Chapter 495 - The War of the Well (Patreon)

For a while, Sami and Stickboy drank in silence. The captain didn't know why the other man wasn't saying anything, but Sami — for his part — was still brooding over the strangers from before. Although he had said that he wouldn't bother with them, their leader's unusual demeanor just wouldn't leave his mind. Maybe he had been overly sensitive to strange characters ever since their meeting with those bearded 'spies' from northern Medala.

It took another noise from the back to bring Sami back to reality — the sound of breaking pottery this time. As he came back to his senses, he suddenly realized how much noisier the tavern had become overall. It wasn't surprising that this place would become more and more rowdy as the day advanced, but this surely was too much. Just as he wanted to turn around and see what was going on, Stickboy picked up their conversation again.

"So, what did you want to ask me before?"

Sami had to think for a moment before he even remembered their previous conversation. Those strangers had really robbed all of his momentum. Luckily, Stickboy was still willing to uphold his end of the bargain and had reminded him. After a few seconds, the inquisitive captain finally remembered. They had been talking about Stickboy's new job, and Sami wanted to learn more about the kinds of manufactories built around Jurau.

"Ah, I just wanted to ask about the general situation on the island, and about your new work. It's a good idea to stay informed on current trends, you see?" Sami added at the end, since he was a bit worried his questions would be misunderstood and he would be considered a spy.

He didn't know how things were here on Rasacopa, but if it was anything like Saniya, this place would have bounties for spies as well.

"I see indeed, friend," Stickboy simply said, as if he didn't worry about anything complicated like that. Though although he 'saw', rather than reply to the question, he turned his head towards the back of the tavern and said: "By the way, this other friend who entered with you is in a brawl. Is it fine to leave him like that?"

Once again, Sami had to interrupt his investigation and turn around. Yet compared to his disregard for the farmers from before, he couldn't stay indifferent towards the scene behind him. All this time, Chanca had been noisily demolishing the disgusting local swill with a bunch of drunks in the corner of the tavern. Somehow, while Sami had been busy collecting information, this merry meeting had developed into a violent brawl.

Bottles and shards of pottery lay scattered around the table in the dingy corner. Two of its four surrounding, flimsy chairs lay on their side, while another was held up like a club by one of the three drunks. The other two were unarmed, but had stances as if they were ready to pounce, if only they hadn't been so unsteady on their legs. By this point in the fight, the three drinkers had surrounded Chanca in a semi-circle, and cornered him behind the table with his back to the corner. If only there had been windows in this place, he could have escaped. But as things stood, his situation looked dangerous.

Blood oozed from a cut on Chanca's forehead. Even so, he still stood upright and confronted the three drinkers with a face distorted in anger. After the fight had broken out, the two sides must have scrapped for a while, before they had reached this strange stalemate somehow. Now they stood ready, weary of each other's moves and unsure how to continue, which had caused a short lull in the action.

Maybe this would be the best time to intervene peacefully and talk out their issues before any further escalation. However, Sami had no time to think about things like that, and he had no time to complain about Chanca, even though his cocky attitude and loud mouth had surely caused this mess, like it had so many times before.

Instead, almost on reflex, Sami muttered "shit" and jumped off the bar stool.

"Wait, friend," Stickboy said, while the bartender shouted: "Hey, don't start trouble here!"

Yet Sami had already picked up his bar stool as an improvised weapon and rushed towards the eye of the storm. He figured that if the others could use chairs, then using one himself would only be fair. Before anyone could stop him, Sami had rushed across the cramped, dingy tavern and whacked one of the drinkers in his back.

Let's go easy on them and not hit them in the head. I don't wanna kill anyone, he thought, but only after the fact, when — finally — his faculty for thought had barely returned. Meanwhile, the drunk man stumbled forward from the hit. After two unsteady steps, he fell against the table, and then collapsed on the floor.

Yet as Sami both admired his handiwork and praised himself for his measured response, something hard hit him in the side of the head and made him stumble away. As soon as he was hit, his head dulled again. All further thought, and all plans for reconciliation flew out the non-existent windows.

Without any further plan, Sami charged the guy who had just punched him, his pain dulled by anger. At the same time, Chanca used the distraction to regain the initiative, and he scrambled across the table and rushed at the last upright drinker as well. For both sides, all considerations were gone. All that was left were allies, and enemies.

As the five men brawled, they soon stumbled and fell into other tables, and spread their fight across the entire tavern like a plague. Of course, all the locals proved to be on the side of the three drinkers. However, just when it looked like Sami and Chanca would be overwhelmed and subdued by the crowd, some of their crewsmen rushed into the bar to save their captains. It was a nice gesture, but also just escalated the fight further. More and more fists joined in, until no one even knew who was fighting who anymore. It was a legendary battle — even by the standards of the Deep Well — one which would last all day, and until deep into the night.

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Drip...

a drop of blood landed on the wooden planks beneath Sami, where it crowded in between half a dozen other red dots which had already staked their place there. In comparison to the dried drops from before, this one was still fresh, glistening in the light of the overhead oil lamp.

