Chapter 129: The Frantic Retreat
And then I was back, five hours beforehand, asleep. Of course, I instantly jolted awake, hands instinctively going to my face to make sure it was all intact. Yes, yes, all there. Then I opened my eyes, heart pounding from the sudden wake-up.
“Father, what is it?”
I looked over to see Ainash, who was currently taking her turn for watch, looking over at me.
“Did you have bad dream? It okay, I normally have those too.”
“No, no,” I said, “there’s something coming. A dangerous Demon. He’s going to kill us if he catches us. Come on, let’s wake up mother.”
I leaned over to shake Erani awake—it was still a bit dark, but the sun was close to rising, so I could see fine. By this point, it was around seven in the morning. That Demon, Xhag’duul, had attacked around noon. Was he already on his way over to us? Sprinting through the canyon at superhuman speeds?
Erani groaned as I shook her as gently as I could, despite my desire to urgently get going. She opened her eyes and squinted up at me. “What is it, did I sleep too long?”
“There’s a Demon on his way to kill us. We’ve got five hours until he gets here.”
She raised her eyebrows. “Five hours? Alright. Give me a second to wake up. Are we going to, uh, prepare an ambush, or something?”
“No, I doubt that’d work. He’s…” I sighed and shook my head, remembering what’d happened last time. He killed us all in a single hit. Me in two, but only because of Dark Plate. Ainash, Erani…If they ever got close to that damned thing, he’d kill them instantly. It was impossible to fight and survive, even if I technically had a safety net. “It’s not possible for us to beat him. We need to run.”
Erani sat up, stretching and getting ready to travel. “So should we hide, then?”
“Could find another Dragon to help,” Ainash suggested.
“We could…” I muttered, trying to slow my mind down to think. “I’m not sure if hiding would even work, honestly. With his absurd power, I’d be surprised if he didn’t have some way to find us instantly. As for finding a Dragon, I don’t know about that, either. I mean, we really don’t have the time or resources to do that right now, and we also have no bargaining power with one, this time. We were really only able to get Astintash’s help because the Demons were actively invading its home. One single Demon, coming in for an assassination and leaving immediately? What reason do they have to help us then?”
“So then, what do we do?”
“I don’t want to rule out hiding just yet. But we have quite a bit of time before he arrives. So I say we use that to run.”
“Just run away?”
“Not just away, but toward the Empire. We’re close by now. Probably only a bit over a full day’s travel, I’d bet. If we use Expedite to keep our speed up, I think we may be able to get there within a few hours. And I’d be surprised if they didn’t have some powerful guards stationed near Kingdom’s Edge to make sure nothing came through to attack them, right? Maybe we could use their help and defeat the Demon.”
“I not think that will work,” Ainash said. “What if Humans betray us? What if Demon tells lies, tells them we are the bad guys?”
“Humans trust other Humans, much more than Demons,” I said. “As long as we get there first, and we have some time to explain ourselves, I’d be willing to bet they’ll help. And hopefully, a whole squad of Classers strong enough to kill Drakes, or even Dragons, will be enough to take the thing down.”
“And if we don’t get there in time?”
“Then we change our plan and hide. If it seems like we won’t be fast enough, we just turn and run up into the mountains, and hope he can’t find us in there.”
Erani sighed and looked down, thinking for a moment. After a few seconds, she looked up and said, “Yeah, that seems like our best bet. You ready to go?”
“When you two are.”
With the help of Expedite, which I continually kept active on myself and Erani, we moved at quite a quick pace along the path. Keeping a stack of it active on two people was a bit too much for my Mana to be able to support doing one hundred percent of the time, but I could still keep it active for a good portion, and with that combined with us trying to keep a generally quick pace, I hoped it would be enough for us to find safety soon.
So we moved quickly along for several hours, and I could almost feel the time ticking away, every beat of my heart sending anxiety through my mind. With the extra space we put between ourselves and the entrance to Kingdom’s Edge, we probably also bought ourselves a bit of extra time, but knowing how fast Xhag’duul was moving back there, I didn’t suspect it’d be more than a few minutes.
