The Avast Mountains. The large mountain range in the north of this city - it connected Huizhou and Shenzhen perfectly, and served as a nice border as well. No one dared to venture through this place, since not only was the road tiresome - but short compared to other routes - it was also infested with danger. Monsters, Magic Beasts, you name it - they all resided within the Avast Mountains and its surroundings.

The parts of the mountain range close to the cities were relatively safe, since both cities had people like Hunters - or in Shenzhen's case, students (teachers would lead the older kids at our school into the Avast Mountains to train) - patrolling it and killing off some monsters or beasts from time to time.

But...that still left nearly a hundred kilometers worth of dangerous territory.

But this was the shortest route...

For a moment, I reconsidered. Maybe it would be smarter to just take a little more time, but be more safe on the way there.

Then again...we'll be riding on Obsidia anyway, and the mountains provide good cover for her in the air. I've been up the mountains once myself - that's how I met Obsidia in the first place. But that aside...I remember the sky was pretty foggy up there, despite it being completely clear back down in the city. That will definitely help us out.

I sighed and settled with just flying over the Avast Mountains on Obsidia's back. Of course, Xiang Peng and Lan Xiao Su had to be informed beforehand of Obsidia's true identity, but I figured the other girls already told them anyway. Both of them were trustworthy. Xiang Peng was pretty annoying, but she was a nice person. As for Lan Xiao Su...well, we were her only chance at saving her mother, so I doubt she would do anything to work against us. The two of them would probably be incredibly surprised, but whatever.

Around half an hour later, after the girls came back from their shopping for Flaria, we set off.

On January 2nd, 2022, the ten of us - Obsidia, Mei Gui, Flaria, Lan Xiao Su, Xiang Peng, Feng Mian, Qing Yue, Yu An Xue, Yu An Yan, and I - left the city of Shenzhen.

*****

- Atop Obsidia's Back, Somewhere Above the Avast Mountains -

"Holy shit...!" I muttered, gritting my teeth as I held on for dear life to Obsidia's neck. She was in her dragon form, of course, and we were riding atop her black scales, on her back. Meanwhile, the rest of the girls were holding onto my back, choo-choo-train style.

"Goddamn it...I knew this wasn't a good ide-woah!"

Obsidia suddenly accelerated, and I honestly would've fell off if it wasn't for my fast reaction times.

In contrast, Xiang Peng seemed to be enjoying the ride.

"Woohoo! So this is what riding on a real dragon feels like!" she exclaimed, sitting near the middle.

"Eek!" Lan Xiao Su yelped and closed her eyes tightly as Obsidia accelerated once more. "I-I thought you were joking when you said we would be riding a dragon-! Ahh! Obsidia, s-slow down please!"

"That was a close one..." Feng Mian murmured after we had stabilized again, clutching onto Qing Yue's shoulders tightly.

Qing Yue, who was in turn clutching on my shoulders, tightened her grip even further, and rested her head against my back.

"Obsidia, what was that for?" I demanded.

"Hmph. You're too loud, human. I can't fly properly like this," she responded briskly. Her voice was booming in this dragon form, but we were far too high up for anyone to hear.

I sighed. "I am never, ever, riding you again."

Xiang Peng decided that was a good time to suddenly lean over the other girls in front of her and whisper in my ear.

"Mm...riding her, eh?" she murmured, wiggling her eyebrows suggestively.

I sent her a quick sideways glare, and she backed off.

In any case, despite the trip experience being quite...suboptimal, it was short and efficient. We arrived on the other side of the Avast Mountains in around 2 hours, which was a lot quicker than if we went by foot and used the actual roads. Once we were on the other side of the mountain, Obsidia descended into a forest below, slowing down.

Once we were on the ground, she changed back into her human form after we all got off of her, and just like that, we were in Huizhou.

"That was...one hell of a ride," Xiang Peng mused, before looking around. "Hm...I know Huizhou pretty well. Been here a couple of times before. Follow me, I know where we are and where to go from here."

The rest of us exchanged glances, before agreeing to follow her.

