The next morning came entirely too early as Karl felt that he was finally making real progress on his spaces, but the promise of a unique challenge for the group, with the promise of even better rewards was enough to eliminate most of the concerns that his time might be better spent in the meditation room.

His backpack had been upgraded while he was away, including a small note from Lotus about the state of his supplies.

[Karl, I replaced all your camping gear, other than what Rae made, which I transferred from a stick to a proper lightweight pole. There is a folded cloth tent, your hammock, rope, lightweight kitchenware, extra boots and socks, and then the essential grooming kit.

Since you're with us, I only included the small fuel stove with one can, but normally, you would carry a spare. The cup that goes with the stove contains a coffee perk, and some fresh ground beans if you find yourself in need of better coffee in the mornings.

There is a week's worth of ration packs in there, as is protocol, and an extra canteen full of good water.

I also added some extra clothes, since you never have anything clean when you get back to civilization. Your laundry is tightly rolled and packed in the central pouch. Please refer to the diagram.]

Her handwriting was beautiful, so what had happened to her picture drawing abilities? Even the shape of the backpack was barely recognizable, much less the stuff she drew inside. Fortunately, the labels were perfectly clear, and Karl understood without completely unpacking the bag.

Instead, he just opened the sections and pockets to double-check, before curiosity overcame him, and he pulled out the grooming kit to see what Lotus had thought were the essentials for a man's grooming.

There was a straight razor, shaving soap and a brush, which looked higher quality than his old one. Then there was a comb, scissors, nail clippers, a sewing kit with both fine and leather supplies, instant set glue, leather soap, mink oil for conditioning the leather, and then condoms. So many condoms.

Now, Karl wasn't a particularly prudish young man, and he did keep one in his old supply bag, just in case. But there were nearly thirty of them here. Was Lotus trying to tell him something? Or was this an oddity of what she considered essential supplies?

Fortunately, he didn't have to wait long, as the Cleric in question came to check on him just as he was putting everything away.

"Lotus, why is half my grooming kit bag filled with condoms?" Karl asked as the smirking woman walked in.

"You see, the standard operating procedure is fourteen days of supplies, except water, which would be too heavy to carry for most of us.

So, fourteen days, and two a day, makes twenty-eight. There are precisely twenty-eight condoms in your bag, and if that number changes, we will have some questions for you, young man." Lotus replied in her best motherly voice before devolving into giggles.

"Well, it's not like they're heavy, but I admire your optimism. I didn't tear the pack apart, but it looks like everything is there. Is it time to leave?" Karl replied.

"Yeah, we head down in ten minutes, that's what I came over to tell you, just in case you were meditating. They hate waiting for people, especially Elites, who should know better."

"The pilots hate waiting on anything. But I'm all packed up now, should we get going?" Karl replied.

"The others should be waiting."

The word 'waiting' turned out to be an understatement. One helicopter was shut down for maintenance, and there were fifty clergy members standing around outside with their gear, as the other pilots wouldn't leave him to fly without his formation if they didn't have to.

There weren't many monsters who could take one out when it was loaded with clerics and Elites, but if they were taken by surprise, even Hawk could be a deadly threat to the transport vehicle.

The mechanisms were complex and fairly delicate, so a single fireball to the rotors would take a helicopter out of the sky. For that reason, the bus was a more popular option, but for wilderness deployments, it simply wasn't an option, as it couldn't get you close enough to the deployment zone, and the Golden Dragon Nation was a large one.

As he scanned the group, Karl noticed that there was another team that stood out even more than his did. While half of his team was in armour instead of the robes of the clergy, the final team was in a different style of robes with a light chest plate, and swords on their hips in a delicate style that Karl was certain would shatter the first time they took a hard parry.

Obviously, they weren't for fighting head on, but more of a martial arts style of combat, but they didn't look like Monks, unless this was some odd fashion of the Capital that he didn't know.

"Spellblades." Tessa offered a one word explanation.

Oh, Karl had heard of those. They were mages who trained in the ways of the warrior. Not elites, but trained mages. They weren't known to be as quick growing as the Elite Mages, but they had a long history, hundreds of thousands of years, and they were the primary fighting force of many of the magical nations.

He wondered if they were going to get to see them in action wherever they were going, or if they were on some other mission.

That answer was solved easily enough when an aging Mage came to join them and quietly informed his group that he had arranged other transportation, and that they were headed to the airport.

But before they could leave, the crew announced that the helicopters were ready to go, and they could start loading now.

That caused a moment of indecision, but the mage waved the Spellswords toward the military helicopters, and made a phone call to cancel the arrangements for the other flight.

That was how Karl found himself seated next to a young woman in black robes, who had a large scar on the side of her face and a serious chip on her shoulder.

"Is this the grade of warrior they're sending into combat these days? Aren't you a bit weak to one of the Elite Brutes?" She asked.

The other Elites were about to respond, but when they saw that Karl wasn't bothered, they held back, wondering what he would do.

For Karl, who had grown up the smallest, being called weak was no real insult anymore, he was too used to it to take offence, but one thing that Rae had noticed right away was that this Spellsword was still at the Awakened Rank.

"You know, given that there is a whole Rank between us, I thought that you could be more polite. Something along the lines of [Have you been ill, Senior Brother? You look far too slender and handsome for a warrior.] That would be much more suitable, don't you think?"

From the look on the woman's face, you would think that Karl had slapped her. "Why in the seven Realms would I call you Senior Brother?"

"You're still an Awakened Rank Spellsword, while it won't be long before I move from Ascended to Commander Rank. Certainly, that deserves some consideration?"

Her teammates were smirking, but holding back from getting involved. Whether to prevent a fight from breaking out, or because they were looking down on the Elites, Karl didn't know. But when it came to a battle of wits, he wasn't completely unarmed.

"As if I would call some young child Senior Brother." She grumbled as she realized that Karl really did have the power advantage.

He didn't know how their faction's internal rankings worked, but the Elites went mostly by power. The more you had, the more respect you got. Most warrior groups should be the same, and Rae was quite certain that the oldest two in their group were Commanders, while the others were all Awakened.

"Teams one and seven, you are up first. You will be hot dropping into a combat zone, so be prepared for action." The cargo master announced, cutting off their argument.

Alice nodded in acceptance, as they were Team One, and it appeared that Team Seven was the Spellswords. It was just his luck, they really were going to the same deployment, and they were already off to a not so brilliant start.

Maybe there was a chance they weren't working together, but just near each other.