Long before we reached the bright entrance of the Khirndarim gate, we could hear the clamor of fighting echoing against the stone walls. Cries of death and screeches of pain from man, beast, monster, and dwarf, intermingled and coalesced into a sound that was straight out of a horror game.
"Papa, what's that noise?" Gerde's tail was between her legs and her ears were flat against her head in fear. I completely sympathized with her, the last time I had felt this nervous was when a friend had convinced me to play a video game in my previous life about being a security guard to haunted animatronics.
"Don't worry, Gerde. Just keep a firm grip on your shield. Whatever you do, do not let go of your shield, and do not forget your mothers training." I would have given Gerde a hug to comfort her, but my hands were occupied with an ax and shield. She still wormed her way under my shield arm anyway.
When we got closer to the gates, I put on my sun shields and helped Gerde put hers on to protect our eyes. After a year of living underground, the sunlight would have been blinding to us, possibly permanently.
Once we exited the gate, and our eyes had adjusted to the light, we looked out on the scenes of carnage all around us. We were a few hundred wagons back from the front, so a path had been cleared long ago, but on either side of the road were piles of monster and beast corpses. There were dozens of yetis and monsters that looked like giant mammoths that were being butchered right then and there for food and their pelts, snow wolf carcasses were hung up to drain the blood for future skinning. The bigger monsters, the dragons and wyverns, were being chopped up into smaller pieces to be dragged back inside. Unfortunately it wasn't just monsters that had suffered losses. Human adventurers and dwarven warriors who had been wounded by teeth and claws had been passing us for the past hour, being rushed back into the mountain on stretchers to where those in the Physician's Guild were waiting to heal them. Those who could not be saved were covered with their sleeping blankets so that the bodies could be retrieved later.
What piqued my curiosity was numerous ice pillars that had not been there when we had entered the mountain a year ago. Taking a closer look, I realized to my shock and horror that they were humans and dwarves who had been frozen solid by the ice dragon's breath.
"Goblin's grog." Bekhi said in a horrified voice as she looked at one of the ice statues. "Bernard. Not you!"
"Someone you know?" I asked. Bekhi shook a tear from her eye as we passed him by.
"Yeah, he started taking yeti hunting quests with me a couple weeks ago. Said he was going on the Vermogen run so that he'd have enough money to free his sweetheart out of serfdom and could marry her. He always talked about his plans to raise a family with a couple acres, a cow and some chickens, and kept asking me how to run a farm since my family back home has one." Bekhi nodded respectfully at the frozen husk that was all that was left of the lovesick adventurer. "May your gods reunite you with your love in the afterlife."
We couldn't stop to pay our respects to the fallen adventurer though, the line of wagons stopped for no man or beast so we had to keep walking in our assigned place. The stacks of bloody monster remains thinned out after just a few hundred feet of walking and then we only saw the occasional yeti corpse, or dead snow wolf pack, and there were no dragon or wyvern bodies for the rest of the day.
That night when we put Gerde to bed, she refused to go to sleep unless she was holding our hands. Even then, she only fitfully slept and seemed to have nightmares that only squeezing our hands seemed to dispel. I had done my best to shield her eyes from the sight of all the blood and gore, but she had still smelled and heard everything that occurred today.
"Did I make a mistake in bringing Gerde out here?" I asked Bekhi in a quiet voice as we felt Gerde squeeze our hands almost painfully tight while going through another nightmare. "I thought that I had prepared her for everything with her armor, shield, weapons, and training. But I never even imagined that the mental strain on her would be this bad."
"It's a little late to be second guessing yourself." Bekhi glared at me as she stroked Gerde's soft black hair. "But… I think Gerde will be fine." Giving a soft sigh as her daughter's face relaxed into a more peaceful dream, Bekhi looked down at the sleeping child. "When I was about as old as Gerde, just past my second winter, a giant pack of starving goblins raided Vesturhildrun for food. I watched them devour our chickens and cows alive while they screamed in agony. My dad rallied the town and drove them off eventually, but only after several people died. It was when I looked into the dead eyes of my older brother and saw my dad valiantly avenging him, that I resolved to become a fighter equal to no other so that I could protect those dear to me."
"That's when you started training with your dad and went to school down in Nurnwuhr?" Bekhi nodded without looking up.
