"Your Highness, we've arrived. This is the Egret Lake marshland." The guide pulled down the woolen cloth covering his face, his breath forming white puffs as he spoke.
It was December eleventh, and winter had already arrived. A light snow had just fallen, blanketing the vast, low-lying plains in a thin layer of white. Here and there, patches of green and dark brown peeked through—the evergreen plants native to the Egret Lake marshlands, along with the small hillocks and large rock formations that jutted up from the flatlands.
"Your Highness, I just received a messenger hawk relay from our covert operatives in the Sabaki Duchy while we were on the road. So far, the pursuit force sent to the Egret Lake marshlands still hasn't caught Master Radi—instead, they've been shipping back cartloads of wounded. Our operatives gathered from those wounded that Master Radi is still holding his own against them. In their words, Master Radi has become an absolutely terrifying demon—aside from the three Great Swordmasters, no one can withstand his sudden attacks. The Grand Duke of Sabaki has dispatched another full battalion of soldiers to the Egret Lake marshlands, along with nearly a hundred wagons of supplies, which are most likely winter provisions for the pursuit forces..."
Tager held a small bamboo cylinder and a thin silk ribbon in his hands, reading aloud the intelligence written on the ribbon. Beside him sat a burly, bearded man on horseback, with a messenger hawk steaming with heat perched on his left shoulder, currently swallowing strips of beef the man was feeding it...
Lorist had brought three battalions—fifteen hundred men from the Guard Corps—to the Egret Lake marshland basin, but at the moment, only a little over thirty men were by his side. This was because Lorist, anxious for Radi's safety, had ridden ahead with a small group; the main force was still trailing behind, roughly three hours' ride away.
Schwarid, wrapped in a bearskin coat, quickly dismounted and pulled a rolled-up map of the Egret Lake marshlands from a satchel slung over his shoulder. He called a guard over to unfurl it, holding it up before Lorist.
The guide raised a small copper flask to his lips, took a swig of liquor, muttered a curse about the damned weather, then walked over to Lorist. He studied the map for a moment before pointing. "Your Highness, we are here. Half a day's ride ahead, we'll reach Red Tree Fortress—the only checkpoint along the middle of this road. Red Tree Fortress sits on the sole hillock between two marshes on either side, marshes that don't freeze even in winter. The checkpoint was built right on top of that hillock, and the only way through is a single muddy path just wide enough for one wagon. There's no way to bypass Red Tree Fortress—unless we dismount here and take a detour..."
"You're saying we can bypass Red Tree Fortress from here?" Lorist asked.
"Yes, Your Highness. Old Gisan here is famous throughout the Egret Lake marshlands. I know every route, every detour, like the back of my hand. Honestly, if you'd hired anyone else as your guide in winter, they'd be stumbling around blind. But I know exactly where the marsh freezes solid enough to cross and where it'll swallow you whole. That's over thirty years of experience talking. I've been out here making a living since I was a boy, following my father around these parts. If I didn't have the skills, I'd have died out here long ago." Old Gisan took two long swigs of liquor, and his voice grew rougher.
"Heh heh, Old Gisan, it's precisely because you know the Egret Lake marshlands better than anyone that we hired you. We just hope you can live up to the handsome fee we're paying you. You've seen for yourself by now—we're looking for someone in this area..." Tager walked over to speak with Old Gisan.
"Looking for someone..." Old Gisan's memory stirred. He called out to Tager, "My lord, if you're looking for someone, you should tell me where in the Egret Lake marshlands he might be, where he entered, whether he left any hidden marks or signs along the way. The Egret Lake marshlands are vast—if all you can say is 'we're looking for someone,' I've got nowhere to start looking..."
"Uh, Uncle Gisan, the person we're looking for entered the Egret Lake marshlands from the Sabagi Duchy. He's probably heading toward Egret Lake itself. Sabagi Duchy is no friend of ours—they've even sent people to hunt down the person we're seeking. That's why we entered the marshlands from this side. As for hidden marks or signs, he probably hasn't left any, or they'd have been destroyed. If he did leave marks, they'd be a circle-and-cross or a bear symbol carved on the lower right side of trees or rocks. But as for how to find him, we have our own methods. What we need from you is to tell us which routes are passable and which we'll need to detour around..." Lorist looked up at Old Gisan.
"Ah, Your Highness, there's no need to be so polite—just call me by my name. Old Gisan would be more than happy to serve you." Being called "Uncle" by Lorist left the guide Old Gisan flattered and overwhelmed.
