[Maruem]

Maruem had no memory of going to bed the night before nor waking up this morning, and yet he had been enjoying the festival quite a lot thus far. The atmosphere was one of joy and celebration, with smiles on all the persons he passed on the packed dirt paths. Once, some of this land had been farm fields or grassy hills, but within the first three days, the stalls were fully set up and the paths between them were packed by the many hundreds of sets of feet trampling the grass and soil.

Upon returning from his profitable day of wood gathering in the Ciminian forest, Maruem had been met with much joy by the people of the land. They were quite happy to accept the lumber he had brought and paid him handsomely for it, even giving him some items what were considered festival rewards.

While helping some of the Landers build their stalls, one of them, a fellow carpenter by the name of Dozla, talked about how he only needed his stall for the first week, because for the second half of the festival his family had their own separate tradition of celebrating, and he offered for Maruem to take his stall over for the second half of the festival.

He realized as they conversed that he had met Dozla a handful of weeks prior when he went and purchased several large pieces of lumber to practice his craft. He mentioned their meeting and Dozla lit up for a moment, before realizing he that had not a thread of recollection of the meeting and he become chest fallen for a short moment before recuperating and quickly reintroducing himself with a smile. He said how happy he was to meet again and that he was glad to be working together.

It was an offer that he could hardly refuse. Dozla was even willing to lend him tools for the job given that both of them would be using the stall for the same purpose, just crafting wooden implements for anyone who wanted them. The only conditions were that he take good care of the tools while he had them and that he enjoy the festival too, not just spend his whole week in the stall. Maruem was more than willing to accept the conditions, they were not only fair but generous as well, and he was excited to see what he could craft for the people of the land and adventurers who took interest in his crafts.

The first week of the festival came and went, and Maruem would have set up his new stall then and there,, but he had lost a bet with a friend, and had to partake in the Pentathalon on the first day of the sports events. The day after, he would have loved to get out and get started at running his stall, but his muscles were so torn that he physically could not get himself up out of bed, and so he rested, ate some yummy squash soup the nice lady at the inn made for him, and arrived on the third day finally ready to start his fancy new stall.

Maruem lifted himself up out of bed slowly. His muscles were still painful and sore, but it was only a shadow of the soreness and exhaustion he had felt the day before. He stood in his underwear and slowly reached his arms as far forward as he could, stretching his shoulders and the upper muscles on his back. He then reached down and planted his palms on the floor without benching his knees. He had always been surprisingly flexible, at least compared to his friends back on Earth. He raised his arms up to the sky and stretched them backwards, his abs letting him know just how much they needed that by assaulting him with much pain. He then pulled one arm at a time across his chest.

With his arms sufficiently stretched he sat and, with his legs fully extended, reached for his toes. After a few more leg stretches he felt nice and limber, and he found his clothes in the quaint inn bedroom's closet. He took them to the bathroom, washing his face and rinsing his mouth out with the cool crisp water.

Upon finishing with his basic hygiene he began to dress. Within no time he was fully clothed and ready for action. Not wanting to delay any more, he jogged out of the bathroom, down the hall, and past the counter, dropping a small tip in thanks for the delicious soup which had been brought up to him the day before.

He kept his jogging pace up until his stall was in sight. He noticed that many of the other people of the land had seemingly just arrived as well, so he had time to set up before the morning bustle of adventurers and landers alike looking to celebrate and buy fun festival goodies came. Maruem slowed and walked up to his stall calmly. He opened it up and finally unloaded all the timber he had bought from Dozla a few weeks prior. He set up the ten beams nicely to sell himself as at least somewhat neat. First impressions were important after all.

His hair was still wet from washing his face so he managed to brush it to the side with his hand and make it look somewhat nice and presentable. Sure, he would not be winning any awards as a male model, but he figured he looked nice in his own right. He ran his right hand down his facial hair as he sat and thought about the day to come. Before he knew it he began to hear the cacophonous voices of festival goers beginning to near him.

He pulled a thick piece of jerky out from the pouch lying on his left hip and raised it up to his mouth. While not the most fancy or nutritious meal in the world, the jerky would have to serve as his breakfast for today. It gave his something to passively chew while he got up and flipped the stall's nice hand-crafted sign from 'closed' to 'open'. He took a seat once more. His first day as a festival craftsman had begun.

Word Count: 1050
Total Word Count: 1050

[Maruem]

Despite his best efforts to make the stall look nice while he worked if over the next few days. The few customers he got were pretty uneventful. A broomstick, a wagon wheel. Simple requests that were practical in nature, and ones he could craft to a degree that they satisfied the needs of the customer, but none of them were particularly interesting crafting jobs and the pay was only just alright, nothing particularly generous and no interesting trades offered.

After a few days of this. He decided it was high time to shut down the shop. It had been a great opportunity and he was very grateful to Dozla for letting him use his stall, but unfortunately this time around his crafting talents just had not received the appreciation he felt they had deserved. Or maybe not appreciation, so much as simply the challenge. He knew he could do better. He just wished he had been tasked with a job that gave him the opportunity to show that.

He packed his lumber into his mystical bag of holding and closed up the stall for the night. before it was even sunset. He had gotten to know a few of the stall owners around him and they were kind enough people. He said a few good byes as he walked down the packed grassy walkway between the stalls of various vendors.

As he reached the end of the festival grounds he decided to find a high place to look around from. He climbed up onto an ancient destroyed ruin of a building on the outskirts and took a look around from his higher vantage point. The towns lander guards, essentially their police force, was not particularly fond of Adventurers staying in ruins, so Maruem was stealthy and cautious to stay mostly out of anyone's sight on his way up.

Once he got up top though, he hung his legs over the edge and watched several groups of people enjoying a few bards music as they danced around a large bonfire. It was an undeniably pretty sight, and when he awoke to find that it was a dream and he was back in his room in Orion's Villa, he signed.

Word Count: 368
Total Word Count: 1050 + 368 = 1418
Notes: It was dream!? O.o