182 Hall (2/2)

The only thing that scared him was the price. He was definitely unable to pay for it any time soon. But at least he had confirmed the feasibility of his idea.

Satisfied he laid down, planning to sleep for the night and then in the morning once again continue exploring.

Soon he had fallen into a routine, composing of getting up, go out and hunt bears as well as collect herbs and then return to the hall and refine some of the lower quality, or damaged, herbs he had gotten that day. Then he would use his phone to call his family and chat for a bit before going to sleep.

With this routine in place soon two weeks had passed, leaving only two more weeks time until he had to accompany Miss. Klein.

Today Ivan had decided to change up his routine. He felt that he had gotten all he could from the surroundings. His inventory was filled with parts of Steelback Bears as well as other monsters he had encountered. His herb ring was filled with herbs, all of which had a good quality, the rest had been refined into pills which filled up the rest of his inventory.

”I really don't have enough space to store items.”, Ivan sighed. Although his inventory was relatively large it still seemed to be too small to store all the things he wanted to put inside it.

”Isn't there any way to get more storage space besides expanding the inventory?”, he wondered. Expanding his inventory was way too expensive for his taste.

Of course, there was. Just like the chest, he had gotten from Lin back then. But the chest was way too clunky to carry around and he couldn't put it into his inventory. ”Maybe there is a bag form of it or something like this. I should check.”

Checking the Systems Store he found what he looked for. Not only were there storage bags but also storage rings, which were much more comfortable to carry around and which had a higher storage space as well. But as always the prices were way too high for him to even entertain the thought of buying them.

”In the end, money is everything.”, he sighed depressed.

Shaking his head he got ready to leave this little hideout. ”I'll be back”, he swore. During these two weeks, he had fallen in love with this place even more and it had hardened his resolve of making it his outpost.

As he went deeper into the mountains he passed the spot where he had spotted the little girl before. Back then he had checked on her the next day but she was already gone. Besides her, the bears were gone as well, so he reckoned that, if she truly was that little aunt, that her nephew had caught her and had taken care of the bears. And if not, then something else should have happened, which he couldn't guess. But there was one thing that he was sure of and that was that the girl was fine. Because if not, then there was no way that the bears would vanish as well.

He entered a valley which should lead him further into the mountains. In the center of the valley was a small stream. In its clear water, there were occasionally some small fishes flitting around. And while the trees here were much smaller than in the forest before, they were still numerous.

By following the stream he reached a large pool into which a waterfall thundered down. This was the end of the valley and also the start of a much more arduous journey. From now on he wouldn't be able to just relaxedly walk onto more or less flat ground, but he would have to climb over rocks and cross dangerous terrain.

By looking upwards it was possible to see the dark spots in the sky. Each of them symbolizing a dangerous monster that would attack as soon as it spotted a worthwhile prey. Those monsters also stopped him from using Vlada to leisurely fly through the mountains.

He moved his fingers in order to warm them up before gripping the stone wall. Then with clumsy moves, he started the climb. The goal was a small ledge about halfway up the stone wall.