Reaching the frozen peak, I do not need to worry about landing this ship. That is why I am still so calm. Right now this ship does not have a suspension formation. It is a formation that actively slows down the ship when it reaches the ground. Trying to land without it is something that I won't be able to do.

  Only a genius should be able to pull off something like this. I have heard quite a few stories about it but I have never seen anyone landing without one. Well, other than the ship crashing into the ground of course. I mean I am good at driving a ship, but this is beyond me.

  Anyway, the people in the fort will not want me to try something like this near their fort. That is about the quickest way to screw with the formations of the place. Even I can imagine quite a few methods of causing havoc if the ship was under my control. Heck, I don't even need to do much. Just aim the failing propulsion formation right into their defensive walls. I am sure that something will break. Well, we would end up dying in the process though. Meanwhile, the Snowwind empire will declare the hexmountain to be their enemy.

  Regardless, the threat posed by us means that the instant that we enter into the range of the frozen peak, complete control of the ship will be taken by the formation mages at the frozen peak. At least they were supposed to do that, but they have yet to do anything. Wait, there they are. As I am speaking the bastards have finally decided to take control of the ship. I would have missed it if I were not actively looking for it.

  We formation mages control formations by making use of control strings. They are strings of mana whose design I don't want to talk about right now. These strings connect to the runes on the formation and give us the ability to control and power them with our mana.

  I can resist such control, by literally ripping apart the enemies string with mine. Doing so would be considered to be an act of war. Right now, that is something that is neither good for me nor for the black mountain. It is still a very icky and uncomfortable sense, to give up control of your formation in that way. The nearest analogy I can think of is letting a bug buzz in your ears.

  That is why, all the people of the troop and the scholars are waiting here in the boarding room for our entry into the frozen peak. As for what the boarding room will open into is my primary worry at the moment. It could lead to a welcome but it could just as likely lead to an armed troop. When that happens I will have to rip apart the enemy's control and try to flee. We will most likely fail but a man has to try.

  I am sure that I won't be killed. There are not many forces in the continent that can afford to provoke the black mountain in such a manner. The Snowwind Empire is not one of them. At most, they will imprison me in their dungeons. It will be unpleasant but I won't die at least.

  The door to the ship opens up and I look outside. I feel two things the instant that I leave the safety of the ship. The first is the bone-chilling cold that I feel the instant that my skin hits the outside. Well, at the moment I am wearing my thickest coat but the cold here seems to seep into my very bones. (Well, I needed to hide the vine armor so I can't be removing this coat.) I have been to cold places before. This is something very different. The best way to put it would be that this is not a coldness of the body, but a coldness of the soul. I am sure that If I were to cycle my mana, it would cycle slower.

  The second thing is much harder to describe. It would be accurate to call it pressure, I guess. I think this is what a sheep feels when it looks at a dragon. I can feel my mind enter into a state of mindless panic almost like I am a stranger looking at myself. I have to reign in this feeling. If I do not do that I am sure that I will be running away at this very instant or I will just curl up into a ball.

  The source of this pressure would be the man who was standing in front of me. He is an old man, thin enough that he more closely resembles a skeleton than a living person. Still, only a fool would consider the man to be weak. He is such a powerful man, that the head office has a detailed record of him. Otherwise, this far north even the black mountain does not like to maintain records. Other than his raw power though, I do not know much about the man. I am not allowed to read the record they have on this man. That is enough to tell you how important they consider the man.

  “Young Captain, I greet you. It is rare for us to see such a young talent so far away from the center of the continent", the commander begins.

  The instant that he speaks the illusion breaks. The intense feeling of fear that I experienced looking at him disappeared like snow in the sun. This man opposite me is not simple. Somehow this causes my heart to beat faster.

  "I bow down to you, commander.", I begin, trying my best not to keep my fear from showing on my face as I bow as is customary with this bunch. These are very particular people. "I apologize for the pitiful state that you have found us in. It has not been easy for us to make our way to this place at the best of times and right now it is the onset of winter. I had assumed people were exaggerating when they told us the danger of winter here. My overconfidence has caused us to suffer."

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  "That certainly seems to be a mistake from our side as well and as the commander, I will apologize to you. We should have been more hospitable and sent a couple of people to welcome you. Sadly even we are restricted by the onset of winter", the commander spoke, leaving me to wonder what hidden trap lay in this apology. If only I could gather my thoughts, I am sure that I would find it. That is a task for later. "for now, let us forgo much more serious talks. It is bad luck to stand too long at the door. You seem to be exhausted and I am busy with my preparations for the winter, so we shall speak again later. My underlings will show you to your room."

