The man had managed to avoid the remaining bandits until the last of them were felled by the other mages. He wasn't going to get paid to kill bandits, so he wasn't going to bother fighting more than he had to. The moment the last one fell to the ground, he was seated once more around the stone table, at the same seat, glaring at the map intently. His ears perked and his head raised when he heard the knights entering, only for them to be swiftly obliterated. Now, he was impressed. Would be a neat little trick to pull himself, if he could do pull it off.

Then he was off, palm resting the pommel of his sword, walking with but apart from the other mages. He preferred to keep to himself, and none of the others had addressed him, so he would keep to himself. The dark presence that loomed behind them was unnerving, to say the least, but he refused to look back at it. Whatever it was, it would only be bad for him if he looked at it. That was what history told him, at least.

It seemed that he was looking as nondescript as he wanted to, for he was being largely ignored by the group. He offered nothing, but made sure to listen in on the plans. To go down the main road and face bandits, or to go through the Black Forest and Elven Forest, both of which had fairly bad reputations among history books and folk legend. He mumbled something into his beard, then shrugged his shoulders to reposition his bag.

Finally, he turned his head towards the group, the female elf in particular, who had attempted to shoot down the scouting party idea, and simply said, "That would only be true if they were fools. If they are skilled enough, they can scout far enough ahead and return without being noticed." He didn't mention that that was all speculation made from a lifetime of reading old war books and fiction, but it did seem like sound advice. "So long as they are swift and don't take all the supplies, sending a scouting party before the main group would be one of the smartest things we could do."

With his two cents put into the conversation, he turned his attention back to the road and his mind to the future and the great library that waited for him. If it compared anything to his imagination, then it would be impossible for him to learn nearly as much as he wished in his lifetime. He'd need to set up shop there, live there for several years, decades even. The only worry would be food and clothing. But, surely, he could learn a long range teleportation spell to get back to the city to get those things. He raised a hand to scratch his head through the short hairs on his head, then began to stroke his beard as he became lost in thoughts of how to procure the majority of the library.