A month had passed, Harlan got every letter he was told he would be getting, he let Ava keep doing what she wanted, he had done enough stupid and dangerous things that he would be a hypocrite if he stopped her.

After another dissection of an orc and more assurances that while they might’ve been human once, over a thousand years after being fused with goblins they were something entirely inhuman.

Harlan thought about the original group who wanted to prove the gods weren’t gone by doing something entirely unholy and letting themselves be stopped by them.

Their hubris and faith in the Fae lead to one of the most numerous dangers in the frontier whose wars with one another had slaughtered thousands, who would cannibalize their own kind without a second thought.

Harlan made his way to the stable area where he kept the Antlered Hare he was growing for Bojana, he told her last weekend that he would let it grow for just one more week before they butchered it.

Though what she said after she saw it wasn’t something he wanted to hear.

“What a vicious little monster, I should get you to make more of them, watching them fight could bring in some money.”

“No, never, I outright refuse.”

“Come now little manling, it is just a little bit of bloodsport.”

“I will never, EVER, make these things unless I know they are going to be killed immediately afterwards, we have enough monsters in the woods without me being the next mad mage to set some ecological threat upon the world.”

“How about we wrestle for it?”

“Bojana, maybe it is best that you simply put this subject away for now, Harl-”

“No, no peacemaking right now, she is not getting what she wants, and she is not going to leave here thinking I will change my mind in the future.”

Harsh words were said on both sides, Adelwulf and Ibery showed up to look for them after they missed lunch, Harlan nearly came to blows with Bojana and Tau could barely keep them apart.

Shockingly, Adelwulf came to his defense.

“Bojana, Harlan is right, these things aren’t toys or pets, while you’ve been arguing I’ve seen this thing literally eat a dagger I tossed in there.”

Things never really stopped being awkward between them, but hearing Harlan so against even the chance that he was going to be involved with unleashing an evil on the world swung him from cautious about him to being cautiously optimistic.

“Bah, fine, I know when I’ve lost. Even the pup is sticking with you. Shall we turn it into a pelt then? Move past this?”

Harlan took a deep breath and shook her hand before they started.

Harlan learned how to tan the hide from Redmond, Adelwulf also helped.

“Where did you learn how to do this?”

“My grandparents were both hunters, they raised me and taught me the trade.”

Harlan decided not to pry and simply changed the subject to the process as they both knew it.

By the end of the day they had a nice rug for Bojana and she once more lamented not having more of them around, nearly igniting into another argument since she clearly hadn’t learned her lesson, but they were saved when Amber showed up to find out what was taking them all so long that it was nearly time for dinner already.

“What did I just walk into?”

“Nothing, because I am dropping it and so is she.”

Tau explained the whole thing to Amber from a neutral perspective, Harlan liked Tau a lot, he seemed like a good guy, but he also felt like he was a bit too used to settling petty spats and was giving too much credence to Bojana and her nonchalance about the risk of introducing an aggressive mutuating predator into the world.

When the groups split up and Harlan fell into his group they could tell his mood was poor that day, Adina clearly wanted to ask but she had taken Tau’s words like an order, putting up a wall between the two of them.

“Adina, you don’t have to pretend you don’t want to ask what is wrong. Bojana asked me to do something I will never do and she pushed too much.”

“Ah, well then.”

He had been putting it off because he just didn’t want to take on more baggage, but he knew he really needed to talk to her about the way she was putting on a fake face for him.

“Let me change the subject before it turns awkward. Are you all excited for the camping trip?” Zella said.

“We've never been camping.” “Mother and Father always said it was a waste when we have such nice beds at home.”

“I wasn’t allowed to leave the house much, so I am excited to know what the woods are like.”

“Zella, don’t call it a camping trip like it is going to be fun, it is a survival camp.”

Amber always ended up with a more difficult version of the test due to her competence, for her it was never a week in the woods making friends, it was always the bitter cold or scorching heat and trying to wrangle people who didn’t respect her until after they were cold and tired and had no food.

Zella shook her head.

“They announced it earlier but you missed it, a random lottery will determine who goes with who. They said it was to break up friend groups and force the students to make more connections instead of isolating themselves with their few friends.”

If Harlan didn’t know better he would say it was for him exactly, but Amber already told him it was like this even when she was a first year.

“So… There is still a chance that we can end up together?”

Harlan’s joke lightened the mood some.

The random lottery felt like it was made specifically to ruin his week.

The only person from his group that he was paired with was Adina, the other 3 were Delmet,Taren, aka the kid from enchanting who unsurprisingly was the former Brightblade Dahlia mentioned, and then some other Golden whose name slipped from his mind the second after he heard it.

The only bright spot was that Lugh was the most excited Harlan had ever seen him, even speaking out loud to Adina.

They were awoken at 5AM and given no breakfast before being nearly tossed through a gate leading somewhere.

Harlan couldn’t get a feel for where he was, the stars were wrong so he wondered if it was in the southern hemisphere, but that would mean they were deep in Confederate lands, yet to be so far south they would be in the jungles and yet it looked like back home with oak and pine trees.

An adventurer was sent with each team to watch over them but not to interfere unless absolutely needed.

For them it was a man who wore a bright red bucket helmet, his guild name was, unsurprisingly, Redhead.

