The halfway point

It had been a long journey to get this far, at least long when it came to time spent. They had travelled a fair distance, that was true, but in terms of miles they’d put barely a third of their total journey behind them. Even so, this was expected to be the halfway point in terms of time.

The reason for that was that travel through the shattered remnants of the old empire was slow at the best of times. The roads in many places were poorly maintained and sometimes even sabotaged, and one always faced danger from brigands and soldiers alike. It was often difficult to tell one from the other.

It saddened Ziyi to see the state of the once great nation. Fomosora was the last intact sliver of what had once been, the only enduring bastion of order in the ancient domain. On the mainland, even the longest ruling warlord dynasties were lucky to stay in power for more than three or four generations, and rarely did any spread their domain further than what would have once been accounted for by a single province.

That was what made travel so perilous. The ever-changing borders and frequent battles, the constant skirmishes even in areas where the was supposedly peace, the roaming bands of deserters and the dispossessed. It all combined to make travel through what the Toranians called the Far Southwest slow indeed.

But that was behind them now, as was the narrow path that allowed for overland travel from the ruins of the old empire into the new one without crossing into the lands of the elves. Ziyi herself would have preferred to go by sea. The people of the Order of Watchers chose the way though, she was just accompanying them. And they’d made this journey multiple times before, while she had never set foot in the younger empire. At least not until today.

This forest, her companions told her, was where the Borderlands ended, and the Empire began. As with most borders, one side looked much like the other. From here on travel should be much safer and the roads much better, so progress should be swifter,

Entering the domain of the Toranians came with some minor drawbacks though. Chief among them, as far as Ziyi was concerned, were the clothes she now had to wear. In order to not stand out any more than she already did, the emissary from the order had gifted her a few pieces of clothing that would not look out of place here. The riding outfit she currently had on was pretty enough, but impractically ostentatious and uncomfortably tight. She didn’t like the thought of having to fight in it. Her usual attire was all packed away out of sight, but she longed for those loose-fitting robes she could easily shrug off and the simple wraps she’d wear underneath.

The day was a beautiful one, at least.