chapter 10

"What were those? I've never seen birds like that" Elor asked, wiping sweat from his brow.

[A SHADOW SPIRIT BIRD]

A voice answered but not in a growl but in Quirin their language. It was another orc with tribal marks on its body, it wasn't among the ones they had met before.

Cerrise noticed the others tensed when they heard the voice but said nothing.

"Don't spirit birds hate cold areas,"

[WE THOUGHT SO TOO BUT A WHILE AGO THEY MOVED INTO THE COLDLANDS CHASING AWAY THE OTHER CREATURES, THEIR APPEARANCE DISTURBED THE POWER BALANCE AND MANY BEASTS HAVE STARTED LEAVING.]

"Do you have any idea why they could have chosen this place," Rode asked.

[WE HAVE NO IDEA BUT WE SUSPECT IT HAS SOMETHING TO DO WITH THE MOUNTAIN, THEY ALWAYS GO BACK THEIR AFTER ATTACKING]

Cerrise approached the remains of the soul beasts, studying the mist that lingered in the air. "Apart from hating the cold they are also solitary creatures that hate living near other beasts, perhaps the isolation of the mountain offered them a refuge. Or maybe something in the mountain attracted them."

Asnir sheathed his weapon, his gaze fixed on the mist. "We should then search the mountain,"

[FOR HELPING US WE WOULD LIKE TO INVITE YOU TO OUR ABODE]

They were led into the place for apparently stopping their resources from being stolen, which saved a few more beasts.

Although broken the houses were huge almost thrice the size of normal village houses. There were giant ants helping the other orcs carry the rubble out of the way and help those who were injured.

Elor, was taken to the healer where they were to heal the cohesion and they were led to a slightly stable house and the got in. they were sat down and the chief explained what was with the birds.

They were Echo birds, scavengers of the south. They somehow made their way north where weaker beasts leave and started taking their food. They became so bad that the beasts of the mountain had to leave the mountain where the birds had decided to stay thus causing the humans who lived there below the mountain to move.

As she spoke the queen instructed two orcs to go get something, they left and returned after a while with something golden in their hands and Cerrise raised a questioning eyebrow, he had read that when an orcs canine turns gold it becomes a very powerful weapon its kept by the orcs as tradition.

"You want something from us," he said.

[YOU ARE CLEVER. YOU LOOK LIKE WARRIORS WE WANT YOU TO AID US WITH LEADING THE BIRDS AWAY.]

He turned to the others and he knew they understood this was to be their mission to begin with.

"Do we need to agree? those birds look terrifying " Asnir asked.

"Technically yes, unless you want to lose," Cerrise said and looked at the rest of the group.

"Sure, we don't mind," Rode said.

"Then we should leave, we have two days left," he said.

The orcs gave them a little food and they walked to the direction of the mountain.

[GOODLUCK]

The queen told them as they left her eyes lingering on the four who had slaughtered the birds like they were mere playthings. With a smile on her face the look in her eyes if one knew they would clearly attribute it to the king.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

The journey up the mountain was tourturingly slow, but they didn't rush, the terrain was new to them and they only had a basic understanding of their opponent.

But it was easier than expected.

The orcs had told them that this Mountain was full of Echo birds. They have been climbing for long and not even one had appeared.

"Ahh!"

A scream!

It came from somewhere in the ahead of them, it was a human's scream. Well, it sounded human.

As they cautiously moved forward, Cerrise could smell the faint stench of blood — someone was there.

"Keep your guards up, be careful, other than us there could be other people," he told them.

And they became even more cautious. They didn't dare neglect anything. The enemy could be watching them.

Cerrise stopped after a while. There was fog in front of them. It was so thick they could barely see what was in front of them

"Is this a sign to stop?" Asnir asked weakly.

Cerrise looked in front of then closed his eyes. He could feel the surroundings clearly and because of the snow he could 'see' what was ahead. An extremely thin winding path.

"I have a way to get us past the mist but you have to listen to me and do everything as I say that way unless an external disturbance occurs, we will be fine."

They nodded.

"Follow my footsteps and do not divert from them even a little bit. I need one of you to hold my clothes and the rest follow,"

After doing as instructed, Cerrise began to walk. The path was small enough to fit one person and it was steep to the p[oint that if he hadn't compacted the snow beneath his feet the ones behind him would have fallen.

'Crack'

Cerrise reflexively stopped causing those behind him to bump into him. Something rushed towards them the force causing them to feel the pressure around it as it crashed infront of them very close to Cerrise's feet.

Crash!

Cerrise felt something land on his face, by the smell it was most likely blood and the familiar scent of it told him that it belonged to the one who they heard screaming so whatever fell in front of him was probably a corpse.

A dead body had fallen in front of them. It was provocation. The beasts were smart enough to have learnt provocation, it was interesting.

The others tensed and the hands on his cloth which belonged to Elor shaked.

"W-what was that?" he asked slowly.

Before he could answer Rode spoke.

"It smells like blood, is it a beast?"

"Oh, I smell it to, it smells dead, so it is a beast corpse," Asnir said.

"It's human," Cerrise said crushing their fantasy, "I'm going to walk past it, jump and don't trip over it."

He opened his eyes and looked down straining his eyes in order to look at the body.

His eyes shrunk, the body was mutilated to the point where one would wonder whether it was human and not. Its skin was scratched by what was clearly claws and half of his face and lower back were beaten off.

Calming his breath, he continued facing their previous destination and walked over the body indifferently. He didn't want blood on him, it could attract beasts.

From where the fog started to this point, the others had gotten used to walking behind him. And Cerrise though gradually his mana got integrated with the surroundings and he could see further.

Suddenly, they heard a sound of something exploding ahead, it wasn't far.