Chapter Text
The store is quite a bit larger inside than it looked from the outside, it even has a shop attendant. Who takes one look at him and goes, “Oh, hon. Girl’s pants? You must be miserable. Come on, let’s get you something better. What’s your price range? Or is your parent paying?”
He blinks a few times. “No, I’m a seed merchant. I’ll be paying.”
“Ahh, then you want something a bit nice but still durable. Trust me, looking professional goes a long way.” She says, running a hand over her bright red, complex braid. Her name tag reads: Clarissa. “That runaway farm kid look you have going on isn’t a good look on you.”
Not that he’s aware of, though if she means the pants she might have a point, but he really doesn’t care as long as she finds him something that fits. He follows her past numerous isles and down an isle with different sizes marked on the racks every few feet.
“You’re what? 13? You look like you wear a size twelve.” She says, pausing by a section marked 12.
“Eleven.” He corrects.
“Your size or your age?” She asks.
“Age.” He clarifies. Is he big for his age? Maybe he is where borderline malnutrition is common since he’s been eating well since the mokuton came in, but that shouldn’t be the case for Lightning, which has plenty of food and water to work with. Maybe he just has tall genes? Hard to say, since the village had done their collective best to forget the man who only stayed one night, particularly his mom. There’s no way Ryu would ever judge her for that, not when she kept him and raised him despite his father. But it does mean he knows basically nothing about the man.
Clarissa nods and starts flipping through the selection, pulling out one now and then and handing it to him. “There you go, hon. Changing rooms are over there. Let me know if they don’t fit. If they do fit, pick the most comfortable ones. Just leave the rest in the changing room and I’ll put them away. And if you want to trade in that pair of girls’ pants for a discount, just tell me. Every now and then we get farm kids in looking for something like that.”
“I definitely want to trade them in.” He agrees and heads toward the changing rooms with the absolute pile of pants she’s handed him.
All of them are higher quality than the ones he grew up wearing. None of them are bad, though one pair is too short and a couple pairs he doesn’t like the texture of and another seems like it will snag too easily. Honestly, he’s impressed with her selections. It takes skill to fit someone so well with just a couple glances. He follows her instruction of picking out the most comfortable pairs and ends up with four. Two in black, one in dark brown and one in a medium-dark green. Peeking his head out of the curtain, he sees she’s still there waiting and asks, “I’ve found four. Can you help me pick?”
“Sure, hon. Come on out and model them for me.” She says with an easy smile.
After he’s done, she hums a little, then says, “Well, they all fit well and look nice on you. Maybe a question will help. Is going through Lightning going to be a regular route for you? I ask because you have a Fire country accent.”
He shakes his head. “No. I just wanted to pick up some Lightning varieties. My normal route will loop through Hot Water, Bears, Rice, Mountains, Waterfall and then back down through Konoha, I think.”
“Mmn.” She nods. “Yeah, then go with the green and brown. If you were going to make Lightning a regular route, I’d say choose black, because it’ll get you more respect, but the other elemental countries don’t really care about that, and green and brown are kind of Fire country colors, y’know?”
“Makes sense.” He agrees. They’ll be cooler temperature wise than the black, too. “Can I wear one of them to the register?”
“Of course, just bring the tag with you.” She says genially. “And the pair you want to trade in.”
He does, leaving the other pants in the changing room for her to put away.
It’s a different lady at the cash register, a blonde. Her nametag reads: Ursula.
“Hello, junge. Clarissa told me you have pants to trade in?” She greets him.
“Yes, I do. And I’m buying these two.” He puts the ill-fitting pants, the brown pants and and the tag for the green pants on the counter. “Are you the owner?” He wonders. It might explain the shop name to some extent. The language belongs to a subculture that he wasn’t aware still existed.
Ursula laughs. “No, that’s my vater.”
Ah, her father.
“Why did he name it sandwich?” He asks.
She laughs again. “Mama asked what he was going to name it and he wasn’t paying attention and thought she was asking what he wanted for lunch. He only figured it out after the signs for the shop were all ordered.”
Ryu snickers. “Okay, that’s funny.”
She inspects the ill-fitting pants, nods and then proceeds to ring him up. The resulting price is much lower than he expected.
“The pants are worth that much?” He asks, confused.
“No, no. I give you a discount because you’re an educated junge and know my language.” She explains, looking mirthful.
“I- Uh. Okay. Thanks.” First time for everything, he guesses. Still, it doesn’t sit right with him. It feels like pity. “Do you like apples?”
“I do. Why?” She enquires.
He sets his backpack down and digs out a seed container and takes out three Green Kami apple seeds. “Plant these. They’re from Green Kami, so they’ll grow.”
“Ja? Well, then. You’re a good junge. I’ll remember you. And give you another discount next time!” She proclaims.
He flushes a little, but doesn’t have the heart to tell her that there won’t be a next time. “Thanks.”
Ryu puts the seed container back and the brown pair of pants on top. He can put them in his clothing scroll later when there’s no witnesses.
