The Dragon flew far above the clouds, nearing the edge of breathable atmosphere.
"Nothing can stop us from here, even if they followed us they would run out of Eneru by the time they reached our altitude thanks to the array's sapping effect." I leaned up against the mast.
"Usually you stay in your workshop, why the change in scenery?" Devin asked while he poured his nutrient solution into his metabolism drink.
"The arrays mess with any sort of crafting unless it's manual, and I don't really have much to craft besides the enchantments for my spear."
"Damn, even this far from the border?" He almost dropped his vials.
"Yep, I guess I could do some gem cutting to replace the focus that I broke while we were in Fort Lao, but I don't have anything to cut."
"Nothing to do about it then I guess." He slyly engaged his Telespeak and I pretended to not notice.
'What's he doing?' I thought, ultimately going back to concepting ideas in my head.
A few minutes later Laveki emerged from the underbelly of the Dragon.
"Hey, I heard you needed a gem." She said, clearly distracted by something.
"Yeah, I blew one out on Rift Garden and now it needs fixed."
"Well I had an extra, so here you go." She hastily handed over a large gem that clearly was pried from a necklace.
"Ohh, this is a nice amethyst, where did you get it?" I asked knowingly.
"Well that's not important, I don't need it." She said matter-of-factly.
"I'll take your word for it, but if it turns out this is important and you're lying to me I'll put it back together."
"Good, cause it isn't important." Her voice was weakened but she insisted.
I walked down to my workshop and grabbed my gem-cutting tools.
"This should be easy cause it's pre-cut."
I shaved off some of the ill-fitting spots and I was careful to keep the shavings.
'If I use Eneru it's gonna cost me ten times the amount as normal, plus I don't get any back. At least the arrays are far enough away that they can't pull directly from me.'
I chiseled away at the gem for hours, making sure to make no mistakes despite my inexperience.
"This amethyst feels a lot like quartz to shave," I said as I finished the focus.
I easily slotted the gem into Rift Garden and made my way back upstairs and leaned back up against the mast.
"With this new gem, I should have two extra charges and one long-distance portal."
"How many does that bring you to?"
"A comfy five charges before I have to recharge it."
"Great, back to waiting then?"
"Yep."
********
The rest of the trip was boring and uneventful, the ship used its propellers whenever the humans were awake and the sails when the wind cooperated. We decided to interrogate the captive, but he had died of unknown causes, we stripped him and tossed his body overboard. It took us about a week to get across the array and another day to be out of the array's influence.
"What now Captain Meiung?" Bella said, with tangible snark.
"We are going to have to find a town, and for that, we will send out the glider trainees."
"And what will they return to? The Dragon can't stand still in the air and none of them are experienced enough to land without matching speed with the Dragon. Unless you mean to have them all land on Larry or Ernest's Eneru."
"Good point, well from this height we should easily be able to spot a town with a spyglass on the Dragon, the gliders will stay here while Larry, dad, and I all look for a village."
"That sounds like a plan, I presume you all have Telespeaks, so get going."
The three of us dove off in different directions. Larry and Dad followed the arrays looking for a border town while I scouted the heartlands. Some time passed and night came.
'How's the search?' I thought over two mind links at the same time.
'Nothing yet' Larry and dad responded in unison.
'Me neither, I'll go up and look for lights.'
I pitched up sharply and flew directly up.
'Wait, I see a light off in the distance.' I leveled off and flew towards the light.
As I got closer the lights split and I recognized the lamps of a small town.
I dove to get closer, but once I neared my destination an arrow glanced off of my armor and another missed.
'I'm taking fire! I got at least two hostiles!'
'Cast a flare, they probably think you are an enemy.'
"Ignus, Lex, Moten, Rapse!" A flare lit up the sky and brightened the entire landscape.
The archers saw me with my hands in the air and lowered their bows.
I made my way down to the town slowly and landed gracefully.
"Hello!" I shouted to them from a distance.
"Foren Kai bo?" One shouted.
'They don't speak our language, what do I do?'
Larry spoke into my mind. 'I know their language, say "Garem bar Denyo Ken."'
I repeated the words and retracted my wings. I acted as Larry's proxy for speaking without questioning the words I said for several minutes. Eventually, they nodded in approval and took me to the mayor.
'What is going on?' I asked over the link.
'They've agreed to let us dock here, Larry and I are flying over now.'
I sat in a waiting room for a while until two figures simultaneously landed on opposite sides of the town.
'Ok, Larry, you're doing the talking.'
'Obviously.'
The Mayor and Larry spoke until morning when the Dragon came to land.
"This is going to be wild."