While he was relaxing in the Manor, waiting for the others to get trained up enough that they could travel, and for the Lamia to hatch, Cain had prepared just the right spell for this situation. A modified version of [Warming Hug] at the Ancient Grade called [Comforting Touch]. With a single touch, while the spell was active, the recipient would feel welcome, wanted, and cared for. the effect got stronger if the emotions were already present, and with prolonged contact.
As the Bunnies gathered around to greet the group, Cain activated the spell and reached out to gently pat heads wherever they came in reach. It was clearly working and the Bunnies looked overjoyed to see him, with many even stopping to give him a hug before going to visit their High Priestess, Jessica.
“Now that you all are here, let’s get some food. The fresher it is, the better, so take a seat wherever you like and we can get started.” The leader of the Bunnies declared, drawing Jessica away from the group to go sit with them over in the shade.
Cain wouldn’t escape that easily, everyone wanted to say hello, thank him for the place to stay, or another similar sentiment, so Cain picked a table that was easy to access, letting as many people as possible come up to greet him. Through it all, he kept the spell active, as it was effective even when shaking hands, and helped assure the nervous newer arrivals that everything here was indeed as pleasant as it seemed.
The flow of new arrivals had slowed, but not stopped. Now instead of people whose villages had been destroyed, leaving them homeless, there was a slow influx of people who had just arrived in this world. Wherever they found them, Cain’s people brought them to safety, and often that meant bringing them back to the Farm.
It no longer looked like much of a farm, more of a farming village, with fields slowly spreading out into the surrounding clearings and hundreds of people, but everyone still gathered in the original farmyard, which was now serving as the town square.
That was largely due to the fact that there was food here twice a day, and that the Echoes did a lot of their experimenting here as well, but it was relaxing to see everyone getting along.
Well, mostly. There were a few kids fighting, and one man clearly had a large black eye that didn’t seem to be made by a creature with claws, but for the most part, everyone seemed to be getting along.
The meal was as random as ever, served potluck style by the volunteers on Kitchen duty. That was a suggestion by the Bunnies, of all people. They believed that spontaneous meals were better for mental health than a meal plan that was refined and optimized for nutrition. So, every day, whoever was on duty just grabbed the ingredients they wanted to use and made a dish.
Sometimes it was enough for everyone, sometimes only those who showed up early or late got to try a particular dish, but there was always enough food, and the Bunnies insisted that was the intended result.
Today, they brought Cain and his group Cabbage rolls, with a side of pulled pork sandwiches, mashed potatoes, and Kimchi. Jin looked at it with some trepidation, unsure what was going on with the meal, and not sharing Cain’s ability to read minds and find out the reason for the assortment.
“It’s a potluck dinner. That’s how they do it here. So you get a bit of everything.” Cain whispered, and the now shiny dragonkin nodded.
“I like it. Usually, meals have a theme, but this is like an adventure on a plate.” Jin responded with a smile, making the people around her laugh.
“I like that. Adventure on a plate. Someone write that down, and we can have a placard made for the buffet line.” An older dwarf with a very familiar voice laughed, sitting down across from them with a plate overloaded with Cabbage rolls glued together by mashed potato. His plate was a small edible castle.
Cain looked up to see that their guest was Gramps, an old Dwarf from Graska, who took care of odd jobs for the younger smiths and helped manage the tavern.
“What brings you to a whole other Continent old man?” Cain asked with a smile, pulling out a flagon of Dwarven whiskey from his inventory to fill Gramps’ mug.
“There was a communication issue. We got a double shipment of the same ore instead of two different types of it, so I came over to see what the problem was. Nothing major, they just checked off the wrong item on the list and filled an order twice, but here I am, so I get to try new things. There is some rice in the rolls, but they look pretty good, I think we might try serving them at the tavern one day.” The old Dwarf answered with a grin.
