Limits

I told Shelly about my plans to leave the shelter and explore new areas. Shelly was rather indifferent towards that, it only wanted to stay with me so it would go wherever I went. Couple of days later we packed out stuff and left the shelter.

I didn't destroy the shelter and even left the swords and axe inside. I didn't want to carry with me all that rubbish. Besides if someone wanted to use that shelter after we left, they were welcome to it. I just didn't want uninvited guests while we were living there.

Our new destination was something called "Silent Pass" that I found on my new map. I didn't know what we were to expect from that place exactly but it was our destination as the name seemed interesting. The Silent Pass was located about 4 days of horseback travel from our shelter. We were of course traveling on foot so it would take us longer to reach the destination. According to the map we had to travel towards north west.

We moved out during the morning after we had a breakfast and when I did my usual training from the Strength Manual. We already knew the terrains that were 2-3 hours of travel on foot from our shelter therefore the journey was very smooth. We set up our first camp after a day's travel. The old days of building a simple shelter just for one night, returned.

We had enough food to last us a few days due to the 2 bags we were carrying. Of course Shelly's bag would be emptied sooner than mine as Shelly was a glutton but nevertheless we didn't have to hunt that day. After we ate the food, I decided to have one final look at the Great Scriptures of Evil Medic and make sure I memorised everything correctly. I would then burn the book and make sure nothing was left. I promised Nick to do this before he passed away. I already remembered all the recipes from that book so there was no point for me to carry it anymore.

After this, there would be only one promise to keep. That was to master my skills before I travelled to any cities, towns or villages. When the day comes and my skills have been mastered, I would no longer have any more promises to keep. I would become burdenless and could explore my life to the fullest.

I've read the book one last time in the quiet of the night then threw it into the fire. The book caught fire very quickly and started to burn. I watched as the flames engulfed the book that Nick painstakingly filled but I was not sad. I memorised it and his legacy would not die just yet.

When I saw that the book turned completely into ash, I stirred the fire and made the ash indistinguishable from the burnt branches and wood. I then closed my eyes and fell asleep.

The next day. I woke up early in the morning and had my breakfast. Shelly usually woke up some time later therefore I always had time to eat in peace and do my usual morning training. When I was done with that and Shelly had its breakfast as well, we hit the road again.

On the way, we encountered a group of animals we never saw. The creatures were smaller than Shelly but had spikes all over their bodies. The spikes were not very long but the sheer amount of them was stunning. Shelly tried to interact with them and it turned out that those animals were herbivore which meant they ate plants.

The animals were not aggressive and those spikes functioned mostly as self defence and the means to deter a potential predator from attacking them. We stayed in the place for a while. I wanted to observe the behaviour of these animals as they seemed quite interesting. The smaller ones played with each other in weird ways. They would form a ball with all the spikes outside and roll around while racing each other. The small creatures would sometimes bump into trees or each other and cry out. These animals didn't have it easy because although they had protection in the form of spikes, it was also their bane. They couldn't interact with each other like most animals and had to keep distance in order not to hurt themselves in the process.

It was a cruel fate when I thought about it 'Being able to defend themselves gave them means to be less likely hunted but at the same time, their lives are more distant and cold'. I noticed that the older animals usually carried some berries on their spikes as a means for transport to their homes.

I thought I will do something for them and collected a lot of berries and what not then just placed them on ground for all animals to take whatever they liked. The older spiky animals came over to the pile and gave me what seemed like looks of gratitude. I imagined that they couldn't climb trees or bushes, they had to pick up whatever was on the ground. Although that gesture was not much on my part, it would help the creatures a lot.

We soon left the group of animals to do their own things as we continued on with our own journey. We travelled for the rest of the day and then found a suitable spot for our camp. We built another shelter and laid there under the clear sky with the moon hanging as if suspended on the string.

While Shelly wen to sleep, I read the other books as I wanted to familiarize myself with them. I then noticed that the sky became more bright. When I looked up, I saw lights in the distance. They seemed to be very far away as if touching the skies. The colours were vibrant like bright orange and yellow as well as red and even pink. Green colour was there as well as very light blue.

I looked at those light with my mouth wide open and managed to blurt out one word "Wow!". We lived in the forest for a while now and we never encountered that kind of thing in the sky. I woke Shelly up to also have a look. Shelly seemed annoyed that I awoke it but when I pointed towards the sky, it changed its mind and stared at the lights just like me.

This lasted for a while but I didn't know how long exactly. I lost track of time and simply fell asleep thinking 'I would like to know what those lights represent'.