was, able to earn their trust, by offering an oath, to Selva.”

Shumiral then placed one hand over his heart and reached out with the other one. This was how westerners swore oaths to prove they were children of Selva. I remembered that I had previously seen Kamyua Yoshu posing in the same way. It seemed that people who looked significantly different from your average westerner had to prove themselves with such oaths pretty frequently.

“And they looked like they really enjoyed our cooking too! They even asked the nobles if they could eat giba meat again tonight!” Rimee Ruu added.

“I see. In that case, I’m sure they’ll be having something with giba sausage or bacon in it for dinner.” Those were the only two varieties of giba meat available in the castle town. The castle town ordered a fair amount of both as needed rather than having us make deliveries on a fixed schedule, so it was likely that you could find giba meat at any inn or restaurant there.

As we were talking, Mia Lea Ruu approached us from the direction of the main house. “Hello there, Asuta. You weren’t coming over to us, so I came to greet you.”

“Oh, sorry. I’ll get the study session started shortly.”

“There’s no need to rush. However, I do have a message for you from our clan head. The Fa clan wishes to take one of these twelve dogs, correct?”

“Yes, we’ve wanted one for some time now.”

“In that case, he would like you to choose one today, as we will be taking the rest around to the other clans tomorrow morning.”

Donda Ruu had purchased these dogs with the Ruu’s money so that the clans of the forest’s edge could give them a try. If they collectively decided that the beasts were unnecessary, then only the clans under the Ruu would be using them in the future.

However, we had already talked about the Fa clan’s desire to purchase one of them. I was certain that it would only take a single hunting trip for Ai Fa to become attached to our new dog, given her personality.

“Hmm, today, huh? If Ai Fa gets back late, would early tomorrow morning work?”

“I suppose with a wagon, it doesn’t take long to get from here to even the farthest northern reaches of the settlement. So long as you arrive earlier than you normally do for work, I believe it should be fine.”

“Got it. I’ll let Ai Fa know.”

“I wouldn’t think that Ai Fa would know how to judge the quality of a hunting dog any better than you, correct? So why not simply pick one now to bring back with you?”

“Well, she’ll be the one working with the dog, so I think it would be better for her to personally be here to choose the one she connects with best.”

“I see,” Mia Lea Ruu replied with a smile. However, I could see a great deal of exhaustion in her eyes. That was a pretty rare sight, considering how cheerful she usually was.

“Um, are you feeling okay? You look a bit down.”

“Huh? Oh, I’m doing fine. It’s just this whole matter with the Rutim.”

“Ah, yeah. Did Gazraan Rutim and the others manage to come to an agreement?”

“I’m not sure how to answer that. In truth, I’m a bit worried, because it looks like Dan Rutim’s position is gaining ground.”

“Wait, are you saying Morun Rutim is going to be allowed to marry into the Dom clan?”

“No, most certainly not!” Mia Lea Ruu replied, shaking off the idea with her hands. “I wouldn’t be as calm as I am now if they had actually come to such a crazy decision. But Dan and Gazraan Rutim don’t seem to be giving up. They’ve asked for Morun Rutim to be given a chance to confirm her feelings once again.”

“So they want her to be absolutely certain that her feelings are genuine? That’s definitely an important step, but how are they planning on doing that?”

“Well, we’re going to be sending some of our hunters to temporarily stay with the other clans when we distribute these dogs, so our plan is to have Morun Rutim visit the northern settlement at the same time.”

Obviously, we couldn’t expect the hunters of the forest’s edge to know how to handle the hunting dogs right off the bat. The Ruu had needed to have Shumiral on hand to tell them everything they had needed to know about what the dogs could do when they had started hunting with the animals, and it had taken quite a bit of time for that knowledge to be disseminated to all of their subordinate clans.

Therefore, hunters from the Ruu were going to be accompanying the hunting dogs when they were loaned out to the other clans. It was kind of similar to the temporary exchanges of hunters and women that the Ruu had done in order to teach the Zaza and Sauti about cooking and bloodletting.

The difference this time was the scale. After all, we were talking about every single clan at the forest’s edge here. Of course, the Ruu were only going to be teaching the parent clans directly, but even so, there were still nine of them: the Zaza, Sauti, Fou, Beim, Gaaz, Ratsu, Dai, Ravitz, and Suun. The Fa and Sudra were excluded from that list, but the Fa would be purchasing a dog of our own, while the Sudra would be joining either the Fou or the Suun for lessons.

