I woke right when the first rays of the sun started to shine through the gaps in the windows shuts, basking my face in its early, fresh light.
Rather than jumping out or even opening my eyes, I took some time to readjust my breathing, keeping myself in the same position and keeping all the sleeping motions from when I was actually sleeping.
Bit by bit, I slightly tensed up and then relaxed all my muscles, going from my feet up, all the way through my legs, belt, stomach, chest, and then hands, arms, shoulders, and finally my head.
This was a simple exercise that all the legionnaires were taught to execute whenever waking up without an urgent drill. An exercise aimed at letting them wake up properly, assess the situation, and only then start going about their day, just in case someone was out to ambush them right as they woke up.
"You can still sleep," Nay's silent, delicate voice filled my ears, proving that my attempts at staying low-key proved futile. "There's still an hour before my watch ends."
Contrary to how it was during our run, we now switched the order in which we kept the night's watch. After all, after two days of rushing ahead while changing horses whenever necessary, we all grew to be equally as exhausted.
'We somehow made it through the night, huh?' I thought, letting Nay's suggestion past my ears as I accelerated my breathing a tiny bit before opening my eyes and then clenching my abdomen to pull my upper body up to a sit.
"Were there any problems while I was asleep?" I asked, shaking my head to rid my head of the last bits of drowsiness.
"Nothing at all," Nay replied in the same, low voice as before.
'Bit by bit, her ice-cold facade is crumbling, isn't it?' I thought, noticing how much the girl had changed over just the last few days.
She started by refusing to speak up unless directly ordered to do so. And during our first night, she even went as far as to plant a seed of trouble, by leaving all the corpses of her own making to be found by the very nobles that pursued us.
Yet, as things went on, she slowly started to open up to us, and just yesterday she actually proved some level of… alignment to my cause?
'Assuming one could even call my desire to escape the harm's way a cause…' I thought, shaking my head over the thought before finally standing up from the bed and slapping both my hands against my face to let the sudden, sharp pain shake off the remaining bits of sleepiness off me.
Just like it was during Nay's watch, no one came to bother us in the room during Kid's or my own watch.
And that could mean that they were either waiting to ambush us the moment we stepped outside of the room, outside of the building… Or they actually have yet to track us down!
'I really wish the third option to be what's real, but I better not underestimate our pursers…'
Even with all the knowledge of my host body now perfectly assimilated into my brain, there was still an insane degree of information that I was lacking.
Being a mere mercenary, even if of relatively high status within the legion, my host didn't really have any need to learn about the full extent of abilities that a saint or saintess could perform. I didn't know what I should expect from those strange, darkness-clad men that rode with the saintess…
And I didn't even know just who the hell was the young and dignified woman that I saw leading the entire group!
'Well, regardless of whether they found us or not, I guess everything will be decided today,' I thought, shaking my entire body to warm my muscles up for a day's worth of exercise.
With my escape plan finally nearing its climax, the moment when if successful, we could finally shake off our trail, I had to be in my absolute best shape.
"The city is already up," I spoke as I approached the window and took a look outside.
Contrary to the three of us in the room, the city inhabitants didn't have the luxury to wait for the sun to wake up. The business owners and the workers of all sorts of shops were already busy as hell, making use of the early hours and relatively emptier streets than usual to haul all sorts of cargo and merchandise from warehouses and wholesale shops to their own businesses, preparing for yet another long day of hard work.
"You sure you don't want to sleep longer?" Nay asked, finally normalizing her voice as she stood up from her shadow-covered seat and approached the other bed to wake the kid up with a drop-kick to his ass. "I mean, we pushed ourselves quite far in the last two days, so I don't think it would be wrong to rest a little bit longer," she suggested.
"Do you think you will ever be able to find a noble who would wake up with the sun?" I asked in exchange while shaking my head and trying not to get annoyed over how long the kid was taking to wake up and get off the bed. "No, the earlier we go, the better chance we have of leaving before our pursuers will ever bother looking for us."
