Somewhere in The Wastelands:-

Harry’s group had been travelling for a month now.

They had left the Great Demon Law forest long back and were in the Wastelands now.

Now, they would need to travel for about a month more to reach their destination.

Normally, this would have taken a month at the maximum for Harry to cover this distance.

But he also had to take Qing and Shin along with him.

Harry’s speed came from his muscular strength while the other two used their qi to achieve a similar effect.

Due to miasma from the forest, most of the qi and mana had been blocked off from entering this region.

And as a result of the negligible qi density present here, qi recovery was an extremely tedious task.

Because of that, they could only move for about 8 hours a day at high speeds.

After that, the rest of the time went in qi recovery along with short breaks for food and rest.

The only good thing about this journey was that the system had put the same type of cloaking field over them so that no energy users or immortals can detect their presences.

This was done as a reward for defeating the Immortal Realm cultivator.

Harry pretended to check the physical map he had, while he looked at the GPS he had on the system window.

“Alright, guys! We’re about halfway there.

Just one month more of this and we’ll reach our destination.”

“Another month in this desolate land!?”

Qing fell to the ground in despair and Shin quickly followed.

Normally, for most people, such journeys weren’t that difficult.

It wasn’t the most preferable thing, but if needed, no one complained as much as Qing had done.

Before meeting Harry, they too fell into the category of these normal people.

But after living with so many modern luxuries, their tastes and habits had become quite abnormal for this world.

When faced with the sun of the summer months, Qing had once even started hallucinating that there was a huge A/C in front of her buried in the ground when all that there was, was a large ravine.

Both Harry and Shin had to hold her down before she jumped to her death.

“If only we had as much muscular strength as you, Harry…

We’d probably make it there within a month!”, Shin said to Harry.

“You are right. But your talent lies in cultivation. That’s something you only told me!

And even without muscle strength, we did end up shortening a journey of about a year into just 2 months, didn’t we?”, replied Harry.

This was true.

Any normal person would have taken over a year to get to the Nobunaga Kingdom.

The people living there were mere mortals. They had to build their cities as far away from the forest as possible, lest the demon beasts should invade.

Plus, considering the backgrounds these people came from, they tended to only accept the strong into their kingdom.

And this long of a travel time served as a test of sorts.

Any average person could not possibly survive the harsh conditions of the Wastelands for a year without somewhat proper food and shelter.

But even after all this, the people there did pray that cultivators didn’t set their eyes on them.

This had happened in the past and entire kingdoms made by mortals had fallen due to this.

So, just the fact that they were going there so easily in just two months while travelling for only 8 hours a day was a feat of an astronomical scale.

“Yeah, but if we didn’t focus solely on improving our cultivation-related aspects, we wouldn’t have been such a drag.

We’re barely able to keep up with your reduced speeds with our qi. Remove that and we’re as weak as regular mortals, if not weaker…”

Qing said in response to Harry’s words.

They decided to take some rest after running like a racecar for three hours straight.

Looking at the two of them, especially Qing, Harry couldn’t help but pity them.

She looked like a train wreck without her regular baths.

Shin was still better but still looked pretty bad himself.

Harry was doing the best due to the survival knowledge that the system had stuffed into his brain.

Even though he wasn’t looking his best, he was still looking way better than how the other two did.

It wasn’t like he wasn’t desperate for a bath, but he had been managing to a certain extent by travelling on a path with lots of water sources that they’d encounter every other week.

But the thing is that the area they were travelling in was a desert. Neither the edible kind (of course not) nor the cold kind.

They were travelling through hot and dry lands in the middle of the summers.

It would take them at least two weeks more of travelling (at their current speed) to reach better regions, where more greenery could be spotted as compared to the “brownery” that they usually saw here.

It seemed to be a bit past their usual lunchtime, so they quickly took out things for a meal.

The meals weren’t that great either.

The fresh stuff had almost completely run out unless someone managed to find and hunt some new prey.

All they had left was hard and dry jerky made from various demon beasts that they had hunted back in the forest along with some that they hunted along the way.

Even the system had offered some food after seeing the faces made by Qing, but Harry had to refuse to keep the system a secret.

So, instead, the system had been sometimes guiding Harry to locations where any edible beasts roamed.

[This system finds it quite surprising to see the host, who had initially taken so many things even without asking, refuse the help that this system is willingly offering.]

‘Will you just shut up for once. If you really want to help, save that help for later when I really want it!’

[Unfortunately, this was a one-time offer and that too only for food. This system knows the host’s intentions quite well and would rather not allow them to be fulfilled.]

After night fell, they were again forced to stop their travels.

The only thing good about the nights was the lack of direct heat.

Sleeping was still a problem, especially for the sibling duo who had been spoiled rotten from the use of the memory foam mattresses for four straight years.

The tents that they slept in was something that Harry had built using properly cleaned and processed hides of a specific kind of demon beast they had found during their travel.

And the sleeping bags they slept in was something that the system had given them out of pity.

They were made of cloth and not any synthetic fibres, as instructed by Harry who declared that he wouldn’t accept them otherwise.

