The sky was bright and blue, and the air was crisp and clean, while my wagon trundled westward towards Roko. I hummed a small tune, a grin plastered on my face as we drove on, leaving Checkpoint behind.

“You’re in a good mood,” Damir scowled.

I laughed, shaking my head instead of answering. Damir clearly did not have as nice of a last night in the settlement, as I had found him sleeping in the stables again, apparently not having gained an education on money management in the previous few days.

He would get no pity from me, since if he blew through the small purse I gave him on something other than an inn, he likely had at least enjoyed himself for a short while in Checkpoint.

The tarands picked up the pace at my mental prodding. I wanted to spend a bit less time under the stars on the next leg of the journey. There were less trees towards the central Kingdom and firewood collection would be a pain, at least if limited to using mundane means with Damir.

We made good time as we traveled across the grasslands of the central Kingdom, and before I knew it we were nearing the last settlement between Gurt and Roko, a small village that the locals called Beyond.

It was a settlement with a cyclical history. Some family or group of people would grow weary of Roko or the crown, and want to leave the city for something new: something beyond Roko’s reach. The people would travel east, but as was often the case, they would only travel so far before they would stop, worried about being too far from their extended families, the familiarity of a walled city, and the comforts of home.

Then, they would settle, and given that these were people with limited resolve—as those with more resolve would make it to Checkpoint, at the very least, or strike out in a new direction altogether—the settlement would likely only last a short while before they fell to internal dispute, a rising group of bandits from within, sickness or starvation, or, having lost the luster of the novelty and romance of settling, returning to Roko as failures.

Perhaps a few would remain, but as the saying went, it takes a village, and when enough of the population abandoned the settlement, the remaining holdouts never lasted long. Eventually, another group would strike out beyond Roko. When they did, and they encountered the withered or abandoned village of Beyond, why push onwards and build from scratch when they could use the existing foundation as a springboard? And so, Beyond would rise again, until the new settlers left or perished.

In a way, that made Beyond a more lasting settlement than others, lost to history, as despite the oscillating boom times and bust times, Beyond never fully vanished. Roko was such a large city that it could always provide additional discontents to the village that never quite evolved beyond an ideal. It was a stark contrast to Checkpoint.

Last time that I had passed through, Beyond was functioning like any other small settlement. People were farming and there were some small families growing. As we approached the small settlement, I noticed how quiet it seemed. While it was presently after the harvest, I could not help but feel like it was a bit too quiet.

“Something’s wro–” I started to say, before an arrow whizzed past my head, my detect and acrobatics skills allowing me to narrowly avoid the sneak attack. Damir was not so lucky, an arrow slamming into his throat.

I moved to check on him but more arrows flew at me and I was forced to pull out my magic circle and throw up a 5-point magic barrier, my focus drawn to defense.

The bandits erupted from the tall grass on either side of the road, grins on their faces at the sight of a wagon pulled by two tarands, the soldier and well-dressed trader driving it, and the promise of enough riches to survive the winter.

I whistled, and from the wagon behind me, a menacing presence stood. The bandits slowed and stopped, suddenly lacking in confidence at the sight of the slavering mecrokotas.

Damir had slumped over next to me, bled out.

“Make them regret this,” I growled to my beast.

My beast growled back with pleasure.

* * *

Damir had been a bit of an irritant on the journey, but I felt immensely bad that I let him get killed. I had grown lazy and comfortable, and my reaction time was poorer than it should have been. While it would always be elevated due to my skills—and those could never really slide backwards—making the most of the skills requires upkeep, practice and training.

Perhaps if I had not been avoiding magic use, and had worn my magic circles on me, I could have reflexively put up a barrier and saved him. Instead, I had put them away in my inventory so that I would not casually use magic around the soldier and reveal my hand, keeping my secrets closely guarded. My secrets for Damir’s entire future, I thought bitterly.

Once my mecrokotas was finished administering the fear and pain of my retribution to the bandits, I had him drag the crying and catatonic bandits back to me so I could end them and maximize my experience gain from the pitiful excuse of a battle. My beasts would not gain any additional experience until they evolved, so I had stopped them from finishing the job for me. With no survivors but me and my beasts, I used healing magic to ensure everyone remained in peak form, and had them return to the wagon.

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I looted the bodies, claiming some meager pieces of equipment and gear and a few trinkets and coins in their possessions. It was hardly worth Damir’s lost life, but there was no reason to leave it all behind to be wasted or collected by some other group of bandits. I also claimed the head of the one I suspected to lead the raiding party, and guided my wagon onwards into Beyond.

There were not many people left in the village, just a few unhappy and unhealthy looking women and children. Some gathered around the road as I drove through, and I tossed the head onto the ground in front of me.

“You had a bandit problem. I took care of it,” I said with an angry sneer. I saw the eyes of the villagers as I entered their settlement unmolested, and the angry reaction of one woman when she recognized the head of the bandits. “I’ll be keeping their gear, of course. Right of might and all that.”

I had no doubt that the village would be fully abandoned by spring. I hoped that the next settlers would do better.

Since there was no chance I would spend a night in Beyond, I pressed the wagon back into motion, then pushed the tarands to the top speed they could manage while hitched to a wagon. I had Damir’s body in the back and wanted to get it to Roko’s guards as soon as I could. Fortunately, the air was cool and would slow the rate of decomposition. Without Damir, I could cast recovery spells on the tarands and keep them in peak condition for the rest of the journey despite a demanding pace.