"Dad negotiated with the Thane of Nurnwuhr to let me sleep in the basement while attending classes. One of the servants kicked me out for the day so they could clean up the room, and told me to go to the youth center. That's where I first met you, remember?"
I thought back to that day, Bekhi and I were both tiny kids who had just passed our fifth winter. I had been dragged out by Zikruk so that I could interact with my peers and demonstrate my talents to generate future sales. While playing a game of shieldwall, I had accidentally created my first magical rune. Bekhi had seen it and had immediately wanted a runed weapon for herself.
My ruminations were suddenly cut off when Gerde jerked awake with wide eyes and a twitching nose. "Mama! Papa! Yetis are over there!" She then tried to hide under her blanket like she had when we were traveling to the mountains. However, we couldn't let her do that on this trip, not if we wanted her to survive that is.
"Gerde! Get your shield! Now!" I tore off her blanket and stood her up from her balled up position while thrusting her shield into her shaking hands. Her face was tearful and her legs were trembling in fear. It broke my heart that I had to be so harsh with her, but there was no guarantee that Bekhi and I would be able to stop all the monsters on this trip so it was better for her to be scared now than dead later.
A pack of three yetis appeared out of the darkness and rushed towards the line. I felt the rune of wrath start burning on my left hand, and it soon appeared in the yetis eyes as they charged at me in a frenzy.
"For the ancestors!" Bekhi yelled as she cut off a yeti's leg with an ax that she held in her right hand before stabbing it in the heart with a sword she held in her left.
I dodged the first yeti's fists and blocked the second yeti's jaws that tried to circle behind me for the kill. Stabbing the first one between the eyes, I quickly turned and disemboweled the other one. Nodding to myself that my weapons and reflexes were still in good shape after a year of inaction, I hurried to check on Gerde.
Her knees were knocking together, and she was only still upright due to leaning on a wagon, but she was still firmly grasping her shield and holding it in front of her.
"There there, it's ok, Gerde." I gently pushed aside her shield and pulled her in for a hug which she melted into. It felt a little odd comforting her like this when she was just a few inches shorter than me, but I felt her tension relax a little. It still took several hours for us to get her back to sleep, and she was cranky all the next day due to being tired.
"Papa! Papa! Wolves are coming!" It was now the second week of travel and Gerde called out another monster warning. She instinctively tried balling up like she had the other night, but this time I only needed to glare at her for her to remember to use her shield. Just like she had been trained over the past week, she backed up to a wagon and held up her shield defensively against the monsters.
Of course, the pack of a half dozen snow wolves never even got near Gerde. Bekhi and I killed them efficiently while they were trying to bite through my armor. But it was better to be safe than sorry with dangerous beasts.
"Good girl, Gerde." I scratched behind her ears, causing her to smile a bit and her tail started wagging slowly.
"Who's my big warrior girl!?" Bekhi enthusiastically pulled Gerde in for a hug with a smile and played with her for a few minutes, causing them both to laugh and shake off the fight.
After yet another week of travel, we didn't even need to remind Gerde to get into a defensive stance since she did it on her own when a pack of yetis appeared.
"Papa, can I take off this armor? It's getting itchy and I never have to use it. You and Mama always kill the bad monsters before they get to me" Gerde spun in circles as she tried reaching an itch on her back.
"No you can't take off the armor, Gerde." I stopped her spinning and scratched her back until her tail started wagging. "Your mother and I have been lucky so far in keeping the monsters away from you but we might not always be able to, then you will only have your shield and armor to keep you safe."
"Mrrr, can I at least learn to swing my weapons like mama does? She gets to go 'for the ancestors' and then the monsters fall dead." Gerde started waving her arms about as if she was swinging an ax and shield. We had taught her to never ever take out her weapons unless she was training or fighting.
"Why not let the little one fight a bit?" A second generation Tochkan dwarf named Gammith commented from behind us. "She seems to have the basics of defense down, and those weapons she's carrying are just going to waste just sitting in their sheaths."
"Maybe…" Bekhi looked over Gerde's form as she pretended to swing her imaginary ax. "Alright, Gerde. We'll start the lessons tonight after dinner, and maybe, just maybe, we'll let you kill a snow wolf when you're ready."
"Yay! Thanks, mama!" Gerde jumped at Bekhi with one of her usual bone rattling hugs.
