The next morning our travels resumed. We summoned our mounts in the morning. Revan had gotten along great with Emer's fire-breathing lizard, but Cara's bird seemed to despise him, because he avoided Revan whenever he was around. Despite being tier 3 mounts, neither the wind-summoning bird nor the fire-lizard were larger than Revan. When he reached tier 3, he would become even larger. I couldn't wait for a colossal tier 4 Revan.

We were heading to the Thalia hills, a rocky area near the outskirts of the kingdom. The monsters there were of a high tier, while the kingdom's presence was rather low. As a result, I had heard it was sparsely populated.

Bandits like Kazach would find it to be the perfect hiding spot, as long as they were strong enough to ward off the local monsters. They would then prey on the nearby trade routes and travellers. Kazach had apparently bought off the right officials and left the right people alone, because he had been ruling his little clan in these hills for over five years, ever since he reached tier 4.

Emer and Cara were rather knowledgeable about our targets and filled Cerion and I in.

"Kazach has escaped most of his enemies thus far, and killed the rest. The guild estimates a low-to-mid rarity tier 4 class, which means that his stats should still be rather limited for a tier 4. That's still close to 1300 in his highest stats if he's at level 100, which means he'll still be able to wipe the floor with either of you two, so don't bother trying to get into a fight with him."

"He uses a large hammer head attached to a chain as his weapon. When I say large, I mean the size of a horse. If it hits you, then by virtue of its weight it'll crush you."

"He has three lieutenants, as I'm sure you read on the quest form. Euron, Bor and Nareo. Euron is a standard lightning mage. Expect nasty attacks that'll pierce through armour, though he'll run out of mana quickly. Bor is a berserker that gets stronger the more hurt he gets, and Nareo a hammer on a chain, like his father Kazach."

Cerion and I nodded. I was confident in taking on any of the three lieutenants by myself, but there was no point in taking risks if I didn't have to. Working as a team with Cerion would guarantee victory.

Cerion turned to Cara.

"Are there any tier 2 or tier 1 bandits we have to worry about?"

"Not that I know of, though I don't doubt they'll have methods to deal with higher-tiered opponents. Keep an eye out just in case."

I had a question of my own.

"So how are we approaching this quest? Are we straight up attacking them? Are we sneaking in?"

Cara answered.

"The second. The primary objective of this mission is to find evidence of involvement in the tsuchigumo smuggling. If that colony had gotten even more out of hand, it could have become a nationwide threat. We need to find out who was behind this attempt. Common bandits, even tier 4 ones, wouldn't risk their necks without a sizable reward on the line. That's why I'm sneaking into the bandit compound when we find it, to retrieve any kind of lead or evidence for this case.

"Emer isn't coming with you?" I asked.

I could get Cerion and I not accompanying her. While we both had good movement skills, neither of us had any stealth skills. Emer replied with a wide smile.

"No, A'm stayin with you laddies' when we get there. I'm no good at sneakin' 'round, an' you two 'll cause far too much trouble without supervision."

For the next hour, we continued discussing the quest's specifics. Apparently, we would have to get lucky to even come across the bandit camp, since bandits tended to move around a lot to stay out of sight. Cara would be flying around while invisible to act as our scout, while Cerion and I would serve as the distraction if we actually decided to start a full-on skirmish. Emer would act as support for Cara and face Kazach if it came down to it.

When I had asked him what level he was at, he had claimed that he was over halfway to tier 5, which meant that he was at least level 76. I doubted Kazach would be a match for him. If Emer and Cara worked together, then he wouldn't stand a chance. I liked our odds on this mission.

A few days later, we reached the halfway mark to the Thalia hills. They were located east of Reito and bordered the Narika kingdom, which occupied the Narika dessert. That meant that the temperature was slowly climbing from Reito's moderate climate to Narika's arid one. Climates were weird. They changed not just based on geography, but also on ambient mana. A prevalence of fire mana would naturally raise the temperature of any location, even if it was surrounded by a moderate climate. As a result, tundras sometimes bordered jungles. At least, that was what Cerion had told me when I had asked him about the heat.

I decided to unsummon Revan halfway through the day, because I wanted to finish my skill progression on Shadow [Apparation]. I had followed behind my companions with a little difficulty because of the rest I needed after every 50 or so jumps, but I motivated myself by thinking of the new tier up I would get in a few days.

Emer and Cara had looked at me a little funny when I had started my repititions, but Cerion had become used to my eccentric training by now.

As we approached the halfway mark, we had come across a traveling merchant with his cart. Normally, we would have simply passed him without issue, but Cara signalled for us to slow down.

"What's wrong, sweetie?"

