Essentia Animus

68-Stock Preparation

Sryine finished her demonstration of the gifts for her brother, a demonstration which appeared to receive a measure of praise in return. Her parents were still out and about, but she had found her brother working here on her arrival.

"It seems like the village really is missing out on quite a lot, leaving us to struggle behind the rest of the world. Your assertiveness in collecting and adjusting so rapidly to such excessive change does you proud, I'm sure our parents would agree that you've held strongly to the family vision in your own way. But you seem tired from your journey, please make yourself comfortable and take some time to relax. I've got a lot to actually worry about myself, but I can already see a few uses for some of the things you've brought back, it should make even the morning's tasks far shorter, leaving us an opportunity to enjoy lunch together." Sryine's brother really hadn't seemed to have changed much, he was still too occupied to do much of anything. Sryine was even going to be left once again to her own devices, much like how things had gone before. However, she also noticed that her brother was presenting her with an actual measure of respect and admiration, he was actually trying to make her feel comfortable. Making arrangements for a family lunch gathering.. she couldn't even remember when that had last happened.. not even which year it might have last been. It didn't even matter that she had no assurance that her parents would have time for such a thing, even her brother alone made it a massive improvement.

However, immersed with her nostalgia, she still quickly found herself outside in the town square once again as a matter of habit. She was however cloaked in an illusion.. but not of one of complete invisibility, something far more obscure. She was a presence, someone familiar, but not familiar enough that anyone could remember who she was. She was there, she was nothing to be worried about, and she wasn't that important. It was an illusion formed over concepts much like the composition of a dream, a process so invested in complexity that it would have been impossible to achieve had she not had so much power to work with in the first place. She found a seat, sitting next to the water again much like she had before. She swirled some wind through the water, forming patterns of ripples over the surface. It really was nothing compared to the displays she had put on before, and was even less a demonstration of what she was capable of at that time. With the capacity of her augmentation, she could put a demonstration on display that would cause a distraction that would put the catastrophe of the cafe to shame. For that same reason, it was also a really bad idea to attempt anything of that sort. Thus, she instead kept to herself quietly.

"That's a bag extra of grain than last season. Come on, we really can't afford such a thing." "Autumn is supposed to be a good season for grain, but our stock of meat isn't doing as well as expected. Maybe all the animals are moving to seek shelter for winter early.. maybe we're in for an early winter this year.. but there has been a lot less of a return from our hunts. A few cuts of meat have a lot more value than some unprocessed grain too, you should know how much grain is lost in processing." Two villagers were trying to make a trade with each other, but both were under hard times. The demand for grain was really high right now, and even with high supplies, there were concerns about how much work was demanded of people to ready grain for trade. It was this demand for physical labour that the grain process was unable to keep up with. Because of how much work it took, most of the grain being traded was still unprocessed, reducing its value even further. Meanwhile, it seems hunting wasn't doing so well right now, even worse than projected for the season. So the animals outside of the village were keeping themselves scarce.. Sryine suspected that she knew who might be responsible for that. This was another good reason for not walking around emitting excess flame while sustaining the illusion that everything was fine, the animals near the village would pick up on that too and become even further scarce. Even so, she really didn't like hearing this news, it was really bothering her that something even related to her was causing problems for the village.