Zero ate with gusto. It didn't matter if he was already bursting at the seams. The combination Grandma Moppo and Zoe's cooking was a powerful drug that left him craving for more. It only became more delicious with every plate. Zero saw how there were no signs of stopping from the two women in the kitchen. They whipped up new dishes every ten minutes and Zero wondered how extensive their culinary repertoire was.
Hua Tuo was mortified. He'd never seen his student ate as much as he did. Sure, Zero would occasionally end up finishing a whole roasted boar but the physician chalked it up to Zero's abnormal need for energy. He'd never seen the brunet smack his lips and grab food with both spoon and hands. In fact, Zero moaned and smiled with every plate he cleared as if he was truly enjoying the moment.
"Don't choke, there's more from where that came from!" Grandma Moppo laughed heartily as she set down two more plates.
Zero nodded and gave them a huge messy smile before digging into the piping hot pie. Zoe came to clear the plates. Leon, Jacqueline and Rima had stopped eating half an hour ago. They were too full and have fallen asleep after eating too much. Hua Tuo shook his head. A few hours ago when they received lunch invitations, he didn't think that it meant a party to celebrate Zero's miraculous cure. It was actually Amaraline's suggestion. Clowis and Lowis arranged a secret hunting trip to bring back all the food they could. Cleo and Latitia worked extra hard so that the harvest would be bountiful for the celebratory feast. The whole village worked together to thank Zero in the only way they knew. Zero was in bliss, savouring every bite. He blushed at their thanks but didn't turn down the food.
Zoe and Grandma Moppo didn't stop. As the most experienced members of the village when it came to cooking, they pulled out everything they had from their reserves. Zero loved authentic dishes and unique cuisines so Zoe tried to replicate everything she knew. Thankfully, the villagers of Half Moon village had a very diverse background so Zoe had many options. Grandma Moppo decided to bring back some original cuisines from her childhood. It was the first time in many years that the old lady made such nostalgic food and it was quite the treat for the village. Zero found the exotic dwarven-fae food exciting and Zoe took the opportunity to commit those recipes to memory.
One by one, the party died down with villagers excusing themselves after eating their fill. Some brought food for their comrades who have yet to eat and the only left eating was Zero.
"Mii," Zero called out from their mental link. "Are you able to remember the taste of all these food? I'd like to be able to replicate them for Truen and the Gods when I see them again."
The strawcherry assistant gave Zero a snappy answer, annoyed at being disturbed from her initial task of monitoring enemy movements for Zero.
"I can't do two things at once... you have to make up your mind, Zero."
The brunet made a face when he heard Mii's reply. Zoe saw it and was slightly alarmed. She signed to Zero using her hands to ask if he was alright.
Zero took the chance to learn some basic sign language from Zoe earlier so he understood the gist of what she was saying. He gave her a reassuring smile and signed back that he was fine.
"Why are you so snappy?" Zero groaned to Mii who huffed.
"It's only natural to be snappy when somebody asks the impossible of you. I'm not able to multitask just yet. I can only do one thing at a time since you're not strong enough to unlock the rest of my abilities. The world you've seen is still too small and your understanding too shallow."
Zero winced. Mii knew exactly what to say to make it hurt the most. "I'm sorry... I just wanted to make people happy..."
At Zero's dejected tone, the strawcherry fairy sighed. "Look, I'll tell you what I can do. Since the villagers are patrolling the area and keeping watch on the enemy's movements, I'll work on getting those recipes you wanted. As long as you absorb a part of it, I can analyse it and recreate the recipe. Do you still have that magic reader?"
Zero nodded when Grandma Moppo and Zoe were not looking. Mii sounded satisfied and told Zero that once she was done analysing it, she would compile all the recipes in a book to the magic portable library. Zero was thrilled and Mii warned him that knowing the recipe wasn't enough to recreate the dishes perfectly.
