I turned my gaze to the sword that I had attached to the belt.
'Just thinking about fighting with this ... and then, what will I have to fight against?' A shiver ran down my spine.
"Plagues, errants… the lord of Plagues? What would they be? " If I really should have stayed in this world, then I needed as much info as possible.
"Decades ago ... well, maybe even a hundred years ago, a being with an almost infinite magical power created five monsters, titanic in size and endowed with strength never seen before, these were called by humans
After that, she remained silent for a few seconds.
"What happened to the dragons?" I asked curiously.
"Mmfh ..." she stared at the floor for a moment, then looked up again, "The catastrophe, remembered as the First Catastrophe ... how much time has passed by now ... 300, maybe 400 years ..."
'She talks about it as if she had experienced these things ...' I thought. 'How old is she?!'
"A dragon with all black scales was born from the mouth of the Chaos volcano, the largest volcano in this world, and from which it took its name ..." The old woman looked in the direction of my sword, then immediately looked up again, "this dragon wreaked havoc on this world for decades, until an alliance between all four races succeeded in slaying it ... The War Against Chaos, as the bards called it... " She took a deep breath, "In this war, hundreds of thousands died, maybe millions ... but above all, more than 90% of dragons died ... the strongest and wisest beings in this world ..." the old woman's words emanated sadness and nostalgia.
The room fell into a gloomy silence, the old woman seemed to have a saddened look as if she were remembering things she would have liked to forget.
"Wait a second... but if what you told me is called
"KHihihih ... are you stupid ?!" She said with a forced smile, "The second catastrophe is the one we are experiencing now ..." She added.
"Ah, right ..." I scratched my head, "and the errants?" I asked.
"Mmh? Ah, yes ... you wanted to know about them too ... well, the wanderers are beings that have always existed, which, as their name suggests, wander aimlessly through this world ... there are two types of errants: the shadow errants and the undead errants ... "
She then explained the distinction between the two, the undead errants, as the name suggested, were what I would call zombies, or rather, bodies of dead living beings controlled by a particular mushroom, the Zaribar mushroom, or by a curse, the "necromancer's curse". The shadow's errants, she explained to me, were the most dangerous, but which, at the same time, were not always "bad", they could in fact attack you on sight as well as not even deign you a glance, these errants are born when a body of a living being very akin to mana dies only to be taken over by its own shadow.
She then explained to me how to tell them apart.
"Before you go I want to give you gifts, young hero ..."
She snapped her fingers and my clothes changed. I was now dressed in a white/yellow linen shirt with small fangs of some animal instead of buttons. Over the shirt, I wore a coat of very dark fur, fur almost entirely thin enough to allow agile movements, thicker over the shoulders. It was brown and black in color, with sometimes light gray streaks, I didn't understand what animal it was made of.
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Lower down I wore hemp trousers, also very dark, almost black. The boots I wore, however, did not change.
"In this world, it is almost winter ..." She added.
She then told me how special the pants I was wearing now were. The two pockets could hold up to 2 kg of items per pocket, moreover, these pockets did not take into account the size of the items. The two pockets were a kind of mini inventory.
Then she suggested that I check the right pocket.
I followed the old witch's suggestion.
'Oh! there's something ... '
It wasn't very big, I grabbed it, it looked like a metal box. I pulled it out.
"Is it ... a compass?"
It was an octagonal-shaped metal object that could be snapped open. In the lid above were represented, in bas-relief, some symbols, of which, to my surprise, I understood the meaning instantly.
"Ask and I will show you the way" was written.
"Exactly, what you have in your hand is not a simple compass, try to open it.
I did as she said, however, the compass, lifting the lid, did not show a normal quadrant with the cardinal points, in the quadrant there was only inscribed an arrow, which did not seem to point to anything specific.
It confused me, 'What good is a compass that doesn't even show where North is?!'
The old woman, seeing my confused face, laughed heartily in her usual sour voice.
"KHihihi ... compass, show me the way to the nearest inn!" Said the old woman.
The arrow began to rotate around the dial, stopping shortly after and pointing to my right.
"A-are you telling me what time it is pointing out where the closest inn to us is ?!"
"Hihihi, that's right, this compass is special ... it's magical!" She said smiling, then suddenly stopping, and remaining with a serious face.
