AN:

Hello all, long time hobbyist here. Just some housekeeping before we get into the story.

I'm eager for feedback to improve my technique. Tell me if you enjoy or if something frustrates you. Tell me if I do too much tell and not enough show. I'm not afraid of criticism.

Be warned, it is a little slow in the beginning. I'm setting up a ton of worldbuilding stuff because I don't want people to have to watch YT videos to understand the foreshadowing of the story, but by chapter 10 the action starts. In terms of what the reader is expected to know, roughly what you would know if you beat the game casually.

The AU tag is there because I've spent over 50 hours recently, and 200 hours total over the last 2-3 years, trying to make a coherent 'canon' interpretation of ER lore and the timeline to build the story around. But undoubtedly I'll have a different interpretations on some things than others; a lot of the lore is hard to reconcile.

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    A pair of plain brown eyes were narrowed in concentration as they stared into the large golden wisp floating above the ground. Or at least, if the eyes could see the wisp of gold, they would have been staring into it.

    But these eyes could not see even a speck of the gold the owner knew with absolute certainty was there. So they remained a plain brown, like they had been for so long.

    The owner of these eyes, sat on the ground relaxed with an arm resting on his knee. He had plain brown hair the same shade as his eyes, with a face so typical it would be hard to describe it with words besides generically "being european/caucasian" with how unnoteworthy it was in all aspects.

    He wore a raggedy cloth gambeson with only a few bits of ill-fitting plate that were marred with spots of rust; along with a pair of worn leather gloves and metal greaves that were beginning to rust as well. On his head he wore a plain metal helm without its visor that had long since fallen off. Laying at his feat was a simple spear, the only thing in his ensemble that seemed to be in excellent condition.

    The man sat in the decaying ruins of a small church that only had it's walls left standing. Dirt, grass, and small shrubs had long covered the stone floor.

Ruins

Ruins [https://i.postimg.cc/gJjVytqz/church-of-elleh-at-night.png]

    A few yards away from the man with the raggedy gambeson, on the opposite area of the church, was a man dressed in red with colorful feathers in his cap. He had stark almost-glowing orange-yellow eyes whose whose yellow color covered the entirety of the eye and was only broken by the black of his scalera.

Red-Dressed Man

Red-Dressed Man [https://i.postimg.cc/jSh3Z9NP/Eldenringkale.jpg]

Yellow Eyes

Yellow Eyes [https://i.postimg.cc/R0Vs8RQ8/merchant-eyes.jpg]

    The red-dressed man sat in a bedroll sprawled out in front of a a campfire with a donkey laden with a large pack just behind him. Next to him was a sizable pile of firewood and a lute-like stringed instrument that he wasn't playing for the moment. Sitting off long neglected in a corner from him was a crude anvil and primitive hammer.

    Off in the other corner opposite of the anvil near the plain man staring into the air, there was a pile of various supplies and tools. Nets, a bow and quiver, a small box filled with plump red berries the size of grapes, and various other assorted tools and supplies neatly arranged. Next to this was a roughly constructed wooden table with quite a few books stacked on it.

    The long familiar sight of the Church of Elleh and Nomadic Merchant Kalé. The sun had set already, leaving only the moon and the campfire to light up the night and only the crackle of the fire and the singing crickets disturbing the quiet.

    Kalé moved and tossed a few pieces of firewood onto the campfire before he laid down in his bedroll. Kalé looked over to the man a few yards away who was sitting on the edge of the fire's light, futilely staring at where he believed a large wisp of gold must be.

    "John, would you toss a couple pieces of wood onto the fire before you go to sleep?"

    The staring man, John, nodded distractedly.

    "No problem Kalé."

    John sat in silence for a few minutes his eyes still narrowed in concentration before the quiet was once again broken by Kalé laying in his bedroll.

    "You know that it isn't going to work."

    John frowned, his eyes narrowing further staring at nothing.

    "We've had this conversation before Kalé."

    "Just for tonight, take a brake. One night will not hurt."

    John just kept silently concentrating on what he was doing.

    "You have been at this for a long time my friend. Sometimes there are things in life that cannot be done no matter how hard we try."

    John closed his eyes for a moment, repressing a sigh, before turning himself to face Kalé.

    "I'm not going to give up on this Kalé. I know how long I've been at this. I am from a place where the Golden Order has not touched. I am much more aware of the passing of time than you.

    "This land, the Lands Between, time is strange here. Time has less weight to it. It is much easier for the days to slip by without one noticing. I'm sure if you asked someone from the Land of Reeds, they would probably say something similar.

    "So I know exactly how long I have been at this, more than you are. And I'm not going to stop until I figure this out."

    John's voice was resolute.

    "John. You are the first friend I have had for a long time. It has been so long; I cannot remember most of their faces anymore.

    "Listen. Every time I finish on my route to sell my wares, you are here. And when I leave to once again trade my ware and come back months later, you still here. Alone in this church.

    "People have a need to speak with others John. As a nomadic merchant I know this more than anyone. It never ends well when a man is left alone for long periods of time.