Although Sami was exhausted and hurt all over, he still raised his hand up to his nose and brushed off the tickly feeling around his nostril. Of course, his finger came back red. Once again, his ship's with excellent lighting helped, or he would have seen nothing in the middle of the night.

"You're bleeding again," an annoying voice from besides Sami commented on his actions.

"Yes, I noticed. Thank you," the annoyed Sami replied and looked over.

Chanca sat on the steps leading up to the Suyana's quarterdeck, right next to Sami. Although they occupied the way up to the ship's wheel, it wasn't like anyone needed to go up there in the middle of the night, with their ship anchored at the pier. The overhead lighting cast most of the idiot's face in shadows, but he still managed to look like a wrung-out dishrag, all dirty, grimy, and squished.

That's what you get for starting a fight for no good reason.

The thought didn't make Sami feel much better, even less so since he himself felt just as horrible as Chanca looked.

"That's the first time I got banned from anywhere, ever, you know?" Sami added after a long silence.

If there was any consolation, at least they didn't have to pay for the damages they had caused. Most likely, the tavern's owner had been intimidated by the size of their crews when he had claimed that 'this happens all the time, that's why we only have old furniture'. Still, it didn't make Sami feel any better about the ban, nor about his dripping nose and swollen temple. Yet his partner-in-crime didn't seem to have any awareness of the trouble he had caused them.

"Yeah, that was a god time, huh?" Chanca claimed, as if he didn't care about their embarrassing state at all. At the very least, after a few seconds of Sami's baffled silence, his friend still added: "Thanks for saving me."

In response, Sami had to sigh.

"Could you just stop making trouble for once?" he asked. "While you were busy getting drunk with your new friends, and then busy getting beat up by your new friends, I tried to gather some information. But then I had to stop halfway through to save you from getting your head smashed in by some useless drunks. Now we still barely know anything about anything, and I have to start looking for a reliable informant again to learn more about Rasacopa."

Although in the moment, Sami had acted immediately to support his friend, now was the time to make sure something like this wouldn't happen again. Not only had they been thrown out. Not only would they have to sleep on their own ship tonight because no other place would take them in after the trouble they had caused. Worse, the man called Stickboy had also quietly disappeared at some point during the brawl.

Although it was a bit disappointing, Sami wasn't surprised. His drinking companion didn't seem close to anyone in the tavern, and didn't seem to be one for crowds either. As a consolation, at least he hadn't joined the fight against them, which was about as good as Sami could expect from an almost-stranger.

Still, without no more reliable sources of information he could draw from, Sami had to delay all his plans. Today, they had already unloaded all their goods from their ship, apart from the useless shellcraft on the Kallpa, of course. Tomorrow, Sami had wanted to just buy more goods and then move on to Chutwa. However, now he didn't even know what goods were cheap here, nor where to buy them.

At this hour, it was unlikely he would meet someone as trustworthy as Stickboy again. Thus, their entire schedule would be delayed by at least a day. Not to mention, if he wanted to gather more information and make their future journey safer, they would be even later. Yet just as Sami wanted to complain some more about their chaotic first journey, Chanca's next words surprised him.

"What do you mean, you gathered information? What do you think I was doing back there?" Chanca asked with an arrogant grin on his face, or so Sami thought. He had a hard time reading his friend's expressions through the swollen face. Though in actuality, he was too confused to carefully read his expression anyways.

"What?" he barely articulated instead. Somehow, he couldn't conceive the idea that today, Chanca had done anything for any reason other than his own selfish wants. However, his friend's next words brought Sami face to face with his own prejudices, and his own arrogance.

"Those drinkers are well-connected, or so father says," Chanca explained, before he groaned in pain. He moved his jaw around a bit, spat out a small mouthful of blood, and continued. "In case I wanted to check out this place and ask some more questions, father wrote down theirs, and the name of that worthless dive. But now that I've been, it looks like father was wrong. I've never seen a more ungrateful tavern owner than that guy. Do you have any idea how much money I spent on that place before that brawl started? They should be glad that-"

"Wait one moment," Sami interrupted after he had finally regained his senses. Rather than listen to Chanca's complaints, he had to clarify what he had just heard. "You mean to tell me that you already knew those drunkards, and that meeting them was part of a larger plan?"

"Of course." Chanca admitted almost immediately, as if it was obvious. "Father planned out every step of our first trip for us, I'm just following instructions. I mean, how else did I know what to buy in Saniya, and to bring it to Jurau, and then where to sell it here? You don't think I actually know anything about this stuff, do you?"

The more Sami heard, the more shocked he became, in perfect contrast with Chanca's face, which clearly expressed an 'isn't that obvious' attitude. So all this time, they had been operating on a tight schedule, with a complete plan? What did that mean for his hard work, and his meticulous research over the course of these weeks and months?

