Irlan nodded several times… it was obvious, and he wondered why he didn’t think of that, it was probably because of the excitement. Learning new things from others was good, learning new things himself was even better.

Considering what he had learned so far, Zelos assumed that the barbarians, natives or wildings are a group of people who prefer to live a peaceful life. The emperors of the past tried to force them to join them, but their strength made them fail when they tried to use military might, so eventually, they decided to leave them alone. However, a lot was still a mystery and Zelos wanted to find out more about them.

“What else do you know about them? About their leaders, traits, and similar things. They are all basically a single clan, right?”

“In theory, yes, but they are a diverse bunch. I heard that they lived over several mountains, but then their leaders managed to unify those tribes, and that is something considering that we didn’t get even closer to defeating them when they were scattered. Those are the only things that are common knowledge.”

Since there was common knowledge, there should also be other pieces of information that weren’t common. Zelos couldn’t say if Heirina knew about them, but if she didn’t mention them, it was safe to assume that it was the case or that she was uncertain about those pieces of information.

Things won’t be easy since, over the years, they lost a lot of people thanks to the confrontations. They don’t start wars, but they kill anyone who disrupts their peace. That is their lifestyle, and they would do anything to protect it. At least, history says so.

In the end, the group crossed the territory of the Carli clan without finding a single soul along the way. They crossed it quite fast, thanks to that, and eventually reached the territory of the natives. Fortunately, there was a clear road to the mountains along the way, so they would be able to gain even more time. They had around one day before they reached the mountains, after that, it would be hard to say how much time they would need to find the location of the natives since there were many mountains along the way. Regardless, Kaitrine let out a sigh and then decided to solve one of the mysteries of that mission.

“Are you planning to keep training until we find the location of their base?”

“Until we reach the mountains since these territories are almost empty in these areas aside from the border. Anyway, it is weird to hear one of your questions directed at me without sensing some anger.”

“And you had to point that out, didn’t you?”

“It just picked my interest.”

At that point, it was obvious that they would have gotten used to each other, even the most annoying habits. At the same time, they fought and survived some difficult battles together, so their sense of camaraderie improved whenever that happened. Despite his words and actions being pretty self-centered, Zelos showed a bunch of times that he was always mindful of his surroundings and allies’ conditions. When he came to check on Irlan or when he covered for Kaitrine when she was breathing roughly after using her trait a few times… if anything, it was safe to say that he had a sense of duty to consider his allies’ conditions when he was working with them.

During the whole trip, Zelos was covered in sweat, but once they reached the base of the mountains, he stopped and then sheathed his dark sword. He felt pretty good despite the pain since he had a sense of accomplishment after enduring many more hours of training than usual.

After cleaning himself, Zelos looked at the mountains and couldn’t help but be surprised at their size and number… it was like an endless sea of massively tall mountains that stretched for quite a distance… perhaps even deeper into other territories. It would be quite something if they actually reached the central part of the country. Now that he thought about it… the ores that Rattay mined would have come from somewhere, and those mountains were the most obvious bet.

As they reached the base of one of them, they soon found the path going upward a bit. The curvature wasn’t that obvious, but since the path ahead looked like it was zigzagging, they could tell that the trip would last for a while. The path wasn’t large, so that made Zelos have a lot of thoughts about the journey.

“Can we even use the horses until we reach their location? The paths seem fine, but… a single mistake, and we would go down the mountain pretty easily.”

Aside from the path ahead, the surroundings were filled with sharp branches, rocks, and rugged terrain that would cause serious damage to anyone’s body, so they shared Zelos’s concerns as well.

In the end, it didn’t take long for the group to realize that the trip would be harder than imagined… the path at the base of the mountain was around ten meters long. It seemed that some large cargo usually went down and upward into the mountains, but soon that thinned out to half of that.

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While looking at the sides on the roof of the carriage, Zelos could already see one hell of an abyss on both sides, and they had just started climbing. Zelos moved his head to the side and then saw Irlan on the other side of the window of the carriage. And he looked pretty nervous while Kaitrine was watching the surroundings with interest. He was bad with heights, apparently.

“Your excitement died out pretty fast, huh?”

“Yes… this is my first time at a tall place… I never thought that I would feel like this.”

