log 003

We have reached the frozen peaks nearly thirteen days after my last log. I have reached this place in nearly half of the time that my predecessors took to come here( granted that was kind of expected since my predecessors weren't exactly formation masters, so they naturally couldn't just have kept the ship running even if they wanted to.) Which I am considering to be a minor achievement in and of itself. Look at the positive side, I guess.

Anyway, Trevor at the moment seems to be very hyperactive, especially with Andrew who seems to have worn some part of his uniform in a wrong manner, which is literally the worst thing you can do in front of trevor. Again, I am thankful that I do not have an uniform.

Anyways, I can finally feel the ship descend. The formation of the ship have degraded so much that any form of auto piloting has completely disappeared if it had in the first place. Thankfully, that will be managed by the folk from the frozen peaks. They are not idiots to let a ship be controlled by anybody other than themselves when it is so near their cities. That is the easiest way to level a city you know. Fill a ship with bombs and then park it in the city to explode it to pieces.

Right now our ship will be stored by the snowwinders somewhere that only they shall know about until it is time for us to leave. It is both a method of preventing escape and precaution to make sure we don't blow them up( granted if they knew about our ships they would know that we would not be able to blow them up)

We fall with a thud that nearly floors everybody on the ship, which means that the suspension formation are damaged somehow. Let's just hope the folks outside have not noticed us. It is kind of embarrassing.

The instant that we guys left the safety of the airship, I had two thoughts in my mind. The very first thought was about the coldness that I felt the instant that I left mouth of the airship. It is harder to describe the second thought, let's do it this way.

Have you ever seen the sight of a deer in the presence of a lion. Right now I have the feeling that I must be looking the same. My back is slick with sweat which is not something that one can expect in this frigid weather, yet the cold is barely in my notice. Well, Those of the snowwind are of the imperial faction and the imperials are known for their presence.

The only reason that these people have any form of diplomatic relation with the black mountain is that the black mountain is not an enemy that they cannot afford to have, regardless of how many ruins they have ended up destroying. This naturally means that they will become our enemy the instant that we show a moment of weakness. Right now I am standing on the edge of a sword and even the smallest of mistake will separate my head from my body.

The reason for that is the old man in front of me is the commander of the frozen peaks. I have never seen such an old man. He resembled more a skeleton than a human if I am to be honest. Though that did not make him any less powerful. If the reports of the head office are to be believed this means that this man is a expert of the fifth circle.

That means that he is roughly about the same level as a general of the black mountain. Even on black mountain there are only three generals. That means that this man needs to look at me wrong and I will be ripped to pieces. It is literally the authority of the black mountain that is keeping me alive.

I am thankful that I worn my armour, which honestly does not seem as impressive as I was hoping it to be. It was a formation armour known as "vine armour". It is not a fancy name but I have been exhausted the last couple of days. It resembles a bunch of vines covering me, which I thought would give me a more rugged look. In hindsight, I had forgotten that we are about to go to a place where even mana tends to freeze. Something a bit more tight would have been better. I will explain its creation some other day, if possible. It certainly took quite the bit of creativity from my side.

Anyway, I am on the verge of running away screaming looking at this old man. I don't know how to describe it but at the moment the old man seemed to be growing bigger and bigger in my eyes, taking nearly all of my vision. For a second I am left wondering if this is some kind of technique.

"Young captain, I greet you. It is rare for us see such a young talent so far away from the center of the continent", the commander begins.

The instant that he speaks the illusion breaks and the intense feeling of fear that I experienced looking at him disappears. Now the fear I feel is that of a man trying to impress his superior. The only thing is that the cost of failure here is death.

"i bow down to you, commander. ", I begin, trying my best not to keep my fear to show on my face as I bow as is customary with this bunch. These are very particular people "i apologize for the pitiful state that you have found us in, but It has not been easy for us to make our way to this place at best of times and right at the onset of winter. I had assumed people were exaggerating when they told us that the winter of the north was capable of killing most mages. My overconfidence has caused us to suffer."