"Don't call me sweetie when the kids are nearby, Emer. Anyway, one of my skills is telling me we need to talk to him."

One of her skills? An investigative skill, perhaps? I wondered what kind of class she had that had both offensive wind spells and investigative skills. Still, if they told her we should talk to the merchant, why wouldn't we? I moved to approach him.

"Stop. Let me go talk to him. You... three will just scare him into silence."

Judging from Emer's ability to get along with anyone and Cerion's innocent pretty-boy look, she was really just talking about me. Well, I didn't really care. Scaring people wasn't exactly something I enjoyed, but it's not like it's my fault I look like this. Our family has always been tall and burly, while my affinity is responsible for my dark hair and eyes.

Cara went off to talk to the merchant and returned five minutes later. She briefed us on the new information.

"Apparently, that merchant got robbed by Nareo and his gang. They were a few days from here, on the outskirts of the Thalia hills. The fact that those bandits are willing to steal at the edge of their territory tells me they've either gotten recklessly overconfident or have nothing to lose. On top of that, they usually only take half of the goods of passing merchants, so that they won't be scared out of the hills completely, but this time they took everything he had. Something is going on with those bandits."

Emer hummed pensively.

"Dissension within the ranks, maybe?"

I chimed in.

"Or a deal that fell through leaving them in hot water."

"With the tsuchigumo exterminated, that is a distinct possibility. Still, we can't say for certain. Let's suspend our judgment for now."

Like that, we continued our journey to the hills. The temperature continued to rise, to the point that I had to take off as many layers of clothes as I could while still wearing my armour comfortably. Despite this, I was getting cooked under the sun. Cerion had it easier, covered in his temperature-regulating enchanted monster hides. Evidently, Emer and Cara had similar enchantments on their mage's robes, because they seemed fine. Well, between overheating and unequipping my armour, I chose the former. I had just paid too much money for my new suit, I wasn't willing to leave it in my spatial pouch for the entire journey.

As we got closer and close to the eastern border of Roa, the vegetation started to match the climate. Trees started to become more sparse, giving way to bushed and even the occasional cactus. I was fascinated by them. I had never seen any cacti before. The idea of a plant growing spikes to defend itself wasn't anything new, roses did it too, but cacti took it to a whole new level.

Emer and Cerion had been amused by my curiosity. Excuse me for being a commoner that never left his hometown before his awakening.

The grasslands I was used to slowly turned into a dry, dust-like landscape, filled with boulders and rocks.

Finally, the Thalia hills became visible on the horizon.

We had travelled for nearly a week to get here. Considering the tournament happened in another 7 weeks, we would have about two weeks to wipe out these bandits if we wanted to make it to the capital in time, which was located to the west of Reito.

Right as we were about to make camp for the night, I finally got the notification I had been waiting for.

[Shadow apparation](100%)

Tier 3 skill.

You possess the ability to transfer your body and equipment from one location to the other, using sufficiently dark locations as a medium.

Tier 2 upgrades

[Dark apparation]

Use locations with sufficient dark mana in the environment as a medium instead.

[Greater Shadow apparation]

A direct upgrade of [Shadow apparation]. Use less mana and cover more distance.

[Ghost apparation]

Become intangible for 0.5 seconds after apparating. Skill uses significantly more mana and can cover less distance.

Another tough decision. [Dark apparation] would solve my limitation of only apparating at night or from shadow to shadow during the day. With my [Dark sight], I had been able to tell that most places had quite a bit of dark mana, even during the day. Apparating freely would significantly increase my combat capabilities out in the open. I had had all of my tough battles so far during the night or in a cave, but that luck wouldn't last. Maybe it was better to prepare for the future. I could then specialise my skill in a certain direction at the next tier.

[Greater Shadow apparation] didn't solve my current problems with mobility, but it would enhance what I could already do. Skills only became more mana-intensive as they tiered up, and the chances of getting one of these tier-ups that limited their mana consumption also became rarer and rarer. If I picked this skill, any specialised version I got in the future would also consume less mana. The big downside was that with my current core, this skill would hardly provide me with any benefits apart from the improved distance, which was already rather impressive.

Finally, there was the first specialised form of the shadow apparition skill tree, [Ghost apparation]. The powerful intangible property that I had decided to give up last time showed up again, though its current usefulness was debatable. 0,5 seconds wasn't much. I would have to be creative if I wanted to make good use of it. Still, its future potential was large, and I would be lying if I said that intangibility didn't appeal to me in some way.

I leaned back and sighed. I both loved and hated decision-making. Still, none of these skills were a bad choice, per se. All had good potential for the future in their own way, while only [Dark apparation] seemed immediately useful.

Welp, what else could I do but procrastinate?