Marketplace "Adventure"

[Ivandra]

It was supposed to be a nice day. The ominous storm clouds from the previous days had scattered as a result of the onset of the northern winds, yielding a brilliant azure blanket in the sky above. The remaining clouds were light, like quick brushstrokes feathered through the sky. The air was still thick with humidity, with the hints of the previous nights of rain. Scattered puddles along the main street and the persistent drips of water from the overhangs of various buildings alluded to the weather of the previous days, but it seemed that everyone else had long forgotten the period weather. And as Ivandra pushed her way through the crowds, it seemed as if everyone was out on the streets celebrating. The marketplace, which was normally bustling with people, was now completely packed. Individuals lined the street, looking more or less the same bundled in their coats and jackets, drawing coins from their pockets for this or that. Ivandra was no different from the masses. She donned a dark brown coat and paced through the marketplace, searching for the ingredients she was looking for. I need cooking oil. I need salt. I need cooking oil. I need salt. The words repeated through her head, filling her mind as she looked from vendor to vendor. Under normal circumstances, the marketplace would have been the last place she would have been found. And, for a certain period of time, she had vowed to herself that she would never set foot there ever again. It was much too chaotic, much too disorderly. She preferred something that would have moved away from the mundane and entered into the realm of discovery. Even from the youngest age, she had been told tales of this traveler or that, and had told herself that she would one day be that traveler. And so she'd taken up what she felt like had been her necessary preparations. Ivandra trained herself to hunt, to cook, to camp. She stayed in the wilderness for days simply to practice her survival techniques. It was all for her time, the moment she would discover something new and have tales told of her. But those dreams had ended in that disaster, in that incident with her traveling party the other day and her forced but reluctant return back to Syliras. So for the period of time, she had retired from her dreams of traveling. They were still at the back of her mind, but she knew that she needed time to recover and become accustomed to the ordinary again. In order to do so, she insisted on keeping herself from entering into the woods. She insisted on refraining from hunting for her food while in Syliras. The only way she would keep any remnant of her traveling days was by cooking every meal she ate from scratch. And even then, it was miserable because all it ever did for her was remind her of the shortcomings during that previous voyage. Ivandra's brows furrowed together with frustration as she recounted the incident. Then, shaking her head, she turned towards her left and began heading towards a large vendor on the very edge of the sidewalk. Someone there had just mentioned cooking oil. And maybe, if she were lucky, she could even get it at a decent price.