"That certainly seems to be a mistake from our side and as the commander, I will apologize to you. We should have been more hospitable and sent a couple people to welcome you. Sadly even we are restricted by the onset of winter", the commander spoke, leaving me to wonder what hidden trap lay in this apology. If only I could gather my thoughts, I am sure that I would find it. That is a task for later "for now, let us forgo much more serious talks. It is bad luck to stand too long at the door. you seem to be exhausted, so we shall speak again later."

Saying that the old man disappeared as quickly as he appeared. For an instant, I had the feeling as If a massive weight was released from my body. I can feel my thoughts slow down as if I have spent the last couple of hours working on a particular hard formation.

There were two soldiers who were standing at attention to the side, who took us to our quarters. A male and a female soldier, with strength roughly equivalent to me. Maybe I can hold my own against them, but that would require me to go all out.

(The next day)

Well, I am kind of embarassed with my performance yesterday. I would have liked to say that I had recovered from the presence of the old man the instant that he left, but it just seemed to get worse afterwards. It almost felt as if I had fought the greatest battle of my life in those few minutes. The instant that I saw a bed i had ended up unconscious on it. I don't even really need to sleep that long.

I have reviewed the thoughts that I have recorded yesterday and i discovered that there was nothing in there except my records. You see, it is the duty of the combat troops of the black mountain to maintain clear and well maintained records during the process of any mission that they have gone through.

This information contains nearly every bit of information that a person is experiencing. Some advanced versions of thought logs are even able to record a person experiences such as smell, taste and all the other senses into their log as well, though such logs are ridiculously rare and are rarely created for some reason.

You never know which place you might end up needing to take over, so any and all information is welcome. You have the obvious information such as the defences and the troop placements, but even petty informations such as the sleep schedule of the people, the places of rest or even the kind of street food that a place might have( you would be surprised just how much the poison mages are able to do with such information.)

To explain this thing particularly well, one cannot forget about the iron forest. The iron forest was one of the last centers of power for the druids. Iron forest and it's legendary iron wall (a dome of iron wood that surrounded the iron forest and something that not even a general could destroy) that was a place that had managed to survive against the invasion of an general and his troops and nearly managed to annihilate that troop. The reason that it was destroyed was from the log of a soldier known as Albert, who noticed the fact that the soldiers of iron forest had a habit of watering the iron wall to realize that it was a tree. A bit of poison and the druids became a part of history.

I have a personal reason to tell this story as well, since it was from this place that we managed to acquire a majority of the druidic spells that the black mountain has records on. It is these spells that my master specialises and what I am preparing to specialise in.

Anyway, in the record yesterday no such information is existing. The only thing that I noticed that would be useful from the logs yesterday is the walls that surround this place. While I cannot say with complete certainty I have a feeling that the place has very powerful formations guarding it. As for the exact details, such as the type of formation, the mana consumption or at the very least the class of the formation it is not something that I have a idea on. The fact that even me, a formation mage could not identify the class of the formation( regardless of how indisposed I ended up at the moment.) Means that is atleast a class five formation and could be even lower than that.

Looking at the wall, nobody would feel that. The wall itself was not in the most perfect postion, with the wall giving an ancient and eroded vibe. The holes that are present in the wall gave it an look as if these people had just survived through a very grueling war which given the stories about this fort could be a pretty reasonable guess.

It also makes sense looking at the region we are standing in. This place is constantly bombarded with the snow storms from the northern wastelands. Any fort that can last for millenia in any other location won't even last for a month in this place.

For acquiring any other information though, we have yet to meet any other person of this fort. Being isolated like this is not a good thing as far as I can tell. That is the standard procedure that the snowwind army has when dealing with their enemies. General lockdown and extremely limited contact with the troops and other things. Well, these are worries that I will need to consult to Trevor. He honestly understands these stuff better than me. It is for this reason that he was sent here anyways.