"Cooking is an art. It requires a lot of patience, practice and trials to get it right. A novice like you wouldn't be able to get it right on the first try."
Zero was deterred. In fact, he became determined. "I'll do it again and again until I get it. I'm sure master would be happy if I took over kitchen duties for a while."
Mii considered it for a moment and agreed before cutting off their mental connection.
Hua Tuo observed how his student had that strange expression again as he ate. He was probably talking to someone using mental connections but Hua Tuo wasn't sure who it was. Was it Demon King Baal again? Also, the physician was slightly worried. His student didn't show signs of slowing down but Grandma Moppo and Zoe were already showing signs of fatigue. They'd been cooking non-stop for two hours and had yet to eat anything themselves. As a doctor, that wouldn't do.
"Grandma Moppo, Zoe... please rest. I'm sure Zero knows how thankful the village is by now. You need to eat something yourselves."
Zoe blinked and shook her head. Grandma Moppo wiped the sweat off her brows and grinned. "Don't worry doctor, we have just a few more dishes to finish up. I'll eat later. Zoe doesn't really need to eat but she'll rest up. She'll be fine tomorrow morning."
Hu Tuo didn't know much about Zoe or Grandma Moppo. He didn't pry his nose into the villager's business too much after all. Zero who listened on the side-lines blinked.
"Zoe, won't you be hungry?"
Zoe signed to Zero and Hua Tuo could only wonder what she was saying. Zero smiled brightly after Zoe finished signing and grinned. "I see, that's great!
Twenty minutes later, Grandma Moppo finally sat down to eat and Zoe was entertaining Zero with some stories. Hua Tuo took the moment to return back to the apartment to make up for his lack of progress in meditation over the past few days. He'd been too busy after all. Zero waved goodbye to his mentor and chatted one-sidedly with Zoe.
"That's nice, I'm sure Rima will find her fated person one day. I'm just really worried about the village now."
[Don't be,] Zoe signed. [The warriors are strong and the children can protect themselves.]
Zero frowned. "Wouldn't it be sad if everyone had to leave?"
Zoe looked wistful at that. [The day would eventually come, Zero. It will only be a matter of time before this home is abandoned. It's an honour for a Zashikiwarashi like me to have lived for so long. Usually, we don't serve masters with long lifespans and many generations. Half Moon village has always been a little special.]
"What do you mean?"
[We're ghosts born from the feelings of family love. Grandma Moppo is the last living master of this village. I've been here for a very long time, longer than you can imagine.]
Zero looked slightly worried. "What happens when she leaves?"
Zoe smiled sadly. [I will no longer be bound to this village. Zashikiwarashis exist to serve and protect the homes of their masters. If the master abandons their homes, the Zashikiwarashi will continue to be bound to the home until the master's lineage completely disappears.]
Zero was mortified. "That's incredibly lonely! But everyone else is still here... will you really disappear?"
Zoe shrugged. That's something no Zashikiwarashi had the opportunity to find out. Normally, a clan didn't accept so many strangers without common blood. Nobody knew what would happen to a household spirit if the family they served adopted heirs.
[We'll get to find out what happens when Grandma Moppo returns to her ancestors.]
Zero didn't like it. Grandma Moppo had just regained her ability to walk without her staff. Life wasn't fair.
Grandma Moppo heard Zero's half of the conversation and chuckled. She put away the washed dishes and joined their conversation in the living room.
"Zero, it's only natural to die. All living things need to return their lives to Gaia so that we can be reborn again with new bodies."
Zero froze at Gaia's name. Wasn't it En who oversaw the rebirthing cycle? How was that related to Gaia?
"You might not understand it now but you will understand it one day."
Zero highly doubted it. According to the Great Gods, Great One couldn't die. As a result, Zero was exempted from death. Grandma Moppo chuckled and ruffled Zero's hair.
