Claude didn't pay much attention to his encounter with Kefnie and her sister, nor did he pay much attention to their beauty. Naturally, he was too embarrassed to stare at them.
His impression of Kefnie was that she was a pretty girl with a great figure.
Her sister seemed to be prettier than her and had a sexier figure. She was also bold enough to call out his name even though she didn't know him.
He recalled that Eriksson mentioned that her sister worked as a waitress in a tavern at the docks. It was no wonder why she would look at him so openly at the docks.
Kefnie, on the other hand, was much more shy and blushed when talking to him.
However, he quickly put the two sisters to the back of his mind, as they had arrived at the apothecary.
Mark, who was driving, helped Claude into the apothecary before bidding him farewell. He still had to go to the docks to see the niros crocodile.
The apothecary was an old man with a goatee. He carefully inspected Claude's swollen left ankle and sternly told him that he had to bleed. If he didn't drain the blood, it would be difficult to treat it.
Claude didn't have much of a choice. He was an experienced driver in his previous life and didn't have any healing skills.
He didn't know much about medicine and apart from watching the so-called health lectures on television, he only knew how to talk about it.
After all, it was an information society where everything could be found on a mobile phone. Everyone was a keyboard expert and had no practical skills at all.
So, Claude had no choice but to agree.
The old apothecary handed him a willow branch. "Bite on it."
Bite on it for what?
Claude soon understood why the old man wanted him to bite on the branch.
It was too painful. Not only did he cut his left ankle, he even used a small wooden stick to roll around the swollen area. The old man was trying to force the blood out.
Claude's face was pale and his forehead was drenched in sweat. The willow branch in his mouth had almost been crushed.
He even asked the old man why he didn't use anesthetics.
The old man said that anesthetics were poisonous and could easily leave side effects, such as drooling and slurred speech. As anesthetics were collected from venomous snakes, the dosage was hard to control.
However, there was a safer way to knock him unconscious. The old man took out a thick wooden stick and waved it at Claude's head.
Claude immediately understood what sort of coma treatment it was and politely declined it.
In the end, Claude chewed through two branches and collapsed on the sickbed like a weak woman who had been ravaged by eighteen men.
Apart from the excruciating pain, the old herbalist's healing skills were quite decent. After letting out the blood and setting the bones, he applied some potion to the wound and covered the entire ankle with a sticky green ointment.
It was said that this ointment could accelerate the growth and healing of bones and joints.
In the end, the old herbalist used a lot of plaster to wrap Claude's entire left leg up to his calf.
Claude's injured left ankle was a joint and he couldn't move it as he pleased during the treatment.
It was fixed with a plaster cast just in case. Three days later, he would have to go to the old man's place to knock off the plaster cast and check it again. It seemed that he would have to bleed again.
This was to prevent the blood clot from affecting the treatment.
By the time Claude reached home, it was already quite late. He was carried into the house by the coachman in a rather embarrassing princess-carrying position, giving his family quite a fright.
Had he not forced himself to tell his mother that it was only a sprained ankle, she might have burst into tears.
She thought that the niros crocodile had bitten off his left leg and crippled him ever since.
Helpless, Claude could only describe the treatment process in detail and emphasize that the reason he looked so weak was because the herbalist had given him too much blood. Only then did his mother relax and get him something delicious to eat to replenish his blood.
Morssen didn't say a word and continued to smoke his cigarette.
Earlier that evening, he went to the Altronis' private jetty to see the corpse of the niros crocodile. While the onlookers were praising him for having a brave son, he was reflecting on whether the gun he bought for Claude was a little inappropriate.
Had it not been for the gun, Claude wouldn't have gone hunting for waterfowl and wouldn't have encountered such a terrifying crocodile.
At the end of the day, Morssen was a loving father and didn't want Claude to be in such danger.
He had once thought that if he were in Claude's shoes, he wouldn't even have the courage to run away from such a terrifying niros crocodile, let alone shoot it.
Even though Borkal and Altronis had publicized quite a bit about their bravery in facing the ferocious crocodile, they couldn't deny that Welikro and Claude were the ones who fought the crocodile at the most crucial moment.
Of course, their descriptions were rather brief. Welikro used the boat pole to attract the crocodile's attention and Claude fired a shot at its head, killing it in one shot.
Everyone saw that the bullet hole was right there. The right eye was blown away and the crocodile's skull was lifted. The crocodile became a trophy.
Morssen didn't know where Claude got his courage from to aim at the crocodile's head at such a close distance.
Even though the crocodile's corpse was laid out on the dock, Morssen felt a suffocating sense of fear just standing beside it.
I don't seem to understand my second son anymore. I don't know how to educate him either, thought Morssen, a little dejected.
His eldest son, Arbeit, was a liberal arts student. Even though he was physically weak, he did well in his studies.
Morssen had planned for him to become a civil official in the future and could use his life experience to guide him.
However, Claude's second son was going to join the military. While the plans he had for him seemed good, were they really suitable for him?
His second son seemed to be even more outstanding than his elder brother.