“Just don’t tell them that Cabbage is a vegetable. Call it a binder for the potato mortar and you could sell them hundreds of Cabbage Roll Castles a day, I’m certain of it.” Kone giggled, admiring the craftsmanship that went into just making his dinner plate.
“They use a purple Cabbage here, and I don’t think that we have that in the valley, so they would never know that we were just messing with them. I like it, good call.” Gramps agreed, then watched with great interest as Luna circled her dinner plate, contemplating what she would do with a roll that was five times the diameter of her body. It was too big to swallow whole, but taking little bites just seemed like too much work.
She had considered making a castle as he had, but she simply didn’t have enough cabbage around her single roll to make it worth it. Instead, she drew a two-handed sword from her inventory and cut the roll into bits, then used a small shovel and her potatoes to mix it into a slurry that she formed into bricks.
Once they were formed to her satisfaction, Luna grabbed one with two hands, tilted her head back, and swallowed it whole. She took a deep breath, then raised another brick and pushed it in behind the first, moving the whole meal down one huge bite at a time, visibly expanding her body as the bricks were ingested.
“As you can see, we are still working on table manners, but Luna is a big fan of large bites, and not so fond of things like salads or soups.” Cain teased the now stuffed and groggy Lamia Progenitor, who gave him a horrified look at the word soup.
“Don’t even mention that evil concoction, I almost drowned,” Luna complained, pouting at Cain, while Kone and Gramps shared a confused look.
“Young Miss Luna here thought that a bowl of soup was a single bite meal, so she simply poured it in her mouth until her body was completely full and she couldn’t swallow anymore, making it hard to breathe,” Cain explained, causing the two to burst into laughter.
“Oh, the joys of parenthood. You have to teach them the most unexpected things.” Gramps agreed after a moment.
Not drowning yourself with mass consumption of soup might not be the usual thing that you have to teach a child, but it wasn’t out of the range of possibilities. Dwarven Children often did much the same thing with ale, trying to emulate their elders and drinking until they couldn’t swallow anymore, and ending up with a mouth and throat full of liquid and a need to breathe. The older dwarves viewed it as part of the learning experience of youth.
Luna was wrapped protectively around her last few bites of dinner when she fell asleep, her usual reaction to eating too much, but one that never failed to bring a smile to her companions’ faces.
“They are just so cute when they are little.” One of the Bunny Priestesses whispered to Cain, bringing around a round of Mythic fruit punch.
“They really are. Be sure to pour for the Dwarf as well, even if he thinks he’s too old for juice. Gramps, you will like this stuff, and it’s good for the old bones.” Cain replied with a wink at the Bunny to let her know that the old Dwarf didn’t know much about the fruit punch. Not much of it had made it to the Beginner’s Valley, and what did wasn’t enough to be served at the tavern where Gramps ate almost all his meals.
At first, he gave it a resigned look, thinking the youngsters underestimated his vitality, but after the flagon was drained, his eyes opened wide, staring at the Bunny with the jug.
“It’s good right? Made from real Mythic Quality fruits, grown right here on the farm and juiced fresh daily.” She giggled, then moved on to fill other cups.
“I think I might just have to start coming here myself to fill the orders for the forges. We don’t use much of the high-quality stuff in the Valley, but in the Demon Capital they go through an awful lot of it, and need to pick up an order every few days.” Gramps’ logic was solid and inevitably led to him, the assigned Elder in charge of supplies, being here for meal times at least twice a week.
Luna woke up a little as the desserts were brought around, too full to be interested in the sugary treats, but she did make the time to stuff the last few bricks of her Cabbage roll in her mouth before falling asleep again to let her meal digest. Like so many times before, she was visibly growing, and Cain suspected that she had leveled up again, due to the excess mana of the Southern Continent on her Ancient Quality physique.
Cain himself had enjoyed the same rapid leveling effect, but he was much closer to his final level than she was, so Luna would be gaining experience at an incredible rate, especially as she shared Cain’s experience bonus, being in a group with him and the others for the trip.
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