There once was a man full of grit,

Who devoured some fire meat—unfit.

The heat made him cry,

Both coming and bye,

Now he sits with regret (and a split).

Goldie Honorhide.

Felix is shitting hot stuff, but Bear-kin are made of sterner stuff.

My energy is steadily depleting again. Thirst is rising. Several people have passed out from the heat and dehydration. Kevin looks like he is about to do the same.

We slog up the next rise. The horses are flagging, and one collapses. It is quickly put out of its misery, and one of the horses released from a discarded wagon is hitched up instead. I saw Makara and several Orcs drinking the horse's blood, and Makara bites into a leg enthusiastically.

We are back on the move quickly.

When we crest the rise, we are back in a thick swarm of ants, and I have to expend more energy.

"The edge is just ahead!" Karen yells at me.

I start pulsing almost continuously to keep the ants away. I must have killed thousands by now. I sense the edge approaching and pulse out Frigid Void, killing dozens of ants, but they keep coming.

As our wagons pass the line of fire ants, Felix and I jump off. I keep the Frigid Void going for all the wagons with Felix's help. We don't want to lose another one at the last hurdle.

My Hearing Aid heard the Caravan master's instructions to the Drivers: "Keep going, keep going. There is a river at the bottom of the hill. We stop after crossing it."

As the last wagon passes, a hand reaches out, and I grab it, and Goldie swings me aboard. I reach down and catch Felix as he jumps after me.

"Well done, lad," Yoboc said as he was there with Goldie. His clothes looked burned, and his beard was a bit singed, but he looked fine. Then I remembered he had Regeneration from his Monster Hunter Class, and it was much higher levelled than Makara's. Goldie looked better than most as well.

"You have a self-healing skill as well, don't you?" I asked.

"That's rude," she clips me over the head, which she can only do while I sit. "A lady has her secrets. And after all we have done for you as well!"

I looked puzzled.

"You left a lot of dead bodies behind, lad," Yoboc clarified. "We are here so we can collect a few to sell." He lifted the canvas, and there were huge bags of dead ants. They had converted all the tenting material, got more material from somewhere, and collected hundreds of ant bodies from the road. "We will need to start extracting the key material before they start to smell, but we now have time to do that."

I just looked, not knowing what to say.

"He's speechless," Yoboc said.

"That is just his normal state," Goldie said. "He has no idea how much this is worth. We will teach you the value of coins when we get to Jern, don't worry, lad."

"We came to an agreement with Oberlun," Yoboc said. "He is the independent Merchant who owns these last two wagons. He is young and looking for opportunities and will organise things for us for a small cut."

I just nodded. Frankly, I was too tired to think about it now. I was nodding off when the wagons finally splashed through the ford across the river.

Borko was there yelling, "Drinking Upstream of the ford, washing and swimming downstream of the ford!"

Felix and I jumped off, dunked our heads in the water, and drank like a lot of guards. The Cargo master ordered barrels filled for the horses, and the drivers were keen to drink as soon as the wagons were parked.

I got up and went looking for Kevin. He had passed out and hadn't been reached in the pandemonium that was the caravan. I grabbed him and carried him to the river. I floated him in the shallow water at the edge to cool him down and splashed water on his face, getting some in his mouth. He came round and floundered and then drank deeply. He then threw up, before drinking again more slowly. I didn't look at who might be downstream of us.

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"Are you coming right, Kevin?" I asked.

He nodded, "Thanks."

The poor guy looked terrible, but it has probably done wonders for his attributes and resistances.

Word came around that we would be camping here for two nights before the last, hopefully uneventful, run to Jern.

We were back together as a team, setting up a little camping spot under one of 'our' wagons when Karen and Alex came up.

Karen looked serious. "Ivan, Makara, I wish to extend my personal thanks for your work through the ant territory. I stuffed up. I made the wrong decision to try to get through. I grossly underestimated the danger. Without your help, we would have lost everything. Only losing two wagons and a horse is amazing for such a colossal misjudgment. I can't offer you anything except the standard 'above and beyond' bonus, but if you need anything, just contact me."

I nodded, but she didn't wait or seem to need a response.

