She considered that a fairly sensible choice; the frontline fighters in games were always dying. Why would it be any different in real fighting? It was much safer to kill your enemies before they could get close to you.
There was a change in the general mood, now that they’d left the road. The men seemed to be more actively alert, searching for unseen enemies. She quietly recalled most of her fellacai for a rest, leaving only two to perform aerial reconnaissance. She figured she’d be depending on them more in the forest, so for now, she chose to have one pair on patrol, with a plan to switch them out frequently so they wouldn’t be too tired when she really needed them. She experimented with draining light around a specific limb, namely her hand. She constantly drained the sunlight, creating only a small cloud of darkness that she could hide from the others for the most part. It was helping her to maintain her aura. She’d gotten a few strange glances, but the other riders were primarily focusing their attention outward, not in.
“So, I’m guessing more monster attacks happen in these parts?” Her voice was almost jarring, the rest of the group having been silent, save for the pounding of hooves.
One of the men behind her spoke up, though just barely loud enough for her to hear, “This is tialon territory. Best to draw as little of their attention as possible.” Well, it did make sense to be quiet in enemy territory. But what was a tialon? Scanning the fields of grain around her, she realized it would be quite easy to hide very large animals in it, especially if they were slinking around or lying in wait.
“Thanks.” Her spoken gratitude barely reached the man behind her as she raised her own awareness accordingly. She thought the biggest danger would be once they reached the woods, but the lesson was being reinforced that this world was not safe...anywhere. There were simply different levels of likely-to-be-attacked. She didn’t know how to fix it, either. It’s not like she could be everywhere, or even use cameras to watch multiple places at once…
Or could she? She remembered Morpheus teaching her about illusion magic windows, which basically consisted of scrying a previously visited place, though it did have the limitation of being somewhere you were familiar with. She wondered...could she scry a person’s location, even if she hadn’t been there herself, but was familiar with the person? She’d have to try that when they stopped and she had time to experiment. She didn’t think trying new magic with potential backlash should be done on the back of a high speed animal during a dangerous journey.
It seemed the alertness hadn’t been totally necessary, however. The Basaigh Woods towered in front of them several tension-filled, albeit uneventful, hours later. The grain eventually gave way to sparse trees which were slowly growing larger as they progressed. She finally spotted the advanced tracking group, who’d stopped in a clearing near where the truly giant trees started. The men made a perimeter surrounding a few tents, and it looked like they were taking turns patrolling.
Marcelle waved as they rode up, obviously expected. Jade watched as Marcelle dismounted and the men around her began to do the same. “We’ll rest and eat here for an hour before we continue.” Marcelle’s voice was firm as she started giving orders, and one of the men came and took Daisy away from her to care for the creature after she’d dismounted. She scanned the encampment, absently rubbing healing magic into her sore muscles. She’d been right that riding wouldn’t be the most comfortable experience. Thankfully, she had magic to cheat the first riding pain away.
Walking over to Marcelle, she found the woman talking to her scouts. Marcelle absentmindedly beckoned her to come closer as she listened to the scout’s report. “...so we tracked them to this point, and from what we can tell, they went into the trees. There are claw marks on the bark going up, but after that they must’ve been jumping from branch to branch, because we couldn’t find any further indications of their path. I’m sorry.” The man hung his head in apology as Marcelle put a hand on his shoulder.
“You did well. We’ll take it from here.” She turned to Jade, who was staring at the trees thoughtfully. “Jade, what do you think?”
She turned to smile at Marcelle, shrugging lightly. “I think it’s time I took a look at the treetops. If you’ll excuse me, I’m going to take a short flight.” She bowed her head slightly, walking over to the tree the scout indicated had claw marks.
With a thought, she lowered her gravity and used wind magic to take flight.
Chapter Three – Vantage
There were a few gasps behind her as she took flight. Her babies kept pace with her as if in encouragement, though they made sure never to get in front of her flight path, thankfully. She smiled lovingly at them, enjoying the feeling of going higher than she ever had before, even if it was for a grim reason. The people on the ground got further and further away, becoming tiny figures on a distant surface as she rose probably two hundred feet into the air in order to reach the first branch of the giant tree.
She confirmed the scout’s report; the scratches on the tree were a clear indication that this was a well-used travel path for the mesmer. Alighting gracefully on the branch, she took a moment to soak in the beauty of the world around her. The deep browns and greens of the forest were broken up by bright rays of sunshine and the occasional pops of color from other plants. Far below, she could see the activity of the group, and glanced away when she saw the area they were using as a latrine.
They were trying to be quiet, so she heard nothing from the camp in the near-silence of the canopy. In the far distance, she could barely hear the cry of birds, though the wind rustled gently through the leaves around her. She could feel the life of the forest all around her, and she breathed in the scent of greenery. Frowning, she sighed as she caught a whiff of something foul, realizing it was the leftover scent of the mesmer. As beautiful as the woods around her were, it was time to do what she came here for.
With a thought, she activated her mana sense. She could see traces of green mana all around her, realizing that the trees were full to the brim of the vibrant life force. It was only when she looked down that she finally saw the taint of the mesmer in the claw marks upon the trunk. What appeared to be older claw marks barely glowed at all, while those that were fresh seemed to roil with the sickly color. It looked like a sickness the tree was fighting to fend off.
Unfortunately, the taint ended at the branch, which made her realize they were no longer using their claws to climb up, but rather running across the huge branches. They were like Tarzan, using the trees as their path. She grumbled to herself, fighting the urge to pound her chest and mimic the apes. Sadly, without the claw marks, she was basically up a creek without a paddle.
Glaring at the forest stretching out before her, she walked out along the branch, noting that it practically created a roadway to the next tree. A short jump and she was on the next tree without any problems. She had no doubt the mesmer could accomplish it just as easily as she could. The memory of their strong legs coiled beneath them in preparation to jump was still vivid in her mind. It seemed quite a bit of their strength was concentrated in their legs, and if they adapted to living in the forest and using the trees as their roadway, it even made sense from a Darwinian point of view.
Unfortunately, there were many different branches she could easily jump to from there, each pointing a different direction, though three of them led naturally deeper into the forest. She figured those three were the main ones to pay attention to, though if she had to try and follow each branching path, she had no idea how long it would take her to pick up the trail. Especially if there was no taint for her to follow. The others on the ground couldn’t follow it, so that left it to her alone…