The wind was blowing from a great distance.

The Moby Gas Inland Sea is quite vast, and for most people who have never left it in their lives, it is not much different from the open sea.

Experienced sailors and captains will tell you that even the fastest sailing ship will have to walk a full week to see the other shore in the best weather conditions if you set off from the port of Vasa to the east coast – but this way of calculating distance is obviously only between sailors, and the average person can probably only understand the most intuitive concepts such as big and very big.

The wide expanse of the sea allows the cold air flowing from the open sea to move unhindered, and in unsheltered coastal areas, such as the Acasta plain where we are now, these cold winds blowing from thousands of miles away become so biting.

Unlike Inznir, the southern province of West Valier, which has a strait to block strong winds, the Ecasta Plain offers a direct view of the white sand beaches that glean like silver when you head straight to the east.

As a result, the vast and flat land near the east was not used for cultivation or grazing, and only the part of the land closer to the interior near Yongchun was inhabited by farmers and herders. Because the temperature on the coast of Ecasta is so weird, when there is no wind, it is like spring in the center of the plain, but when the wind blows, even northerners can't help but need to put on an extra coat.

As a direct result of the temperature drop, almost all of the rest of the country is uninhabited except for Ashinir and the villages that depend on it, and you won't encounter anything but tenacious wild animals and monsters.

The wind was blowing from a long distance, and it had been a morning since the motorcade had started. It was approaching evening, and the long convoy rested at the edge of a forest on the eastern side of the plain.

The cold wind blowing from the sea can be felt at the edge of the forest, and it is thanks to these forests far east of Ashinir that the strong wind is blocked by the strong winds, and the center of the plain is full of spring all year round.

Large horse-drawn convoys don't usually choose to travel at night, and even with torches and oil lamps, poor visibility at night can always make things messy.

Not to mention that the vast majority of beasts of prey and carnivorous monsters are nocturnal animals, and there are enough 7 species of wolves that exist in the Ekasta Plains alone to come out and hunt in groups at night.

Stopping near evening, resting early, and then starting again at around 5 a.m. when dawn begins to be, is the option that most large convoys choose.

More than 30 stoves were set up in a clearing at the edge of the forest, and free-form mercenaries lined up next to the stoves, waiting for the honey bread to be baked.

The bread co-issued by the Chamber of Commerce is baked on site, and the ingredients are easier to preserve than the finished product, so the only way to eat fresh bread every day during a half-month trip is to do so.

The stove is made of simple clay and bricks, and the clay is made of local materials, and you can dig down with a shovel – or even just with your own hands – anywhere on the Ekasta plain.

The bricks were brought in, and they were carefully crafted from a finer red clay and then fired at high temperatures. The stove was built to be small enough to bake a small pillow-sized amount of honey bread, and a full amount of bread was enough to meet the food needs of a large man for more than a day. The chefs baked the tanned dough in the oven on wooden carriages, the sweet smell of honey bread permeated the woodland, and the wooden tables on either side were placed with baked bread, and the mercenaries took their turn to take it and leave.

Thirty stoves fed the food of hundreds of mercenaries for a fairly short period of time, and after processing that, the cooks went on to process the food of the paid travelers—mostly worse than the mercenaries, just coarse rye bread, but some more elaborate.

When all this is done, they carefully break up the clay on the outer layer of the bricks and remove the masonry again for the next use.

Henry and Mira took their portions, and then went to a place where there were fewer people and sat down to eat.

The bread was not wrapped in any of them, and the attentive and clean-loving Mira had spent two iron coins - which was about three denno - to buy four clean cotton cloths to wrap the food that could not be eaten, while most of the other mercenaries simply took it with their dirty hands and tore off a few leaves at random to pay for it.

Neither of them communicated with anyone else along the way, as was the case with most of the freelance mercenaries. Except for a few people who would approach regular mercenary groups and caravans with a smile on their own agenda, most of the others were doing their own thing.

Many people walked past them, and from the short bows they held in their hands, they could tell that they wanted to go to the forest to hunt some kind of animal to add a little flesh to their dinner. The Chamber of Commerce did not stop this, and even if those people were gone, no one would care, and it must be because of why they chose to pay a daily wage. It's easy work, but you have to be in the team every day to get paid, and if you leave, you get nothing.

Henry took a bite of the steaming bread, and Mira drew the short sword he had at his waist and carefully slipped through it. The girl was clearly getting closer to him now, and she didn't even ask the sage himself for advice when she did so.

The bread with some burnt surface softened and melted in the mouth, and the sweetness of honey, the aroma of wheat and the bitterness of the burnt black were very intoxicating together, and Henry took a bite and watched as more and more people sat down to enjoy dinner.

The sound of "crackling" flames burning branches that had not completely dried up could be heard not far behind him, apparently someone had hit his prey and was dealing with it at this time. The sage lowered his head to glance at Mira, who was taking a small bite of the chopped bread, and after a moment's thought, he asked her.

"Do you know how to hunt?" he asked, and Mira raised her little face, and she froze for a moment, then looked at Henry with disdain.

"Put the bread away, take that one, and come with me," said Henry, wrapping the bread in the clean cotton cloth that Mila had bought, and then taking off his short black cloak from his neck, placing it in the center along with the bread that Mira had put in, folding it in half, wrapping it, and rolling it up again and again to make a simple bag.

Mira bit the small piece of bread she had cut and grabbed the dagger that was only a tool to Henry, and the sage looked and looked, and finally removed the scabbard from his belt, and gave her the belt that held the cloak in place.

"It's yours," said Henry, to Mira, and the girl looked down at the equally patterned dagger in her hand, and did not squeak for a long time.

