Akira exited the boat and helped the shorter Burkin with a large pack on his back out of the boat and onto the shore.

Dolph, Vilkas, Zundar, Klyn, and the other bodyguards all started to help unload the sleds and trade goods from a second larger ship that had followed behind them with the supplies and Gargs.

'I hate riding on whatever that dinky wood thing is called,' said Grarr. 'Why did I have to ride on the second one?'

“If you were with me on the first ship we would have been too heavy and sunk,” said Akira.

“Yap,” said Fluffball looking at the large body of Grarr.

'I'm not fat!'

“So what's your plan on getting to the Jerora trade post?” asked Burkin after he finished putting on new dry boots.

“We'll be heading straight there, only stopping at a few places to replenish our supplies. You should be able to trade with whatever town we stop at,” said Akira.

“I guess that's for the best, we can't waste time stopping at every place we see,” said Burkin.

“I'm sure there will be a lot of fighting to keep everyone happy,” said Zundar, as he swung his hammer.

“Only a battle fanatic would be happy about that,” said Klyn as he gathered his items.

***

Akira sat in a sturdy wooden chair of a small square mud house sipping a hot steaming cup of warm winter nut tea. In front of him was Efrem the chief of the Puman village. This was one of the few stops they planned to make.

“Thank you for agreeing to trade with my small village. We don't have much, but the items I mentioned are all that we can offer for trade right now,” said Efrem.

“How is the village doing safety-wise? Any problem with monsters or Demigods?” asked Akira.

“Since you last came and helped build a wall our small village has grown a lot. We have added more houses to the village wall protection to further strengthen the defenses of the village. It may not be anything like a city wall but it does its job.

As for monster attacks we have not faced any problems like before, but we have seen and dealt with a few demigods that have passed by. The few interactions we had were not that great as they tried selling us useless junk that we didn't need or did not have the money for.”

Akira passed over a small bag of gold to Efrem. “Use this to help strengthen your village's walls and buy some better weapons and armor to protect yourselves.”

“How can you give me such a large amount of gold?” asked Efrem as he quickly counted around 100 gold coins.

“I view it as an investment. If you do well and your village can grow even bigger and stronger, then we will both benefit from this. You don't have to think of this as charity. You can pay it back later when you make enough money. I just worry the Demigods might cause problems with you and I think it is best that you prepare yourself.”

“With this much money, we will be able to gather all the needed supplies to fortify the village and buy better equipment. I will be sure to put it to good use. May I ask where you are going next after you leave?”

“We are going to Jerora,” said Akira as he finished his warm drink.

“Now that you have loaned this money to me there is no use in holding onto it. Can I send my son with you to Jerora? I hope you can watch over him as he gathers and buys everything we need.”

“I see no problem since we are going to the same place,” said Akira.

“Ferem, you heard everything right? Be sure to gather all that is on the list and follow Akira's orders. It will do you some good to get out of the village and see several different places,” said Efrem to a young 14 to 15-year-old boy who stood in the corner of the room along with his mother.

“Efrem, is that really a good idea?” asked his mother who looked at her young son with a worry-filled face.

“Mother, there is no need to worry. I understand father, I will do as you say,” said Ferem.

***

Ferem and two other Puman warriors joined the small group as they headed north. With the few conversations Akira had with him he found that he was a rather shy youth who was skilled in the use of a spear as well as javelins.

As they were only a day away from Jerora Klyn let out a shout of warning, “There are three people running towards us from left in front of us!”

Akira who had been talking with Burkin looked over to where Klyn was pointing and saw the three people running out of a cluster of trees a good distance away from them. They were all wearing brown-furred clothing, with large heavy looking packs on their backs.

With a quick whistle, Akira ordered the small caravan to stop.

“Efrem, Burkin, and both of your guards stay here. The rest of you follow me,” said Akira as he grabbed Klyn's outstretched hand and pulled him up behind him before leading the rest of the mounted guards to intercept the strangers.

As they neared them Akira could see that the three men kept looking over their shoulders at the patch of snowy woods they had just run out of.

When they saw Akira and the others running towards them they gained a second wind and started to frantically run towards them.

“Halt!” Shouted Zundar in a booming voice as he stepped forward and held up a hand to the three winded strangers.

“What are you running...?” Akira's question stopped as he looked at the three heavily breathing men. They look extremely familiar.

“You!” shouted the oldest brother in shocked surprise.

“Me,” said Akira as he looked at them.

“Wait don't beat us up! We're not trying to rob you!” said the youngest brother.

“That's right! We aren't bandits, we're honest travailing merchants!” said the middle brother.

“Save us! The crazy demigods are after us!” said the oldest brother.

In front of Akira... were the three Idiot bandit brothers he had met several times back on the old continent.

“What did you do this time?” asked Akira.

“Nothing! They're just crazy! They have been chasing us for over a day!” said the oldest Idiot brother.

“Ha! I found you three idiots! You can't get away from me after saying what you did! I'll also take that map back!” shouted a loud deep husky voice.

“We'll make you pay! We've already put a small bounty on your head,” said a high pitched voice.

Akira looked to the large and huge muscular barbarian woman who had a square blocky face, rough skin, short hair, and wore a large cape made out of a three eye mutant brown bear. She was almost as tall and muscular as a blood orc. The large thick spear she held onto was just as tall as her.

