Chapter 97: Planning for Returning to the Prairie

It had been a couple of days since Joshua checked in on the large town and it was finally a point in time where all of the leaders of the combat guilds in the alliance were in the hub city at the same time. Laura and some of her guild members had just gotten back from a small expedition that involved a dungeon that had already been discovered by another guild in the past. It had been cleared beforehand, but it had some new materials in it that could be useful for the guild. Instead of spending an exorbitant amount of money on the materials in the auction house they decided to just go get it themselves even if they didn't gain the experience bonus from being the first people to clear the dungeon. It wasn't a town dungeon so they didn't have to worry about having the guild that cleared the dungeon barring them from entry.

Madalyn on the other hand hadn't been on any expeditions during this time period, but instead had spent most of her past couple of weeks locked up in her laboratory in her guild. Ever since Joshua had told her about the giant snake that he and Lilly had come across she seemed to be focused on improving her poisons as if she was preparing for an upcoming test. It was good to know that she was focusing on her strength so that she could impress the powerful snake when they met and wasn't taking that upcoming meeting lightly. While Madalyn was busy doing that Isabella had basically kept the guild in line with occasional expeditions and training.

This was the first time in a while that all of the major guilds of the Alliance were around to set up the next expedition. They didn't have to worry about any major territory wars for a while and the system would warn them well ahead of time if there was any major event going on in the hub city so now was the best time to start preparing for another long expedition while they had the chance.

They decided to meet up at the Phoenix Guild's meeting room like they usually did and Joshua was surprisingly one of the first to arrive this time around. He and Henry had come early since they had been waiting for such a meeting for a week now. Their guild members were all ready to get back on another expedition after the decent sized break so they wanted to get the meeting going as soon as possible. Joshua was thinking of bringing Julia along as well for the meeting since she was one of the few other members of the guild that actually had an interest in planning things out, but she was so in love with helping the architects out that Joshua knew pulling her away from that with something as simple as a meeting would just get on her nerves.

It didn't take very long for Laura to show up along with Natalie and Adam who seemed to be the two she was bringing for this planning meeting. They were definitely the ones in her group who were more about thinking things through than just fighting nonstop until things went their way. They all greeted each other with the usual pleasantries between friends before Madalyn showed up having bags under her eyes alongside Isabella and Becca who played a similar role when it came to Madalyn's guild. Even though Madalyn looked exhausted Joshua could see a glint of excitement in her eyes which usually meant that something went extremely well with one of her experiments.

"Sorry to keep you all waiting. Isabella forced me to get some sleep earlier today so I might have barely gotten up in time." Madalyn said as she took a seat at the meeting table.

"If you would sleep more regularly while doing all of your experiments I wouldn't have to tell you such things in the first place." Isabella said with a sigh while Becca just quietly took her seat preparing to listen in on the meeting.

"Well we just got here as well so there's no need to worry. Besides I can imagine how much stuff you have to deal with while having Madalyn as your guild leader." Laura said with a small smile as she noticed the annoyed look that Madalyn was giving her.

"Putting all of that aside how about we get things started." Joshua said with a smile. "Before we focus on the upcoming expedition I thought I should fill you guys in on how the new base is coming along."

"You went by there the other day didn't you?" Henry asked. "I'm guessing Julia was there right? I've been avoiding getting involved since it's a one way ticket to getting a lecture about everything that's going on there by her."

"Yeah she was definitely spending pretty much all of her time in the new town, but luckily the new base is coming along extremely well. It should be finished in a few weeks to the point where we can start setting up Alliance members there." Joshua explained.

"That's good to hear. It also gives us some time to go exploring the other side of the prairie before it's finished." Laura said with a thoughtful look. "I don't expect us to finish exploring all of that area within that time frame, but it should be a decent first start."

"From what we saw the last time we went to explore the area there's no way in hell we will be able to explore everything within that time frame. Not if we want to find the dungeon of the area at some point. It's a much higher level area that probably has a variety of creatures in it that could cause problems once we go in." Joshua said looking a little too excited at the prospects.

"I still can't believe you guys were dumb enough to cross the canyon into an entirely new area that was unknown. You're lucky that beast you all spotted didn't spot you first." Natalie said while shaking her head.

"Now that we've gotten on to that topic what can you two tell us about what you noticed during your brief trip into the other side of the canyon?" Isabella asked getting things back on topic. "You must have gotten a chance to check the place out a little bit in your foolish attempt to speed things along."

Joshua and Henry both noticed the small jab at them in her words, but decided to ignore it and focus on continuing the meeting. "At a first glance the place seemed exactly like the side of the prairie that we had already explored. There wasn't any drastic difference in the vegetation in the area or the weather condition. The only thing we could notice at a first glance was the fact that the grass was a bit taller." Joshua explained.

"When we dived in a bit further we did notice a few things. Although they aren't going to give us all that much information about the place." Henry said grabbing everyone's attention. "The other side of the prairie seemed vaster. You could barely see the mountains in the distance that would be the edge of the prairie. If I had to guess it'd take multiple days to cross on horseback especially if you had to fight beast along the way."

"So that means that if we want to actually explore the entire area instead of just going across it's going to take up a lot of time." Laura said with a frown.

"Meh, it won't be so bad. We do have Lilly's beast companions to ride on such as Cinder and Titus if we want to cross the area at a much faster pace. Even if we go in a large group they're more than big enough to carry us all if needed." Madalyn pointed out.

"The only problem with that is that it could end up drawing a lot of attention to us if we're spotted by other beast. All of Lilly's larger beast stick out like a sour thumb." Isabella explained.

"True, plus even if Lilly's beast companions could fend off some of the beast on the other side of the prairie on their own at this point it would be extremely slow progress fighting our way through the area constantly. We need to think of ways to give our group breaks without putting us in danger at the same time." Natalie said as she started pulling up the members that they were all expecting to come on the expedition. "We have a fairly large group making it impossible to avoid detection from some of the more predatory creatures we might end up coming across."

"Well any ideas?" Madalyn said. "If not we might just have to turn this into a multiple month long expedition at the pace we'd be making it through the area. Hell it took a month for the Fenrir Guild to finish exploring this side of the prairie to the point where they found everything out about it. That was with hundreds of members exploring the place. In comparison we're little more than a scouting group."

"It's impossible for us to bring a much larger group of that scale anyways. Anyone below level seventy going in that area will be nothing more than wasted space if we come across a beast of level ninety. The pressure given off by such a creature would cause them to freeze up on the spot." Adam explained. "I've trained many members in this Alliance and there aren't more than forty that are ready for this kind of expedition."

"Then you've got to consider the fact that the one beast that we did run into while going there was a bull or bison like creature. Those types of beast always show up in large groups and that'll be hard to deal with considering they'll all be higher level than any of the bosses that we've come across up to this point." Henry said while Joshua started tapping his fingers on the table with a contemplative look on his face. "We need to figure out a way to avoid large groups of enemies for this expedition if we want everyone coming home alive."

The room went quiet as everyone seemed to be thinking things over. The only sound was the constant tapping of Joshua's fingers on the table which seemed to get the groups attention. "What's got you thinking so hard over there big man. Got any ideas?" Madalyn asked.

"I've got one, but I'm not sure I'm going to like having to deal with what it will bring to a long expedition like this one." Joshua said with a tired smile. He had an idea of how they could avoid dealing with large groups while moving through the prairie. Or maybe you could say he had an idea of who could help them achieve that goal.