We spent the rest of the day moving away from the centaur-territory, slowly creeping through the forest. It would have been faster if we had taken the old imperial road but we were not quite ready to do that, the chance that a centaur-group might use it to catch us too high for us to risk it. We might have been able to beat whatever the centaurs could have thrown at us on short notice but I wasn’t fond of the word “might” in that sentence. I had no doubt that, if the centaurs had shifted the right beings, maybe anticipating that we had fled in this direction they could take us down, similarly it was easily in the realm of possibility that they were stationing strong groups, tasked with protecting their interests if push came to shove, in border-towns like the one we had left earlier.

I just didn’t know.

And ultimately, it didn’t matter, we had more than enough time to get where we wanted to go in the time the Beta would continue, especially now that we were leaving the frozen north and slowly getting into the area that would be considered Europe on Earth. Sure, here on Mundus the names were different but as I had yet to see a really good world map, I simply used Earth as a reference, even if it wasn’t accurate. Humorously, it was more accurate than the maps I had seen so far, at least for the area we were in. If we were in Africa - Daiea to the locals - or South America - Arbortoma, things would be different, the change in coastlines big enough to throw everything off. It would be interesting once we actually got closer to our objective, the southern part of Arbortoma, to actually find the Nexus we were after. Realistically speaking, I was hunting for a very cold El Dorado, with the idea to break the prison made by a God.

If I put it in those terms, it sounded insane. But also fun and a challenge worthy to write a legend about, whether I would succeed or not.

But all those considerations were for the future, for now, I was moving behind Sigmir while conversing with Lenore what we could do about the trouble we had earlier. She thought the idea to get the information to the Grandmother was hilarious, even if nothing came off it. On the other hand, we had heard, from multiple sources, that the Grandmother had meddled with affairs in the past so she might meddle again. And that was something I would want to see, preferably with popcorn. I might be able to get a small glimpse of what was possible at the highest levels of Magic, a question that made me curious what came after the Elemental Magic skills, what would happen once I managed to max my Ice Magic Skill for example. It wasn’t that far off, even with the glacial, pun fully intended, pace the skill had been rising lately.

Another topic we discussed was how we could protect us from attacks like the one we had suffered earlier, for now, we had done something similar to the filter we had placed over her Hallow, keeping the Ice-Elemental Power out of it, so she wasn’t cold in there. But instead filtering, I had been using one of the mental processes I had gained due to the increase in Intuition to constantly keep a concealment-rune in mind, not quite using a cloak of shadows but trying to combine it with my Astral Meditation skill to hide myself in relation to the Astral River.

Of course, I had no idea if it was actually working or if there was another reason why the attack hadn’t resumed, maybe due to the backlash or the focus or something else, I just couldn’t know. And that didn’t make me happy, just like I wasn’t happy about having to constantly use a mental process.

In the evening, deep in the forest, Adra found a small stream, just deep enough to wade into and bathe and we decided to make camp there. The stream showed me once again just how convenient my affinity for Ice-Magic and the resistance to the effects of cold I was enjoying due to it.

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For Adra and Rai, the stream was uncomfortable cold, causing them to rush in, quickly wash off while I was cooking before hurrying back to the fire, in hopes of getting warm. That they shared a blanket, wrapping it around the two of them in addition to their cloaks was certainly just done in the interest of warmth and nothing else.

Granted, the stream looked quite a bit bigger than its bed would normally suggest, giving me the impression that there was quite a bit of recently thawed snow that was adding to the water, making it about as cold as water cold be while remaining liquid.

Compared to the two of them, Sigmir had some resistance to the cold, thanks to her bond with Ylva. That meant, while I left the two shivering snuggle-bunnies watch the food, I made sure that nothing snuck up on her while she was washing up. I may have neglected my duty, not warning her of a certain Firnelf that was sneaking up on her but she didn’t complain when I helped her wash up. I certainly enjoyed.

I didn’t ask her to return the favour, noticing that she was getting gooseflesh from the cold, which looked incredibly cute due to the amount of body-hair she had. She was, in my eyes, the perfect embodiment of strength, primal and passionate, even if that primality, if that was a word, sometimes clashed with modern beauty-standards. Luckily, I didn’t have to care on Mundus, there was no modern here. There might be a few questions once we got into more populated areas, not that I cared.

With a gentle pat on her gorgeous behind, I sent her to the others, asking her to call me once dinner was ready, before returning to my thoughts, sitting in the water as if it was a hot spring. I needed to use a little magic to keep the chill at bay, or rather, to allow me to ignore the chill but it was merely a trickle, just enough to bolster the amount of Ice Astral Power flowing through my body.

As I sat there, I realised that there would be questions anyway, just because I was having a relationship with what most people would call a computer-program. Some might call it strange, a fetish or some sort of mastubatory fantasy, as if Sigmir was merely an advanced porno for me, but I knew, somewhere deep inside me, that that wasn’t the case. At least I thought I knew, it wasn’t like I could empirically measure my feelings. Or compare them to anything I had felt before.

In a way, I knew, at least intellectually, that the capsule had some way to transform experiences into feelings that would normally be outside of my reach. And going by past experiences, as well as what I had been told by professionals over the years, I knew that I couldn’t experience the feelings I was experiencing. Which made no sense, causing me to question my subjective reality, the processes involved in Road to Purgatory and, at times, my feelings.

But, all those considerations, ended at a simple realisation: I wasn’t willing to give up the feelings I was experiencing, even if they were only due to the capsule. There was the possibility that, somehow, the process used by the capsule to allow me to experience Mundus through the filter of my Avatar allowed me to experience feelings as a normal person would. It was my current hypothesis and if it was the case, the capsules would be a tremendous boon to people like me, who normally had problems to relate to the feelings of other people and who experienced feelings atypically. At least that was the word a professional had used with me once. Sounded better like psychopath, it wasn’t as loaded with images of fava-beans and chianti.

Knowing that my pondering was going nowhere, as it always did, I made sure that I was clean before getting up. Walking out of the stream, quite a bit after the others, I used a trickle of Ice-Magic to freeze the water on my skin, casually flicking the created diamond dust away from me. As I walked, I realised that I would be in for a world of pain further south, especially once summer was here. I would have to come up with a solution, hopefully before I was toast. I had a feeling that, if I ever got a little to much sun, I would burn like a vampire from a bad horror-movie.

Dinner was quite tasty, the new supplies combining with some of the meat we were still carrying, kept in cold-storage courtesy of my Ice-Magic, made for tasty stew, the others grateful to warm up from the inside.

Finally, after dinner, it was time for me to work my magic. I had a few projects to tackle and all of them were interesting.