The trip back to Schwarzenbruck was not much more challenging than the trip to the barrows had been. It was a few days longer because Simon chose to stay off the main road as much as possible. Both the rugged terrain and the extra days on the trail meant that he encountered more zombies than he otherwise would have, of course, but he didn’t mind that. They were only a nuisance when found in ones and twos, and every time he killed one, he freed some tormented soul.

At this point, almost all the zombies he killed had the look of tradesmen or mercenaries, which explained where all the disrupted traffic had come from. Once, he even found an overturned wagon that contained a variety of now-spoiled spices and bolts of beautifully dyed fabric. Simon probably could have sold it for a few coins, but he didn’t feel like the hassle. Between his pilfered grave goods and the coin purses of dead men, he had more money than he’d need for a long time.

Despite his circuitous route, he made it back to the city in less than a week to find that the only undead that were assaulting it were the ones that were whispered about in rumors. While there was no evidence that a single one had been seen inside the city, the guards were out in force looking for anyone who seemed unwell, and everyone traded stories fearfully about what was to come.

Of course, Simon was unconcerned. Instead, he went to a different inn on the far side of town and treated himself to a real meal to reward himself for enduring his mediocre attempts at campfire cooking and day after day of cold hardtack. He had a roast chicken to himself, and then after he was finished gnawing the bones clean, he had a few drinks while he caught up on the rumors.

It was just as he’d heard whispered in the streets. People were afraid, but the story of the Butcher’s Bill was the one he heard the most. That made sense. The prospect of a large mercenary company traveling north but coming back with only a few survivors could be a shocking thing. Simon wasn’t about to explain to him why the majority of those people had died, of course.

He just listened and gave the same nonanswers as everyone else between questions. Especially when they mentioned what a hero Kell was. There, he bit his tongue, trying to decide if it was worse that Kell would be remembered as a hero, or that last time it was Simon who had been remembered as the villain. In the end, he decided to leave it alone.

There were no rumors of conditions further to the south, though whether that was because people were so captivated by what was happening to the north or because there was simply nothing brewing, he couldn’t say. It honestly could have been either. Whole wars could be happening, and no one would notice, but Simon couldn’t exactly blame them for that.

Instead, he just enjoyed a good night’s sleep in a soft bed, and the next day, after he refreshed his supplies and bought some paper to continue his mapping project, he started south. Given the distances he was going to have to travel, a horse was probably the right answer, but neither his weight nor his endurance was where he wanted it to be, so he decided that he was going to walk instead, at least for the first part of the journey.

Given how rough the roads were in places, it was clear that was the right move. The gap in trade caused by this disruption was clearly taking its toll on the lonely dirt road that snaked through the claustrophobic forest that was a dense mixture of pine and fir trees as well as oak and ash. It was clear that trying to keep the road open through such lonely terrain was a full-time job when he noticed a few saplings growing in the road at various intervals.

Technically, he’d been through here when he was a zombie, but he didn’t remember any of it. From that terrible experience, though, he knew that somewhere beyond the trees lay more farmland, and after a few days, he reached it. What followed were a series of inns and villages as he made his way south and east. The countryside blurred together a bit after that.

Some days, it rained, but most of the time, it was sunny, and though much of the Northlands seemed poor compared to places he’d seen further south, they were mostly nice to him. When he stopped to ask for directions, people answered his questions without too much of an attitude, and in places where there were no inns, farmers were happy enough to bring him a meal in the barn for a few coppers, even if they eyed his weapons suspiciously.

I spent what… two weeks… No, almost three north of the Black River Bridge, he corrected himself as he reviewed his progress one night over a bowl of cheap stew that only tasted a little sour. Then, it was a week through the woods and another three weeks through civilized lands.

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As he walked through his progress, he reviewed his map, counting dots, making them both a measure of distance and time. He’d been on the road for almost two months. He’d found half a dozen villages and a handful of larger towns. His map was also speckled with the approximate locations of villages and landmarks that were described by people that he hadn’t personally visited. He was still looking for a number of levels, like the demonic church, but so far, he hadn’t found one.

