79. A promise in the wilderness (above)

The first rays of sunlight at dawn flooded the newly emerged wilderness, and the four of us sat on the back of a beast of prey in the rising sunlight. Kurtz sat at the front of the beast's neck and acted as its handler. The beast was clearly uncomfortable with its new master and seemed to snort restlessly. Kurtz stroked the beast's huge head affectionately, gently tried to move its curved horns and fished a carrot out of his pocket and stuffed it into his mouth, which immediately let out a low chirp of delight, like the whistle of a sea vessel setting sail.

I had stayed up all night again last night, finally allowing Gogo to see how Kiger and I had been frantically working on our fire magic scrolls, but I had drifted off to sleep before we set sail. Kiger was no better, as Sister Gogo wanted us to rest for another half day and follow the Wind Chasers into the wilderness at noon, so that we could take care of ourselves during the first part of the journey, but we politely declined, and Sister Singh carefully laid a thick blanket on the leather saddle on the back of the beast. We continued to catch up on our sleep. Katrina took care of both of us in case we fell off in our sleep, which would have been a disaster.

Under the watchful eyes of old Kulu and Sister Gogo, our group left the caravan camp in silence just before sunrise and headed out into the wilderness.

I changed back into my stiff leather jacket again. Old Kulu said that the nights in the spring moor were particularly cold and told me to keep warm. This wilderness was a place of novelty and strangeness to me.

I curled up in my saddle and slept with the very rhythmic footsteps of the beast. The sun was so strong that I couldn't open my eyes. I put my hands over my eyes to create a pergola and squinted into the distance, looking out over the vast wasteland of dead grass, the ragged dry clover already trampled by the animals. The grass swayed in the cold wind, its roots frozen to a lavender colour.

Beside her, Kiggy was still asleep, very cleverly wearing a blindfold so that she was not awakened by the blinding sunlight. She was dressed in a lotus-striped magic top and trousers, with a pair of long, high leather shoes, probably tied tightly around her collar because she was afraid of the cold wind in the wilderness. It was the uniform of the Royal Grimm Junior College of Magic, with the most useful magical pattern for apprentice wizards, said to increase spellcasting speed, and according to Kiger, it was also known as the "Devotion Magic Suit", which I envied.

Kiger once said to me secretly, "What's in it for you if you follow the wizard Gogo back to Eltown? I'm afraid the junior magic academy there doesn't have enough students to fill a class all year round, and there are no good magic teachers to teach you magic, so why not come back to the capital with me? From the moment Kiger saw my magical talent, she decided that I would become a wizard like her, and told me with a sneaky fox-like smile that we were both born wizards, born with magical talent. I didn't know what her magical gift was, and I didn't ask, I didn't think it was good to carry too many secrets in my heart, my heart would be tired, and she didn't volunteer them. But I didn't say yes to her invitation after all, and decided to follow Sister Gogo to Eltown.

Katrina was wearing a slightly tight suit of leather armour, a beautifully crafted set of tight-fitting leather armour made of magical antelope skin, but I think it had been tailored for Kiger, which is why it was slightly slimmer on Katrina. I was worried that she might not be able to breathe because of the tightness of her breasts, but I was wrong. She wrapped herself up in a black cloak and even had a scarf around her head, showing only her big red eyes as she gazed curiously around her at the landscape of the moor, and occasionally checking on the sleeping Kiger and me who had woken up in a daze.

"How far have we come?" I stood up and looked in the direction I had come from. I could no longer see the caravan's camp, only the rolling hills at the edge of the sky, which had become so faint in colour that only a rough outline could be seen, the last shadows of the Northern Foothills, which would disappear from our eyes as we moved deeper into the moor.

Katrina looked at the sun overhead and pulled her scarf down over her mouth and nose, revealing her fair face and red lips to me uncertainly, "We've been walking all morning, it must be a few dozen miles!"

I looked out over the wilderness, a desolate landscape in all directions, and as I licked my dry lips, Katrina unhooked the sheepskin water bladder from her waist and handed it to me, squinting her bright red eyes to follow my gaze outwards and asking me, a little confused, "Ja, there's nothing in this wilderness, where are we going hunting?" .