  Saying that the old man disappeared and I mean that literally. The man was there one second and he was not there the next. The man could have used dimensional magic, but such magic would have still left traces. The man was simply so fast that I could not process him moving.

  Two soldiers were standing at attention to the side of the commander. A male and a female soldier, with strength roughly equivalent to me. (They are cycling their mana to intimidate me so this is precise.) Maybe I can hold my own against them, but that would require me to go all out and I would have to reveal the vine armor. Jacob and Andrew can hold their own against one and I could fight the other but with Trevor here that is not possible. They wouldn't even need one attack to kill him. So I calm myself down.

  “What shall I address you as?“ I speak, bowing to them in a manner that would be considered polite. Everything feels a bit dreamy right now if I am honest.

  “You can call us guards.“, speaks the female soldier, in a tone that conveys their hostility.

  “Right now, you will have to give up all your weapons. You shall be escorted to the guest room once you have come that.“, speaks the male soldier.

  Normally, I would give at the very least lip service to this man and argue with him but at the moment I am not even able to form the retort in my head. The meeting with the commander was more intense than I had expected it to be. So I quietly give up my weapons, though I leave my formation on me. It would be stupidity to expose such an ace and I would eat my boot if the two guards in front of me had a sensitive enough mana sense to sense my weapon.

  Thus we begin to make our way into the frozen peak. My first review of the frozen peak is how ordinary it looks. The place looks like about any fort that I have seen near my home. With the way that my predecessors described it, I thought that it would be a massive structure with soldiers marching everywhere. The entire place is supposed to echo with the sound.

  Well, I am sure that it still might be true. After all, I will not be taken anywhere interesting right now. The snowwinders would be quite careful with both us guards and the scholars. After all, at the moment we are the monsters that blew up their temple. Anyway, this much caution is always there for the scholars and their guards.

  Still, I try and force myself to observe these confusing sets of tunnels that we are walking through. We are supposed to maintain clear and simple records throughout our journey as well. This is especially true during any mission. Most people would argue that we already have the scholars for such a task.

  The problem with the guards is that they see too much. You can read the logs of a scholar but then you won't be able to get anything of use unless you are a scholar. We guards can be called as the normal perspective in these missions.

  We thus try to record everything that we can. From the behavior of the servants to the many habits of the guards. Every single piece of information is taken in and analyzed by the black mountain. They can make use of small pieces of information like this to predict some pretty impressive things.

  You never know which place you might end up needing to take over, so any information is welcome. You have the obvious information such as the defenses and the troop placements. Even petty information such as the sleep schedule of the people, the places of rest or even the kind of street food that the people will eat. (You would be surprised just how much poison mages can do with such information.)

  To explain this thing particularly well, one cannot forget about the Iron Forest. During the Druidic conquest, the Iron Forest was one of the last centers of power for the druids. Iron Forest and the iron wall surrounding it can be considered to be the toughest nut that the legion had to crack in the campaign. The place managed to survive the siege of a general and his soldiers for two years. Even after that period, it did not seem close to falling. If anything, it was the troop that was suffering heavy losses.

  The reason that it was destroyed was from the log of a soldier known as Albert. He noticed the fact that the soldiers of Iron Forest had a habit of watering the iron wall to realize that it was a tree. Then it did not take long for our formation masters to figure out what they needed to do. A lot of poison to the roots and the iron forest became a part of history.

  Anyway, I will be keeping detailed records for the simple reason that if one of these bastards kills me tomorrow, the guard corps will know who to target.

  Returning to the frozen peak, all I can tell is that we have been taken somewhere deep inside the fort. I cannot tell the route that we have taken other than the fact that it is a confusing mess of twists and turns. I have lost track of the route that we had taken about a couple of turns ago.

  Maybe the logs of one of the other soldiers might shed a better light, though I wouldn't expect too much from them too. It is just a part of working with forts. I wouldn't be surprised if the other side had formations in place to prevent people from being able to remember the path being taken.

  I am sure that we are being taken to the guest room. Every fort has one. A room that seems ordinary, even comfortable. Most of them are fit even for a king. Yet, I am not sure if this guest room will be better than a dungeon. Such rooms tend to be full of surveillance formations. I am sure that the snowwinders will know everything that we shall be doing in the room.

  Well, this is a part and parcel of dealing with semi-hostile forces. At least I will be able to sleep well.