"Tager..."
"Yes, Your Highness." Tager turned around. "Old Mobinhan, I'll need your help."
The man called Old Mobinhan was an elderly fellow whose hair and beard had gone entirely grey, yet he looked surprisingly vigorous for his age. He wore a hunting outfit made of beast hide, and upon hearing Tager's call, he grinned broadly. "Your Highness, just leave it to me."
With that, he turned and lifted a large cage wrapped in thick leather from the horse behind him. He peeled back the leather and opened the cage door, and a massive golden hawk leapt onto Old Mobinhan's arm. A gust of cold wind swept past, and the hawk ruffled its wings and turned its head to survey its surroundings.
"What a magnificent golden eagle!" the guide Old Gisan exclaimed in awe.
"Have you ever seen a golden eagle?" asked Old Mobinhan, gently stroking the feathers on the hawk's back. The hawk displayed a surprisingly human-like expression of attachment, rubbing its sharp beak lightly against the hunting outfit on the old man's chest.
"This little Ink Feather has been with me for seventeen years. I found it under a cliff when it hadn't even grown its feathers yet. It must have been newly born and fallen from its nest somehow. Lucky it didn't break its neck. I took it home and raised it like my third son... we've been companions all these years..."
"Old man, Old man! My dear Old Mobinhan! Please, have a heart and save the memories for later. Just let the eagle go up and find the person! Once we find them, we can go somewhere warm, sit by a fire, have a drink, and you can tell us the whole story of you and the eagle then. We promise to listen with rapt attention, even if we've heard it a dozen times already..." Tager urged impatiently from the side.
Old Mobinhan snapped back to attention and shot Tager an annoyed glare. "What's the rush? Sending the eagle straight up into this cold wind without letting it acclimate first would be suicide. Give it a little more time..."
The guide, Old Gisan, asked curiously, "You're going to have the golden eagle fly up to search for the person? Is that even possible? Does it know the person you're looking for?"
"No," replied Lorist. "Having the eagle find one specific person in the sky is very difficult. But spotting a group is easy, especially in such vast, open marshland. The person we're looking for is being hunted by a group. If the eagle spots those pursuers, it's equivalent to finding our target... at the very least, we'll know they're nearby. Oh, and Old Mobinhan, once it's up, have your eagle search the area around Egret Lake. See if there's a group searching or hunting there. In this cold weather, the pursuers should have a camp somewhere..."
"Your Highness, I will have Little Ink Feather search in the direction of Egret Lake. Rest assured, we will find Lord Reddy," Old Mobinhan answered respectfully.
Old Mobinhan currently served as a special consultant for the
After a while longer, Old Mobinhan finally released his hawk. The bird circled overhead for a moment before flying off toward the west—the direction of Egret Lake.
"All right, Uncle Gisan, let's head west as well. You'll need to tell us which paths are passable and which are not." Lorist withdrew his gaze from the sky and turned to the guide, Old Gisan.
"Well… Your Highness, we'll have to dismount and proceed on foot," Old Gisan said hesitantly. "There are places in the swamp where people can pass but horses cannot. We can bring the horses along, but no one can ride them—if you hit a sinkhole or a patch of deep mud, there won't even be time to mount a rescue…"
"That's fine. You're our guide and you know this place, so we'll follow your lead," Lorist said with a smile. "El, send two men to stay behind and guard the horses until the main force arrives. The rest of you, dismount and check your equipment and packs. We'll take a few pack horses and the essentials—we're moving ahead first. Tell Parker and Great Swordmaster Hughes that once the main force arrives, they should set up camp here and establish a proper logistics and security perimeter."
"Yes, Your Highness." El snapped to attention and replied.
…
Reddy had truly reached the end of his rope.
Seven days ago he had vanished into the Magic Grass Swamp. He had rested properly for two days, recovering from the exhaustion of his body, supplementing his strength and nutrition with the rations he found in the packs of the soldiers he had killed, and the wounds on his body had begun to scab over. Everything was developing in a favorable direction. But he hadn't expected that Great Swordmaster Cindy would order her pursuers to actually bring in fire oil and begin setting fires, preparing to burn every last patch of reeds on the surface of this swamp…
The reeds on this muddy lake stayed green through winter because they were saturated with moisture, but Reddy, who knew the Mudwater Lake well, understood that despite how thin and juice-filled these reeds appeared, once doused with fire oil and touched by a flame, they would quickly dry out and ignite. With a full day of burning and the wind feeding the flames, every last reed in the entire Magic Grass Swamp would be reduced to ash. He had to leave this lake immediately…
If the Magic Grass Swamp was shaped like a spindle, then Reddy's little wooden raft was positioned roughly one-third of the way across from the opposite bank, right at the spindle's center. He still had some time to row the raft to the far shore. The only thing that could aid his escape was the fact that, because the reeds were so full of moisture, they produced enormous clouds of foul-smelling smoke when burned—Reddy might be able to use that to evade the watchmen's eyes and the tracking dogs' noses to escape pursuit.