"I'll help her out too." Gammith said offhandedly. "Thanks to her nose and your skill, I haven't had to draw my weapon once so far. If this keeps up then this will be the easiest Vermogen run I've ever been on."
"I appreciate your offer, but we want to make sure Gerde stays safe above all else." I tried to subtly turn down his offer since I didn't know how far Gammith would take things. But he smiled in a way to indicate that he knew what I was thinking and held up his arms disarmingly.
"Don't worry, I won't be teaching anything too dangerous. Back home I sometimes babysit my two nieces and while I'm watching them I'll teach combat skills with sticks from the woods. So I know how to hold back while training kids."
"Thank you, Gammith. I'll test Gerde's abilities tonight and then we can work from there on what she needs to work on." Bekhi cheerfully walked along hand in hand with Gerde until we made camp for the night.
Later that evening, Bekhi had a test match with Gerde. Allowing her for the first time to use the magically runed weapons I had made for her in combat. Needless to say, both mother and daughter were ecstatic. Bekhi was happy to get a good fight as she always was, and Gerde was glad to get to use the weapons her 'papa' made for her. Once Gerde had been exercised into exhaustion and was fast asleep, Bekhi and Gammith made a study plan to get her ready to fight snow wolves and yeti.
Over the next couple of weeks, either Bekhi or Gammith would yell out "Snowball attack!" and then Gerde would have to instantly move to block the snowball, or small pebble if there was no snow, with her shield. According to her teachers, they would only allow her to take on a monster when she was fast enough to swing the projectile out of the air. It may have been a high bar to clear, but they were taking Gerde's safety seriously.
Ulyanna stopped by near the end of Gerde's training to say hello. "Good evening, Kvalinn. How's your party doing?" She then leaned over to be at face height for Gerde and started speaking in a high voice like you would to a baby. "Hey, Gerde! How are you? Are you being a big brave girl for your mommy and daddy?"
Gerde had a freaked out look on her face and she backed up until she was behind Bekhi. "Mama, why's that lady talking so weirdly?"
Bekhi and I realized that we never actually talked to Gerde as if she were a baby the entire time we had been raising her. The most we ever did was talk in simpler words to make sure she understood us. Since Ulyanna could speak Dwarven, she understood Gerde's question and awkwardly cleared her throat to change the subject.
"Ahem. So, looks like you two managed to keep her alive a month into the journey. I know more than a couple people who bet she wouldn't make it this far. Congrats on that. General Norathuri sends his regards and this for Gerde." Ulyanna took something wrapped in damp cloth from her bag and gave it to Gerde. "The General has a bit of a sweet tooth and sent over one of his sweet rolls baked with honey. He thought this would encourage her to make it all the way to Vermogen since he's bet heavily on her survival."
While Bekhi grumbled about everyone betting on her daughter like she was some sort of race horse, Gerde cautiously took the sweet roll. After slowly sniffing it all over in curiosity, she took a small nibble out of the corner. Instantly there were stars in her eyes as she tasted the sweetest thing she had ever eaten in her life. Underneath the mountains, there was very little that I was able to make that was sweet since honey and sugar was even more expensive here than it was in Nurnwuhr, so the general must have had a full vault as well as a sweet tooth to afford something baked with honey.
It only took only a few seconds for Gerde to devour the entire sweet roll, and after liking her fingers clean of any crumbs, she looked at Ulyanna with puppy eyes for more.
"Sorry, that's all the general sent for you. But he did promise to give you more if you survive until we reach Vermogen." Ulyanna grinned when she saw the new look of determination in Gerde's eyes. "Also, he said that he'd give you cookies and cakes if you take down a snow wolf, an ice wraith, and a yeti, in that order."
"Mama, what are 'cookies and cakes'? Are they yummy like that sweet roll was?" Since Bekhi only knew what cookies were due to me making them, she looked to me for answers.
"Cookies are like mini sweet rolls that have lots of flavors, and cakes are like larger sweet rolls that have different toppings." It was a bit of a crude explanation, but since I didn't know how advanced the culinary culture of this world was, I didn't want to accidentally give away that I had reincarnated into this world by knowing information that only a summoned hero would know.
Gerde jumped up from the campfire in excitement when she heard my descriptions of cake and cookies. "Mama! Can I hunt a wolf now! I smell one nearby! Can I hunt it! Please! Please Please Please Pleeeease!"
