Ritzy and Gerhart only walked for a short while before Mognog called for them to stop. An hour had yet to pass since their break, but their encounter with Lenny’s corpse had sapped a lot of the energy they had built up during their pause.
But Mognog didn’t only ask them to halt because of their need for rest. They had also stumbled upon a near-perfect spot to make a trap for their pursuers.
The rain was doing a good job washing away Ritzy’s and Gerhart’s tracks, but Apprentice Trackers and higher were bound to have ways to pick up their traces, despite the rain.
“It’s time to put those arrows and shortswords to use, tall guy.”
If Ritzy and Gerhart couldn’t escape pursuit, they could at least make more trouble for those hunting them.
Mognog didn’t want to make any assumptions or guesses founded on a poor understanding of the society he had found himself after death. But from what he understood from Gerhart’s explanation, Baron Michmond cared for his son quite a lot. But he couldn’t afford an entourage of knights trained in mana. Or he didn’t think it would be necessary when Michmond was just visiting a random town close to the forest, where nothing was supposed to threaten him.
However, if Baron Michmond had the resources to waste, he wouldn’t skimp out on his beloved son’s protection if he could.
From that, Mognog could conclude that Baron Michmond was a little thrifty, not wasteful, and didn’t have resources to spare, whether that be of the monetary or human sort. Well, he didn’t have a surplus of it, and the subordinates and people close to him were probably busy with more important things than babysitting.
But now that Michmond was dead, revenge would shoot right to the top of the list. But not everyone would be able to chase after Michmond’s assassins.
The first group would be those closest to Banta Forest, which would be the knights and guards of Vestor and any nearby town. There could possibly be Scouts, Rangers, Hunters, Trackers, and whatever else that could move through the forest with relative ease should anyone like that happen to be close by.
However, Lenny, a shoddy Apprentice Ranger, had been the only Ranger in Vestor, the town closest to Banta Forest. Vestor might have been pretty destitute and had a weak population. But it was still one of the larger towns of the barony if one overlooked Mokond, the capital of the Mokond Barony that Baron Michmond governed.
So, if Lenny were one of the few mana users and the only one with skills for the forest, the surroundings wouldn’t have many others. And he had already succumbed at the hands of Ritzy and Gerhart.
But with Lenny out of play, it wasn’t likely that any decent trackers would catch up to them soon.
The second group that would come for Ritzy and Gerhart would be those who could more easily put aside their current business and take on Baron Michmond’s order to hunt down Ritzy and Gerhart. Again, not necessarily the barony’s greatest Trackers and Scouts unless they happened to be free already.
Mognog hoped the third group wouldn’t be sent out since that would spell trouble for them. But if that happened, Ritzy and Gerhart would have the barony’s elites, specialized in hunting people, on their tail.
Against them, the two kids wouldn’t stand a chance, and neither would their traps.
If Ritzy and Gerhart, through some miracle, avoided the third group for long enough, Mognog was sure that the otherwise possibly thrifty Baron Michmond would use his connections and call in a favor or two to get people stronger than what the barony could offer. If Ritzy and Gerhart weren’t in Chitron by then, they might as well give up.
At least, that’s what Mognog thought, based on his understanding of the situation and the degrees of strength each rank mana user had.
Ritzy’s and Gerhart’s traps would only serve that slow them down if the people from the third and fourth groups started showing up. But against the first and second, they could still be useful. But only if they were good enough.
Ritzy and Gerhart hadn’t made traps before. Well, Gerhart had set up snares that were good for catching rabbits, the small kind. But what they were doing now, under Mognog’s guidance, required a little more finesse and eye for detail. Unfortunately, those two things had a tendency to take a hike when one was tired.
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So, Ritzy and Gerhart took a few minutes to breathe, relax, and try to recover. They also munched on a few nearby berries.
“You guys ready?”
Mognog’s cheery voice only got a pair of reluctant groans in response.
“Yeah, I know. But if things go well with this trap, you’ll be able to take a slightly longer rest. So, man up and get up.”
“Urgh.”
“You’re so bossy.”
Although still reluctant, Mognog’s words had motivated Gerhart and Ritzy enough to get them moving again.
“What do we need to do?”
