The scale

Leaving the city by night was a reasonable choice. It made hunting us down all the harder for those who might wish harm upon us.

But what I failed to see through in advance, was how it would impact our departure as well.

'This sucks,' I thought as we walked down a long path leading from the city proper to the city gates.

The massive fortifications that surrounded the place along with long-eroded marks of battles of the past hinted at what kind of history brought forth the current political scenario of this world.

Sadly, as a mercenary, this wasn't knowledge I could ever have any need for. And while I knew a lot about the battles that happened, I could hardly put them in place or time.

Yet, the enormous size of the land protected by the wall now meant one thing.

We were exposed.

Out in the open, walking across a massive plain…

And with our torches lit up.

There was no other way about it.

The meager light of the torches was barely enough to let the horses crawl across the road. Any attempts at speeding up or, god forbid, killing the light, would be the fastest way to have them twist their ankles.

What I internally know thanks to the memories of my host, I failed to predict because I didn't deem this kind of auxiliary knowledge important enough to properly digest it.

I took a deep breath before pulling my three horses to make yet a few more steps.

'It should start getting brighter any moment now,' I thought while looking up at the open skies with hope.

Not only were the clouds receding, it would soon be time for the sun to rise. After all, between preparing, leaving the inn, looking for the stables, and then getting all the luggage and horses organized, it took us about an hour.

But to cross a mere half of the distance from the stables to the city wall, we were now traveling for another hour!

'One more hour to get to the gates, and we should be able to bolt out of here with the sun shining on our…' I took a moment to recall the map of the place constructed from the memories of my host. 'First to the right, then on our backs…'

I took a moment to recalculate my thinking.

'No, even assuming we will be able to travel at the best possible speed, by the time we reach the first relay station, we will be riding toward the sunset…'

A long sigh escaped my lips as I imagined the scale of the journey ahead.

"If everything goes right, we should reach the port in two days."

I took a little risk by speaking about my plans out loud… But just how careful could I be?

Even though it was dark, now that we'd lit our torches, there was a ring of visibility that allowed me to peer a considerable distance away. And as much as I could tell, there was no one anywhere near to hear my soft voice.

"Wait, what port town?" the kid suddenly freaked out.

On the other hand, Nay didn't even bat an eye.

'Well, it's not hard to figure out my plans when you see our current state,' I quickly realized.

Renting three horses per person was an extremely drastic measure. An absolute limit of how many horses one could use without losing mobility over the raising weight of all the feed.

And from there, it didn't take a genius to figure out the rest.

We were in a hurry to get somewhere, as fast as possible. With just two horses, we would tire them out over the course of a single day, forcing us to waste time on rest. But with three horses, we could push just a little further…

To the Imperial Express relay station located roughly one hundred and eighty kilometers down south, at the crossroad that held an extremely important quality.

While the southern path continued along the original route I took to reach the empire, it was the path splitting east that caught my attention.

Because contrary to its southern counterpart which took further one to two days worth of travel to reach the imperial border, the eastern path only took about twenty kilometers.

'One day to the relay station where we will change our horses and get a good night's rest. Then, one more day of constant riding should get us to the harbor.'

I took a deep breath… Only to realize that we've already approached the massive outer wall of the city. It was adorned with an enormous gate, easily allowing for four carriages to pass side by side through the gate's mouth.

Still, to my surprise, the gate was open.

And there was no one paying any mind to the traffic going through it.

'What?' I thought, looking left to right, instantly expecting an ambush. Sadly, it took a while for my host memories to kick in, allowing me to calm down and see reason.

Sadly, as I could feel Nay's intense stare drilling holes in my back during every second of my sudden fit of wariness.

The gate was open and unguarded because, in the current world, it would be unthinkable for any armed invasion or insurrection to occur within the imperial borders.

There was simply no point for the small to rise when they could easily be suppressed with the power of status. And with all the conflict one's heart could desire playing out just to the east in the scattered princedoms of the south, who could be dumb enough to attack the world's hegemon?

And with just those two points, I found the reason why we ended up passing through this tower-sized gate without any stop or delay. Then, we stepped out to the outside world…

Only for my jaw to lower a little as I stared off into the distance.

Maybe it was luck, maybe it was fate, but when we stood at the precipice at the wall's foot, the sun cast its first rays of light over the horizon, granting me a perfect view of a vast land ahead.

After descending from the ridge, we would enter a massive plain that spanned as far as I could see… The hilly area that would mark the middle of our journey was too far for me to see, even with my raised elevation when compared to the plain below.

"We need to cross this entire thing before midday," I muttered, feeling an innate sense to whine.

Now that I stood high above the ground and looked down on it, I couldn't help but feel… overwhelmed. Dwarfed and humbled by the scale of the journey ahead…

A journey that would take a few hours tops with a modern vehicle. But also a journey that would take me an entire day with nothing more but horses.

"We need to get down this point," I ordered, climbing up on the saddle of the cruiser to get a better viewing point. "There are stairs a bit to the south. And with the sun already rising…" I looked to the side, into the extreme brightness of the life-giving star.

"We should be already speeding down the imperial highway."