[Shrubley, the Monster Adventurer] Chapter 93 – Through Mountains Cold

Shrubley climbed the road leading to the mountain pass, leaving behind the mists that covered the autumnal landscape of the Haalften region.

While his adventuring party traveled, they worked on controlling their mana under Miranda’s instructions.

She insisted that they learn how to properly wield their mana.

Shrubley was either quite lucky to advance to Copper without adequate mana control or incredibly talented. He personally thought it was a mixture of the two.

There had been countless reasons why he might advance when others could not, and chief among them was the strange circumstances he had been placed under.

If he could not rise to the challenges before him, he would have died. Faced with that, Shrubley had no choice but to advance. The alternative was simply unacceptable.

Perhaps Cal could be still be dead while also being the greatest S-Grade Hero Adventurer, but Shrubley needed to be very much alive to attain his life’s goal.

The soul shrub had some catching up to do with learning mana control. As a Copper, he learned that he should be well ahead of where he was. On the upside, he had considerably more mana than a Mundane Ranker to work with.

It was his greatest weakness. Perhaps it was his impetuousness. His father had always told him that for a soul shrub, he was remarkably impatient, always rushing off to the next thing.

While learning proper mana control was not torture, it was very, very, very boring. Shrubley practiced the breathing exercises, pushing and pulling his mana with each inhalation and exhalation.

He watched as the others did the same.

“Since you have a Copper’s senses,” Miranda told him, “you’ll also need to study what they’re doing. Using your Copper senses like this will help you to differentiate a monster from an Awakened. And you can learn from them, study what they do and try to adapt it to your own body.”

“But my body is different,” Shrubley told her as the road rose in grade, meandering to the side to avoid a tumble of boulders.

“That is a unique problem all Awakened face,” the Countess told him, though not unkindly. “Humans and the core races are very similar to each other. Though they do not like to hear it, that is the truth. Not all Awakened have the same circulatory system, organs, or even the same number of limbs. That creates a massive disparity.”

“So we have to be better,” Shrubley reasoned.

Miranda opened her mouth to refute that point, then stopped. Why dissuade him? If he saw it as a challenge, let him.

I wish I could think of it like that, she thought to herself.

It felt unfair and unjust to her that monsters had it so much harder than the core races. It was one of the many reasons that Awakened were not treated on a level with the other races, as if they were all somehow lesser. Only in Pandaemonium was there any sort of recognition, and there were countless other problems with that place.

Out of all of them, Smudge, surprisingly, was the most skilled with mana control. He seemed to possess an innate familiarity with it that even Shrubley did not quite grasp yet.

It was remarkable, and yet, not without its quirks. As Smudge practiced wielding his mana, his gelatinous body mass shrunk dramatically in size like a deflating balloon. As he breathed in, his form grew to twice that of his standard size.

I suppose that makes sense, Shrubley thought as he watched and studied his friend. He is a slime, which means he is intimately aware of how to change his body. Changing his mana around must not be too different.

The jewel on the tip of Cal’s new staff pulsed and faded with each of his breaths, a clear indication that he was working very hard to satisfy their taskmistress.

Slyrox struggled the most. While the koblin possessed a natural talent for crafting and fighting, harnessing mana in this way was incredibly unfamiliar to her, even after rising through the levels and bonding two essences.

However, she was determined to overcome her weakness. Though even Slyrox’s determination paled in comparison to Shrubley’s drive.

He needed to overcome this trial. Small as it was, wielding mana was a fundamental facet of advancement. It was one of the many steps of the journey towards becoming the greatest S-Grade Adventurer.

His leaves rustled with effort while his rooty feet carried him forward. He was so accustomed to channeling mana with essence that he occasionally slipped into Nature, Curiosity, and even Light. It was strangely difficult to tap into the energy without instinctively filtering it into an essence.

Miranda kept a steady stream of critique and advice in equal measure. She was much better than she had been back in the mirror realm, where she was often surly and frustrated with their progress.

Even Sose was kinder than he had been. Shrubley chalked the change up to their fondness for the monster group.

It never crossed his mind that Miranda had been near death with vampyric starvation and weakness, putting her into a very sour mood.

Of course, she did care for the misfits. No matter how much she tried to bury the emotion, she could not deny that she was growing increasingly fond of them.

I wouldn’t put it past Mistress Ceasewane to have placed an enchantment on the questbook, she thought to herself. But there was no heat to those words. She did not truly think her growing attachment had anything to do with magic.

It had been a very long time since she had let anybody but Sose into her heart. Once she let another person in, however begrudgingly, it was only a matter of time before she began to care for them.

Watching the four was fascinating. Miranda could scarcely believe the progress they were making. Hours of training and they seemed to grow together as one.

Whenever one of them failed to measure up, the others–despite their remarkably different anatomies–would rally together to help their weakest member.

