The Medallion

Chapter 24 The Unexpected Trip To The Bazaar

After being criticized and punished by Mia, Rocky felt rather depressed. Since his training was suspended, he returned to his room. The moment he entered his room, he saw Uriah, his war beast, in bed kept kicking its left hind limb. All of a sudden, Rocky seemed to understand what Uriah was trying to do. Immediately, he picked up Uriah and helped it remove the strip of cloth and the two twigs that were used to cure the injured hamstring in its left hind limb. As soon as it felt that its hind limb was free, Uriah jumped out of Rocky's arms on to the ground. It landed steadily on the ground with its limbs. There seemed to be no pain anywhere. In an instant, it began to jump back and forth jubilantly. It was evident that its injured hamstring had been completely cured.

"Look at you! How happy you are!" Rocky said with a smile. Seeing Uriah jumping on the ground jubilantly, Rocky felt that his depression was all gone. It was replaced with the joy of seeing Uriah jumping around.

At that very moment, Flint, Rocky's roommate, came in. He saw Uriah jumping with ease. With a slightly startled and puzzled look on his face, Flint asked, "Wasn't your war beast born with a disability? How is it able to move normally now?"

"No, it wasn't born with any disability. It just had a hamstring injury in its limb. Now it has recovered," Rocky replied casually.

"But how did you know it was injured?" Flint was even more puzzled on knowing about Uriah's injury and healing.

"I happen to have gained some knowledge about medicine." Rocky made up a random excuse. The era in which he was living now, there were no professional veterinarians at all, so his war beast was commonly considered as a disabled beast since it was born. Modern medicine was a subject existing only in the era of his previous lifetime. He was lucky that he still had his memory from his previous

lifetime. Thus, equipped with some common knowledge about modern medicine, he was able to find out that his war beast was not disabled but just injured.

"That's good! My war beast, Cloud Tiger, seems to have a poor appetite. It seldom eats anything. Can you help me with it?" Flint said, pointing to the tiger in his cage.

"Yes, but on one condition," Rocky said and winked at Flint with a wicked smile.

"What's the condition?" Flint asked at once.

"After your Cloud Tiger is cured, I want to borrow it for study purpose," Rocky told Flint. He had great interest in learning everything about Flint's tiger, so he had to make use of such a good opportunity.

Seeing Rocky's wicked smile, Flint hesitated for a while, but finally nodded in agreement. Other than relying on Rocky, Flint had no other good option now.

Rocky immediately walked near the tiger's cage. He saw Cloud Tiger lying inside in low spirits. Its face was listless. Its body was much fatter than it had been a few days ago, and from time to time it would open its mouth and spurt a bad smell. After the careful observation, he seemed to find out the reason why the tiger was not feeling well. He asked Flint at once, "For how many days have you keep it in the cage?"

"I've been busy training these days. And at nights, I need to have more practice. I had no time to take care of it, so I've been keeping it in the cage from the last few days," Flint explained carefully.

"No wonder it is not feeling well. I think it probably suffers from indigestion as it has eaten too much and lacks exercise. How much do you feed it every day?" Rocky asked after making his diagnosis.

"In addition to its own share, it also ate your war beast's share. I saw that your war beast wasn't eating, so…" Flint told with a little hesitation and embarrassment.

"I told you earlier also to stop feeding it so much raw meat. You just don't listen to me. From tomorrow, you should go to the kitchen and get some sweet potatoes and vegetables for it. Don't let it eat meat any more. Also, at lunch time, take it out for a walk and let it bask in the sun for some time. In this way, your time of training or practicing will not be affected and your war beast will be in good shape," Rocky suggested.

"But, is that enough?" Flint seemed unsure about Rocky's simple suggestion.

"You just take care of your tiger like I told you. After three days, your tiger will be energetic again!" Rocky said with great confidence.

At that point, they heard the drum, which indicated that it was dinner time.

"Don't forget what you have promised me," Rocky reminded. He quickly picked up Uriah who was jumping happily on the ground and walked out of the room for dinner.

At the dinner hall, Uriah didn't stop jumping. He behaved like a child with hyper-kinetic syndrome, which soon attracted the attention of the other young people dining in the hall. They all had known that Rocky's war beast was born with a disability. But after a few days, suddenly, it was bouncing so happily.

"Hey, wasn't your war beast supposed to be disabled since it was born? How is it able to move normally all of a sudden?" someone, who couldn't control his curiosity, asked Rocky.

"It's a secret!" Rocky said softly and left them in suspense intentionally.

