Sachihiro

There is a sense of urgency to my departure both because I want to get home as quickly as possible but also because I have outstayed my welcome here. The purges by the assassination side of the Conclave of Shadow should begin soon and I want no part of a shadow war where you don't see your opponent coming. I'm a hunter and know the value of ambush but I'm not a hunter of men to the extent that I relish it just yet in my walk of life.

Even with the hasty departure both from Tiba and the Brothel I have had arrangements made to hire myself out as a caravan guard for a group of halflings even though I have to go almost 1000km outside my route home to the town of Chuma in the Mbali Grasslands to do so. The little people can usually be found within the town border where they congregate and collect each other from their many scattered settlements when preparing for a departure. Safety in numbers and all that, I don't think it really works for them though.

They cannot be found in any large numbers on Pangaea but those found outside slaver pens are generally found here though they've been trying to migrate off the continent for a while it’s been said. Halflings are not a wealthy people as they don't usually put too much value into material wealth though they have been known to be hoarders of possessions. A possessive but unambitious people it seems when generalising them.

I travel on horseback from Tiba down into the desert sands as quickly as possible. I don't head towards the Oasis where a person with a horse to water would be expected to go if they had any intentions of keeping said creature alive through the heat and dehydration. I've decided to avoid a confrontation with the creatures trying to harm me and let them die naturally or face them only if I feel them get close enough to be a direct threat. All I have for company now is my horse and as we gallop through the rocky sandy desert on a straight path to my destination I practice my water cultivation technique.

I collect water from the dry desert air from horse back and I condense it into my hands before feeding it to my horse to quench it's thirst. It takes a while to collect any substantial amount from the air but our lives depend on it and I have no other job to do as Norse gallops away occasionally panting for water. I concentrate, tapping into the mana within me and manipulating it in an intricate puzzle so it does what I want, visualisation is very important, and of course know how. This technique I was taught by Vevina during my brief training under her.

I suck the moisture from the air painstakingly; it's as though I were passing through a cloud or passing through mist collecting moisture even in this dry heat. It's an exhausting process that leaves my mana reserves dry after only a few mouthfuls of water and suffering from mana fatigue. I don't even know why I Awakened to any type of magic at all sometimes if my mana pool is going to be so meagre.

Norse gallops oblivious of my struggle as long as I keep providing him with fresh clean water that has no sand in it. Good for him but unfortunately I can't quench my thirst with the same method. I feel pursued, not that I could with any accuracy point at an enemy I made while in Tiba and say, 'this one wants me dead'. But I feel like I am being followed by those that wish me ill.

Another reason not to be where I'm expected to be or maybe it's just my paranoia from being so exposed to spiritual attack. I have been having dreams since I've been open to attack and influence, some I can tell are not malicious others may even be symbolic or prophetic. Dreaming is not a gift I knew I had nor one I particularly want but knowing ma it makes sense that it would manifest in her bloodline.

The night gets cooler and the moisture from the air easier to extract before the temperatures drop to unreasonable levels and the nocturnal desert creatures start unearthing themselves from the desert sands. I'm stalked by a reptile the size of my horse for a while but it stays well away from attacking, simply tasting the air with its tongue as it runs easily on the soft sand to keep pace at our periphery.

Then ahead a scorpion the size of a mundane rhinoceros bull bursts from the sand ahead with stinger already shooting towards me but I manage to deflect the thing to the flesh of sparks as Razor meets its carapace before it's retracted getting ready for another shot. I throw a water and aura honed Kata at the thing with all my strength and as I suspected it cuts deep into the shell of its exoskeleton killing it almost instantly.

This is something I've noticed about most desert creatures, they are susceptible to water based attacks, water mana infused attacks cut through them easier. I collect my weapon, the meat of the creature and what of the carapace will fit into my ring before galloping away on Norse before more predators smell the blood. This is the advantage of using horses or other beasts of burden on Gaia. They can travel faster and further than humans in most cases, Norse isn't even a magical beast but at this current pace he can replenished his stamina at least three times before I really need to rest him for a few hours.

We gallop ahead having to kill another two scorpion creatures and mostly just slow down a third as I only shoot my meagre water bolts at the thing to discourage it. There are very little underworld creatures on this part of Pangaea but it’s now a known fact of life that to travel anywhere by night alone safely you have to be an Awakened of some sort to survive.

