They quickly took what they needed and prepared themselves, Samuel made sure that the mythril armor was underneath his robes. He did leave his magical sword and staff in his pocket dimension, better to leave them as secret weapons to only be used if he really needed to.
Sonya came out wearing leather armor strapped on looking slightly uncomfortable but it would leave her with some basic protection. Both Bregane and Teric wore leather as well mixed in with whatever mage robes they wore. Mages prefered to be light, Samuel wore chainmail underneath but thanks to the magical effects of mythril it had essentially no weight.
Samuel had his Gillfall longsword on his left hip and a shortsword on his right. Only him and Bregane carried weapons and Samuel was a bit surprised to see Bregane's actual weapons, except for all the daggers he had in sleeves and boots. He actually wielded a large scythe, that he instantly dismissed into a poof of shadows. "How did you do that? Do you have a bag or ring item?" Samuel quickly asked, looking at his mentor with amazement. Bregane shook his head. "My weapon is magically bound to my shadow, a delicate procedure that includes soulbonding to your weapon... It's quite a dangerous process unless you know what you are doing!" Bregane added when he saw Samuel thinking about how and when.
Samuel seemed to get it and abandoned the thought (for the moment) Samuel was finally reminded of a presence sitting on his shoulder... "Hi" The small dragon said with a scoff. "Yeah... you forgot about me! I have been following in your shadow this whole time.... jerk!" The tiny shadow dragon closed its eyes and looked away with an disgruntled hmph.
In his mind Samuel spoke. "Oh... I am so sorry! I completely forgot about that!" His thoughts were apologetic and Night could feel a strong remorse coming from him so she opened one eye to look at him again. "Alright fine! Just don't do it again." The dragon spoke aloud.
It seemed like only Samuel could actually hear her speak, because when he looked at the others they didn't react at all, they simply kept walking. All geared up and ready they were approaching a spot inside the fort that was left unguarded.
Bregane took them inside a room where he looked around the walls for a bit before pressing a stone into place and slowly a side passage rumbled open. It looked like a small secret tunnel. "This will take us outside into the pass, there might very well be hostiles close to the exit, so from here on out always be on your guard! Do your best and stay close." Bregane said as he turned to look at them one last time.
"Grumpy old geezer! He's no fun!" Night whispered to herself, but she must have been louder than she thought because Samuel gave her an unimpressed look. She simply shrugged knowing that no one else could hear her anyway. "Let's go have some fun!" She quickly slithered around Samuel's arm and looked at him as if she was expecting something.
Their team all entered the tunnels and Bregane pulled a lever which closed the door they came from, he took the lead with Teric followed by Sonya and Samuel last. Samuel sighed and scratched the small shadow dragon under it's chin, making Night start purring. But it didn't last for long as Samuel had to focus on the passage that was only being lit up from a torch Bregane carried.
One misstep and one could easily trip in this narrow passageway. "I don't like narrow spaces!" Night complained loudly. "They make me feel like I am back in the nightmare I call home..." Samuel could feel her shiver as she seemed to recall her memories. He replied, "I thought you didn't remember much about your home?"
"No, I don't... but the little I do, I can only remember dark places scary and quiet. I don't like those few memories at all, you were the first light I ever saw in that horrible place!" Night had a small pride in her voice as she recalled her first light.
"What did you say Samuel?" Sonya suddenly whispered back to him, Samuel realized he had forgotten to use the mind link to speak with Night and had asked her out loud. Which made him freeze up for just a moment. He could feel Night also freezing up slightly.
"Oh, sorry nothing... Just muttering to myself! Don't mind me!" Samuel replied and he saw Sonya slowly nod in front of him although her face was still looking forward, both Samuel and Night sighed - obviously relieved. But thats when Samuel saw it, Sonya was shaking ever so slightly.
"Hey! We are going to be fine alright!?" Samuel was following her so he took her by the shoulder as they kept walking, he gently gave her shoulder a squeeze and he could feel that she stopped trembling. Sonya sighed and felt reassured. "Thanks! I just... have a tendency to be really scared when something big is going down! What if I mess up or worse!"
