Sleeping through the dragon flight, the flight was peaceful except for the start. After twelve hours of flight when the sun was already starting to reach the horizon Grandjoy swooped down.
She cleared her clouds and called everyone as she tilted and turned, “Children, I welcome you to Niska.” She said and her voice woke everyone who was asleep.
Xero jolted and blinked a bit before looking down and saw the large frontier city. The city was wide and covered a great space and was surrounded by cleared land but there were many things within the clearing and it was stained either black or red and in some places smoke rose up.
Within this clearing Grandjoy swooped down and eventually landed while her tail carefully landed near the gate. Still she towered greatly over the entire town and from everywhere anyone could see her.
“Alright kids, we have arrived!” Tiro shouted and slowly the bodies of the passengers lowered and the clouds vanished.
One of the kids was shaking a bit, “I never want to do that again.” He complained.
“Don’t forget you have a flying creature.” one of his friends laughed making him pale.
“Alright brats, for today we will lodge in the city and tomorrow we will find the designated location for us to came and set up our campsite.” Grunt shouted, “Now let's move in orderly fashion down.” He said and took the lead.
Xero looked beside him where Meldie was sleeping, after fainting she slept through the entire trip and hadn’t woken up once.
“Hey Meldie wake up.” Xero shook her but she just shrugged him off making him sigh. He looked at her and nodded before carefully putting his hand under her leg and the other under her back and lifted her in a princess carry.
Since he was strong he barely felt the girl’s weight but he did attract some stares as he carried her down. After getting off he followed the flow of the schoolmates and eventually they reached a large building near the middle of town where Grunt was shouting.
“What the hell do you mean we need to go build camp now?! Do you know what time it is?!” He shouted.
In front of him was a refined man with glasses and shiny glossy hair in a suit. “I understand your complaint but several other academy are already here and arrived earlier and the city has no space for the swelling number of children. The equipment have already been prepared, a magic bag with a magical tent, reinforced axe, fire starter, magic lamp as well as a map of the area and meat from the recent monster wave that came two hours ago.” He said bluntly.
“Grunt, there is no use fighting.” Miss Gilbody walked forward.
“Greetings Madam Gilbody, looking quite dashing this evening.” The man said with a bow.
“Yes, as for the location, where is our specific campsite?” She asked without giving the man much thought.
“It’s 20 km to the east, the area is a bit more hilly but has a lake with fish, quite a good amount of wildlife but the recent waves have left a strong presence of monsters in the region. The animals have also begun to evolve due to hunting the monsters from the wave.” He said.
“Well then we should be off and use what is left of the sunlight to arrive before there are… complications.” She said and did a ‘hmph’ and turned on her heel. “Children! We are leaving at this moment, please walk in an orderly fashion as you pickup your equipment packs.” She said and looked at the man who snapped his finger. Some people came out and carried mountains of bags and slowly they were distributed to all the children.
Grunt grinned when he saw Meldie in Xero’s arms and he patted his arms, “Take good care of her.” he said and winked making Xero roll his eyes. Grunt tied two bags to Xero’s existing bag and waved him along.
Walking to the east gate with the flow of children he noticed a few people looking out of the inns windows. There were quite a number with white uniforms and he wondered what academy they were from but soon reached the gate and gathered outside.
Half an hour later all the students gathered and with everyone summoning their own familiar Xero was finally forced to shake Meldie who was startled when she noticed how she was being carried. Her face to the tip of her ears down to the base of her neck was red and her face grew extremely hot. He passed her the bag meant for her and she thanked him but summoned her bear and mounted it and moved away completely red faced.
Summoning Ash, the black Ash scales had grown increasingly harder and his defense and strength was rather high. Alone Ash already developed to level 4 and only the creatures that ‘grew up’ one level and died and evolved due to the mana it gained from the milk it drank actually keep up with his development like an instant burst but it’s not constant like his.
“Let’s go Ash.” Xero said and Ash drew his sword. The white eyes now had a clear blue outline for an eye, when it had originally developed he asked Miss Gilbody during class about it and it was shown to be Ash developing mana vision. Some monsters evolve their very eyes and slowly Ash is unclouding his eye as his eyes develop to see with mana. Since all living creatures possess mana within the muscles or gathered in a specific place, within 6 meters of him he can see the source and it seems it grows in detail after it reaches half a meter.
His face also has started to look like an elf and the huge nose has shrunk down to only a slightly larger size than normal for human or elf. That said the elf like face is completely thrown off by the scales and the obsidian fangs that show whenever he grins.
Moving forward, the several hundred students walked on alert. Xero and Ash were on high alert, Xero has developed sharp hearing and has put it to good use in many situations. This is an obvious result of Ash’s presence.
For the full time they walked there wasn’t anything strong or brave enough that came at them in the night. With fire users using magic to light up the way for others they walked. Ash also held a ball of Imp fire both at the ready and because it has a strong though eerie light.
