What surprised Darius though, was that by the time they made camp for the night, they had yet to see a single Adept undead monster. Mikey and Joneson also couldn't sense any nearby at all, making Darius come up with an interesting theory.
Stonekeeper Marasmus should be currently under siege by all the bigwigs of Andrato, right? If they had not perished, it should be that the Adepts here had gone to assist the Stonekeeper's defense.
If so, it would only serve to bring Darius's plans forward, as he would have to visit the forward camp and integrate himself.
After all, what was the point of gathering so many Adepts here if he wasn't the one to galvanize these resources? As for convincing them to follow his directives, it should be easy with his abilities and charisma.
Darius and Gunner set a camp. This time, Darius poured Purifications Potions on the ground to create a livable area. He gave a few potions to Mikey and Joneson so that they could pour them whenever the blight got close to Darius or Gunner.
The Pureblood Vampires were naturally set as sentries while the living duo tucked in somewhat comfortably and went to sleep. By the time it was morning, they felt much better than they had yesterday.
They broke camp so that they could continue forward. Darius gazed at Mikey and Joneson with a deeply contemplative gaze.
While they were no longer menacing undead but handsome vampires, they could somewhat mesh with society.
However, it didn't change that they were undead, and high ranked ones at that.
Darius didn't want to unsummon them for they could give him more persuasive power in the outpost of the living if he played his cards right.
He smiled and decided to keep them. It would be an interesting challenge to talk his way out of this one, and despite the risk, Darius felt that the reward would be better, namely faster and tighter control.
As for the risk, the highest was ostracization. There could be no harm to his person due to his status and perceived power. In fact, to have made two Journeyman Pureblood Vampires, almost at the Adept grade, submit under him would further cement his identity as a talented Adept.
Darius and the group moved forward, passing through the short Adept band. It measured a total of 300 kilometers, about the same as the Amateur band. It was the Journeyman band that had been wide at 600 kilometers.
Darius checked the map. When he had been at the Baratuo Outpost, the Stonekeeper's necropolis had been located 1287 kilometers away. This meant that it was located at the center of the Adept band.
From his current location, it should be 184 kilometers to the north-east. Nodding to Gunner, the duo began their blink-leap movement while Mikey and Joneson simply ran along.
Given their current Agility and Endurance, this was as easy as ever. Even Gunner faced greater ease thanks to the Fast Regeneration ability's extra effect of allowing him to control his motor movement finely.
He was able to allocate optimal force into his feet and waste far less energy and stamina with each leap while going farther. Basically, the theory of doing more with less.
Ironically, it was Darius who was slowing the group down since he could 'only' blink 100 meters, and his continuous blink had a buffer of 0.3 seconds. As a result, Gunner and the two undead had to consciously slow down to match Darius' speed.
Eventually, they reached their destination a few minutes later, and Darius could only smile bitterly. It seemed like he would have to absolutely acquire or possibly Transmute a proper teleportation spell as well as a mass teleport once he became a Journeyman.
Whatever the case, he came upon a large spot of unblighted land surrounding a camp measuring almost 100 square kilometers. It was extremely large, but it was a given since so many powers were encamped here with their people.
Interestingly, he noted that they had managed to keep the area free from the blight. Darius soon saw how, as hundreds of priests standing around the camp were quite a sight, continually chanting then casting various light spells on the earth to cleanse or block the blight.
Darius shook his head, for this was a waste of their time and talent, but he understood that he wasn't in charge... yet.
Soon, the group came up to the entrance of the outpost, where some Journeymen were posted as guards.
They saw Darius' group approach and frowned, but didn't dare to obstruct him since he and Gunner were both Adepts. Still, they couldn't just let two undead waltz into the camp.
"Greetings, Young Lord. You are welcome to the outpost of Andrato, but those two undead might be difficult to accommodate." One of the guards stated with a slightly difficult expression.
Darius nodded. "I certainly understand your sentiment, but they're a part of my group. I can assure you, that they will be necessary for clearing the obstacles ahead."
"However, I don't want to give you two good men a tough time. How about this, why don't you call the resident leader of this outpost of this matter, and let him know Darius Stone is here."
Darius made sure to incentivize this by giving the duo a gold coin each. To Journeymen and above in Andrato, a silver and below had little utility. Like Darius, they mostly traded in gold coins, especially if they were members of the nobility.
Only those commoners who struggled to become Journeymen would still use currency lower than silver, but even then, it would only be for a short while.
Eventually, they'd have many means to gather funds quickly and enrich themselves, so there was a strong incentive in tossing a gold coin here.
A single silver one and they might not even bother to catch it, rather letting it fall to the ground with a look of disdain and chagrin, thinking to themselves: 'Does this lad think that we lack such things?'
Luckily, Darius had made the right choice so one of the guards rushed into the outpost to contact the Royal Seneschal while the other accommodated Darius warmly in the meantime.