Incidentally, the Ruu were going to be entering into a break period in the near future. While they were on break, it would be easy for them to lend out as many hunters as were needed. However, they had deliberately not taken that into account when making their plans. Instead, they were hoping to wrap things up before their break started, because it was important to use breaks to spend time with family, and Donda Ruu had decided that his people needed to be able to do so.

The lessons were going to begin early tomorrow. Two hunters would be sent out with each dog, and a similar number of hunters would be invited back here, where they would be learning the techniques as well.

The Fa, Fou, and Sudra had done something similar recently. We had gone out to teach the Dai, Ravitz, and Suun cooking and bloodletting despite the fact that we hadn’t been closely connected to them prior to that. But that had only been us visiting them during the day. We had still gone home in the evenings. Essentially, we had used the mobility our wagons afforded us to just throw people at the problem.

However, it wouldn’t be feasible to use the wagons to send people back and forth to nine separate clans every single day. Even with a wagon, the most distant clans still took over an hour to reach, and considering that hunters worked until the sun set, that would mean not getting home until late at night.

This time around, there would be an exchange of hunters who would stay at one another’s settlements. The Ruu would send out eighteen hunters from their own clan and the clans under them, and then accept the same number of hunters back from the others. That would also help them form new bonds with the small clans they didn’t know all that well. Donda Ruu had made a number of bold decisions since becoming a leading clan head, and this was undoubtedly one of them.

“The Ruu, Rutim, Lea, Min, and Ririn will be handling this task. The Ririn don’t have many hunters, but since Shumiral is one of them, they’re the most skilled at working with hunting dogs, so they’ll be sending two,” Mia Lea Ruu said.

“I see. So the remaining sixteen hunters will come from the other four clans, then? I suppose if you think of it in terms of being four hunters per clan, that doesn’t sound like too much of a stretch. And Morun Rutim will be going with the hunters from her clan to the northern settlement?”

I didn’t know how they were going to explain her presence, but they were definitely going to have to come up with something. In any event, it seemed like the hunting dogs had arrived at the perfect time.

“Well, I think having her make sure her feelings are real is definitely the right move. If she ends up deciding to stop pursuing it after all, that’ll put an end to this whole issue,” I said.

“So it would. And mind you, I’m perfectly fine with her going. If that girl is considering marrying into the Dom, she needs to think long and hard about her decision until it feels like her skull is going to crack open,” Mia Lea Ruu remarked with a deep sigh. That was something else I wasn’t used to seeing from her.

“So what’s the matter? I still don’t know what’s got you feeling so down, Mia Lea Ruu.”

“I don’t know if I’d say I’m down, exactly. However, it seems the Rutim are planning to send Dan Rutim to the northern settlement with Morun Rutim.”

“Huh?!” I suddenly found myself at a loss for words.

In response, Mia Lea Ruu listlessly shook her head. “Exactly my reaction. The thought of it is enough to give you a bit of a headache, isn’t it? Dan Rutim is one of the most hotblooded people under the Ruu. He’s usually cheerful, but when he gets angry, he tends to run wild. Of course, you know that very well yourself, don’t you, Asuta?”

“Y-Yeah. I mean, I like him a lot and consider him an important friend, but...”

“I feel the same way. The northern clans were feuding with the Ruu for a long time before the fall of the Suun, so the more I think about him going there, the more worried I get.”

“D-Donda Ruu really approved this?”

“Yes. Gazraan Rutim asked him to trust them. If it had come from Dan Rutim alone, I’m sure our clan head would have denied the request.”

So Gazraan Rutim thought this was a good idea too? That made me feel at least a little bit better. No matter how explosive Dan Rutim might be at times, if Donda Ruu and Gazraan Rutim had given their approval, there wasn’t any point in me worrying over their decision.

“Well, there’s no point grumbling about it now. We’ll just have to pray to the forest that nothing unfortunate happens. Now then, Rimee, isn’t it about time to start the study session?”

“Yeah! I wonder which dog Ai Fa will pick? I’m really looking forward to finding out!”

Rimee Ruu was smiling cherubically, while Shumiral seemed to still be giving the dogs his full attention, but I was sure that both of them had been listening in on our conversation.

I also needed to focus on my own work rather than letting myself get flustered. The one who had it the worst here was Morun Rutim herself, followed by Donda Ruu and Dan and Gazraan Rutim. If by some chance they ended up needing my help sometime down the road, I would do whatever I could when it happened. For the moment, I had my own tasks that I needed to get started on.

