Working ... for the city



Later that evening, after dinner, Ashitaka sat down to San with a serious expression and said:
"I need to talk to you about something San."
He sounded a little embarrassed, but when she looked at him curiously, he continued:
"You know, everyone works here in the city, some dismantle iron, others work on the bellows, still others transport rice and iron with the oxen, or guard the city."
"Why is he telling me that, I already know everything."
San thought.
"Unless ... he means that ..."
"I also work, I mine iron and you ..."
He sounded even more embarrassed now, and after a short pause during which they heard people walking around outside and talking, San said:
"Do you think I should work too?"
"Yes ... I mean, in principle I don't care, but I think people are more likely to accept you if you don't work, they think you're too proud or too lazy."
She thought for a moment and when she smiled, Ashitaka knew that she had understood him.In the meantime it was getting late and so they laid down Ashitaka's bed, which he had enlarged that day, and soon fell asleep.

When San woke up the next morning, she immediately wanted to wake Ashitaka. She turned sideways and:
"Ashit- ... He's not there!"
She thought, where had Ashitaka gone? If he had something important to do, he would have woken her up. Then tell her:
"We talked about work yesterday, he probably went to work. What should I do now when Ashitaka is working? ... I'll look around town to see if I can find a job I can help with."
So a few minutes later she left the hut and headed for the city center, but she had barely taken a few steps when she heard someone call out:
"Hello San! Where are you going?"
Toki had seen her and called to her, San went on with Toki and told her what she was up to.
"You can come with me, now I'm going to work on the bellows."Toki meant. San thought for a moment:
"Something better could hardly have happened to me, so I could get to work without embarrassing questions."
Well, I'll come with you. "
Then she said to Toki, meanwhile they were there and went inside.

First, Toki introduced San, and then they started work. While the bellows gasped and the melt hissed a little further, they talked as they worked:
"Do I actually know why Ashitaka came here originally?"
San asked, most of them said no.
"He wanted to ask the forest god to heal him from Nago's curse."
"Nago's curse?
One of the women wanted to know.
"Oh yes ... you probably don't know that at all."
San meant.
"Well, Nago was shot by Eboshi while fighting the wild boars, the shot turned him into a demon who attacked Ashitaka's village. When Ashitaka fought him to protect the village, Nago's curse hit him."
And so, while they worked, they kept talking all the time.When Ashitaka came back to his hut in the evening, San wasn't there, but that didn't surprise him.
"She's probably still working on the bellows."
He thought Kohroku had told him that that morning he saw Toki and San walking in that direction together. A few minutes later, San came over and they talked about their first day of work in town:
"I liked it a lot, the work was not exactly easy, but the fact that we had talked a lot meanwhile, I still had fun and also learned a lot."