From a vantage point on top of a hill, Marcus looked in awe at the city below him. The small rural towns he had visited so far had done little to prepare him for the sight of Rennhafen, which was not only the first settlement that could rival the ones from his old world in size, but also extremely beautiful to boot.
The capital of the kingdom occupied a large valley between steep hills along the course of the river Renn. To the west, the city continued as long as the eye could see, while to the east it only went on for a few kilometers until it met the shores of the Oode Lake —a body of water so large that it could almost be considered a small sea.
As for the city itself, the center consisted of large blocks of square, several story tall buildings, neatly separated by large and straight roads, while the suburbs climbing to the hills were made mostly of smaller houses and narrower, more winding roads. Another two zones of interest seemed to be the dock area by the lake, full of piers and warehouses, and a relatively small area a few kilometers upriver, which was a labyrinth of tall brick houses and chaotic roads.
Several bridges crossed the Renn and united the two halves of the city, but almost all of them were far away to the east, where the river was narrower. Only one bridge had been built near the river mouth, and it was by far the most impressive one. It was a tall and imposing construction of stone, marble and steel, which was actually made of two separate bridges connected to a small island at the center of the river, a spire of rock that emerged from the waters like some sort of giant fang, with a small watchtower built on top of it. A natural tunnel went through the island and connected the two bridges, forming an arch that had to be at least thirty meters tall and ten meters large.
Finally, a huge, grim looking fortress dominated the valley from the top of the tallest hill. It was a squat, crude bastion of dark stone that nonetheless looked incredibly tough, like some kind of grizzled predator guarding over the city. That construction looked positively ancient compared to the rest of the city, and Marcus wondered why it looked so different. Still, that contrast only served to highlight the beauty of Rennhafen, and as the coach continued to approach the city the Vex Queen kept staring, fascinated by that landscape.
Eisen, who was riding with him, noticed his reaction.
“Quite the view, isn't it?” He asked.
“Yeah.” Marcus replied. “I didn't expect that Rennhafen would be this big. All other cities I've seen so far weren't even a fraction of it.”
“Well, Medelan is not exactly the most urbanized part of the Empire.” The nobleman said. “Apart from Rennhafen itself, our cities can't really hold a candle to the ones in Dianisia or Castillar. Though to be fair most of our settlements are relatively recent, so maybe they’ll get bigger with time.”
“What do you mean?” The Vex Queen asked, turning away from the window to give the marquis a puzzled look. “Wasn't Medelan founded something like a thousand years ago? I remember reading about it in some book.”
“Yes, of course.” Eisen confirmed. “But the whole kingdom was completely devastated by the Zaru five hundred years ago and it had to be rebuilt basically from scratch afterwards.” He smirked and pointed at the fortress on the opposite side of the valley. “See that building over there? That's Graystone Fortress, and it's pretty much the only building left from before the invasion. And incidentally it’s also our destination, since the royal palace is inside of its walls.”
Marcus raised an eyebrow in surprise. He knew something about the Zaru wars from the books he had read, but he hadn't realized it had been that bad.
“It must have been one hell of an invasion then.” He commented. “I mean, we had some pretty destructive wars in my world as well, but even then there were still a few buildings left intact.”
“That's actually what made the Zaru so terrifying.” Eisen said, his tone somber. “For some reason they were determined to wipe out the traces of everyone else's existence, even when it made no logical sense to do so. Any city they conquered was methodically razed to the ground, to the point that not even the foundations remained.”
“Why would they do that?” The Vex Queen asked. “Couldn't they have used what they conquered to their advantage?”
“I don't know.” The marquis shrugged. “It probably had something to do with that unholy religion of theirs. But in any case, whatever their motivation was, it made the war all the more costly for us. By the time the Zaru were finally defeated, roughly half of the Empire was in ruins and it took us centuries to rebuild everything that was lost. Heck, technically we still haven’t finished.”
“Five hundred years weren't enough?” Marcus asked sardonically.
“Well, there were some factors that slowed us down.” The nobleman explained. “For example, when the Principate of Rodenheim was destroyed, creatures from the nearby Caligare Forest moved into its territories and at the time the Empire couldn’t spare the resources to drive them away. So Rodenheim was just abandoned, and in time it became the northern part of the Caligare Forest.” He smirked. “You've seen that place with your own eyes, so I think you can understand why it'd be incredibly difficult to reclaim it.”
“Yeah, I do.” Marcus nodded. In fact, he kind of struggled to imagine the Caligare Forest having ever been a civilized place in the first place, though judging by the amount of ruins he had found it kinda made sense. But anyway, to destroy a nation so thoroughly was a testament to how terrifying the Zaru were.
