Before getting back to the city, Leo decided to satisfy his curiosity and try to get to the very top of the mountain.
With the nightfall he left the bushes he was hiding in and according to his memory went across the plateau towards the direction of the trail that went up the mountain. During the day he practiced this in his mind multiple times and now the hardest part was to just go straight, in other words – it was easy.
This trail, contrary to the one leading to the dryad place, was much steeper one and more difficult to climb, but Leo didn’t mind after a whole day of lazying around. In addition, to his great surprise he soon realized that despite the increased difficulty he never stumbled or broke a nail.
Fortunately, before he got arrogant, he threw a glance to the side, then towards the sky only to see it littered with beautiful, shining stars. Up until now he never knew how much he missed the starry sky, but this was not all. Far in the distance, from beyond the endless field of misty clouds below, a crescent moon was slowly rising.
Leo was not much of an artist, but even his simple soul shed a couple of tears at the sight. He sat down directly on the ground, supporting back on the cliff wall, grabbed a bottle of water from the amulet and watched the moon ascend while slowly sipping from it.
It took a while for him to return to the reality, but from then on the climb became completely different. Once again Leo noticed he was running out of breath sooner than usual, but circulating Qi within helped and before the moon was high above, Leo stepped on the very top of the mountain.
Truth to be said, the view was picturesque. Encircled by fruit trees in full bloom there stood a two storey pavilion that under the moonlight looked particularly mysterious. There were no other buildings around, only flowerbeds filled with colorful flowers. Most of them had their petals closed, but somehow they still seemed to reach towards the bright moon. Strangely enough even at the very top of the mountain there was not the slightest breeze and since the arrival to Greenland Leo hadn’t noticed any wind.
Currently he didn’t care for it though. He simply couldn’t enjoy the view or think of anything else because in the very middle of all of it lie a pool, maybe a couple yards wide, but this was all Leo needed. There was not much time till the sunrise, therefore he quickly darted towards it and verified it held only pure water. Then he took off the tree bark clothing, poured two jars of Jack’s mixture in the pool, stirred it a bit and lie inside.
It had been quite a while since Leo took a proper bath and it sure felt nice. The pool could’ve been slightly deeper, but one and a half feet was enough to satisfy his current needs. He relaxed, watched the stars thoughtlessly, letting his mind slip away.
Either it was only his imagination or someone really sang in the pavilion nearby, but the voice was soft and pleasant, like that of an angel and the soothing melody soon made Leo fall asleep. He dreamt about all the ladies he had washed in his life, about the pleasant times with Anna and Maya.
But then everything became dark and gloomy. Anna turned into a heartless angel of death, but Maya continued to fall through the fog and no matter how hard he tried, Leo could never reach her hand to save her. These unpleasant memories seemed to burn his very soul … and for some reason his eyes.
With a loud gasp Leo woke up only to realize the sun was brightly shining in his face. On any other occasion he would’ve loved to hang around in the pool, but he knew any moment someone could come and in that case he would be screwed.
Of course, before sneaking up the mountain he considered the possibility he would be found, and it was clear he could fight his way free. Even if the elite guards swarmed him with the laughable clubs, it was unlikely they could go against someone at the Foundation establishment stage. But on the mountain only dryads lived, in other words – middle aged woman, and Leo simply couldn’t imagine to hurt them, especially since he was at fault.
He wasn’t certain he could still make it down the trail to the large plateau, but the only option was to try. Unfortunately the moment he grabbed the tree bark clothing, he heard distant voices coming from the direction of the trail. Apparently he had slept like a pig and the dryads were already arriving.
Without thinking much, Leo stored everything in the amulet and darted to the opposite side of the mountain, away from the trail. There he noticed a couple of protrusions on the cliff wall and climbed down in hopes no one would come this far or that no one could notice him from below.
A short while later the hell broke loose. The dryads inevitably noticed the crystal clear pool had turned into a puddle of black and smelly substance. They began to scream and run around in panic while chaotically waving hands – at least that was how Leo imagined it judging from the sounds that came from above. After all currently he hung at the cliff wall and couldn’t see anything, thus the imagination was all that was left.
After a few moments another person arrived. Her voice was surprisingly calm and pleasant to ears and with a couple of words she managed to calm the rest down.
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“What happened, why is the sacred pool soiled?” She asked.
“No idea, master!” One of the dryads said in a trembling voice, “It was like this when we arrived!”
“This is bad!” Another one seemed to be of a hysterical type, “This probably means something bad will happen, am I right, master?”
“I believe this is exactly the opposite.” The so called ‘master’ said, “It is an auspicious sign that confirms we’re cleansing the world and that’ll allow us to successfully complete the Grand road.”
