Orou zoomed back and forth between Grizz’s legs, playing around with his new found power. This solved his issue of not being able to practice spells while moving, now he could practice controlling his blood core instead. This left an unfortunate side effect of being able to easily trace them as Orou kept accidentally making holes in the dirt below them. At first, Grizz tried to cover their tracks as best as he could, but he gave up after seeing what Orou had done.

As Orou travelled the plains, he realised how much he missed simply living in the forest. The sun didn’t constantly shine on you, you could hide in trees and the foliage around you, but here, he felt weak and exposed. If a predator that he couldn’t beat approached him, the only option would be to run, it was impossible to ambush someone in these plains. Besides, the food here was not as tasty or plentiful as in the forest. Catching something to eat for both him and Grizz was mostly dependant on luck.

“We’re nearing the main road again so be careful of any beastmen, though they should probably be careful of you if we encounter any,” Grizz told Orou as he stopped his mad dash back and forth and slithered next to Grizz. Orou had noticed that Grizz wasn’t really excited about going back to his family, during these two days of travel he wasn’t as energetic or talkative as before, but that might be the result of his parting from Lyra.

Grizz stopped for a second and while drinking from his water canteen, he pulled out the map from his backpack. According to the map, they were more than half-way through their journey and as Grizz traced his finger across the map, he said: “There should be a town nearby for us to restock, but that’s half a day away. The nearest landmark should be the crossroads, one path heading towards Onilia and the other towards the capital, Mira. We might have to travel to it after I’m done in Onilia, though I’m still not completely sure, so don’t get your hopes up.”

Reflecting back on his journey through the beastman empire so far, he had learned fewer spells than he hoped he would and he had almost died way too many times. That’s why he was so excited about going to Onilia, Grizz mentioned earlier that one of his brothers was learning magic and perhaps he could glance at some of his spell formations, simply to enrich his collection. He had also been thinking of a way to cast spells and move simultaneously, but it was way too hard for him. The main issue was concentrating on the spirits, he could both move and command the spirits, not to mention if he was in battle, a single distraction could potentially disrupt the entire formation, which would waste both his energy and his time.

As it usually happened when he travelled, Orou's mind kept on alternating between different thoughts, but his train of thought was interrupted when he sensed vibrations some ways forwards. A few seconds later he heard a noise in the distance, heavy footsteps were rapidly approaching them and it wasn’t just one pair. There must have been more than twenty pairs of footsteps, moving much quicker than an average beastman or a human. Orou wanted to quickly slither to the east and hide somewhere, but Grizz motioned Orou to stay where he is with his hand.

It didn’t take long before Orou could see what was approaching them. Beastmen clad from head to toe in metal armor were riding on what looked to be horses, only twice as big and strong. The beastman in the front lifted his hand and the horses halted to a trot, halting only when they were face to face with Grizz and Orou. The horses were more interested in Orou as more than a few of them stared straight at him with their red eyes, neighing and sniffing the air around him.

The beastman that was leading the rest of them stepped off his horse and lifted his visor. He had blue scales on his face, bearing resemblance to a fish and his two wide eyes blinked at Grizz as he said: “On royal order, we are to ask for every citizen to prove his identity and search his belongings. If you are to resist this order, we are free to execute you for disobedience. In addition, since you are travelling with an animal, you also need to provide the papers of ownership and the qualifications of a beast trainer.”

Grizz put on a fake smile and started rummaging through his backpack. Orou had been with Grizz for long enough that he knew Grizz was putting up his best act of complying to orders when in reality, he was most likely annoyed about this inconvenience. He pulled out three specific papers and as he did, three more beastmen jumped down from their horses. The six remaining beastmen circled them, their swords ready in case something was to go wrong.

The three of them also raised their visor’s and Orou noticed a striking resemblance in one of the beastmen. A beastman with brown hair, bearing a resemblance to a bear was reading through one of the papers and Orou could swear he looked like the beastman that was guarding the gate of the forest village, only a much younger version of him. After a minute of reading the papers, the bear beastman whispered something to the other two and reported back to their captain.

“Sorry for your inconvenience Mr Grizz Ashmore, you must be in a hurry to get back to your family. Normally, we would search through your belongings, but in respect of your family, I shall forfeit this action.” Grizz’s cheery face had a hint of a frown on it, but it was gone a moment later, humbling himself before the captain and exchanging small talk.”

“Right, one last question. Do you know of a person named Vaar? All information on this subject will be rewarded with blood crystals.” The four beastmen on the ground were intently looking at Grizz’s facial expression, hoping to catch something out of the usual. Orou didn’t know if they were happy or disappointed when Grizz feigned confusion, saying: “I’ve never heard of such a person. Is he a famous criminal? Should I be wary of him?”

“It’s nothing, if you know naught of this subject then it’s better things stay that way. Once more, I’m terribly sorry for the inconvenience.” He beckoned the three beastmen on the ground and remounted his horse. Taking one more look at Grizz, he raised his arm and started galloping off into the distance. Orou stared confusedly at Grizz, after all, they had seen Vaar and they knew where he was, why would he need to lie about that.

“Sometimes, it’s best to feign ignorance and not get involved, besides, I’m not lacking in crystals,” Grizz sensed Orou’s confusion and sighed. He put the three pieces of paper in his backpack and started to move. “I never thought someone would refer to me like that again, but the word of the royal guard is the law. They have the authority to execute anyone and who would ever know that we were killed by them, not to mention they can simply say that we resisted the search.” Grizz grumbled about the injustice and how the kingdom would be a better place without the royal guard as the two of them continued moving on.