Soon, when faced with heavier and heavier kicks, the kid had no other choice but to crawl out from under his sheets and take a moment to freshen himself up.
Watching how he quickly got ready to depart, I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, keeping the air in my lungs as I gathered my wits to face what would come to challenge us in the day.
"I believe we should begin."
At this point, everyone knew what their job was. Everyone was aware of their tasks, the dangers they were likely to encounter, and the backup plans they had to follow if things went south.
And the only thing that was left, was to put all of those plans in motion.
Seeing how both Nay and the kid were more or less ready, I exhaled the air from my lungs and turned around, reaching for the door's handle.
"Let's go," I threw before pushing the doors open, ready to face an onslaught of the ambush…
Only for the inn's corridor to be as empty as when I walked it to enter the room in the first place.
"I guess we will fight outside," I muttered, refusing to acknowledge the lucky possibility of our pursers having to yet figure out where we were.
Yet, after we descended the stairs and left the building… No one threw themselves at us. In fact, hardly anyone paid us enough attention to anything above a random glance!
'Could it be?' I thought, gulping my saliva down as I struggled to accept the most desirable outcome that I prayed for. 'Did we really avoid their attention?'
I took another deep breath before cutting all the needless thoughts and turning to the side, picking up the pace and marching in a very precise direction.
Soon, we arrived at one of the main crossroads of the city.
The building of the Imperial Express was just ahead, a mere few steps away, standing in the rays of the morning sun like a fisherman's bait for all those who were smart enough to employ their services in opposition to the imperial nobles…
"I'm up, I guess," the kid spoke before taking a step ahead of me and Nay and turning his head over his shoulder to look at us. "We meet up at the docks, right?"
Rather than answering, I simply nodded my head before turning to my right and ignoring the Imperial Express, heading for the sea market instead.
"Are you sure it's a good idea to make him the one to do it?" Nay inquired after we moved only a few paces.
Judging from the expression of reluctance on her face, she wasn't really sold on the idea of leaving the most important part of all of our plans to the weakest and least mature one of our group.
But rather than directly replying to her question…
"Yesterday, I saw the saintess, the very same saintess that healed me after I won the tournament, ride into the city on a damned horse," I started to explain while shaking my head. "After what we did in the first city, Imperial Express will be the first place someone on that level will go to check and likely set up an ambush."
The saintess knew how I looked. And that alone made her more dangerous than hundreds of sellswords who could only guess who I was.
"And after yesterday, I believe you are not a blank page for them either," I pointed out.
No matter how good Nay was at hiding, obtaining the documents that I wanted had to come at the cost of someone seeing and noticing her. In other words, even though she escaped their chase and managed to break their trail, she was already someone they were on the lookout for.
"And that leaves only the kid to visit the branch," Nay finished up my own explanation.
"Yeah, he is the only one who can sneak under their radar," I confirmed.
"Under their what?" Nay asked, a puzzled look appearing on her face.
"Nevermind," I shook my head upon realizing my mistake. 'I guess I need to watch what I'm saying a lot more.'
After this short exchange, our small talk died off, forcing us to walk down the street to the docks in total silence… disturbed only by the constant shouting of people and noises they made while working. And soon after reaching our destination, I found the place I was looking for.
"Let's try over there first," I suggested, raising my hand to point at a shabby-looking inn, hidden somewhat behind the main area of the docks.
"Are you trying to save money now?" Nay asked, raising her eyebrows in surprise as she looked over to an impressive-looking building of the sailors guild. "Wouldn't it be easier to find a captain with a ship over there?"
"Finding a captain, sure," I agreed with Nay's suggestion, only to put a small smile on my face as I picked up the pace and headed towards the Inn I pointed out. "But what we need, is not only a captain with ship and crew, but a captain that is desperate for money enough to agree to my very specific terms!"