River Crossing

After walking for half an hour we came across the river that we were expecting to see. Cleo went ahead to check it out. To everyone's surprise she started entering the water itself. We asked her to stop but she told us that everything was fine. The river was not very wide, maybe around 10 meters. After walking halfway she stopped and looked back to wave at us. The water was up to her neck but did not rise further. This means both Leana and Turek who were taller than her could walk through the water. I on the other hand was too short and did not know how to swim. I would drown for sure!

"We can just walk through here. Hold the bags above your heads and walk through the river." Cleo shouted from the river

Leana was carrying one bag on her right shoulder and Cleo had placed another one at the bank when she entered the water. We didn't have to worry about getting wet since it was not that cold and our clothes would dry off soon. What I was worried about was how I was going to cross the river!

To my surprise, no one seemed to be worried about that. Leana started walking towards the river, with me still on her hip! Wait, she was going to carry me through the river? I started getting worried about how she was going to do that since there was certainly going to be some force to the water and she might lose her balance!

Turek picked up the bag at the bank and entered the water. He lifted it up and started making her way to Cleo. He almost lost his balance a few times but finally made it to Cleo. Cleo took him the rest of the way while holding his arm.

Leana entered the water while holding me on her left hip and the supply bag high up in her right hand. As she started getting deeper, she almost lost her balance making me hold her very tightly in fear. She was my only support here! If I let go, I will drown!

Thanks to Leana's height, the water only came up to her breasts unlike Cleo who had water up to her neck. Because of that, my head was also out of the water. Once she made it past the halfway point, the water level started to go down and I breathed a sigh of relief. We soon got out of the water got on dry land. I sighed with relief but I was still holding on to Leana very tightly.

"Ren?"

I looked at Leana and found that she was looking at me with an amused smile.

"Uh.. what?"

"How long are you going to stay like this? I need to dry up a bit, you know?" she continued asking me with the same amused smile.

I realized what I was doing and loosened my grip. Leana then unceremoniously dropped me on the ground!

"Haha, why were you holding me so tightly? Did you think I was going to let you drown?" Leana asked while giggling.

"Uh.. I can't swim and it was quite scary in there! You also had to worry about the supplies on the other hand. So.. I .."

"I wouldn't try to save the supplies and let you drown!" She replied while continuing to look at me as if this was all very amusing to her.

I looked down and said "Sorry, I should have trusted you more..."

"It's alright, I am just teasing! I know it must have been scary there especially since neither one of us can swim..."

"Wait, you don't know how to swim either?" I asked in shock.

"Nope"

I just stared at her speechless. She carried me and the supplies in neck deep water and she didn't even know how to swim? Is she crazy? She could have let Cleo carry me and supplies. Cleo could have helped her cross as well! My heart started beating faster thinking about how much danger I had been in!

Leana laughed once more after looking at my face. Then she went and grabbed a towel that Cleo handed to her and started drying herself.

After sitting there in shock for a bit I finally stood up. Well what is done is done. Now I can just move on. Hah… I don't know what I am going to do with Leana….

I took the towel from Leana angrily and dried myself as well. We rested there since as both Turek and Leana said that they needed some rest. I was of course not tired since Leana had been carrying me the whole time.

Once we had finished resting, all four of us decided to walk by overselves. Carrying another wet person, or being carried when wet did not sound appealing to either party. So we walked for almost 1 hour at a slower pace. Since we were walking through a forest, there wasn't a lot of sunlight. We did not get fully dry for almost an hour.

Cleo carried me again this time while Leana carried Turek at the same time. We decided we could make up the time we lost if we sped up. Thus Cleo and Leana increase the pace and carried us on their backs.

It was around 3pm when we arrived at the mountain range. Even Cleo and Leana couldn't go that fast when going through a forest. We decided to rest in the mountain. After carrying us for almost 2 hours at a fast pace, both Cleo and Leana were tired and needed rest.

I kept watch with Turek while both women slept. Turek and me were not really fighters but we were hoping to change that soon. Once we got to Tiaanway, both our training will start. If we couldn't find some way to train, we might have to go to a bigger city even if it was costiler.

I thought of another possibility. Based on the map, I knew that we were getting close to Tiaanway. The map also had information about which areas were more dangerous. The mountain and the forest we were going to cross were considered dangerous as people had vanished in these parts. This information was usually gathered by the guild. I considered the possibility that some adventurers had vanished here for the guild to mark it as dangerous. It could also be that someone requested the guild to find missing people here.