Dao Divinity 2 Chapter 26 (Patreon)

Bart’s men crawled off the last frame. They had used several days’ worth of lumber in a single day of framing, but now the village had rough frames for their homes and family units were starting to inspect and admire their soon to be living places.

“Good work.” Sasha walked up to his side as he watched the village. “Between these homes and the boat, you’ve brought a lot of excitement to the village.”

Dar nodded, somewhat disappointed the work had completed so quickly. The mindless task had helped him keep some of the thoughts in his head at bay, but it did help to see the villagers so excited as they bounced in and out of the homes.

“It’s nice to see them full of hope.” Dar said, although he knew his voice betrayed some of his melancholy.

“Yes, and I see we need to keep you distracted again.” Sasha replied, giving him a knowing look. He felt his face warm, not surprised she could read him so easily.

Changing the subject, Dar told Sasha, “After dinner I’m giving Amber two fruits for her parents. I’ll let her coach them through the transition.”

“Do you think that’s safe?” Sasha asked.

“Yes, I think it’ll be easier if it passed through people in the community rather than me teaching everyone.” Dar realized he’d been stretching himself thin, and it wasn’t something he needed to do himself anymore.

He needed to look forward toward the ettercap issue. Preparations for winter were shaping up. The houses had made a huge leap forward, and in the worst case, people could start making thatch to cover their homes.

It wouldn’t be great material, and they’d need to replace it come spring, but it would get them through the winter.

Food was being packed away at an incredible rate. Cherry and the farmers were filling two side caves, being used for storage now that the housing situation was in a better spot. Dar hadn’t realized just how much they were producing every day until he saw the barrels piling up in the caves.

Sasha watched him from the side. “And which one will be our home?”

“It’s almost done.” Dar left it vague. It wasn’t exactly done, but he was confident that it would be done in time for the winter.

Sasha went to pry a bit more, but she was stopped as Russ came sprinting into the village. “Dar good thing I found you. I need your help.”

Dar braced at first, ready for a fight, when he realized that the look on Russ’ face was closer to a child on Christmas morning. “Sure, let’s see what you’ve got.”

Sasha gave him a peck on the cheek and stepped away, back to her own tasks.

“You should see the herd on the other side of the river!” Russ chattered. “Thousands upon thousands of bison.”

“Hunting was easy then?” Dar asked.

“Dangerous. When we took the first down, they charged us and circled the injured one.”

Dar could see the boat from where they were, and he noticed that more than one large bison was getting pulled off the boat. “How many did you get?”

“Eight! We had to leave two behind. We just had to keep putting them down till they decided it would be safer to run.” Russ smiled. “I’m hoping we can get these unloaded quickly and go back for the other two. We did our best to drain and dress them, but they are big fuckers!”

Mika shoved one off the boat onto the ground in front of three of Russ’ girls before she looked up and spotted Dar, smiling and waving at him. “Hurry and help them get these back to the village. We need to grab two more.”

“You got it. Mind sending the next over the edge? I’ll grab it and start carrying what I can back.” Dar stepped up to the bottom of the boat as Mika dragged the next one over.

“This guy is big.” She warned, before she started to tip it over the edge.

Dar grabbed a leg and did his best to take the whole corpse over his shoulders. His strength helped him carry it, but it was awkwardly large at best. “Maybe we should get one of the carts to help with this, Russ. You grab one and we’ll make the first trip back and grab a cart for the rest.”

Russ’ girls turned to give Russ a small glare before going back to work. Dar suspected that had been the original goal, but Russ had got too excited. Either way, they’d get these unloaded quickly.

“We’ll get the rest off the boat and head over for the last two quickly.” Mika said from the boat.

“Sounds good. I’ll see you at dinner.” Dar threw the bison over his shoulder and got to work hauling the meat back to camp.

When he and Russ arrived back at camp, there was a big stirring as the women preparing for dinner put down everything. The carcasses were too large for any of their tables, so they started laying out clean cloths and butchering them on the ground.

“How many do we have coming?” Tabby asked, laying down another cloth.

“Eight, and then two more that they have to go back and get.”

Tabby blinked at Dar, stunned into silence for a moment. “Ten? What the heck are we going to do with all that meat?”

Dar laughed, knowing it would be a lot of work for the chefs. “We’ll pack it in salt and put it in the cool cave. Just need to get it cleaned up.” Dar hesitated when he realized she was staring back at him like he was dumb.