I thought that even if we met a large herd of bison, we wouldn't be able to catch up with them, and that the beast we were riding would only last a short while even if we jogged. As for my hunting goals with Kurtz, at first we just wanted to go into the wilderness, find the water source Kurtz remembered, and hunt some single antelope there, so we could take the skins and horns back to Gurudin and sell them, or ask Uncle Fred to make us a cool light armour made of antelope skin, which Kurtz had been bragging about how tough and durable it was. Kurtz kept bragging about how tough and durable it was, and how all the warriors of his tribe had great leather armour for their bar mitzvahs.

Kurtz will be attending such a bar mitzvah when he returns to Gurudin this time. Being able to wear a cool piece of antelope leather armour for Kuz's bar mitzvah was the reason why we decided to go into the wilderness in the first place. But now, with all the things we've encountered in Yemen Town, the leather armour is not so important anymore, and with my sharper weapon, I've set my sights higher. To make up a pot of arrows, we would have to hunt at least five or six wolves.

One thing I found very strange was the look of sadness on Old Kulu's face before we left. Although he hid it well, I could clearly feel his concern for us, as if he knew that we would be in danger if we entered the wilderness, but he had no intention of leaving us with the caravan, instead he was very eager to let us enter the wilderness, which puzzled me.

Our caravan, with its thunder rhinoceros and magical caravans, would have to bypass the northern foothills and the Yelen Mountains to reach the town of Gurudin, with a short stopover at some orc tribes on the way, Master Leipas wanting to do business, and Gadisha, the Dance Maiden, wanting to learn the war dance from these tribes. Old Kulu wanted me and Kurtz to travel across the northern foothills in a month and a half, find the trail through the Yelen Mountains, cross the mountains in a Yagyu beast and reach Gurudin early, teach the poor orcs in the town to make vermicelli, and when the caravan arrived in Gurudin, we would sell the vermicelli to Master Leipas and let him take the vermicelli made from ground potatoes back to the Grimm Empire, completing our initial idea of exchanging vermicelli for wine for The initial idea was to exchange the vermicelli for food.

But I think this plan is only a preliminary idea, in which Old Kulu has not taken into account one problem, that is, the work of secrecy, making vermicelli is actually not difficult to say, once someone has told Master Leipas, what will happen no one can predict, after all, the human tradition of not eating ground potato has been deeply rooted in people's hearts, but want to get a large number of cheap vermicelli, other than using ground potato Is there anything else you can do?

I heard that the Prosperity Adventurers had left yesterday to enter the wilderness, but Mingqian and some of Daj's close friends stayed with the caravan, and it was said that Mingqian was still recovering from his injuries. If the first time I hit Mingqian with a coin was an insult to him, the second time when I drew my dagger and stabbed him in the neck, we were enemies for life and death. A few of us had slipped out of the caravan before dawn in order to postpone this encounter as far back as possible, giving us time to make some preparations and take advantage of our position.

I lay on the back of the beast and gazed up at the blue sky, I felt like a bird under the wide canopy.

"Hare, oh! Ja, we've got lunch!"

Kurtz sat in front of me and jumped like a monkey off the head of the beast, his alloy bow in his hand while he was still in mid-air, and with his other hand he drew a feathered iron arrow from the pot behind him. "Only then did I follow Kurtz's eyes from the back of the beast and see the fat rabbit pouting and nibbling on the grass fifty metres away.

The iron feathered arrow made a straight linear trajectory through the grass, breaking through I don't know how many blades of barren grass, and landed hard on the hare's waist and belly, with such force that it sent the several pound hare flying several metres away, the tip of the arrow plunging hard into the mound. Kurtz and I were both a little dumbfounded, Kurtz looking at the alloy bow in his hand and turning his head to look at me with disbelief.

I walked over to him in a big way, patted him on the shoulder and said, "Good aim!"

Kurtz nodded somewhat distractedly and even forgot to pick up the rabbit.

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