The Goddess Made A Mistake Again-Chapter 352 - Onwards to Whitedon [ Part 1 ]

It was good to travel with Margaret. She wasn’t like the others who would talk too much and annoy my ass off but also wouldn’t stay quiet and let me feel alone.

Margaret would talk sometimes and I would talk sometimes so it didn’t feel like the other person were a mummy. She didn’t say dull stuff and I tried to make mine interesting enough.

Mostly we’d talk about the situation of the kingdom, how we would change our individual gangs and also about the war incoming for us. The last one was almost as important or even more than other subjects.

The problem was that we didn’t know how it would strike or when.

The carriage swayed a bit to the side and continued on its way. My eyes looked outside and saw a guy riding on to a horse and following the carriage.

The guy was tall and wore traveling clothes. But underneath them, I could see good armor and a muscular body. On the outside, there was a sword strapped to his leg and a yellow sigmat ring as he kept following us.

Suddenly, he looked at the carriage, saw me and gave a respectful nod as I just nodded to him. Then my eyes went to his companions who were behind us and following slowly.

This guy wasn’t just a random person going on the same path as us, while there were his other friends with him. He was a mercenary that we hired.

The road to Whitedon was long and it would take 12 days to get there. We could have gone faster if we didn’t stop and camp every day, but it wasn’t just the humans that needed rest, the horses needed it too.

Since it was such a long journey, there was a chance of being attacked by bandits as well. That chance also goes up when smaller villages and towns sees a wealthy carriage buying supplies from them.

That’s why we decided to hire some mercenaries.

There were two types of hired help, one was adventures, that did what the mercenaries does too, but they only kill monsters and not the human ones. Meanwhile, mercenaries were professional killers who didn’t mind taking any kind of jobs, unless they were illegal or the trouble was too big for the reward.

While Margaret and I were strong enough to get through the journey while tackling all problems, we simply didn’t want to for relaxation purpose.

So with that both of us choose the mercenaries while I paid for them. Margaret didn’t hesitate to put her money in as an equal but I stopped her. It was more than good enough to see that she actually had the heart to pay the bill.

We choose three groups of them with each having 10 members on their team. The scouts would check up ahead for any problem or obstacle, the heavy hitters would stay by our side and the remaining people would follow us from behind.

The number was big for the mercenaries because the plan was to scare off any trouble that came. They knew that too that’s why they acted a bit more buff whenever someone new came to view.

The number was indeed big but not too big. Because when you know that two very important members of affluent families were on a long trip, people could get a bit greedy.

We could have brought more people but buying even more would definitely tell them that someone special was inside the carriage, so we went with the high grade package on the normal side.

Also there was slight chance that the mercenaries could betray us too. Even though they were recommended highly by the guild, it didn’t take much to sway people to the other side.

So we bought just the required amount to scare others and also kill if something happens.

It’s not like the mercenaries know that the people their escorting were true murderers and a bit more in their own field.

The journey kept going and we only camped two times a day. One in the noon to eat up and take an hourly rest. Then at night, where journeying would indeed call danger and everyone needed sleep.

There was no trouble on the road and the mercenaries were quiet but there wasn’t anything suspicious about them. Whenever we found a village or town, we would buy supplies if we needed to. That’s how two days went without any problem.

Then the third day came when trouble appeared.

It was night time and we were camped around a healthy forest with high ground on us.

Me and Margaret were at the center of the camp, while each mercenary group had their own campfire where they rested and some sang along to keep awake for night duty.

Surprisingly while most of the mercenaries were asleep, me and Margaret were wide awake as she played with a stick on the fire.

"Do you feel it?" She asked.

"Yeah" I reply, "Someone’s finally upped their courage and decided to attack us."

Margaret smiled seeing Henry wasn’t stupid like the others, "Since when do you think they’ve been chasing us for?"

"Well, it could be tomorrow since that’s when we passed the village and bought that bag of rice and meat."

"Yes, some of them could have seen us and told their group of a wealthy escort." Margaret said, placing it together, "They followed us for a day to see if we had any backup before deciding to attack at night."

"Since their attacking, I can hope to say their confident enough with these numbers." I point to the sleeping mercenaries.

Margaret agreed with me yet didn’t have any worry on her. We could have clearly told the mercenaries about them but decided to lay low and see what the mercenaries would do.

A scout above a tall tree looked around before spotting the enemy group and shouting, "Bandits ahead!"

With one scream from the guy, the mercenaries who seemed like they were sleeping, instantly stood up. Armor and weapons at the ready.

It was as if they knew of the attack and in reality they did. But the mercenary group didn’t speed up and avoided the enemy. They didn’t want to alert them and get attacked later so they waited for them instead.

A lanky person with heavy armor on him and with a leader like aura screamed, "Group 1, protect the package!"

A group of six lanky soldiers like him with heavy armor and shields quickly went towards the package.

The Package, being us, those six came and blocked off all direction for any kinds of attack.

"Hagh!" The bandits being found out, came running at the mercenaries, going for a frontal attack.

"Five of them from the west, three from the east, seven from the north, all with swords!" The scout above relayed the information as the mercenaries quickly formed groups to appropriately fight the bandits.

They all fought the others as the mercenaries effectively blocked off the bandits from advancing.

"...five archers at the back from the package, I repeat five archers at your backs!" The scout screamed, but the archers had already taken position and shot a volley of arrows.

The group protecting us quickly hid us with their tall shields. The arrows came and bounced off the shield until one luckily went through a gap and was about to hit a mercenary square at his temple.

The guy closed his eyes knowing it was the end... but time went yet he found no pain or relief.