A cheer went up, followed by more, but there were also plenty of adventurers who just stood blankly, panting, or found a place to sit down and try to process things. Someone shouted, trying to get back a semblance of order. Another person sobbed, at first softly, then louder, and then an entire chorus of cries.
It was the aftermath of a victorious battle.
Shrugging, I stepped around the dead healer, ignored the few stares directed my way, then made it back to where my friends were.
"Haell! You're okay!" Granuel shouted.
I looked at the five of them, bloodied here and there, but not broken. I doubted they even had any remaining injuries on their bodies after some healing.
"Of course," I smiled an unseen smile. "Just took care of something. How about you guys? I kind of just left there on instinct, but I really shouldn't have."
"What?" Angerly boggled. "We did tell you to go, right?"
"Well, you did… But what if something happens to you guys?"
"We were fine," Therick was the one to answer. "And besides, it is good instinct to take care of our flanks." He lowered his voice and leaned close to me. "It's honestly stupid that everyone went here and left none to defend our rear."
My friend was right. I looked at the front half of our caravan, and it had indeed suffered the brunt of the attacks. But stationing one lower-level party to our flanks would’ve prevented many injuries and a death, even if they couldn’t face the dodoom. Adventurers were actually accustomed to being part of larger groups like this overall, so they weren’t bad at coordinating party units, but we didn’t have an overarching leader and it showed.
Not that I wanted to be taking orders.
“Oh well.” I shrugged, and then started to help my girlfriend in looting and dismantling only the best cuts of the dead barkbarks. Soon, the caravan stirred into motion again, and my party set up on the side of the road to cook a good meal for ourselves after all that excitement. We made soup and roast out of our enemies, and they were delicious.
“Greetings. You are Moonwash, correct?” A merchant approached our group, and I immediately narrowed my eyes in suspicion as I slurped up a barkbark leg.
“Yes,” she answered, “That’s me.”
“Good. I have an offer for you,” he gestured behind him. “Plenty of people have gotten injured in that fight, and we are down one healer. We would like to hire you in order to see them all healed in a timely manner. I’m personally impressed by that ritual you made a few weeks ago, and I would like for you to have this opportunity to help.”
I relaxed a little after hearing his offer. More negotiations needed to be made, but that wasn’t my job.
The first offer was for Moonwash to just take one fixed payment for healing up our forces. Granuel stepped in, and asked for a portion of all the heals. They went back and forth a few times, and my friend was eventually able to settle on a marginally better ratio for Moonwash, but that wasn't the main win. He had secured cheaper heals for everyone, which was more important than profit.
I stood up with the two of them once that was done, and we followed the merchant towards the wagons. I gestured to Moonwash for a silence bubble before I asked my question. "Why do we care about what he thinks?"
"Uh, because we negotiated..." Granuel hedged, a bit confused.
"No, I mean… We can heal people all by ourselves. Why do we need a middleman like him?"
"Ah. Well, first of, we don't have the mana to heal this many people. Second of all, this is their caravan. They organized it. It'd be incredibly rude to just do that without working out a deal with them.”
I blinked. "That sounds like their fucking problem."
Granuel sighed at my comment, then panicked, "Oh wait sorry! It's a valid question..."
I held up a hand to stall him, ignoring how I did get offended. That was fine. I did not let it affect me or my friend. "It's fine. I know I don't understand things sometimes. Continue."
"Well... reputation is important. For us as adventurers. And especially for me and what I do."
"Alright," I shrugged. "That’s fine. I'll just watch. You guys do whatever you do."
"Okay. Thanks Haell!"
I chuckled, and Moonwash collapsed the bubble of air.
On the other side, I found an ishkawtan worker opening a crate upon the merchant's command to reveal that it was full of light element wands.
"An entire crate? That's fucking expensive right?" I asked Granuel.
"Yeah. It is."
"Damn. The war is that bad?"
"It's not just that crate. I believe the other ones are full of the same thing."
"Wow."
Moonwash was handed a few of the wands, each of them full, and then someone from the merchant's side followed her around along with me. Those who had been injured were surprised but grateful over the lower price, although not everyone ended up happy.
"Hey, wait!" Begged a fountan who had lost an arm. The one that held his mana fount. “Please! You have to grow it back! I can't... I can't work like this! What will I do!?
I tensed when he grabbed Moonwash, but I kept myself from violently prying him away… for now. My girlfriend wasn't being harmed, she was fine, and she could handle herself. There was no need to push around someone who was kind of already fucked.
"I'm sorry," Moonwash apologized. "But there is nothing I can do. I can't do biomancy."
"But..." he sobbed. It took a minute more until he finally accepted the reality and let us go.
~~~
"Hey!"
I was just talking to Therick about sword tactics when a young man suddenly approached us. His armor was made of thick fur and leather, and he had a double-headed axe strapped to his back.
"What?" I asked impatiently, really not looking to make friends here, but it was clear he meant to talk to me rather than anyone else in my group.
