Every few turns felt like I was going home.
An odd feeling.
The bushes, the trees, the fields, none of it was supposed to be familiar. Heck, I'd never been here and it was fundamentally impossible to equate this place to 'home' which was hundreds of miles away.
Yet-
Almost every corner of this never-ending ride felt like I was getting closer and closer to home, which was true. But not in the literal sense. Every now and then I'd see a tree and hopelessly- at least for a couple of seconds- assume I was home. But I wasn't. Our no named village was at the literal edge of the Southern continent, and we were on the other fucking end.
"You're awfully restless," Kayla said.
The carriage didn't have good suspension so it kept shaking. The road wasn't very good to begin with but it also came with occasional stones or blobs of dirt that got under the wheels, making it shake extra hard. It wasn't a decent carriage, but at least it was better than walking.
Or so was my initial assumption but at this point, walking was probably going to be more pleasant.
Why?
It was a single cow pulled carriage with an open back and a bamboo seating area without any roofing.
Frankly, I wanted to walk.
"I am," I said. "Who wouldn't be. This is so slow!"
"Hey!" The owner fired back. "If it's too slow for ya, get off!"
I'd seen him arguing with his wife before leaving. So, I could sort of understand why he was furious but god damn! I wanted to lash out too!
"Could you please focus on driving rather than yelling at a child?" Arnet said. "You're making a fool out of yourself."
The driver grumbled but shrugged and kept his eyes on the road.
Meanwhile, Kayla gave me a disapproving glance. "Not like you."
"Not like me?"
"You're usually more mature."
"I'm a child."
"Indeed," she agreed.
Didn't know why but it only pissed me off even more.
Why the fuck did everything annoy me so much today anyway?
What the hell!
"Sol," Alustur said, finally opening on eye, crossed legged, his sword behind his back. "Get down. Walk, and swing."
"Excuse me, what?"
"First, run to that tree and then walk and swing."
"You can't expect me to-"
"Twice."
I grumbled, took his fucking sword and jumped off the carriage.
Ach, my back!
Maybe I shouldn't have spent so much time sitting so stupidly. Still, I had to do something to keep my mind distracted. Perhaps Alustur wanted to give me that something. Or maybe he just wanted to mess with me.
It'd been a while since I'd done any proper running. Yet, I didn't run out of stamina. I was running in weird angles to stay in the same range as the carriage, and yet I wasn't running out of stamina. Even after two whole rounds!
Woah, I've gotten better. Next, I caught up with the carriage, swung around like a moron, even imitating some of Alustur's vertical slash stuff and just kept it up. Sweating, heart pounding, and muscles all tense, yet, yet I was doing it just fine and the more I did it, the more my mind was at ease and the better I felt!
I could do this all day!
Or so I naively thought before I started heavily panting and Alustur jumped out to pull be back on top of the carriage. "You did well. But too many wasted moves. Who told you to imitate me?"
"Just swinging one way is boring."
"I suppose."
But now that the extra heat from my body dissipated, I started to reek of sweat and it hurt. Oww… maybe I should have taken it easy after all?
Yet, no one complained. In fact, Kayla allowed me to rest on her lap. Arnet kept glaring at me but I ignored him like the little child I was.
The ride was still hella boring though.
There was nothing out here. No fucking thing. Not even a fucking Fiend!
"Why are fiends so scarce?" I asked.
"Because they're constantly hunted," Alustur said.
"Even in the ocean, there weren't that many."
"They were small in numbers from the beginning," Kayla said, "That's what my grandfather used to say. Long ago, the sea goddess Zakia created all life in the sea. Her divine mana gave birth to ferocious fiends that guard the sacred sea and-"
"Zakia, not Askavan?" I said. The church claimed, everything was Askavan's creation. And I remember hearing about Zakia in the ocean. Goribo spoke about the World Tree or something which I found no evidence for.
"Lord Askavan is the true ruler of the world!" The driver exclaimed, stopping the whole thing. "You heathens, get off!"
We got off.
"What an asshole," I said.
"Yeah," Kayla agreed.
Alustur and Arnet, said nothing. But their glances seemed to indicate that I should have kept my mouth shut.
But I didn't.
"Tell me more about Zakia. I want to know."
"Lady Zakia. She's the creator of the high seas."
"Right, right. Lady Zakia. Tell me more about her."
"Long ago, she created the ocean. Then filled it up with marine life and blessed the world. But then Askavan, the zealous dragon descended upon the mortal plains and waged war through his pawns, and even violated both Zakia and Slovia, who gave birth to many demigods. Zakia was furious and shed tears. Her tears salted the ocean and poisoned the guardian fiends. The corrupted fiends turned violent. Meanwhile, Zakia hid from the world in shame."
