 Not one bit. Fall back, Goodman, they'll repeat. The opening is ready to come down. As everyone sprints into the mine, the guard captain tosses you a heavy hammer and points at the timber. You deserve the honour, he says. You turn and look at the gray sky, the snow, the spindle and the dredge walking toward you. With a hefty swing, the timber snaps and rocks begin to fall. You drop the hammer and raise down the shaft toward the light of the torches. Good, that was cool. That was awesome. I head the path comes to the end against the smooth surface of a large flat rock. We should camp, Zephyr says. It may be the last decent sleep these people get for days. I'll need Nichols to assist me in opening the path beyond, but first you and I should talk. No, talk, talk, talk. That's my dear. Let's see, what do you have to say about yourself? A few small fires provide a sense of calm for the caravan, though the villages keep well away from the ravens. There is enough light to see you are no longer in a man-made mine but a natural cave of salt. What are we doing down here? Staying alive and keeping below from the dredge. I thought that was obvious. Man just mentioned that the dredge are known to make holes constantly, so staying alive in a mine not going to work out well for us in the long run. But we keep heading down like we're hunting wolves. There are wolves in this game. Awesome. The Valka gives you a ghost of a smell. Are we? Oh. Until today no one but a few in the council knew about these tunnels. Not even menders. We didn't create them, but we have used them a great deal over the years to travel far distances quickly. Zephyr becomes quiet awaiting a question. Where do they lead? Practically everywhere. Alberang, Vo, Grofheim or what is left of it. I'm not sure anyone knows the full extent of these underground paths that we're about to enter a corridor. One of the main tunnels. Zephyr becomes quiet awaiting a question. She does that a lot, doesn't she? So where are we headed? Where would you go knowing you possess the sleeping body of the immortals and the general? Dropping it in the blue river still sounds great. It was not a terrible plan by Valka or her junior for simplicity. But the closest I could get was to the middle of the Fladovala or Plains Fladovala Plains. I have to assume the Dredge Army is there in force. Madagara is the safest place to secure Bellower's body. Whatever drew the Dredge Army towards the Zinbindel, the council can find a way to stop it. And what about the Ravens? So far, helping Valka base less than a bloodshed coin. And that is why I'm talking to you alone now. The corridor will lead us to Manahar in a week's time. See us there safely, and I give you a genuine Valka thought. You will be rewarded well enough to never need work again. You look around at the cave walls and back the way you came. We'll go to Manahar! We were headed there after the Blue River anyway. Let's see. Anything good? Here for another pity match! Both of your quartermaster asks what are you begging me to show you how to really carve up some foes? What can you show me? Lots of neat little deadly tricks. Try to keep up. You're a berserk and we're all impressed. Both of you say it's before spitting, but if you lose it out there in a fight and start killing your own, well, then you're just a pain in the ass. I'll start with you and the shield maiden. You feel up to the challenge? Sure. Stars? Winging. Use Bolvex Frenzy to kill two enemies with one attack. Use champion to protect an ally from... attack. All right, let's see. Frenzy, Frenzy, Frenzy, Frenzy. Oh. So I guess I have to take their shields first. That's an acceptable strategy I suspect. Champion. Oh, I see. I need adjacency then. All right, all right, all right. I'm not an adjacent ally. Let's see. No allies are adjacent to focus, just your positioning. Yeah, yeah. All right. This is a bit more tricky than most of the other ones. Let's just make sure that... they try it next time. Next turn, I mean. All right. Oh. Ouch. Double ouch. I would really appreciate it if everyone stopped attacking Bolverk right about now. Oh, you're going to attack your man, aren't you? You must truly be a pleasant woman. Well, this is not what I had in mind. All right. Let's do this champion thing then. I must drop my first target with a single hit. Is that so? All right. I'm going to try it on the archers. I think if I can move that way. Ouch. This, I imagine, is making things harder. All right. I think we can do this. Oh, so close and yet so far away. Damn it. Okay, let's kill this guy because he is in the way. Another problem is that my health is going very low, very quickly. And that's bad. Oh, boy. I think I may have screwed this up very badly. Let's see. Fair enough. Okay. At least I got the promotion out of this thing. For both of my main characters. That will have to be good enough. Let's see. Promote. Yep. Yep. I think we're going to take these two. Yeah. Good