"So everything I've been doing has been useless?" Sami concluded, first in confusion, before the anger began to set in. Why would Chanca never tell him about any of this? Why did his friend instead just watch him waste his time, and embarrass himself in the process? Yet before Sami could accuse an innocent man in his embarrassment, his friend explained himself.

"I keep telling you not to worry so much, but you just wouldn't stop," he said, and looked away with a face even more crumpled than before. "You've been running around like you've been possessed by a demon, you know?"

As Sami looked at his friend's uncomfortable, bloody face, he realized that Chanca was probably even more embarrassed than he himself had been. After all, it was hardly glorious to have every single step of his life dictated by his father-in-law. Considering the fact that Chanca's wife had only just given birth to his first son, this entire trip probably hadn't been Chanca's idea at all. Most likely, he had been forced away by his overbearing father-in-law, for some reason or another. Clearly, Chanca also wasn't doing nearly as well as he claimed. In the face of his friend's troubles, Sami's own issues suddenly dissolved like sugar in water.

"Sorry about that," a regretful Sami finally said after a prolonged pause. He had been far too focused on himself and had never noticed his friend's own troubles. However, now that he realized that Chanca had a plan, Sami propped himself up in his seat as he regained his energy almost immediately. He needed to know more about Ekkoko's orders if he wanted to help out. He was a captain of their fleet as well, after all. It was only proper for him to learn more, and then to share the burden.

"So what exactly is the plan then?" Sami asked. "Can you tell me now?"

"Well... we've already unloaded all the fertilizer and soap we brought here," Chanca began to explain after some hesitation.

"Yeah, I know. We had a buyer lined up long ago, right?" Sami helped his friend along. At least that much, he already knew. After all, it would have been tough for Chanca to convince his friend of their route without at least this much of a guarantee. Though he still didn't know what they were meant to do from here.

"Yes, father said they'd buy our entire cargo at some Royal something-or-other," Chanca said, and Sami corrected in his head Royal Plantation Initiative, as Chanca continued. "I went to that ungrateful dive today to ask more about them."

"And? What did you learn?" Sami asked, now curious about just how much he had underestimated his friend, and about how much he had found out on his own.

"Did you know that the island here is spending a lot of coin on cotton and carpets and stuff?" Chanca asked.

"I have an inkling," Sami replied, and thought back to Stickboy, who had claimed to be employed by a textile mill. The reminder of his previous encounter annoyed Sami again. Thus, he added in a slightly bitter tone: "But before I could ask anything more concrete, I had to rush away and save your ass from some useless drunks."

"I could have taken them by myself, all three of them at once," Chanca claimed in a gruff voice, which once again dissolved Sami's building anger.

"Of course you could have."

Despite his words, Sami had to stifle a laugh at the sight of Chanca's busted up face. This masterpiece of red, blue and black was the result of their encounter after he had gotten reinforcements. Sami didn't even want to imagine how things would have gone if Chanca had been on his own. Maybe those close-knit locals would have just liberated the stranger with the deep pockets of his belongings and then thrown his body into the deep waters of the harbor, just another new arrival who went missing in the big city.

It wasn't a pleasant thought. Thus, rather than occupy any more of his mind with such inauspicious things, Sami tried to focus on their job instead and asked: "So did you learn any more than me? Something that can be useful to us?"

"Ah, right, the carpet stuff," Chanca said and slapped his forehead, something he immediately regretted. He hissed in pain after he slapped the fresh cut above his eyes. Sami patiently waited while his friend checked that he hadn't started bleeding again. Only once he had confirmed that he wasn't in a medical emergency did Chanca continue.

"Apparently, the lords of this place — which I guess are now the same as the lords of ours — have started to clear out the forest in the south and west," he said. "With all the spare room, they have been planting cotton plants, rows and rows of it, as far as the eye can see. Well, not my eye, but the eye of the guy who told father. Seems like they've also come up with cheaper ways to make carpet or something. Maybe it's kinda like our manufactories in Saniya? I really don't get it all that much."

"Surely, those were the ideas of the miracle king," Sami interjected.

Both him and Chanca had been carpentry apprentices before, but only he had worked in a manufactory in the past. In these new types of workshops, the king had introduced new ideas like modular production and standardized measurements. Sami knew how much of a difference those seemingly irrelevant methods made to their output and efficiency.

"I wouldn't be surprised if they had water-powered machines for spinning or weaving cloth, similar to the metal lathe the TaSa manufactory installed for metal detailing," Sami thus concluded.

"Probably," Chanca shrugged, clearly not interested in any of Sami's speculations. "What matters is that they've already planted 22.000 hectares of the cotton, which means they are now producing about 100.000 tons of carpet in a year. At least that's what those drunks said. I wrote it down somewhere, but I think I lost the paper, but I still remember the numbers. It sounded like a lot anyways. Their carpet is also good quality, the drunks say, and it's maybe half the price you'd have to pay for the same stuff in Saniya."

"So Rasacopa cloth is our next product then," Sami concluded. Now, their future path was clear. They'd buy cheap cloth here, and then transport it to Chutwa, where they would sell it.