As the time passed, we grew more and more eager to get to the end. When Expedite was active, we ran at top speed to make use of the extra Dexterity, and when it wasn’t, we just walked as quickly as possible. It took a toll on my Stamina to move like that over such an extended period of time, but tiring myself out was just fine if it meant I could live to see another day.
However, as the hours passed, the end of the mountains continued to evade our sight. The range of crags and rocks seemed to be slowly getting less intense and less wild as we moved, suggesting we were probably approaching the Barinruth Empire, but I was forced to confront the possibility that we may just not get there in time. My guess that we may have been able to arrive within five hours was just that—a guess.
By the time hour four rolled around and we still saw no end on the horizon, I held out a hand to signal everyone to stop, leaning over and catching my breath.
“What is it?” Erani said, panting heavily.
After a few deep breaths, I responded. “I don’t think we’ll make it in time. We probably only have around an hour left, and I’m not seeing any end to these mountains.”
“So what, plan B then?”
“Seems like it. Let’s move out into the mountains, and hope that Demon can’t track us in there. At the very least, it might be able to buy us enough time to actually get there.”
We found a low ledge in the stone walls of the cut-out path and climbed up, into the wild mountains that surrounded us. We’d have to be wary of the typical Drakes and Dragons, moving into their territory, so hopefully any encounters we had wouldn’t slow us down too much.
I dipped a bit into my Mana reserves to keep Expedite active more often that my regeneration allowed, helping us climb far and high into the various peaks and valleys of the mountain range. Occasionally we’d hear a Drake’s screech of warning—one that I’d come to learn meant “get out of my territory, right now,” and I’d instantly give us a further push with the Spell to get us away and keep us from delaying ourselves with pointless fights against the wildlife.
Thankfully, our climb was easier than I’d experienced before, when we’d first ventured into the wild mountains to try and get help from Astintash. Back then, we were lower-Leveled and didn’t have the Bond to raise our base Stats. But now, with a much higher Strength, Endurance, and Dexterity—especially so for Erani—moving up the cliffs and across the unsteady rocks was much easier. We needed to take fewer breaks, fewer detours around impassable obstacles, and we could generally move with much more ease than before.
“Must be a pretty surreal experience, huh?” I asked Erani.
“What do you mean? Not going to lie, I’m a bit acclimated to the whole ‘running for my life’ thing by now.”
“No, not that. I mean climbing these mountains again.”
“Hm?”
“I mean, the last time we were in the wilderness of Kingdom’s Edge was just a few days ago, right? Back then, you had a 10 in every physical Stat.”
“Ah,” she nodded. “Yeah, can’t say I ever imagined climbing a mountain would be this easy. It feels like I’m living in someone else’s body.”
“I can’t imagine what it’s like for you.” I chuckled and shook my head.
“I mean, haven’t you basically gone through the same thing with Recursive Growth?” she asked. “You’ve gained a bunch of physical Stats, too.”
“Right, but that was over a much longer period of time. I really only had to get acclimated to small changes that occurred over several days of time. And even then, my Stats are still lower than yours. I mean, I doubt many Classers out there could ever boast about having quintupled their base Stats in a day, much less a few hours. Seriously, you went from being no stronger than someone who was Unclassed into someone who could probably beat a decent-Level Melee-Type in a fistfight.”
“Well, let’s not exaggerate things. I still have absolutely no training in melee combat, so I doubt that’d be the case.”
I rolled my eyes. “Stop being modest. Regardless, you said yourself it was difficult to move around at all for a while, right? So like I said, it’s gotta be surreal to climb the same mountains as before, but this time with it being several times easier.”
She sighed and nodded. “Yeah, it definitely is. Been getting me thinking about future Class options. I mean, pretty much every single piece of theory and strategy put toward the Sorcerer Class is predicated on the idea that you’ll have low physical Stats. It’s a pretty core part of the Class that you’ll be focusing your Stats on Mana production. So suddenly, pretty much all of that traditional knowledge is useless. I mean, especially with Angelic Shield, I’m definitely a lot less useless up close as I was before. So any Spell choices that are based on keeping enemies away are way worse, now.”
