169 4.31 The Wine Lake - Part 1

Even though the two had accepted the fact that I was usual, the surprise hadn't left their face.

"Yes, it's hard to believe, and honestly, I would have treated it as a joke if I had just heard it. However, after seeing it myself, I have no choice but to accept it."

Usually, people stared at me in this kind of situation and asked how I could do that, but the two simply accepted the fact. They probably realized that I was surprised like them as well.

"Well, I am pretty unsure about the cause of my abilities myself. I just consider it a gift of god to me."

Both of their faces became a little brighter after hearing my response. There was no point in dragging this conversation as it would reach no conclusive ending, so the best thing to do here was to focus on what's important at the moment.

"Anyway, shouldn't we be preparing for the journey? We will only be able to reach the Wine lake if we head out early."

Garo smiled widely. His nose became more distinct, which was the sign that he was proud of something he did.

"We have already prepared everything. The early morning breakfast is ready in the kitchen as well. All we need to do is clean up and head out as soon as we can."

His work was commendable and, in our situation, greatly helpful. If we head out in about an hour from now, we would be able to reach the Wine lake by the evening.

However, the problem was the royal sleepyheads in our party. The knights were probably hesitating to wake them up due to the respect of the positions everyone held.

"Let me wake the princess up then. The earlier we head out, the better."

"No, please. That would be unnecessary"—Garo stood from his chair—"We did all this because we didn't want to brother princesses by telling them to wake up early in the first place."

"Oh, alright."

I seriously didn't know they had this deep resolve to keep the princesses happy. I rarely even saw them as princesses, even though I used their title before their name. I saw them no more than a really close friend.

At this point, my feelings were complicated, and it might take me a while to sort things out. However, I never considered them more or less based on their family and household.

At first, it was a little awkward, but later, as we became friends, they were no different than everyone else in our dorm.

From there, the conversation went back to my use of lightning magic. They the two were high school nerds talking about some common interest. What's surprising was how well the two used to get along.

I just sat there and listened to their conversation while nodding occasionally. I was just waiting for others to arrive, and listening to their talks turned out to be a good way of passing the time.

Princesses looked sleepy. It looked like they, too, weren't able to sleep much last night.

It was a little awkward today since whenever I looked at Anna, she would avert her gaze and stare at something else. On the contrary, Eliane just gave me a warm smile.

We didn't even greet each other properly and rushed for breakfast instead. 

'It's probably going to take us a while to be comfortable with these new developments.'

During breakfast, they talked about how I could use lightning magic. The sock on the knight's faces, especially Fizz, was priceless. On the other hand, princesses weren't much surprised, but Markus was acting like a proud father who just discovered his child's hidden talent.

Due to this, the whole trip took longer than expected. Although, to me, it was barely interesting. In fact, it was so awkward to be there and hear them talk about me.

After eating our breakfasts, we resumed our journey. Today we had a long way to go as we recently changed our plans one more time.

Instead of going through the long way, we were now planning to travel diagonally.

There was a rough road between the Forest of endless trees that led to the Great Southern desert. However, it just touched the desert as it would soon lead to the Wine Lake. The lake was just a little south-west from there.

Flare was flying above us and acting as the scout throughout the journey. We didn't need to worry about any wild animals and monsters coming in our way due to her.

The forest was filled with wild animals, and even though monsters were inactive during the day, they would attack if provoked. Naturally, they considered one an enemy if they enter their territory like every territorial creature out there.

We were traveling through the heart of the forest for most of the part of the day. It was the den of those monsters that were superior in the food chain in this forest.

Flare telepathically mentioned the names of the creature she had to get rid of for our safe travel. By the time we reached the other side of the forest, the total number of monsters she had killed was 42.

I wanted to hunt them myself, but my body needed some rest. Considering everything that was yet to come, it would be unwise to collect too much fatigue during this journey. However, that didn't mean I would stop training myself. In fact, I was waiting for the perfect moment to train with lightning magic.

From what I could tell, the moment will only come once we reach the Sonar district and rest properly. I was planning to sleep properly tonight and start training myself slowly again from the next one.

After crossing the forest, we came across dry land. A little further from it was the Great Southern desert.

It was already evening by the time we reached the desert. A cold wind had started blowing even though the sand was still a little warm. According to the map, this place was close to the ocean, so that was no surprise.

We barely talked during the entire journey. I was embarrassed to start a topic, and the two didn't do it themself.

Princess Anna was probably embarrassed like me, and Princess Eliane probably didn't do it since Markus was sitting there enjoying the view outside.

We had no intention of taking a break in the desert since it was very risky.

Desert was home to several massive monsters that loved hiding under the soil during the day. Monster Centipede and Monster ants were the best examples of these monsters.

They were weak against Flame attacks, but they had claws that made it easy for them to dig. They could easily avoid the spell by going under the soil.

Since the soil here was weak, they were probably capable of digging several meters in just a few seconds.

If one were to go them without proper planning and understanding, they would just be playing whack a mole the whole day.

Flare's abilities were impressive, but she wasn't invincible. She wasn't capable of sensing movement too deep within the soil. And since these creatures lived many feet below the ground, trying to keep track of their presence was useless.

However, since she could sense anything coming our way, we were safe. If anything dangerous came closer, she would notify me and wait for my response. And if the threats were too big, she would deal with them as she felt appropriate.

There were other ways to assure that no creatures come closer as well. I decided to use one of those methods to ensure that nothing gets near us.

[Flare, release your aura for a while. The monsters won't dare to show themselves if they notice your presence. Instead, they might go deeper into their hole.]

[Yes, master.]

It could be called unnecessary precautions, but I didn't want to be stuck in the desert because some insect appeared out of nowhere and destroyed a wheel of our carriage.

The probability of that happening was low, but the low probability was still a probability.

Due to the precautions we took, no attack happened during the two hours we walked close to the desert. After the two hours, we reached an area covered by tall green grasses and thorny bushes.

There were few colorful flowers growing here and there, but it was hard to see very far in the moonlight. However, what we could see was remarkably beautiful nonetheless.

After we traveled through the route in between the tall grass, we came across a lake.

It was a large lake reflecting the moon and the stars so perfectly that just by looking at it once, the image of its beauty was forever saved in me.