Next to her stood a thin man who had a very angular face, unblemished soft skin, and long flowing blond hair. He also carried a spear but his thin arms looked too weak to do much of anything.

“Hand those guys over to me. They are my prey and I intend to teach them a lesson before killing them!” roared the barbarian woman in her deep husky voice.

“We'll do it nice and slowly!” said the dainty man, who looked like he would be blown away if the wind started to pick up and blow a little harder.

“Wait! I have no love for these idiots... but killing them is overboard don't you think?” asked Akira trying to calm things down as he inspected the two to see who they were.

[Etza Prap] [Imma Prap]

“No. Hand them over along with the map or we'll kill you as well!” said the man named Etza Prap.

Akira gave up trying to talk and silently gave the order to his guards who had their weapons already drawn to dispose of the demigods.

Akira instigated the fight by sending a [Sword slash] towards the two demigods. The skill flew right over the three cowering Idiot brother's heads.

Imma Prap held her spear out in front of her to block the attack while Etza Prap bent backward with great flexibility almost touching the ground to dodge the skill.

Unfortunately for Imma Prap the skill cut right through her spear and cut deep into her chest fatally wounding her.

“So.. strong...” muttered Imma Prap as her nearly severed body fell to the ground blood flowing out of the deep wound. The damage to her body was too large and she quickly disappeared into multiple light fragments.

“Sister!” Screeched Etza Prap, “You demon! I will keel you!”

Etza Prap ran towards Akira with his spear glowing brightly as he came forward several guards threw javelins at him trying to pierce him.

But he was able to nimbly dodge them and slip past those who tried to block his way with their spears.

Etza Prap was amazingly agile and dodged everything as he was determined to attack Akira with his full power spear attack.

BAM!

Zundar surprised Etza Prap by blocking his path at the last second and received a full-powered attack from Zundar.

The large hammer slammed right into Etza Prap's gut and sent his limp body flying nearly 50 feet up into the air before disappearing into several fragments of light.

“Thank you! You saved us! We are very grateful!” said Middle idiot brother.

“What did you do to make them so angry?” asked Klyn who didn't know who the three were.

“Nothing much. We were just playing cards with them and kept losing money to them,” said Oldest idiot brother.

“They were using some type of cheat I'm sure of it. So when they offered one more round to win it all back as well as a special map, we took the chance and sorta made sure we would win,” said Middle idiot brother.

“Right, right, we only won that round and thanked them for their time and left,” said the youngest idiot brother.

“So they caught you cheating?” asked Akira.

“No way! I don't think it has to do with anything like that. Brother is very skilled at cheat...I mean playing cards. They only got angry after I complimented them. I only told them that their names suited them very well before we left,” said the youngest idiot brother.

“They've been chasing us ever since! Who would have thought being nice would lead to someone trying to kill you!” said the Oldest idiot brother.

“It seems like they will be looking for you when they reappear tomorrow,” said Akira.

“Please let us come with you back to Jerora!”

“I beg you, keep us safe!”

“We can give you the map they wanted if you protect us! It's some type of treasure map may be worth 1000s' of gold.” said the oldest as he handed the map over to Akira.

Akira took the map as he inspected it. He did not know what the map showed or where one could find the area depicted on the map. In all his traveling he had not seen any area that had the features that were on this map. At the bottom of the map were several lines written in an ancient language.

Ding!

You have found the map that leads to the secret hideout of an ancient kingdom from long ago.

Use the map and the clues written to find the ancient hibernating kingdom and earn several great things!

'A hibernating kingdom? What is this? Hmm...they weren't joking, this looks like a very important map,' thought Akira.

After taking a few moments to think it over Akira rolled up the map and put it in his bag.

“You can join us and while we're at Jerora I'll protect you from the Demigods if they try to kill you. But after I leave you're on your own.”

“Thank you!” the three idiot brothers all shouted.

“What are your names so I don't have to keep calling you by your age?” asked Akira.

“I am Oib.” said Oldest Idiot brother.

“Mib.” said Middle Idiot brother.

“Yib, at your service,” said Youngest Idiot brother.

“You three better keep to yourselves and not do any stupid crap. I don't need you causing me any problems. If you do, I will leave you to the demigods. Don't talk to Ferem since I can't have you corrupting him with your idiocy and bad habits,” said Akira.

“We will be so quiet that you won't know we're traveling with you!” said Eib, as they all stood straight and saluted Akira.

***

On the rest of the way to Jerora the three idiots loudly talked with everyone ignoring what they had said.

The weather was slightly warmer this far north compared to the south which had already entered the early weeks of winter.

When they arrived at Jerora the next morning they found that the whole outside of the city was jammed packed with several large tent cities everywhere. Which made the trade city look to be nearly 3 times as large as it was when Akira had last stayed here.

It was extremely crowded and the loud noises coming from everywhere was quite maddening.

As they walked through the crowded areas Akira could see several different demon races, along with humans, and even some demigods setting up tents.

“What's going on?” asked Akira as he looked at all the chaos.

“Hmmm... not sure...” said Burkin as he looked at the large crowds.

“Ah! How could I have forgotten this big event was going to happen! It is that time of year again,” said Burkin after thinking of something.

“What?” asked Akira.

“The great once a year Mega Auction!”