After the second day of jogging through the woods, I finally arrived somewhere that Tabris could attach a place-name to: namely, the coastal(?) city of Iprebert, home of around eighty thousand according to her somewhat foggy memory. During my run, Tabris and I had gotten to know each other better: we’d whiled away the hours with her telling me about this planet—which I learned was commonly called Roiturn—and me clarifying some of the more complex topics in the databases I’d given her access to. Then, the path had led us to the top of a cliff, and we were greeted by the sight of the great city in the distance.

From my elevated vantage point, I could see the city in its entirety, and how it had grown to envelop a secluded bay; like how a bacterium might consume another microorganism whole. The cellular membrane of the city consisted of a stone wall, and the interior was positively packed with red-roofed constructions. Only occasionally was this carpet of squat dwellings interrupted by spires or larger and architecturally divergent structures of varying heights and levels of grandeur. Tabris informed me that these were in part churches or the dwellings of the local aristocracy.

The most notable feature of Iprebert—and the one that Tabris used to identify this specific city, was the harbor, more specifically the bay. In it, dozens of ships and other watercraft constructed from wood and webbed with hundreds of lines were anchored. The signifying feature wasn’t the harbor though, it was a massive chain, visible even from my far vantage, which was spanned across the mouth of the sheltered bay.

“That chain is what makes Iprebert so well known in this part of the world,” Tabris told me, “As far as I remember, Iprebert’s economy is primarily focused on shipbuilding with a secondary focus of projecting naval power across the Saltless Sea. That’s where the chain comes in. Apparently, when ships need to pass through the strait and into the bay, it is lowered under water, but in its raised position it is said to be nearly impassable by hostile or unwanted ships.”

I was intrigued. This new view of Roiturn’s civilization was different than I expected—when Dakla first suggested that I find a higher population density, I expected more villages like South-Tenstones, but simply larger in scale. That’s not at all what this city was. I need to stop being so dismissive of these people, clearly, they’re remarkably capable despite their limited technological development. Even from this distance, I shuddered thinking about how big of an engineering project building such a city or even the chain spanned across the water would be with only manual labor—no machines or bots. I estimated that each link of the silvery chain spanning the harbor was around as long as I was tall. Even with my enhanced strength, I’d need quite a lot of mechanical advantage to even budge one of those links.

The area surrounding the city and outside the walls was also suited for shipbuilding. Vast forests, similar to the one I’ve been running through, came quite close to the walls, and were only held at bay by a few agricultural fields and small collections of shantytowns which grew on the outer fortifications like a moss or a fungus. Out in the fields I could just make out small figures of farmers working, and on the road I saw an animal-drawn wagon transporting lumber to one of the gates in the city’s fortified wall.

Unfortunately, I was reminded of a problem while my eyes tracked the distant figures of lumber-haulers approaching and then entering the city’s gate: namely, past evidence indicated that there was no chance that I’d pass as a normal person in the city. My skinsuit-formed apparel was fine, but I couldn’t really change my height and my alien eyes would probably attract all kinds of enmity and unwanted attention. I needed a way to hide my face, and I didn’t think that a simple and shadowy hood was going to cut it.

“Saint Tabris, do you think I could wear sunglasses without looking too out-of-place?” I asked.

“Sunglasses?”

I browsed through my asset library and under the fashion section I found some samples which I sent her.

“They’re designed to be worn on the face and protect from harsh light.”

“Ah, I understand, and unfortunately no…” she said, but then continued, “The only place you might see something like this is on nobleman’s nose in a battlefield, where large amounts of radiance are commonplace.”

“So, it would definitely look out of place in a city?”

“Yes.”

I contemplated the problem a bit more and I was wary of having my solution attract more attention than my unhidden eyes would. For example, I could simply walk around with my eyes closed and use the drone’s sight and my other senses to navigate, but I didn’t think this would go over well. Same with the sunglasses, I could probably make a decent imitation with my skinsuit, but that might just cause more people to focus their attention on me.

This line of thinking led me to further consider the options my skinsuit gave me: certain nanobots included in the garment were transparent, and, when concentrated on one area could form things like basic visors or camera covers, but they couldn’t assume the crystalline structure that optical-grade materials required. Forming lenses of any sort or sunglasses specifically would’ve been difficult too: I couldn’t simply polarize the transparent bots, nor did I have any method with which to apply a reflective, one-way coating.

Thinking about skinsuits and battlefields, helmets came to mind and the idea of overhauling my disguise in general seemed like a prudent one. After talking to Dakla and Tabris, I realized that what I was doing—walking around the wilderness alone—wasn’t something often done by sane folks. A proper disguise that tells people I’m not to be trifled with might not be such a bad idea. Even better, I can include a helmet and wear it without sticking out too much. I pumped my Saint for some more information on possible helmeted disguises, and eventually we came up with what we both agreed was a workable solution: I’d assume the role of a scout, or a “Woodswalker”.

Being a scout or one of these Woodswalkers would go quite a way towards alleviating any suspicions. First, Woodswalker as a profession could generally be described as an information broker or a guide for the wilderness. During peacetime—which we hoped this was—Woodswalkers sold information and their services to multiple different types of clients. For example, hunters might hire one to locate plentiful game, Knights might hire one to sniff out a bandit hideout, or a merchant might hire one to plot a path through the wilderness and in general keep their trade caravan heading in the right direction.

