24. X marks the spot

Fixed raft was a lot more stable, but they still had to be careful.

Yax stood at front, using long pole to push away any broken wood floating near them.

Blaze sat at the back, with his shorter but more flat pole, Ivory called it 'a rudder', steering them more or less in the middle of the river.

Others were also holding their poles and lasers ready, in case there is another big fish trying to eat them.

Flow was slower here, and river spread wide, looking more like a lake than a river. It took them a bit towards east at first, but now they were moving south, as they planned.

Ivory sat in the middle, marking their path on the map.

"We should find a place on the right side to land soon," he said "we are within 50 km from target area." Well, should be.

Yax heard it, but looking at the right, there was apparently a solid wall of trees, their crowns leaning over water. Not ideal terrain to disembark, yet, what could they do? Float till they get to the sea?

From the shallows of the river, countless birds watched them passing. Long necked and with huge beaks, they rotated their heads watching them go by. Swimming behind them, smaller colorful birds followed them, creating a cacophony of sounds.

Ducks were loud but not dangerous, while storks helped them spot and avoid underwater shoals. They generally liked them by now.

Blaze saw a gap in the flock, and steered them through that passage. Yax checked the depth in front, and they managed to aproach the shore without getting stuck. They floated on shallow water, pulling by the branches overhead and pushing by oars.

Yax spotted a huge weeping willow, it's trunk half in water, branches arching and dipping. "We will stop here."

Blaze steered, and raft gently leaned on the willow, finally stopping. They used a rope to tie it's front to the trunk. It was not important to fasten it securely, just enough for them to disembark, as they could not bring it along.

Back on the solid ground, firstly they stretched. Sitting for so long while fearing to move too much was more exhausting than walking. They strapped on their backpacks, took out their machetes and started familiar task of cutting a path forward.

This time though, they were very aware of their food shortage. They did have a lot of dried fish with them, but otherwise they needed to keep their eyes open. Luckily, forest was full of edible things.

Ivory identified usable species, Jone and Floreo pondered how to prepare them, and while moving on, they actually managed to pick up a lot of stuff.

Acorns were bigger than beech seeds, and easy to collect. Mushrooms were everywhere, but they were tricky so Ivory focused on them, considering he could compare them with his database. Blackberries still had no fruit, but Jone insisted they gather their leaves. For vitamin C he said.

Then, just as they were collecting some smelly leaves that Echo insisted to gather as well, Mani started beeping. Well, pendant on his chest started beeping. The sound was not loud as before though. And there was wide interval between beeps.

They all knew what it's supposed to mean. Mani took the pendant out, and two Eyes were faintly glowing. He walked backwards, to where they came from, and beeping stopped. Faint glow remained though.

Then he walked back to original spot, then few more steps forward. Under watchful eyes of others, he kept walking here and there, observing variations in gems colour and vibration. He realised that red eye and green eye dimmed or glowed differently.

When he moved back, red eye glowed while green one dimmed. Opposite happened when he moved towards their target. Also, if he stood still for over a minute, beeping would stop. Which was good, otherwise it would be really insufferable.

"I got it," he said and showed pendant to Yak and Ivan. "Green one lights up when we are on the right course, red when we are not. For beeps, we need more points of observation, but I guess frequency will change as we get closer." He stopped himself when he noticed that everyone is looking at him as if he suddenly started to talk in priest tongue.

"What?" He frowned and Yak patted his shoulder "We don't have Serpent's Sight, Mani, to us both gems look same. We cannot see that green red that you can."

"Then what colour they look like to you?" Mani asked then plucked one more smelly leaf and placed it next to gems "Same or different than this?"

"Same?" Yak said now confused a bit, are they not?

"It's all yellow." Ivan added.

"This one might be a bit darker." Blaise offered pointing at red gem.

"Doesn't matter what we see, as long you can use it to guide us to the spot." Cindy concluded.

Mani stood with now silent pendant in his hands. What Serpent Sight? They are all just color blind. Well, it was a genetic trait though and it seemed it somehow affected all enhanced replicants. Was it by accident or design, though? Mani pondered. Well, whatevers the case, he concluded that it doesn't matter, since he is not affected by it. And I just thought they are weirdly into red - green colour scheme thats on everything.

With that mystery solved, they continued forward. Mani now walked in front with Yax, as they moved ahead according to pendant's guidance. Moving away from the river, forest changed again. Terrain became higher, ground dryer, and poplars and willows got replaced with chestnuts and maples. Mani liked their red leaves then figured only he can see that difference.

As they climbed, they ran into two families of deers, scared a bunch of rabbits, and met some rather curious orange dog-like creatures. Ivory said they are foxes. It seemed there are more animals on this side of the river, but they were neither aggressive towards them, nor afraid.

Well, deers had babies with them so they cautiously moved away when Blaze tried to pet them. Rabbits just ran away, not waiting for introductions. Foxes though sniffed them all over, circled a couple of times, then went on their way.

After spending a lifetime in closed environment, where animals were only on wall decorations or visual logs, whole group felt elated. Those fluffy creatures! Had big wet eyes! Bushy tails! Twitchy ears! Yep, they were gushing over cutenes. Even Cid, who now lost any moral ground to chastise Yax in the future.

"Deers and rabbits are edible, it's called 'game meat'." Jone said and felt stabbed by hostile looks that got him, but still added "Foxes are health hazard due possibility of rabies transmission."

Like they would go and eat those adorable soft fur balls. It's not like they cannot just keep eating plants like before. They even had fish now, so that should be enough.

With occasional stops for foraging, morning was spent on slowly climbing up from river edge to first hilltop, some 600 meters higher from where they started. After the break and reorientation, they continued to climb following instructions from their pendant. Top that they had in their sights was over 800 meters, with some peculiar gray stones sticking out of the trees.

When they finally climbed all the way up, they were rewarded by spectacular view on all sides. To the north-east, from where they came, they could see wide silver river, slowly making it's way through trees. It flowed to the east, where in the distance they could see their river merging with another, even larger one. For a moment it looked like it's a sea, but there were forests behind it as well.

To the west was another valley, dipping down between hills surrounding it. They saw another river, a lot smaller than the one they came from. Coming from the hills on the north-west, that river also went east, likely merging with other two, somewhere further downstream.

"Let's make a camp over there tonight." Yax pointed at a clearing a bit underneath the spot they stood at, then his attention went to square hole on the stone wall next to it "But first, let's check that place over there, it looks like a cave doorway?"

"Could this be some ancient ruin?" Ivory was interested at once. Only confirmed artifacts so far were that road and remnants of a town they passed before.

Blaze slid down and already dropped his backpack on the clearing in front of the cave. "Going first to check if it's safe." Cid also went with them, while Floreo and Echo started clearing area for placing the stove so they could start making their dinner.

Yax turned to follow them, but then noticed Mani still looking at the valley below. "Come, we will go down in the morning." He said and placed his hand on Mani's shoulder to guide him down, but then his fingers got covered with Mani's and held back.

"I know where the new spot is." Mani sounded pensive a bit.

"How?" Yax asked and stood by his side, casually leaving his arm wrapped around Mani.

Mani snuggled closer to him "There are maple trees growing in lines." Trees cannot chose how they will grow, so they should not form lines. "Someone planted one line going north to south, and another going west to east."

Yax could not see it, but could imagine "So, they drew an X?"