By Zephyria 
“How many herbs did you gather? I filled about half my basket.”
“About the same as you. Half?”
“I see. Just wondering.”
Silver brushed the question off and looked away. It was as if a dark cloud had settled over his heart. He pushed through the thickets roughly.
The gathering was finished in the time it would take for a single candle to melt. With baskets full of herbs, they descended the mountain. By the time they neared the pirate village, the brilliant sunlight was spreading across the land.
“Oneeeee…….”
“Twooooo…….”
Right on cue, the sound of a fading count drifted from inside a village alleyway. Soon, the pirates appeared around the corner, led by Charcoal Fire Bear. Their limbs were so limp they looked as if they would collapse instantly if they weren’t holding onto staves. They weren’t a pirate crew; they were jellyfish that had swallowed poison.
Even with eyes that had lost all focus, they somehow managed to spot the new captain. The jellyfish-like men all grimaced simultaneously, and Charcoal Fire Bear, sensing the mood, screamed at the top of his lungs.
“One-ack! Two-ook!”
“Haaaaang! Twooooong!”
The mollusks suddenly straightened their spines and snapped back into human form. They immediately began a full-sprint race, only to screech to a halt after barely ten paces, as if hitting an invisible wall. A barrage of gazes shot toward Silver. Every wide-eyed stare held the same question: ‘Who are you?’
It was only natural. Silver was showing his bare face.
In his haste to leave, he had forgotten his human-skin mask. Silver scowled. Damn, I don’t know either. I’ll just insist that the witch’s curse was lifted.
“C-Captain? Captain?”
Charcoal Fire Bear pointed at Silver with a sausage-like finger.
“Who is… this mouth-watering pretty boy…?”
“Who do you think he is? It’s Silver, the lackey.”
At the man’s reply, Charcoal Fire Bear gasped. The pirates stared at each other with their mouths agape.
“The Silver we know doesn’t look like that!”
The seniors shouted one after another.
“Silver’s face was covered in burns! He looked like a shoe left in boiling oil!”
“He didn’t have a face as pretty as a Fairy!”
“No. That is his face,” the man countered nonchalantly.
“You’ve just been misidentifying a perfectly fine face as a burnt one all this time. It’s a typical symptom of narcotic drug addiction.”
“What… what in the…?”
The pirates were flabbergasted, muttering among themselves.
“This is weird! It makes no sense! Are you saying we all went blind at once?”
“Did the Captain take drugs behind our backs? He probably mistook some pretty boy drifting on the beach for Silver!”
“We weren’t high on drugs every single day! Even when we were sober, Silver’s face was…!”
“No!” the man roared.
“Even on the days you didn’t take drugs, you were never sober! Silver’s face has always been this face! From the very beginning!”
Silver was now genuinely baffled. What is this guy doing?
The man put strength into his eyes and took a bold step toward the pirates. The pirates let out a collective ‘eek’ and scrambled backward.
“What’s my name? Answer me now.”
“S-Stuffy Field Mouse! Real name is Quick-to-Die Rat.”
“You know what? You used to call me Deaf Donkey. And you thought my real name was Hurry-up-and-Die Cat.”
“D-did we? I-I-I don’t remember…”
“Of course you don’t! Because you were soaked in drugs! You probably don’t remember this either! Whenever you had a spare moment, you’d collapse in the street and make out with broken pot shards and snapped oars!”
“I-I remember that… but really, Silver’s face was…!”
“You even mocked my sculpted face, saying I looked like a diseased cow! Of course, you won’t remember that either!”
“Ugh, I-I don’t remember… because that never happened in the first place…”
Someone protested in a voice as small as an ant’s, but quickly hid behind Charcoal Fire Bear under the man’s predatory glare. The man kicked the dirt hard.
“Now do you get it! The reason I’m putting you through hell training! You’re rotten! Even when you weren’t on drugs, your brains were so rotten you’d confuse names and faces, and couldn’t tell a chick from a goose! Rotten! Rotten! Rotten!”
