Suspicious merchant is suspicious, but it'd be funnier if they played it straight and he's a perfectly reasonable guy who unfortunately startled the murderflock.
And all y'all commenting about Africa need to
reread chapter 6 lol
Seeing Africa like that is making my brain hurt. Go to Google Maps, measure the distance of that Plateau to that Prague, and it's over 500 kms. The real Africa is huge.
It might actually be okay. Chapter 4 noted that it took "several weeks" to get from the plateau to the town, putting that around ~25km/day (15 miles/day) (500km/21 days), which is a lot, but for a high ranking adventurer party plus support from the murderflock (e.g. Dere carrying Amelia the whole way), maybe not unreasonable?
I hope the party has a magic bag or something, though, because a few backpacks definitely isn't enough to hold 2 months of supplies plus loot.