"Calm down, Gerde!" Bekhi tried to keep up with her eyes as Gerde bounced all around the campfire. "If you smelled a wolf nearby, why didn't you tell us?"
"Because it didn't move any closer to us. It just followed us and sniffed around. Can I go out and kill it! Please! I want to try the cookies and cakes!" Ulyanna seemed concerned about the wolf who had just been following and held down the jumping Gerde by the shoulder.
"Gerde, which way is that wolf?" Seeming to sense that Ulyanna wanted a serious answer, Gerde's smile died and after a few minutes of her moving her ears and sniffing the air, she pointed out into the darkness beyond the lines. "Good girl, Gerde."
Ulyanna stepped to the border of the firelight where the sentry's patrolled for passing monsters and aimed her staff in the direction Gerde had pointed in and shouted. "Fire Tornado!" A powerful but narrow cyclone of fire shot out of her staff and obliterated an extremely large wolf that was briefly illuminated before being turned to ash.
"Haah, haah, and another one bites the dust." Ulyanna panted out as she leaned heavily against her staff. "Thanks for the tip, Gerde. Sometimes mutant or alpha snow wolves emerge from the cursed areas of Tochka, they usually attack the supply wagons and can drag off two or three mules at a time. If you hadn't pointed it out, Gerde, then it probably would have struck tomorrow or day after."
"Do I get a cookie?" Gerde asked with hopeful eyes. Ulyanna just patted her head as she joined us in sitting next to the fire.
"Maybe next time. But now I need a minute to rest. Phew!" Ulyanna was nearly doubled over in exhaustion and pain and spent the next several minutes trying to recover her breath as sweat beaded her brow.
"Are you alright, Ulyanna?" I asked. "I traveled up from Handel with a magic user but it never affected him like this."
"I'll be fine in a minute." After taking a few more deep breaths, Ulyanna leaned back and sighed out the chilled air. "Sorry about that, I'm a quarter dwarf so casting magic like that is a bit difficult for me."
"I'm impressed that you can cast magic at all!" I raised my eyebrows in surprise. When the gods had created the dwarven race, they had made sure that their creation would never be able to use their power, also known as magic. Based on Elder Rongrim's teachings in school, I was pretty sure it was hard coded into our DNA. I was the sole exception with the runes on my hands and back.
"My father's part of a prestigious order of wizards back home in the Empire so I inherited some of his magical power." Ulyanna explained. "It wasn't easy, but thanks to some good teachers at the Imperial Academy, I was able to earn my staff."
"The Imperial Academy! Isn't that a place where only nobles can go? If you're some sorta noble then what are you doing here?" An adventurer from the Empire named Oswald said with a start. Ulyanna nodded and answered his question.
"It's a long story, but to sum it up, my mother said this job is a family tradition. Plus, imperial politics is very boring and the constant requests for marriage get tedious."
"Do you know if the Imperial Academy has any ancient dwarven tomes?" I asked with eager curiosity. "When I passed through Tochka, I was allowed to visit the university library where I found several books with lost knowledge of the past. If the Academy has any books like that, then I'd do anything to gain access to that information!"
Last time I had gotten access to ancient dwarven books, I had learned several forbidden runes, numerous non forbidden powerful runes, and more than a few ancient weapon smithing techniques. It may not have been directly technology related, but it was still really fun learning new information, especially information that was considered lost and that no one else on the continent knew.
"Settle down, Kvalinn." Ulyanna said with a look that showed how weirded out she was at my enthusiasm. "Sorry to tell you this, but what Oswald said about only nobles getting into the Academy is correct. No one but Imperial Nobility is allowed to even enter the Academy building, let alone visit the library."
"Hmph, we'll see about that." I said with a grin that bordered on dark humor. If there was one thing I had learned from my encounter with the nobility in Tochka, it was that runed weapons were considered highly valuable and a few bribes in the right places would get me whatever I wanted. As long as the nobles didn't kill me to prevent anyone else getting the weapons that is.
"I don't know what you're planning, Kvalinn. But the Empire takes noble lineage and privilege's seriously. So unless you do something truly extraordinary on behalf of the empire, or for the emperor himself, then you aren't getting into that library."
In an attempt to change the subject, Bekhi asked Ulyanna where all the gold and silver would be going after it reached Vermogen. We had been told that merchants in Vermogen would take it all over the known world, but considering our geography lessons back home had been a bit lacking she was curious about who would be buying all these precious metals.
