CHAPTER 6

Daelyn hadn’t been gathering information for the last three years in vain, while the library and the bookshelf at home had finite knowledge, he still was able to learn quite a bit.

He was in one of the great forests of the world. These great forests were either forests governed by a world tree, a very large sentient entity that governed the woods, or they were just a large forest. These forests were normally inhabited by large amounts of beasts, and they were also normally inhabited by different kinds of elves, especially the forests governed by the world trees.

The great forest he was in is inhabited by dark elves, and is named Eleanor. Well, that is the name of the world tree and the forest goes under the same name as its governor. The forest is quite large, housing several smaller villages around on the edge, a few towns deeper in the woods and a large city at the base of the world tree. Almost all the houses in the great forest of Eleanor are made by the forest and made from tree and other organic material.

The capital is named after the world tree and as such is named Eleanor. The capital houses the council of seven and it houses the largest and strongest political, military, and financial entities in the dark elf kingdom.

We live in a small village on the western edge of the forest, named Elrieden. It seems that it was named after its founding father, Ilfrid Elrieden, and that his descendants still inhabit the town alongside the other inhabitants.

Founding a village inside a great forest is no easy task, because you first need to be connected to the flora there to make houses out of trees, secondly you need to become dominant in the food chain in the area, which means that you will have to kill the biggest and strongest beast around. While the normal creatures in the great forests are normally not very strong, the apex predators are another story entirely. They can be very, very strong and even the apex predators around the edges of the forest are able to easily kill a small group of warriors, while the apex predators deeper in the forest are even stronger.

Due to this there are large parts of the great forest of Eleanor that are not inhabited by dark elves and are still circumvented by beasts. The dark elves only inhabit about 45% of the whole forest, the rest is still inhabited by beasts and other creatures. However, don’t underestimate this 45%, about 150.000 dark elves live in the great forest of which 50.000 live in the capital.

This means that founding a town requires great power, and the founding father Elrieden had that power. He was a very powerful shaman, able to conjure up the basic marks almost instantly and more complex ones in a matter of seconds, enabling him to slay the apex predator in the area. The predator here was originally a variant Rockbird. The Rockbird normally has long legs, with a large neck, sharp talons and a stone hard beak. These are normally coated in a layer of earth, but this variant had a layer of magma instead of earth, giving it great defence and a good counter towards physical attacks.

It was heralded as a very hard fight, but it is known that using a large amount of water based magic disabled the bird by hardening the molten rock. The hardened rock limited the movements of the bird and made it far easier to defeat.

Daelyn was very interested in this story, not because of the chance to become a lord. Why would he want to do that? No, he wanted to learn more about where that monster came from. He wanted to know where it came from, because he did not want to dominate other people as a lord, he wanted to dominate everything as a powerful mage. He had decided that after reading a lot of books, lords were tied up by their responsibilities, farmers and other craftsmen were too weak to defend themselves, while mages and warriors were free to do what they wanted because of their power.

Daelyn wanted to become a mage, and a powerful one at that.

While Daelyn was reminiscing about the story he read and the conclusion he reached, Grey and Lyvia had gone to Elrieden. They had explained the situation in detail, Elrieden was even more perplexed than they were. They were sitting there with both pride and worry on their face. Elrieden was deeply worried, both for the child and for himself.

Elrieden sat opposite of them at a table made out of the tree he lived in, like all of his furniture. He stared at them with an inquisitive gaze and said with a reaffirming voice: “Are you sure, are you completely sure?”

Grey replied to him with a truthful and steadfast voice: “Yes, I could not be surer of this. He was talking about the soulspace, there was nothing that could even resemble something like that.”

Elrieden continued his questioning with the same tone: “What did he say about those two objects that were there? Does he know what those are?”

Grey replied with a slightly embarrassed and hesitating voice: “I didn’t ask him, but I doubt that he knows. He may be smart, but he is not all knowing.”

Elrieden sat there silent for a moment, before rubbing his eyes and letting out a sigh. He turned back towards the couple at the other side of the table. He turned back to Grey and Lyvia and said with a voice filled tiredness and necessity.

“Okay, I will take you to someone who can be of more help than me. Come back tomorrow and bring Daelyn, he will need to hear this as well and meet him.”

Lyvia made a confused expression and asked him with a questioning and slightly nervous tone: “Why does Daely need to hear this? We can just talk about this like adults.”

“There is a bit more going on that will be explained, tomorrow. Bring Daelyn, okay?”

The last words of Elrieden were laced with several emotions, nervousness, irritation, and even a bit of guilt. Both Grey and Lyvia understood that it could wait.

Lyvia said with an understanding and steadfast voice: “Okay, we will bring him. No need to get so stressed out about it.”

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Elrieden only answered with a grunt and some mumbling under his breath. As he prepared to leave, Lyvia asked him one more question with a slightly nervous but mostly wondering tone.

“When do you expect us, we have a playdate in the afternoon, and we would like to go there.”

Elrieden replied with a sigh and said to her in a tired voice: “You can come in the morning, but the news might disturb your schedule.”

Lyvia replied with a confused look and tone: “What do you mean by that?”

Elrieden said with a voice of tiredness and decisiveness: “You will find out tomorrow.”

And with those last words, Elrieden left, and let both Grey and Lyvia stand with a perplexed expression and a feeling of worry. What could be so important that Elrieden, a descendant of the founding father, would be so nervous about. While they had already dreaded tomorrow because of the playdate, it only worsened because of this.

As Elrieden left, he immediately went to Orthrus to notify him of what happened. Arriving at the house, he saw the sign again with ‘Do not disturb’ on it. As Elrieden had a bit of spare time on his hands, he could only wonder why it said, ‘Do not disturb’. Like there was an animal inside that you shouldn’t wake, not something like ‘I’m busy’ or ‘We’re out’. It seemed odd to Elrieden, but for now he decided to ignore it. He once again walked up to the door, and tried to knock. This time, he was again not able to remove his hand from the door before it was opened by Gob.