"Oh," he slowed down once he was next to me, marching in pace with the caravan. It had been a few days since we were besieged by barkbarks, and everyone was more wary now, sending more scouts ahead just in case. "I just wanted to say you're awesome! We all saw you fight a level 20 by yourself! And win! That's great!"
"I'm… level 20 too?" I just said, perplexed, though admittedly incredibly pleased for the praise.
"Well, yeah. I know that! But it's still so cool that you're willing to take that risk by yourself.
"Right..." I just got even more confused. It was a monster the same level as me. I had barely shown a smidgen of my full potential. Why was he so fucking impressed!? "You're right. I'm fucking amazing,” I said anyway.
"Right!?" he laughed. "That's all I wanted to say. I'm glad to see Golex the Hero's granddaughter be so impressive. The future is bright for the Edengar Kingdom!" He ran back to his place while waving at me. "Oh and I'm Axtrus of The Big Movers! Call on us anytime if you want to quest together!"
"I'll keep it in mind!" I couldn't help but reply. I likely wouldn't get the opportunity since we would be on the move very soon, but that had been a pretty fun conversation, and he had made a pretty positive impression.
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"You're confused," Angerly pointed out.
"Totally," I admitted. "I think he was talking about that dodoom I killed. Why was he so excited over me soloing something the same level as me? Why is that fight surprising?" Moonwash's anti-sound barrier went up. "I am capable of so much worse if I didn't have to hold back so much."
"Most people don't take those kinds of risks," Therick explained. "Monsters can often be stronger per level than the sapient species."
"That's not true," Moonwash corrected, "From what I've gathered, most wildlife are probably weaker than us per level. But there are a lot of them so the stronger ones might give that impression."
"I think even just being equal or slightly stronger is already a big risk that a lot of people would like to avoid," Granuel added. "Those fights could go either way, they can be unpredictable, and no one wants to lose their lives. This is substantiated by what quests adventurers typically take."
"Yeah!" Berry agreed. "I've seen people who tried to take on something too dangerous die. I've seen some get permanently injured even by something so much lower-leveled because they let their guard down! It's really always best to be safe." She looked at me. "Not that you're doing anything wrong, or even unsafe! I'm sure you know what you're doing!"
I snorted, and the rest laughed.
~~~
The forest gradually thinned as we traveled, eventually transitioning into a vast and open shrublands. With this change in environment came a variety of new plants, terrain, and threats to contend with. The caravan continued to follow the road, but Moonwash and I had diverged a little, uncaring for the judgement of everyone else.
We remained close and were just off to the side! They didn’t need to be like that, when we’d contributed a lot when it came to actual fights.
I followed Moonwash as she explored our surroundings, and I listened intently as she explained all the new plants and animals. The bushes here were more vibrant and full of life, from those that replenished their leaves very fast, to ones that bore fruit both poisonous and delicious. There were more horned hares and other small critters running around, and I caught quite a few of them, but not all as evidenced by how an unexpected surge of grasping vines managed to trip me up and nearly bring me to my knees.
"Help!" Moonwash suddenly shouted in a bland tone while I was fuming and trying to find some other prey. A snake had jumped out of the mildly colored bush my girlfriend had been poking into, and now it was latched onto her arm. Her armor was dented, but the monster was thankfully unable to bite all the way through in one go.
"MOONWASH GET BACK!"
I shouted as I swung my greatsword wide and drove away the animal. It was a sort of viper, but as large as the largest snakes of modern earth. It was a level 20 venomusa, known for its piercing bite-force and strong poison. The enemy monster slithered back into position, then struck like a spring coil.
My greatsword flashed forward, succeeding in driving away the creature’s attack, but not in actually hitting it as it jerked away at the last moment. The venomusa then proceeded to shoot back into another attack right after, thus catching me off guard. I raised my arm at the last moment, forcing the bite to be more shallow, but it still dented my armor. A clumsy blast of fire from Moonwash drove the monster back away, and I growled as I felt a growing hatred for this slippery beast. For a moment I actually considered if I should use my hyperdemon gland to finally end everything once and for all.
Breathe.
The rage washed through me, and I kept myself as unaffected as I could. I had not used that Mutation at all since my evolution for a reason, and now was not the time to suddenly activate it again.
So I cleared my mind and observed my foe. I remembered my training, and I focused my reflexes to their very limit. This was a faster foe, a stangely-moving foe, and I had to be one step ahead.
Another lunge, another bite. I drove the monster away, then again, but I misstepped during the third clash and got bit on my thigh. Thankfully my armor was strong enough to take care of a few bites, but the monster in front of me would get through the mythril at some point, so I had to end the fight before then.
I exchanged a couple more blows with the snake, running around like the floor was on fire when the animal tried to slither below and around me. I got better and better with every clash, all my efforts finally coming together into one, until I was able to land a single cut. We both only redoubled our efforts after that, but the next attack of mine that landed nearly managed to break the spine of my foe. The venomusa hissed as it quickly slithered away in defeat, but was stopped by a blast of earth right ahead of its path, and that got me all the time that I needed to finish this fight.
