Walking to the disembarkation point, Dan glanced at the rising sun as he calmed his heart down. Everything was ready and they were as prepared as they could be.

  In the last three days, they had been working on a plan so whoever was going to drop to shore would be as safe as possible, doubly so considering who those were most likely going to be.

  Dan still held a bit of hope at the beginning, thinking that the ones going wouldn't end up being the three old ladies. Unfortunately for him, no better option had arisen, so they were exactly the ones the crew had decided to send.

  Dan would be lying if he said he was comfortable with that, but he had been there when the three ladies told them their plan and why they were recommending themselves for this mission, and he had to admit, they were convincing. Well, Mary and Brittany were. Mrs Raily wasn't as clear about all her skills, but she said that she knew what she was doing, and Empath alone would be valuable to them. Being able to read the emotions and feelings of the people they were going to interact with would prove to be more than just a bit useful.

  Of course, they still weren't sending the ladies on their own, they were sending Luke and Hank with them. Luke because his skill would prove useful in case things went south, and the same for Hank. The young man didn't have Old Raily's or Marcus's experience, but his Wandering Adventurer class was useful and had considerable offensive power if the need called for it. Plus, he had been spending time with those two, trying to learn as much as he could from them. Dan trusted that he would do his best to bring everyone back safe and sound.

  While those preparations were ongoing, Voyager continued on her path, slowly. They were cautious not to get caught at the final stretch of their journey, so they only made it to the Dynasty on the second day. The last day was spent calibrating their location and scouting the towns they had decided on to be their possible target.

  In the end, they didn't even need to go to all three towns. After seeing the second one, both Marcus and Old Raily decided on it directly.

  From what they had known from the natives on board, the town was called Lonely Ridge Village, and from what they saw, it lived up to its name perfectly. It was situated atop a coastal cliff surrounded by even bigger mountains from all three other sides, giving it an isolated feel.

  The village was known as one of the few hubs in the path crossing those huge mountains and their forests. Travellers weren't that common, but it wouldn't be that unusual for a couple of new faces to appear there.

  Marcus and Old Raily had their eyes on that town from the beginning just from the natives' descriptions, but once they laid their eyes on it, they knew that it would be the perfect location for the coming operation. Especially after they scouted around for a bit and noticed that the waters just below the cliff face were deep, meaning that Voyager could dock right at the doorsteps of the village if it came down to it and they needed to extract their people from there fast.

  Their preparations also included questioning the natives some more about what to expect and how to act. Mrs Raily and the others had been part of those interviews. They also spent a lot of their time talking with the natives to get their command of the language and pronunciation as perfect as they could be before the Universal Translation skill was gone.

  One of the things that came out of those questioning was the fact that moving in the morning was the best for them. Lonely Ridge Village wasn't that isolated, but it also wasn't big enough for night activities to be expected, so heading to shore just as the sun was rising and reaching the Village at the early hours of the morning was what they had decided on.

  As Dan was lost in his thoughts about all they had done and prepared for, he only noticed that he had made it to the disembarkation point when he saw Marcus waving him over. After greeting the man and everyone else there, he asked:

  "How are things going? Everything is ready?"

  "As ready as it could be," Marcus said as he looked again at the tender behind him, which was one of the Phantoms that Rose worked on, and it was perfectly ready for the mission ahead of it.

  "How are they doing, though?" Dan asked, whispering.

  "The old ladies seem to be looking forward to this more than anyone else," Marcus said. Dan could see how he held back a sigh. "Luke might be a bit stressed about what's coming, but I'm sure he can pull through. While Hank, well, you know how he is."

  A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

  Dan nodded, he did know. Hank was even colder and more introverted than his sister, Fleta, but that wasn't exactly a bad thing. The man was calm and seemed to have nerves of steel, Dan didn't worry about him.

  "Dan, sweety," a voice suddenly sounded from his side, "You don't need to be worried, everything will be alright, and we will get back before you even notice us gone."

  Turning around, Dan found Mrs Raily standing to his side, her usual gentle calming smile as present as ever.

  "It's easy to say," Dan chuckled, "But I can't control my worries, I just hope you all come back safe and sound."

  "And we will," Mrs Raily said seriously, "I will make sure that nothing's going to happen to us."

  "Come on, you old hags! It's time to go!!" A shout came from the side before Dan could reply.

  Looking over, it was Mary as expected, looking at them from the tender with a huge smile on her face.

  "Well," Mrs Raily said wearily, "She might get herself into trouble."

  Dan's heart, which had calmed down because of Mrs Raily went over the roof as he looked at Mary waving at them with a huge smile on her face.

  ***

  Liam hated the early mornings, especially when it was his shift at the gates. The only thing worse than waking up early was having to deal with people on top of that.

  Being a guard in Lonely Ridge Village wasn't that bad. Making sure everything was alright in town and even going out to clear the surrounding area from any monsters was something he welcomed, but the same couldn't be said for gate duty first thing in the morning.

  You might think that having early duty would be easy and calming, after all, people would only start coming in later in the day, but that wasn't the case. There would always be those who had arrived late the night before, who then ended up camping outside, wanting to go in as soon as the sun rose. And also those who were in and wanted to leave as early as possible.

  "Next," he shouted.

  Looking at the next group at the gate, Liam saw three old women and two young men heading towards him. The five looked to be travellers, their clothes hinting at a long arduous journey, though something didn't seem quite right to Liam. He frowned as he tried to find out what it was that didn't quite sit right with him, but he met the gaze of one of the old ladies, and the gentle smile she gave him made him forget that as he felt his annoyance and bitterness at his early shift lessen.

  "Good morning," he greeted them with a smile, to his surprise, "Where did you come from?"

  "We are coming from Sealia," the same old lady said, "Unfortunately, we didn't make it early enough to get in last night, but it's good that we made it at all."

  "That is a long journey," Liam agreed, "It's good that you made it safely, those mountains aren't for everyone."

  Liam then went on with his job as he asked them for their names and where they were heading. He felt quite comfortable with the old lady who handled the conversation, Agatha, her name seemed to be, so he didn't make things hard for them and cleared them quickly.

  "Oh, wait," he called to them just as they were about to pass the gate, he saw the other members of the group stiffen at his call, but Lady Agatha just turned towards him in interest.

  "What is it?" she asked.

  "Just something that the higher-ups are having us do," he grumbled as he took a palm-sized, yet surprisingly thick piece of paper from the stack right at his side, "We got these just the day before, they are having us give them to every new face who passes through here for some reason."

  Liam could still remember how grave his captain seemed as he called them all and told them about this, it seemed that all the isolated towns and villages got these pieces of paper and were told to give them to anyone who seemed new or unfamiliar with the area.

  Lady Agatha took the piece of paper and looked at it for a few seconds before passing it to her interested friends. As Liam had expected, all of them had confused frowns as they looked at it. He understood what they were feeling, after all, the paper only had a few confusing words.

  Dear Friends, mention the name of the one to whom you gave gold, to see the rest.