Stanspar Stalagmites

"HAH...! That's all to it then, my good friend. I believe you would fulfil our request in protecting this little piece of land for the future of the dwarves and elves alike."

"We could be approached here in this enchanted mithril mine for the next few weeks and then we would move back nearer to where you had come from at the duck pond."

"This enchanted mithril mine would be depleted soon and it would be another 30 days before the mithril pieces would start to reappear again. We only have two enchanted mithril mines so we would be going back and forth between these two."

"Go on ahead, you had gained an invaluable knowledge based on our race, the elven race, the orcs, ogres and trolls too."

"We hope you could use it as an added advantage on how you could prevent these marauders from claiming what's ours in the first place."

"We would be going off now and as usual we would leave this place and head back to our own realm at dusk. This is what we normally practise and what Robin the Hood knew, you know it as well too."

I knew that we had been taking too much of their time and the dwarves need to head in deep inside the mines.

I returned the piece of mithril that Priest Michael was scrutinising it for a very long time and how he wished he had the capabilities to conjure these even more elusive pieces up from 13,000 feet underground...!

When the mithril piece was handed back to Doc, Priest Michael was looking at the exchange of hands once more and knew that this mithril piece is the main source of livelihood for these dwarves and there's no way we human would have a hold on them at all.

"Toodle do, Mars... Be seeing you pretty soon. Let me know if you have any issues with the Stanspar that are now officially yours and remember the 4 gemstones pouches."

"It would be refilled back every evening, not in the morning. So you can clear those later back in your realm and then it would be replenished after dusk."

"Remember to leave a single shard inside it to replenish it accordingly, alright?"

Doc reminded me as he and the rest of his members ambled past me and disappeared once they had entered the entrance of the enchanted mine.

I looked at it and then the enchanted cave glimmered a few times before it disappeared from our sight. I guessed it would appear again when the time comes for it to appear.

"Sigh... Its been a great chat, old buddy. Now I really think that humankind and the like would be depending on us right now then."

"Michael, please wait a while. I'm still in my meditative state and I would go to the realm to dump these 48 pieces of poor quality gems."

"Once I'm done I would be off my meditative state and I would mark out this place for future reference."

I turned to face Priest Michael through my third eye which looked pretty weird since all I could see was a world of grey and flashed of white which indicates living things before me. I waved my hands at Priest Michael as I sat down properly and began to enter the realm of mind.

I did not bother to count the number of pieces that each pouch contained, but I just poured the contents into the palm of my cupped hands, placed a single gemstone inside the pouch after doing so and tilted my palm and poured the whole contents inside the crate marked poor quality gems.

Once I had done the same to all the 4 pouches, I meditated off to return to the real world. When I opened up my eyes, it was already high noon and I guessed the guys had already heated up the food we had and would be baking some bread in the conventional oven.

The scenery before me had returned to normal and it was lush green and brown and despite being mid-autumn, most of the trees within this forested lands did not defoliate like the rest of the trees elsewhere.

I checked my surrounding and Priest Michael informed me that we had gone away from the stream about a mile or so and due to my lengthened stride earlier, I had covered about 3 miles from our temporary settlement.

"Wow...! That's pretty far away, 3 to 4 miles passed during they short minutes while you kept chasing me, right, Michael? Well, let's mark this space and hope we would be able to find this once again after we leave."

"My gosh...! Everything looks the same over here. There's no way I could find this place again right after I leave. There's not even a trail for me to follow or estimate where I am...!"

I looked around and what I had said it is true. I could never find this exact place once I leave and there's no way I would be able to find it the next time around.

I had a piece of twine with me and I have my wearable pin-up shield with me and all I could do right now was to tie the shield with the piece of twine and then hang in above the branches in such a way that it would point to the general direction of the enchanted Cave.

If anyone were to pass it, they would miss the shield that was dangling above overhead.

Due to the sun rays that managed to penetrate the forested land, the back part of the shield, which was of a smooth mirror-like finish would deflect some light and would be visible from afar.

At least it could be made into a kind of marker somehow.

"Come on Michael, let's leave the place. You would be receiving the whole account of the conversation that I had earlier."

"Now I wanted to see the clumps of Stanspar shards that had been growing for hundreds of years back at the small island in the centre of the duck pond."

We walked towards the smell of running water and soon reached the stream about 15 minutes of trekking.

Once I had reached its riverbank, I arranged a pile of rocks and made it point to where I had come from when I had hung the palm-sized shield back then.

