I agree with you, I wish we could skip at least the tree underground short paths, but I don't think this will happen for two reasons: firstly having going through the caves being tedious will make ending the orc's war storyline being more rewarding, secondly when people told Hyao this problem he added in the zone 59 of the northern cave the chance to find a shortcut (maybe you need perception to unlock it).
For now my suggestion, other than to unlock that shorcut, is to unlock the shortcut you can find in the zone 84 of the southern cave (requires perception and is an event that has a chance to happen). Moreover, since the content of that area for now is limited, you could use a saveslot to save the game when you are in the village and when you want to check if there is something new of importance, use that saveslot to do so.