“Well, there’s a lot of literature on the subject, right? Couldn’t you find some book from someone talking about some niche Sorcerer strategy that assigns its Stat Points into the physicals?”
“I’m sure there’s stuff out there on that, but then for them, most of their choices will probably be predicated on the fact that they won’t have much Mana available to them. I’m sure the Signature Magic Talent choice is out of the question for them, for example, not to mention some of the Spell choices coming up. Ugh, I really am on my own in this aren’t I…?”
I looked over to see her with her head in her hands, muttering to herself, and laughed, wrapping my arm around her. “Don’t worry about it. You’ve got us, right? So you aren’t totally on your own.”
“Right, sure, you let me know when you somehow find a god and get it to change your Class to Sorcerer, and we can all figure it out alongside each other.”
“Ironically, if I could do that, we wouldn’t be in this mess in the first place.”
Erani laughed, and began to say something else, but suddenly cut herself off, looking up with fear in her eyes. I glanced up, too, and completely understood her reaction.
A sight that instantly seized my body soared across the sky. Giant, leathery wings, a long, scale-covered body, and a throat that no doubt housed the ability to completely incinerate us all.
The Dragon flew close above our heads, and I felt the rushing wind from its wings hit against my back. Close call, I thought, but it flew past. We’d just need to look out for whatever mountaintop it made its home in, and keep away from that.
But then it turned around midair, eyes locking onto us.
As it moved back in our direction, gliding down to the ground, any hope that we were dealing with the familiar Astintash left my mind. Not only were we far from Astintash’s territory by now, but this Dragon was a clearly different beast from its looks—where Astintash’s scales were reddish-purple, a deep royal color, this new Dragon was a shining white. Honestly, with the near-noon sun reflecting its light off the silvery scales, the monster was almost blinding to look at.
It crashed to the ground just a couple dozen paces from us and I barely managed to keep myself standing from the resulting shaking of the land. I was still trying to process what was happening, unable to formulate any sort of proper plan of action. What was this Dragon here for? Why was it coming to us? And why hadn’t it killed us right away, like Astintash had done in the past?
I felt the burning breath of the beast as it breathed a sigh, raising its head to look at us from above, the sun forming a sort of halo around its head.
“Greetings, Humans,” it spoke in a deep rumble of a voice, with a strange accent that almost made it sound like a fancy noble speaking to me. “I am Peacekeeper, Compassiongiver, Hearthaver, Homeholder, Gracegiver, Knowledgegainer Paiiniak. Why do you come to my domain?”
I blinked, processing what it’d just told us. Specifically, the titles before its name. Peacekeeper? This was almost too perfect. If it kept the peace, maybe it could help us with that Xhag’duul Demon! They were invading and starting wars, how could this Dragon not want to intervene?
“We’re having trouble with a Demon,” I spat out, eager for its help. “He’s trying to kill us, and tons of other Humans! They’re starting a war. Could you intervene? Stop them from attacking us?”
It looked down on me with a slight smile. I’d almost say it was smug, if I didn’t know any better.
“Ah, simple Human,” it said, “have you not tried simply asking the Demon to stop attacking you? Do not be so quick to solve conflicts with violence.”
I paused after hearing its words. Was that a joke or something? But it looked completely serious, like it genuinely thought we were too stupid to try something as simple as asking the Demons to stop. “W-what? You don’t understand. It’s trying to kill us for no reason, and the Demons have already killed thousands of other Humans. One’s hunting us right now, as we speak! Could you help us at least immobilize it, so we can escape?”
“But by running away, are you not simply proving the Demons right? Perhaps they are only attacking because they are upset by your assumption that they mean harm in the first place.” It chuckled an irritating laugh to itself. “You silly Humans and your simple minds. Now run along and go make friends with that Demon. I have solved your problem once again.”
…Okay. It seemed like this would be a bit harder than I’d originally thought.
But still, my mind was hard at work trying to figure out how to use this to our advantage. Even if we couldn’t get the Dragon to help directly, maybe there were other ways to use its power.
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