The next morning we gathered together for a long breakfast in the cabin before we left to head deeper into the forest. I sat quietly beside Gabrielle and Aaron as we helped prepare breakfast until everyone arrived.

“Morning, everyone,” John said to a fairly cold reception. “I’m sorry for dragging all of you out here for this expedition, somewhat unknowingly,” he grinned weakly towards the group. “Although, I gave both teams knowledge of the F-rank awakened that we’ve hunted for a much greater reward than the dungeons in the bloodfields. I’m just asking you to trust me on the next step, I know there’s something out there past these forests.”

“I’m grateful for the knowledge of the F-rank awakened you shared with my team, and it’s the main reason I’m trusting you enough to stay,” Gary said with a sigh. I nodded slowly; ever since John had talked about the edges of Satar I felt drawn to seeing what was past the bloodfields. I tried not to let it affect me when our team discussed the decision to move on last night, but I was interested.

“It’s fine, if we don’t find anything after a few days we’ll just head back and keep hunting for the clearings,” Gabrielle responded. Although we were willing to go with John for a few days since we had left with a month's worth of rations, we wouldn’t spend too long searching if we didn’t find anything. I ate a small breakfast of oats and dried fruits with everyone else and then packed up. We formed up in a closer formation when we set out towards the other end of the clearing, with both teams only a few meters apart. The next few hours passed without any surprises as we traveled through the dense forest without coming across any patrols.

“The trees are clearing up,” Zack noted from beside me and I nodded in reply as I scanned the area ahead of us. The dark red trees slowly shifted from densely packed to sparse within the next couple of hours as we hiked further away from Gorok. I was surprised we hadn’t seen any monsters at all once we passed the clearing, and I was doubting John’s idea more as the day went on.

“Heightened Senses,” Aaron cast a while later. There was a small mountain range that we could finally see through the tall trees of the bloodfields. “I can’t see anything on it, but we’re very far away.” The mountains spanned as far as I could see in front of me and the base was probably around fifteen miles away from us.

“Amazing, we can reach the base of the mountains tomorrow,” John grinned and looked excited, but the rest of his team didn’t look impressed. I glanced around and saw Aaron examining the mountain intensely while everyone else gathered up to discuss our plan.

“I thought I saw something moving, but it’s too far. It might have been my eyes playing a trick on me,” Aaron said after he noticed me watching him. He shook his head and turned to walk towards the rest of our two teams.

“What does everyone think about heading halfway to the mountain today. We can finish the last few miles tomorrow morning and see what's waiting for us while we’re still fresh,” John suggested. I glanced at the sun and judged we had another two or three hours of sunlight left. I shrugged indifferently, we could probably make it to the base of the mountains today if we set a quick pace.

“All right, sounds fine to me,” Gary responded and both teams set out towards the mountain range in the distance. The rest of the hike passed quickly and a few hours later we were all resting beside a stream we had found while searching for a good place to stop.

“Heightened Senses,” Aaron cast again from beside me as we sat eating. He had been casting the skill repeatedly since we had seen the mountains and I waited as he studied the mountain in the fading sunlight.

“There’s fire up there, in a few different spots that I can see. I think I see movement, too,” Aaron stated loudly enough for everyone to hear him. I grinned and looked around to see everyone staring at Aaron. “That’s all I can see.”

“It must be all Awakened out here unless there are different dungeons in the mountains,” John said.

“They could be anything, tomorrow we need to be careful. Mountains seem like easy places to get ambushed…” Gabrielle trailed off as she frowned worriedly at the mountains slowly fading from view.

“We’ll keep both teams close like we did today, moving forward,” Gary said firmly and John nodded in reply. “I don’t want anyone scouting ahead once we reach the mountains, we stay together as we move.”

I spent the rest of the night chatting with Zack about his new armor and how the weight was affecting him. With two passives that leveled his strength and his larger frame he almost didn’t notice the heavier metal. He complimented me on my better use of Entangle and we planned some additional techniques we could use together in different situations as we passed the first watch. While we were out past the bloodfields we agreed to keep two on watch at all times to make sure we stayed safe. Neither of us saw anything during our watch and a couple of hours later we woke Gabrielle and Aaron and headed to sleep.

I woke up feeling refreshed and I joined the rest of the group for a quick breakfast while we watched the sunrise past the mountains. Everyone wanted to get moving so we ate quickly and packed our gear before we head off into formation. Two hours passed before we reached the base of the mountain, and we hadn’t seen anything during that time. Once we got close enough we turned slightly to head towards an area where there was a gentle slope leading up, rather than the cliffs that blocked most other areas. We carefully made our way up the path as we inspected around us and we hiked slowly for a couple of hours along the rocky mountain path. As we walked I started to feel an odd sensation from the air all around me and I glanced around to see if anyone else noticed anything as I slowed to a stop.

