37. Cycling (Patreon)

Aloe started her afternoon by infusing the remaining pistachios seeds. She didn’t know how atrocious Karaim’s vitality regeneration was, but after having a nap and lunch, she was topped up again.

“The old man didn’t lie when he said vitality and stamina aren’t the same.” Aloe wiped the sweat off her forehead with her sleeve. “I’m out of vitality, but I’m not truly tired. My body feels heavier than the heavens, but otherwise, I could continue doing tasks.”

Quite ironically, Aloe said this as she sat down on the shade of a palm tree and fanned herself with her straw hat. Ignoring the fact that she had some tasks to do since the first day that she had simply postponed indefinitely.

“Well, let’s see if the diminishing returns of the pills are permanent or just temporary. Please let it be the latter.” She whispered the last part to the heavens. But not the sun, fuck that one.

Aloe opened one of the many satchels she had in her belt and took out a Cure Grass pellet. They were small enough that she could stash multiple ones in a single satchel, even if the satchel’s volume was of a single fist. She had already cut down and polished the rest of the vitality pills, giving her more than a dozen to work with. And depending on what the results were, she surely would make more.

With a deep breath, Aloe downed the rather sticky pill.

She waited for a few pregnant instants as the pellet traveled down her throat to her stomach. Even when it reached its destination, the effects weren’t instantaneous. Her stomach had to first dissolve the layers of aloe vera sap before reaching the Cure Grass.

Aloe frowned as it took a lot of time for the vitality to appear, but quickly realized the problem.

“Note to self, don’t take pills after eating.” A few seconds later, it finally kicked off. “Note to self, the Cure Grass pills do not possess enduring diminishing returns.” She said composedly, before letting all manners go to the shitter. “Let’s fucking goooooo!”

The newbie farmer was more than exalted. She had been fearing for hours that her shortcut to Evolution and Infusion proved to be a fluke. But now she knew it was better than expected.

“Wait, I still have to check something.” Aloe calmed herself and stood up.

She knelt down in front of where she had planted the pistachios. In reality, she hadn’t managed to infuse all of them before her vitality had run out.

“Last one.” She muttered before infusing the burrowed pistachio and emptying her vitality again.

Even in her kneeling position, Aloe could feel her legs buckled and lost all their strength. If it wasn’t because she had done this multiple times by now, she would have dropped to the ground. Having no vitality drained oneself a lot. Whilst panting heavily, she grabbed another pill with the hand that hand clawed the soil and swallowed it.

Aloe waited impatiently as her stomach did its work, it took even longer than before, making her restless. But after a couple of minutes, she had her answer.

“Yes!” Aloe jumped out of her position. “I knew it!”

Even after having her vitality depleted multiple times, Aloe felt energetic as she hopped on the spot. She could vaguely hear the grunt of annoyance from Fikali in the background.

“Pills don’t get less effective by taking multiples on a short interval. They are only less effective the more vitality you currently have.” Being right with her theory made Aloe happier than the opportunities this gave her. “This means a single pill will allow me to do a big infusion if I do it from an emptied deposit! I just need to cycle vitality constantly!”

Considering it only took her minutes to craft a round of pills and then a few hours to dry, this meant she could do tens of them in a single day.

“I doubt my stomach is big enough to house that much grass, but this means I could theoretically infuse the whole oasis in a single day. Not that I would...” Aloe’s bright expression suddenly darkened. “Oh heavens...” Her visage contorted in a grimace. “I’m eating grass.”

Only now the gravity of the situation downed in her. Even if it was an evolved plant, it was still grass. And humans weren’t built to eat grass.

“Oh, I think I’m gonna puke...”

In the end, Aloe did not puke. But considering that she extracted the vitality from the Cure Grass before digesting it, it could technically be possible and feasible to regurgitate the grass to make space for more and don’t actually consume it.

“Ugh... I... I just won’t think about it.” Aloe refreshed herself by splashing her face with water. “Yesterday I ate the first pill and I don’t feel ill, but thinking about it it’s making me ill.”

It took her a series of long breaths to finally calm herself and dissipate those thoughts from her mind.

“Let’s just infuse some things...”