There were any number of other locations, though. There was even the distant capital city of Liepzen, not so far away. It was still over a week away by foot, maybe even two. He was tempted to stop there and check it out, but it was a distraction to his main mission. No matter how much he might want to make random side trips while he was in the area, he needed to get to Ionar.

Despite his careful tracking, though, it still surprised him when he went into an inn that seemed to be vaguely familiar, only to find an all too familiar face standing behind the bar. She looked at him a moment and frowned before she made change and told him which room it was he’d be staying in. Simon had forgotten a lot of things during his travels, but he would never forget a woman who had killed him.

That was only then that he realized how far he’d come. He was in Wellingbrooke, which felt like the crossroads to half of his adventures with a murderous old woman who could see things, including the darkness in his aura.

He still wasn’t sure what that meant, though, but it was clear that it wasn’t as sinister as it once was. After all, the last few times he’d come through, she looked at him like he was the devil, and this time she merely looked at him like he was just a piece of shit, which, in some contexts, he probably was.

Ethically or spiritually, though? At this point in his life, with the exception of the occasional grave robbing or revenge killing of someone who really deserved it, he always tried to do the right thing.

That night, after Simon had eaten and shared his news about the roads to the north of Wellingbrooke with the locals, he went to his room. There, he wedged a dagger in the door frame of his room just in case the proprietor changed her mind about him, and then, in that dark room, he produced his mirror and decided it was long past time to have a very specific conversation with it.

“Mirror, show me my experience total please,” Simon said. The mirror would fit any amount of writing he requested on the small surface, but if he asked for too much, the spirit that controlled all of this would shrink it down so that it was utterly unreadable. So, rather than ask for his whole sheet, he asked only for the relevant bit.

‘Experience Points: -748,292,’ the mirror typed out promptly.

“That’s… that’s a big change,” he said, looking at the number. It had dropped at least a hundred thousand since he’d last reviewed it, and probably more like a hundred and fifty thousand. He was pretty sure he didn’t even bother to look at his character sheet after his last death, but the one before that, well, he wasn’t sure about that either. It had either been two or three deaths since he’d last checked,

Even if it was a big change though, there were really only a few places he could have shed that many negative points. He’d spent a lot of time healing the sick in Abrese and even more time fighting a war against the centaurs around Crowvar. He’d gotten a lot of satisfaction from both of those, but he’d also helped a lot of people.

Even after all this time, he wasn’t sure if the number had more to do with the effect his action had or how he felt about it. “If I stab Varten to death, does that number go up or down?” he wondered aloud.

‘I do not know the answer to that question,’ the mirror typed, making the other data fade away.

Simon shook his head, completely unsurprised that was what the thing had done. That was what it always did. It was so literal that it was barely a step above the computer-style interface it very clearly had.

“That’s fine,” Simon said. “I don’t need you to tell me. I’m going to find out for myself.”

He put away the mirror and got ready for bed, but his mind was already racing. Not even the vague worry that an old woman might try to kill him again in the middle of the night was enough to dull that excitement.

Simon had explored the magic system of the Pit extensively. He focused on certain skills to try to improve them enough for the value on his character sheet to click over from fair to good or from good to great, as if it mattered at all in the grand scheme of things. The one thing he hadn’t done, though, was to try to understand that mysterious experience number.

So, that’s what he spent the next several days doing. Taking some of his precious paper, he kept a small journal. Every day, he’d write the starting number when he woke up, and then in the evening, he’d write the ending number and list a few of the things he’d done that day. Sometimes, it was ‘had a good dinner,’ and other times, it was ‘slept in the rain.’

Slowly but surely, patterns started to emerge. For starters, except on his most miserable days, he seemed to gain at least ten points. Simply existing and leading a normal life seemed to heal whatever karmic wounds he’d caused to himself. On better days, though, he could get twenty or even thirty points. Helping people seemed to spike that number, but so did simply having a nice day.

It was hard to say for sure one way or the other when the world seemed content enough to leave him in peace. That was when he arrived in Slany.