Orou woke up lying on the ground behind Grizz's house. The puddle of liquid and the shards of glass that covered the ground were gone. His head was pounding as if someone had hit him in the head with a hammer and as he looked around and observed his surroundings, he realized that it was mid-day already. His thoughts were a bit sluggish and it was hard to move, but somehow, he forced himself to raise his body and enter through the window slit.
He had trouble steadying himself, but once he did, he realised that Grizz wasn't there. He tried thinking about where he could have gone, but Orou's head was hurting too much. He tried his best to recall what happened last night, but all that he remembered was a haze after he drunk the liquid. He wouldn't mind taking a few more drinks if it meant to experience to that dream again, but then again, seeing in what state he was in made his hesitant about any future drinks.
The longer he continued to sprawl on the floor the better his condition became. He felt the waves inside of him alleviating the headache, but not by much. It was like something was temporarily obstructing the waves from clearing his headache, though they could reach the rest of his body just fine. Even though he wasn't feeling great, the impulse to practice his spells wasn't impeded by a headache, but try as he might to control the spirits, it was simply impossible with his current state.
The rest of the day wasn't productive for Orou, he had planned to further investigate every building, but he simply couldn't in his condition. Grizz arrived back in a few hours, his hands covered with dirt and the exhaustion clearly spelled out on his face. Seeing Orou slightly alleviated his mood, a smile on his face as he sat down next to him.
"I can't believe they made me work so hard. You wouldn't expect this from beastmen of high purity, but this is a village of exiles after all. I can see the benefit of becoming feral if it means having as much stamina as those guys," Grizz sighed and started complaining to Orou. He listened in hopes of gleaning any new information from Grizz, but all this served was to bring up more questions.
"You went drinking last night eh? I found you lying in a pool of dream-wine, clearly drunk beyond belief. That stuff is expensive and you only take a single glass don't you know?" Grizz continued speaking to Orou, not expecting an answer back. The exhaustion from earlier was gone as he continued making fun of Orou, which was only making Orou's headache worse.
"What kind of a dream would an animal even have? I've never tried feeding dream-wine to my pets." As Grizz continued talking to himself, Orou was half tempted to get another bottle simply to laugh at the beastman when he gets completely drunk, but after this incident, he didn't want anything to do with the wine.
Eventually, Orou had enough of Grizz's babbling. He simply wouldn't stop talking and although he was a wonderful source of information, Orou simply wasn't capable to process all the information given to him, especially considering his current state. Not minding Grizz's shouts of Orou abandoning him, he lowered himself down the side of the building with less grace than he wanted and moved to a building where he had a clear line of sight to the town centre. Positioning himself so he could comfortably relax, he coiled up and stared at the town centre, waiting for night to fall.
Orou observed children playing and their mothers chasing after them, reprimanding them. He heard shouts and groans of beastmen in the distance, but from what Grizz had said, they were either doing manual labor like chopping wood or sparring with each other. There were designated hunting parties that were out hunting some meat both to have a stockpile of food and to prepare for another feast, but Grizz wasn't sure how they were leaving the village when a barrier was surrounding it.
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Although Orou didn't really care, for Grizz it was a huge lead and he promised Orou to learn more about the hunting parties and if possible, escape using that way. Orou had a lot of time to think while he was waiting for night, so he pondered if he should go with Grizz once he leaves the village. If Grizz could get him further into the beastman kingdom, he was all for it. Besides, it was like having a mobile source of food ready to be eaten at any time, in case of an emergency.
He continued contemplating the pros and cons of leaving with Grizz as the sun finally set. The children were ushered in and slowly, the activity died down. Orou waited until he could no longer hear a single noise before he started to move. Even though it was dark, Orou didn't simply slither down the middle of the road, instead opting to dart between shadows and stick to buildings for easier escape.
His head had cleared enough for him to finally gather some spirits and guide them to his eyes. He saw the familiar blue shape of the spirits and he decided to use this night in order to properly scour this village using his spirit sight, looking for any anomalies. He started from the eastern gate and zigzagged through the village, looking above and below him, searching for any anomalies.
Before he could even get to the village centre, he noticed a few vibrations approaching closer to him. From the looks of it, it was a group of more than four, but it was difficult to pick out how many were there exactly. Darting behind the corner of a building, he slowly poked his head out and waited for the sources of the vibration to arrive in order to judge how to proceed next.
Five beastmen were walking down the road and whispering to each other. A few chuckles and even more grimaces could be seen on their faces as they seemed to be engrossed in conversation. By their sides were metal swords and while they weren't wearing any armor, they looked more experienced than the regular beastman simply based on the way they walked, forming a similar formation to the one he had seen Tjord's group use.
They seemed to walk fine in the darkness without any light, but it could be simply because it was a well travelled and familiar route. Either way, it didn't stop Orou from slowly moving to their backs and following them from behind, hoping to glean any new and interesting information. Keeping a good distance just in case the spotted him, Orou hopped from one shadow to another and got into ear-shot of the ongoing conversation.
"That's not funny, how long do you think we can continue living like this, it's bound to change soon," a beastman with a horn he didn't recognise slightly pushed his companion, a grimace on his face as he wasn't the only one not laughing at something his companion had said beside him.
"I'd reckon we have a month left of this before the barrier finally cracks. I've got a wife and two kids, I don't know if I can join Vaar in his upcoming campaign." The beastman with a slightly warped face spoke to the man next to him. The mood of the group shifted as he continued speaking: "Of course, you're free to join him but honestly, I don't believe he will succeed against, he's going against the king himself."
"Where will you live if Vaar doesn't succeed? There's no place for ferals like us in beastmen society and Vaar hopes to change it. Besides, I don't think you have that much more time left to decide. Vaar told that he has news from Belor and that we need to find the snake that was here a few days ago, if Tjord and his group succeed on finding it, we might be out of here before we know it." As the beastman said that, Orou got a bit worried. He didn't know why Vaar needed him and what Vaar would do if he found him.
"We're up against impossible odds. I haven't heard the latest news from Solus but they always have an army stationed near the border. If we somehow manage to get past it, the news will surely travel to the king. I don't doubt for a second he would mobilize the rest of his forces to crush us, not to mention that he himself would participate in combat." The beastmen argued fiercely over which side to take until eventually, they reached the western wall.
"I hope you can join us." With those words, the group of beastmen dispersed, leaving Orou all alone to contemplate about what he had just heard.