"Hello, young man. Weme to The Rusty Bed."
The kindly middle aged woman, Miriam, who-managed the inn alongside her husband, Harvey, greeted Sol as he walked in.
Doesn't look like she rgnizes me either. Probably for the best, Sol thought to himself before speaking.
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"Good evening. Do you have any rooms available tonight?"
"Ofurse! It'll be 50pper a night."
Sol nodded and handed over a silverin. "Two rooms for tonight, then. Oh, and do you have any ammodations for beasts?"
Miriam smiled gently and nodded. "If it's a tamed beast, it can stay in your room. But if it's a larger one, we have a spacious room behind the stage that should work for most beasts."
"That's perfect! How much does itst?"
Though Thorwyn technically wasn’t a tamed beast, Sol trusted he was smart enough not to cause any trouble.
Miriam shook her head. "Don’t you worry about that. It’s nothing worth charging for, just a large room we normally use for storage. You can make a bed out of spare blankets, and we’ll bring some water, but we leave the food to you since some beasts have special diets. If you’re fine with your beast staying there, bring him in through the side entrance in the alley, it has a larger door."
Though it wasn’t the mostmfortable ammodation, it was only for one night, and Sol doubted Thorwyn would mind too much. If anything, he’d probably prefer it over sleeping on the hard ground.
"Alright, will do. Thanks!"
Miriam smiled and handed over two keys. After telling him which room number was his, she added, "If you need anything else, don’t hesitate to ask, dear. Ah, before I forget, breakfast is served anytime before noon and tonight there's an open stage night. Feel free tome down and enjoy some food and drinks with the entertainment."
Sol shivered as he recalled the last open stage night. Though the evening had been mostly enjoyable, Harvey’s performance at the very end had caused him more mental damage than a psychic attack. He definitely didn’t want to see what new material the pun fiend hadme up with this time.
Still, it would be rude to voice his true thoughts, so he simply nodded. "Thanks, I’ll think about it."
With that, he waved Miriam goodbye and headed outside to show Thorwyn where he'd be staying for the night.
...
Behind the stage, Sol laid down a few extra blankets, making the makeshift bed a little bigger. Then, he turned to Thorwyn, who was curiously inspecting the room.
"Make sure not to make a mess. She was kind enough to let you stay here for free," Sol reminded him.
"Hyuuu… (Okaaay…)" Thorwyn lazily replied before turning around and flopping onto the bed, creating a small thud despite the cushioning of the blankets.
"Do you need more blankets?"
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Thorwyn simply shook his head, circling the makeshift bed twice before settling in the perfect spot.
"Arf! (Nope! It'smfy!)"
"I’m glad you like it," Sol said, sitting down next to the large beast. Leaning against his soft fur, hentinued, "Now we just have to wait for Amber to get back."
"Awroo? (What is Scary Amber doing?)"
Ignoring the addition of Scary to Amber’s name, Sol explained, "Well, do you know where we’re heading?"
"Hyun! (Sapphire Scales Alliance!)" Thorwyn answered with anfident nod. While he didn’t know the full details, he at least knew that much.
"Yes, but it's on the far western side of thentinent, and we have three possible routes to get there…"
The first option was to head south through the Vibram Desert and thenntinue west until they reached the southern border of the Sapphire Scales Alliance. However, that route was the longest and least viable, as it required traveling all the way to the southernmost part of the kingdom and trekking through a vast desert.
The snd option was heading northwest, through the Holy Kingdom of Delvania. This was an appealing route since there were established roads and friendly relations between the twountries. The journey would take about a month and a half.
The third and final option was heading straight west through Sylmasera, which would require traversing the Great Forest inhabited by the elves. This was, by far, the fastest route with only three weeks of travel, but there was a major problem, it was inhabited by the elves.
The elves didn't like outsiders, especially those from Crestelia.
Soluld only let out a helpless smile as he spoke about the reason why they hated Crestelia. "I don’t blame the elves for not wanting us in their territory. People from Crestelia used to invade their borders and capture elves to turn them into slaves. It’s no wonder they restrict entry."
"Awroo? (What’s a slave?)"
"I... Uhh… don’t worry about it. They just don’t like us."
It was an awkward topic, and Sol had no desire to be the one to introduce the innocent wolf to the darker aspects of humanity. Quickly shifting thenversation back to the main topic, hentinued, "But going through Sylmasera is undoubtedly the fastest route, so we have no choice but to take the risk. The problem is… we don’t know our way around the Great Forest."
It would be easy to say just go west and keep going until we reach the other side, but without a proper map, they had no idea what obstacles or dangers awaited them. More importantly, Sol wanted to avoid any diplomatic incidents. The last thing he wanted to do was accidentally cause a war, especially after he just ended one.
That’s why they were planning to sneak through Sylmasera and avoid being detected. But to do that, they needed information on the layout of the Great Forest, something that was not easily obtained.
Publicly available maps of Sylmasera didn’t exist. Given that no one from Crestelia was allowed into the Great Forest except for a select few diplomats and groups, there were no maps readily distributed. The best oneuld get was a map of the entirentinent, but those only marked the borders not what was inside theuntries.
"When Amber and I were discussing it on our way to Initium, she mentioned she knew where weuld get our hands on a map. It belonged to her ex-boss."
Cane, a man who had his hand in multiple criminal enterprises but was most infamous for kidnapping rookie adventurers. He had mainly operated out of an abandoned prison, the very same one that Sol was captured and held in to be sold to the highest bidder. The prison had originally been used to hold captured elves back when slavery was still legal. Among the relics left behind from that dark era, Amber recalled seeing an old map of the Great Forest, one that Cane had kept in case he ever needed to flee the kingdom.
Unfortunately for Cane, he hadn’t even managed to evacuate his base when it was raided by the Guildmaster of Kerman and her old party.
As long as Amberuld retrieve that map, he was sure they would be able to navigate Sylmasera without issue.
After finishing his explanation, Sol said, "She should be back later tonight, so get some rest for now."
Thorwyn nodded but let out a big yawn midway through. He was a little tired from the fight with Bob, so he laid his head down and closed his eyes, drifting into a short nap.
Sol glanced at his sleepingmpanion and smiled before retrieving an item from his spatial ring.
'While we have some time… let’s see what I can do with this.'
The object in his hand was the misty orange marble, The Mimic Eye of Learning, which Thorwyn had won for him.
But what truly intrigued Sol about the item wasn’t the fact that ituld teach [Commune with Beasts].
It was the thin, nearly invisible tether extending from it.
