Chapter 112
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Several days had passed since Altair arrived back on her homeworld. She had hunted for her own food and found it quite nostalgic to do so.
The taste was awful though. It was obvious to Altair that she had gotten spoiled back in the Empire. The taste of the food that she could cook could not compare. It was bland and tasteless. She also didn't have any salt she could use to improve it. After every meal, she would eat a cookie or two so that her tongue would stop revolting against her.
She also felt filthy. It had been several days since she had cleaned herself. Being able to submerge herself at nearly any time she wanted in a nice and hot bath was just too much to lose all of a sudden. Sleeping on the cold and hard ground wasn't even as bad as missing the bath because she could get rid of the stiffness she would feel in the morning with Mana. But she couldn't do anything about being dirty.
Even though she wasn't even really that dirty.
She mentally chastised herself for becoming so addicted to the baths of the Empire.
Still, she had an easy time of exiting the forest. Then she found the road easily and, judging by the deep tracks upon it, merchants were frequent in the area. Or, perhaps, they were caravans. Altair didn't know which but that didn't matter. She only knew that, because of the deep signs of Human movement on it, it was obvious that the village she was going towards still existed.
Coming to the conclusion, Altair looked around the road to make sure there was no one nearby. Then, she took off her belt and satchel and placed them on the ground. She then took her cuirass and shirt off, and then put her cuirass on over her camisole, followed by her cuirass, then her shirt. She put the belt she had on underneath the shirt at her waste and put the satchel on over her shoulder.
She still looked like a child even in her world. It would be incredibly strange for a child to be walking around wearing leather armor and covered with weapons. It was common infiltration tactics, when disguising oneself as a Human, to conceal your weapons and armor under your clothes.
Thankfully, the silk shirt she had was able to conceal what she was wearing very well. It was also still mostly clean and white, which would make her look like the child of a wealthy merchant or noble at a glance. She was counting on these things to help her later on, down the road.
With her concealments finished, she quickly started off on the road towards where the village was. The area she was traversing wasn't plains right now. She was still travelling along a hilly valley that had trees on one side and a river on the other. The road went alongside the river, to make it easier on travelling merchants and caravans.
She was still a day and a half from the village.
Along the way down the road, she watched as a merchant caravan passed by her. The caravan had a number of guards, at least ten of them, and they all gave her a strange look as they passed.
Altair merely smiled at them gently as she played her part of being a naïve little girl who was heading home. Unfortunately, she knew it would probably cause questions to surface among most of them as she was still a day from the village and she was travelling alone.
She considered killing them all for a moment but dismissed the idea immediately. She needed to keep a low profile and wiping out a merchant caravan on the road wouldn't go unnoticed.
The merchant didn't stop his caravan so the guards and them continued on without delay.
Altair felt a little nostalgic at seeing their heights. It had been a long time since she saw someone under 180 cm.
The caravan disappeared over the hill that Altair was climbing. She should be able to see the village from the next rise. Beyond this hill she was climbing, if memory served, was a section of grasslands. The hill itself was fairy tall and provided a commanding view of the grasslands. She was still a day's travel from the village but the ground was flat so it would be within sight upon the hill.
Coming over the rise, sure enough, the village was visible to her.
But the sight of it shocked Altair.
The village she remembered had about two hundred people living in it. They didn't have a wall and only had a militia for guards. It was a farming village that came complete with hunters. Thanks to the fresh water provided by the river they didn't even need to dig up any wells.
The village she was seeing now was more like a city though. From a glance she could tell that the population was at least four thousand. It now had a stone wall all around it. They even had strange floating buildings that travelled along the river. The houses she could see from the hill weren't the straw and wooden shacks that she remembered either. They were tall buildings that appeared to be made of stone and brick. A lot of the houses had smoke rising up out of them. The surrounding land around the town was covered with massive crop fields that offered different kinds of produces. Each field was different from the fields next to it. Around the edges of the fields was a secondary wall that appeared to be designed to keep animals out more than it was for defensive measures.
The town was so different that Altair suspected she was in the wrong place.
'How can a small village become this in only two years?' Altair asked herself. It would have taken an insurmountable amount of manpower to change a small village this much so quickly. Even the farms they had were strangely designed. She remembered that farmers all tended to grow the same foods as each other.
She felt a sense of unease looking at the town and bit her lip. 'No matter,' she thought to herself as she continued walking down the hill. 'I'll find out when I get there.'
Due to the expansions made by the village, it now covered a far larger area than before. Thanks to that, Altair figured it would only take half a day more for her to reach any buildings within the town. She could still see the caravan from where she was as it was trying to prevent itself from racing down the hill.
