“I leave here,” Cernit explained.

Solfis translated the words of the knight. The Church base was further east, so he still had to ride some distance and going through the city would lengthen his stay. She would be fine as long as she behaved and presented the mercenary license he had prepared to the gate guard. Then, she could find employment as a mercenary or just move on with the money she already had, which should really last her a while.

“Will Solfis’ presence create problems? With his appearance.”

“No, the inspection skill shows him as a golem. While golems are rare and valuable, he will look more like a knowledge repository than a combat model, so you should be fine with the local populace. The guard will know what it is, however, but they have no reason to stop you. Just be careful and make sure to keep him charged in case thieves get any ideas. I would still advise you to make contact with the local church. Their support will guarantee your safety. The letter I wrote will make sure they appreciate how much you contributed to our success.”

Fighting evil. Nice.

“We would have died without you,” the knight stated.

Then came the awkward moment she feared.

“So, this is goodbye?”

“Yes, Bib, this is goodbye. May we meet again in better circumstances. Know that Barran will know of your heroic actions. If you find yourself in our lands, come and greet me or my fellow knights. There are worse causes than ours to raise your flag for.”

“And good luck to you too, Cernit. I hope we meet again.”

She stared in silence at the knight’s retreating back. With the sled decoupled, he could now move much faster, which he did. A part of her wondered if he had prepared a trap, if he had given her fake documents that would see her imprisoned and left to report her to authorities or something. She dismissed those thoughts immediately. She was a rather good judge of character, and this human from another world was as straight an arrow as they came. Or perhaps she was the human from another world. Bah, it didn’t matter.

Viv huffed and grabbed the ropes which she tied around her torso.

“Back to it, I guess.”

The trip was slow. She went downhill in a friendly environment where monsters were not trying to eat her eyeballs, and yet it became by far the most physically harrowing part of her trip, stamina-wise. She had to stop every hundred meters or so to take a few deep breaths. There was a slight wind that sent her short hair aflutter. It carried the scent of sap and wet earth. In the distance, animals sort of mooed as they were released from a barn and into an enclosure. A man in a grey shirt tilled his field a distance away, and would sometimes stand up and look at her distant form before getting back to his task. She felt strange. Detached. At some point, she realized that a pair of men carrying crates were following her at a long distance. They would stop when she stopped.

She reached the gates after an hour.

Fields surrounded her on all sides by then, with cottages seeded here and there. The city’s walls were twice her size and covered in white plaster, with no sentinels that she could spot. The gates themselves sat at the top of a small incline that a city car would not have minded, but proved to be a pain in her ass for her. There were five guards manning it, who let a woman loaded with baskets pass before they turned attention to her. Their eyes went wide.

Just like the knights, those guys had a greenish tint to their faces, though it was not as pronounced. Their skins were lighter as well. She would associate their features with Southern Europeans mixed with Incas or something. Again, it was weird. They looked like they belonged to the same ethnic group as the Baranese, more or less, and that meant that she stuck out like a sore thumb. They wore undyed leather jerkins inscribed with a shield sporting a tree on it over off-white shirts. Their helmets were steel and reminded her of conquistador morions with a neck guard as well. They carried spears and shields, as well as truncheons attached to their belts. Only one had a bow. No arrows were nocked, for now.

One of the guards had a large beard and a small red plume on his breast. He licked his lips nervously while the others, who all looked sixteen if they were a day, deferred to him in the typical ‘above my paygrade’ grunt reaction.

[Kazaran guard, not very dangerous. Follows a path concerned with keeping the peace]

[Kazaran guard sergeant, not very dangerous. Follows a path concerned with keeping the peace.]

First thing first, look mostly harmless.

She stopped and spread her arms in a gesture of ‘I’m not here to kill you, at least, not yet,’ which she hoped was convincing enough. She took down her backpack, and found the mercenary accreditation Cernit had given her. She waved it under their collective nose like it was a flag or something. The sergeant was sweating profusely by that time, but he nodded slowly and approached the sled.

