As Spartacus guided the caravan towards the gate, Hunter began to wrap his hands around both his labrys as he eyed all the gargoyles that were on the buildings. As he watched closely, he noticed one of the small winged gargoyle blink as it's head rotated to watch the caravan as it neared the gate.
Spartacus stopped his wagon as the guards began to slowly surround the front of the caravan. As the captain looked at the drivers, shock crossed his face as he saw Ian, who was decked out in his sentinel armor, driving the second wagon. He looked towards Ian with awe and was about to go up to him when Ian pointed towards Spartacus.
The captain blushed in slight humiliation as he realized his error and as he turned back around to look at Spartacus, he saw the boy sitting next to him all decked out with weapons and fully dressed in black assassin ware. He slightly frowned as he walked up to the two, and noticed that the boy in black seemed to be looking up at the wall, tensed and ready to fight at any moment.
"You can relax, they won't attack unless we deem you all enemies of Siol." The captain tried to reassure the boy, but he noticed that even though Hunter moved his hands away from his weapons, he was still tense and ready for a fight at any given moment. [How does this kid seem so experienced? Even though he's no older than ten, he acts like a professional who has been trained for at least twenty years!]
The captain returned his focus to Spartacus, and that's when he realized that all the drivers were children. Still recognizing that one of the boys was a sentinel, and the other seemed to be a trained professional, the captain made the quick decision to not treat these boys as any lesser than fellow adults, so as not to cause any offense to them. "May I ask what brings your party to Siol?"
Spartacus nodded as he faced the captain with a smile. "We came for a better future with our family. Some of our family members happen to be non-humans, and we heard that Siol is willing to protect the non-humans so we came as quickly as we could."
The captains eyes widened as he glanced at Spartacus before he leaned in to take a look into the wagon, finding that there was a couple beast boys and girls, and two beautiful elves sitting in the wagon. He nodded towards Spartacus as he continued the conversation. "Siol does give protection and citizenship to all those who wish to live here. I can have someone lead you to where you can get the legal documents and can lead you to a place to stay."
As the guard was speaking, his mind seemed to click and a slight frown appeared on his face as he looked back at Ian again before turning to Spartacus with a question. "Good sir, may I ask, since you aren't from Siol, how did you young lads come to get that sentinel armor?"
Hunter watched, realizing that even though the guard asked the question, neither he nor his men went to draw their swords. Spartacus also noticed this and sadly smiled towards the captain as he explained about the slaughtered merchants and how when Ian was repairing the wagon he found the armor and tried it on; causing it to shrink and fit him perfectly.
At first the captain was shocked, then he nodded and smiled at the boys. "You all seem to be nice and good hearted lads. If you want, once I'm off my shift tonight, I can meet you boys at a tavern and answer any questions you might have."
Spartacus smiled as he nodded his head. "We would like that very much, good sir. By the way, one of our family members happens to be from Dunham. She said that they had not heard of any wall being built at the border during the last few years, may I ask how this wall came to be?"
The captain rubbed his nose as he contemplated before he spoke. "Since you're wanting to become citizens anywise, you'll definitely end up finding out about it. A couple years ago, the royal family hired a multitude of earth mages, magical earth beasts, and even wizards to create this wall that surrounds the entire nation. From what I heard, it was a decree from the prince, who was four years old at the time. This wall is to help regulate who enters and exits and defend the nation, though we don't know who our enemy is yet. After the wall decree came to be, the royal family released another decree that gave sanction to all gargoyle species, as long as they all swore an oath to the kingdom. Since then the dragon gargoyles have been assigned to help watch over the wall and the border cities, while the normal gargoyles are assigned to watch over the cities, towns, and villages at night. I can go into more detail about all this later tonight at the tavern, or you can ask your guide since it will be one of the dragon gargoyles that will be leading you. As for why no one else has heard of the wall being built, it's because all guests are required to make an Oath to stay quite about the wall."
Spartacus and Hunter were both awed as they listened to the captain speak. The captain gave a sign to the guards, and as they stepped away, they heard flapping wings coming from above them. Looking up the brothers saw a winged male dragon gargoyle fly off the middle tower (that stood above the gate) and land in front of them.
The captain watched the children closely, expecting at least some type of fear to show since it was most likely their first time seeing a gargoyle. However thanks to movies and tv, the brothers had already seen what gargoyles looked like, so they were unafraid. As for the other children, after witnessing what the brothers could do, they held no fear, wholly believing that they were safe as long as the brothers were there.
The captain raised his eyebrows as he witnessed this scene of no fear, wondering to himself on what these children could've gone through to not be afraid. At this moment the gargoyle turned around flapped it's wings as it began flying through the gate. The caravan began following, and as they passed the gate they found themselves entering what appeared to be a military base.
As they followed the gargoyle, all the children watched the scenery around them. Alongside the road was multiple barracks, training grounds, a few smitheries, multiple storages, and a number of canteens. As the caravan trundled through, the soldiers would stop and watch, many of them becoming shocked as they realized that all the wagons had kids, and one of them was decked out in sentinel armor.
After passing through the military encampment, they found the road led through a grassy field before reaching a very large city that had a magnificent stone wall twice the height of Adenville's but truly small compared to the border wall. The gargoyle looked back before he continued flying towards the city.
