Snippet #2816939

The Gan River was beautiful. An indigo stream of serene tranquility, the water gently babbling nature’s song as it burbled lazily downstream, perfect in form and function. The scent of humans that roiled in from her destination, however, was not. For whatever reason, humans living in close proximity and large numbers always smelled sour to Ginchiyo. The last round of fireworks added a heady mixture of smoke to the odor and the resulting aroma could only accurately be described as the perfume of “The Great Yune Empire.” Realistically, all human settlements had a similar smell when they got big enough, but something about the Yune always made it... perverse. As if to punctuate her point, a man in naught but his loincloth began hopping his way along the river, bound in some sort of mating display. With a forced exhale, she steeled herself for what was likely to be an Emperor themed bacchanal going on in the village and quickened her stride.

Even before crossing into what would normally constitute the village, street barkers and merchants began fighting for the attention of everyone within earshot. Doing her best to deafen herself to the onslaught of noises, Ginchiyo began to shoulder her way through the crowd. The walk here hadn’t been short and a large cut of something that was alive this morning would go a long way towards improving her mood. It took all of five minutes for her to find a plump, squat man that was selling chunks of goat that was slowly roasting on a spit. Bits of fat glistened as they sizzled and popped, producing a heavenly smell when they fell into the hungry flames below.

For a few moments, Ginchiyo just stared at the goat as it called to her with its siren song. The feel of something tugging on her belt lifted her out of her daydream; more specifically, a tug on her coin purse. With a practiced turn on her heel, she grabbed the thief's hand with a vice-like grip and brought him to the ground, elbow on his throat.

Her eyes widened slightly, her reflexes had pinned the pickpocket to the ground, but he was just a boy, not even old enough to begin Agoge back home. With an annoyed sigh she lifted the boy up, not relaxing her grip on his wrist, and fished a gold coin from the purse he still had desperately clenched in his hand. “Give me the biggest piece of shoulder meat you have, and a hindshank for the brat with sticky fingers.”

---

The night was young, and seemingly everyone in town had a reason to party, i almost felt like Ancestor Day, back when Ginchiyo was in Agoge. The memory brought a faint smile to her face as she thought about those carefree days. It was a nearby storyteller that brought her back to reality, “It was an evening like this,” the storyteller began, “That they say the first Emperor was born.” Ginchiyo snorted, of all the propaganda she had heard throughout her travels, the Yune were somehow both the most obvious and the least effective. She hurried away before the storyteller’s drivel made her nauseous. Someone in this stink-pit had to know something that was worth knowing.

A bit more aimless wandering had left her belly only slightly more full, and her quest none the closer to ending. The later into the festival that it got, the drunker the people would be, and the less likely her visit would prove fruitful. “This is going nowhere…” Feeling defeated, she stopped to lean on the wall of a nearby building; contemplating whether or not the night had to be a total waste, after all her last job had left her with funds to spare for a night of drinks.

A moment of deliberation later, Ginchiyo started back the way she had come, hoping to catch the honeyed wine merchant she had passed not too far back before he had sold the last four bottles. Two white rabbit ears stood slightly above the crowd, bobbing up and down with the sway of movement from the gathered masses. Normally, Ginchiyo would worry about a free Beastman in Yutan, but maybe things were different on Emperor Day. “Yeah, and maybe they’ll give me the honeyed wine for free because I'm so damn pretty.” She snorted to herself, while hurrying to buy the last bottles of wine.