Lennart was the lookout at the moment, though calling it a hearout would had been more accurate. He pushed his magic into his hearing, which was a bad idea unless you had a special spell inscribed to deal with the many downsides.

Because there was always something to hear, and if a gullible idiot would just used Body Enhancement or Sense Enhancement on their ears, the moment they tried to discern whether that strange sound was something strange or just the slightest of breezes, then someone whose steps you ignored before because you were so concentrated suddenly spoke to you, rupturing your eardrums, making your outer ears volcanoes which erupted blood. Lennart spoke from experience!

The problem remained unsolved for him, though. He tried a spell that would make him deaf to sounds of his choosing, but for that he had to designate every single voice. Then a spell that made him deaf to everything but what he wanted to hear, which caused big problems when he didn't hear a warning and was almost killed from a monster from behind.

Lennart was just a two-star magic-user, which was why he had to be very careful with the two spells he could learn and his affinity with enhancing his senses outweighed basically anything else. He wished he could use the captain's Lifeform Radar, but that was way out of his league, because the self-enhancement was just a small part of it, and the captain just forced it through his vast magical power.

Well, Lennart could learn it, but the area he could cover would only extend to his touching distance.

So a very unhappy Lennart occasionally used Enhance Senses on his ears, so that he had a chance to pick up voices in the mist. Or anything else that could be dangerous. There was a lot for a lookout to look out.

He heard a screech in the distance, almost blocked by the trees. It came from west, so on the opposite side of the forest, could it be one of these damned birds? After a moment of hesitation, he decided to focus his hearing on the direction, trying to pick up the sound of their wings, so he could follow.

No, not possible. He would have needed a hearing spell for that. He could only retreat between the trees for now, which would make it hard for the captain to find him, but Lennart decided that his safety was more important than to make it easier for a man close to madness to find him.

It was not that Lennart didn't like the captain, he was just being realistic and seeing things as what they were. That was his job, after all.

After some minutes of breathing as quietly as possible to not miss a thing, he could finally hear something. There were at least three birds in the beach area, but something was off, like the way they beat their wings... it was faster and stronger, so there were only two things that came into Lennart's mind: First, it was another kind of bird or second, it was the same, but it carried something.

The lookout decided to be not delusional and replaced the 'something' with 'someone', as the beasts would had been big enough to be ridden. He just hoped that these people were so savage, that they never found out how to use magic.

At least they did say something, but it was faint, even with his enhanced hearing. Even if it weren't, Lennart may not know the language, but everything just implied that these were humans or at least something close to it. Maybe elves or dwarves, this would certainly count as a seclusive area.

Nothing he could do here at the moment, so he decided to sneak back to the ship to report. This was important and being close to the monsters onboard would make him feel safe.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

After that short trip, the first mate furrowed her brows and Lennart wasn't able to tell if she were holding back another anger-tantrum or regrets that killing the messenger wasn't appropriate: “Anything else?”

“No, I was hurrying back as fast as I could,” while sneaking “and getting close to them seemed to be exactly the wrong move there. What can I do against these birds, after all?”

“You are right, maggot. Without someone there to seal the deal, distracting them by feeding yourself to them would do nothing.” That was a clear insult, but it was also the truth: “So we put your sole talent to use by sending you with Quartermaster Greggor later.”

“Send me... to do what?”

“To make contact with them and try to negotiate.”

“What!?”

“You may have noticed that we are neither pirates nor grave-robbers. What are our goals?”

“To become rich?”

“True enough for you scum, but what is the task?”

“Erm... to make maps?”

“Yes, to discover, explore, and chart. If there are people living here, we don't need to take their treasure, we only need them to allow us to stay long enough to satisfy the captain and so that we have at least a sea chart of this place with several pages of notes for future endeavors. I will look for the next good-for-nothing lookout, so swing your ass into a hammock and get some sleep, because we will work you to death!”

With her red, fiery hair and her pointy teeth, First Mate Scarlet certainly was frightening, and if she actually made such a dark promise, everyone would be shit-scared, and she had that dangerous gleam in her eyes that meant, that Lennart's only way to survive it was to heed to her order now.

After two hours of sleep, he was woken and the next thing he new, he stood in the middle of a group, containing from Quartermaster Greggor, Doctor Hank, the Mages Ocher and Indigo, himself, and three other men, which names he still hadn't bother to learn, as he was sure that half of the newbies would die on this trip. But in case of combat, these would provide additional blades and muscle.

“Come, Lennart,” Greggor said in his calm voice, and for a moment, Lennart just wanted to entrust himself to it, but he had still some questions.

“Why the doctor? Why two mages?” He himself had to be the lookout, the one who would notice the other people first and who would be able to look for their settlements the easiest. But bringing Hank and even two mages with them...

“In the past, it proved to be beneficial to bring medics to native tribes, as they often have problems with diseases and such. Ocher will support me with the negotiations, and Indigo in case things go wrong.”

Lennart didn't like Indigo much, she always looked fed up and distancing herself from the rest of the crew, so Lennart believed that she thought of herself as something better, which she had reason to, as she was a mage, after all.

Yet he would rather entrust his life to her than to Ocher, who was nice, but didn't seem as dependable. Whenever there was a fight, Indigo would take a lead-role there, so while Lennart didn't know which mage was how strong, he had always the impression of Indigo being the second-strongest after First Mate Scarlet.

However, in the best case there wouldn't be any fights, but food and dancing waiting for them. A celebration for the guest humans that arrived here and brought friendship and knowledge to that island.

...despite being a lookout, Lennart couldn't see that coming.