It was one hour before sunrise.
But the gate allowing people to get in and out of the Lavos Village is already opened wide. Traffic had already started, with multiple horse-drawn carriages coming in after checking their content and identity.
Some travelers on foot also can be seen queuing at one side, handled by two guards. These people will be allowed to enter the village after their identity and intention of coming to the settlement are checked out.
There was a gathering spot not too far from the gate.
This gathering spot is ideal for those planning to step outside of the Lavos Village to get a quick check over their equipment. There are also stalls selling dried food like jerky, buns, and medicinal salves for minor injuries.
Although the item sold here were not up to the quality sold in bigger shops, they're still essential goods for a quick pick and leave. After all, both buyers and sellers need to queue outside those proper establishments for their turn.
Hespar was the first one to wait for the others to arrive. The others also gradually come, like Victor, Ashley, and Selene. The trio came together as their houses were adjacent to one another.
It was unexpected to everyone for Paul to arrive last. But he had a good reason for coming late. Because he's responsible for everyone's meal throughout this final examination, Paul decided to include some of the beneficial herbs in his backpack.
This took some of his time to prepare and shop around for good-quality items.
"Is everyone ready?" Hespar asked as the leader of this group. Few other groups have already made their way out of the village while waiting for Paul. But since this is not a competition of who's faster and who's not, there's no point competing against one another.
"Yes, Leader!" everyone responded Hespar with a hint of respect in their tone. Having such firm support from everyone is crucial as they'll be relying on one another on the road.
The group made their way out of the settlement without wasting their time. Using the mission card as the letter of approval, the group of nine yet to be counted as adults exit the village.
Hector saw Hespar when the latter was leaving the village, but he chose to keep quiet except take a few glances until they were too far to be seen.
"Boss. Are you sure that not greeting your boy is the correct decision?" one of the guards on duty asked Hector.
"Heh! He's the son I'm very proud of. I'm sure he will be coming back safely and graduate with the top score in the class." Hector replied.
They quickly pay attention to their task again, as the number of people queuing to enter the Lavos Village will gradually increases. Sometimes, the number of people in the queue would reach over a hundred if the registration was processed slowly.
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"Are we going to approach these convoys?" asked Terry, the more talkative in the trio responsible for assisting the vanguard and support team. His question also happened to work as an icebreaking subject for them as the atmosphere around them was too tense.
After all, this was still their first time coming this far out of the Lavos Village. Although the surroundings might seem peaceful right now, the situation might change in a flash without notice.
"Ashley, any suggestion? You're the most experienced out of everyone here in this regard." Hespar chooses to rely on Ashley for this. If Ashley had no good idea that everyone could accept, he would be making the decision then.
"Approaching the convoy here might be safer than further down the road, but the chances we're helping is lesser too," Ashley replied. Then, she added some of her views about why she would say so.
From her experience, convoys about to reach the settlement would choose to make no contact with outsiders unless there's a case of emergency. This means the support they'll be providing would be limited to a particular area.
Using this reason, Ashley convinced everyone to not look at the easy part of this task for now and miss the more significant and substantial contribution further down the road.
Still, this is not the solution as they're required to at least ensure the safety and survival of one convoy per day in this three-day examination. If they're unable to complete this task, perhaps the mission would be an instant fail before the arrival of day 2.
"Can I make a suggestion?" suddenly, the quiet Victor seemed to have something to say.
"Of course. Everyone should take the initiative to speak as we won't have too much time to do so when we're getting on the right track." Hespar said.
"Why don't we make something like a service station for the convoys? This would be beneficial to both sides. Furthermore, it'll also be helpful as the more convoy gathered, the more help we could get." Victor said.
The suggestion was so popular amongst the team. Even Hespar finds no reason to reject the proposal because what Victor said made sense. As he mentioned, making the service station would make the gathered convoy bigger and safer, especially at night.
But again, a suggestion is only a suggestion until it is correctly done.
