Replenishing Stocks (D5, LA)

[Togashi Saruko]

While there was still some daylight, Saruko figured she could help out with replenishing some of the expedition's supplies from the nearby area. Figuring that the warriors had done their part in hunting, she instead took her basket with her and began looking for things that could be foraged; roots, leaves, mushrooms, berries, edible flowers...

----

D5 LA Hunting/Perception to forage for supplies. Free Raise from area. TN 15?: 4d10o10k3 32

[Nozomi]

From nearby, there was a quiet rustle and with it the twang of a bow-shot and a shrill cry from a goat as it found its mark, and started to try and lope away. A muttered curse, and a second shot brought it down. A hooded figure emerged from the underbrush, going up to the beast and making sure to check to see that it was dead, murmuring something to it and hefting the beast up onto her shoulders before turning to start carrying it to drier ground for dressing.

Phi caught sight of the woman and nodded. "Don't think we've met yet. Phi," she said as she came closer. She didn't seem to be quite up on who was supposed to be important yet. "Can't have the supplies dwindling because we don't forage, eh?"

======

(Hunting/Survival - Rolled a 26, keeping the Free Raise for effect.)

[Togashi Saruko]

Hearing the injured cry, before it went silent, Saruko offered a brief prayer for the wounded animal as she put her basket down and pressed her hands together. "Carry no ill will, gentle soul."

She looked up to see the unknown woman "I don't think so, no. Togashi Saruko." In greeting, she presented her empty palms.

"We still have safe lands to forage, so we should do as much as we can while possible." There was a brief approving nod of Phi also seeing that importance.

[Nozomi]

"Best to get what we can while it's still safe and healthy, and the game here's more plentiful than the northern bogs. Finding a goat's a battle out there," she grunted. "Wish I'd gotten it with one shot, though." Never paid to have an animal suffer. She set it down and without much aplomb started to work. The ground here had enough dry patches to do what needed to be done, and she preferred to start on the spot. The rest of the work could be done at camp.

"Togashi...Togashi... one of them, right? Dragon, I think someone said. I'll admit, I don't know much of that one or any of them really. We barely know our neighbors to the south." other than that they stayed out of their hair and she was thinking of visiting their lands when this was done.

[Togashi Saruko]

The dressing of the animal didn't bother the woman. It was something she had seen many times before, even if she cared more about lessening an animal's suffering.

"Yes. Dragon," she confirmed and found a dry stump to sit on. "Which tribe are you with? It must be very far north if the home of the Dragon are south of you..."

[Nozomi]

"Sorry, wasn't speaking clearly. Heh. I'm Hikaru, or what's left of us. Most of them went with Koyama to follow Shinjo, but not all of us. We're still wedged into the spine, north of the Scorpion. Nobody wants the ground we're on, so they've let us be or the time being, and we return the favor." She gestured around as she worked on the carcass, casual about the whole thing. It was very much every day for her. "There's some peat bogs, lot of them on the north end of their lands. real reeking place, but the mountains are just low enough in the foothills to work with, so we're up there. So, I hear you guys live in mountains too. What're they like?"

[Togashi Saruko]

"Ah, then it's north of where we've settled. Near the Northern Wall Mountains. There's some lovely plains and lakes in the lowlands there, and the highlands are beautiful and peaceful, though also harsh for those unused to such life." She at least thought it was beautiful.

"So what brings you along for such a dangerous expedition, if you don't follow Shinjo-Kami and her husband?"

[Nozomi]

"The lady of the Spider made her case a year ago to what remained. We spoke, and we kept a shrine to remember her kami, though none of us truly have an interest in serving him ourselves. When Shiba's call came out, I was the one who answered. The Hikaru are being swept away, and I do not wish that to happen. For myself or them." She said it a little methodically. She'd said it a few times. "Time is passing us by, and I could no longer stand in the mountains, apart from everything. So I am here, and in being here I will find a place in this new empire."

[Togashi Saruko]

"Hmm... I don't think everything is being swept away, but it's certainly a time of change. We can learn and improve, but we don't need to abandon all we grew up with. If anything, there is much the Kami have to learn about us and from us, as well."

As they talked, her hands worked through the items in the basket to start separating leaves from roots, and flowers from stems.

"Shinjo Koyama seems very much unchanged from being married to Shinjo-Kami."

[Nozomi]

"You aren't wrong... but it is a simpler sense. We are dying out, slowly. In generations, if nothing changes, there will be no Hikaru. With so many gone, they cannot survive on their own. I would, however, like to keep much of what we are." She chuckled a little, though, at the mention of Koyama. There was a bit of a smirk barely visible under her mask.