“Ten of these. That’s going to be… tons of meat. We don’t have enough salt for that, and it won’t keep long in just the cool cave. If it was winter, we could pack them in snow…”

Dar cut off her panic, understanding her worry. “How about you cut them, and we just apply a surface layer of salt to keep for the night. Then we’ll make a run here tomorrow to get more salt?”

Tabby looked at the girls behind her who were listening before turning back to Dar. “We’ll do that. And everyone will be eating plenty tonight.”

Dar let Russ handle the rest of the bison with the help of a cart, heading off to find Amelia to see about getting more salt. He found her sitting down with Neko, the two of them talking in hushed voices.

“I see you two are hitting it off well.”

“Fantastic, you might say.” Amelia didn’t miss a beat before turning to him, her eyes meeting his. “You look like you need something?”

Dar sighed. “Salt. Lots of it. Russ came back with ten of those bison.”

Amelia let out a soft whistle as he hit the number. “There’s no way I can pull that much from the cliffs, at least not in a short period of time. Think we can get the boat and go down to the ocean?”

“Yeah, if it isn’t too much trouble. I thought you and Mika could maybe go down to get all you can tomorrow.”

“All I can?” Her eyes opened wide as a joke before her smile gave it away. “Sure. I’ll fill that boat to the brim with salt if that’s what you want.”

A squeal drew Dar’s attention. Neko was sitting, playing with a piece of salt that was giving off bright light. Dar watched, remembering his other question for Amelia. “Think you could bring back plenty of crystals like that to enchant, too?”

“Sure, but be careful. Pussy Cat likes to steal them and play with them. Only way I kept her entertained today.”

The cat girl in question turned to Amelia with narrowed eyes. “Neko good.” Before the shiny crystal occupied her attention again. 

“I feel like we owe you quite a bit for all of this.” Dar admitted.

“Oh, I’m taking a chunk of that meat.” Her eyes wandered before centering back on Dar. “And a room in your new little fort?”

He should have known she’d go back to inspect what he’d been trying to hide. “Hah, done.” He enjoyed the surprise that flitted across her face, but he knew he wasn’t going to get rid of her, and she was becoming a part of the group. She’d have her own bed for the near-term as they figured out where it would go from there.

Her tongue stuck in her cheek, like she was physically stopping herself from saying what was on her mind. He had a good idea of what that might be. She’d definitely started meeting him where he was more comfortable.

“Thank you.” Dar said, trying to show in his eyes he meant more than just going to get the salt.

She smiled her acknowledgement before stating, “No problem. Just leave it to Mika and I. We’ve done things like this before.”

Dar nodded, not wanting to tell her how to do her job. “Any extra you bring back you should feel free to hold onto. We could trade it when the next river boat passes.”

Movement to the side caught his eye, and he noticed Marcie hanging to the side.

“Milord. Me and Amber wondered if you couldn’t help us with something?”

Dar shrugged. “Sure. Lead the way.”

She surprised him by taking him out of the village and to the edge of the northern woods. As they entered the woods, Amber ambushed him, a knife slashing at his back. His red-headed maid was quiet as a whisper; he wouldn’t have seen her coming if it wasn’t for her bright hair flashing in the corner of his vision.

Dar jumped back just in time as her knife came up short. His brain worked to catch up with what was happening as he realized that the knife she’d been using was wooden.

“Drat! I thought that would work.” Amber looked disappointed.

“Told you.” Marcie rolled her eyes.

Dar was still overcoming his surprise. “What are you two doing?”

“Practicing.” They said in unison before giggling.

“We tried to learn to fight from Sam’s husband, but he just taught us a few simple knife moves and moved on to teaching the others.” Amber said.

Nodding, Dar imagined the man didn’t think much of two human girls for fighting. “And you’ve brought me out to see if you couldn’t ambush me?”

Marcie shook her head. “No, we wanted help with how to use mana. She just wanted to see if she could surprise you.”

“Oh. Well, good job doing that, and thanks for finding us a secluded place.” Dar realized why they had taken him out to the forest. “Have both of you filled yourselves up with mana?”

They nodded together. “Yep, I can feel it floating through me. It’s very strange, but also amazing.”

Dar sat down and started to explain what he’d learned so far, realizing as he did just how far he had managed to come. It was easy to forget it in the need to be so much stronger.

He walked them through what it felt like to flood his channels with mana, feeling his body become much stronger, and pressurizing his mana to use his dao differently.

Both of them stayed quiet, asking a few focused questions and absorbing everything he said.

“Do you want to give it a try?” He suggested once he’d run out of things to share with them.

“Sure.” Amber and Marcie got up and paced ten steps away in either direction. Dar thought it was a bit far for a knife fight, but he let them do it how they wanted.