The black-haired sage pulled out a shorter knife from the other side of her waist, and the girl behind her pulled her belt to secure the scabbard to her slender waist. The extra belt was tangled in a knot with her, and the dagger in her hand was clenched tightly as she followed behind Henry.

Crossing the resting place of the convoy and entering the deeper forest, the two immediately felt a chill, without the fire that gave people a warm feeling, and the evening sun was almost blocked by dense foliage, and the overall gray-blue forest seemed silent and cold.

The girl looked left and right at the forest, and in small steps came closer to Henry.

The sage noticed the movement behind him, he reached out and touched her head, and then began to deliberately control his steps not to make too much movement, while patting the girl's little head to signal that she did the same.

They walked for a while, and when they reached a place where they could not hear the human voice at all, Henry slowed down a little.

There was a rustling sound in the bushes beneath the trees ahead, and Henry carefully controlled his posture, and Mira behind him did the same.

But the rustling stopped suddenly, and Henry glanced shrewdly to the right and left, then grabbed some dry dirt from the ground and waved it down.

The dust drifted behind the two of them, and it was the downwind position. He frowned, the low bushes were obviously small herbivores like hares, timid and easily startled by smells or sudden movements, but neither he nor Mira had just made any sound, and the smell of their food could not be smelled in the downwind position.

Ruling it out in this way, there was only one possibility, and Henry's searching eyes finally locked on something crawling on the ground diagonally in front of him and Mira, and then turned his head to look at the girl.

"Do you eat snake meat?" asked the sage softly.

......

......

The girl from the Roan looked a little depressed at Henry, who was skinning neatly on the other side, and their results were not small, a python weighing a few pounds and a small hare with gray and black coats. Even without spices, a simple roast with honey bread can obviously make a hearty dinner – so that's not what makes the girl a little depressed.

What made her sullen was what had happened a few minutes ago—the black-haired sage had rushed out with an arrow, and at the same time flung out the knife in his hand and stabbed the python's body accurately—

Grabbing its tail, he picked it up and killed the rabbit next to him.

At the same time, Mira, who also ran out when Henry rushed out, sat on the ground with wide eyes and wide eyes because of the exaggerated movements of the sage.

The white-haired big Lori was looking very dejected by Henry, he thought for a moment, and then beckoned to Mira.

The two did not return closer to the camp. Places where you can rest, such as carriages, are the exclusive domain of the Chamber of Commerce and its travelers, and more freelance mercenaries are looking for their own places. So staying there is actually not much different from running farther away, it's all sleeping in the wilderness, so it's better to find a quiet place to spend the night without being disturbed.

The girl from the Loan came over, she didn't quite know what Henry wanted her to do, and the sage didn't explain: "Sit down," he said, and Mira cleared the ground a little, and then sat down.

"Did you make a fire?" asked Henry, and Mira couldn't help but give him another look of disdain, but the sage shook his head, "No, not in the inn, but in the wild. ”

He pulled out a rough black stone with silver intervals from the small leather bag on his belt, then drew the knife he had just slain the python and struck the stone with the back of the knife.

"Click—click—" The girl was startled by the dazzling spark that flashed in front of Mira, and the sage then pulled out some of the materials he had collected during this time.

"If you want to live, it's not enough to know how to fight, you try. He handed the knife and the stone to Mira, and the girl swallowed, then struck the stone with the back of the knife, as Henry had just done.

"Click—click—" Henry nodded, then grabbed some of the dried leaves he had picked up earlier, kneaded them into balls, and placed them in the clearing between them.

"Try to light it," he said, and Mira looked at him, then leaned down and began to pound the stone hard. Sparks splashed around, and after dozens of seconds of non-stop attempts, the girl finally succeeded in setting the dead leaves on fire.

"Oh!" she let out a small exclamation, and then looked up at Henry, her eyes sparkling.

"It feels great to do this," said Henry, smiling at her, "You told me before that you had to learn and learn how to fight, and I believe you had some very majestic scenery in mind." ”

He said, and the girl paused for a moment, nodding silently.

"Definitely. Whether they are powerful magicians or great sages, their power comes from and is respected for knowledge. ”

"But, Mira," said Henry, solemnly calling her name for the second time in these days, "knowledge is not very distant, not untouchable. Rather, they are present in every detail, everywhere in life. ”

The sage held out a finger and pointed to his head.

"Knowledge comes from your own mind, use it"

"To think, to observe, to remember, to summarize, and more than anything else—" he said, "to use." ”

The dead leaves gradually burned, and Henry picked out some of the tiniest of the branches he had prepared earlier, and put them together to form a cone that enveloped the flames, while Mira listened attentively, observing his movements.

"I won't, and can't teach you everything," he said, "and no one can do that."

"What I will teach you is how to use your way of thinking, and how to be eager to explore, to gain more knowledge. ”

"Only then can you really be who you want to be. ”

Henry said, and Mira listened in silence, nodding for a while, but then shaking her head again.

"It's too esoteric for me to understand," the girl said bluntly, and Henry was stunned for a moment, then showed a wry smile.

"I'm sorry, to put it simply, I will start teaching you from the most basic place, and you have to observe and learn more, knowledge cannot be passively acquired, you can't wait for me to teach you, but you must take the initiative to observe and learn. Henry said this, and then added thicker branches to the already burning fire.

Mira's eyes were fixed on the growing fire, and this time she nodded very earnestly.

"I see"

"Teacher"

It was already night, and the big Lori, whose face was half illuminated by the firelight in the forest, replied with her crisp voice and smile.