Chapter 68 — A Druid?

Amber returned several days after her departure, and sure enough, she found the camp had grown another ring larger than before. Between the tents now stood many wooden houses, and drying yards, workshops, and warehouses were scattered across every quarter of the camp. A new sawmill had been raised on the bank of the Whitewater River, hard against the crude temporary dock, with packed-earth roads linking the camp to the various facilities around it. This place had already taken on the shape of a permanent settlement—it was beginning to transform from a camp into a domain.

That fellow's labor system really does work, she thought.

The dim-witted little maid had already run off to inform her master, so Amber sat idly in Gao Song's great tent, staring into space. Beside her stood an old man wrapped in a filthy gray cloth robe, a soft cap on his head, his beard and hair in wild disarray.

This old fellow, who looked like he had been dug out of a slum, was the professional Amber had brought back. He stood in the middle of the great tent, carefully keeping his distance from everything around him, while his eyes darted this way and that like a profiteering merchant paying a visit to a lord's castle. Miss Amber, meanwhile, was looking up at the tent that had stood there for the better part of a month, muttering to herself: "The masons and carpenters are already living in wooden houses, and he's still pitching a tent. I really don't know what goes on in that head of his..."

"Hey, hey," the little old man suddenly spoke up. "Is what you said true? Is that really the Gao Yang Cecil from seven hundred years ago? The one everyone in the south has been buzzing about lately?"

"Of course it's true," Hetty rolled her eyes at the little old man. "I dug him up with my own hands—how could it be false? I tell you, never mind how poor the Cecil family is now, their Mystic Vein Sect is formidable. The whole lot of them are a walking treasure vault..."

The little old man stroked his messy beard. "As long as it's true. Little girl, I tell you, in the field of antique appraisal, my skills are—"

Amber froze halfway through his sentence. "Huh? Wait! Aren't you a druid?!"

The little old man's hand froze mid-stroke on his beard, and he stared at Amber, dumbstruck. "I—"

He had just gotten out the word "I" when the heavy tent flap was flung open and bright light poured in—only to be completely blocked by Gao Yang's nearly two-meter-tall bulk. The little old man and Amber both jumped in fright.

Gao Yang noticed the extra stranger the moment he stepped inside: a filthy robe of some strange cut between a short tunic and a long robe, almost every edge worn to fuzz; a grayish soft cap with several holes in it; beard and hair in wild disarray—heaven knew how long since they had been washed; the whole man old and shriveled, yet his eyes were bright...

Yes—a true hermit aesthetic.jpg.

Gao Yang made his judgment silently. The little old man before him almost perfectly matched his image of a druid—one who shunned the world, kept company with the wild woods, and commanded countless ancient knowledges. If he had seen the man on any other occasion, he might have taken him for a beggar from the slums, but Amber had gone out to find a druid, so this was clearly the druid aesthetic.

So the disgrace of the elves had actually managed to bring back a druid—or at least something that looked very much like one. It seemed he had underestimated Amber a little.

Offering Amber a silent apology in his heart, Gao Yang strode forward to meet the little old man. "Welcome. In the name of the Cecil family, this land has waited a long time for a true scholar. I am Gao Yang Cecil. You have surely heard my name."

The little old man also shook off his brief daze, and a dazzling smile immediately spread across his face—so dazzling it hardly befitted a hermit. "Ah, your name is known to all and sundry across the entire continent. I am delighted to serve you and your domain. Now, where are the antiques that need appraising—"

Gao Yang spoke at the same moment: "The arrival of a druid will surely—"

"Antiques?" "A druid?"

The two spoke in unison, and both stared at each other in bewilderment.

"Did I hear that wrong?" Gao Yang said, taken aback. "Did you just say appraise antiques? I sent Amber to find a druid..."

"A druid? Not an antique appraiser?!" The little old man was equally shocked. "I thought I was brought here to appraise antiques!"

Gao Yang's mouth twitched, and his gaze drifted involuntarily to the half-elf lady beside him, who was doing her best to shrink her head into her own belly. "And just what did this half-elf 'lady' tell you?"

The little old man answered offhandedly, "She said she had dug up an antique seven hundred years old, so I came at a dead run without even asking for details..."

Gao Yang reached out to grab Amber's pointed ear. She let out a yelp, slipped out from under his hand in a flash, and vanished into the omnipresent shadows.

But someone was faster than she was. Before the thief could fully enter the shadow realm, Gao Yang stepped out and blocked her escape route, activating a knight's protective aura. As the invisible halo effect spread outward, Amber's mind went blank; she was jolted out of her shadow state and crashed headfirst into Gao Yang's chest and belly, crying out on the spot.

The camp's defenses were inadequate, and to be ready for any emergency at any moment, Gao Yang never went anywhere without his armor.

Even Rebecca's hard head had raised a bump when she collided with Gao Yang, to say nothing of Amber, whose head was not hard at all. The half-elf lady was knocked silly; after being forced out of her shadow form, she clutched her head and spun in place twice before she could stop. Then Gao Yang seized her by the ear, and she shrieked at once: "Ow, ow, ow! That hurts! Let go, let go, let go!"

"What's this about an antique seven hundred years old?!" Gao Yang glared at this disgrace of all living things. "Where is the druid I sent you to find?!"

"He is a druid! How was I supposed to know about the antique appraising?!" Amber, thoroughly aggrieved, struggled to break free of Gao Yang's grip while shouting at the top of her voice. "I mentioned offhand that I'd dug up an ancient man from seven hundred years ago—how was I supposed to know he'd take it the wrong way?!"

The little old man watched the farce with his mouth hanging open, and at last a glimmer of understanding dawned on him. "Wait—the antique from seven hundred years ago you mentioned is Duke Gao Yang Cecil?"

"Don't call him an ancient antique! He's going to pull my ear off!" Amber screamed. "Didn't I tell you? Gao Yang Cecil has been resurrected—I woke him up with my own hands! But I never asked you to appraise him—I thought you understood!"

The little old man's eyes went wide. "I thought you'd awakened this ancient hero and then robbed his tomb on the side! I was even wondering how you'd pulled it off—how, after looting a grave, you could get the man himself to agree to let you bring someone to appraise the antiques..."

Gao Yang: "..."

After running through every great historical figure he knew from his past life, Gao Yang finally suppressed the urge to throw Amber out on the spot, and looked at the little old man with a mix of laughter and tears. "So... you're not a druid?"

To his surprise, the little old man stroked his beard, straightened his ragged gray robe, and spoke in a tone of unfathomable profundity: "That depends on the specific circumstances and your requirements. If the conditions here are suitable, I could also be a druid..."

Gao Yang was stunned. Druids could "also be" something?

"Then are you a druid or not?" Gao Yang frowned. "I need a druid to assist with my domain's agricultural development, and I don't want any problems with this work, so you'd best answer carefully."