Kingdom Of The Weak

"It"s holding together with patches and jellyfish-glue, but it should get as far as Fal"Herim." Arnold pointed. "The whole fuel conversion system is gone for good, but if you power it manually, you should be able to get it to move. I wouldn"t push it, though, so go easy on the throttle. Stay below the halfway point and you should be able to avoid a breakdown."

"Right. Let"s go pick up the adventuring team." Mindy turned to Tim. "Are you guys ready?"

Tim glanced over his band of merry lynxmice and nodded. "Ready!"

Remian, Mindy and Tim got on the airship with Vigil and a squad of lynxmice. Remian invited Carrie to join them, but the moment he did, she had her claws out dug deep into the ground and absolutely refused to get on board. Candice and Denise joined them, readying their crossbows in case some flying Wild out there decided to have them for lunch.

Charlie"s crew of ten were likewise nervously handling weapons, generally crossbows with a single shortbow and a Wind Blade wand in the mix. Up until now, they had not encountered hostile Flying Wilds, but they were about to sail over all sorts of Wilds" nests and territories, and there was no telling whether any of them would have the power and temperament to attack the airship in the sky.

In a matter of hours, they crossed the Three Forks River, the border of Shadowflash Fief. The last time Remian had come this way, he had taken a day to reach this point, even with Carrie"s help.

Not long after they crossed the area known as the Rocky Ford, they pa.s.sed the Black Depths Lake. It had taken Remian the entirety of the second day to pa.s.s by that lake, before. Heading south on the airship with the lake on the left and broad savannah to the right, Remian wondered if all of the Wildlands was really this picturesque. It was a pleasant, peaceful few hours ride in the airship so far…

There ahead of them was the rocky canyon that they had taken three days to reach and pa.s.s through. On the right (East) side of the canyon, however, was something Remian hadn"t noticed before; a large swathe of sand with absolutely nothing visible growing on it.

"What is that?" Mindy asked Remian.

Remian grimaced. "I actually don"t know. I"ve never seen it before. It wasn"t visible from the ground when we pa.s.sed through here last time."

"Those are the Deadly Sands." Denise told Mindy. "n.o.body can cross them alive. The sands themselves would swallow anything walking upon them…"

"Quicksand?" Arnold asked from behind.

Just then, something in the sand area moved. Mindy gulped. "Did you see that?"

"Yep. I saw it." Remian nodded.

Mindy shivered. "There"s something alive down there."

"Let"s not mess around with it." Remian advised.

"Is that them?" Candice pointed. There at the near entrance of the rocky canyon was a camp.

"They"ve made it this far back already? That"s fast!" Remian blinked.

It was indeed Joshu and the adventuring team. They made a quick report as they boarded the airship.

Apparently, Spike still lived at Craggy Falls. He had not been kidnapped and moved to some weird secret base. Craggy Falls was just a little over three days away for the adventuring team. Spike had left a trail wider than the road the Iron Legion was building. Following him here all the way was no problem; the biggest difficulties they had was having to fight the various Wilds who were in a bad temper after the gigantic fellow rudely barged through their homes and territories.

But now they confirmed Spike"s location, Tim and Remian got to work; the lynxmice were deployed and the squad of little spies stealthily made their way south to keep watch on the big Spike-Back Lizard and find out how exactly he was being controlled.

Having deployed the spies and retrieved the adventuring team, Charlie"s airship turned and headed for home.

On the way back, of course, they stopped by at KarGoth and loaded up on cargo. Pa.s.sengers got down; other pa.s.sengers got on board. It was early the next morning before the journey home resumed.

What did "home" mean? Why, Ashdale, of course. Not only was Charlie bringing those seven friends of his back to his hometown, he was also dropping off a few crates and over a hundred lynxmice spies at Fal"Herim. That, and hopefully get some quick repairs done.

***

With the airship going as slowly as it did, the Roving Albatross took an entire day to limp its way to Fal"Herim. As they arrived at the Desert King"s City, however, Remian noticed something he hadn"t seen the last time he was here. "Is that… an Iron Legion camp?"

Mindy nodded. "Yep. And they"re building a road straight for us."

