Chapter 21

The next day Alec drove on a carriage through the gates of the white city, leaving his home for the first time in his twenty years of life.

The first destination was the city called Berse. The journey was nothing special for normal people, but for Alec it was something he had never experienced before. He met lots of different people and together they travelled through forests and over rivers. Alec saw, for the first time in his life demonic beasts, as for some reason there were no animals or beasts at all inside of the white city.

Alec was astounded by the countless different species that roamed through the forests, swam in the beautiful blue rivers or ran over the wide grass lands. There were dangerous ones, small ones, harmless ones, really big ones and totally grotesque ones, such as the Culuma. The Culuma was the strangest thing Alec had ever met before. This species could change its appearance into anything. They could morph into knifes, lids, pots, stones, leaves, everything that wasn’t bigger in size then them. Alec believed that he never even saw the real form of the Culuma and when he asked the leader of the convoy about it, he got the reply that no one did. He didn’t seem like he was impressed by this fact, but for Alec this was a shocking conclusion. He was totally intrigued by those creatures as his fantasy was spinning theories one after the other:

What if the real form of the Culuma is nothing but magic, maybe they are an illusion?

What if there real form is that of a slime?

What if they don’t have a real form and every form they morph into is their real one until they morph again?!

Alec’s thoughts wouldn’t stop for a minute and it was not only about the Culuma. Alec had seen countless different species now and no one could tell him much about any of them. It was like no one cared at all. Alec couldn’t understand that attitude at all, as he was always a very curious and inquisitive person. He wanted to find out more about the different species.

So one day, during a rest in a village, he purchased a notice book and from then on he recorded everything he observed of the different demonic beasts, together with every theory his fantasy could muster. Soon the book was filled with countless words and drawings of the different creatures, documenting his observing. When they arrived in Berse, he had to buy two more books, because the one he bought in the village was already full. Afterwards he had to meet with the various big customers and trading partners, which were residing in the city f Berse. That was fine though, because like this Alec learned a lot more about his trading partners and most importantly about humans. After a full week of rest the convoy headed back to the white city, accompanied by Alec, who was eagerly documenting everything he saw. At some point he started to document not only the different species of demonic beasts, but also the surrounding he was travelling through, the people he met and his thoughts. The books he bought were filled quickly, so he waited eagerly to reach the next village, so that he could buy more books. Unfortunately the village they stopped in next, didn’t have any books, not even paper, but considering that it was a really small village, that was normal.

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So Alec had to think of something else to do during the journey, which didn’t take long as he saw the escorting martial artists doing basic training. As he watched them he realized that his body was lacking. He had become a little fat during the three years after his fathers dead and he looked really unhealthy. He walked to the training martial artists and asked them if he could train with them, which surprised them greatly, as they had only seen him sitting on a carriage, observing the surroundings and write into a small book. After a short time of thinking about it they agreed to the proposal of Alec as long as he was satisfied with them only teaching him the basic training methods and fighting techniques, but not the martial arts techniques, which were necessary to use spells. Alec was overjoyed and directly started to train with them, doing his best to keep up with their paste.

A month later, as they reached the white city, Alec was running alongside the escorting martial artists next to the carriages. His former fat body had completely changed into a fairly muscular shape and the former sick looking appearance he had was replaced by an energetic look and sun tanned skin. He also learned basic fighting techniques, which would be enough to deal with common bandits. Of course only if they were not martial artists.

Those changes didn’t come for free though as Alec had to endure a full month of heavy training. He had to do push-ups, sit-ups, squats, running, everything one could think of and the martial artists who trained him seemed to enjoy torturing him with more new training methods every time he got the hang of one.

Alec didn’t know anymore how often he had cursed the martial artists, how often he cursed himself for having such a dumb idea, but after half a month he started to feel the changes in his body. He could keep up with the martial artists for at least five minutes and most of the exercises had become bearable to do.

After a month he could run alongside the mercenaries for almost half a day, which would normally be impossible to accomplish in one months time, but the hellish training seemed to have been very effective.

As he reached the city he didn’t even talk with Hakin or any other members of the council, but directly moved out with the next convoy. He wanted to see more and this thirst couldn’t be stilled by sitting in the city. He could imagine why his father was travelling as much as he did. It was one of the most amazing things one could experience in life.

He travelled for over a year like this and saw countless unbelievable things.

Some of them were beautiful.

Some of them were terrifying.

But every single one of the experiences he made was interesting.

Someday, a different convoy brought him a message, which asked him to return to the white city, because his decision was needed. So he started travelling back to the place he called home before. He didn’t feel like it was a home anymore, he felt more like it was a prison, because he learned that the world was the most interesting thing in this world and he felt good travelling through forests, mountains, grass lands and over rivers. The world had become his home.