So let me explain, the plan was to go to the town these people received their raw silk from. The name of it was incredibly intriguing. Since i wasn't even aware of the fact that there were any other villages in the bay, well that just made it more intriguing.

Spider village. It was located on a feeder river of the coil a river named, fittingly, spider river.

But what was most amazing, as the Elders of the Winter village had explained, after we had come to agreement with the Ents to the south, was the fact that this village was apparently periodically (once ever sixty years) attacked by a group of massive spiders.

The elder had said the village was entirely draped in spider webs, its even gone so far that the village has accepted the webs into their way of life, the village has evolved to use the spiders thick webs, the elder claimed the village, while residing in the spring locked zone, a fairly rainy zone, had been entirely roofed by the spiders silk, it was apparently something like a ball web wrapping up the city. It shed water but allowed for enough light to comfortably work. He went on and on about the city despite the fact that only a few of the villagers had even been there.Most trade with the city was done by a single well traveled merchant,i asked to speak to the man but he basically told me the same story as the Elder.

So we decided to go, but that was a few days ago now, come on keep up.

Now we have a much bigger issue, well now honestly its not an issue, it's actually convenient, extremely.

We got picked up by a group of bandits believe it or not. I honestly had to hold back laughter.

I restrained myself though, this was clearly only a small group, there must be a larger camp somewhere, bandits are rarely nomadic. So I devised a 'clever plan'. Or at least that's what Claire had called it when I told her the ploy.

Claire is a young noble on vacation, and I am her body guard. Or that is what we told the bandits who threatened us with knives, they demanded everything we had, we complied calmly but before they struck us I offered them something they hadn't thought of, since Clare is a noble, famous in the capital, the Count would surely pay greatly for her safe return.

So now, here we are a day later walking, tied, on our way to the bandit camp honestly, I amaze myself.

But why am I so calm right? Well, I have actually mastered mana vision somewhat, it was a few days after we left for spider village. I was cultivating mana stones and created a tiny globe shaped one, suddenly one of my eyes could activate mana vision perfectly, I continued to train and within a couple hours I had perfected the orb for my second eye and now I can easily gauge internal mana of plants and animal whenever I please, it obstructs my vision but I can just toggle it on for a moment so it's not to much issue. Whats most interesting is it seems even the ground seems to emanate a bit mana, I wonder if its just this place or everywhere, I had heard that only animals and humans generated mana so how was it that mana was rising from the dirt. Moles? Rabbits? Probably not.   

These bandits are a joke though, seriously if I released a single ounce of my mana they will very possibly die. I'm kinda worried what will happen when the eventual battle ensues. Maybe I shouldn't even call what this will be a battle.

Is this just my ego? I'm honestly not sure. It could be, I guess we will see when I get to camp. Claire didn't seem particularly worried either so we will just go with this plan for now.

For bandits they were treating us fairly kindly, and I mean for them being bandits they treated us kindly, lets not mix up who's the bandits in this situation. Yeah since my family maintains a tribal lifestyle we often get mistaken for bandits but we technically aren't.

I mean would bandits leave a perfectly toll-able bridge un-tolled? I don't think so. typically the people who have taken the young noble and her body guard hostage are the ones considered bandits. Well it's not like the police will be asking.

While having these odd thoughts we finally arrived at the bandits camp. It was a little nicer than my own camp to be honest, I was a little bit jealous, should i steal these tents when I'm done here? What exactly am I going to do here, do I kill these people, technically they did threaten my life, I have every right to.

"Hey! who're these two?" A man seated at the large campfire spits through missing teeth.

"This'un's a noble, we can random em." The man says with a firm grin on his face unaware of his typo, er… I mean unaware of his tongue flub.

"Ransom them?" Another man corrected him

"Yeah, right I mean ransom em," The man corrects "Well what'dya say boss?"

"What you want us to really turn into bandits just cause he hasn't paid in a few weeks?!"

"Well boss we don't even know if he'll come back with more work, and it'll be impossible to survive here unless we can make some income."