When they finally reached the area they would set up camp Grunt sighed at the front, “Alright brats, this is the place, as you can hear the river mentioned by that glasses freak at the city is half a kilometer from this location. This will be the location since the true size of the river is unknown and we are unsure if it rises. Now the first order of business is to chop all these trees. There are magically reinforced lumberjack axe in your equipment bags. Spread out and chop these logs. Any familiar that can use Fire is to be used to incinerate the trunk but only with the supervision of water magic creatures and one of us teachers.” Grunt instructed.
Everyone complained that it was already nighttime and they wanted to rest.
“Shut up!” He growled, “We are currently in the woods at the dead of night, The basic thing we need is to build palisades and clear a space for you to seat up the tents. Or do you want to sleep in the wide open?” He asked.
This easily shut the students up. Although they complained, most of them slept on the dragon so they aren’t exactly tired at this time. After a moment of silence he nodded. “Good! Now get moving!!” He shouted and then fussed around his bag and suddenly removed a large axe.
“I’ll be helping around while patrolling, make good use of your familiars in this but don’t throw all the work on them!”
With his instructions passed he turned and began to walk towards any random tree. The other teachers also dispersed and would act as guards for the students. Xero took Ash away a bit from the huge group and stopped in front of a random tree and pulled out the Axe.
“Ash keep a watch for me and keep the fire lit.” Xero said.
Lifting the axe with some effort due to the restraints and swings again and again. His strength shakes the tree with each swing as he quickly chops large chunks. Slowly the base was chipped away and when it got half way he heard a crack and pulled the axe back and took a step back. It had cracked and the tree was swaying under its own weight. He turned a bit and began to swing at a slightly different angle and took a bit off and then heard a strong splintering sound.
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“TIMBER!” He shouted and the nearby students looked over and saw the tree start to tip and quickly cleared out.
CRASH!
Soon enough several other crashing sounds came from all over the nearby forest.
Looking around, the people that had been in the way slowly returned and looked at him a moment before returned to chopping their own trees.
Waiting a bit more he saw Grunt and one of the teachers appear.
“Oh boy, so it was you. Alright let's see.” Grunt said and gripped the tree and lifted the base and with his axe he quickly began to chop the edge leaving it at a point and the pulled it a bit away from the other students and then began to remove the branches and leaving only the long tree trunk.
“I’ll take this, this kid beside me will monitor the trunk and roots burning.” Grunt said and casually took the cleaned tree trunk and left.
“Alright.” Xero muttered and gave Ash the order to push the Imp fire into the tree trunk.
Following the imp fire made a large eerie bonfire that slowly spread and quickly grew strong but after several strong water spells from the teacher who had a water spirit familiar the grounds stopped burning and contained to only the trunk that soon turned to ash and he snuffed the rest.
The teacher cast one more water spell in the area leaving it damp and releasing smoke and left for another fallen tree and Xero began to cut another tree.
The entire night was like that and the following morning soon dawned to a huge space that had cleared out but burned dirt and at its center was a palisade with quite good structured walls and a skillfully built wooden gate made of trees.
The students slowly walked into the completely enclosed area and found it easily reached 300 meters in diameter and Grunt was happily beside a small tent and a campfire. The ground all over was strongly packed and formed dirt roads.
“Oi brats! Good job, now you can set up your tents, the packed dirt are roads, only build on the looser dirt. Also within the spaces you should build in circle formation with a campfire at the center. That way you can share the work of cooking. You guys have the morning off and can rest.” Grunt shouted.
Everyone moaned tired but they all moved and slowly formed groups. Since there was still a limited space they could only follow his suggestion. Meldie hesitantly approached Xero and with him they gathered a group of five other commoner students and choose a spot halfway to the walls and set up their tent.
When Xero finally set it up he bent over and entered the tent that reached only his waist height but he froze as he found 4x4 room inside. The tent is set up with a dome like formation and the rods bed to stretch out the tent cloth but he hadn’t thought the ‘magic’ tent was like this. It was, after all, his first time seeing this kind of magical item. Still he woke up after a moment and from his own bag he pulled out his things.
“I should have brought my bed and closet.” He criticized himself but he still did have blankets and the tent had one cloth under it to keep away from the dirt so he could stretch the blankets for now and after a few days, and some help from Grunt maybe, he could build a remedial hammock stand and turn his blankets into a hammock for himself.
“Ah right, maybe if I kill some animals I can get their fur and clean it to make bedding, after that all I will need is a bedframe for a normal bed.” He thought.
The two were attractive offers but the bed would also need several days to clean the fur and remove blood and then gathering enough animal pelts, cleaning and all that caused him to feel that it was a long term objective.
Finished inside he walked out and saw a few of the others trying to start a fire over a small pile of green branches.
“Need help?” He asked.
Although the others were using the fire started which was a magic tool that lit a small magic flame that will quickly catch fire it still needs a good structured fireplace for the fire to spread properly.
