Day 2 Phase 2

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I settle down on Claudia’s shoulder while we made the last preparations for heading out. Unfortunately the idea with the grass bag didn’t work out, but after our discussion about our status and skills Claudia set her inventory skill to active in her empty Body slot. One inventory space is not much, but it can hold a small tree-branch. And using it for collecting will get it up to reasonable levels fast, I expect the second slot to become available tomorrow or the day after that.

But collecting cheap wood is not where the real treasures are probably hidden, so I try again.

“Claudia, I still think you should put more time in reading those books. There has to be a reason why the god gave them to you, and specifically mentioned not to absorb them.”

“Sorry, but reading those books is like watching an approaching disaster – and one where you know that it will involve you yourself. Didn’t you tell me that there is a ritual that allows you to learn that language from me? That way you could check them yourself.”

“Yes, but you have seen my status – with a mind of 1 that ritual will really hurt and put me out for a day or two until I recover. I would really prefer if you could handle the books.” I answer.

“Not going to happen fast.” Claudia says to me “There is a reason why I put down the books. OK, everything looks good now, we can talk while going out. I think directly west until we hit some landmark, just to get a better overview and allow you a better guess of where we are.”

“Ah – I think there is a translation error. The words you were looking for are not ‘put down’ but ‘throw at the wall at the other side of the room’…” I try to get her to joke about it.

Which unfortunately fails when she answers dryly “Hardi har har – sorry, that is nothing to joke about for me. I think I better explain what I read to that point.

Korventin was an arrogant idiot. Or more probably an arrogant idiot-savant because he was great in one thing and an absolute idiot in all others. Basically he created biological life with his magic – including the Sareni, the race I’m now a part of. And you can’t tell me that is something regularly done.”

“WHAT???” I’m absolutely stunned. ‘Even most of the gods around here have to put in some work to create a static monster race, and that mortal mage created a variable shapeshifter epic tier race? That is so much more than genius…’

“No, Claudia, that is not normal. Isn’t Korventin the name the System gave to the statue we got as an obstacle? I thought it was a very regal looking mage…”

“Yes, from all what I can determine that is a statue of that piece of shit. Because you haven’t heard what exactly I read last – the reason for the creation of the Sareni.

He wanted his sex-slaves to double as his bodyguards, despite everyone suggesting that this would be a bad idea. And the reason why he still followed through with those plans despite the negative advices? He didn’t want the aesthetic view of his inner chambers to be disrupted by having veteran soldiers stationed there.”

“Ohh … key” I mumble shocked “That would explain the focus on Presence and Body for the Sareni. And I heard that a lot of humans have strange fetishes like the catgirls…”

Suddenly there is a clawed finger before my face and Claudia mentions “You might want to reconsider what to say and remember that I was human before being reincarnated as a Sareni.”

“Oh, look at this branch here on the tree.” I fly up “The tree is partially dead, and in this branch there is already some moss and fungus growing, as well as some insects. If you break it here you should be able to store it in your inventory slot, getting everything in one go into the dungeon.”

We slowly continue west in silence for a while. There is no landmark or anything special so far, but at least no wolves either. ‘We probably got the main pack of the area last night, so it will be a few days before the system can guide more wolves to this part of the forest.’

After half an hour or so I quietly tell Claudia “I will spend one of my free points to Mind this evening, and then handle the language ritual after the dungeon rooms are placed. You could use that time to absorb the tokens we got, just consider the order of the two monsters when triggering the tokens for them. The first token used will appear more often in the random list as the second token used.”

“Thanks, I appreciate that.” is her equally quiet answer while we continue west.

After another ten minutes I suddenly see something. “Hey Claudia, I think the forest ends there. The bushes are suddenly denser, but I can still see more light coming through. A hundred meter or so, then we should be clear of the forest.”

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I raise up from her shoulder when we leave the forest. “It’s a forest lane, cleared for a high road in the middle – let’s search the road for a marker!” and I speed up ahead.

But before I can fly even half the distance to the road, I hear an “Ouch” and a thumb behind me.

Turning around I see Claudia sits on the grass rubbing her nose with one hand while using the other three to keep herself in a sitting position.

I fly back to ask her “Claudia? What happened?”

“I don’t know. I was trying to jog to the road myself when I suddenly hit something invisible.” Claudia stands up while telling me this and waves her hand in front of her. “There – look, here is some form of invisible wall. Wait a moment…”

Her face takes a really pissed off expression while she makes a number steps to the south, trailing that wall that isn’t even there. Then she begins to hit that wall with her forehead while shouting “Aaargh.”

It looks really strange. There is no wall, but I can see where her skin is suddenly contracted as if she really hits a wall with her forehead. I ask her “You found something? What is going on?”

“Yes” Claudia answers with a sigh “We are exactly one mile away from the Dungeon Heart, and this invisible wall curves to stay at exactly that distance. Or in other words, this is how far I am allowed to leave the dungeon.

That Power did say that five miles was too much, but I hoped for at least two or three miles, because one mile is basically nothing.”

“But what are we doing now if you can’t get to the road, Claudia?”

“Oh, I can get to the road – just a bit farther south. The road goes from northwest to southeast after all, and about five hundred meter or so along the barrier it should have reached our dungeon area. Until then, you’re the one who has to check everything beyond the border as it doesn’t exist for you.”

