Cooking with Wild Game (LN) - Volume 27 - Chapter 2.3

3

The lessons the Ruu clan were giving on handling hunting dogs were going to last for the next six days. That was how long it would take to impart the bare minimum of knowledge that the other clans would need. After that, they would return home, leaving the dogs behind so that their students could continue to benefit from the animals’ talents.

As Ai Fa had said, Ludo Ruu had been assigned to teach the Fou clan, along with another boy from a branch house, and in exchange, one hunter each from the Fou and Ran had been sent back to the Ruu settlement. For the duration of the teaching period, Ai Fa and Brave were going out into the forest to hunt alongside them.

Every other day, a Sudra hunter would also join them. On the days when he didn’t come to visit the Fou clan, he would be with the Suun, taking lessons with them instead. The hunters of the Sudra clan were still visiting the Suun settlement once every five days, so it seemed they had made additional arrangements to allow this.

Incidentally, there were northern hunters from the Jeen who also went to the Suun settlement to hunt periodically, and they had aligned their schedule to match the Sudra clan’s visits a while back. That meant the Ruu, Suun, Jeen, and Sudra were all hunting together now, and personally, I thought that was pretty amazing. Each of those four clans had different standings, and their members had different temperaments, so I was definitely a bit curious as to how well they were getting along as they worked together.

As for the other clans, the Zaza and Ravitz had an exchange with the Rutim, the Sauti and Dai with the Lea, the Gaaz and Ratsu with the Min, and the Beim with the Ririn. What caught my attention the most was how the Gaaz and Ratsu were paired with the Min. All of those clans had sent women to help with the stalls, which meant they were now loosely tied to one another. It was definitely interesting to think about what kind of conversations they might be having over dinner.

The greatest point of concern was obviously the northern settlement. Dan and Deem Rutim had been sent there, with Morun Rutim accompanying them as planned, and they had asked to stay at the main house of the subordinate Dom clan instead of the main house of the Dom’s parent clan, the Zaza.

“It’s not that we’re trying to snub the Zaza or anything. We’d just like to try to deepen our ties with the Dom this time around!” was how Dan Rutim had sold the idea. At the forest’s edge, it was a sin to lie, so he had explained the reason for their request in a way that was basically honest. They hadn’t revealed Morun Rutim’s feelings yet, for obvious reasons. All of this was meant to allow her to have some time to confirm how she felt about Deek Dom one way or the other, after which the Ruu and Rutim would finally decide how they wanted to proceed.

If she couldn’t cast aside her feelings for Deek Dom, would she ask to marry into the Dom clan? Or would she tamp down her feelings in order to maintain peace and order at the forest’s edge? That was something I couldn’t help but be anxious about as I waited for those six days to be over.

During that period, Lem Dom made a single visit to the Fa house.

“The former Rutim clan head sure is a noisy one! It’s like we’re keeping a wild giba in the house!” Lem Dom grumbled. She’d had a nice quiet life alone with her brother up until recently, until their home had suddenly been invaded by three intruders and a hunting dog a couple days ago. And since one of those intruders was Dan Rutim, the disruption they were causing was undoubtedly much greater than their number would have suggested.

“Well, at least you’ve interacted with Dan Rutim before, right? But what about Deek Dom? Is he holding up okay?”

“He just keeps acting like everything is fine no matter what happens. Of course, Deek hardly ever lets anything get to him regardless, so I’m having more trouble with the situation than he is.”

“What about it is troubling you, Lem Dom?”

“Well, it’s more like I’m feeling on edge about all this,” she replied. Then she stared right at me. “Hey, what exactly are the Ruu up to here, huh? I’m sure you know something, don’t you, Asuta?”

“U-Up to?”

“Don’t play dumb. It doesn’t make any sense to me that they would ask to stay with the Dom rather than the Zaza, and it’s even weirder that they brought along some woman who isn’t even a hunter. We were told we didn’t need to pry into their reasons because Donda Ruu will explain everything eventually, but I’m sure Gulaf Zaza is feeling awfully suspicious about what’s going on.”