job. Good job, everyone. Let's take a nice rest. So we... Oh, great. So we can move on now. This is a very interesting change in perspective. So far in the banner saga, we've always gone about the world from the crust. Now we're going underground. What's going on here? You hear a folk ask a group of ravens. They're standing around a whimpering man on his knees. He kept whining about being hungry. One of your fighters says, we found those little glowing bellies for him, but certainly he's not so hungry. There's the other's chuckle. Let the folker handle this. Get up! She tells the man who complies. You three take some of the bellies. You three will be the testers. The ravens eyes go wide. You're kidding, right? One asks. His response is folker sweeping his leg with her spear. Eat. They put a few bellies in their mouths. As the fighters chew, their mouths glow with the berry juice. Folk and the man she hopes start laughing. The fighters look at each other and laugh. After a while, they show the raven. They don't taste half-bad either. Says one raven. Others start collecting the berries to eat and squeeze waving glowing hands in the dark. Mothers rub their smiling children in the juices in order to keep track of them. The child maiden turns and gives you a cocky grin. You snort and move on. Did we all just cover each other with luminescent berries? Because that sounds about as insane as it should. Hello. Hi. The man's southern appearance makes you tense. I didn't mean to sneak up on you. It's something I do. I mean, something I've learned to do. Something that will get you killed if you do it to me again. Okay, yes. But it does have its uses. Just allow me to fight alongside you now. Well, a fight. You won't regret it. You scoff and turn away from the man with the goodman there at the approach. I see you, Madditch. Strange fellows who have an excellent fight. But he fights his way through enemy defences. The new fight next to him. People near me tend to get hurt. But his injuries won't be an accident. This voice is taking out a lot out of me. That was so grammatically incorrect. The man goes back to the cavern. There's a gold down here. Gold! You feel the surge of excitement like everyone else. The man looks left and right confused. Damn it. All turned around. Idiot, you're on New York's duty. The man frowns but says nothing. I just punch him in the arms and back, despised by the false hope. Yep, I expected that to happen. The torches highlight the crudgy black rocks and bubbles in the path of the food. They do little to keep everyone together. Sharp turns around boldest, quickly block lines of sight. We've lost a few families, everyone informs you. We need to stop and find them. You consider your options. This is the only time. This is the only time! I appreciate the help. She says and splits everyone into surge groups. As you surge, you realize it's just as hard to track time down here as it is above where the sun that never moves. Sometimes later you think you hear voices to the left. Search to the left. As you move away from the main path, you leave someone with a torch standing every sale often. This route proves useless as it seems you must have heard nothing but an echo. You follow the line of torches back to the path. Keep searching down the path. A bit further down you find the source of the sounds a mother is holding her children tucked away and she says of a rock formation. She whimpers as you approach and focus says better let me handle this. Moments later you'll head back to meet with Zephyr. Surprisingly all the missing clansmen were found. Huh, I'm actually happy this happened. It's so rare that taking things all the way will result in something good like finding a bunch of lost children and their mums. Water barrels are running low. Hopefully your quartermaster reports and I'll be damned if I start licking these slimy rocks for a drink that she had made and looked at you. If these people start getting desperate for water down here you get her off. I know! You say, send out some scouts we'll come here until they return. Some of your ravens and other members of the current group open grab torches rope and waterskins before heading off in different directions. Better catch some rest while you can. Nothing to do until they get back anyway. Laying down you focus on the sound of a small drip somewhere in the cave. It grows louder, like the beat of a drum. Like thousands of feet marching behind you. You turn and everyone stops. You see the glowing eyes of your army looking at you in admiration. A hundred members break formation to dig holes in the cavern floor and place stone barrels in the depressions. The barrels quickly fill with water and the first is offered to you. You just make your turds before seeing your red armoured reflection in the bowl. Whoa, was I dreaming that I'm a dredge? I must serve, right? You wake up before it's a shout and focus joins you. What was it this time? She asks.