By time Hunter returned to the others, they had already finished their breakfast and were loaded in the wagons waiting for him.
"Thought you got lost there." Ian teased with a gentle smile as Hunter passed the second wagon before climbing up into the first wagon. After climbing up into the coachman's seat, Hunter shouted back to Ian. "In your dreams punk!"
The brothers smiled as they began driving the wagons forward and down the street. Linrun sat next to Stephanie in the front wagon, guiding Spartacus through Ironchill's streets towards the Southeastern gate. Unlike Adenville in the Yechen Empire, Ironchill had eight city gates compared to the regular four. There were the regular four gates at the cardinal directions, and then there were the four gates at the angular directions (SE, NE, NW, SW). The reason for this was since Siol as a nation was a business country, many merchants would be coming and going with their wares, resources, and gold, making the four regular gates inefficient with number of people entering and exiting all the cities. All the cities in Siol had this design, and the kingdom's capital had twelve gates instead of eight.
After an hour, the party finally passed through the gate and began their travel down the dirt road heading for Snakecliff village, located about three hours away from Ironchill. Thanks to the Rooted Horses, the party would be able to reach the village in less than an hour. As they were driving through fields, that was sparsely filled with trees, Spartacus turned back so he could face Linrun.
"Hey, why is the city called Ironchill?"
Linrun was in the middle of playing a card game, that she had gotten from the tavern, with Stephanie, Asani, Tarenia, and two of the older boys. Looking up at Spartacus and Hunter she calmly stated. "That's because the iron they mine have ice elemental properties. Normally, this type of iron would be found firstly, farther north than Siol, and secondly, in a freezing cold region where most of the warmer climated races wouldn't live. Even the dwarves have difficulty living in those regions, and even if people could withstand the cold, there are many different types of monsters that would be living in those areas."
She stopped and contemplated for a short period of time as she tried recalling information she had heard long ago. "An old dwarf that had came to purchase chilled iron said that the Dwarves of Ice only have one chilled iron mine in their kingdom as well. So you can guess how rare it is for ice elemental weapons to be appearing in the world. I do believe the Winter Elves in the Cold Forest have several chilled iron mines, however they don't sell any of the mined ore and instead use it for their own crafts."
Spartacus nodded as he turned back towards the front of the wagon. Hunter looked at Linrun who in turned looked at him as well before she adverted her gaze back towards the card game. With a sigh, he too turned away, facing the open plains around them.
"Never knew crossing a river could be so varying." Hunter chuckled as he looked at the plains sprawled around them, trees only growing near river and creek beds, similar to how the Midwest used to be in old time America.
Spartacus nodded as he too looked around. "At least we can see farther, though the slight hills would be bothersome if everyone didn't keep saying that Siol was the safest place to be."
Hunter smirked. "Come now brother, did you forget about my senses? Ever since we left Adenville, I kept my senses on high alert which I guess you could say, has made it natural for me. To be honest, as long as my blindfold is on, I have no intention of using my eyes and instead use my senses of smell, hearing, touch, and echolocation to create a map of our surroundings. As of right now this map is about one kilometer around us, so even though it's not really far, it's a zone that has no secrets hidden to me."
Spartacus' eyes widened open in surprise before they relaxed and the corners of his lips curled up in a gentle smile. "So you're basically omnivident in this zone view of yours. Damn, you're more of a god than I am."
Hunter let out a light laugh as he teasingly bumped Spartacus' arm. "By the way brother, were you able to figure out everything for forming a guild?"
After Hunter finished speaking, he heard Spartacus let out a soft sigh before he spoke. "We have the number of people to form a guild, however we also need to fill out a lot of paperwork, pay taxes that we can't afford right now, have a base of operations which we also can't afford right now, and we have to have enough members capable of taking quests. If anything, it will be a while before we can create our own guild, instead we might have to just settle with joining another guild until we are financially stable and more members of the family are capable of fighting."
Hunter listened silently before he turned back and looked at all the children in the wagon. The oldest of the group was the twins who were both fifteen, however discluding Linrun the oldest children would be Stephanie and two boys who were all twelve. Though Stephanie was a level four storm mage, she was going to be leaving soon to continue her training and thanks to Hunter's blood she had a high chance of breaking the many years long "curse" that seemed to stop mages from breaking past rank five. As for the two boys, neither of them had a natural affinity towards magic and so they would most likely end up learning to fight with swords or bows, however that would also take time before they could be good enough to take kill missions from a guild.
Hunter returned his focus back to the scenery around them. "Looks like there will be a lot of training needing to take place for the children, and since we can't higher any professionals it will be difficult. You think that prince will be willing to help us?"
Spartacus glanced over before returning to staring at the road as he thought. "It all depends to be honest. I'm hoping he's someone like us from Earth, which I think is the most likely case. However, there is a chance that he is just this world's genius and ended up getting inspiration from making enemies with someone from our world, so it all depends on how he acts when we meet him. Until then we should focus on curing your little kitten's grandmother and dealing with that Yechen bastard."
Hunter sinisterly smiled as he thought about what he would do. "By the way brother, Stephanie said she wanted in on our attack against the bastard."
