Chapter 156: Entirely different situations (1/2)

Ultimately, Hermes decided to restrain his hunger and weakly flew around the barren wasteland.

Since the sky was now clear, he could finally find out where he was.

'It should still be somewhere around here,' Hermes sifted through his belongings and felt a hard and intricate object in his hand.

”I told you I'd take care of it, Sophus.”

This was the wooden sextant Sophus gave him as a gift hundreds of years ago.

It always helped him enormously in unfavorable situations, akin to his current predicament.

The sextant was a tool that navigators used to calculate their latitude relative to the equator.

Hermes put the lens of the wooden sextant to one of his eyes and calibrated the tool.

Then, he made the proper calculations of the sun's angle and elevation above the horizon.

Over the years, he mastered these calculations, and could now perform them mentally.

As he came to his final result, a soft gasp escaped from his mouth.

”I'm this far north?”

It was obvious that he was far from Qiantang and the East Sea only by observing the climate, but he didn't realize that man blasted them so far away.

”I wonder how Alexei-boy's doing?” Hermes' mood dampened down due to this conclusion.

On top of that, he was extremely hungry, and the luggage with all of their food was in Alex's possession.

However, using his enormous reserves of faith energy, he was able to sustain his flight and movement.

As he went in all directions and didn't find a single change to the snowy landscape, he almost lost hope.

Suddenly, he perceived a black and rocky patch in the distance.

”What's that?”

He flew in that direction and found out that the patch was actually an entirely different landscape.

The elevation was somewhat higher in this place, and Hermes felt like the ambient temperature was not as cold.

The best discovery he stumbled upon was...

”Moss!” In this endless snow, he finally found 'vegetation'.

This tundra was the only landscape that could persist in the dry and cold wasteland, but if he could just find an area with higher temperature and humidity, maybe there would be timber and cattle in that place.

Hermes landed in this place first and examined the ground.

This kind of black, ashy rock was familiar to him.

”There's a volcano around here?”

Next to Hepheastus' lava pit, the composition of the soil was exactly the same.

The presence of a volcano explained the higher ambient temperature and moisture in the air and the growth of moss as a result.

Since there was a volcano around here, there was bound to be a more thriving ecosystem closer to the mount of the volcano.

Hermes began his manual search and was joyful to find that it was successful.

More inland, the rocky black rock became greener and less ashy.

This wasn't in any way lush, but it was better than endless ice and snow.

Soon enough, he found a small woodland centered around a stream of water.

As there were trees, he could ignite a bonfire and cook some prey.

”At least the dry air has this advantage,” Hermes laughed out loud.

Because of the low humidity compared to Qin, the timber easily caught on fire, and large flames blazed very easily.

Unexpectedly, another wolf pack approached him.

This pack was less docile than the one from earlier and immediately charged at him.

”Well, I have an excuse now.”

His eyes flashed with the glint of a predator.

__________

-Mekong Delta, Nam Viet-

As they heard that knock, Binh and Chau stopped eating.