Traversing the forest, which he now knew was filled with not only Blue Ape hunting parties chasing him down, but also other creatures, maybe even more dangerous than the hunting parties, was a very mentally exhausting task.
Gaston had some experience in tracking his enemies from all his time spent at war back in the Poisoned Continent, but never something like this.
The unknown was always the most dangerous, even someone like Gaston could feel the effects of the mental effort it took to move forward under such circumstances.
It was true that he had quite a lot of experience in being hunted down by the Blue Apes, so he was quite familiar with a lot of their methods.
This however, being on the opposite side of the equation and tracking them down instead, was new for him.
He wasn't sure whether they were really as reckless as they appeared to be at first glance, not covering up their tracks at all, not even hiding their smell, or if this was all a part of some kind of trap.
It seemed too cautious of an approach by them to attempt to set up a trap for him in this manner however, and nor did it make any sense to him.
If they had spotted him during the night, when he was sleeping, then they could've just killed him, there was no need to go through this much trouble.
On the other hand, Gaston had no doubts about the fact that they had failed to discover his position when they passed by his little camp. He was far better at camouflaging himself than most creatures the Blue Apes usually came across, or at least so he assumed.
On top of that, from Gaston's experience in dealing with the Blue Apes, he knew that whilst their sensitivity to magical activity was far better than his was at the very least, their other senses were not quite as acute.
Or at least, they were not as sharp as what Gaston would have guessed, given that they are magical creatures, though it was not like Gaston had much experience with what the magical creatures in this new part of the world were like, so he couldn't really speak on the matter with a definitive manner.
Eventually, after a little over two mentally exhausting hours of tracking, he finally came across something different.
It wasn't what he saw that made him alert however, but rather what he smelled. 'Fresh blood... But it's not just Blue Ape blood that is spilled up ahead. Most of it seems to be human.'
Identifying his current situation as dangerous, Gaston took out his knife, but then immediately paused, as an expression of mild shock appeared on his face for a second.
After taking out his knife, he discovered that he had looked over this matter when he looked back at the memories of his amnesiac self!
The knife he was holding now, was not the punch dagger he had been using during his battles with the Blue Apes.
The design seemed rougher, and the material it was made of he still couldn't identify now, but Gaston was confident that it was made in this continent and not his previous one.
The material was too foreign looking to have come from the Poisoned Continent, something he was sure of even with his fuzzy memories of that time.
On top of that, the craftsmanship involved in the making of this knife was far inferior to even that of his punch dagger, which all but confirmed it's place of origin, as Gaston knew that he would never allow for himself to carry such inferior weapons.
Despite it's rough looking design however, Gaston got the feeling that the knife was able to be infused by his magical energy!
There were some oddly shaped marking on the blade of the knife itself, which he could only assume were some kind of magic runes that were responsible for making infusing magical energy into the knife possible.
It was a pity that he was most likely near a battlefield that involved the Blue Apes, so using magical energy at the moment was impossible, as it would only give his location away.
What made his head filled with question marks however, was why he was in possession of this rough-looking rune engraved magic knife in the first place.
Gone was his halberd, gone was his trusty punch dagger that he kept hidden in a specifically designed sheath on the inside of his robe, on his chest right below his neck.
In their place, he was now left with this mysterious knife, that he didn't know where he even got from.
None of the Blue Apes he had ever seen were in possession of equipment of this quality.
Whilst in his opinion the design looked rough, it was still a weapon engraved with precise-looking runes that he was almost positive gave this knife magical properties.
In comparison to the weapons that the Blue Apes usually wielded, glorified sticks with a sharp pointy end to them that they used as spears, this weapon might as well be a divine object.
If not from the Blue Apes however, from where had he gotten his hands on this knife?
"No! No, no! Please... please!"
The sudden noise broke Gaston out of his thoughts, instantly grabbing all of his attention, as his head rose up and snapped towards the sound's location.
The sound didn't come from too far away, and it was clear, which enabled Gaston to precisely identify where it came from and what it was.
'The desperate wailing of a woman, most likely to be a little girl, judging by her voice.'
His eyes were quite calm, too calm, given the situation he had found himself in.
He had finally come across another human, this he was certain of since there were no women aboard his ship.
Gaston did previously have the slight worry that he was about to come across a fallen...friend, one could say, which would not be good news for him or his future plans.
So to discover that the human blood spilt was not that of his crew members, Gaston was quite happy, even allowing a little smile to appear on his face.
The good news did not stop there however.
Travelling to the village that they had learned about from the tortured Blue Ape from several months ago was one thing, but they had never actually discussed what to do afterwards.
Once they actually got there.
After all, the prospect of even making it there seemed difficult to say the least, at the time. That's why they had never taken the time to even think about it, much less discuss it at length.
Now however, a perfect opportunity presented itself in front of Gaston.