"In the distant past, the shorelines of the Elmaiya Empire were where the poor and the outcasts lived, as everyone with money favored the large cities further inland instead.

Nowadays, the shorelines are *more* bustling than the inland regions, save for those aforementioned large cities, which only came up to par instead.

Funny how time changes things sometimes." - Aideen deVreys, the Silver Maiden, circa 463 FP.

The party departed the next morning, headed further to the southwest. As they neared the border between the lichdom and the empire, Cal noticed a few small guard outposts, all of which were from the empire's side. The lichdom's own side of the borders lacked any such measures.

Then again, the hundreds of undead sentries stationed in and around each village in the vicinity, coupled with their necromancers, definitely served their purpose and ensured the safety of the region, just like that.

While they could have rather easily avoided the guard outposts - the lax security at the border testament to the good relations between the two nations, which had remained informal allies for a while - Cal decided that there was no reason to, and the group headed for the guard outpost nearby.

There they had their identities verified by the clearly bored guards, who waved them in after a cursory inspection. A part of her was a bit irked at the lax security, but then again, maybe that was to be expected of a land that had been at peace for a good while now. Even the people back home at the Al-Shan empire were a bit like that prior to the civil war.

They continued their trip throughout the day, as they made a good pace as usual. By evening, they set up camp by an uninhabited stretch of beach, which had clean, white sand constantly washed over by the tides.

Much like Cal expected, her students and nieces were quite excited at the sight of the beach, despite the physical exertion the former had just been through. With a smile, she gave them permission to go for a swim or to play in the waters as they liked, while she went for a bath herself, before she sat down and prepared dinner.

Joyful laughter echoed from the waters, where Cal saw her students and nieces as they played and frolicked around. For her own part, she focused more on the dinner she was preparing. The pre-marinated slabs of wyvern meat from her storage that roasted over the fire was kept rotating by Dan, and just needed time before it was done.

Cal herself was adjusting a clear soup, mostly made with a light broth of fish and seaweed, thickened with starch, and flavored with the flesh of some small crabs she caught skittering around the beach.

Despite their small size, there were plenty of them, and she had shelled them for the little bits of meat inside together with Kino, an activity she found quite relaxing, as she recalled doing the same when she was much younger with her parents.

After Cal gave the soup another taste and deemed it satisfactory, she whisked a couple of bird eggs in a bowl, then drizzled it into the soup as she stirred. The egg set into thin, gossamer flakes that floated inside the thick soup, and she finished it with a sprinkling of chopped wild onions.

By then the rest of the party had finished their swim and play, as fatigue from the day's run and the setting sun both signaled for them to call it a day. They had just walked out from the tent where they took a bath when the scent of good food enticed them to gather by the fire.

With a slight chuckle, Cal told them to help themselves to the roasted meats and soup. They did so, as they grabbed skewers of the roasted meats and served themselves bowls of the piping hot soup, then sat down as they ate happily around the campfire.

They carried on with their journey the next day, after a peaceful, restful night of rest, tracing the shorelines as they went. As they walked a couple hours, the sandy beach started to give way to a more rocky one, which slowly but surely increased in height, to the point that by noon, the oceans were a good distance below them, separated from them by a steep cliff.

Curiously, there was a clearly man-made structure that they could see further in the distance, which looked like a floating port city anchored to the cliffside. The floating city below was connected to another at the top of the cliff by long rope ladders, and large baskets that were raised and lowered by cranes and pulleys.

When they entered, Cal saw that it was a quite prosperous port city, though the construction had made her wonder why the inhabitants chose to build the city there instead of the friendlier beaches their group left this morning.

"It's because this place carried many memories for us," answered a man just as Cal voiced that question while she drank at an open-air bar. "Not many still exist who remembered of it, but for those of us who first pioneered this city back then, this cliff was our place of salvation."

Cal turned to look at the man who just talked, and saw a human man, maybe in his late twenties or early thirties or so. He was dressed like a hunter, and looked the part, but one thing about him utterly contrasted the rest of his appearance.

The man barely had mana that emanated off him, likely someone that would not pass muster as a mage, but what little Cal felt, had felt strangely old. It was a quality she remembered all too well from the mana Aideen and quite a few others had. Mana that tend to belong to the Unliving.

Which helped explain why the man spoke as if he personally experienced what he had said.

"Been around a while, huh?" asked Cal to the man politely.

"Aye, been so long now. I was saved and brought away from these cliffs once, so later I returned with a few like-minded friends, and we built this city right here," said the man with a melancholic sigh. "Now most of them have moved away, or passed on. I'm about the only one left who still remembered those days…"