The insect repellent they used had been made using dried herbs that the three had collected along the way.

However, they didn’t sleep for too long periods.

Someone had to keep watch for any nocturnal beasts that came out once the sun had set and the heat had gone down.

Because as was the case with most deserts on Earth, the deserts on Etheldor became very active at night. And active meant deadly in this world.

The demon beasts found in the Wastelands were more based on physical strength than mystical stuff.

Their overall body structures were similar to the desert animals found on Earth, like scorpions, snakes, lizards, arachnids, rodents, etc.

But, keeping up with the fantasy world’s demands, they were much bigger, way more poisonous, crazily mutated and extremely deadly.

Some of the creatures even put the ones back in Australia to shame.

Like the almighty Arachno-Lacer-Scorpio-Serpentes, as Harry called it since he couldn’t remember the term used for it on Etheldor. (But as far as he remembered, it was something cheesy, so he never bothered asking anyone either.)

{A/N: Lacertilia is the scientific name for lizards, as I found on the internet.}

This was a very deadly combination of basically everything dangerous.

A spider, a lizard, a scorpion and a snake.

And much, much more dangerous than anything similar found on Earth (or Australia).

This was the only thing that was difficult to deal with.

It had a stinger with poison that could kill a person instantly.

Its mouth also had fangs with the same poison.

Its long body was like a snake and it used it to bury itself in the sand before leaping onto its prey.

It also had eight legs and a web producing gland near its tail, which could also detach like that of a lizard’s.

Its body proportions were like those of a small to a medium-sized dinosaur. So, getting close was a huge problem.

It normally took a few physical attacks from Harry (either kicks and punches or a shotgun shell) to kill it.

The only good thing was that this was a very rare beast that they had only found thrice in their one month of travelling.

The other beasts felt like bugs compared to this one. (It did take some effort to defeat the others too, just that they were at half the level of that monstrosity at best.)

All this wouldn’t have been much as much of a problem if he had his old cheat level weapons.

He would have just opened fire on anything that approached him, if not for the fact that his bullets were now limited.

So far, Harry had used his guns and daggers very rarely to preserve durability and ammunitions.

He had even thought of asking the system for a car or some other vehicle, but he knew that it wouldn’t be allowed in the first place.

And even if he managed to get one, he wouldn’t be able to explain how he got his hands on it to Qing and Shin.

And so continued their high-speed journey through the deserts of the Wastelands.

The one ironic thing that Harry found about this place was its resource abundance.

But it came as no surprise.

The energy users who were capable of mining the majority of these resources avoided this place due to the low densities of mystical energies in the region and the initial harsh climatic conditions present.

The people who were living here could only use a minor amount of the ores and minerals they found aboveground. Plus, they used the thought processes of the energy users as a base to do everything, never allowing them to progress much.

This place had so many mineral deposits amongst other resources that it would last for more than a hundred years even if Harry used them in very liberal amounts.

That’s why, during the times they stopped, Harry had gone around mining a lot of precious looking ores and gemstones using the system’s new resource detection ability.

He planned on using these to literally buy the Nobunaga Kingdom from its current king.

That guy was a lazy and selfish narcissist who loved getting and spending money but hated working for it.

It was a miracle that he was the king.

But this was that kind of a world.

His great grandfather was quite the strong person, though mortal, who had established the kingdom.

But by the time the throne came to him, he was not a bit as strong as his mighty ancestor.

How did Harry know this?

The system’s help, why of course!

Seeing Harry’s plans, the system decided to give him some basic knowledge about the king to make the procurement of his new country a bit easier and less messy. (Harry’s original plan was to just barge in and cause a massacre in the royal palace till either the king gave him the kingdom or the king himself died and left the throne empty for him to take.)

Just as Harry was thinking about what he would say to the king during negotiations while running, Qing noticed the first sight of greenery.

“Yay! Elder brother Harry, we’re only two weeks away from that kingdom you mentioned! Look at those green trees in the distance!”

Seeing the green coloured land approaching them, a grin broke out on everybody’s faces.

They were through that blasted desert!

The relief they felt also brought forth a wave of fatigue in them.

Their brains registered the fatigue that had accumulated in their bodies and decided to release it in a bit more exaggerated manner a little early.

Feeling tired from all that running, they decided to take a rest and ate lunch under the soothing shade of a nearby tree.

For the first time in a long time, all of them very looking happy and relieved.

Harry knew that Qing and Shin didn’t like this travelling, but they also knew that staying near cultivators was very dangerous for them. That’s why they decided to stick with Harry through this long and tedious journey.

Thinking about the future, Harry knew that it would take time to get back all the luxury they had up till just a month and a half back.

But this time, every bit of luxury they get will be there to stay.

They decided to enjoy their time and started moving only the next day.

This time, the remaining journey was a whole lot smoother.

They had ample water, fresh food and also shelter during their breaks.

The sun also didn’t hurt as much as before.

And after some more days, they finally spotted the walls of the Nobunaga Kingdom.

They were back to the basics now.

But life would still be better than before.

Why?

Because Harry would own this place as the king in just a few days.

And the three of them will be living in the Royal Palace!