After dinner that night, we spent the rest of our evening getting to know our new family member. Upon returning from her hunting work, Ai Fa had headed to the Ruu settlement right away and had chosen one of the hunting dogs for herself.

Currently, the dog was curled up into a ball on top of the rug in our main hall. He had been given giba meat and a bone for dinner and was looking quite satisfied now.

Ai Fa had picked a dog with a reddish pelt. His eyes were closed now, but they looked quite clever and had made me fall in love with him right away too. Gilulu was resting on the dirt floor of the entryway on the other side of the dog from me, and I thought the two of them were adorable together.

“He looks so peaceful now that he’s asleep. It’s almost hard to believe that he has the courage to face down a giba, seeing him like this,” I said.

“Indeed,” Ai Fa replied with a nod. Her gaze had been fixed on the dog for some time now. It was clear to me how much she already cherished him. It seemed the people of the forest’s edge really were universally drawn to totos and dogs.

“You’ll be taking handling lessons alongside the Fou, right?”

“Yes. Asking the Ruu to send us a hunter just to teach me would be unreasonable, and we also have no one to send back in exchange, so I will be going into the forest alongside the Fou and Ruu hunters for a few days,” Ai Fa said, and then she turned my way for the first time in a while. “It seems Ludo Ruu will be one of the hunters sent to the Fou clan. It feels a bit strange to imagine him sleeping among them.”

“You think so? Well, I’d be happy if Ludo Ruu and Aimu Fou would become friends after this.”

“Yes, I would too,” Ai Fa replied with a nod and a gentle look on her face, and then she adjusted her sitting posture a bit. “By the way, Asuta, about our new clan member’s name...”

“Right, we have to give him a new name now that we’ve taken him in. Do you have something in mind?”

“No. I would like you to come up with the name.”

That was rather unexpected.

“But why? The dog is going to be your partner, and besides, shouldn’t you be the one to name him as the clan head?”

“It seems to me that Gilulu is your partner, and yet I was the one to name him. This time, I want you to do the naming,” Ai Fa said, fidgeting a bit. She had already let down her hair, which shone like gold in the dim light. “Besides...at the forest’s edge, the father is typically the head of the house and the one who names the children, but sometimes the mother does instead. It is not a rule that only clan heads do the naming.”

“Ah, I see.”

Ai Fa’s fidgeting was causing me to get a bit nervous too. I was starting to feel like I had randomly ended up in a parenting simulator, but I wasn’t completely certain why Ai Fa was so nervous. Thinking about it too deeply was just putting me on edge, though, so I tried to mentally force myself to switch gears.

“Still, that’s a serious responsibility. I don’t know much about how naming works at the forest’s edge.”

“Yes, I have been thinking about that as well. Why don’t you think of a few candidates and I choose one from among them? After all, you picked out Gilulu’s name from the two I came up with.”

“Yeah, all right,” I replied, feeling satisfied with that proposal. I was feeling a lot of pressure, but I didn’t want to turn her down. I just had to rack my brain to come up with a name for our new clan member.

“Well then, hmm... The people of the forest’s edge take the meanings of words into consideration when trying to name things, right?”

“Sometimes we do, but names can also be chosen based solely on what sounds right. My name, Ai, holds no special meaning, for example. What’s important is the emotions you imbue the name with.”

“Hmm.”

I pondered the matter carefully. Gilulu’s name incorporated the name of Ai Fa’s father, Gil Fa. Similarly, Saris Ran Fou had named her child Aimu Fou hoping that he would grow into a fine hunter like Ai Fa. And, needless to say, the totos Ruuruu and Fafa had gotten their names from clans. Jidura was also a Ruu clan totos...and from what I recalled, that meant “red” in the language of Sym. That name had come from the color of the bird’s plumage. As for the Rutim totos, Mim Cha, that name meant “tomorrow,” also in the language of Sym. It was kind of embarrassing, but Dan Rutim had chosen it based on the meaning of my own name. I also knew that Raielfam meant “fangs of the fierce ape” in the old language of the forest’s edge. It was apparently a vestige of the days when their people hunted black apes.

Taking all of those different examples into consideration, it seemed like there were many different meanings that could be baked into a name, and that made the responsibility of coming up with one feel all the heavier.

“Don’t worry too much about it. Why not follow the traditions of your home country?”

“Huh? Would that be okay?”

