"Uncle Holin, are you not sleeping?"
Early morning, An'nan woke up Martin, who was about to fall off his bed. Rubbing his eyes, Martin walked out of the room to find Uncle Holin, his right foot wrapped in linen, chopping wood in the courtyard.
The haggard Uncle Holin forced a smile: "I... I'm worried about An'nan at the gold mine."
"Good morning, Uncle Holin."
An'nan emerged from behind, and Uncle Holin's smile became more genuine.
The aroma wafting from the kitchen filled the courtyard, its cooking smoke merging with Pine Grove Town's thin mist.
Aunt Susan brought out the food: chicken soup with mashed potatoes, several pieces of soft-baked black bread, and an apple pie.
"Why didn't we have these foods yesterday?" Uncle Holin sat in the low chair, stunned by the feast before him.
"Because you don't need such good food!"
Aunt Susan wielded her ladle, swatting away her husband and Martin's dirty hands, first filling An'nan's wooden bowl to the brim.
"Little An'nan, eat more to have strength for work."
"Thank you, Aunt Susan."
Aunt Susan's care for An'nan wasn't just out of fondness—after Uncle Holin and Martin finished eating, the dining table looked like a battlefield ravaged by demons.
Before they left, Aunt Susan instructed Martin: "Take good care of Little An'nan, don't disappoint me!"
That morning, An'nan and Martin departed amid Aunt Susan's worried farewells.
In the bard's tales, this Pine Grove Town sat in a remote borderland, surrounded by vast forests stretching thousands of miles to the coast, snow-capped mountains, and swamps. There were no churches, no screaming greenskins, no conflicts or conspiracies, let alone other races. Even those weary of strife who yearned for peace found it too quiet here—perhaps only forest-dwelling druids and scavenging kobolds and gnolls favored this place.
But the bard also said never to trust a bard's words. They could fabricate any lie for a complete story, sing any word to make their rhymes work.
The haunted gold mine lay at the forest's edge, not far from where An'nan had first appeared.
Initially, An'nan tried to find his way back.
On his third day at Aunt Susan's, An'nan made stumbling excuses to follow Uncle Holin into the forest at dawn. But when he tried to sneak away to find that forest clearing, he encountered a wandering pack of kobolds.
These dog-like creatures, more lizard than canine, wore tattered rags that barely covered them, wielding crooked spears and slings as weapons.
An'nan resisted the urge to greet these "fantasy creatures" and fled back to the forest's edge. While the chances of being killed by kobolds might be low, they weren't zero.
Later, when An'nan told the bard about this, he said running was the right choice—more unfortunate souls died to kobolds than dragons. These cowardly creatures preferred lone adventurers.
Then he told An'nan about kobold habits: their preference for dark forests and caves, never attacking larger groups, how a single kobold would flee even from one sheep—
An'nan and Martin met their foreman at the crossroads, an old man named Zoren who walked with a limp. He was said to be a former soldier.
"Holin's not coming?"
Old Zoren sized up An'nan. With his faded linen clothes and sickly pale but delicate skin, he didn't look fit for physical labor. But unlike others, Old Zoren believed mining was about luck. "Unlucky Holin got his foot crushed by rocks on his first day. Hope you bring better luck."
"How are you related to Holin?"
"I'm Martin's cousin."
Old Zoren's expression softened slightly as he explained the mine's rules. His murky accent and slang made it hard for An'nan to understand... but it wasn't difficult to guess—stealing from the mine was forbidden.
"Martin, take him to the shacks first." Old Zoren waved, noticing Martin stood motionless. "Martin?"
Coming to his senses, Martin puffed out his chest: "He's my cousin!"
...
They followed the limping Old Zoren toward the mine with the slow-witted Martin. The barren clearing outside the mine tunnel was dotted with shacks, figures moving among them.
An'nan initially thought they were Old Zoren's subordinates, then realized the miners ignored him. He thought Old Zoren was the foreman, but he didn't get along with other foremen.
The shack camp was strange too. Logically, a gold mine should strictly limit miners' contact with the outside world. But this mine's supervision was lax—miners freely entered and left, cooked over fires in the clearing, and foremen handed out pay...
Old Zoren took out a key and opened a shack door. Several crude, crooked wooden beds stood on the dirt floor, insects freely crawling about, with bedside tables serving as both storage and dining tables.
This would be An'nan and Martin's new home.
As they grabbed their pickaxes and prepared to follow Old Zoren into the mine, An'nan saw an ornate carriage bearing fancy emblems pass on the distant road.
He saw the big boss Mr. Fast had mentioned—the Wine Lady.
The luxurious carriage and lady seemed to exist in a different world from the decrepit, dirty shacks and An'nan.
Head slightly bowed, An'nan followed Old Zoren, who carried an oil lamp, into the mine.
The gold mine had long been abandoned, many tunnels collapsed and impassable. Old Zoren lit the oil lamp and led them deep inside. A faint burnt smell permeated the air, surrounded by the symphony of picks striking stone.
The oppressive darkness made everyone tense and uncomfortable.
In the dim lamplight, old scattered abandoned tools and broken support beams revealed this was an exhausted mine. And from other miners' quiet conversations, he learned many were townspeople trying their luck.
Old Zoren was the same, hiring Uncle Holin and others to try their luck—found ore belonged to him, while finding nothing meant the cost fell on him.
This arrangement worked well enough, with minimal conflict between miners and foremen. Old Zoren left them at yesterday's dig site. While not the deepest part, it was close, though the support beams were still intact.
"Hope you bring good luck," Old Zoren said, leaving one oil lamp and taking the other as he departed.
Martin took his pickaxe and crawled into yesterday's low tunnel while An'nan held up the lamp to observe their surroundings.
Echoing picks rang from indeterminate directions as dense dust danced in the lamp's glow.
"Cousin, I'm stuck!"
A muffled cry suddenly came as An'nan turned to see Martin's upper body wedged in the low tunnel, his exposed bottom wriggling.
An'nan put down his pickaxe to help but hesitated at the awkward position, instead telling Martin to let go of his pickaxe and crawl out before retrieving it.
Once out, Martin went for his pickaxe but oddly started pulling at it and the tunnel corner.
Just as An'nan was about to warn him not to hold the pickaxe sideways, Martin suddenly yanked out a pale curtain from the tunnel.
"Ghost!!!"
Martin dropped his pickaxe and ran.
"Human!!!"
The ghost screamed and crashed into the deep mine wall.