He looked around his corner of the street frantically, immersed in a cold sweat. The previous night had not been a good one. Every hour or so, Adanis would wake up just like that, heart racing, nervous about the events that would happen in the next few hours. But this time, he did not go back to sleep. Instead, Adanis stood up, careful not to wake anybody, went to his pack to check if everything was in place. He was sure it was. During the past four hours, he must have checked 8 times. Map? Check. Canteen? Check. Compass? Check. Telescope? Check. Money? Check. Mule? Adanis looked over his left shoulder, and saw the plump quadruped still sleeping on the bare ground. Check. Content, Adanis sighed and leaned against the wall. For a few minutes, he just sat there, and stared into nothingness. He stared, and stared, until he noticed that the dawn was breaking. “Great,” he thought, “Now I can go grab something to eat.” Instinct forced him to look through the streets for any stray morsels, but this time, he did otherwise. Instead, he walked straight to Midas the butcher’s shop, the fanciest place in Palm.

As he walked into the clay doorway, Adanis felt severely out of place. Here he was, dressed in rags, in a place Palm’s affluent visited. His anti-climactic presence was accented by Midas’s harsh greeting, which consisted of, “Adanis? What’s a beggar like you doing in my shop?” “Looking around.” “Looking around for what? Scraps?” “No actually,” said Adanis coolly, “I would like to purchase a meal.” “What can a beggar like you afford to buy from my shop? The pig food I feed to the hogs?” “What’s the priciest meat you offer?” “The upper tenderloin. In this resteraunt, I cook it to perfection. Of course, a beggar like you couldn’t possibly afford this mea-.” Before he could finish, Adanis slammed 25 gold pieces onto the table. To tell the truth, he felt quite satisfied with the loud, ka-ching the gold made. Midas’s eyes widened like eggs. “Where’d you get that kind of money, son?” “It’s none of your business,” Adanis replied coldly, “Get to work.” Midas grunted, as if in protest, and started to chop up parts of the tenderloin. Adanis moved to a table and waited for what seemed like forever. He had never had a decent meal before in his lifetime. When the plate was set before him, Adanis could not believe what he saw, for he saw perfection. He smelled perfection.