"A decent amount will travel by the sea lanes down to Handel, where it will then travel by land to Zaihan and the Empire. Some will cross the seas to the western continent and the human nations over there. Most, however, will go to the cursed elves." Ulyanna then launched into a string of curse words against that race. Fun fact, dwarves have over a hundred swear words in our language specifically for those pointy eared bastards.
The reason for the dwarven hatred for elves was both complicated and simple. In our history, it was recorded that Hjerouhrdinn, the first dwarf, had a beef with the first elf and recorded the second great grudge in the Great Book of Grudges against him and his descendants after chasing him off the continent to the elven island where they have lived ever since. That's the complicated reason, the simple one was that after Hjerouhrdinn removed himself from this world and created the halls of the ancestors to retire in, the elves invaded and occupied the continent. Isolating the dwarves in their mountains and killing any who ventured out with their powerful magics. It was only after the war of the first demon lord, when their population was severely diminished by the decades of warfare, that they relinquished the continent to the humans and dwarves.
"Mama, what does #$%^ mean?" Gerde uttered a word that roughly translated to saying that elves should do something perverse to themselves. Causing Bekhi to choke on her tiny portion of beer that had been served with dinner.
"I'll tell you when you're older, Gerde."
"Aww, how much older do I need to be to find out what #$%^ and $%^& and &@#$ mean?" Bekhi glared at Ulyanna to stop teaching Gerde new words that she was way too young to know the meaning of.
"Sorry about that." Ulyanna said sheepishly. She then explained why she hated elves so much. Back home in the Empire, she had a friend who was taken advantage of by an elf who overpowered her with magic and forced her to bear his son before ditching her to go back to the elven island. "Her son will have a bright future ahead of him, since those with elven blood are usually very powerful in magic and every country attempts to attract them to work in their nation, but my friend's prospects for marriage and happiness are pretty much in ruins thanks to that-" She was about to start another round of swearing but Bekhi meaningfully cleared her throat.
After a little more conversation, in which Ulyanna constantly had to stop herself from swearing, we found out that this was standard practice for the elves who visited the continent. They would seek out a female with generous stores of internal magic, impregnant them by various means, and then move on before the baby was even born. So the elves left a trail of half elven children across the continent for unknown purposes whenever they crossed the seas.
"Why don't the governments on the continent stop the damned elves from crossing their borders?" Bekhi asked with a frown. "I would've thought that having random elves going around producing kids without sticking around would be frowned upon."
"It's because of the half elf offspring." Ulyanna said while desperately holding back swear words. "They generally have more magic than humans and are necessary to maintain magic tools used by every kingdom on this continent."
Oswald then moved the conversation to monster attacks on other parts of the line, and Ulyanna told of the tough fights that adventurers and those in the warrior clan had engaged in against dragons, wyverns, yetis, and snow wolf packs. Bekhi, of course, listened in jealousy to the stories of bravery and adventure that other parts of the line were experiencing.
Ulyanna eventually had to move on to other fires to check on the adventurers, but before leaving, she reiterated that the general wanted Gerde to kill a couple different monsters before the journey ended, and warned that the scouts had warned of dragons in the area.
"Be sure to keep Gerde safe, a lot of dwarves will doubtless add you to their grudge book if you let her come to harm." Ulyanna then turned to Gerde with a friendly smile. "Bye, Gerde. I'll bring you another sweet roll if you kill a snow wolf by the next time I visit."
Everyone around the campfire laughed at how determined Gerde looked, with her scrunched up face as she sniffed the wind for prey, and her tail wagging like a propeller. A few minutes later we put her to bed but she kept muttering about sweet rolls in her sleep.
Looking out in the darkness, I thought about Ulyanna's warning about dragons coming soon. I only knew about that species from books in my previous life and a couple stories Newman had told us on the road, but they sounded quite formidable and extremely difficult to kill. The ones who had been felled outside the gate to the mountain had only been slain with the aid of giant ballista on carts that had been crafted for the purposes of killing dragons, they used mithril ammunition to pierce the tough hides but it was still very challenging to hit a flying target with them. I just hoped that none of them would come near our part of the line, and if they did, then I hoped the weapons I had made would be enough to kill them.