The more they moved North, the more of the kids began to give up. On the first day, only the sons of nobles stayed on guard duty, but from the second day onward, all the others had to do it. Naturally, those kids had no experience of staying awake throughout the whole night, so in order not to fail, they didn't take turns and ended up skipping a night of sleep. Thanks to that, their focus wavered during the day, and they ended up injuring themselves. On the seventh day, around 200 kids had already given up.
On the eighth day, Zaos noticed that the temperature was decreasing. He didn't know if that was a coincidence or not, but he also noticed that they were approaching a mountainous area.
"... This will be difficult," Zaos muttered.
Considering the little he knew about Elius, Zaos was one hundred percent sure that the lieutenant would choose the harshest route in order to exhaust as many kids as possible and forcefully make them give up. While that seemed like something necessary in order to make the kids grow up physically and mentally, that seemed a bit too much from Zaos's perspective. Even though he was used to harsh training regimens.
"Ow, shit… my feet are killing me," Drannor said. "I want to take a hot bath and sleep in a decent bed…"
"I am sure if you complain more loudly, Lieutenant Elius will help you," Zaos said while they crossed the first valley on their path.
The number of medicinal herbs and plants was weirdly abundant in that area, to the point that Zaos even found one that was supposed to be the main ingredient of mana potions. The plant's name was the 'afterlife call'... the plant had that name because it is said to show up in areas where apparently a mage died. The plant itself cost fifty silver coins. It was the type of plant that could easily give birth to others, as long as it is replanted in a decent place. At least that was what the encyclopedia said.
"I guess I won't have time to look after plants in the Northern base, so I will sell it…" Zaos nodded to himself. "Speaking of which, it has been eight days already, when that annoying lieutenant is planning to stop at a town or village?"
Elius wasn't planning to stop anywhere close to a place where the rookies could rest properly by the look of things. That was a problem since Zaos had already made quite a bit of ointment. He had a lot of free time at night, after all, since he had to conserve his strength.
Two day later, Zaos noticed that the peak of the mountains was white thanks to snow, and at night, the cold was starting to get annoying. Fortunately, for the sake of speed, Elius didn't make the newcomers cross the mountains. They passed in between them.
"Do you know anything about the Northern base?" Zaos asked.
"No," Drannor replied. "Father wanted to surprise me as much as possible, so he didn't mention anything about the four camps. He only said that he had graduated in the North. That is why I choose to come here."
Laiex also chose that base by the look of things, but naturally, he didn't say anything about it, nor did Zaos ask. However, at that point in time, Zaos was starting to get a pretty good idea about the place he was going to… it was very cold and desolate.
Things got harder from the eleventh say onwards. The carts carrying the food got lighter, so the horses' speed increased. The recruits had to increase their pace, but to Zaos's surprise, no one gave up after that day. They were so close, so all the boys mustered all their willpower to endure the last few days of hardships, even though they had no idea if things would be better or worse once they reached their destination. Four hundred of the original one thousand boys had given up. Still, none of them belonged to the boys from noble families who had previous training. They were surprisingly diligent… none of them wanted to bring shame upon their families by failing on their first journey.
The vivid green of the central area of the kingdom gave place to the brownish grasslands, which was a depressing color. Still, things were about to become even more depressing. On the morning of the thirteenth day, the newcomers saw snow falling on them.
"We are in the second month of the year… how come it is snowing here?" Zaos frowned.
The weather in the central part of the kingdom is pretty straightforward. There is a rainy season around the middle of the year, and at the end of it, snow shows up. It doesn't pile up, but considering that even in that region, it snows, then in the North…
On the last day of the journey, Zaos couldn't see any color aside from the white of the snow in front of him. All the mountains were covered in snow. Given that they were pretty close from each other, it wasn't hard to imagine a disaster happening if all the snow in all the mountains in the area fell in an avalanche.
Since everything was covered in snow, it took a while for Zaos to notice a massive building in the middle of the mountains. While it wasn't as tall as the castle, it was three times larger… It was the northern base of the army. While the building was essentially a fortress that had twenty meters tall walls, the mountains around it worked as a much better defensive structure. Not only that, but it could also conceal its existence amidst all the white of the snow.
"How weird it is to find such a massive area in this mountainous region…" Zaos said. "It is even weirder that someone managed to bring the materials to build it… still, why build such a massive base in the middle of nowhere?"
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