After a couple of minutes they arrived at the city gates, finding that they needn't wait in line as the guards let them through thanks to the gargoyle. Finally, he landed and walked over to them after entering the city. "I can take you children to some cheap taverns, however I doubt you'll have enough money to stay for a week as even the cheap taverns are far more expensive compared to Yechen. After that, I'll take you all to get registered as citizens. Then if there isn't anything else you need me for at that time, I'll will be returning to my post."
Spartacus nodded in response to the gargoyle, indicating that he was willing to listen to his plan. As the gargoyle turned around and began walking down the street, Spartacus looked over and saw Hunter staring at the monster intently. Spartacus became curios as he saw the intensity from how Hunter set his jawline, and so he couldn't help but ask, "Little brother, what is it that has you so intrigued?"
Hunter glanced at Spartacus before he turned back towards the gargoyle and whispered. "The captain said that he was a dragon gargoyle. However, he looks a lot like a regular gargoyle to me."
The gargoyle turned around and sniffed with contemptment as he looked at the little boy in black. "Listen up little boy, we draconic gargoyles are different from regular gargoyles because as you can see, we don't turn to stone in the day. Also, regular gargoyles have troll skin which is like thick leather hide, but my kind has scales and armor platings for skin. Our kind is also sorted through classings. Those of my kind with more draconic blood have larger, more dragon-like characteristics though many are born wingless. The ones with more troll blood flowing through our veins are like me, smaller and winged. However, I still have dragon blood so that makes me stronger than regular gargoyles. Then, there are the very few cases were a draconic gargoyle is born that has the entire form a dragon; so far only three of them have been born in Siol, and they are the strongest of our race." After finishing his rant, the gargoyle turned back around and began walking again, albeit slightly faster than before.
The group finally came to a halt in front of a large tavern that was made with a marble base, and large wooden logs that allowed it to be built into three stories. Wrapped around the building on the second and third balcony was multiple stone statues of gargoyles, giving the impression that it was not for decoration but for camouflage for the gargoyle kind. As Hunter and Spartacus looked around, they found that every building had multiple statues built onto them; many of the work appearing recent by a year or two.
The gargoyle glanced at them before walking into the tavern. The children dismounted and entered the tavern as well, finding the gargoyle had taken a seat at a table as he waited for some food and drink to be served. Seeing the large party of children enter, many of the customers and barmaids looked at the party confusedly, but then when Ian entered shock flowed across the crowd as they realized that one of those kids was a sentinel. One of the barmaids behind the counter rushed into the office and informed the owner, causing the middle aged man to come rushing out in a clamor of shock and excitement.
Running up to Ian, the tavern owner clasped Ian's hand tightly and began vigorously shaking it. "How can I help you great sentinel?"
Ian froze in slight shock before he glanced at his brothers and then strongly responded, "I would like to get ten rooms, all of which can hold four people in each please."
Nodding his head excitedly, the shopkeeper smiled as he thought about how much this young man had to be able to request such a number of rooms. "Sure, sure great patron. One room costs ten gold coins and one hundred silver pieces; but since you're buying ten rooms at once I'll give you a discount of nine gold coins. So one night of payment for you will be ninety gold coins good sir."
A lot of the children's eyes widened when they heard this astronomical amount. Even though they had around three hundred gold coins, back in the Yechen Empire a tavern room would cost at most a silver; but here, the lowest price was in gold.
Spartacus slowly pulled out a bag of one hundred gold coins before he pulled out ten and handed the bag over to the tavern owner. The tavern owner than called over a barmaid who took the children upstairs and guided them to the rooms they bought. The tavern owner was kind enough to make it so all the rooms were in the same hallway, allowing the children to be close to each other should they become frightened.
Quietly all the children split up into groups of four, claiming a room and then moving their stuff into the said room. The brothers all took a room together, allowing them to discuss about the current situation.
Looking at all the gold they had, Spartacus shook his head. "We only have enough gold to rent these rooms for another two days, and that's not adding in the fact for food and other purchases. We should go get citizenship immediately so we can get some sort of jobs."
The brothers slowly nodded their heads as their faces became gloomy. Ian stood up quickly as he clenched his fist and looked excitedly between the four of them. "The tavern owner was treating me with as much respect as that of a revered hero or a lord. If we can get out citizenship here, I can probably get a strong support as a sentinel which we can use to help keep us afloat for a while. Besides, we're immortals. If we really need to, we can use some of our Divinity to take on very powerful monsters and get rewards from that."
Hunter frowned slightly upon hearing the last part, then he shook his head. "I don't entirely think that last part is possible. Think about it, this kingdom is said to be the wealthiest in the entire world, they ended up building an entire wall to surround their country. If I was in charge, I would never have done that unless I had chased out any powerful monsters. If I had to guess, the only wild monsters left in this land are all weak creatures needed to keep the ecosystems balanced... if the nobles even intended to keep the ecosystems around."
Spartacus nodded his head as he thought about it as well. "They also sanctioned the gargoyle species. Judging by how our guide was acting before, it was pretty obvious that the gargoyles are very happy about this. If that's the case, there is definitely a high chance that most of the gargoyle populace has moved here, bolstering their population from that three million to who knows how much. If the population jumped drastically, then they may have either begun destroying the wild ecosystems to turn them into farmlands, or created another sanction for some other race that could help with increasing crop abundance. This shows that we still have much to learn about this kingdom, so everything should be done with one step at a time."
The brothers nodded as they left the room and gathered the other children, heading back out of the tavern and getting in their wagons as they began following the gargoyle again.