As he repeated the same words over and over, the pirates’ eyes began to waver. They looked as if they were thinking, ‘Is that so? Maybe it is. Maybe it is…’ Silver clicked his tongue at the sight. Wow, they’re actually falling for that? Well, I guess the field mouse guy was fooled by me too…
“Now that you finally recognize Silver’s face, it seems the drug haze has finally cleared from your skulls. You will train even harder! Depending on your progress, we set sail tomorrow! Run! Only those who can accurately distinguish a chick from a duckling in five seconds will be allowed on the ship!”
As soon as the words left his mouth, the pirates’ eyes lit up. They all raised their fists and let out a cheer.
“We’re sailing! We’re finally escaping!”
“The torture is over!”
“Run! Run!”
The pirates ran off, kicking up a cloud of dust. Once the last one disappeared around the corner, Silver tossed out a comment.
“Copycat.”
“It’s called excellent crisis management,” the man added brazenly as he walked.
“Then what else were you going to say? That you know magic to change your face? If you’d said that, those morons would have clung to you, wailing for you to turn their own mugs into handsome men and beautiful women. They probably would’ve begged you to grow them new teeth as a bonus.”
“I could have just said I was cursed by a witch I cheated out of money, and then the curse broke.”
“Ah…! That way…!”
The man snapped his fingers and looked at Silver.
“By the way, what’s with the face-changing? Did you really cheat a witch and get cursed? Or did you receive some special transformation technique from someone?”
“Curious? If you want to know, you can pay back the witch for me, with interest.”
Silver held up his middle finger. The man shrugged.
“I’ll have to make a big score on this voyage. What does this witch look like? An old lady in a pointy hat?”
“I don’t know.”
Silver looked up at the sky. A flock of black crows crossed the autumn sky. Their cawing overlapped with a certain scream in his memory.
“She was as gaunt as a skeleton.”
He stopped speaking and followed the receding crows with his eyes. Eventually, the sky was empty, but the black smudge remaining on his retina did not disappear.
“Her face looked as young as a girl’s. I just hope I never run into her again.”
The man didn’t ask any more questions.
The pirate captain’s house had not only an open-air bath but also a kitchen. Unlike Charcoal Fire Bear, who likely viewed the kitchen as nothing more than a wine cellar, the man seemed to use it for its original purpose. A firewood fire blazed inside the hearth. On the workbench, an oak cutting board stained with grease and a clean kitchen knife were laid out neatly. The water filling the tin bucket was clear.
“You need to eat first. I heard the medicine is potent,” the man said, placing the basket on the workbench. Silver also set down his basket and sat on a chair.
The man opened a workbench drawer and took out a bag of flour, a salt jar, eggs, and a bottle of oil. He poured the flour into a mountain-like pile, dug a well in the center, and cracked the eggs into it. After splashing in some water, he went straight to kneading. His rough palms pushed, folded, and pushed the dough again. Once the bread dough took shape, he made three or four slits in it, placed it on a long wooden paddle, and pushed it deep into the hearth.
The man slammed the iron door of the hearth shut and dusted off his hands.
“Let’s make the medicine while the bread bakes.”
“Is there nothing for me to do?”
“There is. Just watch.”
The man took the herbs out of the basket one by one and lined them up. He also brought out a heavy brass mortar and pestle, a straining cloth, an iron ladle, earthenware, and a cast-iron pot. First, a handful of black leaves went into the mortar.
The man ground the herbs by type and put them into the cast-iron pot. He poured in water, brought it to a boil, and stirred. The heat of the hearth, the smell of baking bread, and the pungent scent of herbs filled the old, cramped kitchen. When smoke acrid enough to bring tears to the eyes rose from the pot, the man placed the straining cloth over the earthenware and poured the mixture through.
The man’s hands were like those of a gambler who had never lost once. He was that fast and skilled.
“You’re quite handy,” Silver remarked.
“Were you a mage’s apprentice? Where did you learn how to make medicine?”
“I never learned.”
The man leaned his head close to the earthenware. His gaze never left the straining cloth.
“Cooking and medicine follow the same principles. Ingredients. Processing. Order and ratio. Heating, measuring, steeping, and filtering.”
“But is your medicine reliable? This is just folk remedy, after all.”