"I know it was not your will to be a hero, however, before deciding whether to follow your destiny or not ... travel this world ... look at the darkness that is slowly killing it..." She paused.
"You are a hero, even if you don't believe it yet, you are ... you will be ... and remember, you will notice it over time, you are more akin to the mana of this world than its inhabitants, you know all the languages and the weapons are "friendly" with you ..." she said, then waved at me and the door behind her opened and I was thrown out of her old shop.
"Farewell Hero!"
*Rumble
I rolled on the ground, but without hurting myself, the clothes the old woman had given me had cushioned the shocks.
'And now…' I stood looking at nothing, thinking about what to do. It was difficult to realize what had happened. My heartbeat quickened and my breath became heavy.
I instinctively touched the hilt of my sword and the feeling of discomfort I was experiencing subsided.
I got up from the ground, looked around, and noticed that the door to the witch's shop had disappeared.
I pulled out the magic compass.
'It seems that the compass still points to the inn closest to me ... maybe I could go there ...'
I tried to think of better alternatives, but nothing came to mind, so I walked towards the inn.
I walked through that grayish and dying forest, sometimes I looked up, the sky above me was always covered with clouds.
'Who knows what time it is in this world ... I hope to get to the inn before evening ...' Although due to the darkened sky of the clouds it already seemed almost evening.
Even though the forest seemed not to be teeming with monsters, I always kept my guard up, ready to draw my sword at the first noise. Well, not that I knew how to use the sword, though, it was still better than fighting monsters with your bare hands, right?
I noted with regret that there were not even animals in that forest.
As I walked I thought of a name to give to my new partner (the black-bladed sword), quite trivial names came to my mind that definitely didn't give it too much justice, all names that concerned its being black and powerful.
I then remembered how, during the explanation concerning the first catastrophe, the old witch, while speaking of the black dragon "Chaos", had looked at my sword for a moment.
'Mmh ... maybe this blade was made with the scales of that dragon ... after all, it's black just like that dragon ...' In my head, that theory didn't seem to sound bad, 'Mmh ... what if I just call it "Blade of Chaos "?' I asked myself, I didn't mind the name at all, so for now I decided to call it that. Sure, it wasn't anything too original, but it had a meaning behind it.
'Come to think of it… that old witch didn't even tell me her name-'
*AAAAAHHH !!!
While I was still absorbed in my thoughts perhaps trying to escape from the reality I was experiencing, a female scream of terror came from my right.
For a while, I was frozen in fear.
Another scream broke again the silence of the forest where I was, now the voice seemed to ask for help.
I touched the pommel of my sword, and as before, I calmed down.
'D-do I have to go ?!' I was still undecided on what to do, but the side of me that wanted to see what was happening won.
I ran through the sparse undergrowth, trying to make as little noise as possible. I noticed that the closer I got to the voice, and the more the forest seemed to develop less in height but denser, the pines became lower, and I began to see more bushes and wild grasses. Although the flora changed, the environment retained that dying and gloomy air.
I finally arrived a few meters from the source of the noise. Now the woman's screams were attenuated by her crying, I hid behind a bush near the scene and scrutinized what was happening. I was in a slightly raised position with respect to the scene. The whole scene seemed to take place on a dirt and gravel road left enough to its fate.
I saw to the right a wooden cart with a cloth that covered what appeared to be food, in front of the cart there was a dying donkey, hit in the neck by something sharp. There was a man lying on the ground, smeared with blood, with a rusty sword next to him. I also saw the woman responsible for the screams, she was on the ground with her left calf bleeding, on the ground crawling towards the wooden cart.
The woman was looking at the person responsible for this repulsive sight, it was a small bear, probably still young, or rather, that died young. I noticed, in fact, that this beast had at times moldy and decaying skin, with open wounds that never healed and that did not pour even a single drop of blood. It had grayish-brown fur, which turned reddish, almost purple, towards its head.
It had very sharp claws, sharper than a normal bear, yellow, at times black due to dry blood, and red due to the blood of his most recent victims. I noticed how the bear had completely white eyes with no iris or pupil. Finally, white mushrooms with bright purple dots grew over his head.
I remembered the old witch's words, what I was looking at was an undead errant.
{TO BE CONTINUED ...}