"She will be lucky to be in charge again," Yoboc said. "Her bosses will assess her leadership, and there will be a lot of complaints about what we have just gone through. To be fair, she would not have attempted it without Makara on board. You were an unexpected bonus, Ivan. A critical one at that."

Then my stomach gave an audible gurgle.

Goldie started laughing, "Karan thinks Ivan is hot shit and guess what he is about to do? Felix set the example. Hey, go far away from us!"

It was an extremely unpleasant and messy couple of hours. My ass burned and my piss was on fire. I need to be more careful about what I eat.

I drank and drank to try and dilute the mess I ate.

I checked for a new Resistance or Skill, but there was nothing for all that pain and discomfort—nothing except the conventional wisdom to be careful what you eat.

Goldie did our night shift. And the cooks had gone all out to prepare a good breakfast. We could take out time as we were staying the day and moving in the morning.

The Beast master and Carpenter were the busiest. Kevin was roped in to help the carpenter.

The night watch system was extended throughout the day, and I was on an afternoon watch. I raised the emergency alarm when about thirty heavily armed warriors appeared down the road, heading towards us.

The Guards scrambled, grabbing weapons and running to their emergency stations, and Borko appeared by my side. He took one look and grunted.

I glanced around and saw Yoboc on a wagon with his bow. Caravan Master Karen came out to stand by Borko and me. When she identified those approaching, she relaxed a bit. Neither she nor Borko signalled the stand down, even though they seemed to recognise some of the warriors.

I looked closer. They were on foot, but they had a draft horse pulling a two-wheeled cart with some barrels on them. The lead warrior was an orc with a two-handed warhammer on his back. All of them wore thick, heavy armour. Heavy leather armour, not metal plate, though. There were only a couple of archers. Most of them were equipped with melee weapons.

They stopped just outside normal bow range. I knew Yoboc and several others in the caravan could easily shoot that far, but this was being polite. The lead orc said something in a language I didn't understand, and Borko replied. It was obviously in Orcish.

Then Karen said something in the same language, which surprised me. Orcs are picky about who they teach their language to. There were several exchanges. Orcish is a low guttural language which always sounds like they are sweating at you, even though they are not. The orc members of the caravan often communicate in their native tongue.

Then Karen signalled the stand down.

The warriors moved across the river to set up their camp. That put them between us and the ants.

As I was going off watch, I saw the orc leader and two others come across the river. Karen, Borko, and Alex greeted them and led them off to talk. I wonder where Alex was earlier. The scouts are supposed to warn us of approaching people.

We were all together eating the evening meal—all of us except Kevin, who was still working. I wonder if he has picked up some carpentry skills yet. The cooks had done well again. We would be on the move again in the morning. Four to five days to Jern.

We rose when the orc from the warriors approached us with a female orc at his side. Well, Makara and Felix didn't get up, but the rest of us did.

"Greetings," he said in common. "I am Nash, and this is Mog. May we join you?"

I got the feeling it wasn't really a question, but more of a statement. Yoboc also had that feeling, but he didn't challenge it. "Aye," he said, "What is it you want?"

Yoboc gets blunt when he gets annoyed. They didn't start on the right foot here. They sat anyway. Nash had left his warhammer behind, as had Mog with whatever weapon she used.

"The Caravan master tells me you are all a mercenary team on contract to the caravan, and that you two were instrumental in getting them through the fire ants," Nash said, pointing to Makara and me.

Silence greeted that obvious statement. Makara took a big bite from the meat in front of her, showing a lot of teeth.

For some reason, this seemed to amuse Nash. "You are not from Jern, so you don't know me." He pulled out a Mercenary Guild Token. It was larger than ours and made of an expensive metal. "I am Guildmaster Nash, in charge of the Jern chapter of the Mercenary Guild. Mog is part of my personal mercenary team, the Teeth Nashers. We have taken a contract from the Duke to deal with this nest of monsters before it spreads too far. We might be a tad late." He looked at Makara and me. "I am looking to co-opt you two in with us. I have cleared it with your caravan master and your current contract. Are you interested in having a crack at the nest? We could use an affinity user, and" he looked at me, "whatever you are. I am told you are hot shit, but nobobdy will tell me more. Wolfslayer and Ant Cruncher?" he said questioningly.

Goldie burst out laughing.

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