Chapter 2: Meeting the Denizens of Asaris
Kain took other look at his strange bracelet on his right wrist and hoped that it wouldn't be too strange to have in this world. Now he needed go and find someone to feed him information! Kain sighed as he traveled out of the forest, leaving the corpse of Gem Bear behind to empty grassy plains as wind made soft blow across the plains. The weather was excellent as well, not a spot of cloud in the sky with two suns shining down in all of their majesty. Kain hoped that he wouldn't have to run across any mobs right now.
After all he was only level one mage with basic spells! Kain grumbled as he tried to move across the plains quickly and in direction that his creation, Jeeves had pointed out of closest road. After a while, perhaps around twenty minutes of quick walking without any rude interruptions that he only did finally stumble on something! That was group of humans with a lofty carriage rolled down a path of soil that seemed to be used often. Just as Kain was about to shout out to get their attention, something happened! The wheel broke and the carriage fell down!
The guards that were around the fancy carriage was quickly startled taking a quick look around the region -- and quickly noticed Kain! They shouted "HEY! WHAT YOU ARE DOING HERE?!" With their blades and other various weapons holstered toward to Kain. Kain quickly threw up his hand. "Whoa there! I was just leaving the forest to find a civilization and when I was just about to call you guys out, that happened!" The guards were clearly suspicious of this young man. Just as one of the guards -- seemingly to be a guard captain -- was going to say something, only did the figures from the carriage finally came out, curious about the commotion.
It was a old fat man. Kain let out a silent sigh, hoping that the noble is not pompous one that looked down on commoners or whatever. The old fat man looked at Kain briefly before glancing at the presumed Guard-Captain then to the broken wheel. "Guard-Captain Falstor, is there any problems that is preventing you from fixing the wheel?" Kain smirked as his presumption was correct! Guard Captain Falstor shook his head. "Well... No, before we could assess the damages, we noticed suspicious figure up there..." The fat noble took other look at Kain before declaring "Don't worry, young man. I won't bite, come here and explain your presence here in the Forbidden Plains." The fat man let out a strained smile.
Kain blinked, taken aback by the name of the region that he woke up in. It seemed... so evil and malevolent contrary to the peaceful nature that he had seen so far. "Huh? Oh sure." He approached to the fat man, just as he drew closer to the fat man, only he did realize that they had been communicating perfectly fine! Although... It wasn't his native language! It was this world language! He wondered if it was side-effect of his sudden appearance in this world that seemingly to be carbon copy of Asaris Online.
Just as he arrived before the fat man and was about to start speaking... Unfortunately Guard-Captain Falstor shouted "Kneel, peasant! You stand before His Lordship, Viscount Daer of Jaerun House!" Kain just looked at him with dumbfounded face, fortunately Viscount Jaerun had discerning eye and could see this young man was unusual one. "Falstor, don't worry about it." He waved his hand dismissing the command of the Guard-Captain. Which Kain was slightly grateful for that. After all, in first place he wouldn't bow to anyone! Viscount Jaerun had unwittingly saved him his face.
Viscount Jaerun smiled. "So? Can you explain your presence here?" Kain tilted his head as thousands thoughts went though his mind before finally speaking. "Mm. I grew up in the forest near to here with my grandfather. I have never seen the outside world and my grandfather rarely taught me anything. Although he did teach me some things but he said that it might be outdated because outside world changes often and quickly." Kain shrugged lightly. "He recently died and told me to leave the home in the forest. So here I am."
Kain thought it was fairly solid background... Of course if someone don't go to the actual forests and actually look for non-existent cabin that he had supposedly grew up. Viscount Jaerun give a thoughtful expression before nodding. "That is highly unusual... It seems your grandfather had some problems with some people and hid himself. What of your parents?" Kain had expected this and promptly answered "According to my Grandfather, my father died in a battle and my mother died in childbirth. I am last of my lineage." I spoke with sorrowful tone. I hope my acting abilities was good enough!
Viscount Jaerun was taken aback and quickly apologized. "My apologies, I did not mean to give you painful memories. How about I give you a ride to the so-called civilization that you spoke of?" Viscount smiled softly - his guts was telling him that this man would help him out and had good stature! "Your name...? I do not recall you introducing yourself" Kain blinked in surprise before laughing. "Oh yeah, I didn't. My name is Kain. I would love to join with you but... Isn't the wheel broken?" He asked the Viscount.
Viscount blinked before slapping his forehead. "Right! Falstor? It is doable without the Engineering Art?" Kain blinked at the strange term -- Engineering Art? It shouldn't be Engineering Skill? Before he could raise his question, the Guard-Captain give his answer promptly. "While you two were conversing, I took a look and it is not doable without it, we will need send someone fo..." Just before the Guard-Captain could finish what he was saying, Kain interrupted them.