Damir’s death also introduced another complication, in that he was my escort from the soldiers that were on the road behind me. They could blame me for splintering off from their group, or even accuse me of killing him to escape, although I did not think that was particularly likely. Still, I scryed their location to make sure they were as far behind me as I figured they would be, and made sure I would leave Roko for the capital before they reached it. So long as I was present and registered for the tournament before they caught up, there should be no reason to blame me. The wilds were simply a dangerous place, and death was a constant risk.

I left the body with the guards at Roko’s east gate, explaining what had happened outside of Beyond, and scrawled a note on parchment for his captain for when he arrived apologizing about Damir and claiming he had heroically saved my life from attempted banditry. I wrote that I would continue on to the capital and that he should find me so I could offer my condolences to his family and a reward for his bravery. It was the least I could do.

Not feeling like luxuriating in a high-class inn after the deadly run-in with bandits, I instead opted to find a smaller, simpler inn. I still needed to find an inn that had on-site stables, to keep my beasts nearby. Before I created the Tamers Guild and the only beast you were ever likely to see near a city was an oxalire, the only stables were the public ones just by the city gates. This is where merchants and other travelers could leave their oxalire, if they had them, and did not have a large enough space that they owned or rented to contain their beasts in that city. When I traveled with Marshan to Roko at the beginning of my apprenticeship, the convoy had rented a warehouse.

Oxalire were not particularly valuable beasts, and could be found all across the central plains of the Kingdom, so there was no real risk of theft leaving them in a public stable. With the introduction of higher-value tarands, particularly as personal mounts for wealthy travelers and tamers, and companion beasts as a result of the Guild’s growing influence, people no longer wanted to rely on public stables, even if they were technically under the purview of the city guards and relatively safe.

Some inns across the Kingdom were adapting to the changing times and buying up neighboring lots or property they could tear down or repurpose and building on-site stables for tarands and other beasts. A subset of those inns were also adapting to allow tamers to keep smaller companion beasts with them, inside the inn, though in both cases there were some additional fees. Since more fees meant more opportunities for slight markups, these inns were, in certain cases, able to drive more profits. The fanciest inns still tended to lean away from having beasts nearby their wealthy guests, looking down on the additional dirt and smell that could be associated with beasts on the premises, though once the so-called high society started keeping companions, that could change in the future as well.

In any case, I found a modest inn with stables and a companion beast policy, leaving my wagon, tarands, and beasts I brought for battle in the care of the stables while bringing Rika in with me as a companion. She was, apparently, “a bit on the large side” for a companion beast, but I simply ate the additional fee they charged me, as I had budgeted for a more pricey accommodation.

The past years had seen my training grow lax and my pursuit of self-improvement had largely been replaced by entrepreneurship, making money, and finding comfort and happiness in the Freehold region. I had stopped chasing levels with the same passion of my youth, content instead to acquire skill points from skillfruit consumption and dealing with any threats or problems with the power I had already attained, particularly the advantages I had through my otherworldly knowledge and special skills.

While I could not speak ill of my businesses, which I felt were largely improving the world and most definitely improving my local community, nor could I find anything to regret about building relationships with the people in and around Freehold, there was no denying that I had grown a bit soft and slow. My new skill points meant I had technically reached new heights, but I required hard training and the intensity of combat to forge what I had gained into a proper tool. I may have lived the rest of my life not ever needing that, but I was headed to a tournament that was going to gather the best that the Kingdom had to offer. Worse yet, I still planned on withholding my full power in order to guard my secrets. My lackadaisical attitude to the threats I could face in this world just because I had some neat tricks was likely to be my downfall, if I did not shape up.

So, my plans for the winter changed. I found strong, retired soldiers who I could hire to train with, and focused on my martial skills, drilling myself to make the most out of every skill point and relearn how my adult body moved and reacted, having long since grown from the smaller stature of my youth when I was most active in regular combat. I practiced with my beasts, creating formations, shorthand commands, and plans for the tournament. I studied magic and found more new ways I could apply my knowledge, making sure I had some additional trump cards to play if things ever got too dire in the capital, though I still wanted to avoid using any obvious magic in the tournament. I focused on subtle, hard to notice works of magic, no less powerful than flinging mountainous boulders but quicker on the draw and harder for opponents to deal with.

I still continued to eat skillfruit, and I quickly advanced my strength skill as I had planned, no longer needing to wait in order to not reveal myself to an escort. Rather, I wanted to advance it as quickly as I could, so I had more time to train my body and my reflexes with the additional muscle mass. I pushed myself to train hard, making small trips out of the city to find crucibles of battle to test my mettle and gain some quick experience. Between the bandits in Beyond and my winter of training, I pushed myself to Level 46 before spring approached and it was time for me to leave Roko and head north.

My dracosaur scale armor had been adjusted to fit my new frame, and I donned it for the journey, alongside a new, dark-colored travel cloak I bought in Roko. My hair had grown pretty long, and my beard had grown rather wild, but I decided to leave it until I reached the capital. I did not need to look clean cut and pretty for this journey, as I was not headed north as a merchant. I was headed north as a beast tamer.