"Hey, don't think that way, I know you can do it! I have already been saved by you once, I know we can do it!" Samuel reassured her and it definitely helped Sonya to focus again. "You are a really good friend, I hope you know that!" She said with a chuckle. "Sorry if I was giving you a bit of a cold shoulder, It was nothing personal!"
"It's all in the past!" Samuel replied and he could almost feel Night rolling her eyes. "Oh just fuck already! Or wait, that was the half elf... riiiight!" She sarcastically rolled her eyes again. Samuel blushed up thinking about this morning, inwardly speaking to night... "Right, sorry about that!"
The moment he apologized the shadow dragon just let out a small laugh. "Maybe I should be the one who is sorry for intruding. I just don't want to go back, If it means staying out here and witnessing all your embarrassing things I certainly know which one is better!"
Samuel was less entertained by the idea that there would always be someone watching and inwardly sighed to which he felt the shadowy dragon patting his cheek with a claw. "There, there, I will make sure you won't notice me, It will be like I wasn't even there!" Night couldn't help but snicker a little bit.
The rest of the tunnel walk was done mostly in silence before they eventually reached a dead end. But there was a simillar lever to the one used at the other end of the tunnel, Bregane turned to them all and gave them a nod to be prepared just in case before he pulled the lever.
The sound of stone being dragged against stone filled the tunnel as light started peeking through a crack slowly opening. As soon as one could squeeze through the opening Bregane did so and the others followed him. As they exited the tunnel there was no enemy in sight, but there were plenty of rock formations as they were in the middle of a small side pass.
The rock and stone stretched high up above, but as they looked down it was the same going down, they were in a middle point of the pass, somewhere in between the top and bottom. There were rocky pathways one could climb down and the same going up.
"Alright! Time to start climbing!" Bregane sighed and quickly walked over to the wall. "Be so kind as to close the passage!" He added and Samuel did as instructed. Seeing it slowly close he couldn't help but wonder if there was a way to open it from out here. But Bregane shook his head when he turned to ask him.
"Follow in my steps for the safest climb!" Bregane said as he started climbing. It was a treacherous wall, but there seemed to be safer places that Bregane was easily able to find. Following eachothers tracks they eventually all reached the top after roughly 5-10 minutes of climbing.
"Whew, that certainly was a climb!" Teric said as he helped drag up Sonya and Samuel the last bit. He then looked over the edge, "Wouldn't want to find yourself falling back down there. Make sure you have a flight or falling spell prepared in your mind, just in case!" He smiled at Sonya and Samuel whom both gave him a nod.
They were now all standing atop the pass, several hundred meters up. Bregane waved them all to come along behind him as he started to slowly jog over the open stone that eventually started sloping downwards again. He stopped short in front of a cliff, with almost nothing to hide behind atop these mountains he lay down near the edge.
He also waved for them all to come lay down next to him, "Look there!" He said and pointed with his fingers, far below by the edges along the bottom of the mountains lay a camp with thousands of tents and campfires.
There looked to be plenty of activity at the edges of the camp with figures running around. Bregane pointed towards the largest tent that was pretty close to the mountain base at the "safest" place in camp. They would never anticipate an attack from behind from up the mountain.
"That is where our target is going to be! We will be hovering down the mountainside, luckily its not just a pit fall down but we can actually climb back up if we need to. With the help of magic."
"Teric, please use your clairvoyance to see if our most probable target is there!" Teric activated a quick spell and his eyes shone bright blue with markings around his eyes. After a while he spoke "Yes what I assume to be a horde leader is indeed there! With evening coming about we should have the perfect opportunity to strike if we move now! There won't be too many guards and we might even be able to do it completely silently!"
"Alright good, let's move!" Bregane said and quickly stood up and casted a spell in which his hand proceeded to glow yellow, he placed a magical rune on each of them before taking a running start and jumping off the edge of the cliff.