“What do you.. Oh, it’s you!”

“Yes, it’s me, now can I speak..”

Gob interrupted him with an irritated and hesitant voice: “Can’t you really not read the sign? Are you blind, or is my handwriting just really bad?”

Gob turned to look towards the sign, before reassuring himself that the human standing in front of him was just dumb. Not able to read such a masterfully crafted sign by THE Gob himself, what an idiot.

Before he could continue his mental degrading of Elrieden, he was interrupted.

“I need to see you master, it is urgent. Even more urgent than last time.”

“What did I say! Can’t you read the sign, you illiterate monkey!”

“Shut your mouth, you damned goblin. The only thing your species is good at is dying!”

Hearing this, Gob could not help but be enraged as he was generalised along with the other idiot goblins. GOB. IS. SMART. Gob is not like other goblins, other goblins stupid, Gob is smart, Gob able to help master with his intelligence. How dare that dark elf say that!

Before the shouting match could escalate, a sound could be heard. A very, very tired sigh, followed by: “Gob, stop insulting the dark elf.”

“Yes, master. Of course, master.”

Weary steps could be heard from inside the house, making their way towards the door. The sounds of steps was interrupted by the sound of someone bumping into something and a pile of books falling over, followed by a ‘goddamn it’ and more frustrated mumbling, until the footsteps finally reached the door.

“What do you need, Elrieden.” Said the old man with a tired voice as he looked upon the dark elf standing in front of his door.

“There has been a development with the child, he seems to be able to access his soulspace at will through meditating.” Replied Elrieden with a courteous yet hurried voice.

A moment of silence reigned as the old man looked at Elrieden before shouting at the tops of his lungs with a perplexed tone.

“WHAT! HE CAN DO WHAT!”

The old man quickly regained his composure as he changed from surprised to the same stoic and tired expression, and said with a quick and demanding voice: “Get inside, tell me everything you know.”

After telling Orthrus everything what he knew, Elrieden sat there and waited for Orthrus’s answer. Orthrus answered with a slow and analysing voice.

“So, you discovered that he could access the soulspace through his parents, and then told them to come here tomorrow?”

“Yes”

“And you did not think that it would be a good idea to first consult with me?”

“Well, I thought this was the best course of…”

He could not finish his sentence, because Orthrus interrupted him with an angry expression and a stare that seemed to radiate bloodlust.

“You idiot! Why did you not consult with me!”

This silenced Elrieden completely, he was perplexed. Most people would treat him with favour or at least neutrality due to his heritage, but this old man did not care. Elrieden did not dare speak up, Orthrus was scarier than most beasts he had met in his days he served in the local guard regiment.

After having his fit of rage, Orthrus calmed down, and was able to assess the situation with a cooled head. He calmed Elrieden down and said with a calm and cold.

“Okay, I will explain them the situation here tomorrow, but I doubt it will be a large problem. The kid won’t remember that it even happened.”

Remembering something Elrieden said with a meek voice: “Well, about that..”

The old man looked Elrieden in the eye and said with an irritated and sharp voice: “I thought you were supposed to notify me of any important events.”

Elrieden replied with a meek and scared voice: “Yes, but this did not seem very important, and..”

With a sigh Orthrus asked with clear irritation in his voice: “Fine, what is it?”

“He is very intelligent.”

“What do you mean, ‘very intelligent’. Is he able to read picture books?” The old man said with a slight snicker.

“Not picture books, more like ‘basic magic theorem’ from Hans Gutlach, and ‘exotic creatures encyclopaedia’ from Ernst Haecken.”

With those last words, Orthrus leaned back in his chair and said with a defeated voice:

“You should have really told me that, you know?”

Staring into the distance for a moment, he sat up.

“Well, you did the right thing. I will begin teaching that child earlier now, now that there is the possibility of that. Anyway, did you find out more about his affinity?”

“They did mention something about objects inside the soulspace.”

“Objects? Like furniture or something? A little more clarity is appreciated.”

“I asked Grey, but he didn’t know either.”

Orthrus looked away from Elrieden for a moment before saying with an irritated yet calm voice: “Fine, I will find out tomorrow. While you did withhold some information from me, you did a sufficient job. Gob, give this man 50 silver and see him out.”

“Yes, master.” Said the goblin with clear obedience.

“One more thing Elrieden, I don’t like to waste time. Tomorrow, go to their house and guide them here. I won’t take no for an answer this time.”

With those last words, Gob ran to the back of the house. In the meantime, Orthrus walked back to his bureau as Elrieden remained seated in his chair.

As Elrieden looked over to Orthrus, he noticed that he was research towards he development of dark mana in children. These documents were quite rare, since it was not exactly morally accepted to experiment on children with dark mana, and it was hard to set up an experiment that observed a large group because they were mostly shunned, despite the efforts of some medium-sized countries.

As Gob came back with the money, he let the dark elf out of the building. Upon coming back, he saw master staring into the distance. Master had a worried look on his face, Gob did not know why master would have that. Master’s gaze retracted to the present, and he started stretching himself. Looking at the papers in front of him, Gob heard him say one thing.

“If he has a dark mana talent, I will make sure that he does not have the same trials as I did. Granting this boy power, and teaching him how to use it must be my priority now. This world hates dark mages. That gives dark mages two options, give up and die, or rise and live. I will make damned sure that he does not make the same mistake that I made.”

He said this as he turned towards a framed photo lying down.

“I’m not able to face you yet, but when I do, I hope that you can forgive me.”

He said, before returning to his research under the growls of multiple beasts from both inside and outside of him.