Chapter 44: Chapter 43: a melancholic dream

The most beautiful face smiles at me through the blur of unconsciousness. A voice speaks to me, more the idea of the best voice than anything. “Wow, such beautiful wings, just like the monarch butterfly. But green, like your hair.”

I awaken with tears in my eyes, and a hole in my heart. It’s been a while since I dreamed about her. 

The bed is fairly uncomfortable, but I remain laying, just letting the tears flow, remembering her and what she lost out on when her life was unceremoniously cut short. 

The sun peeks through the holes in the wooden blinds, lighting the empty interior of the small room I chose in the barracks. The room is bare with only the bed and a small desk positioned such that the bed is used as the chair for it.

Maybe I should get out of bed, but what should I wear? I feel like something comfortable, but we will probably fight today. Searching through my inventory for something that fits both requirements lets me focus on something else and subsequently lets me take control of my emotions. 

I could wear a gambeson. Those are more or less a padded coat. Combined with some comfortable underwear, it should be fairly comfortable.

Getting out of bed and magicking on the clothes reveal that the dark green gambeson is not all that comfortable because of the stiffness of the material. So what else do I have?

In the end I settle for an oversized black hoodie with a mild agility enchantment and some green accents on it in place of the gambeson. Not as safe, but at least it’s comfortable. Checking my appearance with my hovering mirror, which collides with the walls while trying to get into position, reveals my messy hair, slightly red eyes and drooping wings partially phasing though the limited furniture.

I stow away the mirror since I don’t really feel like posing today. Trying to open the door, I find it still locked. It’s easily rectified, but doesn’t really improve my mood.

After walking through the hallway and down the stairs to the common room, I find the three apprentices eating and talking.

I wave to Jo, who waves back, and sit down on a different table, manifesting a glass of water and some food. I don’t pay attention to what food I take out, so I end up with a meaty sandwich, which tastes pretty good, although a bit dry.

While eating I hear the chatter of the apprentices which seems to focus on me and my magic now that I entered the room and I decide to ignore it for the most part. Jo explaining my mana glass was fairly amusing, as well as the reaction from the others.

When I’m almost finished with my meal, I realize that Murdoc is not sleeping where I left him, so I ask the others. They respond that he awoke sometime after they had gotten back up and apparently he had his best night of sleep in a long time. He was apparently quite miffed when they told him that I cast a spell on him, but not enough to spoil his good mood. Afterwards he went outside, and will probably be back at some point.

I guess his attitude came at least in part from not sleeping well. James and Garth also woke up before me, and went for a morning run a while ago. I imagine James having someone to exercise with is a good thing, though he doesn’t really do it all that often while he is traveling with us.

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After finishing my dry sandwich and flushing it down with water, I let the glass shatter, willing the shards to fly farther, causing some to even harmlessly bounce off the walls before disintegrating. I did it primarily to impress the dwarven mage, but it turned out quite interesting in the end. She was still impressed though, and a bit startled.

Before leaving, I walk over to their table and place a knife made of mana on it. Nothing special, just the same design I use for fruit, which is a little bit more complex than the glass. Then I tell her to have fun with it before it disintegrates and walk outside. She should be able to play with it for a couple minutes without me feeding it mana.

Outside I find the sun shining, birds chirping and the remains of broken golems. Some of them are the ones I destroyed, but apparently the others have broken more since then. I decide to explore the mining camp for now and start to wander around. 

The other barracks is empty, but the closest warehouse is not. It’s filled with a variety of mining equipment. This settlement is probably not abandoned, just temporarily evacuated because of the golems wandering around.

After exiting on the other side, I hear the sound of metal striking rock. Since there are no screams, I decide to just walk over to it. On the other side of the second warehouse, I find Mardoc chipping away at the central boulder of a golem that has had its limbs broken.

His ornate Iron staff has grown a metal spike like the ones on a pickaxe and he is efficiently digging away the material. I just leave him to it and enter the second warehouse. It’s filled with more equipment, though more suited towards processing ores. There is also a small section for stone carving, which explains some of the stray carvings on the stone walls of the buildings. 

Once outside again, I fly up onto the roof and look around. I see the road we arrived on, and another one going the opposite direction. There is also a well traveled road heading towards the mountain, which according to the quest marker leads towards the mines.

James can also be seen heading towards the barracks together with Garth, running at a quick pace through the forest. Deciding to meet them there, I jump from roof to roof with mana thruster at a pace so that I arrive at the same time as James. 

He might have spotted me because he looked up for a moment and then promptly sped up, making me speed up to match him.

I land in front of the barracks just as he slides to a stop, with Garth only a moment behind. Greetings are exchanged alongside smiles and we head back inside together.

Once inside we start planning what to do now that we are here, namely, should we help Jo get more experience fighting golems, or should we head straight for the mines?