Again, just a notice that i changed the teaser into an authors rant. Please read this rant! feel free to comment.
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Grass, Grass, GRASS!!! I’m so sick of grass! “This sucks,” I state. It’s been 3 days since I got out of the forest and at this point all can see in any direction is grass. ARRG it’s driving me crazy. The first day was awesome I finally got away from the proverbial pit that was home and was feeling emotionally high as a kite I could sing! And I don’t sing. The feeling of coming out of the forest into the unknown and to top it off it was not where I expected. So exiting!
About half of the Araparaho Forest borders the Altreya Desert a place where no kitsune will go if they can help it. I haven’t figured out why, I just know that any female kitsune that they have sent out on diplomacy missions only speak of that place with shivers and say they are never going back. (Mom says it’s made it hard to really establish an alliance with the desert people when they are always seeing a new face. “Hard to build up trust,” she says.)
Anyways that was where I planned to leave to. After being chased all around the forest I have no plans on being captured and a place where no kitsune go sounds like the perfect place for me. I mean that seriously because those guards sounded furious to be chasing after me for so long, and from the sounds of it, the council members were angrier by an order of magnitude. So my plan was to go to the desert where no one will go to find me. Just in case they decide to send pursuers out beyond kitsune land (mostly northern Araparaho Forest) from my earth memories sending troops into other territories is a big no-no but I’m not taking any chances. So desert it is.
I had actually planned to go there anyways just to see what all the hype was about. After all the female kitsune were @#$% so maybe it wasn’t so bad after all and they were over reacting. After all they are females who can’t get bush or cat hair into their fur (snigger).
But long story short I ended up in the grassland. To be honest all the maps I’ve looked at only go shortly beyond the forest but shouldn’t this hell have ended yet? Wait I see a road! Yes let’s follow this and see where it goes. 'and by lets follow this road I mean I will follow this road...', because I’m board and alone I start singing as I walk along the raid, “cuz I’m all alone there’s no one here beside me...”
As I walk along the road singing I see something approaching from the distance I’ve been walking along this road for another day so far and the only thing I’ve seen is?.... you guessed it grass 'this sucks' I think to myself, 'I hope I don’t walk on this road forever. Hopefully the thing I see in the distance is somebody and not some lone tree out in the middle of nowhere with me.”siggggggh” as the dot grows larger I can make out more. It’s a wagon! Approaching on the dirt road I can see it so far out because the road is really strait actually.
The wagon doesn’t have a top or at least not one that I can see I was kind of expecting to see a covered wagon if they used wagons in this world but I guess I won’t see it today. Anyways there are two outriders on the left of the wagon one walks and the other is following slightly behind the wagon on a brown horse. Still singing I can see as they get into range of my voice. One of them waves at me as the others cup their ears to listen harder so I start singing louder. The man who was walking along the wagon starts to run towards me waving his arms over his head back and forth like someone at a rave. As he sprints, I mean staggering towards me and shouting something,”stop singing stop! My ears I can’t take it any longer they are bleeding.” oh he wants me to stop sing, wait... how is my singing related to his ears bleeding? How rude.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
As the man staggers and falls in front of me I say “hello how was my singing?'. Man-”miss please NEVER do that again!” “miss he called me miss! What the heck! Anyone can see I’m a man right? I mean it’s not like I’m wearing a dress I’m wearing casual forest attire, a tan homespun shirt with rough brown homespun pants. Wwhat the heck why is he calling me a woman? No wait maybe I can use this to my advantage and put myself in a position of authority.
No I can’t do it I can’t let him call me a girl, I can’t do it. It goes against all my dignity! So I respond “please call me kit and I’m no miss”. Man-“well kit as well intentioned as you are I would ask that you never again sing in my presence” my ears droop sadly “alright I won’t. Anyways what’s your name?” ”My name is Royells I’m one of the hired guards for old Jon over there” he points at the driver of the wagon as he rolls closer. “Jon’s headed to rolls village down the road for some trading on his route where are you going traveler?”
“I’m was on my way to the Altreya Desert but I’m currently lost will this road take me there? man-”yep you’re traveling along the fastest route to get there from here, why don’t you travel with us to the next village and I can give you directions from there. It’s all in the same direction.” kit-”alright”
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As we travel I start to get more information on this world from Royells. Royells is an adventurer hired out through the adventurer’s guild which is a group of people who take on odd requests for anyone paying, and by odd I mean they’ll do anything. From finding your cat to guarding a caravan so long as you will pay the adventuring guild will do it. The guild is a lower ranking guild in the kingdom but is still popular because of how easy it is to get in. Royells is still relatively young in the business at 18. He started to tell me Joz age but she slammed him. Scary! This whole time Joz has been staring at me and it’s kind of creepy sometimes she gets this happy grin.
Joz POV: “ahhh he looks so cute look at those twitching ears I bet they are soft I see why the rumors of kitsune being high priced slaves got spread. Look at that tail I wouldn’t mind a kitsune slave to pet. Look at that tail I could just cuddle with that thing forever if it’s as soft as it looks.”
Royells POV: “Is it a man? He told me not to call him miss but that does mean it’s not female sometimes girls are just touchy like that. All weird over titles like mam or miss. I’ve gotten in big trouble for getting that wrong before so maybe she doesn’t want to be called miss? Ahhh I can’t tell!”