“I see... But, well, it’s the Ruu and Rutim’s business, so I really shouldn’t blab about it.”

“What a tease! Maybe I should get my revenge by giving Ai Fa some lessons of my own.”

“I-I’m sure Ai Fa wouldn’t be interested in that!”

“Oh? I’m not so certain. I imagine she’d gladly trample all over our customs if she thought it would make you happy.”

I felt a chill run down my spine. “I’m begging you, don’t go and do anything crazy. Donda Ruu is going to explain what’s going on and he isn’t planning to do anything a leading clan head shouldn’t, so please just trust me and put up with it for a while.”

“I certainly hope that’s the case. I’ve got no interest in fighting with the Ruu at this point,” Lem Dom remarked with a deep sigh. That was what I was the most concerned about too.

“By the way, how are things going with the hunting dog? The hunters of the Dom clan are all receiving lessons together, aren’t they?”

“Trying to redirect the conversation, eh? But yeah, it’s been working out amazingly. It’s hard to imagine a more useful beast for hunting with.”

“I’m glad to hear it. And I’m sure Deek Dom will be happy too if this makes hunting less dangerous.”

Lem Dom—who had needed to push past her brother’s objections in order to become a hunter—scratched her head with a sour look on her face. “But they cost even more than totos, don’t they? No matter how helpful they are, it’s not going to be easy for us to buy them.”

“Yeah, but if everyone from the forest’s edge decides that the dogs are worth using, the Ruu clan is willing to share some of their own fortune to help the other clans deal with the cost, and we can dip into the reward money from the castle town for this too. And I’d like to have the Fa clan offer our support too.”

“You’d use the money you earned for the sake of other clans?”

“That’s not that strange, is it? We’ve got more money than we know what to do with here.”

“If this is a plan to make allies of the Beim and Ravitz, I have to say, I am impressed.”

“It’s not like that. I’m not trying to manipulate them or anything. And the Fa aren’t trying to earn more money for its own sake. There’s no point in what we’re doing if our comrades don’t agree with us that it’s okay to build bridges with outsiders.”

Shortly after that, Lem Dom headed back to her clan’s settlement, not looking especially satisfied with my responses. Though the Fa and Dom houses were far apart, it seemed she had come all this way just to grumble at me. Basically, that little encounter had been me getting rained on by the edge of the storm the Rutim clan was stirring up.

At any rate, for now there didn’t seem to be any issues with the lessons the other clans were taking on how to use their new hunting dogs. Ai Fa in particular seemed to be in a great mood day in and day out. She talked about Brave constantly, saying things like “Brave is so clever” or “Brave is wonderful.” She was like a doting parent, but then, she’d always had a soft side that only came out around those who were close to her.

“By the way, we’ve only been giving Brave raw meat and bones. Can he not eat your cooking?” she asked one night.

“Well, it’s not impossible for him to eat it, but I’d say it’s best to only give him raw meat. Anything that’s been steeped in pico leaves, we would have to wash thoroughly before giving it to him.”

“I see. In that case, I’ll have to hunt at least one giba every day so that he can always have fresh meat to enjoy.”

That was pretty much always how things were with her. Brave was monopolizing her attention so much that I was starting to feel a little lonely, but seeing her so happy made me happy too.

As for the other clans, I was able to hear some stuff indirectly. After all, my work in the post town meant that I met with people from lots of different clans almost every day at the stalls, while handling prep work, or when I was leading study sessions at the Ruu settlement. We had also been purchasing giba meat from the Dai clan lately for our business, so there were few clans that I didn’t have at least some connection to at this point.

