Turns out we’re leaving tomorrow.

Guemeros himself came by my place in the evening yesterday, he seemed genuinely sad and I think he really was. He shared with us a Trait of his, “Good Leader”, that was at the major stage. An interesting acknowledgement of competence by the system, that also provides some good inspiration and ideas on how to lead, like a creepy personal advisor whispering stuff in his ear.

His village is worrying and as a leader he has to do something. Going against the very natural fear and dislike of strangers is asking for trouble, more than he can handle without some time to ease his people into it.

There are other sentient races in the world, various seafolk have a few enclaves all around the known lands, both within and outside the Kosraky kingdom we are in now. There is also the people of Burhamia, short and green skinned beings, which are called nilbs, even though they really sound like they are goblins.

Anyway, the point is, gilfeiths have stories about these other races, they know what they are dealing with.

No such thing with us humans, we are unknown.

At least we’ll get to leave with some decent supplies. We’ve already got all the basics, from a pair of knives to a sleeping mat. There’s also a couple waterskins and backpacks with food for a week, along with miscellaneous essentials like rope, a bone needle and a length of thread.

Alix is resting after a new cast of Datari’s healing spell. While using magic to heal is fast, it is also an exhausting process for the body that generates immediate benefits at the cost of some lack of balance for multiple days: poor sleep is the most common and almost guaranteed, but as one repeats healing sessions, the backlash tends to quickly grow out of control.

Even though he is still far from being a picture of health, casting the heal a fourth time would likely do more harm than good.

I went to the morning physical training for the last time today. A strange feeling. While I can hardly be called exceptional, even by human standards, I’ve come a long way compared to the first time, twenty days ago.

Even though Pheyis was there to hound me, I actually managed to stay pretty much standing for the whole two hours, through what was easily three or four times as many repetitions as what I could do back in the start.

Most of all, I’m disappointed I never got any kind of balance traits from the confrontation exercises. Not that I ever won one against anyone my size, but still.

Pheyis acted like nothing was out of the ordinary for the whole training, pointedly ignoring how much more of a wide berth most people were giving me. But she told me at the end she’d come see us during the first quarter of afternoon, which should mean more or less any time now.

Somewhere between 13 and 14. My money is on 13:59.

Well, I already got a flexible progress today, but stretching has become kind of a reflex when I don’t know what to do.

- - -

She completely disregards any kind of privacy and just walks in with a confident stride at... 13:58.

So close.

“Hey Marc.”

“Pheyis, welcome.”

Alix stirs at the noise, and opens a pair of bleary eyes. He waves weakly and activates the translation for us all as he speaks.

I’ll send some mana his way while we talk before he ends up being a dried up husk.

His voice lacks its usual energy but the spirit is there.

“Hello my beloved savior. Nice to meet you.”

She chuckles at that.

“Eh, I didn’t think you’d cause so much trouble. Really, showing off magic in the middle of the street. Almost unreasonable enough to make me want to leave along you guys just for the sheer entertainment value.”

Almost.

So she did come to see us off. I don’t know why, I never even voiced it, but I had this unreasonable hope that she would come along. As if she would be more attached to a man that she interacted with a handful of times than the village where she’s been living for years.

Almost means you might be able to convince her!

“What can I say, I can’t resist a good chance to shine!”

She chuckles again.

“You remind me of the hot headed fire eaters I met in my youth. None of them lived very long.”

Shit, that got dark really quickly.

I intervene,

“So Pheyis, why did you want to visit?”

“Well, really, to give you some advice and directions. Unless you want to adventure blindly and get lost in the mountains perhaps?”

How did we not think of this by ourselves?

Busy sulking.

“Good point, what are our choices?”

“Well, for starters, I do not recommend going west, further into the Kosraky kingdom towards Alvadorra. Marc, you’re simply too weak to wander around, one army or another will conscript you forcefully and there will be nothing you can do about it. Alix, same problem, except anyone aware of your powers will want to point you at their enemies, so it’s even worse.”

Alix looks a bit crestfallen, but I tank the dismissal with no problem. Nothing really new there.

“East you can try to cross the mountains, and discover whatever is on the other side, but that’s pretty much considered impossible, nobody ever came back. South you could probably make it to the lands of Gorlinguia, which is the largest seafolk controlled land, but the mountains are bigger than to the north.”

“And what’s to the north?”

“Honestly? Nothing much. Mountains that get smaller until you eventually reach the sea. Odds are there are a bunch of small villages like Wathamber, but that’s about it.”

Alix chimes in,

“Sounds boring. I like the idea of the seafolk country though.”

“Have you ever met seafolk Pheyis?”

She nods.

“I was recruited on some crazy lord’s crusade against Gorlinguia about ten years ago. Pretty sure he just wanted more land. Seafolk are good merchants but terrible fighters. Well on land at least. They know it, so they always fight dirty. The whole thing was an ugly mess, trust me when I say that, and the crusade died from a thousand cuts. I deserted before things could get ugly in a more personal way, and traveled all the way to the north of kingdom after that. No hard feelings there though, seafolk are a varied but usually decent people.”

“So do they actually live inside the sea? What do they look like?”

“They do. Grey or silver scales are the most common, they almost always have gills and webs but as I said, they are a varied people.”

“Wait, you can’t say anymore? Like, do they have legs and arms and stuff?” says Alix

“Well, sometimes.”

Oh no, he looks so disappointed.

“Sorry Alix, sounds like there will be no pretty mermaids to amaze with flashy light shows.”

He just huffs my way.

- - -

We discussed some more with Pheyis, learning a little about the various cultures she knows about, the easy to avoid dangers of the land.

After that we just spent a good time together, we ended up telling her all kinds of stuff about back home, from before the Knowledgeable. Weird food, weird drinks, weird people, trying to match and one up things with those of here in Onvilia, this foreign planet we have barely scratched the surface of.

Then she wished us luck and took her leave, with that unique smile of someone who’s seen countless people leaving to fly on their own, and very few find their way back.

A bit of a sad smile, a bittersweet thing. Wishing for the best while knowing how quickly things can end.

And a present.

A charm of good luck, a pendant. Some sort of pierced old coin covered in odd patterns.

She really cares uh?

She does.

We'll try to come back here.

I’m feeling rather down now, but there’s one last thing I want to do today.

Well, either me or Bob.

My exp is sitting at 99%.

It’s time to go and level up again.