They had stopped at a medium-sized town. If Liam had to guess there were about two thousand people here, all encapsulated by a wooden fence around the height of two men.

The further into the countryside they went, the poorer the settlements got. Blue had prophesied that to Liam very early, and so far he had been right.

The houses were not as neatly built as the ones they had encountered in their first towns. None of the houses here had a proper steel hearth to warm them against the cold nights of winter. There were few oil lamps and only sparse candles. Instead of a guesthouse for all of them to sleep in, they had to stay in their wagon. These people here couldn’t afford any needless luxuries.

The town's state was also visibly reflected in the market atmosphere. Only around half of their merchants had built their stalls that day, with only the most basic of materials presented on them.

“These people don’t get traders too often, right?” Liam had asked Blue.

“Rarely.”

“So shouldn’t we like… offer a little more? Surely there will be more than a few things they will need.”

The man snorted.”Just wait for it.”

And so Liam had. At first, he wasn’t sure what Blue meant, until it became apparent around midday, that the day wasn’t just a slow one. No, there were simply very few people visiting the market in general. Only a thin stream of customers trickled in over the long hours they spent at their city center, half of them not even buying anything.

“Where are all of them?” Liam had asked.

“What do you mean?” Blue turned towards him. “That is all of them.” He gestured over the town center square.

“But… Why so few of them? I don’t understand, if they get so few traders coming through here, shouldn’t more of them be coming than in the other towns? I mean Ernst and Lepo’s town had half this many people, but we had two full market days there!”

“There are more people here, yes. And they also get fewer visits by caravans. But the reality is, that few of these people have the money to even afford any of the goods we present. Climate here is harsh, and there aren’t many opportunities for them to generate wealth. At least not in the form that is of any use to us.”

Liam hadn’t understood fully at first, but it became apparent as the day went on. More than a few people offered trades instead of payment. And while most of the merchants were generally not disinclined towards a good trade, he found them turning down almost all of the offers.

“Money starts losing its value quickly in the wilderness, you will see Liam,” Blue had said.

“Couldn’t we buy some of their things?” Liam had asked once again during one of their frequent breaks. “I mean, surely their wheat or whatever they’re growing must be worth something.”

Blue raised an eyebrow. “But we do. Yesterday when we arrived we stacked two full wagons of their goods.”

“Then how come so few of them have any real money?”

Blue shrugged. “Poor management on their part I guess. Maybe there was another caravan coming by before us. Or maybe they expect another one later in the season. It’s really not our business to force these people to buy, all we can do is offer.”

Towards the end of their shift, Liam found what this ‘poor money management’ really was. He was surprised to see two merchants chatting in such a good mood after such a low day, and so he listened to them talking while the workers stowed away their goods.

“Maybe I can finally buy the house in Eldezimar now.”

“You should finally buy your Missus the ring that she has wanted for like three years now.”

“Settling is for losers Wick, I can settle when I’m dead. Not when there are trades like this to be made.”

“Maybe we can even push them to two copper per ten pounds next time. If the season is as bad for the crops next year, I think I can squeeze out enough for my own small farm then.”

“Please, you’re too lazy to farm.”

“Who says I have to work on my own?”

The two laughed and Liam walked away, back to his wagon. He felt disgusted.

—----------------------------------------------------

In the days that have passed, he has thought about acting against Bilby again from time to time. He knew that the amount of drugs he had destroyed was negligible in the grand scheme of things for the man. But still, he found much delight in observing Bilby’s reaction.

The way he strode through the camp has changed. Instead of his obnoxious swagger, there was some paranoia in his gait now. He didn’t speak in a volume that droned over the whole caravan, making inappropriate jokes while sneering down on everybody anymore. Instead, his gaze rested on people he passed for a few moments. As if he was trying to glean from them whether or not they had been responsible or knew who the culprit was.

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It wasn’t really that Bilby was afraid, for his position in the caravan was too strong for that, but he was definitely at unease knowing that there was a mysterious cultivator probably working against him.

Liam still had no idea who the man was that had almost spotted him. But he was grateful for the cloudy night and his quick reaction.

It was painfully obvious to anybody that something strange was going on with Bilby. The fact that talk of a mysterious cultivator was going around the caravan didn’t help much.

Still, as much as Liam would’ve liked to agitate the cultivator even more, he knew he needed to be careful. Bilby was more alert now. Every time Liam passed his wagon there were at least two people stationed outside. Sometimes one of them was even one of the other cultivators of the caravan.

Liam hadn’t known it at first, but three out of the caravan’s four cultivators were actually part of Bilby’s entourage.

The matter was made even more tricky because Liam still wasn’t able to use his skills. At least not consistently. By now he and Marten had found a way to mask his mana signature. The technique was highly unusual, and maybe even unique to Liam. But as long as it worked for him, Liam didn't care much.