Making a service station might be a good idea but bad at the same time. The reason for saying so was that monsters are more attracted to big convoys than smaller ones. Without having sufficient fighting power, it would be disastrous to open their own service station.
The idea kept everyone busy for the whole morning as they made their way further down the road. Before they noticed how far had they gotten, the group came across a merchant's convoy with two injured personnel.
The wall of the carriages also filled with cracks created by blunt tools.
"Selene, I'll be relying on you for medical help." seeing this, Hespar immediately knows what to do. He doesn't need the convoy's leader to take the initiative to ask for help.
"Yes, Leader." Selene immediately responded to Hespar's order.
"Terry, Alex, Sean. This location is likely the place we'll attempt the service station idea. Search and scout around to see if there's anything out of the ordinary. As for the support team, you may do your job."
"Victor and Rory will follow me. Please back me up during the conversation." Hespar finished giving out instructions and approached the merchant's convoy.
To make it easier to initiate a conversation, Hespar approaches them without wielding a weapon, but Victor and Rory do. Meanwhile, Terry, Alex, and Sean split and inspect the surroundings.
"Who's there?" asked the guard. He couldn't help but be alarmed by the arrival of an unknown guest. The guard also seems to have some trauma from his previous fight, and the sign can be noticed from how shaky he was with the sword.
He would be easy picking for the monsters in this mental state if they decided to attack. But lucky for him, the one that arrived was Hespar and not the monsters.
"We're the academy students from Lavos Village. We approached the convoy because we thought you needed some help. Would you allow my companion to check on your injured members?" Hespar asked as he approached without holding a sword in hand.
Instead, he disarmed himself to look harmless before the only guard still standing.
"P-Please..." the guard relaxed after ensuring that the one that came was six youngsters, barely fifteen in age. Hespar instructed his group members to attend to the wounded after the guard agreed.
"We're the students from the Lavos Academy. Please allow me to give you a hand..."
"We're the students..."
"We're..."
Everyone copied Hespar's sentence as they approached the wounded and provided them with some help. Those with lighter wounds will be treated temporarily with first aid and some medicinal salves. As for Selene, she'll be working on the heavily wounded ones.
Meanwhile, Paul is responsible for whipping up something light but nutritious for the wounded. Victor and Rory were on standby after bringing the injured together. Still, they soon went into a battle when a few vagrant monsters appeared.
Terry, Alex, and Sean returned half an hour later with some leftover equipment and precious belongings. There's also the corpse of a woman behind one of them.
"Are they..." the guard that spoke with Hespar earlier tried to confirm if the trio belonged to Hespar's party. After making sure there's nothing to worry about, he expressed his gratitude to Sean after noticing the woman's corpse on his back.
The dead woman seemed to be dressed in a maid attire. And on her wrist is a bangle similar to the one on the guard's hand.
If Hespar weren't mistaken, this woman might be the significant other of this guard. She might be the reason the guard's group was employed by the owner of this merchant convoy in the first place.
Using the excuse of letting the guard reminiscence on the dead, Hespar recalled his group member to Paul's location.
"So, what's the result of your inspection?" Hespar asked.
"Nothing suspicious. About ten minutes further down the road, we found a broken carriage and twenty or so monster corpses. All of them were left untouched, and there were two other guards' corpses along with the female corpses I brought back here." Sean reported first.
"Based on the scene where the fight took place, this convoy was attacked while resting. They were overwhelmed, which is why there's a few died and injured. No sign of banditry or trickery can be seen, so it's likely an accident, not a coup." Terry added.
"Our surroundings also had minimal monster activity, but I noticed some footprints from multiple goblins. I would suggest that we pay attention at night. Are we going to make our service station here?" Alex asked after giving out his part of the report.
"What does everyone think after giving them help? Did you find anything wrong?" Hespar continued. He believes that if they're going to guard the convoy overnight, they'll have to make sure they know these people and their intention.