We walk along the border toward the south. I have problems keeping a grin of my face. ‘Yeah, so I can still do my regular job as a dungeon pixie – getting things from beyond the reach of the dungeon into it. This barrier might be bad for Claudia, but it assures me that I still have a job.

Hey – isn’t that…’

“Claudia, please stop and wait here – I think there is something interesting on the other side of the road.”

I fly to the road where I slow down a bit to check it. ‘Definitely a reasonably maintained High Road. It even looks like a Varelian High Road, but there is no marker in sight to be sure. OK, on to the bushes on the other side’

A hundred meter further I see my guess confirmed. ‘Yes, Falanna-Bushes, the staple of animal fodder. Now how do I get those thorns broken to get at the berries..’

Ten Minutes later I’m back with Claudia. “Hi Claudia, I was right. But I probably need a few minutes to carry a batch over here. These are the thorns first – careful, they are almost as long as my arm. But they make good materials for some traps.

I’ll get the berries next – don’t eat them, they are too sour for most people but very liked by a lot of animals. And since we didn’t have them yet they should give us enough points for the berry skill to become usable.”

As we continue along the barrier, the road comes closer and closer. Ten minutes later I see a marker – shortly before the road reaches the barrier. I fly and check it before returning to Claudia with good news.

“Claudia, this is a High Road of the Varelian Empire. The marker there told me that the next rest place is five hundred meter inside our zone, and that the next settlement is to the southeast as well.”

Claudia marches the last meters until she can examine the road as well. “Hmm, on the world I was born on previously this would barely count as a dirt track. Is this Varelian Empire one of the smaller ones?”

“Hu? No, the Varelia is one of the largest empires on Nerwara. Only the Varelians and one of the smaller kingdoms bother to clear one hundred meters on both sides of their High Roads to protect from bandits and the like. And look at the work they put into creating the road on the raised bed of gravel…”

“In my old world, two thousand years ago the Roman Empire paved most of their roads with stone. And your Nerwaran Common language doesn’t even have to words to describe how we made our current streets. And we need those streets because travel is much faster than a horse-drawn cart. For our cars 50 miles per hour was normal and not fast.”

I fly to her to get more information. “That sounds as if you had a very high level of magic in your old world.”

“No” Claudia answers “We had absolutely no magic at all, everything was done by craftsmanship. Extremely advanced craftsmanship admittedly, but no magic involved at all.”

“How is that even possible” I wonder loud, but unfortunately Claudia shatters my hope.

“I don’t know, I never went to college to learn something like that. I became a clerk in a clothing store shortly after school. I was a pure city girl without any knowledge about nature or crafting. And my memory ends about one or two years later, the rest has already been erased by the soul river when that Power took me out.

Let’s follow this road to the camping site, so we know how to reach it from the dungeon.”

I settle down on Claudia’s shoulder again while we wander along the road. It slowly turns more to the east, but after a short while I can see that it turns to the south again after the rest site.

When we reach it I fly up to better check it out.

Everything seems to be normal – a gravel place of 50mx50m with the road in the middle, a small 2mx2m stone hut to the side with grips so a guard can better climb to the roof, and a stone slab for a fireplace.

“Hi Claudia, to explain a few things: That stone hut is basically only a place to keep firewood and firedung dry. All travelers are supposed to replace what they take with fallen wood from the forest and/or dung from their Crevans – that is the most common beast of burden around here. You can check if there is anything inside that we’re missing. Most likely we already have each wood sample, but sometimes caravans have broken wheels or similar things they place there as firewood.

It also serves as a tiny guard tower.

The stone slab there is where you are supposed to make your fire. Any questions?”

I watch as walks around and checks everything before answering “No, everything is cleat and I see nothing special here. But is there a place for handling trash on such sites? If a caravan has some things that can’t be burned to throw away? Broken leather pieces or bones from food they carried might help us with materials as well.”

I shake my head “No, there is a lot less trash than you assume – most travelers and especially caravans learn to repair and mend almost everything, because you can’t carry too many replacements with you. The rest is often kept until the next village where it still might be of use. And since this place is only one day from the next village, it is unlikely that something is left here in either travel direction – either it was fixed on the last stop or is kept until then.

However let me check the forest border – if there is some trash it is supposed to be deposited or buried there.”

I fly along the forest on both sides but as expected we aren’t lucky. But since we already have found a lot, we decide to return to the dungeon and deposit what we carried.

While we were checking the shortest way between the dungeon and the rest site, Claudia has some additional questions.

“Parsi, how far is it to that next settlement exactly? You said one travel day?”

“Yes, it’s about eight miles to the village.”

“What? But most people I knew could walk that distance in two or three hours, why are you calling that a travel day?”

“That sounds about right for light encumbrance and good weather. You’re forgetting that most travelers or caravans have only three or four hours a day for travel because they also need time to forage and hunt for food, to take down and setup their camps, to collect firewood and so on.

Messengers that carry their own food often skip one or two camping places per day, but for regular travelers eight miles is a lot.”

I watch as Claudia shakes her head again. “It seems I have a lot to learn” she tells me. “There is the dungeon. We still have a lot of hours until evening, I suggest we do another round for more berries, we are short of getting their material skill usable.”