That usually meant that Slyrox was helped along more often than not, but not always. She was a quick study. Whenever she learned something the others did not appear to know she was quick to share.

This is what I’ve been missing, Miranda realized as they climbed the first of the foothills. They do not hold anything back. They share everything with each other so that each person grows.

Even Shrubley’s new tome was passed around or read aloud for mutual benefit.

Under the expert tutelage of Mistress Ceasewane, Miranda’s group had never been like Shrubley’s. There was too much ego among the members of their party, and that had ultimately been their undoing. Of course, there wasn’t a bad egg like Alaster here either.

That duplicitous, backstabbing Alaster Mynt had ruined everything.

Shrubley’s party would go much further than Miranda’s ever could.

“Yes, yes, very good,” she told them. “I think you’ve mastered the basics of mana control, but that is simply the foundation. From here on out, we will rely on far more intricate designs to test your mastery and push your limits. Now, try not to trip while you perform these exercises. It is a very long way down…”

***

Julius Eritis was about to pack it in for the day when he heard tuneless whistling and childlike giggling, accompanied by a stern voice of command. To his well-tuned bandit ears, it sounded like a mother leading a gaggle of children.

In other words, a lucrative mark.

Women with children were always so easy to manipulate, they would give anything to protect their precious little darlings. It was easier than taking candy from a baby, and significantly less messy.

Cupping his hands to his mouth, Julius emulated a black-crested warhawk’s cry. No bird that would be recognizable to the idiots on the eastern side of the Empire, but similar enough to local birds that it wouldn’t be entirely out of the ordinary.

An answering call replied, followed by three others. His crew had heard and were converging on his position.

Lately, there hadn’t been any traffic through the Ranmount Pass. That meant Julius’ band of highwaymen were gaunt and angry. They needed food and money more than ever. And they would take it from whomever they could.

Julius scrubbed a gloved hand down his matted beard. He was no hunter, and the Ranmount Pass was notoriously difficult to find a decent meal. The locals near Talvar were on to him, and he would need more money to slip by their patrols if he wanted to get back into the Outer Ring.

A scrabbling set of boots announced the presence of his number two, Gregor.

“Have you found somebody at last?” the weaselly man asked, his beady eyes darting around.

Julius nodded. “Just down there, can’t see them yet because of the blind turn, but they should be coming into view any minute now. Sounds like a mom and a bunch of brats. Don’t hear no karaks nor horses, no carriage, so they’ll be easy pickings.”

Gregor’s beady little eyes gleamed, and he rubbed his filthy hands together excitedly. As far as Julius was concerned, the man took far too much pleasure in his work.

Julius would have preferred to return to his home, the Republic of Torbast, and out of the filthy Empire. That was ultimately his goal. To go back home. But it was expensive, and every time he caught a big score, he found himself moving farther away to throw off the scent of the imperial dogs.

Turning to banditry had seemed like a fine idea at the time, but he quickly learned how rough life could be in less competitive areas. The pickings were slim indeed.

And lately, something down in the border towns had gone horribly amiss. No merchants came through the Ranmount Pass. Something dark and sinister haunted the mountains, plucking his men in the dark of night. Every night risked more of his men being taken or simply running away out of fear.

What had started as a band 20 strong, had been reduced to little more than a hand–5 men–with nobody knowing where the 15 other members of their group went.

Banditry tended to be nasty business, especially if people thought they could be heroes. Julius had been a Corporal in the Republic’s army. He had 2 of the 3 necessary essences and would have gone higher had he not made the simple mistake of taking the spoils of war he was due rather than offering them up to his Captain.

Now he took anything that wasn’t nailed down and often carried a pry bar to make sure he took that which was too.

But the last few weeks had been disconcerting. Men tended to wander in and out of bandit groups, but never so many, and never so quietly. It was unsettling.

Moving low, he got into his hiding spot, prepared well ahead of time.

Gregor raised his crossbow and cranked back the string as he placed a poisoned bolt. It was his favorite move, poison the strongest person there, then offer them the antidote for their valuables.

Brutal, but effective. People were less likely to fight back when they knew that every heartbeat brought them closer to death.

It was a shame that there was no antidote.

A tall woman in a cloak rounded the path first, followed by… Julius squinted. “What the hell?” he whispered aloud.

Gregor, however, didn’t have Julius’ sense of danger, which suddenly spiked the moment before the fool pulled the trigger.

The poisoned bolt sailed through the air as the woman with a small band of monsters in tow came into view. A woman who, Julius realized, was far too large to be any ordinary mother.

His greatest fears were confirmed when the bolt was snatched out of the air with the speed and grace of a viper by that very same woman. Her shadowed eyes gleamed blood red, and Julius saw his death reflected in them as she clenched her fist and snapped the bolt in two.

“Run!” Julius told Gregor.