She spent the afternoon helping dry the clary berries.
After they finished setting out the fresh ones, she was given a taste of some berries that had been dried about two weeks prior; they were quite delicious. She was told that the process reduced their acidity and emphasized their natural sweetness. Adriana enjoyed sour fruits, but she was equally fond of this sort of natural sweetness.
"Ah, these are wonderful!"
"Aren't they? I'm the one who picked them!" Kururu puffed out her chest proudly, while Maruru and Baise watched her with fond smiles.
(A family... sisters. How nice.)
Adriana felt a small pang of envy.
"Ado, do you want to come with us tomorrow? There are some spots that aren't too hard to reach."
"Though we might not find as many berries there..."
At Kururu and Maruru’s invitation, Adriana gave an immediate answer. "Yes, I'd love to go."
She hadn't spent a day playing in the wild like this since she was a little girl. Suddenly, the faces of her old childhood friends surfaced in her mind.
(Baru, Humund, Rolora...)
She whispered their names in her heart. In her memories, they were still the same children they had always been, smiling back at her.
＊ ＊ ＊
The next morning, after finishing breakfast, Adriana set off for the mountains with Kururu and Maruru. They carried bags for the harvest and some dried meat for emergencies. Adriana had mentioned she could produce water with magic, so they only brought small, lightweight canteens. Water was heavy, so that alone made the trek much easier.
"But why do we need the dried meat?" Adriana asked. Each of them had a bag on their back containing a harvesting basket and their canteen, with the meat tucked inside.
"Because you can't take the mountains lightly," Maruru explained. "There's always a chance someone could sprain an ankle and become unable to walk."
"...I see."
Current Adriana was capable of using mid-level Healing magic, meaning she could easily mend a sprained ankle or even a simple fracture. However, there was always the risk of getting separated, so caution was indeed necessary. Thus, they each carried their own rations.
"Phew... hah... wait, let's... let's rest a bit..."
"Ado, you really aren't used to this, are you?"
"We haven't even made it halfway yet... and this is supposed to be the closest, easiest spot."
Compared to Kururu and Maruru, Adriana was completely out of shape. By taking frequent breaks, the three of them managed to reach their destination shortly before noon. They stood atop a flat, table-like rocky mountain.
"..." Adriana collapsed, exhausted.
Kururu, still full of energy, immediately began darting around to gather clary berries. Maruru stayed behind, tending to Adriana with a worried look.
"Ado, are you okay?"
"...Ye—yeah. Just... let me rest... a little longer..."
After about ten minutes, Adriana managed to pull herself together. Maruru then began her explanation.
"These are clary trees. There are male and female ones, and only the females bear fruit. Also, bugs like to hang around them, so be careful."
"Got it."
Adriana didn't mind bugs in the slightest. In later years, she would go so far as to keep ground spiders in the underground of Hourai Island.
"Ado! Look, I've already got this many!" Kururu came running back to show off her basket. The container, roughly the size of a human head, was already a third full of clary berries.
"Wow, that's impressive."
"Yoisho," Adriana muttered as she hauled herself up. Having inherited the habit from Shuuki, she sounded a bit like a middle-aged man.
"Let's see... ah, there they are."
There were plenty of berries left higher up, well beyond Kururu's reach.
"The purple ones are ripe enough to eat raw. Try some!" Kururu said, her own lips already stained a deep purple.
"Okay."
Following the suggestion, Adriana popped a ripe purple berry into her mouth.
"Oh, it's delicious."
A sweet and tart flavor burst across her palate. As Adriana ate three or four more in quick succession, Maruru added a warning.
"The red ones aren't ripe yet, so they're very sour."
Just to see for herself, Adriana tried a single red one.
"Ah, you're right, it's very sour," she said, though her expression remained perfectly calm. She happened to love sour things.
"Ado, you're amazing..."
"Yeah. I can even eat a whole ramon fruit raw, you know?"
"I don't know what a ramon is, but I've certainly learned that you love sour things..." Maruru said, half-impressed and half-appalled.
While they talked, Kururu was gathering berries further away. Suddenly, she let out a loud shout.
"Big Sis! Ado! Come look at this!"
"Oh? I wonder what it is."
"Let's go see."
Responding to the call, the two headed toward her.
"What is it, Kururu... Oh."
There stood a large clary tree, its branches covered in numerous pale green, elongated spherical objects.
"Those are wild cocoons."
"Heh, so that's what they look like..."
They appeared to be wild silkworms, Adriana noted.
To offer a bit of trivia, the silkworms of Earth are incapable of surviving in the wild. Even if placed on a mulberry tree, their white color makes them easy prey for birds, and because their prolegs—the suction-cup-like legs on a larva's abdomen—have such a weak grip, they are blown off by the slightest breeze. However, in the world of Ars, wild silkworms seemed to thrive.
Furthermore, these "tensan"—the wild silkworms—are not actually the larvae of the common silkmoth, but rather the larvae of the Japanese silk moth. Their cocoons are specifically known as yamamayu. They also feed on trees like oak and chestnut rather than mulberry, which is another point of difference.
"Do you collect a lot of these to make thread?" Adriana asked.
Kururu and Maruru both shook their heads. "No, we don't do anything like that."
"I see..."
"Yeah."
Since Shuuki hadn't known much about sericulture, Adriana wasn't well-versed in the field either. If they could turn these tensan into an industry, the village's income would surely grow, but unfortunately, no one present realized the potential.
"More importantly, let's get back to the clary berries!"
"Right."
The three spent a pleasant afternoon eating their dried meat and berries for lunch before eventually starting the trek back.
"Descending... isn't exactly easy either, is it?"
"It's easier to get injured on the way down, so watch your step."
"Ugh..."
As expected, Adriana was completely spent by the time they reached home. To make matters worse, she woke up the following morning in a different kind of pain.
"Ouch, ow, ow, ow, ow..."
This time, Adriana found herself plagued by a severe case of muscle soreness.