Masquerading as a Woodswalker would provide a reasonable explanation for why I was traveling the wilderness alone, it would give me a higher baseline level of respect from most people, and finally the Woodswalkers were one of the few martially oriented vocations where it was only mildly unusual for a woman to be a member. Further solidifying this choice was the fact that a Woodswalker was expected to be lightly armored. The wilds were dangerous places populated by beasts and bandits—not that I’d encountered any of these yet. I took a seat and started to design my new disguise.

First, the point of this entire wardrobe change: hiding my eyes. From Tabris’s descriptions of Woodswalkers she’d met and those she’d known, I used the skinsuit to create a facsimile leather helmet which would cover the top half of my head and included a nose guard and holes for eyes. Then, I moved downwards, transitioning my clothing into something more rugged, adding a mottled and nature-colored cloak, and making knees and elbows padded.

Next, I added some armor. I continued using the skinsuit to form look-alike-leather and made a leather vest for my torso along with vambraces and shin guards. According to Tabris’ recollections, this level of armor was appropriate—if leaning a bit towards the heavy side. Generally, a Woodswalker focused on stealth and dexterity instead of slugging it out with an opponent and any more armor than I currently appeared to have would be unusual.

Next, besides their general appearance, the identifying features of a Woodswalker were their armaments, but this is where I started to run into problems with my skinsuit. The armor, while appearing as leather, wasn’t only for show. It was functional and dense with suit nanos, which left less suit nanos for the weapons any Woodswalker was expected to have.

Primarily among those was the recurve bow: a piece of treated wood which was stored, unstrung, and in a hollow tube or weather-resistant wrapping to protect it when not in use. Luckily, my bow didn’t need to be functional: it only needed to appear as a bow to casual visual inspection. I skimped heavily on the suit nanos invested in it, and the end result was a product that, while stiff enough to imply a wrapped bow, would bend like a wet noodle under any real stress. I performed the same trick with a faux-quiver and fake arrows. Visual inspection wouldn’t show anything amiss, but closer look would reveal that the arrows were all abnormally flexible and lightweight.

Besides the bow, a Woodswalker was also expected to have a small hatchet for general purposes and a dagger—although by the way Tabris described this, I quickly learned that nobody walked around without a bladed weapon or tool of some sort. Because of this, I skimped on the hatchet and made it only appear to be metal, but I didn’t skimp on the dagger. I concentrated the rest of the excess suit nanos into forming a strong blade which had steel-like properties, reasoning that if I needed to draw any weapon in the city, the dagger would be the most likely one. By preparing it now, it would be ready when I needed it and I wouldn’t need to stall for time in order to subtly shift suit nanos into the blade—which would take quite a while.

Finally, to complete the look, I repeated the process I’d done to my first disguise: artificial wear and grime. Pristine leather became coated with fine concentrations of fake dirt, scratched, darkened, and in general modified to give it a well-loved and well-used look. Then, I moved on to my other articles of clothing and the small accessories I’d formed which would hopefully sell the design: small pouches on my belt, my dagger’s sheath, and other small miscellaneous features which Tabris suggested.

Orbiting my drone about myself to get a proper third-person view, both Tabris and I admired the handiwork. Now that I look the part, I only need to act the part too. Great. This was an area that Tabris couldn’t help me with—at all. I’d learned that she was a priest before she became a Saint (and as digitized?) and had spent most of her time in an urban environment. She had known several Woodswalkers and could describe their physical appearance to me, but to her, they’d always been in the role of parishioner. She had only vague notions of how a Woodswalker acted or behaved when not in a liturgical or spiritual setting.

I hoped it wouldn’t be too big a problem. Even if I did know how to act, it’s not as if I’m an actor. I decided to just figure it out on the spot; time pressure was always a nice boot to kickstart the creative engines. After all, what’s the worst that could happen?

Disguise complete, I checked the sky for the position of the sun and estimated the distance remaining to the city gates. It would be best to arrive before dusk, that way my eyes—hidden as they were—would be concealed in the shadows of my leather helmet. Additionally, Tabris warned me that fortified cities often closed their gates at night, or if they didn’t, entrance inspection would become more rigorous after dark. Someone would probably end up shining a light in my face and thus revealing my eyes—something I wanted to avoid. Calculation complete, I determined that a comfortable walking pace would bring me to the city gate with time to spare. I stood up, directed my drone to hide in the blue of the sky, dusted myself off, and reoriented myself on the route I’d been taking.

Since I’d parted ways with Dakla, this specific path hadn’t gotten significantly wider or more trafficked, but I did frequently leave the trail and run in the woods to avoid crossing paths with anyone heading my way. Jogging at superhuman speeds, alone, and with a sub-par disguise probably wouldn’t’ve gone over well.

Now though, disguised and walking at a regular pace, I decided I wouldn’t shy from any potential encounters. Maybe I’ll get some practice in acting as a Woodswalker before I reach the city? I only had around two kilometers and half a dozen switchbacks to go before this small path would emerge from the woods and join the main paved artery which led into Iprebert. With spring in my step, happy that I’d taken the time to form a proper disguise, I headed off, towards city below me.