‘If I want to cross it, I can either wait for the next night or…’

Leo raised his eyes to the top of the cliff.

Growing roughly two hundred meters high from the plain Leo was in, it currently blocked most of the early sunlight. Yet, with every passing second, the shadow cast by the cliff continued to shrink, forcing Leo to make the choice.

To cross at night, when the darkness would cover his track, or to do it now, before the last shadow on the plain dies out?

‘Keep the damn initiative.’

Leo twitched.

He wished, with every fiber of his being, to just take it easy. To rest through the day and then approach when the night would be the darkest.

But with a single look up the steep incline of the cliff, Leo swallowed his saliva and took a careful step forward. And then another. And then…

Like a ballet master on the stage, he moved forth along the wavering shadows in an intricate dance…

Or rather, a clumsy attempt to move quick enough to match the pace of the shrinking shadow cast by the hill while not making himself an obvious target.

Yet, even with every passing second now bringing Leo closer and closer to losing his cover…

He still made the small detour, rushing over to the river’s edge instead of hurrying straight for the cliff’s bottom. Yet, right as he slowed down by the huge rocks, a sudden thought filled the young man’s mind.

‘Wait, it’s been so long. What are the chances they would’ve missed it?’

By now, those bloodthirsty cultivators have likely researched their spoils of war. And while it was unlikely they could fully understand the potential of the technology left behind in the backpacks of Leo’s late teammates…

They were sure to notice it was a novelty. And on that point alone, the chances of them overlooking Leo’s backpack when he managed to chance upon it right as he made his approach…

Slowing down, Leo wasted the precious seconds as he carefully approached the place where the glint of light came from.

And then, as if to make him doubt his own convictions, a perfect explanation presented itself to his eyes.

Leo’s backpack rested below a stone’s ledge, washed up in a tiny cave by the river’s chaotic currents.

It was only thanks to the watery mist created by the nearby waterfall diffusing the sun’s early rays in the air that Leo noticed the anomaly. And between the cave’s opening facing away from the cliff and the ledge that shielded it from above, there was only a narrow-angle on the approach to the cliff that allowed one to witness the reflected light.

‘And it all so conveniently happens that I randomly picked just the right path to notice it.’

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Leo’s face soured as he hid behind a nearby rock, painfully aware of how quickly the shrinking of the night’s last shadows came closer and unnervingly closer.

Leo took a deep breath and cast an instantaneous glance at the cliff above.

‘Yeah, there’s no way I can handle that,’ he thought before turning his eyes back to the nearby backpack.

In all honesty, Leo could hardly remember what sort of tools were hidden in that precious bag. He had no way of knowing how much of it was left in a working state after all this backpack went through.

‘But if there’s one thing that’s certain,’ Leo raised his eyes to the cliff one last time before turning his attention back, to where the light of the rising day came dangerously close.

“Thinking about it, I have both the worst and the best luck, don’t I?”

Leo rose up from behind the cover and moved forth at a steady, unhurried pace. Upon approaching the small cave, he casually squatted down and reached inside before leisurely pulling the backpack out, raising up, and moving on toward the cliff.

A few steps later, Leo already threw the bag over his back as he gradually built up his momentum.

With every step, he got closer to the cliff’s face…

But the time he wasted thinking was now catching up with him. By now, no matter how much Leo hastened his steps… the fleeting cover of the dying shadows continued to shrink faster than Leo could move.

There was a limit to how quickly he could proceed not to stand out. A limit that the faint shadows imposed upon him.

‘Fuck!’

The moment the sun would light up the plain with Leo still on it, a single glance from the guard at the top of the cliff would bring the whole thing to an end.

‘Did I bite more than I could chew?’ Leo thought, before gritting his teeth in desperation… And stopping his dance, taking but a second of rest as he brought his rushed steps to a stop.

And then…

Leo straightened his back and instantly moved up. Betting his life on the expiring cover of the shadows, Leo moved in a hurried and extremely busy step.

The one he saw whenever he lingered at the edge of the business and commerce districts of the city.

A step of a salesman who has long since forgotten their own name and identity, merging into the living and breathing tissue of the city’s corporate workflow.

Step by step, Leo covered more and more of the plains while the light of the rising sun gradually caught up with him. And right as only ten steps separated Leo from the cliff…

The rays of the sun finally reached across the cliff’s edge, killing the last of Leo’s cover.

Just five steps…

That Leo crossed with a single breath, perfectly upholding his matter-of-fact act throughout the mental ordeal.

Leo face-slammed into the cliff without even a hint of hesitation, keeping the act up until the very end. And only there, hidden from the cliff’s top by the slope’s unevenness, he dared to breathe out.

‘Did they spot me?’ Leo thought, baffled by how calm he appeared to be.

Just now, he was all there for anyone looking to see. And, without a shred of a doubt, he would lose his life upon first notice.

And now, Leo stood without moving a single inch, listening for the tiniest noise, the faintest sound that would indicate the guards at the cliff noticed him.

Leo waited and waited, his breath ragged and restrained.

Leo’s heart rocked in his chest, far faster than his breathing should allow.

And yet, as moments passed, Leo couldn’t hear a single, extraordinary noise.

‘Did it… work?’

Leo slowed down his breath even further. His eyes moved up, to where the light of the day shone directly upon the stones at the bottom of the cliff.

‘Just an arm’s reach away…’ Leo resisted the desire to reach out with his hand. He froze for a second, staring at the plain brightening with every passing second.

Leo gritted his teeth and took a deep, mindful breath.

‘I need to scale this cliff, find a way to distract the guys above, and then somehow slip into the truck,’ Leo summarized his goals before sliding the bag off his shoulder and bringing it up to his arm.

He wasted a lot of time and ultimately risked discovery for this travel-sized bag, having no clue what exactly was inside or even if anything was still in working order.

But now, Leo had more than just his nanites to rely on. For in this world devoid of technology, it was as much of a novelty for the locals as the local magic was a novelty for Leo!

‘Now, let’s see,’ Leo thought, sliding the zipper of the bag open and pulling its folds aside to peek inside. ‘What sort of stuff do I have to work with?’