Although there was a road, there were no other carriages. I could see occasional houses and even people but they too far away. The Southern continent almost always felt like a village compared to the megacities of the Western continent.
"So even now, she's in the ocean?" I said.
"Yes," Kayla said.
"What about the sea serpent? Or the world tree. Any idea what they are?"
"I've heard that the sea serpent was also a god that was cursed or something. There's a lot of folklore about him but I don't know much. And the world tree? Are you talking about the great tree of the Southern Continent? I forgot it's name."
"No, no, I mean something different."
Kayla shook her head. She didn't know.
Frankly, I couldn't remember the name of that big Southern tree either. Just that it produced really amazing honeycrisps. Even now I couldn't forget about the taste of the stuff I had on my birthday and-
Sigh.
Speaking of honeycrisps, we still had half of the create left, which Arnet reluctantly carried. Every now and then I picked up a fruit and merrily chomped away. We had to finish this by tomorrow otherwise most of them was going to spoil.
"Why are you so into gods and goddesses anyway?" Kayla asked.
"Oh, I'm supposedly a Paladin candidate or something like that," I said.
"What is that?" Kayla asked.
"Means, he'll be a bigshot in the Askavan church," Arnet said.
Kayla's brows furrowed. "I see."
"Don't worry; I don't like them either." I knew we didn't have any around and even so I spoke very softly.
"They're scum!" Kayla didn't have a volume button though.
Anyway, we kept walking.
We more or less overtook the slow carriage. The driver of which kind of glared. But he didn't do anything stupid, yet.
***
We were going to camp outside.
That hadn't changed now that our ride wasn't with us.
"Remember, there aren't any dangerous fiends around but that doesn't mean, you should let your guard down. Even a mosquito can be dangerous."
"Technically they're the most dangerous animal around," I said. "Probably kills more people than even people."
"By sucking their blood?" Arnet said, dubious.
"They can give you many diseases," I said. "You know, you get bitten and then you develop a fever and then you die."
"No, you don't," he shrugged.
I'd forgotten that most people in this world didn't get the same diseases. They were almost immune to the stuff. They probably still got occasionally sick from mosquitoes or other stuff but it wasn't the same as back on earth. "I'm wrong then," I gave up.
"No, they do carry diseases," Alustur said. "But people kill more."
I didn't bother with that conversation.
Instead, I helped them light up a fire, and then I practiced a bit with wind.
"What are you doing?"
"Controlling the fire with the wind. Trying to see if I can make it bigger without messing with the fire or the wood," I said.
"You need a fuel-source for fire."
"Of course," I said. "I'm using mana in that regard."
"Inefficient," Kayla said.
"You know magic?"
"No. But I studied it at school."
Oh wow, she went to school.
"What'll be more efficient?"
"I don't know but that's what I heard at school. I don't pay attention you see."
Sigh.
Anyway, I kept at it.
The more mana and pure oxygen I fed the fire, the more it grew. Even without being connected to the burning wood. I could isolate the fire, and condense it and then throw it like a ball of pure flame.
"That's pretty good," Alustur said. "Way better than when you first started."
He'd actually seen some of my earlier attempts back at the academy.
"Well of course. I'm also using boost to make it more efficient; still eating up at least two, maybe three bone worth of mana. I wish I had more mana…"
"Fu!" Rexy wiggled and blew at the ball and it just doubled in size. I needed to do nothing.
No, it had nothing to do with me to begin with. She just doubled my frigging fireball!
"Woah!"
That would have required at least five or even six manafish bones!
"That's awesome… how'd you do it?" I said.
She said nothing and went back to sleep.
"That lizard is amazing," Kayla mumbled.
"I know right! That's my Rexy!"
Arnet rolled his eyes and moved away. Apparently sick of our little weird show.
Meanwhile, I focused on what had happened. I couldn't feel mana being fed to the fireball. If anything, it just grew on its own.
But how?
It wasn't oxygen. It wasn't like we could do fusion or fission out here in these conditions, so what the fuck was this?
What was this?
No, no, stop thinking in terms of earth science. I thought science was going to help me. I thought science would give me an edge. But in reality, it was becoming a burden now. I was hitting a literal limit. A ceiling.
"Give it a rest for tonight," Alustur said. "You still have two months to figure it out."
"You're right."
I still had plenty of stuff I hadn't tried in the book either.