Mognog looked at Ritzy to make sure he was listening while he answered Gerhart’s question.
“A bunch of things. There’s going to be some heavier manual labor and some more crafty stuff. And since I think the kiddo will be better at the crafting, I’ll leave the heavy lifting to you, Gerhart.”
“Alright.”
“Don’t worry. After this, you won’t have to carry bags of arrows and swords anymore.”
“That does sound nice.”
“Great. You will collect branches, preferably wide and leaf-covered ones we can use to cover up the pit you will be digging in the middle of this animal trail.”
Gerhart was tired, and he began turning around to start looking for suitable branches when he realized something.
“Wait… Won’t something like that be too obvious? I’m pretty sure even I would spot that kind of trap.”
Mognog chuckled deviously. Gerhart felt a chill run down his spine as it looked like Mognog’s teeth shone in a grin.
“That’s the plan.”
Mognog stopped chuckling abruptly.
“Ah! Not that you will spot it, of course.”
“I kinda got that.”
“Good. Get to work.”
Gerhart nodded, curious about what Mognog had planned. But since he knew now wasn’t the time for questions, he obeyed and started looking for branches, both on the ground and still attached to the trees.
He was careful in case there were any traces of forest creatures or monsters or Lenny. But he, thankfully, didn’t have to go far to find suitable branches since they were in a part of the forest with leaf-bearing trees whose canopies and crowns created umbrella-like coverage here and there in the forest.
The trees weren’t dense enough to block out the ever-continuing rain, and their leaves weren’t dense enough to shield the ground right below them either. But their branches seemed tailor-made for what Mognog wanted. When Gerhart grabbed several of them and layered them with care, they created a nearly perfect mat of leaves.
It was probably one of the reasons Mognog decided to make the trap where they were.
Gerhart decided he would ask Mognog to teach him as much as possible when they made it out and were safe from Baron Michmond’s pursuit. There would probably be trouble in store for them in the future purely based on the fact that Ritzy would be there, so Gerhart wasn’t sure there would be a lot of free time, even after they made it to Chitron. But he could hope, just like he was hoping that they would make it.
Their journey had been kind of smooth sailing so far, as long as they ignored Lenny catching up to them and Talia’s subsequent death, their fatigue, Lenny’s corpse acting weird, the weather, their pursuers being stronger than them, and most likely catching up, the fact that they probably aren’t even halfway through the forest, and getting out of the forest wasn’t even the end of it.
The more he thought about it, the more he realized they had a lot speaking against their success, so Gerhart stopped thinking about it and started digging.
He was curious about what Mognog had told Ritzy to do since he was fiddling with the arrows, the bowstrings, and the shortswords. But he quickly got lost in the monotonous digging. Gerhart was too tired and his mind stopped moving as his body just repeated the motions and scraped away the muddy dirt below the mulchy cover the fallen leaves provided.
The roots did provide some trouble, but Gerhart ignored it and dug around them. Since he only had his hands and a dagger, there wasn’t much he could do, even if the ground was soft from all the water soaking it. Even with a shovel and an axe, he would still have had trouble getting through the sinewy underground network of roots to make a deep pit.
Thankfully, he only had to make something shallow.
Gerhart snapped out of his hardworking daze and realized he had dug a lot. His hands, forearms, and legs were covered in mud. He had also lost feeling in his hands from the cold and wet ground, so he wasn’t sure if he was bleeding or not, but it wasn’t comfortable.
“Is this good?”
Gerhart got Mognog’s attention with his question.
“Good job, mudpie. Take a breather. Ritzy will be done shortly. After that, we should try and get a move on if possible.”
“Good.”
Gerhart sighed in exhaustion and found a nearby trunk to lean against as he rested while scraping the mud off his fingers to see if they were as torn by the digging as they felt.
When Ritzy was done, they rested for a few more minutes before continuing onward through the forest. Now that Gerhart didn’t have to carry the bags of swords and arrows, he could alleviate some of Ritzy’s burden so that he only carried his spellbook, Bone Chalk, dagger, and Mognog. The bag with flesh-melting liquid and their other supplies ended up with Gerhart, who had no complaints since it was a lot lighter than his previous load.