As much as she wanted to learn how to infuse different properties into plants, she agreed with Karaim in the fact that it would take her a while to know how to do it. She just knew it was possible but had no clues on how to begin.

“Let’s see... the pistachios and bananas are done, so before I start with the greenhouse, I should do the potatoes and beans. Ugh... but there are a lot of them...”

She wasn’t being lazy, just emotionally devastated. Aloe stood up and directed to the potato patch without bothering to dust off her pants. But before making it halfway through, she was interrupted by a few grunts.

“Huo! Huo!” Fikali berated her. She couldn’t actually tell that the dweller was doing that, but it certainly felt like it.

“Oh, right.” Aloe sighed and slouched her shoulders. “You wanna have a walk, don’t you?” Her expression was that of a corpse.

“Wrooooo!” The dweller added excitedly, bellyflopping repeatedly.

“You are far too excitable for someone of your age,” Aloe muttered as she undid the knot on the lead.

Fikali responded by puffing out some air, almost seemingly saying ‘How dare you speak of my age?’

“Did you just scoff at me?” Aloe frowned at the dweller. This time, the monster didn’t respond back. But the hurt expression Fikali put made Aloe think who the real monster was here. “Go, you have the afternoon free.” But even after saying so, Fikali stood still in place. “Come on, go. You have the dunes there, play a bit.”

The dweller didn’t move, instead, she rubbed her face against Aloe’s thighs.

“What?” She looked down at Fikali and she responded by grabbing the lead with her snout. “Do you want me to go with you?” The dweller nodded in affirmation. “I don’t know... I was about to do some things.” Fikali peered directly into her eyes with the small dots she had for hers. “Well... I guess I could go with you whilst I restore some vitality... That’s way healthier than stuffing myself with grass.”

“Ou!” Fikali heaved her nose up and down cutely.

“Alright, lead the way then.”

Aloe followed the desert dweller to the sands. When she was moving on the dirt of the oasis, Fikali’s movement was slow and awkward. More than walking, she was bellyflopping around. But the instant her claws and fins touched the sand, she became like fish on water. Quite literally at that.

“Slow down!” Aloe cried. “You are way faster than me on sand!” Especially as she was wearing sandals and not boots. The scorching sand swayed on her feet like a sea of needles, and whilst painful, Aloe had grown used to it.

Only a bit. It still hurt. It hurt a lot.

Thankfully, Fikali heard and responded to Aloe’s pleas and approached her. Half of the dweller’s body was submerged in the sand.

“I don’t know how you do that. If my feet were a finger width deep on the sand, I would be unable to walk.” Fikali turned her head to the side in confusion, incapable to understand Aloe’s speech. “You don’t have to stay still, though. You can move, just don’t go that fast.”

Fikali continued to look at her, her ability to understand human language, whilst outstanding sometimes, most of the time she was incapable of making sense of Aloe’s words. The dweller then patted her hind fins on her side. But as Aloe proved also unable to understand her gestures, she rubbed her back with her front claws.

“You... want me to ride you?” Aloe added with hesitation and the dweller affirmed with a short grunt. “I don’t know if it’s a good idea... You aren’t even saddled...”

“Wroo!” Fikali grunted in protest, having none of Aloe’s excuses.

“Alright, alright! I’ll mount you.” She raised her hands in defense. “Jeez, what a mood you have.”

Whilst Fikali’s body was deep in the sand, making it easy to ride her, Aloe shyly raised her legs and sat on top of Fikali’s back. No matter that she was wearing trousers, it was still uncomfortable as the dweller’s spine pressed down on her crotch.

“So how are we doing to this? I don’t have a spot to graaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa-“

Before Aloe could finish her sentence, Fikali set off at full speed. And the pace of a dweller swimming on sand wasn’t to be underestimated.

“Stop! Please stoooop! You are going too fast!” Aloe fought for her life as she grabbed the lead tied to Fikali’s neck. “I’m going to faaaaaall!”

Aloe’s heartbeat shot up eleven notches as the dried air of the desert crashed against her face. Her short hair winging on the wind, her humid sweat substituted by dryness incarnate.

“Staaaaaaahp!” Aloe’s pleas for help were muffled by the high winds and the grunts of joy of the dweller.

Fikali did, in fact, not stop.