Altair continued along and approached the town from the road. It took another several hours for her to get close enough to the outer walls to tell that there were still several guards at the front gate. When she saw the caravan approach the front it did pause for a moment before it went into the town. The guards had probably done something with the merchants and she wondered if she would be stopped as well.
As Altair got close to the town she burned some Mana to conceal her eye color. She did so as she got within speaking range of the guards. The two of them were wearing the matching chainmail suits that had an emblem of a horned deer on them. Altair assumed it was a new noble house because she didn't remember any noble houses with that crest before.
One of the guards asked, "What are you doing out so late, girl?" By now it was approaching evening. Daylight was quickly vanishing from the day and, beyond the outer gates on the wall, Altair could see some people already walking around with torches. It was obvious that Altair, being a little girl out this late at night, was strange.
Still, it wasn't the first time Altair arrived at a village like this. She answered with a confident tone without hesitating, "My father wanted me to learn some life skills. So he had me dumped in the forest nearby and told me to get back to town on my own."
It wasn't unusual for noble families to test their children's skills as they grew up. Of course, this only happened among the families that had several children and were planning to have some of them join the Knighthood. She also knew that female knights were a thing. Because of this and, due to the quality of clothing she was wearing, she immediately went with this excuse.
The guards shared a brief look before one of them asked, "What's your name, girl?"
Altair had approached to within a few steps of them by now. It was probably too dark to tell what color her eyes were thanks to the gate that loomed over them. She confidently replied, "Aria Marnithok." She knew that it was almost impossible for guards to know every single noble house within their town, especially if the noble had come under a false name. She was counting on using this if she was questioned further. She also didn't mind using her Empire alias here at all because they would never figure it out.
Sure enough, the guards nodded a few times together before one of them said, "Well, off you go then. Be sure to tell your old man that he should time it better so you arrive during the day instead of at night. Wouldn't want you to get mauled by wolves or something out there."
Altair gave him a soft smile as she said, "I will. Thanks!" She then walked in between the guards and entered past the gate at a normal walking pace. Just because it was becoming dark didn't mean that they would close the inner gate when until she got in. The people on the inner wall would be able to see her approaching by now.
After she had walked for a couple of minutes she heard the gate behind her closing. Without looking over her shoulder she knew that the two guards had already come inside and were either switching with the next guards or waiting until the gates closed completely to switch.
Up ahead of her, two guards were looking at her with obvious impatience upon their faces. They probably wanted to hurry up and close the outer gate so they could switch off the next guards.
However, Altair was currently playing a noblemans daughter. She had to act as if they waited on her by design. So she continued her slow pace instead of hurrying up at all.
As Altair approached the gate, she glanced upwards towards the wall above it. It was common for towns to display their name above a gate if they had one. If they didn't have a gate, they would put up a sign.
Until she read the words above the gate, she still wanted to believe that she was somewhere else. Now that she had read the words, she could no longer deny that it was the same place she had been too many times.
Above the gate, the words "Welcome To Dyersberge" were in full view of anyone passing by.
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Several days had passed since Altair arrived back on her homeworld. She had hunted for her own food and found it quite nostalgic to do so.
The taste was awful though. It was obvious to Altair that she had gotten spoiled back in the Empire. The taste of the food that she could cook could not compare. It was bland and tasteless. She also didn't have any salt she could use to improve it. After every meal, she would eat a cookie or two so that her tongue would stop revolting against her.
She also felt filthy. It had been several days since she had cleaned herself. Being able to submerge herself at nearly any time she wanted in a nice and hot bath was just too much to lose all of a sudden. Sleeping on the cold and hard ground wasn't even as bad as missing the bath because she could get rid of the stiffness she would feel in the morning with Mana. But she couldn't do anything about being dirty.
Even though she wasn't even really that dirty.
She mentally chastised herself for becoming so addicted to the baths of the Empire.
Still, she had an easy time of exiting the forest. Then she found the road easily and, judging by the deep tracks upon it, merchants were frequent in the area. Or, perhaps, they were caravans. Altair didn't know which but that didn't matter. She only knew that, because of the deep signs of Human movement on it, it was obvious that the village she was going towards still existed.
Coming to the conclusion, Altair looked around the road to make sure there was no one nearby. Then, she took off her belt and satchel and placed them on the ground. She then took her cuirass and shirt off, and then put her cuirass on over her camisole, followed by her cuirass, then her shirt. She put the belt she had on underneath the shirt at her waste and put the satchel on over her shoulder.