But the wind was too strong. The great fire spread quickly, sending billowing columns of smoke skyward. Reddy wanted to go faster but couldn't. The roots and stems of the reeds in the lake kept snagging on his little raft, forcing him to use his longsword to hack them away and clear the obstructions. By the time the fire was almost at his back, the raft was still four or five meters from the opposite bank, and ahead lay nothing but a dense wall of reeds with no way to push the raft any farther…
Reddy grabbed the punting pole he had been using to propel the raft and bound it tightly together with his long spear. The combined length came to roughly three meters. He hoisted it, put every ounce of strength behind his arm, and hurled it forward into the thicket of reeds. The spear plunged into the water and embedded itself in the lake's muddy bottom, leaving only a foot of its tail above the surface. Reddy snatched up his longsword, drew a deep breath, and leaped with all his might. The tip of his right foot landed with perfect precision on the tail of the spear. The spear drove downward and Reddy's entire body dropped. But in the instant before his feet touched the water, he had already borrowed just enough force from the spear to spring upward once more. With a heavy splash, he landed face-down in the mud of the bank.
He had made it onto the bank. He could use the shore for leverage here, but Reddy didn't dare stand up. Because of the wind direction, thick smoke was billowing straight toward the shore. The sentries the pursuers had posted on this side had long since scattered to who-knows-where. Reddy first used his longsword to clear away the waterweed roots tangled around his feet, then, enduring the nauseating stench, he lay flat on the ground and crawled forward inch by inch.
The great fire on the Magic Grass Swamp burned for an entire day before finally revealing the true face of the entire muddy lake. Reddy used the cover of darkness to slip out of the encirclement and ran, dodging and weaving, toward Egret Lake. His pursuers didn't know whether Reddy was still hiding somewhere in the Magic Grass Swamp, which gave him the cover of one night. But come dawn, the pursuers would quickly spot the little wooden raft half-submerged in the water on the opposite bank and immediately confirm the direction of Reddy's escape…
Reddy's premonition proved correct—the pursuers had already picked up the trail he'd left the night before and were closing in. Because he was unfamiliar with the terrain and the swamp was full of obstacles, Reddy's night of running yielded twice the effort for half the result. He turned through countless bends and skirted around innumerable bogs, yet hadn't managed to put much distance between himself and his chasers. The pursuit party behind him needed only three hours to catch sight of Reddy's back.
But at this point, a large swamp still separated Reddy from his pursuers. Reddy flipped them the middle finger—a gesture of contempt he'd learned from Lorist—and then, seeing that Great Swordmaster Xiandi hadn't followed in pursuit, he sat down with some relief to rest for a while.
The pursuers didn't bother searching for a path through the swamp either. Reddy had stumbled through it the night before by pure luck, poking around with a long tree branch and somehow making it across. Seeing that the distance wasn't great, the soldiers who had caught up began assembling their longbowmen to rain arrows toward Reddy, which made him deeply miss the longbow he had abandoned on the little wooden raft. Right now, he had no means to fight back.
After a few choice curses, Reddy had no choice but to keep running. The pursuers behind him refused to let up. After two days, his rations were gone as well. If it hadn't been for a half-day of snow that happened to fall and cover his tracks, and if he hadn't happened to find a water rat's nest to sleep in for a night and fill his stomach, the exhausted and starving Reddy would have collapsed long ago.
But yesterday's snowfall had been too light. The next day the sun came out, and the pursuit party with their hunting dogs quickly picked up Reddy's trail again. He could only continue his desperate flight with no alternative. Just as he was finally getting close to Egret Lake, Reddy suddenly discovered to his despair that another flanking squad had appeared ahead of him—more than a dozen cavalrymen charging straight toward him. He glanced back at the enemies pursuing from behind, gave a bitter smile, and drew his longsword. With the situation as it was, all he could do was fight to the death. Just as his teacher had once said: kill one and you've broken even, kill two and you've profited. Now let's see how many he could profit from…
……(To be continued.)