Not long ago, Rocky had defeated a young man with a crew-cut hairstyle and a stout young man. He had shown the strength possessed by one at the second grade of Mortal Stage, which had surprised all of them. Now, on seeing Rocky's disabled war beast suddenly moving normally, they began to look at Rocky in a different way. But it was still not enough to make them look at Rocky with respect, because the idea that Rocky was a good-for-nothing person had been deeply rooted in their minds.

After dinner, Rocky went to the kitchen to ask for a small empty bottle. Then he went directly to the clear pond in the depths of the bamboo grove with Uriah in his arms. He wanted to store Uriah's magical saliva. He wanted to directly store it in the small empty bottle, which would be convenient for his current use and could also be used in the future. Earlier, he had to take the magical saliva from Uriah's mouth before each practice and he found it very troublesome, so he came up with such an idea.

But after he dropped three drops of saliva from Uriah's mouth into the small empty bottle, he couldn't get any more, and Uriah was now looking a little listless.

"Does it mean that I can get only three drops of the magical saliva per day?" Rocky frowned and immediately began to feel a little distressed. Had he known the fact earlier, he would have collected more of the magical saliva at the beginning.

Unaffected by the distress, Rocky diluted the magical saliva with a little water. He drank it and began to practice as usual. After the practice, he also studied the Dragon Spirit Mark on his left arm. He was making an effort to find out what was the special part about his dragon spiritual power.

In the blink an eye, the night passed off. Early next morning, Rocky didn't go back for training. To punish him for his brawl, Mia sent him to the kitchen to do the scouring work for three days, so he went straight to the kitchen.

"So, it is you who's been punished to do chores at the kitchen," one of the two cooks commented the moment Rocky entered the kitchen. The cook's name was Jerry. He was always nice to Rocky when he saw Rocky have dinner with Uriah.

"Is there anything I can do for you?" Rocky asked with a bitter smile.

"Well, the ingredients in the kitchen are running out. I'm going to the bazaar outside the palace to buy some. I need a person to help me. If you don't mind, you could come along with me for the shopping,"

Jerry suggested politely.

"Outside the palace?" Rocky repeated and his eyes flickered with excitement. He didn't have any chance earlier to see the world outside the palace as he had been staying in the palace since his soul came to this era. Thus, he was eager to get onto the unexpected trip outside the palace. At once, he replied, "I'd love to go with you."

After some quick preparations, Jerry drove an empty carriage, accompanied with Rocky and his war beast, Uriah. They headed towards the bazaar immediately. After passing through the dragon field and several gates of the palace which were heavily guarded, they got out of the palace. Then they crossed the moat surrounding the palace across a huge stone bridge, and passed through an extremely magnificent gate. Finally, Rocky saw ancient business streets bustling with people making it quite noisy. It was really like what was shown in the famous painting, Along the River During the Qingming Festival*.

(*TN: A famous painting in China. It captures the daily life of people and the landscape of the capital during the Northern Song.)

As Jerry was driving the carriage along one of the streets, Rocky was dazzled by the many things he saw. He saw carriages, horses, a vast crowd, and the straight, spacious and crisscrossed streets made of ancient stones, rows of ancient buildings extending all the way to the end of the street, and the shops on both sides of the street, which were selling all kinds of stuff.

Soon, Rocky spotted many spirit manipulators carrying their own war beasts. Some of them were even inferior to a one-star war beast. Also, some of the manipulators didn't even reach the first grade of Mortal Stage, but they had the nerve to swagger at the street with a proud look on their faces. Rocky even noticed that when the ordinary crowd saw them, they immediately stepped aside to make way for them. They didn't dare to provoke them.

'Wow! I never expected that spirit manipulators with such low strength could be so arrogant! Then, as a spirit manipulator at the second grade of Mortal Stage, I can be much more arrogant, ' Rocky thought, secretly laughing.

Along the way, Rocky also saw a lot of shops selling various war beasts. Unfortunately, he could not get off the carriage to have a look at them.

Before long, the carriage entered a very lively bazaar, which had a supply all kinds of food and ingredients. The bazaar was full of people.

"Basil, help me hold the horse," Jerry said as he got out of the carriage.

"All right!" Rocky replied energetically. Quickly, he got out of the carriage, took the rein of the horse, and followed Jerry, who began to buy ingredients.

After an hour or so, the carriage which had been empty was now filled with a variety of ingredients.

"Basil, our shopping is almost finished. Now, I just need to go east of the downtown to buy rice and grains, which I can finish on my own. If you want to hang around on the streets and buy something, you can do it now. We'll meet an hour later at the large gate near the moat. Have fun but don't forget our meeting time," Jerry instructed him.

"Thank you so much, Jerry!" Rocky expressed his sincere appreciation. It was a pleasant surprise and his eyes were gleaming with joy. Soon, he left Jerry and began to wander around leisurely.