She still looked like a child even in her world. It would be incredibly strange for a child to be walking around wearing leather armor and covered with weapons. It was common infiltration tactics, when disguising oneself as a Human, to conceal your weapons and armor under your clothes.
Thankfully, the silk shirt she had was able to conceal what she was wearing very well. It was also still mostly clean and white, which would make her look like the child of a wealthy merchant or noble at a glance. She was counting on these things to help her later on, down the road.
With her concealments finished, she quickly started off on the road towards where the village was. The area she was traversing wasn't plains right now. She was still travelling along a hilly valley that had trees on one side and a river on the other. The road went alongside the river, to make it easier on travelling merchants and caravans.
She was still a day and a half from the village.
Along the way down the road, she watched as a merchant caravan passed by her. The caravan had a number of guards, at least ten of them, and they all gave her a strange look as they passed.
Altair merely smiled at them gently as she played her part of being a naïve little girl who was heading home. Unfortunately, she knew it would probably cause questions to surface among most of them as she was still a day from the village and she was travelling alone.
She considered killing them all for a moment but dismissed the idea immediately. She needed to keep a low profile and wiping out a merchant caravan on the road wouldn't go unnoticed.
The merchant didn't stop his caravan so the guards and them continued on without delay.
Altair felt a little nostalgic at seeing their heights. It had been a long time since she saw someone under 180 cm.
The caravan disappeared over the hill that Altair was climbing. She should be able to see the village from the next rise. Beyond this hill she was climbing, if memory served, was a section of grasslands. The hill itself was fairy tall and provided a commanding view of the grasslands. She was still a day's travel from the village but the ground was flat so it would be within sight upon the hill.
Coming over the rise, sure enough, the village was visible to her.
But the sight of it shocked Altair.
The village she remembered had about two hundred people living in it. They didn't have a wall and only had a militia for guards. It was a farming village that came complete with hunters. Thanks to the fresh water provided by the river they didn't even need to dig up any wells.
The village she was seeing now was more like a city though. From a glance she could tell that the population was at least four thousand. It now had a stone wall all around it. They even had strange floating buildings that travelled along the river. The houses she could see from the hill weren't the straw and wooden shacks that she remembered either. They were tall buildings that appeared to be made of stone and brick. A lot of the houses had smoke rising up out of them. The surrounding land around the town was covered with massive crop fields that offered different kinds of produces. Each field was different from the fields next to it. Around the edges of the fields was a secondary wall that appeared to be designed to keep animals out more than it was for defensive measures.
The town was so different that Altair suspected she was in the wrong place.
'How can a small village become this in only two years?' Altair asked herself. It would have taken an insurmountable amount of manpower to change a small village this much so quickly. Even the farms they had were strangely designed. She remembered that farmers all tended to grow the same foods as each other.
She felt a sense of unease looking at the town and bit her lip. 'No matter,' she thought to herself as she continued walking down the hill. 'I'll find out when I get there.'
Due to the expansions made by the village, it now covered a far larger area than before. Thanks to that, Altair figured it would only take half a day more for her to reach any buildings within the town. She could still see the caravan from where she was as it was trying to prevent itself from racing down the hill.
Altair continued along and approached the town from the road. It took another several hours for her to get close enough to the outer walls to tell that there were still several guards at the front gate. When she saw the caravan approach the front it did pause for a moment before it went into the town. The guards had probably done something with the merchants and she wondered if she would be stopped as well.
As Altair got close to the town she burned some Mana to conceal her eye color. She did so as she got within speaking range of the guards. The two of them were wearing the matching chainmail suits that had an emblem of a horned deer on them. Altair assumed it was a new noble house because she didn't remember any noble houses with that crest before.
One of the guards asked, "What are you doing out so late, girl?" By now it was approaching evening. Daylight was quickly vanishing from the day and, beyond the outer gates on the wall, Altair could see some people already walking around with torches. It was obvious that Altair, being a little girl out this late at night, was strange.
Still, it wasn't the first time Altair arrived at a village like this. She answered with a confident tone without hesitating, "My father wanted me to learn some life skills. So he had me dumped in the forest nearby and told me to get back to town on my own."
It wasn't unusual for noble families to test their children's skills as they grew up. Of course, this only happened among the families that had several children and were planning to have some of them join the Knighthood. She also knew that female knights were a thing. Because of this and, due to the quality of clothing she was wearing, she immediately went with this excuse.
The guards shared a brief look before one of them asked, "What's your name, girl?"