At least we could make use of the river to walk upriver and then make a left directly when we reach the pile of rocks that were used as a point marker.

"Michael, you are deemed as a good sorcerer just now by the leader of the dwarves. Earlier, the leader of the dwarves, by the name of Doc, had even mentioned that he had nearly pulled you back into his realm when you first conjured up those Stanspar shards. Hahaha. "

"Besides I had learnt a lot of their habitat and characteristics too. Not only that, but I had also learnt about the elven race, the orcs, trolls and ogres."

As we walked, Priest Michael listened to me on what had transpired when I was talking to a clump of shrubs which was unseen by the former's eyes. To the former, it was a clump of shrubs but to me, I had the clear vision of what and who in was talking to back then.

The information that was related to me was kept first since I need to gather everyone around when we had reached the temporary encampment. Besides, we need to have immediate action done to facilitate the requests of the dwarves.

We walked down the river and finally reached our temporary encampment where Eagle and the rest were pacing and waiting for our arrival. "How did it go, Your Majesty? You didn't leave instruction for us and follow for Michael to trail you when you enter your meditative state. What had transpired and is it good news?"

Eagle greeted me and I raised my hand as I return his greeting. My eyes moved towards the duck pond and towards the small island and — WHAT A SWEET SURPRISE...! I saw many clumps of light blue Stanspar stalagmites growing in the green grass instead of a Cave floor...!!!

When I saw the clumps of Stanspar stalagmites, I was somehow filled with an unexplained joy and I nearly jumped about in ecstasy. It was a relief to see all those and only I could see those stalagmites and no other.

"My Golly....! If only you could see those stalagmites growing on the grass fields over there, I am sure you would be heading there and be hugging them close to you. Hahaha...!!!" I could not contain my excitement anymore as I walked briskly towards the edge of the pond, crossed the makeshift walkover bridge and was squatting down to the nearest Stanspar stalagmites.

It seems I need to have a pickaxe or something because I could not extricate a huge piece that looked like a gourd out from the ground so easily.

The stalagmites felt cool in my hands and when I tried to pull even on the tiniest shard, it refuses to budge.

Since I am the only one who could see this, I am the only one who could harvest it. Which means I would be wielding a pickaxe for some time now.

At this moment, since those Stanspar stalagmites are not going anywhere soon, I returned back to where Eagle was left dumbfounded after he watched my weird reactions right upon returning.

"What those dwarves had mentioned to me is really true, Eagle. Only if the Stanspar was bestowed to the eyes of the beholder, then only the particular person could see it. Hahaha...!!! Perfect gemstones, here I come...! Did any of you guys packed a pickaxe at the back of the wagon boat?"

I explained to Eagle and he finally understood my weird behaviours.

Besides, when I asked for a pickaxe, one of the Shadow unit members happen to bring a few of them at the back of the wagon boat and handed it to me.

It was the old miner's pickaxe that they used to mine those iron and coal ores before. It looked quite old but the tips had been sharpened so it would easily pick those Stanspar stalagmites out from the ground.

I wonder what they would think if the guys saw me wielding a pickaxe in the middle of a barren grassy patch small island smack right in the centre of a duck pond. Hahahaha....!!!

"This pickaxe would do just fine, my fellow men. Alright, let's all gather round, have our meals and tea and I would relate to you on what had transpired earlier when I ran off as I had seen the trail of those dwarves through my third eye."

"Besides, we would have to organise a military movement right after this and we might end up having a military outpost here as well."

"I am not sure of how the arrangement would be like but Eagle is here and he would give us the best solution there is."

"By then, I would need to be back at town once the military movement had been deployed."

When Eagle heard this he got so excited since he would be seeing action once again. But I stopped him and I advised, "If you want to be involved in this military movement, you have to be a Ranger, Eagle."

"This is a 100% long-ranged offensive manoeuvre and we can't afford to lose a single man...!"

When everyone heard this, they did not understand what I'm trying to imply since I would need only Rangers to be involved in this military movement.

Besides, Rangers are considered as a long-range offensive combatant or normally be used as a support role and never be seen as a primary role in combat before.

Even if a Ranger was deployed as the frontline combatants, there would be tanks who would be able to ward off any physical onslaught coming in from any directions which would harm the Rangers.

Thus having a Ranger would also be piggybacking someone to be on a defensive role and that's a bit troublesome.