Morssen didn't blame Claude for his injury. Compared to the niros crocodile, it was only a sprained ankle. It was far too insignificant.
However, he still reprimanded Claude with a stern face, telling him that he shouldn't have gone to the edge of Swamp Kemda to hunt waterfowl and ended up running into such danger.
Even though they became crocodile-hunting warriors, it didn't mean that they would be as lucky in the future. So, for the next few days, Claude had to stay at home and focus on his studies. Don't go out for no reason.
Claude nodded and accepted his father's teachings humbly.
His mother brought him a bowl of duck soup, fried steak and toast.
The starving Claude couldn't take it anymore and started wolfing down the food.
When Claude was almost done, his mother asked him why Borkal and Welikro brought over so many white-scaled fish in the afternoon. It wasn't like they had any poultry at home.
Even though they caught more than a hundred fish in the night fishing and nets, more than thirty of them were white-scaled fish. The ones Welikro caught at the reeds were mostly palm-sized white-scaled fish.
They wanted to throw them away, but Claude said he wanted them, so they left them in the living water cabin and brought them back.
"They brought them over?
What did he give you? "Claude asked.
His mother replied that there were beef, mutton, three longtail swordfish and a duck. The rest were small fish like the white-scaled fish.
It seemed that the egrets and other fish were sold by Borkal. The beef and mutton were the leftover ingredients. Since he bought them on his own, it was only normal for them to bring back the leftovers.
"I wanted the white-scaled fish," Claude said.
"This fish tastes really good when deep-fried. The bones are crispy and you don't have to worry about getting pierced.
You don't even have to scrape the scales. You just have to remove the innards from the belly and wrap them in bread crumbs. You can fry them until they're golden brown. "
His mother didn't say anything. She knew that if Claude said it was delicious, it would definitely be delicious. So, she grabbed Angelina to help clean up the white-scaled fish. Not long after, the smell of fried fish wafted from the kitchen.
Unlike those families that were reluctant to use oil, Claude had once fried half a pot of potato chips for Angelina and Blok as snacks.
He wanted to deep-fry them, but he failed and ended up with long, sticky dough.
Angelina and Borkal ate them all, though. Claude was even reprimanded by his mother for wasting oil.
Still smoking, Morssen asked about the details of the kill of the niros crocodile.
Compared to what Borkal and Eriksson told him, Claude's narration was much more boring.
He had only briefly described the battle with the giant crocodile, but Morssen could still hear the risks involved.
It wasn't that Claude and the others didn't want to run, but the boat couldn't outrun the reeds. They could only watch helplessly as the crocodile swam towards them and pounced on them. They had no choice but to fight it to the death. Fortunately, the crocodile was stuck in a hole in the side of the boat, giving Claude the chance to land a killing blow.
Mr. Morssen shuddered again at the thought of the broken starboard side of the little fishing-boat which was later hauled up to the wharf. He had nearly lost his second son.
He put down his pipe and made his decision. He sternly told Claude that from now on, he wasn't allowed to venture into dangerous areas with his companions anymore.
He could go to the outskirts of town to hunt for rabbits and pheasants, but he wasn't allowed to go to Egret or Swamp Kemda to hunt anymore.
Every time, he would run into danger and his family would be filled with lingering fear.
Claude had no choice but to nod in agreement. At the very least, he wouldn't be able to go out to play before his left leg healed.
His mother served them a plate of fried whitefish. She had a fish in her mouth. His siblings were eating it with oil all over their mouths.
"It's delicious. Big bro's cooking is delicious," said the boy.
The little snow hound beside him stood up and clawed at his clothes, wanting to taste the fish as well. However, the little fat boy raised the fish in his hand high after taking a bite, not letting the little snow hound eat it. The little snow hound was so anxious that it whimpered.
His mother knocked him on the head and snapped, "Mommy's the one who fried the fish. Your brother's just saying it."
Angelina broke the fish in her hand into two and gave the snowhound the head. Only when the snowhound had something to eat did it let go of Claude.
Morssen ate a piece of the fish and said, "There's too much oil, but it tastes alright."
Claude stopped eating after two pieces of fish. He bade everyone goodnight and prepared to return to his attic.
Morssen asked, "Do you need help?"
Claude shook his head. "No need. I can go up alone."
Under everyone's watchful eyes, Claude held onto the railing and hopped up step by step with his right foot.
After washing up in the bathroom on the second floor, Claude hopped back to his attic and lay down on his bed before heaving a sigh of relief.
He wanted to train in Hexagram Meditation, but the pain from his left ankle made it difficult for him to focus. In the end, he fell into a deep slumber in his half-awake state.
The next morning, he hopped down the stairs as well. During breakfast, Morssen said that he would send Claude to school after breakfast. He brought a carriage from the town hall and prepared a pair of crutches for Claude.
Claude despaired. He had wanted to use his injury as an excuse to stay at home for a while, but he didn't expect Morssen to be so well-prepared.
Faced with his father's love for his son, he could only express his gratitude with tears in his eyes.