"That lowlander, eh? He's gone a little soft since he came down from the mountains. I need to poke some fun at his expense while I have the chance." She didn't sound really critical, more amused. "He's been busy though. Lot going on."

[Togashi Saruko]

"Has he?" she giggled softly. "He still sounds very much like a highlander, though neither you nor Sora sound like him at all when you talk." In truth, she had a very hard time understanding Shinjo's groom at all, and kind of praised the fact that their paths didn't cross that often as she'd hate to offend Shinjo or her family by not being able to understand him.

"What do you think is the most important thing of your ways to preserve, going forward?"

[Nozomi]

"I wasn't born Hikaru. I was raised when I was a child. Didn't pick up the worst of that atrocious accent of his," she snorted out, her lips twisted into a wry smirk still. "Trust me. It's an acquired thing. I've known him for years and I still have trouble understanding him with as thick as it gets sometimes." There was definitely fondness there, though. Sora and Koyama were pieces of her past even if she hadn't come to the tournament with them. She'd barely been an adult at the time, and when it was done they had only been back briefly, each going their own ways or different reasons. One with the tribe's blessings, the other with their boot to his ass.

"We are people who stand on our own. We survive by our own gifts, our own strengths. If we rely too hard on others, we become weak. I want us never to lose that. No matter how long we serve."

[Togashi Saruko]

"Hmmm... what is relying 'too hard' on others, if you don't mind me asking?" she inquired with curiosity in her voice, trying to understand what it was Phi was seeking in this ever-changing world.

[Nozomi]

"We've always been a self-reliant people. We raid only when there is nothing in the grounds we forage from. We hunt. We forage. We live off of the land, and we endure, no matter how rough the land is," she said, trying to explain the mentality. "I would imagine most of the tribes are survivors to an extent. We wouldn't have made it this far without, but it is... a thing we pride ourselves on, to stand alone and to endure."

[Togashi Saruko]

"Many tribes have been and are self-reliant, and much of those ways will likely continue - foraging, hunting, enduring. But at what point does it come too dependent for you? Are you providing all the food for yourself, and water?" And all the other things that the safety of the group provided.

[Nozomi]

"For the most part, yes. Especially of late. Trade is hard when you are where we are. Merchants don't come through the bog. We like it that way. We'd rather not trade for it, if we don't have to." For the most part, they were aggressively self-sufficient. "Some of that must fade, I know. We can't live on our own forever. But I don't want them to get soft. It's how we've endured."

She also wouldn't mind keeping up with the flutes and dancing. Those were fun.

[Togashi Saruko]

It seemed her questions had been misunderstood, but answers always answered something.

"I don't think Hida-Kami or Akodo-Kami would call their ways soft. Rather, there are many ways to live a... non-soft life. Or to endure. Is one hard way of life superior to another?"

[Nozomi]

She chuckled a little and nodded, her eyes kind of twinkling as she leaned over to nod at the Togashi, her eyes meeting the woman's rather directly. "A little secret, Saruko." She pitched her voice a little low. "It's bull-headed pride. Most folk think their way is the best way. I'm sure the Hida and Akodo do too. I don't fault the Hikaru who left either, but I'll poke them in the ribs for it, good naturedly of course. These Seido are tougher than I remembered the others saying, for one."

She leaned back, though and frowned. "But... I will say... Akodo's ways, if what I have heard is true? They are not our ways."

[Togashi Saruko]

She looked at the woman's strange eyes, and chuckled at the little secret that was shared. "Ah. Pride does have funny ways of working."

People did a lot of silly things out of pride. Even the Kami werent without it.

"Akodo-Kami is very prideful I'd say. But I'll agree that his way isn't for everyone. At least, it's not for me."

[Nozomi]

She sat back to take a moment from the work. Sighing to herself, she grunted out and relaxed while she looked to the sky. "Ever since Koyama came back, we heard whispers of something called Honor. It's not something I hear from everyone, and most here don't talk of it, but I hear he likes it a lot." She wouldn't speak for Koyama on the matter, though, only herself. "It sounds like a pretty thing, an idea of a rigid, perfect world. I am too used to living among rocks and marshes, hunting from the shadows. It is definitely not for me, but that does not mean I can't serve just fine without."

A low, throaty chuckle. "Something less... prideful. We have dances. Songs we play. Customs. If we could keep the land we live on, I think we'd like that. We like hard, rocky land, away from others. But Bayushi would have to permit it first." And right now, they only got away with it because the bogs were awful and nobody knew that the iron ore in those mountains was trash if you didn't master refining techniques. Hell, nobody even knew there WAS iron in those mountains yet, or what it was good for. It was just a patch of nowhere to be forgotten in. But eventually, he'd need it and they'd have to deal with that before then or on that day.

Better before.