"Don't look so sad. I've lived a great life. Thanks to your magical abilities, I'm once again able to live up to my name as a great Dwarven-Fae hunter. You'd think that dwarves and fairies wouldn't be able to get along due to their conflict of nature but you'd be wrong. My ancestors are proof that understanding could still happen between different species. Coexisting with humans will be possible one day too."
Zoe clapped and Zero was confused. Grandma Moppo grinned. "A very long time ago, dwarves and fairies never got along. The dwarves couldn't stand the fairies' lackadaisical attitude and love for mischief. They envied how fairies could fly and had magic so the hate grew. On the other hand, fairies didn't like the dwarves because they kept destroying the earth they tried to protect by mining and building strange things using it. They hated how the dwarves were always loud and insensitive until one day, a dwarf called Dunford and a fairy called Elmory met."
Zero was absorbed in the story and urged Grandma Moppo to continue, curious as to how two races who hated each other could come to live together and create such a unique village.
"Dunford was an odd dwarf. He didn't like drinking and loved to cook. He was always scouring the forest for ingredients to create new recipes. The dwarves didn't quite like Dunford because he didn't share their same love for shiny metals and good beer. On the other hand, Elmory was a fairy who loved helping lost travellers in the forest. She was kind, beautiful and hardworking, unlike her friends. The fairies laughed at Elmory and called her foolish for wasting her time helping ungrateful travellers when she could be sipping on nectar and napping in flowers."
Zero nodded. Grandma Moppo's eyes sparkled as she continued.
"One day, Dunford got injured when he went out to collect ingredients. He fell into a pit and broke his leg. Elmory who'd been passing by spotted him and helped him. She was fascinated by a dwarf who had a different hobby and they became fast friends."
Zero grinned. "Did they fall in love after that?"
Grandma Moppo chuckled. "Yes. Yes, they did. However, the fairies and dwarves didn't like that so they had to leave their original villages. That's when they came by this forest and cliff and decided that it would be a great place to build their house. Remember the lab in the forest where Raj and company frequents? That was the original house."
Zero's eyes went wide. "How did this happen then? The tree houses and underground tunnels..."
Grandma Moppo grinned. "This is done by the children of Dunford and Elmory. Some children married other dwarves, some married fairies and to satisfy both communities, they decided to build both in the trees and underground. These half-dwarf and half-fae children were often targeted by other dwarves and fairies so they had to build some sort of defence in the village. The architecture for the tree houses was created by a very clever fairy who married a half-dwarf here. Her name was Elaine. The tunnels were actually the creation of some mischievous children who decided to dig holes underneath to hide when they played tag. Fairies had magic and dwarves didn't so the dwarven children created secret tunnels to outwit their fairy cousins."
Zero giggled. It sounded like fun to dig and hide. "How did it become a passageway for travel? Wouldn't it be too small for adults if it was made by children?"
At that, both Zoe and Grandma Moppo became more solemn. "Humans came once and tried to destroy the village during the dark ages. The passageway only allowed children to hide, so many adults died. The remaining children of the village decided to widen the tunnels so that they could live in for a few hundred years until the humans no longer bothered them."
"A few hundred years?" Zero marvelled. From what he knew, humans didn't really live as long as hundred years.
Grandma Moppo laughed at Zero's incredulous expression. "Fairies can live hundreds of years, so can dwarves. It's not very surprising. However, there will be some changes if fairies and dwarves lived underground for a few hundred years. The dwarves became fairer and the fairies became stronger physically as they couldn't rely too much on magic. The feast cave used to be a farm during the dark ages."
Zero was amazed as Grandma Moppo told Zero more about the village's past and secrets. "Only Zoe knows everything there is about this village. I've not been able to tell anyone yet."
"Why would you tell me the village secrets? I'm not even a proper villager..."
