The conversation had quieted down after that, with the driver too concerned that asking the wrong questions was going to earn him a knife between his ribs, and the passengers feeling too awkward to try and assuage him. Even Chudsworth caught on to the general atmosphere and decided not to intervene.

Thankfully the trip didn’t last for much longer, and within half an hour, the carriage was finally approaching civilization.

In the distance, the group could see a smattering of buildings, all made of locally available materials; a muddy brown-yellow type of brick and hearty mulberry wood. The structures were at most two stories in height, and were placed on either side of an incredibly wide, unpaved street. People wearing a mix of humble fabrics dyed in simple colors walked up and down the road, but each of them was adorned with a single cloth accessory made of brightly colored silk.

Scarves in all shades of blue from the clear sky to the deep ocean, headdresses in all seven colors of the rainbow, all of these were a common sight amongst the villagers. In one case, there was a young woman jogging down the street wearing a pair of silk arm warmers colored in a tie-dye pattern.

While the road they carted over was still made of dirt, the earthen surface was stamped almost entirely flat. Most of the carriage’s bumps that kept the passengers from properly relaxing on the trip had finally stopped. There was still, however…

Creak. Groan. Huff.

Ted looked back in from the window towards Chudsworth. “Thirty minutes have passed, I believe it is your turn to take this seat.”

“Actually, since we’re pretty much already here, how about if I just walk the rest of the way?” asked Chudsworth.

“I think I’ll join you,” said Nash. She stuck her head out the window and took a deep breath. “Smells a bit like sulfur, I think those are the hot springs!”

Before she and Chudsworth could get up and make it to the carriage door, Delphi cleared her throat, making them both stop in place.

“Actually, this isn’t our stop, we’ve still got a while to go,” she said.

Both of the agents’ faces began to drop, and soon their cheerful smiles were nothing more than bitter, open-mouthed frowns.

“H-how long?” croaked Nash.

“About one more hour,” said the driver, finally working up the courage to speak. “Your actual destination is a decent ways out of town. Not sure what the place is exactly, but I’ve done deliveries and dropped off people there before. But it’s been a while since I was there last.”

“Oh come on, Delphi!” said Nash in a high-pitched whine. “Can’t we stay here? In a cozy inn next to the hot tubs?”

“Sorry, Nash,” said Delphi, with an apologetic frown. “We need to stay outside the range of the spy’s potential scrying magic. Remember, we needed to keep two thousand feet away when we sent Chudsworth to interrogate him? The town’s too small to consistently keep that kind of distance.” Saying it hurt her just as much as it did the others.

“You’re the worst, Delphi,” said Nash with a pout.

“I-I’m tempted to agree with her,” added Chudsworth after a second. “This is the worst.”

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Creak. Groan. Huff.

“But we have no choice,” said Ted with an unfeeling expression. “We might as well go along with it, I’m sure there will be plenty of chances to have some fun during this mission.”

The driver shivered ever so slightly at the word “fun,” but kept quiet.

Eventually, the other two each let out a sigh and nodded.

“Fine, let’s keep going then,” they said in a low grumble.

They took their seats and the cart continued on, getting closer and closer to the village. As the buildings in the distance got larger, hope for an early relief from their terrible journey welled its way into everyone’s hearts, only to be quickly dashed as reality set in.

As the group finally reached the closest point to the village before moving away, a brand new sound began to echo out from nearby.

Creak. Creak. Creak.

Chudsworth reflexively shifted in his seat at the sound, but his seat didn’t move. He and the others looked out of their windows to find its source quickly approaching.

Another wagon driven by a slightly older woman wheeled its way on the road leading away from the village. The two carriages were perfectly placed such that they would have collided at the crossroads, but both stopped at the last second.

“Why hello there!” said the other driver with a kick in her voice. “Aren’t you all stopping in town?”

“Well, I’ve gotta drop these four off… elsewhere first,” replied the team’s driver.

“Oh really, where to? There isn’t much around for hours at least!” Her eyes narrowed. “Say, are you bringing them to that strange building an hour out from here?”

“I… er well,” said the team’s driver in a low mumble before freezing. He slowly craned his neck over to the back of the carriage and whispered over to the passengers. “Please don’t hurt me, I didn’t say anything to give it away.”

“Nobody’s going to get hurt,” said Delphi with a sigh. “Please just ignore anything Ted here says.”

“I would never do any harm to someone deemed valuable and trustworthy,” added Ted with a wide smile. “Your efforts bringing us here are enabling me to harm someone who is expendable.”

The driver blanched at that.

“What’s this about harm?” asked the other driver, leaning over to try and look inside the carriage. “If someone’s causing harm, you’d better head into town and tell the chosen hero about that!”

“Wait, he’s here?” asked the team’s driver.

“Sure is! He’s staying at the Squirming Worm inn right now! Well, he checked in there half an hour ago, at least. Not a minute later, he ran off with his team into the forest to pick a fight with whatever’s been haunting it. Even if that old rumor was real, I doubt that the ghost will show its face to someone so strong, so he’ll probably be back eventually.”

“Hold on, how many people did he go with?” asked Delphi as she stuck her head out of a window facing the other driver.

“With three others, so four people in total.”

“That’s all of them,” said Delphi, sticking her head back into the carriage. “Alright everyone, possible change of plans.”

The other three, suddenly keenly interested in anything that would cut this carriage ride short, leaned over and listened carefully.

“From all of the missions our team’s given the hero, we’ve seen how impatient he can be,” said Delphi in a low whisper. “If there isn’t anything for him to immediately fight, he’ll last for about one and a half hours before giving up and leaving.”

“And since the spy hasn’t had a chance to properly set up any security measures in his room, now is the opportune time to bug it!” exclaimed Nash.

Delphi and Ted shushed their co-worker and she quickly fell silent while trying to fight off the blush forming on her cheeks.

“So does that mean we can get off this awful carriage?” asked Chudsworth. “No offense, by the way,” he said to the driver.

“None taken,” the driver shot back.

“Thankfully yes, but we have to get back on once we’re done so the spy doesn’t pick us up on his way back. Remember, he already knows that he’s being followed, and we don’t want to paint a target on our own backs.”

The others let out an annoyed grunt, but acquiesced.

Nash looked right at Delphi with a focused gaze and pointed a finger at her. “But if we have some time left, I want to check out the hot springs.”