It was at least 5km long already. Clearly, the plan was for the Legionnaires in Fal"Herim and Fort Spoas to build the road from both sides and meet in the middle. The Fal"Herim side was making far more progress on the project than Marcus" trainees.

Remian felt a strange chill when he saw it. He should be happy, he thought. The road meant access, and trade and all those nice things. But when he saw it, he thought only one thing… "Fal"Herim is coming for us. Once the road is built, there"s no stopping the Desert King"s armies from marching straight to our doorstep."

For a minute there, Remian contemplated sabotage…

Then, he shook his head with a wry smile.

"What? What is it?" Mindy asked.

"I was just thinking about the time it would take for that road to be built." Remian mentioned. "I"m betting that DD"s injuries would heal before then."

In which case, if the Desert King did decide to send his armies marching along that road and cause trouble in Frontier Town, Remian would have a Tier 5 Diamond Bristle Boar in peak condition just waiting to greet them enthusiastically…

Speaking of which, Remian had to talk to everyone real quick to make sure n.o.body spilled the secret while they were out. Actually, not everyone knew that DD had sworn fealty. The most they knew was that the boar and the bull had been trapped in the pit. Remian simply had to have a few words with those precious few people on board who knew what happened after.

Charlie bought a few parts while they docked at Fal"Herim. This enabled them to increase their speed to roughly 80% of what it should have been as they continued on towards Ashdale.

They pa.s.sed over the free folk of Itarim, where the Iron Legion HQ was located, then skimmed over the kilometer wide borderlands between La Vive, one of the Seven Kingdoms, and neighboring country Germat. Borderlands in this continent were neutral territory; n.o.body was allowed to settle in the borderlands, and it functioned as a major accessway for land and air traffic alike; so long as airships didn"t cross over somebody"s border, n.o.body would complain about airs.p.a.ce violations.

Finaly, they docked at a large, comfortable airport in Ashdale. Charlie"s people got them into carriages and he basically brought his friends home…

***

"Mindy!" Mandy grabbed her sister as soon as they arrived at Charlie"s house. "You"re here! You"re finally, finally here!"

"Why do I feel like a third wheel?" Remian remarked to Charlie at the side.

"If you"re the third wheel, aren"t I the fourth?" Charlie asked.

"If you two are wheels then what am I? An axle?" Arnold snorted.

"Come in, come in!" Beth urged them. "You"re just in time for tea!"

"Do we have time for that?" Andros glanced at Remian. "How long are we going to stay?"

"We need to be back by Fryday." Remian glanced at Charlie.

"We can make it if we leave the day after tomorrow. Meanwhile, the airship needs repairs and we all have things to do, but we should certainly have tea."

Tea was a polite, rushed affair, and then Charlie brought Remian to the "experts" to find out what exactly was going on with his powers.

He brought Remian to the magic hospital.

Thereafter Remian suffered hours upon hours of waiting in queues, taking test after test, getting prodded, poked, strapping on sensors, walking into weird shimmering machines, being asked to cast rudimentary spells and channel mana under the observation of more machines, and having his blood pressure taken at least two dozen times. Every other test, someone would ask him to please pay his bills first, and several posters on the walls mentioned off-hand that hospital policy was for treatment to be reserved for official patients (i.e. people who pay them for it).

On occasion, there would be a loud argument at the reception about ensuring payment for emergency patients. All this led to a distinct nervousness as Remian eyed his rapidly dwindling cash on hand.

At last, night fell and he was offered a ward as every other doctor advised him to stay for observation and that it was best he do so. He just had to guarantee he could afford it.

"Sorry, I think I"m out of cash…" Remian mentioned.

Just like that, he was politely ushered out of the hospital as they were closing for the night.

With a thick folder of test results filled with big words and numbers and charts in his hands, Remian wandered back to Charlie"s house in a sort of daze.

"What does it all mean?" he asked.

Charlie took one look and shook his head. "I"m not sure. I think we better ask my dad. Maybe he knows someone who can help explain all this."

Apparently, he did know someone. Several someones, in fact, one of whom could be invited over for breakfast tomorrow.

Until then, Remian could only wait and try to get some rest in one of Charlie"s guest rooms.