~
As he puts his backpack back on, there’s a tearing cloth sound and Ryu freezes. A glance proves him right. The right shoulder seam has ripped out. “I forgot I was supposed to be getting shirts too.”
A quick glance shows that Clarissa is already helping the fattest kid he’s ever seen and he grew up with Chouza a lifetime ago.
Ursula points. “Over there.”
He starts with the size 12 shirts, but when he holds one up, it’s even smaller than the one he’s wearing, so he moves up to size 14, assuming size 13 is what he’s wearing. As he pages through them, he finds that most of them have pictures and slogans on them for whatever reason. What even is that about? He wonders. It’s not that he’s never seen shirts with patterns, but he’s never seen something like this before. Not for the first time, he wonders how much has changed between his last life and this one.
Well, worrying about it won’t change anything. More to the point, he should probably buy more than two shirts. Three? No. Four should be about right.
After some deliberation, he picks out a black and white hexagon patterned shirt, a light green shirt, a dark green shirt and a red shirt with black lettering that says, ‘Air Is Free, But That Doesn’t Mean You Should Waste It’ because it strikes him as funny. A little mean, but funny.
Though he probably should be careful not to wear it when he’s selling stuff, since it could be taken as a backhanded insult.
Ryu tries them on to make sure they fit, which they do, so he goes back towards the register, then pauses and about-faces and heads to the coat isle. He needs a new jacket too.
He ends up picking out a medium brown one in a heavy fabric that’s coated in something shiny. Probably water repellant, since it claims to be a rain proof. It’s lined with a lighter weight silky green material, which will help break any wind better than a single layer jacket would. Pausing for a moment, he decides to go look at the shoe section in the back. Unfortunately, a quick skim shows that there’s nothing rugged enough to stand up to the travel he does, so he heads back to the register.
“Got everything this time?” Ursula asks, eyes amused. “No underwear?”
He blushes. “No, that still fits.”
“Gut, gut.”
Putting the clothes on the counter, he waits for her to ring him up. Again, the price is lower than it should be.
“This is too little.” He protests.
“Nein. I told you I would give you a discount next time. Your jacket is half off.” She says, then shakes a finger at him. “No giving me extra back this time, junge!”
Ryu sighs and accepts his fate, handing over the yen. Defending his pride will not be a good move if he steps on her pride in the process. “Is there a shoe shop around here that sells sturdier shoes?”
“Ja. Two blocks north and one block east of here. Ninjas and farmers like it a lot.” She says.
That sounds promising. “Thanks.”
~
Akuma lumbers to his feet when he comes outside and gives him a questioning look.
“I got pants, shirts and a jacket. Got to go to a different shoe store, though. The ones in there wouldn’t last two weeks on the road.” He says in response.
The dog huffs and nods, keeping up the pretense that he can’t talk.
He follows Ryu to the shoe store and again waits outside.
This shop doesn’t have a floor attendant but it doesn’t take Ryu long to find what he’s looking for and pay. The guy at the cash register doesn’t talk other than to tell him the price.
~
On the way back to the hotel, they stop at an open air café that has several dishes on the menu from Ursula’s cultural group. He orders maultaschen and coffee, the latter out of morbid curiosity. Ryu ignores the cashier’s amused look and takes his meal outside to eat.
After eating, Ryu feels strangely energetic, which probably explains the cashier’s amusement at his choice of drink. He wonders if he can convince his mother that it’s a healthy necessity and reluctantly decides that she won’t fall for it because she dislikes bitter things. She’d probably like the maultaschen, though. Maybe he can get ahold of the recipe for her? Well, he’ll think about it tomorrow. For right now, the sky is starting to darken.
~
When Ryu and Akuma enter the lobby, the faint scent of incense from earlier is much stronger, though still light, and he looks around curiously for the source. His eyes widen as his eyes fall on a plant in a wide, shallow pot with some kind of tiny groundcover covering the dirt around it. The plant is a rare one and definitely not one he’d expect to find in a humble hotel or anywhere outside of daimyos’ palaces or an apothecary. It’s not native to the Elemental Nations and as such is only found as a brag piece or a medicine ingredient source, even though it’s a decently tough plant indoors. He has no idea how it got here, but…
The plant itself is a small and bushy, with a multitude of small, tri-lobe leaves. As typical with a healthy plant of this species, it’s in bloom, the flower a hard green spiral of plant flesh, the top of the spiral letting off wisps of incense scented ‘smoke’.
His eyes flicker from the plant to the woman behind the desk, who looks like she has a headache. Upon him approaching the desk, she looks up at him. “Need a room?”
He shakes his head. “I rented one earlier. I just wanted to ask if I could buy some leaves from your Summoning Island Incense Plant.”
“Leaves? That’s a new one. People usually try to buy the plant or want seeds. Not that the seeds do anything. Gave some to a friend with a greenhouse and he told me that they’re duds. But far be it from me to turn down money. I’m surprised you know what it is.” She says.