"I suppose you are right, Well how do you even know this one is worth anything?"

"Look at her."

"Can't deny that, even dressed in rags she is a sight, How did you find out she was a noble?"

"She told us."

"She told you."

"Yeah, oy tell 'im yer name." The man who brought us here barked at Claire.

"My name is Claire Duvont" She said quickly thinking up a royal sounding last name "I am daughter of the second cousin of the Count. He regards me kindly."

She was truly a marvelous liar, though I suppose I had found that out earlier this month.

"Mhm so she say, but how do we know what she says is true?"

"Well I mean why would she lie?"

"I suppose you are right, it makes little sense for her to admit she is someone of worth."

Seriously? I thought we were boned there for a minute.

"But what about the kid?"

Oh is it my turn? Should I? I really want to.

"Hey you heard him," a man behind me growled, "You know who you're looking at? That, there's the leader of the 'blood hook tribe'"

A few men snicker in the background shallowly.

Oh this is just too much. It almost hurts how excited I am to say this. I cough sharply and begin.

"This man is a nobody, a disposable Knight that the count told me I must keep nearby."

Oh that's mean Claire, you stole my thunder, I was so ready. I had even opened a mana rock in preparation of a massive mana burst. I noticed Claire was glaring at me firmly so I shrugged it off. Perhaps she wanted more information before we acted. He did mention someone who was funding this, it's possible they are the real issue here. I suppose we can wait and learn what we can and then free ourselves and leave for spider village.

Don't get me wrong I know this is the main mission, but I'm not just gonna leave this place because I complete my mission. There is much more I need to figure out, the season locks for one, and I just plain want to see spider village. Training with professor mage a bit more would be nice of course. Oh I wonder if they have completed the work on the new loom in Winter Village. They had begun construction when we left, but its been a few days since then. They must be close by now.

"Well then why don't we just kill him, he's disposable after all." The leader says, I suppose he isn't the cool headed one like I once thought.

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"Well, yeah, but, I mean a knight's a knight, I'm sure the count will pay something for this one." Claire effortlessly added.

"This one is fairly smart, forget the count I should just take her up as my wife." The leader retorts with a perverted grin and cackle.

Try it. Please. I'm getting bored.

"Well lets talk to money-bags first, if the ransom doesn't work out then we can do whatever." The man who brought us here reports. Well, he is smarter than I thought. Or maybe he is planning on taking her first while they wait for this money-bags. the look in his eye supports that theory.

Try it. I'm itching, I wanna get these ropes off. I'll take any excuse.

"Would money-bags even know how to get in contact with the count with demands?"

"Heh, of course."

Hmm interesting, a theory is building. but I don't know all the detail right now so I will keep quiet, ideally I'd like to meet this money-bags.

By the way I have of course investigated mana levels of the people around. Incredibly the highest is actually a scrawny looking man who's standing in the corner looking slightly sad with a thick hood over his ears.

I say highest but this man is nothing, not even a single stones worth of mana. If anything he just won't completely pass out whenever I choose to strike.

If that's the case I will just pulse him head on. Ah, right, I have learned to control my pulses to some extent. It was during Claire's, training… yeah that one. But it was a handy time I had where I could experiment with different pulses. I had now almost mastered targeting a single person up to forty feet away, it wasn't much but it was something.

The mana was also much more concentrated so I would have to be careful as to not kill the target. Of course Claire would be completely fine, I had inadvertently released an extreme amount of mana the other day. While it demolished most of the nearby trees and shrubs Claire was, although unconscious, not seriously hurt.

So when the time comes I will only restrain a little, I didn't want to hurt the tents but, at this point I could care less about the people. Most of them seemed perfectly okay with the thought of killing me moments earlier so by association they are each guilty. The only who maintained a gloomy look when my death was mentioned was the mage in the corner, I wasn't positive but his intent seemed to whisper that he didn't want to be here. Obviously it wasn't an intent message like me and Claire had been using. His was more of the message his mana inadvertently revealed.

