He flew up to the edge of the island, and decided to climb the rest of the way up, as to maintain his anonymity. He found that no one was at the top. He had made sure to strap the quartz to himself using a rope the clan had given him for that purpose. He snuck further inland into the forest. He found a village where he asked for directions towards the nearest clan city.

The largest and most important cities were the ones where the hyena clan had direct presence. Typically recruiting activities, shops, and other services were provided for martials of any stripe. Despite the clans typically being enemies, they weren't in a perpetual state of war. Wealthy martials, with flying artifacts, frequently visited the islands of other clans. Not to mention the unaligned martials that could be found everywhere. There was truly no reason for Gary to sneak in besides his own paranoia. If he had been caught sneaking in rather than flying in as a visitor he would have been seen as more suspicious, and been arrested and interrogated. However, fortune had been with him, and he was not seen suspiciously slithering through the woods of the island. An island of this size was simply too large to effectively patrol.

The island wasn't just large. It was massive. It held multiple cities, towns, and villages. There were even a few mortal nations vying for dominion. Of course the goings ons of mortals didn't affect the hyena clan, so long as they did what they were told. Mortal rulers typically asked how high when told to jump. The scraps offered to them by the clans were too good to pass up. It was against the laws of the clan to fly around without a permit. Of course this didn't apply to incoming martials, but as soon as they touched down they would have to pay for a permit. They were relatively cheap, but Gary hadn't been given any money. He would have to walk the rest of the way to the citadel. He had a bad feeling that, that was where the clan once stood.

He'd managed to arrive at the city without incident. They asked him for identification which he didn't have. He was forced to go through the lengthy process of receiving identification papers. They could tell he was a martial due to the flying quartz strapped to his back. They had never before seen such a shabby martial with a flying artifact. On his ID he claimed to be an unaligned martial. If Gary had had any money he would have likely had a fun time in Sita city, unfortunately all it had to offer him was a job. There were plenty of folk looking for martials to perform a variety of jobs. Gary needed to get close to the fortress and the only way to do that without starving to death was to find escort jobs that would hop him around the place. He'd found out that the journey to the center of the island would take around a months time, and that was if he was traveling in a straight line.

He enlisted to act as a bodyguard of the caravan belonging to a local merchant. Perhaps due to the harsh hand of the hyenas, the island was quite prone to banditry. Gary was fortunate he hadn't been robbed on arrival. However, as the nearest clan city to the edge Sita was the easiest to get to unmolested. The Caravan's journey would take them through three mortal cities and end at a clan city. The payment would be just enough to spend a week drinking, and going to brothels before having to go back out for work.

The journey had started off uneventful. The caravan had managed to travel through two mortal cities before encountering any trouble. There were dozens of bodies on the road in front of them. In the center of this chaos stood a lone martial with a spear. This man was a member of the boar clan. They had once been allied with the hyenas, but had since been brutal enemies. The boar clan regularly sent disciples out to raid caravans, and sow general chaos on the islands belonging to the hyena clan. While the boar clan didn't have much manpower compared to the other clans, each graduating disciple was the equivalent of 3 first-rate martials.

Gary could be considered a second-rate martial as a graduating disciple of a clan. Most unaligned, and training martials could be considered third-rate. The caravan had not brought any bodyguards above second-rate. Fortunately the boar martial appeared to be heavily wounded. The 10 bodyguards brought along could probably handle him with some losses.

Gary, and 6 others positioned themselves around the boar martial, 3 guards decided to sit out the fight. He hadn't moved an inch from the beginning. The other bodyguards began trying to take him down with their various weapons, while Gary placed himself in a position where the distracted boar wouldn't be able to spot him. As the boar disciple fought for his life, killing 4 guards with his spear, A crossbow bolt hit him in the neck. The rest of the guards took this opportunity to stab him to death. Gary had used his mini crossbow, preferring to not put himself in harm's way by foolishly approaching the much stronger warrior.

With that out of the way the rest of the journey to the second mortal city went off without a hitch. The martial had been looted by the other guards. Gary was only given a little of the money the man had in his purse, and a fine dagger that had been on his belt. It was a good replacement for the relatively poor dagger the dragonfly clan had given him.