I walk my horse when he has had enough and I reward him with a stop and a rub down while he eats the goo and the meat from the scorpions. He carries no other burden than me, no saddle or bit put in his mouth like I've seen the knights do. It's a torturous experience to have an object put in your mouth for the length of time I'd need to get anywhere and I'm not in the business of torturing those I depend on.

Even Keir Airell who is probably an evil fucker that has done many horrible things in his time on Gaia I won't torture because I depend on the creature for things. Besides, he is still very useful and will keep feeding everything he learns about the Circle to the relevant contacts.

After another hours rest and recuperating I'm back on Norse and we are galloping across the harder packed sands and into the rocky regions with renewed energy. The light of the sun crests the horizon with me on his back moving towards the greener pastures of the Mbali lands. Birds start to sing and the small thorny bushes are being replaced by more robust gnarled trees. This is the mostly monotonous view we are exposed to for several hours in this part of the journey, and I quite enjoy it. The peace and the life of the desert, you'd miss it if you didn't know where to look, or you didn’t have my dimensional awareness.

Then I'm in the grass and the smell of pollen and bees is heavy in the air here. Usually there is nothing that comes from the desert to harass the creatures that live here and so the ancestors of the halflings thought it safe to have the desert at their backs. Which it mostly is, but trading and travelling into the human lands has become perilous for a people that make the perfect servants and slaves.

I slow down a bit but I also want to be home within the year, I think it's possible. To spend ten months on the road and then to be home with my girls and my loved ones again. I notice a few creatures and people at the edge of my awareness at times but none act threateningly besides simply trying to hide their presence and watch my passage.

‎ .

‎ I slow to a walk as I realise sudden that these hills I'm seeing rising and falling at regular intervals are actually hovels in which houses are built. I pass by a few halflings that come out of their houses to watch me or do other activities as dawn gets deep reaching its zenith. I talk to an old man who stands up to my waist at the shoulder and he directs me on how to travel if I want to get to the town before nightfall.

I am invited by a halflings woman for tea who ends up telling me all about her available daughter the entire 15 minutes I spend there. To the mortified and red faced state of the daughter in question who doesn't contradict her mother once on her virtues as a potential wife, 'even a wife for a human'.

I again gallop when passed the little village feeling even sorrier for the cute humanoid creatures with how fragile nature has made them. They are like children to the average regular man and they are treated as such in most human lands if they aren't just flat out taken as slaves. They are not natural fighters but more thinker, tinkerers, farmers and thieves.

I've never been more glad to be a Barbarian than when I witnessed these people try to protect a caravan from raiders on my way to Tiba all those years ago. Their arms are too short, their ligaments to stiff, their feet too big, their muscles too weak to properly defend themselves against humanoid creatures. Now I guess I am making amends for watching that slaughter or I just want an excuse to kill slavers.

Either way I'm going to join a halfling caravan as a guard and escort it South as far as it will go towards my destination. Maybe I'm suicidal or most likely homicidal because from my understanding even the halflings know they are a prime species for the human and Elvin slave trade. And apparently orcs love them too and they are sometimes shipped across the sea to the orc kingdoms of Drada.

I start slowing down again when I notice the smoke up ahead. I start to meet more people on the road, not all of them halflings. Pretty soon I find myself in a town in the middle of the woods without even noticing the transition from woods to town. The buildings are between the trees and there are birds singing and an ambience of peace and prosperity.

The hammer from the smith's forge is ringing out from at least two different directions. People are out and about seeming busy, walking the street, shops are open and so is trade. There is even a building on the branches of one of the trees like some sort of tree house. There is a group of halflings carpenters making beautiful furniture out in the open yard of one of the shops.

They seem to be at peace, they seem to be self sufficient. Why then the need to keep going South if in their own territories they live as they do? I travel straight to where a small man directs me as were the convoys meet for travel.

Talking to the foreman there it seems I am over a day late as a convoy of 12 caravans has already headed South laden with goods and people. I get him to hastily write me a letter of recommendation for the leader of said caravan to read and believe the origin of my whereabouts. I hardly have time to feel the moisture of the sleepy little town before I'm on my way galloping South again and towards home.