Stolen novel; please report.

“Does anyone feel that?” I asked while I frowned at the air around me. I felt almost a light pressure from everywhere around me and as I studied the feeling I realized that it felt incredible.

“It’s Essence, in the air around us!” Gabrielle shouted and I looked around to see everyone peering around in confusion. I closed my eyes and focused on my core of Essence as I ignored everyone around me. It felt like my core was surrounded by essence just waiting to rush back in and I realized my regeneration would be massively increased while we were here on these mountains. Gabrielle grinned at me once I explained what I thought and I laughed at the excited expression on her face. No one had any ideas what was causing the Essence to gather around us and we eventually continued along the path.

“Stop,” Aaron spoke in a sharp whisper and everyone grew still.

“Heightened Senses,” Aaron cast and looked past the ridge we had just crested. The path led back down for another half a mile before I lost sight of the path in the mountains ahead of us. “There are people down there,” he pointed into the distance and I squinted as I tried to focus on what he was pointing at. “There’s a large cave along the mountain there, I see people going in and out of it.”

“Are they hobgoblins?” Gary asked. I could only see the cliff face where Aaron had pointed and I gave up to look back at him. Everyone from both teams was standing around listening.

“I can’t tell, I can just see specks moving around the cave from here,” he responded and I sighed. We would have to leave the path to head in that direction, and travel over the rougher terrain to reach the area, but I was ready to see what lived up here, outside of Satar. We took a short break to eat some dried jerky and hydrate before we set off along the mountainside. Another hour passed before we reached another crest in the mountain and I could see the cave ahead of us. I crouched down immediately once I saw how close we were and both groups stopped as they reached me. I studied the massive cave that had to reach hundreds of meters into the air with some shock before I looked at the creatures at the entrance.

“They’re fighting each other,” Zack whispered loudly and I nodded dumbly as I stared at the odd sight. Large grey creatures fought with clubs in the clear area outside of the cave. Their skin looked almost like a stone from the distance and they had to be three meters tall at least.

“Trolls, I think,” George said after a minute. “What do we do?”

“Well, we’re not fighting all of them at once. Let’s move back,” Gary ordered after George’s comment. I followed him as he led us a few hundred meters away to an overhang we’d passed earlier. We all gathered up once we were hidden from most directions and I looked to Gary to see what he planned.

“I saw fourteen of them out there, most of them fighting each other. I saw another two of them walking towards the cave from further along the mountain past the trolls.” Aaron said before Gary could speak up.

“Well, that changes things,” John said with a relieved sigh. “We have no chance of fighting that group by the cave. Two trolls should be possible for both of our teams together,’ he looked around to gauge our reactions and I looked down worriedly. Those monsters looked to be about meters tall and I was worried what would happen if one of them was able to hit anyone. Maybe it would be better to return to the Bloodfields and stick with the safer option, for once. On the other hand, the increased Essence out here would let me level my skills much faster than before. I cast Thornbolt as we hiked earlier to test how much faster my Essence regenerated and was shocked to see that it was twice as fast. I guessed that I could recover my full core of Essence after twenty minutes out here, compared to just under forty everywhere else.

I settled back as both teams began discussing whether or not we wanted to move forwards as I decided to trust Gary's decision. He hadn’t led us poorly so far and I felt confident he would make the right decision.

“We’ll take a long route along the ridge and wait on the other side of the cave to see where the patrols go. If there’s an area where we can ambush them outside of sight of the other trolls, we’ll take them out,” Gary finally decided after everyone talked. No one else had anything to say about the plan and we quickly set to it as we backtracked another mile to get further out of view of the cave. We continued along the other side of the ridge as we made our way to the far side of the cave where we had seen the patrol walking earlier.

“Here’s a good spot,” Aaron suggested as we hiked beside a massive rock overhang. I glanced around the rock and saw there was enough room behind it to hide all ten of us easily. “We can hide here while we wait for another patrol to head this direction, they won’t be able to see us from any direction, even if they send a larger group.” We had planned to go further, but the sun was only two or three hours from setting, and we had yet to see any more trolls as we hiked along the base of the mountain cliffs.

“Good plan, Aaron,” Gary complimented as we stopped behind the rocks. “We can set up a strong ambush from here, can you find a good spot to watch the area?” Aaron nodded and both groups dropped our packs down to rest while we had a chance. Aaron stayed seated on top of the rock formation a few meters away from us and I focused on thinking how I’d fight a monster that large. Time slowly passed and eventually, watches were set as no trolls appeared and the sun steadily set behind the mountains. I settled into sleep, excited for tomorrow and interested by the strange Essence in the air of the mountains.