The monster was split into two, then three and four and five, until it could move or slither no longer.
“I think it’s dead,” I joked, then promptly fell on my ass.
Moonwash was already harvesting all that she could from the high-level monster before I could even sigh in relief, and she was also very interested in the bush it was hiding in. The venomusa was apparently in symbiosis with the toxaleafa, which was why we really should not get poisoned by one. Had the monster not been near one such plant, then its venom would’ve actually been very weak for its level. I made the right choice to avoid its poison by making sure that my armor never got bit on the same spot.
“I’m excited to see what I can make with this later.”
~~~
We came across our first cursetacean. One had made it this far.
It saw us just as we saw it, and it shrieked in unison with the battle cry of a party that ran off to take care of the threat.
It was... below level 20. Though it was sort of hard to tell with these creatures. I stayed at the ready, but otherwise just watched with my friends how other people took care of these complicated threats.
I smirked as their archer tossed rocks at the enemy instead of using the bow on his back. The stones hardly dealt any damage, but that was the point. The action was just enough to redirect the beast's attention, where it was then led away from the road to be set upon by numerous vines. The cursed monster thrashed, someone jumped on its back, and then she screamed in pain as she drove the spear down its head.
The woman immediately fled. The cursetacean had somehow survived, but only just. The party's swordsman finished it off, then also cursed from the damage that the overgrown crab did just before it died.
The adventurer party immediately went to get healed after that ordeal, while someone else burned the remains. That mage also had to get some light healing, because even the monster's corpse somehow retained some retaliation effect, if a vastly weakened one. A mere echo of an echo.
~~~
I went away from camp to take a piss again. People had begun to think I had some sort of condition because of how frequently I urinated. That was untrue, because what I was actually doing was dumping wrath magic as deep into the earth as I was able. People would detect it if they looked really hard, but mana was typically harder to detect beneath solid objects. Mana sense was different than regular senses of course, but they were still informed by it. Most people weren’t used to looking for things underground, so the only ones who typically had good magic detection in that sort of environment were those who lived in such an environment, or those who naturally had sharp senses related to it.
When I finished and merged back with the caravan, the massive towering walls of The Fortress City Agwar were already visible in the distance. It was a far more utilitarian construct than I’d come to expect from Angelore, and it made for an imposing figure even from far away. We walked the rest of the way there, crossed the massive barren clearing that surrounded the city, and then went up to the gates.
The head merchants talked to the soldiers at the gate, who were still mostly humans, but a little more diverse. There were kobolds, ogres, and even a centaur ready to slaughter whomever was inconvenient for Edengar.
We were let through after a quick inspection of our cargo.
Inside the walls, we found a place that remained more dreary and dull than I was used to. The buildings were still decorated, but only to the bare minimum, and there was little color to be seen. There were no children playing in the streets, the stalls were quieter, and the stores present were more geared towards providing necessities rather than any luxuries.
Soldiers strolled through the place like they fucking owned it, and that’s because they effectively did. (Probably. I just got here.) Regular civilians showed them deference at every turn, but were also very obviously trying to avoid their attention. They walked with their heads down, as if always in a hurry, but never wanting to actually run.
There was also one other addition to the streets I was used to, and that’s the heavy presence of inhex(ant-like insectlike-like sapient people). They followed their commanders through rigorous marches and drills, silently seething in most cases, and I empathized with their wrath as someone who too felt a need to destroy everything in sight, if for admittedly less empathetic reasons.
The inhex people seething silently was actually the best-case scenario here, for they would otherwise be beaten and abused. Most still tried to remain silent through that, but those who did not were threatened, not by their own lives but by the safety and well-being of their beloved queen and her eggs. Individual inhexes were forced to fall in line, where they would’ve otherwise fought, even if it meant death.
Not far from the entrance, I saw a bunch of them training in a field, fighting each other in brutal ways that left lasting scars or worse. Their spars continued until someone could no longer stand and fight, where they would then be ushered back into this dark warehouse, and were seldom given any form of healing before they entered into the darkness. That building was so full of inhexes that they had almost no room to walk, other than on top of each other. Even the walls and ceilings were full of the enslaved people, for they could walk on any surface. That was just another thing for the army to exploit.
“Haell.”
“Haell, hey!”
“Are you okay?”
I wrenched my furious gaze away from the training camp and looked back at my friends. My head turned towards where they were pointing, and I saw that the caravan was starting to move on without us.
I stared at it for a while longer, gradually rearranging my hidden expression into a semblance of civility. Their plight was a terrible one, but it was not something I could fix by glaring really strongly, for my glare was not yet strong enough.
“I’m fine.” My hands painfully unclenched and wrapped around Moonwash’s own. “Let’s go,”
How much longer do I need to wait? How much stronger do I need to become? Until I am able to burn it all down.