“I can’t deny that the look is a bit dangerous to the heart, but you will probably get used to it if you don’t look away and don’t think too much about it. Then again, considering that Heirina is driving, perhaps your nervousness is justified.”

“Hey, I am an excellent driver.”

Irlan couldn’t help but gulp… the idea of an accident seemed stronger than his trust in Heirina’s skills, and the fact that the path seemed to be thinning out with every single passing moment only made things harder to take for him. Irlan tried to follow Zelos’s advice and look out the window whenever possible, but soon he felt a nod in his stomach and then he got dizzy as well.

Zelos felt a bit bad for him… he got used to the situation pretty well, despite the jokes that he made about Heirina’s driving skills. Regardless, two hours after they started the climb, they found some sort of sign ahead… one that was decorated with a skull… There was a drawing of a weapon in his hand as well. Zelos wondered what that was about.

“They don’t want weapons here or they don’t want drawn weapons?”

“I guess it is the second option… anyway, this guy here probably didn’t come with a message from the imperial family, so we don’t have to worry about it.”

Heirina tried to sound as convincing as possible, but she failed at that. In the first place, even a long speech about that wouldn’t have as much impact as the skull on the sign. In any case, the group soon resumed their journey.

Around noon, the group reached the summit of the first mountain, and then they were able to see the terrain ahead. They could see the path crossing through several mountains, so it seemed that they wouldn’t get lost. Still, there were no signs of the natives’ village, town, city or whatever it was. They all assumed that finding it in such a place would be pretty easy, but their guess couldn’t be more wrong. In any case, when Heirina was about to start going down the mountain, Zelos jumped from the roof of the wagon.

“The horses are exhausted. We should take a break.”

“... You have a point. I completely forgot to consider that. Despite the situation, risking hurting them would be even more dangerous. We need to find them as soon as possible, but we can’t make mistakes while being in a hurry. Anyway, this view is amazing.”

“Irlan looks like he is about to faint, though.”

After hearing Kaitrine’s words, Zelos went to check the interior of the wagon and soon saw Irlan with his eyes closed while holding his weapon. At the same time, Edea looked like she was relaxed with a smile on her face, but she was just looking at nothing trying not to think and see the surroundings. She also wasn’t good with heights.

“I guess we can rule out you two from missions in mountainous areas.”

“No way. I will get used to this, eventually. I can’t bring shame to my family by running away from this kind of job.”

Irlan didn’t look like it, but he was indeed the kind of person who would say things like honor pretty often. Regardless, Zelos decided to use that chance to eat something. The mountains were pretty green, but close to the path, the area was quite dry. They also didn’t know if they could hunt anything around, so it was better to be cautious just to be safe in order not to get on the bad side of the natives.

One hour later, they resumed their journey since they knew that they wouldn’t be able to move at night. It would be too dangerous with a dangerous path like that. Moreover, Zelos decided to go on foot to give some respite to the horses. His stuff was pretty heavy, after all. At the same time, spending so much time without moving his body felt wrong.

“... What is he doing now?”

Kaitrine frowned when she saw Zelos moving ahead and then kicking some Peebles along the way. It seemed that he was bored, but Heirina knew what was going on.

“He is cleaning the path for the horses. He likes to take care of them, after all. I am surprised that he didn’t buy one after this point in time.”

Now that Kaitrine thought about it, Zelos was always the one looking after the horses and that was a lot of work, but he never complained. He actually looked like he was enjoying himself while doing that. The pebbles were too small to cause any real damage, but the problems that they could cause can pile up. Zelos was trying to decrease the chances of those problems arising even by a small margin.

“Captain… despite the Peebles, this path is quite even and free of obstacles and deformations. The natives probably keep them in this state. This area rains quite a lot, after all.”

“Yep… that would reveal why there are some rocks along the way and the Pebbles on the road. They could be watching us as we speak.”

“Hopefully, that weird kid won’t give us a bad impression.”

As the group approached the other side of the base of the mountain, the vegetation began to approach the path once again. There were even some trees around and when he looked ahead, Zelos couldn’t help but frown when he realized that the path disappeared thanks to the vegetation… he could see it continuing in the middle of another mountain, though.

“This is a good place for an ambush… but it seems a bit too soon for that.”