Thinking it over, the only clans I didn’t have direct contact with were those related to the Zaza, Sauti, and Suun. Out of all the parent clans, those were the only three that still hadn’t gotten involved with the Fa clan’s business, though, so that made sense. However, I was able to hear about the Suun through the Sudra, and the Jeen, who were subordinates of the Zaza, did work with us, so the Sauti were the only ones I still wasn’t connected to yet.

Still, even if Dari Sauti tended to stay neutral, he had shown himself to be forward-thinking several times, so I doubted I had anything to worry about on that front. Even clans opposed to the Fa’s actions like the Ravitz and Beim were very interested in the hunting dogs’ potential, after all. They were the kind of people who hated significant change and placed a lot of value on old customs, but they had still quickly come to realize just how valuable our new canine comrades could be. Or at least, that’s the impression I got from what Fei Beim and Lili Ravitz had to say.

“So, when are we going to be able to get some hunting dogs of our own? I’m feeling kinda left out over here!” Radd Liddo grumbled one day. Since they weren’t a parent clan, no hunting dogs had been sent to them. Most of the other subordinate clans were sending hunters to accompany those of their parent clans so they could see for themselves what the dogs were like on the hunt. However, the Liddo and Deen lived pretty far away from their parent clan—the Zaza—so that wouldn’t work in their case.

“If they had been able to buy a couple more hunting dogs, they would have sent the Zaza and Sauti two each, since they have so many subordinate clans, but unfortunately there weren’t enough on sale for that,” I explained.

“Hmm, so we’ve got no choice but to wait until these six days are over and the Zaza come to teach us, eh? We really are being left out, then!” Radd Liddo said angrily. He kind of reminded me of Dan Rutim in some ways.

Regardless, there hadn’t been any way to avoid this issue, as we simply didn’t have enough hunting dogs. Out of the eighteen total dogs, two of them were remaining with Shumiral, and one had been taken in by the Fa clan. Then five of the six clans under the Ruu—all of them except the Ririn—had each taken one, and the remaining nine had been sent to various other clans.

It would have been perfectly reasonable for the Ruu to have kept all of the dogs for their own use, but instead they’re essentially giving most of them away. Complaining about them not being generous enough feels like inviting divine punishment on yourself.

Each hunting dog cost sixty-five white coins, from what I had been told. In comparison, a totos cost fifty white coins, while an iron pot cost twenty-four. Converting that into giba horns and tusks (and boy, it had been a long time since I’d done that), we were talking about a price equal to roughly fifty-four giba.

Considering the cost of ingredients, my intuition was that a single white coin seemed to be roughly equivalent to two thousand yen. That meant the price of a single hunting dog was about a hundred and thirty thousand yen. I was really impressed that Donda Ruu would buy eleven of them at once, then send nine of them to clans that weren’t even related to him. Even if the reward money from Genos Castle was being used to help buy them, it was still a pretty remarkable thing to do.

The Ruu had been at a loss as to how to spend their wealth, so they had decided that now was a good time to use up a ton of it all at once, and I wanted the Fa clan to provide at least a bit of assistance too. Without all the assistance so many of the other clans had given us, the Fa never would have been able to amass such a fortune, so I felt it would only be right to give some of that back to the forest’s edge.

Still, for now we had to wait and see how the other clans reacted before bringing in more hunting dogs. Shumiral had told the sellers that as well.

All in all, those six days passed by quietly. Naturally, there were still a number of events that occurred that didn’t involve the hunting dogs, such as Reina Ruu’s birthday, Diel and Arishuna visiting the stalls, and the Fa house finally getting its own stone oven.

On top of that, Marth, our acquaintance from the guards who was still healing up, surreptitiously ended up becoming one of our regulars. Also, Lady Odifia sent some flowers and accessories to Toor Deen as thanks for the sweets the young chef had made for delivery to the castle town, and the Fou women found a new favorite topic of discussion: how adorable and reliable Ludo Ruu was. So it wasn’t like those days were exactly dull.