The problem was though, that he wasn’t even close to mastering it yet.

The act of veiling mana was difficult, to say the least. It wasn’t like the first methods Marten had told him, where he would have to introduce the ambient outside mana into his own mana stream and thereby neutralize his signature.

It also wasn’t, as it was for some cultivators of specific gods apparently, possible for Liam to simply mute his abilities. An act in which he could simply attune his mana to the one surrounding him.

No, his way of masking his mana signature was more strenuous than this. They had first discovered the technique only after Marten had noticed that his mana was strong enough to override the mana he was taking in from the surrounding mana. Liam’s way of masking his mana involved influencing the ambient mana to make his signature stick out less.

For that, he needed to release a small amount of his mana into the ambient energies swirling around him. If he slowly and carefully siphoned it, leading it directly towards the outside mana, they mixed.

It was a process that didn’t just require lots of attention, but also a not-insubstantial amount of mana from Liam. Once he had set up the mana around him, he could refocus his concentration on his skills, but veiling his signature still took a toll on him, yet.

With the ambient mana somewhat blurred from his own mana, he was able to mask his presence. Somewhat at least. When he stood close to him, Marten still was able to recognize his use of skills almost every time, no matter how much of his mana Liam sent to the outside.

When he was a little further away, and Liam was more careful, Marten didn’t always manage to discern whether or not he had used one of his divine abilities.

“I’m not an aura specialist though,” Marten had said. “So there are people whose skills in this area far surpass mine. More than you probably imagine.”

“Will it be enough for Bilby and his people though?”

“If you don’t use your skills directly in front of them or while they’re paying attention to you, you should be safe,” he paused, putting more emphasis on the part that came next. “But that doesn’t mean you should rely solely on that technique now. You still need to work on it and experiment. There are people more dangerous than Bilby outside.”

Despite the downsides of the technique and Marten’s warning, Liam was still delighted. Because it meant that he would finally be able to practice his skills again, an action that he had put off to the side for far too long.

Over the last few days since they made their breakthrough, Liam had done just that.

“Liam - Skills Stats:”

[Gravity Manipulation (Epic) - Level 9]

[Gravity Jump (Uncommon) - Level 6]

[Gravity Field (Uncommon) - Level 2]

Most of his gains have been in his Manipulation skill, as it was the easiest to practice. His progress there was measurable, and Liam felt proud. He was now able to balance two different objects around at the same time, and through shifting their gravitational pull, even move them around independently.

Nonetheless, he was somewhat less satisfied with his progress in his newest skill. Something about it still felt elusive to Liam. He had only managed to raise it one level while practicing around for a long time, but it was still a little tricky.

Liam had played around with it as soon as he had managed to veil his mana somewhat to Marten’s satisfaction.

One early morning he had sat at a small clearing in the forest and tried to get it to work. At first, it seemed that nothing was happening after he activated the skill. Even after trying around for the better part of an hour, Liam hadn’t managed to make anything happen. Only shortly before he was about to call it quits due to frustration, he noticed something.

The grass in front of him bent. It was only very slightly, and so Liam increased the mana he poured into the skill. Sure enough, a moment later the straws bend a little more towards the ground.

He turned around and saw the same thing happening even behind him and to his sides. Encompassing a small circular area roughly three feet around him, all the grass was pressed to the floor. Together with that came a slight sense of the area around him, an almost instinctive feeling of gravity there.

And then it clicked for Liam. He suddenly realized what the skills description meant and how he could get it to work. His mind opened up with the vast opportunities the skill could present, but he was quickly hit with a roadblock.

The ability seemed to be churning through his mana like fire through dried straw. He couldn’t manage to keep it running for more than a minute and even then the effects weren’t too pronounced.

Liam knew that wouldn’t keep him for long though, as excitement overtook him and he gained another level in the skill.

Since then he hadn’t managed to raise it again though, he simply lacked the time for that. It bothered him a little, but he had more pressing concerns.

What bugged him the most was that he rarely found time to practice his second skill. [Gravity Jump] as it was the one that had saved his life more than once now already.

It was only an uncommon skill, so at first Liam hadn’t expected it to be that strong or useful, at least not compared to his Epic skill, but he had been proven wrong.

He had to admit though, that he didn’t know that much about skill rarities yet. Or other cultivator secrets for that matter.

Marten had made true on his promise not to divulge any secrets of his journey upon him, and basic things like skill rarity belonged to that category. Liam had asked him a few questions, but those had always been blocked so thoroughly that he had just given up at some point.

Marten hadn’t lied when he had said he would teach Liam to survive, but not more.

There was nothing Liam could change about that though. He might not know much about the skill rarities, but he knew that his [Gravity Jump] was his most useful ability. And that it was a shame it wasn’t at a higher level yet.

So he was determined to practice it tonight while they were still in town. And he knew just the place for it.