D.E.M.O.N.S: Getting Summoned Weekly isn't so Bad-Chapter 1767 Making Good Time. No Dryads Involved
--- Kat ---
Their fears were unfounded. It was just a few hours of walking later when the road came into view. It was a massive construction of stone set into the land and pulsating with magic according to Lily. The forest was pushed back a good deal and the road seemed to suck in water for some purpose. Apparently it was even stored in a separate space, and was flowing somewhere else. The road itself was made of beautiful white stone that had clearly been made with the assistance of an Earth mage. The whole thing looked like a solid slab, with one grove down the middle to demark which half the road you should be on.
It was somewhat busy. Looking left and right Kat could already see a few people travelling along the road, though most seemed to be heading towards the city at the moment. Kat was broken out of her reverie when Gareth asked, "So, Kat, would you be willing to carry one or two of us at a time? That way the people who aren't resting can sprint beside you until they tire before swapping out who is running,"
Kat shrugged, "That's fine with me… but surely there's a better way to go about this?"
Gareth shrugged back, "Perhaps but I'm not sure what it would be,"
"I could help," said Lily as she jumped off Nixilei's shoulder. "I could carry… well maybe everyone with my shadows. I'm not sure how much mana it would cost long term… but if I can have people held in shadow hands, or shadow hammocks or something that I anchor to Kat, we can make great time while I still have mana,"
"I'm willing to try," agreed Gareth. "If it doesn't work or your mana drains too fast we can shake up the plans. As long as Kat's ok with it of course." Kat nodded. "Alright, in that case… how are you thinking of setting things up?"
"Well… I guess it depends on what costs the most mana. I was sort of thinking like… chairs that hang off Kat's shoulders… but now that I see the road, I'm not sure it's wide enough. Like it's big sure, but if I didn't want the seats too close together the width is still an issue… and I wouldn't want to split you guys up in front and behind because Kat still needs to see…
"Behind everyone might work?" Lily pondered aloud. "I'm not sure how many laws of physics my shadows need to conform too. If that doesn't cost too much mana, and the ride isn't too bad that's probably the best way,"
"Green and I can share a… seat, if you want to do things that way," offered Gareth.
Lily nodded, "Yeah that's easy to change. The only alternative I can think of is like… stacking you guys up on Kat's shoulders above her head but I worry that might attract flying monsters and if you need to be constantly on watch you're not really resting are you,"
With that established, and there being plenty of space beside the road Lily got to work. She tried a few different configurations for her shadow… but quickly found that the cost in mana was rather high. The reason for this was the need to make the seats solid constantly, and the anchoring not wanting to stick without a lot of mana.
Backing up Lily looked at everything for a few more moments. Sure she was missing something. "You should use Kat's shadow as well. Perhaps ours on top of that," said Nixilei.
"What? Um… I mean, why would that help?" asked Lily.
"We won't be resisting at all so our shadows should be 'happy' to help out. Kat's especially considering your bond. It might be different if you were using them to attack or some other more aggressive action but if you're just using them as support structure? I think it would reduce the mana. Though it might strain us a bit? Not sure about that," explained Nixilei.
"Alright I guess I can give a try…" mumbled Lily as she swapped things up. Soon she developed a shadowy set of chairs and attached them to Kat. She did have to poke everyone into place a bit things seemed to be going well. Kat's shadow acted as the support structure and the connecting beams while the others all acted as their chairs. Gareth and Green's shadows were mixed together with no issue… and the mana cost was a lot lower now.
It wasn't nothing. Lily was sure she'd have to drop the construct at some point, but it was perhaps one percent every thirty seconds or so? It would likely be worse once they started moving but it was fine for now. "Ok everything is ready! Hop in and let's get moving," said Lily.
Everyone did as asked, while Lily transformed and nestled herself in Kat's arms. Lily immediately noticed some of the mental strain drop off when she did that. Though for what reason she didn't know. Once everyone was in position Kat hopped onto the road and started to run.
She didn't want to take any risks so she started slowly and built up speed as the seconds ticked by. [The mana cost is staying the same so far. Feel free to keep the speed up.] With that bit of confirmation from Lily, Kat doubled her speed in the next few breaths, flying down the road. She needed to take the occasional detour onto the grass to pass the others making use of the stone path, but it usually only took her a step or two to get past them. The grass might've been a bit damaged, but only a bit every now and again.
Kat looked rather cool from the outside. She was sprinting down the road, leaving a trail of rapidly dissipating black fog as the shadow moved forward. Green was asleep in the back, and the parts of her shadow that made it up the contraption seemed the second most solid behind Nixilei's.
The whole contraption looked a bit like a cage of shadows attached to a fearsome beast. A crazy way to travel, though many of the people they passed could only make out a few flashes of red and black before the figure vanished further down the road. It would seem they weren't the only ones with crazy methods of transport, as nobody seemed to care much about the somewhat fearsome sight.
This continued until they made it to the bridge and the group was forced to slow down. For two reasons really. The first was that Lily was running out of mana. It had been about an hour and there was no point in risking Lily getting mana exhaustion. Especially not when they were already making good time.
The second reason was that three roads converged here at the big bridge… and it seemed like they had guards stationed around the place, slowing everyone down as they checked the goods coming across the bridge. As they pulled to a stop and Lily carefully undid her shadows before falling asleep Kat had to ask, "So… if there's the main road, and two roads heading off in the other directions… how come we didn't take that left road?"
"It doesn't really go anywhere," said Nixilei. "It's a short road that goes to an outpost made up of one rather large building that serves a few functions. The second road, the one heading off the to left at least has a proper town there. Sure we could've taken the road… if we knew exactly where it was. As is, we'd probably have lost time adjusting to ensure we found it at some point. Easier to go for the main road. Travelling roughly perpendicular to it meant we were unlikely to miss it,"
"Alright… and the guards?" Kat asked as she tried to glance around the mess of people nearby. They had about six wagons to go before it was actually there time to cross. Kat couldn't even get a proper look at the bridge from here!
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"Tax reasons probably?" shrugged Nixilei. "The city has a whole bunch of ways into it, and relies mostly on enchantments and geography to keep the monsters out. Plenty of people could bypass any guard station setup there… so I guess they do it here instead? Or perhaps it's just because of the tournament and an influx of people? It's hard to say. The map didn't mention anything about it,"
"So… do we need to declare anything?" asked Kat.
"We shouldn't. We have a writ of passage because of the tournament, two nobles, and valid adventuring licenses so they shouldn't have the right to ask us to empty our storage rings… but they might ask anyway," said Nixilei.
"Wouldn't merchants always want to be an adventurer then?" asked Kat.
"No, of course not. Not only would it mean they could be forcefully recruited for emergency quests when a monster attack happens, if they were caught selling wares in bulk without a license for it they'd be in big trouble. Adventurers may have a lot of freedoms… but they also have exceptionally severe punishments if they're found to be abusing them," Kat nodded along to Nixilei's explanation.
