The caravan manages to reach a town just as it is getting dark and we stop for the night. Amn and Gremshow rent out two entire inns for the night, one for us and one for the troops. The food at the inn is surprisingly good, but definitely not healthy, and I add several more dishes to my pouch.

  Since we are staying in a town, I don’t bother to go out looking for beasts and just open a soulscape. I do the usual with my wives and kids, but after they are gone I invite the goddesses for some fun. I am spending quite a bit of time with their avatars and don’t want them to feel ignored.

  Besides, if I have the chance to have two goddesses, why would I not take advantage of it? Considering how excited they were, I should probably try to remember to do it more often. By the time I am done playing with them, I am actually tired enough to sleep until morning.

  Breakfast brings with it several more dishes of fried goodness to add to the pouch. Again, they are unhealthy, but everything that tastes good tends to be bad for you in some way. Besides, I am pretty sure that with healing spells available we shouldn’t have to worry about things like that.

  We leave after breakfast and we cross the kingdom’s border shortly before lunch time. We stop for a quick lunch in another town, but we don’t make the next town before it gets dark. Gremshow starts complaining about having to camp, but Amn ends it by assigning an attractive maid to serve him.

  It is definitely not a move that I would make, but I am also not going to interfere. I am sure that Amn knows what he is doing and I trust him not to force someone against their will. He especially wouldn’t do something like that with his daughter around and watching.

  Besides, I doubt that he had any problems finding a woman who wanted to get close to a king. She probably jumped at the chance, a chance to change her entire life. Even if Gremshow can’t take her home, I am sure that he will be generous with her.

  As a king, he shouldn’t lack money and unless he is a complete fool he will know why she is there. Shiro also sees what’s going on and she doesn’t say anything about it either. Although, when she notices I see a look of disgust on her face for a second before she hides it.

  She is being restrained about it, but I am fairly sure that Amn will hear about it later in private. That is none of my business, but it is a rather entertaining situation to think about. Just imagining Shiro ranting at her father about the poor helpless maid has me almost laughing.

  When I reach Lizzy and she sees my smile, she demands that I explain why I am smiling. I know better than to try and argue with her, so I tell her the situation and what I was imagining. Lizzy’s laughter sets the beasts off in their pen, but a quick hiss silences them.

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  The beasts really are terrified of her, not that I blame them, but it makes it easier on the guards. I have heard a few of them commenting on how docile the beasts have been so far. Then again, being worried that something is going to eat you if you act up is understandable.

  Once the beasts have calmed down, I place wards around the camp and then mount Lizzy. She heads out into the surroundings looking for beasts and I work on making some more jars. I doubt we will find any strong beasts in the area, it is a little too civilized for that.

  Still, I would rather have the jars made and enchanted before I actually need them. Besides, it is not like I need to worry about guiding Lizzy, all I need to do is stay in the saddle. Lizzy covers a lot of ground in a couple of hours, but she doesn’t find anything more than a few small beasts.

  To be honest, it isn’t really worth collecting their essence, but I do it anyway for the practice. I still haven’t been able to gather essence without cracking the core first, but I am working on it. I can drill into the core with mana and get the essence, but that is basically the same as cracking it.

  The core is basically designed to protect the essence and so far I haven’t found a way around that. Although, that does explain why my Drain Touch can’t drain the essence from beasts. If I can just figure out a way to get the essence without breaking the core, I can fix the spell.

  However, so far it doesn’t look like that is going to be possible unless I learn something new. Somehow, I don’t think that is likely to happen before I find some stronger beasts to study. That is definitely not going to happen in this area, the hunting is too poor for that.

  It is so poor that when we get back to camp Lizzy complains of still being hungry. As I am feeding her from my pouch I remember that I need to create a stronger version. One that can feed the dragon, or at least give him a decent meal the next time I visit.

  Once Lizzy has eaten, she settles down to sleep and I spend some time designing a better pouch. Unfortunately, the hide of the spider, the best I have right now, isn’t going to hold enough enchantments. I will need some better hide and even then I will be adding some other materials.

  In order to create a great amount of food, the pouch is going to need to be able to gather a lot of mana. The more mana it has to store, the more detailed the enchantments need to be to contain it. Not to mention that it will need more safety enchantments to make sure it doesn’t overload.

  I could probably throw one together right now, but it would be better to take my time and plan it out. I work on the design for a bit and then put it aside as I open up a soulscape. I spend time with my kids and my wives and then afterwards I get some sleep.

  In the morning, Gremshow is in a much better mood, but Shiro is avoiding him. After breakfast, as the servants are packing up, I notice one of Amn’s soldiers mount up and ride off. When I ask him about it, Amn tells me that he is sending word to Queen Mavel that we will be arriving early.

  It seems that we should reach the capital by dark, almost a full day ahead of schedule. While Amn doesn’t think Queen Mavel is as bad as Gremshow says, he doesn’t want to test it. Besides, since we are staying the night it just makes sense to give Mavel’s servants time to prepare.