The Runic Alchemist

Chapter 209: Mountain Trail

The next morning, Damian was ready in his mini gear made for him by the beastmen runesmith before they jumped worlds, prepared to head out. His sword hung at his waist,it was supposed to help him get a sense of his aura though Damian was doubtful if it worked at all.

A goat beastman waited for him outside the camp. As Damian left his tent and walked toward the beastmen, Sam—who usually slept late—joined him excitedly, as if they were heading for a picnic in the woods. Damian had left Yovan in charge of his unit and took Einar with him. Everyone was concerned about her, so it was better to keep her close rather than let her roam among the hundreds of soldiers.

Along with them came a first-ranker mage from Damian's unit who could cast a basic wormhole spell—though he succeeded only once in every three attempts, and with poor aim.

Damian felt confident he could cover the whole mountain on his own with small wormhole jumps, but having a mana backup was safer, and he also wanted to conceal his mana limits as much as possible.

"Ready?" Damian asked as Einar, Sam, and the mage soldier joined him.

"Yup," Sam replied, his arms crossed behind his head, looking completely at ease with their task ahead.

"Hmm," Einar simply grunted, staring straight ahead.

After last night, when she finally let him go, Damian had given her a private tent for more comfortable rest. While her fiery hatred had somewhat mellowed, she still acted like an NPC with a limited range of dialogue.

"Follow me," the goat beastman said as they met him. Damian spotted Royce and Mira in the distance, watching them from their side of the camp. Some other captains were up too, observing. Why were these people wasting precious sleep on such a pointless gesture? Damian would never understand these nobles and knights.

They passed through the forest and entered the valley. Damian was relieved to sense nothing noteworthy except for some small animals here and there. He had hoped to capture a few to try out his mimicry spell, though it was not an appropriate time. He had already used it on various creatures during their journey, but none had provided anything useful.

Most of the animals had worse vision than humans, and his attempt to gain wings from birds had failed. He discovered that while he could mimic organs he didn't naturally have, they had to resemble something in his existing anatomy—like eyes or hands, which turned webbed - scaring the life out of Sam, when he mimicked certain amphibians.

However, the internal organs had to match closely, and the animals in this forest lacked the variety he needed. Damian longed to experiment on monsters that looked more like them but hadn't come across anything useful so far.

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As they traveled deeper into the valley, they passed several beastman villages. Damian was surprised by how crowded they were—not just with beastmen of all kinds but also with humans. Despite the beastmen's general disdain for humans, they still provided shelter for them. It was a strange contradiction: although they avoided human wars and mingling, they helped their neighbors in times of need.

Damian noticed Sam smiling at the sight, his views of them also changing seeing that the beastmen were not that heartless towards humans.

Finally, they reached the last village, behind which stood the mountain they were supposed to climb. Throughout the valley, Damian sensed individuals with varying degrees of mana. There weren't as many as in a typical small town, but that was expected, since most beastmen were biased towards the pugilist class, making it hard to gauge their true power.

Aside from the common arguments about discrimination found in all kinds of books, Damian had read about several famous beastmen who served prominent kings, lords, or were knights in their own right. However, it was difficult to discern what was true and what was exaggerated.

All the stories had that loyalty to their masters element though - kind of superiority complex for the authors, or maybe that was just how their era was, not that much had changed since, it was as if the stories were written by pompous nobles and they only cared about loyalty and wanted all beastmen to be like that.

"Nice to see you decided to come after all," Kazak greeted them as they approached a large, artistically designed wooden hut. It was likely his home or office.

"Yeah, I thought the day was nice, I should climb a few kilometers up a mountain today," Damian replied with a fake smile, the sarcasm didn't go unnoticed by the old fox mage, who just smiled.

They weren't alone. Next to Kazak stood a young boy with wolf ears, his expressions rivaling Einar's in gloominess. Noticing Damian's curiosity, the old mage introduced him.

"This is Neo. He's an apprentice pugilist who is in need of some guidance.. I thought this trip would be good for him. He'll be coming along with us."

"With us? You're coming too?" Sam asked, glancing at the frail-looking old fox beastmen.

"I can perform the spell too, though it's not as nuanced as this boy's," Kazak said, motioning toward Damian. "I thought I could help."

"You can.. I was just going to say my mana wouldn't be able to keep up, and we'd have to use it sparingly, but if there's a second ranker with us, that won't be a problem," Damian replied nodding.

The old fox and the chief exchanged surprised glances, which confused Damian for a moment before he realized his mistake.

"Ah… Was that supposed to be a secret? My bad."

"Hahaha! Not even the best mages in the town can sense my rank. You sure are one amusing kid!" the old fox laughed heartily, leaving Sam looking equally awkward and confused beside him.

"Let's go then," Kazak commanded.

The seven of them started toward the mountain trail behind the large hut. Damian had expected only a few random scouts to accompany him, but the elder and the leader themselves? Did these people have nothing better to do? Then again, they might have been worried about sending someone he could overpower and manipulate.

Well good to see they were open to accept them and still kept backup of backups in all situations. Damian was kind of starting to like the cynicism of this tribe—it rivaled his own.