Money-bags was apparently someone who lived in spider village, from the sound of it he was just staying there, the leader, a man I didn't particularly want to get to know, had sent a few men to find the money-bags and ask about the ransom. I wasn't sure but it did sound like the man would be coming here.

I truly hoped that to be the case, if the ransom demand actually goes through they will quickly realize that we aren't who we claimed. With raven communication it would still take at least six hours for word to arrive here so I just had to find out the identity of money-bags and the true identity of the person behind money-bags. But that was of course only if money-bags sends word before coming here.

Oh yeah obviously money-bags isn't the one with the actual money, if i had to guess, he is the middle-man for a rich noble, or worse. But I'm still not sure of the intention, or not positive. Its clearly something shady, these men, from their earlier conversation are clearly not bandits. They are more likely down on their luck mercenaries, mercenaries turn murderers. One thing i was abundantly positive of though, they aren't the 'Blood Hook Tribe'.

I still honestly wanted to laugh a bit, this had gone far to well. They were seriously morons.

----------------------------------------

Hurry up money-bags, Its been over three hours. I was now sure he would be coming here, the bandit leader accidentally said something about him being late when he was near our cages. I say near but he was actually around twenty feet from us, Claire had claimed she didn't hear what the man had said but I heard it extremely clearly. Perhaps I've attained superhuman hearing. Next stop daredevil costume, and incurable blindness.

Ah, no what are you doing with that?

Put that down. You can't touch that, that's mine.

S*%t he's opening the bag. All my stuff, hes getting his grubby fingers all over my stuff!

No, don't take out that jar.

No! That isn't yours.

"DON'T TOUCH MY FUCKING CINNAMON!"

Oh, damn. I didn't hold back did I.

Everyone was laying on the ground, The make-shift cage was obliterated as well.

All that stood was me, the mage with the hood, and Claire who was groggy but still conscious, I'm glad. She seems to be improving rapidly. Had she? Oh, well, baby steps.

"What did you do?" It wasn't the mage standing terrified across from me who asked, but a man standing behind me.

Huh, when did they get here, oh that's right this is the man 'that' unconscious leader had sent to collect money-bags from Spider Village. So standing between these two messenger pigeons must be the middle-man himself.

One of the bandits quickly lifted a crossbow and aimed it between my eyes. I was honestly scared, how would I stop a crossbow bolt, it was like a bullet, except that Kevlar wouldn't help here, truly one of man's most formidable weapon.

He fell, No I don't mean he slumped over gracefully and died with a final gasp.

He just fell.

Into pieces.

All that was left were the black scars Claire had carved into space.  The middle-man standing beside the pile looked at me with breakfast appearing in his throat.

The other bandit acted different, he raised his sword and ran at me, I said acted different, not smarter.

I grabbed a blade from amongst the fallen merc's and tossed it. It wasn't as balanced as my blade but it still soared true. Or, actually, would it hit? This man was around fifteen feet away and closing, it was a good blade toss but the balance of this blade really ruined it.

But why should Claire get all the credit in this final battle, its not my fault I don't have many distance attacks. I wanted to use a mana pulse but his closeness to the man called money-bags, who was incredibly mana weak, prevented me from doing that. I didn't want money-bags to die. I had questions.

A void opened inches in front of my rotating blade. The blade vanished in a single rotation and then reappeared in the back of the mans skull. I can definitely see the reasoning for multi-void openings now. Professor mages juggling was a cool trick but this was surely its true purpose, and it was terribly deadly.

I glanced at Claire, she was entirely green. I had assumed as much, she had just bisected a man with a void and then redirected my blade to kill another. I supported her slumping body and carefully rested her down on a log after brushing a corpse off it.

The mage and money bags just looked at the two of us blankly. We sat amongst shattered wreckage of a cage and amongst thirty five bandits. And it all started because the bastard opened my damn cinnamon.

I quickly stepped over to his, corpse and retrieved the jar and replaced the lid carefully, placing a kiss on its surface and replacing it into the bag.

Well that's settled.