Altair had approached to within a few steps of them by now. It was probably too dark to tell what color her eyes were thanks to the gate that loomed over them. She confidently replied, "Aria Marnithok." She knew that it was almost impossible for guards to know every single noble house within their town, especially if the noble had come under a false name. She was counting on using this if she was questioned further. She also didn't mind using her Empire alias here at all because they would never figure it out.
Sure enough, the guards nodded a few times together before one of them said, "Well, off you go then. Be sure to tell your old man that he should time it better so you arrive during the day instead of at night. Wouldn't want you to get mauled by wolves or something out there."
Altair gave him a soft smile as she said, "I will. Thanks!" She then walked in between the guards and entered past the gate at a normal walking pace. Just because it was becoming dark didn't mean that they would close the inner gate when until she got in. The people on the inner wall would be able to see her approaching by now.
After she had walked for a couple of minutes she heard the gate behind her closing. Without looking over her shoulder she knew that the two guards had already come inside and were either switching with the next guards or waiting until the gates closed completely to switch.
Up ahead of her, two guards were looking at her with obvious impatience upon their faces. They probably wanted to hurry up and close the outer gate so they could switch off the next guards.
However, Altair was currently playing a noblemans daughter. She had to act as if they waited on her by design. So she continued her slow pace instead of hurrying up at all.
As Altair approached the gate, she glanced upwards towards the wall above it. It was common for towns to display their name above a gate if they had one. If they didn't have a gate, they would put up a sign.
Until she read the words above the gate, she still wanted to believe that she was somewhere else. Now that she had read the words, she could no longer deny that it was the same place she had been too many times.
Above the gate, the words "Welcome To Dyersberge" were in full view of anyone passing by.
Several days had passed since Altair arrived back on her homeworld. She had hunted for her own food and found it quite nostalgic to do so.The taste was awful though. It was obvious to Altair that she had gotten spoiled back in the Empire. The taste of the food that she could cook could not compare. It was bland and tasteless. She also didn't have any salt she could use to improve it. After every meal, she would eat a cookie or two so that her tongue would stop revolting against her.She also felt filthy. It had been several days since she had cleaned herself. Being able to submerge herself at nearly any time she wanted in a nice and hot bath was just too much to lose all of a sudden. Sleeping on the cold and hard ground wasn't even as bad as missing the bath because she could get rid of the stiffness she would feel in the morning with Mana. But she couldn't do anything about being dirty.Even though she wasn't even really that dirty.She mentally chastised herself for becoming so addicted to the baths of the Empire.Still, she had an easy time of exiting the forest. Then she found the road easily and, judging by the deep tracks upon it, merchants were frequent in the area. Or, perhaps, they were caravans. Altair didn't know which but that didn't matter. She only knew that, because of the deep signs of Human movement on it, it was obvious that the village she was going towards still existed.Coming to the conclusion, Altair looked around the road to make sure there was no one nearby. Then, she took off her belt and satchel and placed them on the ground. She then took her cuirass and shirt off, and then put her cuirass on over her camisole, followed by her cuirass, then her shirt. She put the belt she had on underneath the shirt at her waste and put the satchel on over her shoulder.She still looked like a child even in her world. It would be incredibly strange for a child to be walking around wearing leather armor and covered with weapons. It was common infiltration tactics, when disguising oneself as a Human, to conceal your weapons and armor under your clothes.Thankfully, the silk shirt she had was able to conceal what she was wearing very well. It was also still mostly clean and white, which would make her look like the child of a wealthy merchant or noble at a glance. She was counting on these things to help her later on, down the road.With her concealments finished, she quickly started off on the road towards where the village was. The area she was traversing wasn't plains right now. She was still travelling along a hilly valley that had trees on one side and a river on the other. The road went alongside the river, to make it easier on travelling merchants and caravans.She was still a day and a half from the village.Along the way down the road, she watched as a merchant caravan passed by her. The caravan had a number of guards, at least ten of them, and they all gave her a strange look as they passed.Altair merely smiled at them gently as she played her part of being a nave little girl who was heading home. Unfortunately, she knew it would probably cause questions to surface among most of them as she was still a day from the village and she was travelling alone.She considered killing them all for a moment but dismissed the idea immediately. She needed to keep a low profile and wiping out a merchant caravan on the road wouldn't go unnoticed.The merchant didn't stop his caravan so the guards and them continued on without delay.Altair felt a little nostalgic at seeing their heights. It had been a long time since she saw someone under 180 cm.The caravan disappeared over the hill that Altair was climbing. She should be able to see the village from the next rise. Beyond this hill she was climbing, if memory served, was a section of grasslands. The hill itself was fairy tall and provided a commanding view of the grasslands. She was still a day's travel