Chapter: 48

The more clean he got, the more disgusted he was by the smell coming from his laundry basket. With a final check for mud behind his ears and a soap scrub under his armpits, he got out of the tub, dried himself with the towel and put on a robe.

Jay decided his bag would need to be cleaned too, so he removed all his items from it and gave whatever he could a rinse in the soapy bath water before putting them on a shelf to dry – though he decided to place [Molodus’s Coat] in with his other laundry.

The remaining mushrooms, nuts, and bondtussle root were all spoiled at this point, so he wrapped them in his stinking shirt and placed it on top of his laundry basket for Tamara to dispose of.

Grabbing the stink-rat tail, he wondered what he should do with it. It was nearly 2 meters long and as thick as a fist. Analysing it, he realised it was top quality meat – the fat streaks formed elaborate and evenly distributed branches throughout, the marbling could have been the most beautiful that Jay had ever seen.

‘I wonder….’ Jay squinted at the meat.

Jay opened the door and called “Tamara!”

“Coming!” a voice sounded from up the hall.

In a moment, Tamara appeared. “How can I help?” she said with a smile.

“Here’s my laundry, also I left some rubbish in that shirt so please throw that away. Oh, and I was wondering if your father would like to buy this rat-tail? It’s quality meat, and I would butcher it then sell it myself, but I’m going to be too busy these next few days; It would be a shame to waste it.”

She pursed her lips as she took the laundry basket with Jay’s bag on top. “I’ll tell Devin”.

“Thanks” smiled Jay, happy to have the stinking laundry basket gone.

A short time later, someone knocked on the door. “Hey Devin” Jay said after opening it.

“Hello, you have some meat for me do you?”

“Yes, here it is. I’m… I was a butcher so I know top-quality meat when I see it. Have a look here at the marbling and the fat distribution. Quite alluring, isn’t it?” Jay said, looking at Devin. ‘Huh, he’s older than I initially thought, now that I see him up-close’ thought Jay.

Devin took the tail and inspected it. “How much?”

“50 gold.”

“50 is too much, kid” Devin said, his eyes betraying him as he was still gazing at the meat.

“I don’t think so. I think even 80 gold would be a fair price. It’s nearly 2 meters long, if you cut 3cm thick steaks from it and sold them for as little as 2 gold – which is the same price as your other steaks – it will fetch a profit of about 100 gold; of course, with this quality of meat, you could probably even charge as much as 3 or 4 gold for it.”

‘Damn, this brat knows what he’s doing. Even I realise the price is low, maybe there’s a catch’ Devin thought as he scratched his bald head.

“Well, why don’t you do that?” Devin inquisitively asked

“Because I’m becoming an adventurer, I don’t have time to prepare it, and it would be a travesty to let this prime meat go to waste.”

Adjusting his glasses and half-smiling, Devin made a decision “I see. We got a deal” Devin was as indifferent as ever as he pulled out 50 gold and handed it to Jay.

“Thanks.” Jay smiled.

Without a word, Devin left the room and closed the door, dragging the rat tail behind him.

“Tamara, I’ll be in the kitchen! We’re doing a special tonight!” Jay heard Devin’s deep, raspy voice from behind the door.