Still, what concerned me most of all was, naturally, what was happening up at the northern settlement. I had gotten an early report from Lem Dom, but after that I stopped hearing anything. I saw Tsuvai and Oura pretty much daily around the stalls, and they were a part of the Rutim clan, but they had no way of knowing what was going on up north either. And it was the same for the members of the Deen and Liddo, who fell under the Zaza.

“I don’t think Dan Rutim would start any trouble at the northern settlement,” Oura told me. I hadn’t seen her in a while, but today she was helping out at the stalls in Morun Rutim’s place. She was a kind woman just under the age of thirty and had previously been Tsuvai’s mother and the wife of the former leading clan head, Zuuro Suun, until both she and her daughter had had the Suun name stripped from them, after which the Rutim had taken them in. “I believe Dan Rutim and the northern hunters actually have a lot in common. They used to be at odds because of the Suun clan, but now that their feud has ended, I think they’ll probably get along surprisingly well.”

“Hmph, I’d be willing to bet that Dan Rutim has been challenging them to contests of strength every single day. Even though he’s so far away now, I feel like I can still hear his overly loud laughter,” Tsuvai grumbled.

Even if there was some violence involved, I was glad they were able to have that sort of friendly interaction. And, well, it was true that both Dan Rutim and the northern hunters hated pointless quibbling. Still, I felt like their temperaments were different enough to be at least a bit of a cause for concern.

“Really? It’s true that the northern hunters can be rather uptight, but I’m sure they still relax in their homes like anyone else. And Dan Rutim is an exceptionally strong hunter, so I can’t imagine them treating him with scorn. They value a hunter’s strength more than anything at the northern settlement, after all,” Oura said.

“Hmph. If that’s true, then I’m sure that Diga and Doddo have had a really tough time over there,” Tsuvai grumbled.

Now that she mentioned it, those two were also living at the Dom settlement now. Based on how Lem Dom had described their situation, it didn’t seem like they were living at the main house, but this did mean that they and Dan Rutim were actually going to be hunting together until this six-day period ended.

Well, that could definitely provide them with some valuable experience in its own way, I thought as I prayed to the forest that Dan Rutim wouldn’t cause any unnecessary problems.

And then, the twentieth of the vermilion month arrived.

It was the seventh morning since the hunting dog lessons had begun, when all of the hunters who had been exchanged between the clans would be returning to their respective homes. From what I had been told, Donda Ruu and Gazraan Rutim had headed to the northern settlement the evening before to learn what decision Morun Rutim had come to and also to explain the Rutim’s actions to Gulaf Zaza and Deek Dom.

Even if Morun Rutim decided to give up on her feelings, they still intended to open up about everything. They couldn’t simply leave the truth hidden about why they had chosen to stay at the Dom house rather than with the Zaza, or why they’d had Morun Rutim accompany them.

I was pretty on edge as I carried out the morning’s work, wondering how everything had worked out. My answer eventually came right as we were wrapping up our preparations for work. That was when Gazraan Rutim showed up at the Fa house’s kitchen, where a great many women were working.

“My apologies, Asuta, but could I have a bit of your time?”

“Oh, Gazraan Rutim. Are you on your way back from the northern settlement?”

“Yes. My father Dan and Donda Ruu are asleep in the wagon. We were up late yesterday speaking with Gulaf Zaza and Deek Dom.”

Gazraan Rutim had found himself in the same circumstances as well, yet he still had his usual composed smile on his face. As Toor Deen and the others helped to clean up all the cooking tools, I stepped outside with him. Ai Fa had been chopping wood with Gilulu and Brave watching her, but she stopped when we came out and approached us.

“Would you mind listening as well, Ai Fa? The Fa clan is somewhat involved in this, after all.”

“Hmm? What does an issue between the Rutim and the Dom have to do with the Fa?”

“It’s not a direct connection. But you aren’t entirely unrelated.”

With that, Gazraan Rutim calmly began talking, and we were in for quite a surprise when we realized what he meant.