On the second day of their journey back towards the Lezatian Dukedom and Jacob couldn't help but think that this sort of thing felt way too long. One can never really appreciate the transportation of the modern world until it is taken away from them, their walk right now would probably only take an hour or so if they were riding a train and if they were to go by private jet, then it would be even shorter. Caravans and horses, people, walking- all of that is slow, and journeying for miles on that sort of thing can be pretty taxing both mentally and physically, personally, he didn't know what people usually do to stave off their boredom during times like these.

But even if his thoughts said otherwise, the warmth that he felt from drinking his own soup and eating jerky while everyone around him enjoyed themselves was pretty good. There was a sense of comradery here and it was something that Jacob couldn't help but notice.

Walking alongside each other and traveling for weeks at a time with nothing but each other's back probably required a lot of trust, and that amount is probably enough for the people to let their guard down enough that making friendships is pretty easy during times like these.

"Enjoying yourself?" Asya asked as she took a seat right next to him, on her hand was a bowl of food that was getting offered around camp. Jacob looked down at it and stared at the meaty soup full of vegetables, "it's stew." Asya answered a question that was never voiced, "And it tastes pretty good, you should try it."

Jacob waved his own food around, he too had his own soup, and on it are fish and vegetables he added as he was mixing the dried soup, watching the brownish water swirl inside the pot with nothing on top of it made him feel empty and ashamed at what he was about to eat so decided to add everything else, he did so out of principle and pride because he didn't want to be seen eating an empty bowl while everyone else was eating an actual stew.

And if anyone were to ask, then he wouldn't admit it, he'd probably say that it was planned from the beginning or something.

"Your loss." Asya said with a shrug as she gulped down another spoonful of food, "This is basically free food and it'll cut our costs."

"I have a lot of money right now." He replied with a wry smile, to which Asya simply rolled her eyes at. "So, ignoring that," Jacob started, "I'm curious about what you know about the history of the three kingdoms around us."

Asya gulped down the mouthful of food she was chewing, she wiped her cheek with a napkin that she pulled out from underneath her robe and stared at the sky, her eyes looked melancholic. "I know that it was one of the few things that are consistently taught in your world but..." she paused, "How do I say this... I don't think anyone is interested in the history of the world."

"But there are books written about it." Jacob replied.

"Yeah but those books are just records of some scribe, and writing things that happen is basically what they do all they so..." Asya replied, scoffing, "Duplicating the words written by some man before I was born is something that bored wizards usually do and they only because they have nothing better to do up in there towers other than read."

"I thought you'd say something like the wizards do it because they want to know about what happens to the world outside their towers," Jacob replied.

"That too, I guess." Asya grumbled, then she eyed him, "are you saying you're a [Wizard]?"

Jacob shook his head, "what? No." He denied, where did Asya even get that from? "I'm just saying that history can be pretty important,"

"How?" She asked and Jacob frowned.

How..? Well... at the top of his head history is important because... well, it's because- so that people can learn from their mistakes. "So that people can learn from their mistakes." He tried to sound casual as he replied, but the way Asya stared at him with an unimpressed look told him that she didn't catch on with the "casualness" of his tone. He decided to elaborate further, "but other than that... people also need to know about the records of a Kingdom for example, how things turned out, how things happened, what kind of things are happening during their time... you know, standard stuff?"

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Asya's unimpressed stare kept boring at him and Jacob can only scratch the back of his head and look away, "... I don't really know what I'm talking about." He admitted.

"You do." Kaxa came barreling in with his own bowl of stew and sat right next to Jacob, "Asya," Kaxa nodded at the girl sitting right next to Jacob, then turned his head to him and did the same, "Jacob,"

"It's weird that you're calling me by my first name," Asya said with narrowed eyes, "what brought that on, I wonder?"

"Well you said it yourself." Was the knight's reply.

Asya groaned, "maybe I did." She turned her eyes to the ground, frowning, she looked up at Jacob, "I did, didn't I?"

"I dunno." He replied, "But I'm pretty interested about why they need to call you other than your first name." He added, "I don't really want to keep mine, but if I have to, then I'm probably gonna toss it around."

"My last name..." Asya murmured before her eyes suddenly regained their lost clarity and they snapped open in panic, she whipped her head to look at Jacob, "Forget about what I said just now."

"Sure." He nodded, smiling to keep the guard down of who the hell was responsible for causing Asya to act like that. He tried his best to keep his eyes away from the stew but looking at Kaxa, the knight looked fine as he chewed the vegetables and drank the soup so he doubts that it was the stew that caused Asya to act that way. But it's probably still better if he keeps his guard up.

After a quick inspection of the camp, he found nothing suspicious happening on the surface and because he didn't want to start talking to people and make "connections," he decided to put what happened at the back of his mind for now and turned his eyes to the knight captain sitting right next to him, "So, Kaxa,"

"Jacob." Kaxa called back after swallowing a mouthful of food.

"What did you mean earlier when you said that I know what I'm talking about?" He asked, genuinely curious about what the knight said.

Kaxa placed his bowl down and sat, "You're a noble right?" He asked and Jacob only nodded because he didn't know what the equivalent of a CEO is in this world. Also, it's not like his father didn't have political sway, he had enough connections that he can probably do things. Come to think of it, what do politicians actually do? "And I don't really want to offend you-"

"You won't." Jacob cut him off, "Trust me."

Kaxa nodded and took a sip from his stew, "other nobles are downright obsessed with passing their legacies so they write them down into books," he started, "and I've always assumed that it was just useless posturing and that no one actually wanted to read those damn things but I guess I was wrong," Kaxa shrugged, then frowned, his expression looked like he found a particular puzzle that he couldn't solve no matter how hard he thought about it, "can I ask a question?"

"Sure," Jacob replied, he already had a guess as to what that question is but it's probably better if he knew about it.

"Why would you read it?" He asked.

"Because I want to know more about the world and I want to start with its history." He replied, "I know there's a lot of things that I can read to do that but I want to know what it's like for the average citizens of this world,"

Asya frowned, "So... you're not reading that history book to just look at the deeds of various bastard sons?" Jacob chuckled, he may know what that particular part that Asya is talking about, he shook his head, "Then... can I talk to you about a certain piece of history in this world then?" She probably didn't need to ask that but since she did, Jacob answered her question with a nod, "Okay... I just wanna... think things first."

"Take your time," Jacob replied, wondering why she didn't have a book about it but judging by that interaction she had with Kaxa earlier, that piece of history is probably gonna come from her personal life.

And, since Kaxa stood up and left without saying another word, Jacob's suspicions only grew tenfold. Both ways. He still didn't know what made Asya act like that earlier but he'd like to find out. Preferably soon.

Eventually, Asya spoke, "Okay, I wanna talk to you about a small village," she said, "it's a Town now but back then it was only a village, and it has only grown since then and because of that, it's no longer a village- but a town." Jacob nodded at her, willfully ignoring the way Asya stalled by repeating words.

Asya took a deep breath, "Okay, that village is called Terania, and the people there, when they first moved into the land, were stressed about their new living conditions but their mayor at the time wasn't-"

Taking a mental step back, Jacob lended his ear to Asya.