“Alright, you have all been given a spot in the woods where you won’t run into any other students or dangerous animals. I say that under the assumption that each of you can fight to defend yourself, there are dangerous things out there for normal people, but you should be fine. Your goal is to set up in this clearing and secure food and water for the week and avoid being injured. I will be here but I will be out of sight and I will not solve your problems for you, unless something unexpected happens you won’t even see me. You can set up your group and your tents or homes or whatever else however you want. You will be graded at the end of the week but I am not supposed to tell you how you will be graded. See you in 7 days.”

The second he left it turned into a conversation about who should be leader, Harlan didn’t step in because to him it didn’t matter.

Worse comes to worse he would set up everything for him and Adina and the rest could sleep on the dirt if they bothered him.

Nothing was settled after 30 minutes, both Taren and Delmet felt that they should be leader.

The last person, a Golden girl named Ximena, sat on the sidelines and started weaving a covering out of reeds from a nearby stream for a tent.

Eventually Harlan and Adina joined her, she showed Adina how it was done by grabbing her hands and moving her fingers for her on account of her lack of sight.

He was already starting to like her.

Harlan had suggested that they used these as mats to lay on instead of for a tent since they could make a simple hut with the trees since he had experience with doing just that.

After an hour Delmet and Taren decided that they should just let the better leader make himself known as the week went on.

They turned to see that they were alone, the others had already left to find something for breakfast.

Adina had learned how to enhance her hearing by quite a lot in her time at the academy, she pointed at where she heard animals and Harlan used his knowledge to guess what it was that she was hearing while Ximena went to find berries, she couldn’t tell what was poison or not but Harlan taught her the spell Redmond taught him.

By the time they had a few rabbits, some bird eggs, and a couple small woven baskets of berries, they realized they didn’t quite know the exact way back.

Luckily Adina had excellent mapping skills and they returned to the campsite without any issues Taren and Delmet had apparently run off to do something else.

Harlan was already getting paranoid.

“Is this too easy? You guys feel it too, right? Something is wrong.”

“I don’t think so, what if we were simple nobles? Would they have such an easy time? You tell me that you grew up on a farm, you have a ranger for an uncle, and you’ve been camping before. Perhaps you are just too well qualified for this?”

“Harlan does seem very good at this. Now that we have the rabbits, can you teach me to butcher them, I don’t want to be a burden.”

“Come on, you lead us back to the campsite with ease, we could’ve wasted hours out there.”

“I say we teach the girl, I’ve never gotten the chance to teach a cripple.”

Harlan used his best glare to show his displeasure, and Ximena got the message.

“Ah, I mean, I’ve never gotten the chance to meet someone like her.”

While she couldn’t see, Adina knew exactly what had happened, causing her to laugh.

“How lively, is this what camping was like for you Harlan?”

“No. I had to kill a spider as big as you and I had my eardrums ruptured by a spider 5 times its size after I burned its eggs. I don’t think I’ll ever get the sound and the smell of those eggs popping out of my head completely.”

As Ximena and Adina processed the rabbits Harlan started on the simple huts.

They were only 6 feet long and 4 feet across, big enough to sleep in but that is all he meant them to be for.

He made them on a small elevated platform of stone with just 2 steps just in case there was heavy rainfall, he didn’t want water getting inside.

They had one window facing the east to let sun in during the morning, however it could be sealed with a piece of wood that slotted into the window, though it wasn’t a perfect fit, it didn’t need to be considering the ventilation was already not great.

At some point Taren and Delment stumbled back with handfuls of poisoned berries

“Those won’t kill you, but they will make the rest of your day very unpleasant.”

“What do you know?”

Harlan shrugged and let them eat, he even let them have some of the food the rest of them made, if it had been hard to get he would’ve let them starve, but hunting for rabbits and eggs was so simple he got extra.

“So, Sir Fomoria, I am told you are a Fomorian, I’ve never met one before. What is it like?”

“What is being a Golden like? I have no idea what it means to be a Fomorian, they are monsters who hide out in the woods and do terrible things to people who don’t deserve it. I know what it is like to be a person who is stronger than normal though. That feels pretty good.”

“Ah, forgive me for my rude question.‘

“There is no such thing as a rude question, the Fomorian just gave a rude answer.”

Delmet was still upset about Harlan always having a single win more than him no matter how many times they fought.

“I am glad you ate those berries, in another hour you will be crapping your guts out, so please do that away from here. Meanwhile I will be laughing because I told you so and you are a prick.”

Adina choked on her meat when Harlan spoke, he had more or less always been a gentlemen around her and she rarely heard swearing at all.

“You ok?”

Harlan patted her on the back to knock the meat free.

“Yes.”

she said between coughs.

“I just didn’t expect you to swear or to say something like that.”

“Which part?‘

“When you called him a… Well you know.”

“Sorry, I shouldn’t have said that even if it was true.” Delmet had been yelling something at him since his first comment, Harlan wondered how long it would be before he realized there was a ward around him stopping all sounds from getting out.

“Before I forget. Don’t worry about it Ximena, I don’t mind you asking, sorry about the hostile answer.”

Redhead hated the group already, he had to keep taking notes both good and bad, they didn’t set up a leader but Harlan and the girls were basically a group separate from the other two, they worked good together, but that wasn’t the point.

He hoped once it got to the next stage they would learn to put aside their differences.