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Chapter 65 Mountainous Tail
🕑 Added 2023-02-26 08:00:02 +0000 UTC“I have no idea what the high council is thinking. Sending you out in a mission like this.” Sarielle whined. He was chosen by Edelweiss to accompany us on the diplomatic mission we were given. She was perturbed that none of our party had any education about diplomacy, so she sent Sarielle as a bonafide and educated elf.
“Why did you bring me? I am just a humble farmer now, okay?”
“Come on, Mattheus. You can’t even farm without Luna’s help. Listen to your inner mercenaries,” Nora retorted.
“I never expected you to get a mission like this as a minor lord under Lord Edelweiss Lily. Even Lord Edelweiss was never sent to a dwarven kingdom.” Lhorne commented while looking sick.
“Our adventure began! For Lord Lily!” Alith and Sana cheered on. They were the only ones from our group who viewed this task optimistically.
And so, our party of one grumbling elf, one archer elf who didn’t know what to do, four tailfolk, one human, and one dwarf began.
“Wow! It is so pretty!” Lily shouted as she looked into the far distance. After we got out of the Edenthal thick forest, we were greeted with a mountainous region as far as I could see. It resembled Everest mountain if looked from afar. The tip was snowy white, the middle was rocky black, and the base was lush with grasslands.
“It certainly is quite scenic,” Lhorne replied.
“Ladies and gentlemen, we are now inside the dwarven kingdom. The mountain pass is over here.” Jona was guiding us to a path.
“Should we hold up the flag now?” Sarielle asked. He prepared his bags and a spear for holding up the flag.
“Huh?” Lily tilted her head.
“We are diplomats! Not some random traveler. We needed them to know that we came openly in peace!” Sarielle shouted. “And they also needed to be informed in advance so they could prepare our accommodation!”
“Don’t mind that. Nobody will see you until the cave entrance. Although this part is officially inside a dwarven kingdom, nobody would bother looking for us in the open like this.” Jona waved her hands in dismissal.”Besides, your clothes are already a good sign that we are some official from an elven country.”
“Hah… this is why other countries are so uncultured. No laws or customs.” Sarielle sighed. The lord here is Lily, and since she followed Jona’s advice, Sarielle could only sigh as he folded the flag again and put them in the bag.
“It is still noon, but I recommend staying the night here. If we go into the mountain pass at night, it could prove to be perilous.” Jona warned.
“Huh? Wait, oh yeah, the elven guide about dwarves said that the mountain pass was next to a cliff.” Sarielle was flustered as he looked through some notes or books from his master. “We won’t have any problems seeing them even at moonless night, but Lord lily might be different. I agree. Let us rest at the foothill just before the mountain pass.”
“What about those cliffs, Jona?” Lily asked.
“It can’t be helped. If you live in the mountains, you will inevitably meet cliffs. This path was the safest among all the paths.” Jona replied while shrugging her shoulders.
“Let us rest here.” Lhorne pointed at some spot near a tree facing the mountainous regions.
We then made camp at the foot of the mountain. Sarielle was surprisingly a good cook, comparable to Lhorne. As we dined, we asked various questions.
“Why aren’t there any merchants here? This is a very known path, right?”
“It is out of season, merchants required permission from lords to travel, and they usually formed the caravans every 3 months or so,” Sarielle answered. “The last caravan was a month ago. Trading silver ore and gold for food and timber.”
“I see.” Lily nodded
“Why you didn’t know?” Sarielle asked, confused.”You were already a lord a month ago, right?”
“I handled those caravans papers. They were from Lord Edelweiss, so it is not important for us.”
“What about tariff?” Mattheus asked
“What is it?”
“the taxes when you enter the city?”
“We don’t do that if they are elves. We only do that if they are dwarves.” Lhorne explained
“How much is the tariff for dwarves?” Lily asked
“About 40 percent.” Lhorne and Sarielle answered. Our jaw dropped at once when hearing those absurd numbers.
“You’ve got to be kidding!” Mattheus and Nora shouted.
“No wonder there aren’t any dwarves merchants!” Lily and Jona shouted. Even she was aware of how much forty percent means.
“They buy food. Elven law regulates that strictly. The food prices need to remain low for our citizens, so we jacked up the prices to discourage others from buying our food.” Sarielle spoke out.
“Yes. There was a time over 200 years ago when elves faced famine. So, regulations about food export were put into the elven book of law,” Lhorne answered.
“Jona, are you sure the dwarves didn’t hate us for being like that?”
“Relax. We only did that to unregulated merchants. If dwarves buy it through their king, we only raise the price by 5 percent compared to the inside market.” Sarielle answered. His face showed no guilt, as if everything the elves did was correct.
“What a hassle.” Mattheus sighed. Lily nodded while biting through our rations.
“Alright. The night is coming. I will be on watch duty.” Mattheus answered.
“I will be on watch with you. I don’t feel safe with humans watching us sleep! Lhorne, switch after me in four hours.” Sarielle answered.
Sarielle was questioning us about why we brought Mattheus. Lily was adamant about getting her bandit party as she wanted to remember the days when her life changed. The first day when she was free. However, only Lhorne and Nora shared this sentiment, and thus, Sarielle, Alith, and Sana were quite guarded against him.
The white peak of the mountain that reflected the moonlight was a sight to behold.