“Something something Kazar, me guard sergeant Elimi, please something something identity and purpose.”

Wow, she could almost understand him. She guessed that, with the Harrakan heartlands so close, the local language was deeply rooted in Old Imperial.

“I am Viviane,” she slowly said, “I am looking for the office of the Church of Neriad.”

That felt safer than saying ‘I’m here for beer and hookers’ or any variation thereof.

The man in front of her blinked, and she raised a brow in answer, crossing her arms. Better not look too much like a victim either.

The sergeant inspected the sled.

“Squee!”

His jaw unhinged.

//What are you looking at, meat?

She could probably shove a whole egg in his mouth right now. The man took a few steps back and raised an open hand in the universal ‘hold on please’ signal. She took a step back. See? Harmless.

The sergeant turned and ordered one of the recruits to do something. The little scrub took off at a run, probably to get reinforcements.

Fucking hell, that was not a great start.

Viv took another step back and sat heavily on the sled’s front. Two tiny clawed hands went to rest on her left shoulder as Arthur’s intense red gaze inspected the gate. The dragonling huffed, then she bonked Viv’s head with her own very lightly and pointed at the green wall of the forest some distance away.

“Later. Viv tired,” her human answered laconically.

The small creature cocked her head in a gesture that Viv could have sworn she had never done before. It was strangely human. Or dog-like, she guessed. Viv pointed to herself, then mimicked eating and sleeping.

Arthur chuffed again and returned to her nest.

“Negotiations successful, I guess,” Viv muttered.

Meanwhile, the sergeant had gathered enough courage to talk again.

“Speak our language?”

“I speak Old Imperial.”

The man nodded. He started to speak in single words that Viv could understand, on account of being close or identical to Old Imperial.

“Name Bibiane, purpose Church of Neriad. Yes?”

“Yes.”

“Drake dangerous?”

That was not a drake, that was a dragonling. Did Arthur have something to mess with inspection? She tried to remember the bestiary and realized that drakeling and dragonling were extremely close in terms of spelling. Oh, well.

“Drake not dangerous if left alone.”

“Sorry…”

“If drake angry, drake dangerous. Drake not angry, drake not dangerous. Yes?”

“Yes. Fine. Good.”

“Can get in?”

That made the sergeant panic a bit. He took his most diplomatic air, which made him look constipated, and explained with a small voice and a fake smile.

“Bibiane caster. Caster greeted by important person, yes? After, Bibane can get in. No entrance fee for church person,” he said, pointing at the folded document in her hand.

Well, that was fine.

“Yes. I wait.”

“Thank you.”

The sergeant screamed something and another guard ran into the city, but he came back thirty seconds later holding a terracotta glass filled with fuming liquid.

“Klod,” the sergeant generously offered.

Well, fuck you too. She grabbed the Klod with a polite smile and smelled it. It was a sort of cereal-based infusion. It smelled good.

Viv sat back more relaxedly and glanced up. The silence here was different from the silence of the deadlands. There was still wind, even now caressing her cheeks and uncovered neck. It whistled through the branches of the nearby trees, some of whom were sporting their first green buds as spring approached. The smell of her hot beverage now covered that of nature and the light stench of a locker room that the guards emitted. After the mounds of smoldering corpses, that little stink did not bother her anymore.

It smelled nice.

In fact, it was the first time that it genuinely smelled nice since she arrived here. Even the Cassian springs had been more odorless than anything else. Silence and a pleasant smell. So weird, after so long. So much death. The monsters. The very air turning her veins dark and her body weak.

She took a sip and let the warm liquid rinse her palate. The taste was light and earthy.

She stayed like that for a few minutes, the light wind drying the small sheen of sweat the past hour had created. It made her feel cold despite the skinsuit. On a hunch, she called her interface. She had not done so in a while.

Current status:

Deep fatigue

Mana poisoning (very mild)

Soul trauma (serious)