    "I cannot stay here for long this time; I could only spare this day. Why don't you join me on my route and see more of Limgrave?"

    John couldn't deny the truth of Kalé's words, but he had a reason he didn't want to leave here yet. One he didn't want to have to explain to Kalé. Leaving before then would be an extremely dangerous risk in his eyes, and he had always been averse to taking unnecessary risks. He absolutely hated gambling, especially with his life. So John just stayed silent.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

    Kalé saw John's back still straightened in stubbornness.

    "If that won't sway you, my friend, I know you have seen those listless wandering nobles. Us in the Lands Between may not die thanks to Queen Marika the Eternal, but we are not immortal. Our bodies do not grow old, but time can still take its toll. We can wither.

    "Those who lose the will, the drive, to continue on, those who are do not live and change as life goes on, they slowly wither away body and mind until they are left just as those wandering nobles are. They become hollow shells.

    "Those nobles became that way from relentlessly pursuing their goal with everything they had until they had nothing left to give anymore. They didn't eat, didn't sleep, didn't move their minds from their goal. I have seen this happen to my fellow nomads before as well.

    "I do not wish this fate for one of my friends. Please, come with me when I depart tomorrow."

    Seeing Kalé stubbornly trying to help him, John sighed before smiled wistfully.

    "Thank you for worrying about me Kalé, but I think you are overstating things. Yes, every night I'm here trying to figure this out, but during the day I do different things. I am not stagnating.

    "Sometimes I'm hunting or catching crabs or fish at the beach. Other times I'm practicing with my spear. I try cooking and eating different things in different ways. I might work on my physique or just enjoy a walk seeing the majesty of Limgrave.

    "And I eat a meal every day. I am not just sitting here for months on end doing nothing but wracking my brain about this. If I was I might have figured this out by now.

    "And Kalé, thanks for looking out for me, but you must admit I have come far from where I was when we first met."

    "Yes," Kalé said grudgingly after a short pause. "I cannot deny that. You are far from the man that first walked into this church in your strange waterlogged clothing only able to speak your strange language and not able to even gut a fish. You have came far over these 5 years.

    "And if you really are so stubborn that you cannot be convinced to come with me, then I will drop the subject."

    "Thank you Kalé. Speaking of that, I still own you for tricking me into calling myself a woman and that the word for greeting was cuss-"

    "Let us not change the subject," Kalé hurriedly interjected. "This is about you messing about with your [COLOR=#e6c200]runes[/COLOR]. Just because I will not try and convince you to come with me does not mean that this fixation of yours is not foolishness. You have been at this for more nights than there are stars in the sky and you have gained naught. When will you accept that whatever it, is is not possible?"

    "I already have told you many times before. I'm not going to give up. It's not like I'm trying something that has never been done before. I know for certain that this can be done, I just don't know how to do it. Half the battle of figuring something out is just knowing it can be done in the first place.

    "And it's not like I'm uselessly doing the same thing over and over again hoping it will work this time. Every night I try something different. And when it doesn't work, I add it to the list over there and try something else.

    "Normally it doesn't take me this long to try an idea, but this one is a little trickier than usual. I've already long since went through all the simple and straightforward ideas. If it wasn't hard to do, this wouldn't be a something that most people can't do."

    Kalé just sighed and laid his head down, closing his eyes.

    Seeing no more immediate interruptions coming, John turned his focus back to what he was doing.

    His eyes may have been open, but he was totally focused inwardly. He could feel the runes he that had collected in his body. They sat low in his gut in a ball of them that grew more concentrated, but not bigger, as more more had accumulated over time. The runes in his gut, somehow they felt golden in a way that was clearly unnatural.

    To someone from Earth that had never felt anything supernatural before, the presence of this feeling that just felt, implied, screamed golden in his mind whenever his focus drifted to the runes, had immediately become apparent after he had killed and eaten his first crab. Nothing mundane impressed that sort of sensation; something similar to what John imagined synesthesia felt like.

    The runes themselves were just various tiny geometric designs that were vaguely letter-like. Some were common and some rare. Some simple and some elaborate. Just looking at them, there was more to them, a depth, that was hard to describe. It was like that were more real than the rest of reality.

    John could control the runes inside of him with a sort of mental hand made of his will. He could shuffle them around his body. He could could arrange them beside each other or superimpose them on each other. None of this seemed to actually do anything though.

    He had tried to every night for over 1800 days straight to figure out their secrets. He had done his best to be thorough and try everything that made logical sense to him.

    He had long and meticulously documented and tried various ways of trying to get the runes to do anything, but all his attempts had ended in failure. They were clearly magical, but John didn't know at all how to tap into whatever power they held.

    At this point, John was sure that only the Gods, or those close to them, could use on them.

    The only thing he could do was move them around his body or transfer them to another person with a touch and impress his will on the runes that would temporarily 'absorb' it but soon go back to normal.

    One day the Chosen Tarnished would come along and things would be put into motion. With the Guidance of Grace, with that, as a Tarnished he would be almost-uniquely able to be revived over and over as he threw himself at seemingly impossible challenges until he won. Not even the power of Destined Death would be able to stop him.