“I do not mind. You are a proper man of the forest’s edge, but your blood ties were not severed like those of the Suun clan. There is no need for you to cast aside the pride you feel for your old homeland.”

“I suppose not.” If Ai Fa was suggesting that, then I certainly had no objections. “Names for dogs in the style of my home country... The first thing that comes to mind is Pochi, I guess.”

Ai Fa remained silent.

“Ah, he doesn’t really look like a Pochi, though, so just forget that one.”

“I’m glad to hear you say I can simply forget it.”

Apparently, the sound of the name Pochi wasn’t to Ai Fa’s liking. I felt the pressure on me growing more intense.

“Er, in that case...how about Tarosuke or Musashi?”

Still nothing from my clan head.

“No, Japanese-style names really aren’t clicking for you, are they? Hmm... How about Ricky or Ben?”

The silence was starting to become deafening.

“Ugh, it’s hard to try to come up with something just based on what sounds right. I’d like to try to add some sort of meaning to it.”

“Anything is fine, but I hope you won’t go with a name as strange as those were.”

“I’m telling you, I’ve got no clue which names will sound strange to you and which ones won’t. Er... Since he’s got reddish fur, maybe Red? Or Big, because he’s large?”

Those were nothing but physical features, though. What about something more like a wish for what I wanted him to be like?

I’m sure my folks gave my name a lot of thought before they decided on Asuta.

I closed my eyes and considered the matter carefully. Eventually, a word popped into my head.

“What about Brave?”

Ai Fa’s eyebrows twitched. “Does that hold some sort of meaning?”

“Yeah. It should be something like ‘gallant’ or ‘hero.’”

I was pulling it from the title of a DVD a cinephile classmate of mine had once forced me to borrow. I had watched that movie a long time ago, so the contents were fuzzy in my head, but I recalled it being a pretty gloomy film set during the colonization of America. Putting the movie aside, though, I felt that the meaning of the word was a perfect fit for a hunting dog. And when I turned to look at Ai Fa, I saw that she was now smiling warmly.

“It’s a wonderful name. Let’s go with that.”

“Okay. I’m glad you like it.”

The red-furred Brave kept on sleeping away, ignorant of the fact that he had just been named. He was now the fourth member of the Fa clan, after Ai Fa, myself, and Gilulu. I promised myself that I would pray to forest daily from here on out for him and Ai Fa to always return home safely.

Take good care of Ai Fa, Brave.

Having completed that important task, I suddenly felt rather sleepy.

“Well then, I guess it’s about time to go to bed. Today has been seriously tiring,” I said.

“Hmm? What happened today aside from welcoming Brave into our home?”

“Oh, just some more developments on the Morun Rutim front. I know there’s no point in me worrying, but I can’t help it.”

“Ah, that. I never would have thought that something like this would come up right after things were resolved with Sufira Zaza.”

“Yeah. I hope it all gets settled smoothly.”

We went ahead and got our bedding ready. With the cold of the rainy season gone, that just meant spreading out a couple sheets for ourselves in the main hall. Ai Fa requested that I lay mine out beside Brave, so I did.

“Is it really okay for me to take this spot? I thought for sure you’d want to sleep next to him.”

“It’s fine. This way, I can watch over all of you until I fall asleep,” Ai Fa said, slipping into a pose reminiscent of the recumbent Buddha. From where she was sitting, she could see me, Brave, and Gilulu all at once.

She then put out the candle, leaving us just the moonlight to rely upon. Thanks to the excitement of welcoming in a new clan member, Ai Fa probably wouldn’t go to sleep for some time yet.

“By the way, there was something I wanted to ask you, Ai Fa.”

“Hmm? What is it?”

“This happened a while ago...but back at the Daleim dance party, I thought you seemed a little worried when you were watching Sufira Zaza and Leiriss. Was that because you noticed their feelings for each other?”

After a moment of silence, Ai Fa quietly replied, “I wasn’t certain, but they had that sort of feel about them. I never expected it to result in such a commotion, however.”

“I see. You have a surprisingly sharp eye for that kind of thing.”

“What do you mean, ‘surprisingly’? I am a hunter, you know.”

“I just meant that I didn’t figure you would have such an eye for romance.”

That comment was enough to get Ai Fa to stretch out and kick me in the leg.

Afterward, as I drifted off to sleep, I couldn’t help but wonder what Sufira Zaza and Morun Rutim were thinking about as they did the same elsewhere in the forest.