“Out of curiosity, there are no more Zaru around, right?” He asked as an afterthought. “Because I really wouldn't want a bunch of them to crawl out of the forest like the orcs did.”
“Well...” Quite alarmingly, Eisen hesitated for a moment. “The ones that invaded our lands were completely exterminated, but...”
“But?”
“Well, the problem is that no one really knows where they came from to begin with.” The nobleman continued. “As far as everyone knows, one day they just came out of the Caligare Forest and invaded our lands, destroying everything on their path. In fact, one of the reasons they were so devastating is that they caught us completely by surprise.” He paused, noticing the worried look on Marcus's face, and quickly added: “However, no one has seen a Zaru in five hundred years, so I'd say it's unlikely that they will reappear anytime soon.”
The Vex Queen nodded, but internally he wasn't entirely reassured. For starters, as of late, rare and semi-mythical threats, like the oni and the Goblin General, were popping up like mushrooms, so he wouldn't be too surprised to see the Zaru make a comeback too.
Moreover, recently there had been another race that had shown up seemingly out of nowhere: the Vex themselves. And while they weren’t a threat, their appearance could herald the arrival of other, less friendly races.
As Marcus finished this thought, he somehow felt a disquieting sensation on the back of his head… as if some part of his brain was telling him that the Vex were only friendly because he himself was friendly. However, this sensation made him feel uneasy, so he tried his best to ignore it. After all, this was a beautiful day, and it would be a shame to ruin it because of some baseless speculations.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
Luckily, the city proved interesting enough to distract him from those worries.
By then, the coach had entered what looked like some pretty well off suburbs, full of two-story houses, each with its own courtyard. The dirt and gravel roads had also given way to cobblestone roads delimited by lines of mulberry trees. Currently all vegetation was quite bare because of the winter season, but luckily Toathal decorations provided more than enough color to the streets. Garlands of red leaves and colored ribbons dangled from trees, lamp posts and windows, while small silvery bells were tied to doors and fences. The general mood was also more than warm, with families walking together and kids playing in the courtyards, either building snowmen or throwing snowballs at each other, laughing and screamings as kids usually did.
Watching this scene reminded Marcus of Christmas festivities in his own world, causing him to feel a pang of painful nostalgia in his chest.
“Usually, by this time of the year I'd be at my grandparents' house.” He reminisced. “I'd decorate the Christmas trees with my cousins while my mum made apple pies for us all...”
He suddenly felt tears forming in his eyes, and he quickly fought back those memories. Not that there was anything wrong about mourning what he had lost, but this was nor the time nor place for it.
“Goddammit!” He silently cursed while wiping his eyes. “Is everything conspiring to ruin my mood today? What's next, a procession of orphans and sickly puppies?”
“Is everything alright, sir Marcus?” The marquis asked, noticing his face.
“It's nothing.” The Vex Queen replied. “Just... something in my eyes, that's all.” He paused for a moment, trying to get a hold of himself, and then tried to change the subject: “By the way, can I ask you something?”
“Of course.”
“Those answers we agreed upon in the past few days... are you sure they will be fine? I mean, some of them sounded pretty damn vague, so I'm not sure people will be satisfied with them.”
“Don't worry, it'll be fine.” The marquis reassured him. “There is no harm in leaving people guessing. Besides, since some information is just best not divulged and saying an outright lie could be counterproductive in the long run, staying vague is just our best option.”
Marcus, Eisen and Trakk had spent the whole trip preparing for the upcoming social event, writing some speeches and agreeing on what answers they would give if asked certain questions, in order to not give away compromising information and avoid contradicting each other. Or to be more precise, the nobleman and the goblin had been coaching the Vex Queen nonstop on what he should and should not say, since it was pretty clear that if left to his own devices the monster girl would have ended up with his foot deep in his mouth in a matter of minutes. By the end, Marcus’s hate for politics had gone up a few notches, but at least his mentors were reasonably confident in his ability to avoid causing a scandal.
“Fair enough.” Marcus shrugged. “Honestly it’s also better for me, since that means that I have less things I need to remember. Though admittedly, with Trakk’s method that wouldn’t have been too much of a problem.”
“Yes, the General really had a good idea back then.” Eisen agreed.
A couple days before, when the Vex Queen had shown some trouble in trying to remember everything he was supposed to say, the goblin had come up with a rather clever solution. Instead of trying to commit those discourses to his mind, Marcus had just written them down and had then given the papers to one of his Copy Drones, so that he could read them telepathically without anyone else noticing. That kinda felt like cheating, to be honest, but given the circumstances —and the fact that the Vex Queen sucked at politicking— it could probably be excused.