Ryu can’t help it, he snorts. “The seeds are nigh impossible to germinate without a strictly climate controlled set up, several months to spare and knowledge of the exact conditions required. The leaves on the other hand, root new plants pretty easily. I’m a seed and plant merchant.”
Her eyes widen in interest. “You seem to know your stuff. I didn’t know that. You think you could keep it alive? My friend with the greenhouse said it shouldn’t even be surviving and thinks that if it’s moved elsewhere it would just die and I hate to just kill it, so I haven’t sold it. But the scent gives me headaches and if you think you could keep it alive…”
Huh. Well, paying for an insanely expensive plant really wasn’t on his to-do list. Still, he’s not going to pass up the opportunity, even if it will wipe out his funds and then some.
“I can. It’s actually a pretty easy care indoor plant and I can wrap it to keep it warm while traveling.” He says. “How much do you want for it?”
“For you? Free. Just do me a favor and don’t kill it. The Lightning Daimyo left it here, said he didn’t care for it, but I can’t justify letting it die.” She says with a dismissive wave. “You probably have the money for it, but I’m not going to take money from a little kid and this will get rid of my work headaches.”
Oh. Well, that’s complicated. Troublesome.
“If-” He clears his throat. “If you won’t take money, will you take replacement plants?”
She looks intrigued. “You actually travel with plants?”
“Yeah, they’re up in my room.” He confirms.
“You know what? Sure. I’ll trade you for another indoor plant. Preferably one without scent.” She says easily.
“Wait here. I’ll go get them.” He says, like a liar. But it’s not like he can just pull out a storage scroll and expect her not to tell someone about it.
She waves him off. “Sure. I’m not going anywhere for the rest of the night.”
He wonders if this is her normal shift, but doesn’t dwell on it as he rushes upstairs to the privacy of his hotel room, Akuma hot on his heels. Once in the room, Akuma asks, “What are you planning to give her in return?”
“A pink orchid division, a green orchid seedling and a fern plant.” He decides after a quick mental sort of what indoor plants he has in stock.
“Three? You realize she might not accept that many?” Akuma asks.
“She doesn’t have to, but I’ll be damned if I don’t offer her at least close to half the value.” He replies, setting down his backpack and rummaging through it for the right scroll.
“Okay.” Akuma agrees. “Leave your backpack here. I’ll guard the room.”
Ryu gives him an amused look, aware that Akuma just doesn’t like the stairs. “Will do.”
His trip back downstairs is a lot slower and more careful as he balances the three small pots. He sets them carefully down on the front desk. “Here.”
Curiosity on her face, she stands up and leans over to poke at the plants. After a moment she asks, “Are these flowering plants?”
“Uh. The fern isn’t. It just grows spores on the undersides of its leaves. But the other two are orchids, and they flower. That one’s green and that one’s pink. The green one is scentless and the pink one has a very light scent that you can only smell up close.” He explains.
“Hm. Which to pick?” She ponders.
“You don’t have to pick.” He says hastily. “All three together are only worth about half of what the Incense Plant is worth, but I figured you probably didn’t want more than three plants.”
She gives him a sharp look. “One would’ve been fine, but I see your point. Good for you, realizing that I wouldn’t want more. This is a more than acceptable trade.”
He relaxes. “The fern will probably like a little more water than the Incense Plant and the orchids a little less. Both should do fine in this lighting and they tolerate temperature changes better than it. Just avoid freezing or scorching temperatures.”
“Alright.” She nods, then shoos him off. “Take it away so my headache will leave.”
His trip back upstairs is as slow as the one down, because the pot is large and the plant too valuable to risk tripping while carrying. Sure, he could probably fix it with the mokuton, but he’d rather avoid a heart attack.
“She took them all?” Akuma asks after he closes the door with his foot.
“Yeah.” He says, carefully setting the plant down on the small table in the room. “I told her that they were only half the worth and that I didn’t think she wanted more than three and that seemed to convince her.”
“Valid technique.” Akuma agrees.
“It’s not-” Ryu cuts himself off as he realizes that Akuma is right. It’s just not a technique he had much use for in his past life.
“You going to put that in the scroll?” Akuma asks.
Ryu blinks, then shakes his head after a moment of thought. “Pot’s too big. I’m going to have to make another scroll. Which means I need to locate some larger paper.”
“That should be easy enough. Are you going to sell plants while here?”
He thinks about it. “Yeah. The guy at the desk the first time said there was a market tomorrow. We can sell for a couple hours, then roam around and see what the market has and look at a couple greenhouses if we can find them.”
“The lady at the desk could probably direct us to her friend’s greenhouse.” Akuma points out.
“That’s true.” He agrees and takes a closer look at the ground cover in the pot. “Huh. This is thymus minus. I wouldn’t have thought that the plants would get along so well.”
“Why?” Akuma wonders.
“They’re not even remotely from the same ecosystem.” He explains. But well, it’s not bad to learn new things.