Spartacus nodded as he became silent, watching the road in front of them as he listened to the children laughing in the wagon as they learned different card games from Linrun, Stephanie, and even Tarenia. Hunter leaned back, going into what could be called a stasis state as he stayed consciously awake enough to be alert, but relaxed enough allowing his body to rest and recover as if he were fully in REM sleep.
After nearly an hour, the wagons began seeing the entrance to Snakecliff village. As they drew nearer, everyone could hear the roar of a waterfall, and they saw that the village appeared to be nearly wrapped by a river that lead to a massive gorge with Snakecliff Village being about thirty meters from the edge.
Spartacus paused the wagon as Ian guided the second wagon up next to theirs. Orion looked over at the two, his eye brow raising as he looked back at the village. "Doesn't seem like the smartest idea to build a village so close to a gorge, don't you think?"
Spartacus nodded his head as they all turned to look at Linrun who had finished playing cards with the children. "The reason why Snakecliff Village is so close to the gorge is because it was the most defendable spot in the area to fight against the Pythons. Since the troops have chased the Pythons away, there is no need for us to be settled there, however it takes time to move the village entirely, even if it is only several hundred yards."
"What's a Python?" Hunter was sitting up from his seat as he began looking around the area.
"A Python is a giant snake that is said to be born from mud and has dragons blood flowing through it's veins. They have a level one dragon core, however bare slight resemblance to wyrms. The smallest that ever attacked the village was about ten meters in length, while the largest was nearly twenty five meters. They had a strong venom capable of dissolving anything, and they released a smell that could knock a young dragon unconscious. Their blood was also poisonous and the only way to kill the large ones was by using fire or well hidden traps. There's even a myth in the village that the strongest of the pythons were even clairvoyant and able to foresee the future." Linrun paused as she took a deep breath, holding back her grief though Hunter was able to sense how strong it was hitting her.
He didn't reach forward, but instead tilted his head towards Stephanie before jerking it back towards Linrun. Stephanie saw the motion and understood instantly as she too began to slowly sense how strong her grief was. She pulled Linrun into a tight hug without saying a word, waiting till she had collected herself and was ready to speak again.
"My grandmother was accidently poisoned by the python's blood three years ago when the prince's army came and purged them from the caves. My parents had died two years prior to the snake, saving my life by sacrificing theirs so my grandmother and I could escape at that time." She smiled sadly as she looked up at everyone else before she rested her eyes on Hunter. "I was truly happy when the troops came back telling us that they had exterminated all the pythons, even bringing back the broken egg shells, teeth, and scales to show us."
Hunter instantly understood what she was trying to say with that last sentence. He softly spoke a few words to her, though that message was quite impactful for all the other children listening in. "Death is a part of life, and there is nothing that can be changed about that. Taking joy from the loss of life does not make you a sinner or a monster unless it's of creatures or people that did no wrong to you or others. The Pythons killed your family, and continually attacked your village, it is only right that you would feel relief and joy for removing a threat that could wipe out the entire populace. Just as the Pythons must've taken joy in feeding on your flesh, listening to yours screams, and smelling your fear every time they attacked. If I had to guess, since people definitely would not be a very nutritional diet for such a massive snake, and the energy wasted to get just one person from a village, would imply that they attacked your village much like a drunkard goes to a tavern. They got a high off of attacking your village, and that's why they didn't exterminate the entire place if they truly could."
Shivers ran up Linrun's spine as she heard Hunter's evaluation, then she became increasingly angry as she slowly registered that her parents had died, her grandmother's injury, and the nightmare that she would've been forced into was all just for a stupid snake's high. She was pissed and everyone could see it. Hunter turned and looked at his brothers, noticing the scent of disgust wafting off of all of them.
Ian turned and looked at him as well before one could hear him growl through his helmet. "That's some fucked up shit. I say good riddance to them. Had we been here earlier, I would've definitely taken part in the prince's hunt."
Hunter nodded his head as well as he turned his focus back towards the village, slightly tapping the "reins" to usher the Rooted Horses to begin traveling forward towards the village entrance. [To be honest, those Pythons would've made great experiment materials. Oh well nothing much can be done when a nest has been purged, but I wonder if there was already one nest here, than there must be nests in other places on this continent right?] Entering the village, Hunter's heightened senses in his Domain of Awareness alerted him to multiple guardsmen and mercenaries all over the village. He also noticed a very expensive carriage located near the best inn in the village.
Focusing much of his attention in that area, he saw a very fat middle aged nobleman yelling at the innkeeper. "How come nobody in this god forsaken place knows where that little bitch is at?! She told me she would be here and yet when I come to pick her up, she isn't here to warm my bed and instead makes me wait the entire morning for her! God damn it, I want to know where she ran off to so tell me or else I'm going to take your fucken daughter instead!"
Hunter moved his senses noticing the innkeepers wife holding what appeared to be a newly sixteen year old daughter and her ten year old son as they hid in one of the back rooms listening to the noble outside.
"Then once I've had my way with your daughter, I'll give her to my men just as I will with your wife! Unless you tell me where that little bitch is at!" The noble turned to one of his mercenaries before saying coldly. "Kill that bitches grandmother."