Grandma Moppo smiled. "That's because you're the only person I can count on. Zoe will cease to exist when I die. It's a very lonely thing for a household spirit to not be able to welcome a master home. Zenobia and everyone else will one day leave this village. The children will find spouses and move away from it. However, you're different. Your master is an immortal and you might be able to achieve immortality someday too. All I ask is for you to return every few hundred years to visit the village and check up on Zoe. She's a very dear friend of mine and has always been here for me. Even when the village perished from the plague, she was there, listening to their prayers till the very end. I left the village for a while but returned because I had nowhere else to go. If it wasn't for Zoe before I met Qin Yun, I would've died. As a child, I didn't know how to cook or hunt, I would've starved if Zoe didn't take care of that. The farm in the cave was maintained by Zoe but I didn't know that until many years have passed. Zoe raised me so this is the least I can do for her."
Zero looked at the Zashikiwarashi and felt a pang of pain. He could only imagine how lonely it would be for her when everyone leaves the village. He didn't know if household spirits disappear when the house is abandoned because they died from loneliness but he didn't dare ask. Having experienced loneliness in the void for a long time between waking and sleeping in that darkness, Zero didn't want Zoe to go through something like that.
"Can household ghosts leave the village?"
Zoe shrugged. [There was always a barrier that prevented me from leaving the village. The barrier expanded when the Sky Bridge was built but I've never been able to leave the village.]
The brunet started thinking. It was a crazy thought but it might be worth trying in a year or so before they left for their travels.
"Grandma Moppo, is it alright if I took Zoe with me on my travels?"
The half-dwarf seemed stunned. "Can you do that?"
"I don't know," Zero admitted. "I have an idea but it might be a year or so before I can try it."
Grandma Moppo didn't mind. "It's worth trying I suppose. However, by saying that I assume that you're ready to inherit the village from me?"
Zero paused. "No no, lady Zenobia is the Chieftess. I can't inherit it."
Grandma Moppo scoffed. "The master of the village and the leader of the village are two different things. Zenobia knew that when she accepted the role of the Chieftess. All these years I've yet to name my successor and nobody has come to claim it. Everyone has their own plans. Think of this village as a long-term inn for troubled people. Some stay here to hide from the world for life, others use it as a shelter to rest up before heading back into the battlefield."
Zero grimaced. That sounded about right too. Every villager who joined Half Moon village had backstories like running away from something or having no place to go. The Cockatrice descendants, Soon and his dead friends... even Mitchnew looked as if they were here to seek refuge and spend the rest of their lives in secrecy here. On the other hand, there were people like Raj, Wiser and Karris who had nowhere else to go.
"I understand. This is still a little too sudden for me so I'd like some time to think about it. Becoming a village master is a huge responsibility after all. I'm not confident about protecting it myself."
Grandma Moppo sighed but agreed anyway. "Well then, take all the time you need. Hopefully, you'll let me know your decision before my time is up."
Zero swallowed nervously and nodded. There was a knock on the door that saved Zero from committing to anything. Grandma Moppo got up to greet the visitor and Zero was amazed to see Lovina smiling at him from the door.
"There you are! I thought you might still be here so I came over with some of Cleo's tea. Am I interrupting anything?" she asked.
Grandma Moppo smiled and shook her head but she left anyway. Zoe took the tea leaves from Lovina to prepare tea while Zero blinked. Lovina seemed slightly strange and Zero wondered why so many people were looking forward to chatting with him. He wasn't good at holding conversations and sorely missed his teacher's presence.
"Hello, Lovina. What brings you here?"
The witch adjusted her hat and thanked Zoe who came with two steaming cups of tea.
"I heard that you performed the new type of healing magic and wanted to talk more about it. Are you interested to pursue the path of magic?"
Zero blinked. "I will study magic next year from a teacher but I don't know if I'll become a magician. I suppose learning some magic will be helpful on my travels but I'm not sure about pursuing the path of magic just yet."
Lovina smile made Zero very cautious. The witch didn't appear to have any evil intentions but Zero felt uneasy. Just what was she planning?