“Ready?” Maya asked as he jumped off from the broken wall near the entrance of the portal. They agreed to meet there for the quest. Alex was with her already while Miles and Val came together. Both were carrying backpacks. Alex and Maya had theirs leaned against a broken wall.

“Yeah, we are ready to go.” Val smiled brightly to enlighten the world for a short span of time. Maya too smiled as she grabbed her backpack and threw Alex’s to him. For a petite girl, she had quite a strength hidden in her arms. Miles just nodded and they started to walk towards the portal.

Monsters and walking dead were crying from afar, but they were already used to these sounds. The forest was filled with them but the experienced students knew the forest like the back of their hands already. Val was a cartographer; she knew every nook and cranny of the forest to the detail, so they walked without encountering any boogie.

Soon, they passed through the portal and let the clerk working there know that they were heading for the invisible knight. It was one of the procedures to notify the academy before students headed for the quests. As there were too many mishaps that could happen in Portal World, students were obliged to alert the workers before taking a trip related to the quest. In case of not returning, the Academy would know it was for their quests students went MIA. The Clerk made them sign up for an old-looking book. Although it looked like an ancient tradition, all students were forced to sign them before leaving for quests.

The invisible knight was acting for a long time and the clerk there signed many who went missing in action before, thus when she saw four bright students were about to hunt that dangerous creature, she felt pity.

“Please be careful. Many before you failed in this quest. Just don’t overdo it and return if you fail.” She said. Miles and others knew she said what she said out of goodwill, and thus smiled and thanked. After all the procedures were done, they left the building towards the location.

Since Val created most of the maps in the academy and she had access to the rest of them, she knew the quickest way toward the area. They could also circumvent the danger zones and skip dealing with dangerous monsters on their way, but there was still a hurdle they had to pass through as that was one of the easiest ways to the area where the invisible knight lived.

“We have to pass through this bridge. Other paths are more dangerous. At least this way we can pass without battling.” Val pointed at the bridge connecting two sides of a ravine. The ravine itself wasn’t impassable by normal means, as one could fly over it, but the thing was, it was under protection.

“I don’t think we should deal with the Apes, that's all I am saying.” Maya strongly disagreed. “They are tricky little shits and will rob us naked before we could even pass.”

The bridge was protected by a monkey family and the Monkey King would fee everyone trying to use the bridge. And if one tried to pass without paying the fee or fly over the ravine, monkeys would surround the creature and beat them to death before robbing them. Academy at first wanted to deal with the monkeys to let students have easy access to the bridge but it wasn't the most logical action.

Firstly, monkeys would deal with other monsters as well. They would charge every creature who wanted to pass the ravine and if even a bird wanted to fly over, they would have to deal with the monkeys.

Secondly, there were more than a thousand of them living in the ravine, deep in the walls. It wasn’t easy to destroy them. So, the academy let them be.

“If we don’t take the bridge we will have to go around them. It will cost us several days and we will be forced to pass through the HES Desert. Although we can pass through it without any trouble, there is still a big risk.” Val defended her argument.

HES Desert was named as such because of the creatures at the top of the food chain there. Human Eating Scorpions were bigger than bulls and lived under the sand in the desert. Via vibration of footsteps, they would locate their prey and jump out of the sand to devour them without wasting time on bites.

They had lethally potent poison and steel exoskeleton. They weren’t easy to deal with but easy to avoid. One just had to fly over the desert to be careful enough to abstain from making any pulsation while walking on the sand. Although the latter was easier said than done, by covering feet with energy, one could still walk on the sand without alerting the monsters beneath. Still, it required constant concentration and massive amounts of energy.

“We all are in mid-tier. Have enough amount and mastery over our energies. We can pass through the desert. I don’t want buck-naked monkeys to rob me.” Maya huffed as she folded her arms on her chest.

“I think Maya has a point on this one.” Alex defended his teammate as he pointed to the map. “The area where the invisible knight has been spotted is closer to the entrance through the desert. Even if we pass through the bridge, we will still walk towards it.”

“Yeah, in a straight line.” Val rolled her eyes. “It will take us a day if we are slow. But if we go through the desert, it will take at least 3 days.”

“But we get to keep everything we have.” Maya also rolled her eyes exaggeratedly.

“What do you call Miles?” Alex asked. Miles looked at all three of them and took out a coin from his pocket. “Let’s flip for it.”

“Pussy.” Val muttered silently as she turned her back. Miles sighed as he handed the coin to Maya. Since he was friends with Alex and Val, his choice would decide the outcome but it would hurt Maya if he was against her opinion. But he also thought the bridge made more sense. It would save them lots of time. So he decided to take the safest option and let luck decide for them.