“Go ahead and start us, Milord.” Marcie’s wooden knife creaked as she tightened her grip.

“On three. One, two, three.”

Both of them exploded forward with speed that would have made an Olympic athlete jealous. But rather than their blades meeting, they slammed their forearms together and started rapidly slapping away each others’ knife hand while trying to control the others’ wrist.

When they started switching the knife to the other hand and catching the opponent off guard, it started to get really interesting. Their reactions improved with each move, but Amber changed it up, grabbing Marcie’s hair and pulling her head back.

“Ouch!” Marcie yelped before Amber’s wooden blade tapped her on the neck. “Not fair! That’s cheating”

“I don’t think you’d mind, as you’d be dead.” Dar said, impressed with what he’d seen. There was a fighter inside them. They just needed some training.

And it had made him realize that he needed to spend some time doing some similar training. He’d relied a lot on his dao and enchantments to get him through battles, but he could use some basic combat skills.

Realizing they were both staring at him, Dar added aloud, “That was impressive.”

“Mind if I join, two on one?” Dar asked, wanting to see for himself how he would stand against them.

“Of course, Milord.” Amber panted for another second before forcing herself to breathe slowly and stand straight.

Both girls readied their wooden daggers and stepped back, their feet crunching the leaves underfoot as they readied themselves to spring forward.

Dar stretched his arms out and put his hands up. “When you are ready.”

“No daos?” Marcie clarified.

“No daos. Just enhancements to your body with mana.”

Both of them nodded, flexing their hands and getting ready.

There was a moment of pause with nothing but the soft patter of falling leaves, while all three of them waited for the other to make the first move.

Amber ended up being the first, lunging forward with her dagger. In response, Dar moved to grab her wrist, but she flipped the dagger to her other hand and stabbed at his arm.

More reaction than anything else, Dar slammed his palm into her chest, sending her flying back, her stab missing his arm.

Marcie filled the spot Amber left in an instant, her dagger going for his throat, moving as silent as a wraith.

Leaning back, her dagger just barely nicked his throat, Dar grabbed her arm, spinning and tossing her, but he wasn’t comfortable with how close she’d been to slitting his throat. If this had been a real fight, he’d be feeling a trickle of warm blood on his chest.

Amber had recovered and was running back at him; meanwhile, Marcie flipped over and kicked off a tree. They were coming from both sides. It was smart.

Dar jumped back, putting both of them in front of him again. They moved quickly, throwing themselves at him with a reckless abandon that seemed more akin to assassins than fighters.

The two maids were relentless. He blocked them and threw them off, only for them to be back a second later. Their wooden daggers scratched him if he had the slightest distraction from the other.

Dar had no doubt they would have worn him down if it had been a real fight. And they were still just beginning their practice. He’d had no idea his two maids held such a natural ability towards being great assassins.

Where Dar had been relying on brute force and power in fights, they’d started on a different journey, focused on speed and agility.

“Got you.”

He felt a wooden dagger press into his back. That moment of distraction had been all they needed. Dar held his hands up in surrender as the three of them breathed heavily.

“That was great. Both of you.” Dar had learned more here than the brute force fighting he’d been doing.

But Amber shook her head. “No, you could have broken our arms or necks with some of those first moments when you grabbed and threw us. You going gentle on us gave us all our chances.”

“Not to mention, I’m unsure if we could have pierced you with your dao.” Marcie agreed.

“Still, I have to step up my game. You moved so quickly; how did you learn to kick off trees like that?” The agility and the acrobatics both of them had performed during the fight had surprised him.

“Practice and play. We are a lot tougher now and sometimes we just try something. It doesn’t matter if we fall, since our bodies can take it now. So we experiment and often end up surprising ourselves at just what we are capable of. It’s quite fun.” Amber spun the wooden dagger in her hand, looking like she was getting ready for round two.

Dar raised an eyebrow. “Just practice and play, eh? Maybe we need to do this more often.”

Both girls looked excited at that prospect. “Yes, please!”

Dar thought about if they should include any others. Their immortal status was a secret, so none of the soldiers would be a good choice. It would be clear very quickly that they held extra abilities.

But then he remembered that Mika came from a tribe that fought for their lives frequently. Even if they were more primal tactics, her experience in fighting other ancients and tribes likely had some form of martial arts she could teach. She’d be a great addition to help them all get better.

“Good. Then I think this is going to become a daily thing before dinner. We’ll see if Mika has any lessons for us.” Sparing with the beautiful women and improving his fighting abilities sounded like just the right way to spend some of his time.