from the village but the ground was flat so it would be within sight upon the hill.Coming over the rise, sure enough, the village was visible to her.But the sight of it shocked Altair.The village she remembered had about two hundred people living in it. They didn't have a wall and only had a militia for guards. It was a farming village that came complete with hunters. Thanks to the fresh water provided by the river they didn't even need to dig up any wells.The village she was seeing now was more like a city though. From a glance she could tell that the population was at least four thousand. It now had a stone wall all around it. They even had strange floating buildings that travelled along the river. The houses she could see from the hill weren't the straw and wooden shacks that she remembered either. They were tall buildings that appeared to be made of stone and brick. A lot of the houses had smoke rising up out of them. The surrounding land around the town was covered with massive crop fields that offered different kinds of produces. Each field was different from the fields next to it. Around the edges of the fields was a secondary wall that appeared to be designed to keep animals out more than it was for defensive measures.The town was so different that Altair suspected she was in the wrong place.'How can a small village become this in only two years?' Altair asked herself. It would have taken an insurmountable amount of manpower to change a small village this much so quickly. Even the farms they had were strangely designed. She remembered that farmers all tended to grow the same foods as each other.She felt a sense of unease looking at the town and bit her lip. 'No matter,' she thought to herself as she continued walking down the hill. 'I'll find out when I get there.'Due to the expansions made by the village, it now covered a far larger area than before. Thanks to that, Altair figured it would only take half a day more for her to reach any buildings within the town. She could still see the caravan from where she was as it was trying to prevent itself from racing down the hill.Altair continued along and approached the town from the road. It took another several hours for her to get close enough to the outer walls to tell that there were still several guards at the front gate. When she saw the caravan approach the front it did pause for a moment before it went into the town. The guards had probably done something with the merchants and she wondered if she would be stopped as well.As Altair got close to the town she burned some Mana to conceal her eye color. She did so as she got within speaking range of the guards. The two of them were wearing the matching chainmail suits that had an emblem of a horned deer on them. Altair assumed it was a new noble house because she didn't remember any noble houses with that crest before.One of the guards asked, "What are you doing out so late, girl?" By now it was approaching evening. Daylight was quickly vanishing from the day and, beyond the outer gates on the wall, Altair could see some people already walking around with torches. It was obvious that Altair, being a little girl out this late at night, was strange.Still, it wasn't the first time Altair arrived at a village like this. She answered with a confident tone without hesitating, "My father wanted me to learn some life skills. So he had me dumped in the forest nearby and told me to get back to town on my own."It wasn't unusual for noble families to test their children's skills as they grew up. Of course, this only happened among the families that had several children and were planning to have some of them join the Knighthood. She also knew that female knights were a thing. Because of this and, due to the quality of clothing she was wearing, she immediately went with this excuse.The guards shared a brief look before one of them asked, "What's your name, girl?"Altair had approached to within a few steps of them by now. It was probably too dark to tell what color her eyes were thanks to the gate that loomed over them. She confidently replied, "Aria Marnithok." She knew that it was almost impossible for guards to know every single noble house within their town, especially if the noble had come under a false name. She was counting on using this if she was questioned further. She also didn't mind using her Empire alias here at all because they would never figure it out.Sure enough, the guards nodded a few times together before one of them said, "Well, off you go then. Be sure to tell your old man that he should time it better so you arrive during the day instead of at night. Wouldn't want you to get mauled by wolves or something out there."Altair gave him a soft smile as she said, "I will. Thanks!" She then walked in between the guards and entered past the gate at a normal walking pace. Just because it was becoming dark didn't mean that they would close the inner gate when until she got in. The people on the inner wall would be able to see her approaching by now.After she had walked for a couple of minutes she heard the gate behind her closing. Without looking over her shoulder she knew that the two guards had already come inside and were either switching with the next guards or waiting until the gates closed completely to switch.Up ahead of her, two guards were looking at her with obvious impatience upon their faces. They probably wanted to hurry up and close the outer gate so they could switch off the next guards.However, Altair was currently playing a noblemans daughter. She had to act as if they waited on her by design. So she continued her slow pace instead of hurrying up at all.As Altair approached the gate, she glanced upwards towards the wall above it. It was common for towns to display their name above a gate if they had one. If they didn't have a gate, they would put up a sign.Until she read the words above the gate, she still wanted to believe that she was somewhere else. Now that she had read the words, she could no longer deny that it was the same place she had been too many times.Above the gate, the words "Welcome To Dyersberge" were in full view of anyone passing by.