According to Xiang Peng, the forest we had landed in was called the Infinite Forest. Apparently, it was pretty much the Huizhou equivalent of Shenzhen's portion of the Avast Mountains - the high school here in Huizhou also sent their older students into this forest for training. What that meant for us was two things - one, the bad news, we would probably run into some Monsters or Magic Beasts on our way out of the forest, and two, the good news, most of these encounters will be pretty easy, considering this place was being used for training purposes for students. The Magic Beasts here should be around Rank 3 or 4 at best.

Magic Beasts also had a ranking system, similar to mages. However, it was far less complex. Instead of having a name for every single rank, there were simply 8 tiers - Rank 1, 2, 3, 4, and so on. A Rank 1 Magic Beast would be about the equivalent of a Novice Mage in terms of strength, and a Rank 2 Magic Beast would be around the level of an Intermediate Mage. The system continues - meaning a Rank 8 Magic Beast would have the power of a Divine God.

Contrary to this legendary title that no one has ever achieved, Rank 8 Magic Beasts do exist. However, as expected, they were extremely rare, and all of them had human level intelligence, if not more. Fortunately, they wished to just live peacefully, which fell just in line with the IMF's intentions. They worked out a deal, and the Rank 8 Magic Beasts get to have their peace while we don't have to live in fear of them. A win-win situation.

Incidentally, Monsters shared the same ranking system as Magic Beasts.

In any case, the Monsters and Magic Beasts in this forests were all probably Rank 3 or 4 at best, meaning they were on par with an Advanced Mage or perhaps an Ancestral Mage. If they came at us in hordes, that could be a problem, but then again...we had Xiang Peng - an Ancestral Mage - and a whole ass dragon with us too. I doubt we would have any trouble making it out of this forest.

That being said...there was just one thing I was concerned about - running into anyone.

School should've already started literally just yesterday for them, assuming they followed the same calendar as Shenzhen. I find it unlikely the teachers would send their students for field training this early in the school year right after school began, but there was still a possibility. Besides, Huizhou definitely also had a Hunters' Guild, meaning we could end up running into some Hunters as well, following the same pattern as Shenzhen's Avast Mountains.

If we didn't run into anyone, we can just blast our way out of this forest with ease. My absorption ability thanks to the Chaos inside my body will render all magic attacks from any enemies useless, and none of the girls were weak, either. But if we did run into anyone...

"Guys - if we run into anyone, just pretend we're weak, got it?" I suddenly said, causing everyone to look at me.

"Uh...why?" Xiang Peng asked, blinking in confusion.

Feng Mian sighed. "You haven't known him long enough, Xiang Peng. He's just overly cautious of everything, and wants to keep everything about himself a secret."

"I...see..." Xiang Peng replied hesitantly. "Well, I guess that's not a bad thing. I mean, it's certainly better than not being cautious of anything at all."

"Look, this is for the best, okay?" I inserted myself into the conversation. "Just in case, I don't want to leak any unnecessary information about any of us to strangers. As they say...information is the most powerful weapon. You never know when they could use it against us."

"Um, I think it's 'knowledge is the most powerful weapon', but okay," Lan Xiao Su murmured hesitantly.

I pretended to have not heard her, and merely cleared my throat and continued. "A-Ahem, anyway...let's move. Don't fight any Magic Beasts or Monsters unless it's absolutely necessary. If we can run, we run. Let's try to stay discrete."

We didn't prepare any food or water or anything, so we couldn't afford to get caught up in this forest. The girls didn't bring all that much stuff, and the things they did bring were all safely stored in my Space Locket that I had gotten from Yu Ao a while back.

"Got it," the girls replied in unison.

And then, I felt a tug on my sleeve. "Master."

I looked down at Mei Gui. "What is it?"

"I can detect for any enemies that are coming our way, and we can reroute to avoid them," she explained. "If we travel this way, we will be out of this forest in no time."

I nodded. "Sounds good. Let's do it your way."

Mei Gui closed her eyes and probably chanted a spell of some sort. She, like me, didn't need to chant out loud to cast a spell with precision and accuracy.

"Alright, the spell is activated. We can move now," she said.