"You know Eliane, I am so excited about this quest. I have only ever seen villages from inside the carriage," said Princess Anna in an excited tone. It was understandable since for a princess of a kingdom like her, visiting a remote village was no less than a great adventure.We were in the study room comparing the map that villagers left in the guild to the map of the dukedom. We were busy with our training since we came here so we never got to use the study room much. It had a few books, but most of them were related to the Academy"s course so they were not very useful to us.
"Yes, I am also interested in finding out how the villages in this country are," said Princess Eliane trying to look composed but the excitement was clearly visible on her tone and gesture.
The dukedom"s map we were comparing to was a copy of the map in the library. It wasn"t very detailed but since it mentioned geographical features like hills, rivers, and gra.s.slands, the two maps were easy to compare.
Princesses and I were the only ones in the study room since we had divided the works among ourselves. There were several works that needed to be done in preparation of our journey. Ronald and Arica went to the trade district to buy food and supplies. Nina, Sistina, and Marina went to the Amigo inn to ask Diane if she knows anything about that village. Our work was boring compared to theirs but it was every bit necessary.
"Looks like it is around this part of the dukedom, around this area," said Princess putting her finger to the north-eastern part of the dukedom in the map.
"Yes, it is mentioned that we need to travel for a week on the north-eastern Route to get there in the map that the villagers left," I said looking at the map that villagers left. It wasn"t very detailed but there were arrows that showed the directions that we could take to get there.
Few details on the maps matched so we got the general idea of where we need to go. We had to travel in plain land for 3 days after which we would reach a small river called the Serpent river. After crossing the Serpent river, we had to travel through the dense forest for 4 days to reach the village.
"We also need to plan where we will be camping during the travel," said Princess Anna. I could hear her say "yay! camping for the first time" in a low voice after that.
"Well, excitement is fine but please stop acting like a 10-year-old kid wanting to go Disneyland. This is a quest, remember?" Of course, I couldn"t say it out loud because that would be rude.
"I think it will be easy to find a place in the plains but finding a good place in the forest is a problem," I said based on what I learned during my travel to the city before.
"Yeah, I don"t think we can rely on these maps to decide that. Nina told me that she will ask Diane about the places good for camping around those areas," said Princess Eliane. The maps weren"t very detailed so relying on those may not be a good idea.
"Hope we don"t end up camping near mosquito nest. I don"t want to look like blood shucked Ghoul when I wake up the next day"
"Yeah, let"s decide that after she comes," I said since the information she brings may be useful in deciding where to camp during our journey.
We wanted to start the journey soon since we thought the villages would need a.s.sistance as soon as possible. We planned to arrange things and head out tomorrow if possible.
"Everyone was working hard but our good-for-nothing teacher headed out somewhere early this morning without even telling us where she was going."
Nina"s team came back in the afternoon. They told us that they weren"t able to find much. That was the only village around those parts and people from there rarely came to the city. The closest village to that one was at the bank of the Serpent River. From there, it took four days to reach that village.
We were in the sitting room discussing that information when Arica and Ronald came back. They brought the necessary materials like dried meat, preserved food, and insect warding powder. Since Miss Lilith was arranging the equipment for us, we didn"t need to buy those. But we needed to arrange everything else.
Ronald told us that it only cost us around 5 silver coins because of the haggling that Arica did. Considering how costly dried meat is, that was incredible.
"Even a lazy girl becomes active when it comes to haggling during a sale, I will never understand them."
We then went to our room to pack the personal things that we will need during our travel. I was done with the packing quickly since there weren"t many things that I needed to take. After I was done, I returned to the sitting room. Miss Lilith had already returned and was sitting on the sofa there.
"Hey Miss Lilith, are the horses and equipment ready?" I asked when I saw her sitting there.
She looked towards me and replied with, "Yes, they will bring that here tomorrow morning."
Ronald and Nina knew how to drive a carriage so we won"t have any problems finding a driver. I was more worried about the princesses since they had never been on a journey like this before.
Before dinner, we discussed the details of our journey with everyone. Princess Anna was the one who was most excited among us. The excitement was clearly visible on Princess Eliane"s face too, but not as much as Princess Anna.
After dinner, when we were about to go to bed, Miss Lilith called Marina. She said, she wanted to discuss something regarding her training. Since she only called Marina, we said our good night to them and went to our room.
The next morning, coachmen brought a carriage and a wagon to us. The necessary equipment needed for camping like camps and stoves was already there in the wagon.
"There is something missing."
"Miss Lilith, we don"t have monster warding light," I said after looking at our equipment and checking everything.
"We will not be needing that, this is part of your training," she replied with a wry smile.
"She had a similar smile when we showed her the route to the village yesterday. I have a feeling that this is going to be one h.e.l.l of a ride."
Miss Lilith and Nina were going to travel in the wagon while the rest of us will be traveling in the carriage. It would be congested if we were to take our things with us in the carriage so we left most of our things in the wagon with other equipment.
Marina, who had been gloomy since some days was looking fresh this morning. It was probably because of what Miss Lilith told her yesterday.
"I am curious to know what she told her. But, anyway, It"s always good to see her bright smile."
After everything was ready, we started our journey after saying our byes to Sam. We started our journey almost an hour after the sunrise. We went straight towards the exit gate on the trading district. Unlike while entering, we didn"t need any permission to get out of the city.
We got out of the city and started traveling in the plains. Soon, the city was no longer visible so we looked forward towards the road ahead of us.
Next Chapter: The Journey to the Village