Chapter 25: The Mushrooms Workbench

Another short chapter. Not doing this on purpose I swear haha. Probably got something to do with chopping up and mashing together a book written in a diary format. Anyway, hope you guys enjoy!

Samora’s bed had been shoved into a small corner of the house. Since the house was one giant room, it did stand out a bit. It sat between Ellephwen’s random stuff chest and the kitchen. Even so it was a valuable addition to the house, as the Elf had slept that much better for it.

Oddly there was a small pang of irritation in Ellena’s chest knowing that Samora slept better without her. Perhaps she had just gotten too used to her warmth. Still, it had given the Elf even more energy, so when Ellena returned from the dungeon, Samora had already done exactly what she had requested of her.

When Ellena arrived dragging an oversized Rat corpse, Samora was ready to receive her. She had set up a simple station a small distance from the house for Ellena to try her hand at leatherworking.

“That’s what you’re using?” Samora asked as the Mushman threw the corpse near her workbench.

Ellena twisted her brow a little confused. “Yeah?”

The Elf widened her eyes, gesturing at the Rat Lord. “Well. It’s massive? I thought you just wanted to make a pair of gloves?”

The odd mushroom stared at the corpse alongside Samora, then looked back at her. “Well. I pwobably won't get it wight on the fiwst twy.”

As usual, Ellena’s speech quirks ruined any serious nature their conversation may have held. Her conversation partner cracked a smile beside herself. “Well. If you have much left over I wouldn’t mind a new pair of walking boots. Or maybe you could make one glove for Ellephwen,” she smirked.

To Ellena, it felt perhaps a little tasteless to already be poking fun at the Dryads missing limb, but then that was the relationship the two seemed to have. She shrugged, not having a retort and not sure if she should have giggled alongside the Elf or if she should have admonished her.

“Oh and Ellie. Ellephwen found this.” Samora grabbed something from the nearby work surface and presented it to Ellena. It was a knife. Ellena had seen similar designs before. It was likely a skinning knife, which was definitely something she would need.

“Why does Ellephwen have a skinning knife?” she asked.

Samora shrugged. “She probably doesn’t know the answer to that question either.”

The skinning knife was handed over and Samora headed back for the house, tired after a full day's work. She had set up not just a workbench at the right height for Ellena, but also a tanning rack and liming station. This was still going to be a lot of trial and error though, as Ellena only knew the basics thanks to her old life.

She began by skinning the Rat Lord, which took a good few hours. The beast was huge, double her size at least. His insides also stunk, terribly. For once Ellena wished for one of her senses to be diminished.

By the time the Mushman was finished she had gained her first level in skinning. Though she wasn’t sure what a skill could do to help with her skinning ability. It was something that seemed entirely down to her own personal skills, rather than skills she had been given.

Truth be told it was definitely something she needed to improve in. The tattered rags of Rat hide that were scattered around her workbench spoke volumes about how little she knew on the subject. There were a few useable pieces thankfully, but given the size of the Rat Lord that seemed a given.

Before she could even start designing gloves, the Mushman had to tan the hides and turn them into something useful . Samora had left all the necessary items Ellena would need and there was still enough time to get the salvageable scraps ready to be soaked before the end of the day. With everything in place, Ellena got to work, and for the next few days that was almost all she did.

There were occasions with nothing to do where the little Mushman would go out and look for stray Monsters to fight, but now the local wildlife did little for her. Ellephwen lived in a relatively safe area, though that may have been her presence as an influence.

It was several days later that Ellena finally had leather albeit low quality leather. She had also gained her first skill in tanning, another skill she wasn’t entirely sure about. Perhaps increasing the skill would mean that any mistakes she made would have less effect?

The issue now was making the gloves. Though gauntlets felt more accurate with what she wanted. The stout Mushman hopped onto the chair Samora had brought out for her and got to work laying down an outline for these new gauntlets.