    John was not the Chosen Tarnished. With his inability to see the grace in front of him that he knew for an absolute fact was right in front of him proved that. He wasn't even a regular tarnished as he hadn't woken up in the Church of Anticipation nor somehow traveled here. He had to treat any risk to his life seriously.

    And the Lands Between were full of dangers that a regular mortal man would easily succumb to. Even a demihuman bandit one of the weakest of dangers could kill him. And while John was willing to face danger, he wasn't stupid, and he was perfectly capable of being as patient as he needed to be.

    As for why he was so focused on this, John could either stay insignificant and just hope things turned out alright, or he could take things into his own hands.

    John would much rather take control of his own life. And really, in his opinion, there was no truly good ending to Elden Ring. To him they were all different flavors of bad, some worse than others. Two in particular stood out.

    So his plan was this: he would make his own good ending! He would craft his own mending rune for the Chosen Tarnished!

    But that was far into the future. For now, he had to take the first step. He had to be able to travel around without getting killed by a fat from Radahn.

    Hence, the task at hand. These runes.

    John had long since tried hundreds, thousands, of different things he thought might work. First it had been the obvious things like copying ideas from how magic worked in some of the games and books he knew. Things like FATE, Lord of the Rings, or even Dark Souls, but none of those had worked.

    Then he had moved onto more other ideas like channeling them to specific body parts, making 'sentences' using them, aping pagan rituals like pentagrams, or even more scientific ideas like laying them out like electric circuits and trying to channel other golden runes through them.

    And this was only the barest sampling of what John had tried. He'd spend the day on tasks or chores, occasionally thinking of an idea for what might work and how he could test it, and then he would extensively try things out in the evening.

    Some ideas even seemed to somewhat work. For some things, when John impressed his will into the runes, they somehow changed. But as soon as he stopped concentrating, they would revert back to normal. These ideas, he he recorded for later in journals in case they could prove useful somehow.

    John had been doing this every day for over 5 years. And not a single success.

    Recently, he had actually completely ran out of ideas. So instead the past few weeks he had been going with vague esoteric bullshit. He'd already tried that off and on over the years, but now it was all he had left. Just throwing shit at the walls and hoping something stuck.

    John directed his will inwardly to the runes low in his gut. That mass that had been slowly built up over years of hunting animals from just a few scarce runes to a whirling indistinct mass. He willed them with all his strength. To make himself a step closer to perfection.

    Better in every way. His arm stronger, his legs faster, his skin tougher, his mind brighter, his will stronger. His body to be more unrelenting, and his mind and soul to be harder to exhaust. To be more all encompassing, to have more depth. To be, like the runes themselves, more real than reality itself. To not just allow him to better resist the laws of the world, but for the laws to directly support him, pushing him forward.

    He willed them to not just improve him, but to become him. To have no distinction between him and them. Just as Marika's very body was inextricably one with the Elden Ring, these runes would be with him. Irrevocable and irremovable even after his death.

    John took this intent and affixed it to his runes in his stomach. As the runes grew potent with that intent, he stretched out his hand in the air and shoved shoved the runes into that unseen wisp of grace that he knew to be there and was, despite the great distance, still connected to the Erdtree and Marika.

    Then he put his hand where he knew that wisp of gold, of grace, to be even if he couldn't see it, couldn't feel it.

    It was like he touched a live wire. But instead of electricity flowing through him, it was gold-runes. That mass of runes sitting in his gut rushed to up through his body, down his arm, into his hand, and into the unseen wisp of grace.

    John felt felt euphoric. He could feel that it had worked.

    Himself becoming better, becoming more in some indescribable way. It wasn't something extreme, but having lived in his body for his entire life, he could tell when from one moment to the next, his breathe came ever so slightly easier. When his back became ever so slightly less strained. When the clothes on his body chafed ever so slight less. And the many other small ways he was better.

    By themselves, barely noticeable, but when all happening at once, they stuck out like a red sign. Just on how lighter his armor felt and crunching a couple numbers in his head, he'd say he could lift around 5% stronger.

    But what most of all told him that he succeeded; he could see the barest impression of a golden wisp in front of him. Too faint to be seen in the daylight, even now in the darkness of night, he could barely make it out only because he was looking for it.

    John luxuriated in combined feelings of being ever so slightly improved along with achieving what he had so long attempted.

    "John! What is going on!?" Kalé gasped.

    Kalé was now sitting up in his bedroll staring at his chest with wide eye. John looked down and noticed his body was faintly glowing gold. Just as he noticed, the runes he was channeling slowed down and stopped flowing into the grace. He tried to channel them into the grace once again but a pressure was stopping them from flowing. Like a blockage in a water hose, John was sure he'd need the power of more runes to be able to break through the pressure.

    With the flow of runes and the golden glow faded. John still had a sizeable amount of runes, but it was only a fraction of what it had been before.

    After all this settled into Johns mind, he turned and smiled at his friend.

    "Well Kalé," John said smugly, "Looks like I am going with you on your next expedition after all."

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