"Eh? You need someone with Engineering? You're looking at the person who has it." Kain smirked and wondered if he could ask questions to Jeeves about it. He didn't want to speak out of loud so he tried using his thoughts Jeeves? Can you respond to my thoughts? And just as he thought that, he received quick response. Jeeves: "Indeed, Master. Do you have a task for me?" Kain smiled as he quickly asked Jeeves what he wanted to ask. Kain: Jeeves, why it is that they refer Engineering Skill as Engineering Art? He heard few beeps in his head as Jeeves executed his inquiry. Jeeves: Master, It seems I do not have access to the World Database for unknown reasons. I cannot execute your inquiry, my apologies Master." Kain let out a sigh, he had to be really impressed with the AI. It actually had a personality, although slightly robotic. He asked Jeeves yet other question although this one was probably dumb one. Kain: Jeeves, it is possible for me to use my Engineering Skill to repair the wheel? Jeeves: Indeed, Master. You have Grand-Master level , it should be within your skills. To call upon Engineering Skill Menu, simply think about it. Although in this situation, Master... I do not advise it. You are in strange situation; where you know nothing of this world. It is better for you to do manually. According to my limited Database of Information, there is two way of using Skills - one is what I just told you, other one is doing it manually by following your instincts." Kain nodded and mentally thanked Jeeves. All of this - took less a minute.
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Viscount smiled brightly, the heavens had blessed him! "That's great, Kain. I'll compensate you for it, of course. Can you please repair the carriage?" Kain let out a soft chuckle. "But of course, you are giving me a ride to civilization. I hope you might will answer some of my questions as I am naive to this world!" Viscount quickly nodded as Kain moved toward to the side of the carriage where the wheel was broken. He looked at it and he just -felt- as though it was easy-peasy like snapping his finger to repair it. 'Seriously... They can't even do this?' as that thought floated in Kain's mind. He shook his head and took to work.
By using his godly skill although manually - he still easily repaired the damage and it looked as though it never broke. Viscount and the Guard-Captain was stupefied by this. Viscount let out a nervous laugh. "Wow... It seems you have very high level of Engineering, perhaps?" Kain tilted his head and blurted out "No? This was easy." Viscount and Captain-Guard was on verge of simply fainting. Viscount burst into laughter. "Right, right... You know nothing of common sense of this world." Viscount shook his head and moved to the door of his carriage. "Come in, and we'll talk more. We need to be on way to Keares City!"
Kain nods as he accepted Viscount's invite and entered his carriage. If anyone else of noble or even commoners would be greatly shocked because commoners was usually not allowed in noble's carriages! Even the guards around them was slightly shocked but at same not surprised -- after all he had repaired the carriage. They finally started moving toward to the city. Kain chuckles as he was about to bomb the Viscount with a lot of questions! At least the ones that probably can't be answered in library.
Kain: "Alright, can you tell me where am I? Grandfather hated geography and never touched it..." Kain let out weak laugh, shaking his head.
Viscount Jaerun: "You are kidding me? We're on Human Continent! In Kingdom of Saris... It was newly founded only merely two hundred year ago! It is currently ruled by the Saris Family. The current king is Mirom Saris! He's pretty powerful... Then again, all world leaders are powerful!" Viscount laughed, shaking his head.
Kain: "At least now I know where I am.. Grandfather said there was Human Continent, Zaern'thal also commonly known as Elves Continent, Sorched Continent and the Dark Land, right?" Those continents was the ones that was present in game! He really hoped that nothing had changed too much...
Viscount looked at Kain strangely. "Well, mostly... yes. Although I'm surprised that you don't know about Sorched Continent. According to the history, it did indeed exist before the Calamity, but after that... It sank and no longer exists."
Kain was surprised. He needed to find out more about Calamity. "What happened to the orcs and other races that lived on it and what this Calamity is?" Kain realized that he probably sounds like some backward person that knows nothing, like some certain individual in a television show...
Viscount looks even more surprised. "How you can not know about the Calamity? Ugh... Your Grandfather must be spectacularly lazy! The Calamity happened five hundred year ago; the powerful and famous individual had all but vanished expect for few. There's some theories that they actually ascended to Heavens... But after they vanished, the world cried out in pain as it shook and heavens fell." Viscount paused, letting out a chuckle. He never thought he would narrate the Calamity to someone who was already well into his teenager years! "Well, several remaining powerful individuals tried to prevent the Calamity... or at least delay it. They did a massive ritual and it succeeded. There was a massive white flash that could be seen by everyone and the World stop crying out in pain and calmed down."
Viscount let out a bitter smile. "Although they paid great cost to do so - they used entire continent filled with animals, and millions of useless creatures beside few more intelligent races like the orcs and so on - they already left with Elves' warning for them to depart the continent immediately. They used the continent to power up their grand spell. So, the Sorched Continent is forever lost. After the Calamity, much happened. Orcs moved into Human Continent and claimed lower part of it. So now we refer the lands that we are currently on as Humans Lands and the lower part of the Human Continent is now referred as Orcs Land."
Viscount paused for a moment in his quite long storytelling. "Out of all kingdoms, only single kingdom from the Ancient Era survived the Calamity and passage of time. That would be Kingdom of Arcana." Kain immediately recognized the name. "So that is still around, huh.." Just as Kain was going to ask further questions, they arrived the Keares City and had to be admitted in.. Hopefully everything will go fine.
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Hello~ Sorry for long wait on next chapter! School, ugh. Anyway, enjoy it! I'll try to release other one on Sunday as it will contain more information about Asaris Online, such as history, kingdoms, families, ranking systems and more...!
As always, I will welcome any feedback and apologize if there is any grammar problems. It is not exactly my best skill. :(
Cheerios,
Danare