Disclaimer:

"Dialogue"

'Thoughts'

-Author notes-

Chapter 34: The Best Place to climb

When Zephyr came back to his senses, he found himself lying on a large rock.

Seth was at his side, looking very tired.

"How long was I out?"

"Zephyr!" Seth shouted his name when he saw him awake. "I can't believe you survived that!"

"Yes… that was close…" He recalled seeing his health at two points. Just a tiny bit more and he would never open his eyes again.

"Close? Almost every bone in your body was broken, and you were bleeding from everywhere. I had to use all my healing ointment and bandages!."

Zephyr looked down at himself. "You don't have any spare tunics… right?"

What he was wearing now could hardly be called clothes anymore.

The tunic was torn so much that it barely covered his most private parts, and what remained was covered in blood.

"No, I don't have any spare clothes, but with a bit of time and some animal hide, I could put something together," Seth offered.

"Perhaps when we are in a safer place…" Zephyr looked around. They were on top of a large rock, close to the road. He stood up and tied the remnants of his tunic to prevent it from falling. "This will do for now. We should not stay here." He was mostly afraid of another one of those drakes coming down.

"Yes… I want to get out of here too." Seth had enough of these mountains already.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

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They had to walk for over five hours at a very brisk pace but Zephyr and Seth were able to leave the mountain pass without suffering any more attacks.

They both felt a great deal of relief once they saw the grassy field ahead of them.

The experience at the pass had also served as a good lesson for Zephyr. He could not rely completely on his magic to win every fight. Like the drake from before, there could be many other beasts who were resistant to his magic, so he couldn't expect to kill everything with one spell.

Before it got too dark, they found an acceptable place to camp and started a fire to cook some delicious bear meat.

With their bellies filled, Seth and Zephyr opened up the map to plan their next move.

"If we go southwest from here, we will reach the most western part of the wall. There's a mountain resting against that side, making it easier to climb," Seth explained.

Zephyr could also see this by looking at the map. That would definitely be the easiest place to get over the Wall. But he found an issue that Seth had overlooked.

"If that is the easiest place to climb, it will also be the most guarded one."

"I don't think there are many humans crossing the Red Bear pass so they can climb the Wall…" Seth could not understand Zephyr's logic. "To be honest, I don't even know why they would guard the wall in the first place. They even went through the effort of creating that massive fortress in the middle…"

"That's a good question. Normally, you would think that the threat of death by the poison cloud on the other side of the wall would be enough," Zephyr said.

"Right?... my grandpa told me once that perhaps the Wall guards are not just there to keep us from going south but to keep something else from going north," Seth explained.

"Like what? Beasts?" Zephyr asked.

Seth shrugged. He had no idea what his grandpa meant by that.

"Whatever the reason… the fact is that the Wall is well guarded. So we should try to cross in a location less likely to have powerful guards," Zephyr suggested.

He had already fought against Celestials before and he was confident in winning against opponents like those two Beastmen from before.

But he was not foolish enough to think that he had a chance against a real Celestial warrior, like the golden-furred one at Zloria Town or the Emissary and his two companions he saw back at the village.

Any of those would be able to instantly kill him… so he wanted to avoid such encounters if possible.

He pointed at a location directly south of where they were right now. "Here… I don't think they expect anyone crossing from there."

"Well, of course not… that's where the Wall is at its tallest, and there are no mountains or anything nearby to help. According to this marking here… the Wall is over one hundred feet tall there (30 meters). How are we supposed to climb that?"

Zephyr moved his fingers. "With these, of course."

Seth wasn't sure if he was joking or not.

"Come on, I'm plenty strong enough to climb a wall that tall," Zephyr assured him.

"Mmm… you might be…" Seth conceded. He had personally seen that Zephyr was surprisingly strong for his size. "But I am not… I won't be able to climb that."

Zephyr observed Seth closely. The boy was short and thin. Couldn't weigh more than eighty pounds.

"Status."

[Status: Zephyr Level 11

Health points: 45/45

Mana points: 42/42

Strength: 16

Dexterity: 22

Intelligence: 20 (+3 reg)

Vitality: 15 (+2 reg)

Luck: 9

Available points: 5]

'If I push my strength past twenty… I bet I can climb the wall while carrying him.'

"Leave it to me, Seth!" He put all five available points into strength.

[Strength reached 20… passive skill 'Intimidating Presence' unlocked.]

"Ohh!" He exclaimed.