Unfortunately she couldn’t work out how to draw blueprints for gauntlets, so gave that up quite quickly. Instead, she grabbed the largest scraps of leather and just wrapped them around her arms, marking the point at which the two sides met. She did the same with different parts of her hands, then her fingers and then her wrists. Finally, she tried to use the skinning knife to cut the leather into size, which didn’t work. It wasn’t quite sharp enough. Or maybe she wasn’t strong enough. Either way, that was a no go.

That was when she returned to the house, to see a miserable looking Treekin staring right back at her. She didn’t think Gedill could look any angrier, but she was very wrong.

“Why are you still here girl?” He growled.

Ellena looked around. “Whewe?”

“In this forest! Why have you not begun your journey?”

The Mushman scoffed “I’m still a little Mushman. How am I supposed to stawt a big jouwney like this?”

It was only now that Ellena realised she now looked down on Gedill, just a little.

“I heard you’re strong enough to take on a Rat Lord. You’re strong enough to get out there on the road!” He was breathing heavily, standing right in front of her.

“Don’t be ridiculous Gedill! She’s still a Mushman, and she’s clearly a variant. First time a group of hunters or greedy adventurers see her they won’t give her a chance to fight back!”

Gedil snapped around and glared daggers at Ellephwen. “Don’t coddle the girl Ellephwen! We don’t have time to waste with you playing mother!” He pointed a shaking finger at the Dryad.

Samora stood by, staying silent, but Ellena wasn’t going to do that. “Oi,” she poked the Treechilds shoulder. He snapped back around, wild eyed. “Don’t talk to hew like that.”

Even if it was a simple request, the air became thick with tension. Ellena seemed calm on the surface, but her anger was close to boiling. This man’s attitude and arrogance irritated her to no end.

“Ellena…” Ellephwen looked almost terrified as Gedill drew up close to the Mushman.

“If you don’t fix that attitude of yours, you won’t get a chance to see the outside world. Do you understand me brat?”

Ellena knew that this Treechild must have been stronger than her. He was millenia old, but her urge to punch him grew by the minute. She looked over at the other two who both shook their heads. She took a deep breath and unclenched her fists.

“I’ll twy to wemembew that, old man,” she replied through gritted teeth.

He lingered on her one last second, poked a single sharp finger into her chest and walked past her. “Wish you had never learnt to talk,” he muttered as he slammed the door behind him.

As the tension slowly subsided, Ellena let out a long breath. “What is that guy's pwobl-”

Before she could finish her sentence, Ellena was near knocked over as a certain Elf charged her. “Ellie! Why would you do that?!”

“Do what?”

“Antagonise Gedill child,” Ellephwen answered for the fussing Elf. “Even if Belric can usually hold him back, if you irritate him too much he will make your life miserable.”

Ellena threw up her arms in exasperation. “I don’t get it. You two are strong, you’re just as old as him! Why do you let him get away with so much? Why does he have so much authority?”

The other two exchanged a worried glance. Ellephwen softly shook her head at Samora who sighed and stood up.

“Ellie. Just know that this is not due to a lack of trust. We can’t tell you why yet. Gedill is a very high ranking associate of the Council of Dryads. That’s all we’re allowed to say.”

With how irritated she already was, Ellena was at the end of her rope, but she held back. It didn’t feel right to get angry at these two. She didn’t know the ins and outs of the Council, or the political landscape of the forest. Or the political landscape of Monsters in general really. If he were human, it would be because of great wealth and influence, but a monster is harder to grasp.

“Fine. Let’s drop it and have dinner, alright?”

Samora gripped Ellena's shoulder, squeezing it gently. “Alright, Ellie.”

Ellena walked over to Ellephwen to help her up as Samora set up the table. They walked over and sat the Dryad down as Samora placed the plates. Ellena hopped onto her chair as the smell of the meal washed her tension away.

As Samora dished up, Ellephwen turned to the Mushman. “So Ellena, change of subject, how is your leatherworking going?”

“Ah.”

Ellena had forgotten why she came back into the house in the first place.