‘Oh, no …’ Leo felt his feet growing cold, ‘Please, I beg you … please don’t say it …’
Since the childhood he had allergies against the word ‘auspicious’ and according to his fathers orders and his own rules the person who claimed a day was auspicious had to die. But he really didn’t want to kill any of the ladies up there!
Fortunately it didn’t have to come to that. The ‘master’ with the pleasant voice said, or rather – chanted, “Watch … by the power bestowed by the Moon, I purify these waters!”
Afterwards Leo only could hear gasps of admiration and elation. The dryads once again were back in their good mood except for one.
She quietly asked, “Master … the moonstone … did it ...?”
“It’s still fine.” The ‘master’ said and it sounded as if she was smiling, “It should work at least four more times, but when my daughter is born, so will another moonstone.”
“But the sacred pool was … how the moonstone still can be born there?” The dryad was still concerned.
“The power of the Moon works in mysterious ways.” The ‘master’ said and apparently the case was closed.
It was great the ladies were not upset anymore, but the youth still had to hang at the edge of the cliff for the rest of the day. The only thing that consoled him was that he could support himself with legs at a couple of protrusions in the wall, otherwise he might’ve fallen off before the noon. Of course, the sun burning his naked butt was an extra, but he decided to not complain about that since it was unknown when he’ll get the next opportunity to take a sunbath.
When Leo was back in the city a couple of days later, he had a heavy sunburn and even headache and nausea from the sunstroke, but he was still happy he went up the hill. His nails were nice and pink and it meant he had properly cleansed himself. In addition, he had found a place he could watch the stars or take a sunbath in case he got nostalgic again.
Approximately a month later the grand project began.
Leo didn’t intend to take part in the building process – not only he found it boring, to his understanding he had build and repaired enough for this and maybe the next life. He did try to join the exploration crew – a squad made of twenty strong men and an accompanying dryad, with the main purpose of disposing of any threats that were met on the way.
Leo’s idea was that by killing ranked snakes he could increase his beast core count, but he was young and didn’t look too reliable, thus the best he was offered was to work at the forefront.
In the end he did accept the proposal and for the next half month jumped from tree to tree with astonishing agility, carrying and securing ropes that further were used by the other workers to advance further. Albeit dynamic, the job was boring with the only perk being finding bird eggs from time to time.
Fortunately it all changed when the exploration crew for some reason overlooked a tree full of bats – similar to the one Leo encountered some time ago.
As usual Leo jumped over to the next tree, but this time was attacked by a swarm of bloodsucking beasts. His mates and the supervising dryad watched in horror how the youth was basically drowned by the dark cloud of bats, but a while later, when the exploration crew arrived to the rescue, they found a grinning face covered in greenish blood, clearly not his. During the fight the heaviest injuries Leo sustained were multiple scratches and, in fact, he considered to look for bat nests in the future order to hone his reaction and coordination.
Without a second thought the dryad in charge promoted Leo to his dream job and from then on his life finally got a bit more action. The only downside was that he couldn’t use the Cleaver and to get the beast cores he had to stealthily use a dagger that he afterwards hid in the amulet every time. Of course, he could not take the core from every beast since often there was someone around, but in one corner of the amulet a couple of months later three boxes that previously contained antidotes were filled with shiny rank two, three and even rank four beast cores.
When the eldest dryad told everyone to get ready for building a long detour, Leo left. To the north was the ‘dangerous’ region they intended to avoid, but that was the place he was interested in the most.
He had no hopes of finding a poison pearl, even though he could’ve gotten a clue from the conversation between dryads while he hung at the cliff wall. What he intended to do before returning to the Aurora realm was to hunt something big.
For the next month he randomly explored, mostly moving in the northern direction. The trees and the mist seemed the same everywhere he went and not only there was nothing dangerous about the place – it was completely boring. In addition, his nails were slowly turning dark and it was clear that soon he will be forced to return. The only place in Greenland where he could take a detox bath was on the mountain near the Nameless city after all.
Just when Leo intended to turn back, he arrived at the edge of what he previously though was never ending forest. Standing on the top of a tree he could only see white mist in front of him, well – it might’ve been mist, fog or clouds – he had no clue, but at least it was something new.
He climbed as low as it was possible, took out a long rope made of a tree bark, the only thing he ‘borrowed’ before leaving, and secured it on the lowest branch that was not covered in the toxic mucus. Then slowly descended only to find himself on an edge of a grassy plain.
This was the first time he climbed back down to the ground since massacring the greenlanders many months ago and to his disappointment he realized that the fog here was as thick as it was back there. The ground was similarly soggy and he kind of missed the mountain with dryads where one could actually stumble on a stone.
Of course, the main problem was the lack of the sun – it was clear that if he left the spot and fifty yards later got lost, he might never find the way back. But according to dryads this was the place where the scary beasts with many heads lived.
After weighing his options, Leo took out the Cleaver, secured it on his back and marched in the thick grass that went up to his waist.