After a few minutes, the coach left the suburbs behind, and entered the city center, which was a much more commercial and tourist district rather than residential. The small brick houses gave way to much bigger stone buildings which at the street level were almost entirely occupied by shops, cafes and restaurants. Large squares often displayed huge monuments, usually representing some king or another, and occasionally some city blocks were occupied by large parks rather than buildings. However, what really got Marcus's attention wasn't the location, but rather the people. The streets were crowded, with hundreds of individuals visible at every turn, something the Vex Queen hadn't seen since his previous life.
Moreover, this crowd was much more heterogeneous than any he had ever seen before. The majority were humans, of course, but their clothes were peculiar enough that they ended up being rather interesting nonetheless. Only a few wore the simple tunics and trousers typical of the inhabitants of Brettholz, and instead they mostly favored brightly colored, fur trimmed jackets, with tights for the men and large gowns for the women. Tiny hats that seemed to serve no practical purpose were also popular amongst both sexes, something which the Vex Queen found quite hilarious.
Beastmen of all kinds also abounded. Lycans, Felids and Ursids and many others that Marcus knew only by description, like Boarmen, Ratmen and Minotaurs, walked through the streets side by side with the humans, often dressed similarly to them and showing no appreciable difference in their demeanor.
And then there were creatures that he knew nothing about and that often seemed to have come straight out of a fairytale. There was what looked like a mix between a tree and a man, three meters tall and wearing nothing but an ornate half plate armor on his bark-like skin, carrying a colossal sword on his back and walking with a slow but impossibly long stride. A few meters away, at a table outside of a café, a vaguely humanoid bird roosted on the back of a chair was cheerfully chatting with a cloaked, hunched figure that showed nothing of its body except a very long, dark and prehensile trunk that occasionally came out of its hood to grab some cookies from a plate and drag them to where its mouth probably was.
And that was just the people, as many other exotic creatures served as pets or beast of burden. For example, a posh lady carried what looked like a miniature hydra on a leash, while a huge animal similar to a wooly mammoth with six stilt-like legs walked on the lane alongside Marcus’s coach, carrying some sort of palanquin on its back.
All in all, this looked like a scene straight out of the Wizard of Oz, and the Vex Queen couldn't help but to stare at it in complete awe. It was one thing when the weird stuff was confined to the wilderness, but to see it as part of everyday life in the city somehow made it all the more surreal for him.
“Looks like I'm really not in Kansas anymore.” He thought sardonically, continuing with the Wizard of Oz reference. “But at least this Emerald City seems nice enough. And I even have my own Toto with me!” He smirked and stared at Cooper, who was sitting at his feet. “And as for the other companions... I guess Felix could be the lion. He does have something leonine about him. And Trakk could be the scarecrow since he's so brainy, which leaves Klara as the Tin Woodsman... well, technically she's a huntress and not a woodsman, and she's not made of tin either. I'm also missing the ruby slippers, any kind of shoes for that matter, so I'm probably stretching this similitude a bit too far.” He shrugged internally. “Well, whatever. I would make a lousy Dorothy anyway. Let's just hope that there won't be any wicked witch that will ruin this day.”
As he jokingly mused over his current situation, the coach proceeded through the city, heading towards the big bridge that Marcus had previously seen from afar, and when they started crossing it the Vex Queen, who had always had a fascination for architecture, took the occasion to inspect it thoroughly.
As expected, now that he was giving it a closer look, he found himself even more impressed with it. For starters, the sheer size of the construction was incredible. It had four lanes, plus two elevated sidewalks large enough to allow the passage of a crowd of people, and it was tall enough that most ships could pass under it without lowering their mast. Elegant marble parapets secured the two sides of the bridge, alternated into different segments by pillars which carried statues of men and women dressed elegantly and wearing solemn expressions on their faces.
The bridge was also so long that it took five minutes for them to get to the central island, despite the complete lack of traffic jams. Once there, Marcus noticed with fascination that while the huge tunnel that went through the rock spire was indeed natural, a second, slightly smaller arch of stone and marble had been built inside of it —probably in order to make the passage more secure and avoid potential cave-ins.
By the time they finally reached the other side of the river, Marcus felt almost sad about leaving the bridge behind. It was by far the most impressive work of engineering he had seen in this world, and something that even modern people on Earth would find difficult to emulate.
“Really, these people are not as backwards as I assumed.” He thought. “If they are able to build a city like this, then their technological level must be more advanced than I thought.”
As he reflected over his own prejudice and fantasized about what marvel he would see next in this fantastic world, the coach kept traveling through the city, slowly moving up the hills in the direction of the grim fortress that dominated the valley.