“Do you know how to make a campfire?” One of the boys asked.
“I went hunting with my father once so he showed me how to set it up.” Xero said and walked up.
They make space for him and he first removes the really messed up pile and the grabs nearby stones and makes a circle of stones first to contain the flame so it doesn’t spread, then he grabbed some of the slightly burned and dry grass around them and piled it in the middle and made a small pyramid of slightly thicker branches and under them he added the thinner easier to burn ones and with the fire started her lit the grass on fire and carefully blew the fire. Quickly the fire spread and started to burn the branches. He took a few thicker branches and stuck it inside and left it.
“Done.” he said and felt his stomach growl and sighed. “Let's let the fire start up first while we help the others set up.” He looked at the struggling halfling who couldn’t properly set up her tent and even the two boys had yet to made their tent.
While they left the fire to start up properly four tents were raised around this campfire. When the flame was strong Xero walked over and set more branches to burn and then turned to the others. “Give me the ration the city gave us so that I can cook it.” Xero said and the others handed him the meat.
He looked into the equipment bag and happily found a butcher knife and a cook knife as well as a small metal pan that can be used to boil water and cook and finally a clean and polished marble stone that can be used for a table.
He happily smiled at this and carefully set up a small space of rocks before placing the marble over it making a stable table and dropping the meat on it he started to chop it up as the others looked at him work. Taking sticks without leaves he chopped the meat and then pulled out some herbs and other things he obtained in the woods as he was cutting the trees and what he gathered at the forest zone of the academy training areas. Chopping and crushing the herbs he put it over the skewers before taking them and putting them beside the flame and going to make more.
“You sure are skillful?” One of the boys said.
“I learned with my dad and brothers.” Xero replied as he didn’t stop making the meat skewers.
“Is your dad strong?” Meldie asked.
Xero stopped and thought, “Not really, his familiar is a level 30 Silver Wolf, it’s not very good with magic but its has strong senses so its good for hunting. He also can’t use magic so his familiar never grew stronger than that.” Xero said and went back to cutting.
“So how come you can use magic?” The other boy asked.
“Who knows?” Xero said.
Magic is a talent said to pass through genetics so normally talentless people can’t have talented though, rare cases alway exist so no one really contested to it.
“Ex-excuse me?” A voice called and everyone looked and as shocked to see the classes rich girl standing there.
“Yes?” Xero asked.
“Can I build my tent in your group? No one else wanted me to join.” She said.
Although she had gained the Blue Winged Salamander it should be known dragon type creatures have a slow growth rate and slow rebirth rate. In the month that the school year started she started with quite a good momentum but even when she trained daily the ‘weaker’ students quickly caught up and with Chad being beaten up the Nobles came to realize that they weren’t the top of the food chain just because of status. The ‘fame’ of being a noble dulled down and some people even found it annoying though never voicing it.
Xero looked at the others and who shrugged. “Sure, if you're hungry you can pass the meat the city people passed to us and I can cook it.” Xero said and she did that but she didn’t want to touch it since they are raw meat.
Like this he made more meat and then sat down to take care of the cooking meat while Univa slowly built her tent, when it was almost done and she hadn’t built it yet Xero pulled the meat back a bit while handing out a few and went to help her so she could eat.
“Thanks.” She muttered as she took the meat.
He put more meat to cook and soon the group was filled with the boys complimenting his cooking before going to bed. Univa didn’t know how to look at him so she just nodded and went into her own tent and the remaining two didn’t know what to do and simply went to rest after Xero spread the fire wood so that it would die down faster.
Waking up at noon Xero started the fire again and made more food for the others and woke them up for it, doing so awkwardly for Univa since he had a somewhat complicated relationship since she always saw him as weak like the other nobles so he never had a good impression until she quiet down due to his explosively growing familiar.
When they finished Xero went to walk around. The walled area was now a huge campsite with hundreds of tents filling the ground and campfires all over the place. Xero walked to the center and found Grunt who had also noticed him.
“Oh kid, you ready for work?” Grunt asked grinning.
“What kind?” He asked.
“Well first off we need to transport lots of the thicker branches I cut off yesterday to the gate and then we need to build watch towers. I’ll also be teaching some students to make remedial hunting weapons like bows and then teaching them to spear fish for when they can’t rely on their familiar.” He said.
Xero sighed and thought a bit, “I’ll do some transporting them, need the wood cleaned like you did yesterday?” He asked.
“Nah, I’ll do that myself before we build the watch towers. We also need to make a space behind the walls for archers and for you kids to watch your familiars when we fight.” He muttered. “Ah well! Get going and get wood, there will be others coming eventually so have fun.” He said and laughed loudly.
Xero just turned and walked to the gate. He didn’t expect much else and summoned Ash so that they could gather wood together if need be.
Leaving the gate he looked at the many piles of rubble wood and choose a random one and brought Ash to pick it up and got to work.