Chapter 367: Chapter 329 – Butchery at Sea

“Hunting large creatures at sea often meant having to butcher them right then and there as well. While some powerful monsters had vitalities that would have preserved their carcasses for weeks or more, most creatures lack such a thing, and the deeper regions of the seas they lived in meant dragging the carcasses to land was rarely a possible option due to the lack of time.

 

As such, people who hunt such beasts on the regular were often skilled in processing the carcassed right where they were slain, butchering it while they raced against time, for such carcasses almost always attracted large amounts of predatory creatures to it.” - From a lecture by Garth Wainwrought, Dean of the Levain Institute of Higher Learning, circa 684 FP.

“You’re butchering it on the spot?” asked Cal with some fascination to the ship’s first mate, a burly therian man with alligator-like features and rough, scaly skin. He directed the crew members as they did their work, but most of the ones who actually did the work were smaller, nimbler sailors instead.

 

“Oh? Yes, Miss. Kinda have to, otherwise the whole thing would just sink to the bottom of the ocean,” said the therian man after he processed her question for a moment. The ship had pulled the carcass in, and it was wedged right between the two hulls at the moment, where more ropes and cords were used to secure it in place for the time being. “That’d be a massive waste of materials, and we’ve long learned never to waste anything.”

 

Despite the massive bulk of the carcass, the ship easily remained afloat even while it supported the whole thing, as it only slightly dipped further towards the waterline. The ship was much larger than the carcass after all, and the construction made it extremely buoyant for a vessel of its size, which made holding the multi-ton carcass afloat a minor issue.

 

Many of the smaller sailors who resembled bipedal lizards nimbly walked across the suspended ropes as easily as walking on flat ground, They also climbed the slippery mass of the carcass with ease, at times on all fours, as they worked on it with various tools.

 

Cal quickly understood why the work was mostly done by those crewmembers, as the larger therians amongst the crew would have had a hard time just getting to the carcass itself, much less keeping themselves stable on the slippery mass. The smaller lizard-like people on the other hand seemed to have feet that stuck to whatever they stood on like an adhesive.

 

The crew worked fast, and within an hour, several of the smaller crew members walked back towards the left hull of the ship, as they dragged a rope connected to a strip of the beast’s thick, blubbery skin that they had worked to free from its flesh. The rope was then handed to the larger sailors who had gathered, and they hooked it over one of the larger masts, grabbed it together and began to reel it in.

 

It was a sight to see the carcass spin around in the water as its skin was stripped from it like the peel of a fruit. The process was repeated several times, and before too long, there were multiple bloody strips of blubber and skin hanging from the mast, while the carcass of the behemoth was skinned all the way to its tail, with only its tailfin left unbothered.

 

Said tailfin was entirely chopped off its butchered form and hauled over to the right hull, where some of the rodent-like sailors worked to further butcher it and chop it into smaller pieces that were then stuffed into storages or barrels where they would be preserved and stored below the decks.

 

Meanwhile, the blubber was cut from the strips of leathery skin and also stored into barrels. The first mate explained to Cal that they would later be turned into precious oil, the sort that was used in various expensive goods and were prized by even nobles.

 

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Massive cuts of the behemoth’s flesh were brought on board the vessel as well, most to be preserved for later usage. The blood that spilled during the butchery had already spilled the sea red by then, and attracted various marine predators that took bites from the submerged underside of the carcass.

 

It was a race against time to harvest what they could from the beast. The crew carved off as much meat as they could from the topside of the carcass, while one group dug deeper. An unpleasant stench reeked out when they dug into the intestines of the beast, but after a while, they returned back out, and deposited lumps of greyish, rock-like objects that gave off a faint fragrance under the fecal stench.

 

“What are those… things?” asked Cal with curiosity.

 

“We’re not completely sure either. They’re some sort of buildup that formed in the beasts’ intestines when they ate things that disagreed with them,” explained the first mate with a shrug of his wide shoulders. “I guess some considered it poop since it was taken from where shit was stored in the beast.”

 

“And why would you dig out… the poop then?”

 

“That thing’s got a lot of uses in alchemy and medicine. The foreigners consider it worth its weight in gold,” said the therian man with a grin that split his large snout into a maw that displayed rows of dagger-like fangs. Then his look turned somewhat odd as he thought further. “I’m not sure if it’s true or not, but I heard they also make fragrances and perfumes out of it.”

 

“No shit?”

 

“That’s what I heard from some trader friends of mine, at least. Sounds weird as fuck to make perfumes out of poop of all things, but who’s to say what them northerners had in mind?” he explained. “I even heard stories that some used it as spices, though that’s probably a tall tale made as a joke.”

 

“Maybe… you never know. Some people might actually season their food with shit for all we know.”

 

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