It was late into the morning when Kelsey finally woke from her slumber. Based on the light coming in from the window, she estimated it to be about an hour before noon. She rolled out of bed feeling refreshed, she hadn’t slept that well since arriving in Anoura… once she had finally fallen asleep that is. Aches and pains she didn’t know she had were no longer present and some level of sleep deprivation she hadn’t known she was suffering from was gone. The world seemed brighter and she felt like she could think more clearly. I didn’t even know I could have aches and pains anymore.
She was still reeling from all the information the guards shared with her last night, but after having some time to think about it, she came to an easy decision. She was going to find Thadius and then focus on becoming an Immortal. Or, if she couldn’t find Thadius soon, then she would do the immortality part first. She didn’t know what this world had in store for her, but she was going to be prepared. She had only been in Anoura for two months, but if there were two things she was sure of it was that she enjoyed the rush of fighting monsters and she enjoyed becoming stronger.
Using her domain, she made her way to the group of guards who were standing in pairs on each side of the iron gate that separated the bridge. Kelsey walked over to where Lisa and Owen were standing and gave them a small wave. “Is there any chance I can go through the gate today?” Kelsey said with a sly grin on her face.
Owen and Lisa both let out a soft chuckle before saying that, yes, they would let her through. Before she left, Owen handed Kelsey a sealed letter and said “This is a letter for the guild master at the Whitebranch Adventurers guild. He and I are very close. It’s just a letter of introduction. He should be able to get you some identification” Seeing her confusion at the idea of the Adventurers Guild distributing identification, he clarified.
“The Guild is an international organization, technically speaking you aren’t part of any nation. When Otherworlders started appearing, the nations decided that the best course of action was to have the Guild manage identification, so you aren’t beholden to whatever nation you happen to arrive in.”
“So, the ID doesn’t mean I have to join the guild, right? Not that I’m against it.” Kelsey asked carefully.
“No, the identification is just for records and such, if you want to join the guild, you’ll need to go through the membership exam just like everyone else. My guess is that you wouldn’t have any trouble passing though.” Owen said with a smile.
With this new information, she said her goodbyes to everyone, gave them her thanks, and began the journey to Whitebranch.
The road after the bridge was significantly more well maintained than the one in the plains. It turned from a pathed dirt road into one made from cobblestones. There was even an irrigation ditch running alongside the road.
It was several hours of peaceful walking later as Kelsey was considering the best way to hide things like her domain, vault, and creation abilities when she heard something that broke her from her contemplation. She heard a woman and child screaming.
Bursting into action Kelsey activated her enhancement and launched herself at full speed in the direction of the screams. As she pushed off the ground, the cobblestone beneath her feet fractured and cracked. She didn’t even notice as she heard more screaming and crying from the child. With rapid teleports It only took a few seconds before she had cleared the half kilometer distance to the area the screams had originated from.
As she crossed a bend in the road, she could see past the trees that were previously blocking her sight. In the middle of the road, she could see a woman near her age with a little boy that was maybe 5 or 6 years old in front of her. There was the corpse of a decapitated horse that the woman and child must have been riding on. Attached to the dead horse was a very small wooden cart filled with supplies.
The woman and child were running from a living tree whose roots and branches were chasing them violently.
Kelsey quickly identified the monster before making her move.
[Treant - lvl 19]
No problem.
Seeing the monster’s level, she acted as quickly as possible. Summoning her saber, she teleported in front of the family and sliced away the roots and branches. As she did this, the Treant groaned in pain with a sound that reminded her of splintering wood. Wanting to finish this fight quickly, Kelsey created a few large blades around the monster tree and closed her fist, causing the blades to implode together, chopping the tree into pieces.
*ding* You have defeated a [Treant - lvl 19].
The fight was over in less than five seconds.
Scanning the area with her domain, Kelsey ensured there were no more obvious threats before dismissing her saber and making her armor transparent. She turned around and looked at the mother and son to ensure they were okay. She looked them over with her eyes and her domain but didn’t see anything life threatening. The woman seemed to have a few broken ribs, and the child had a broken finger.
Not knowing what else to do, she simply said “The monster is dead, you’re both safe now.” At hearing her words, the mother broke down into tears of relief. She held the boy tight and sobbed for what seemed like eternity but was probably only a few seconds before Kelsey started to feel uncomfortable. Kelsey never knew what to do in these kinds of situations so instead of standing around awkwardly, she walked over to the saddlebags and removed them. She didn’t think that the other two were going to be strong enough to lift the horse to get to the strap. Thankfully, it didn’t take her long before she had the saddlebags removed and was able to take them to the woman.
“Here, I got these for you. Do you have anything for your injuries in the bag?” Kelsey asked as she placed the bags next to the crying woman.
Looking up through teary eyes, the woman nodded, wiped her face off, and said “Yes, we brought a few healing potions. Hopefully they didn’t get smashed when the horse fell.”
Damn, I really could have been a witch making potions like in those old horror movies, such a missed opportunity.
The woman knelt down to look through the saddle bags, groaning in pain from her broken ribs, she looked up at Kelsey. “Thank you. Without you, Charlie and I might be dead right now. If there is anything we can do to repay you, don’t hesitate to ask. Please. You're our savior.”
If Kelsey felt awkward around the woman before, it was worse now. There is nothing worse than receiving a heartfelt, genuine thank you. I have no idea what to say. She knew she should probably say something heroic like ‘You were someone in danger, I couldn’t just sit back and watch it happen!’ or ‘No thanks necessary! It was just the right thing to do!’.
Instead, she awkwardly scratched her head, chuckled, and said “Yeah, no problem. Need anything else or are you okay?”
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Before the woman answered, she found the potions inside the bags, and thankfully they were intact. Pulling the stopper out of two of them, she first fed one to her son, and then to herself. Paying close attention, Kelsey watched the potion enter the woman's body and saw as her injuries began to vanish. A handful of seconds later the two were completely healthy.
Damn those potions work quickly.
Standing up the woman introduced herself as Caroline, and her son, Charlie. She explained that she was on the way to take supplies to the guards down at the bridge. “They don’t get people often at the bridge. Since the Centaurs went wild and took over the plains, there is almost zero travel through that area. Merchants and travelers have to take the long way around.”
Caroline and Kelsey chatted for a few more minutes before Caroline confirmed that she and Charlie would be okay. She pulled out a small rectangular card and said “This is my guild card, when we got attacked, I put some mana in it. There should be a Classer here any minute to escort us.”
“Okay great. Quick question though, not totally relevant. What is a Classer?” Kelsey asked sheepishly.
Caroline blinked a few times before answering. “A Classer… like someone with a class.” Seeing that her answer didn’t totally clear up the confusion on Kelsey’s face, she finished with “It’s someone with at least one Combat Path. Technically everyone is a Classer, because everyone has a class. But over time it has evolved to generally refer to people over level 100 with two Combat Paths. How have you liv– oh… You’re an Otherworlder aren’t you?”
“THAT'S SO COOL!” The child, Charlie screamed at top of his lungs and ran up to Kelsey and barraged her with a dozen questions before she could stammer out the first answer.
Covering his mouth, Caroline pulled Charlie into her stomach and apologized, “Sorry about that, he has learned about Otherworlders in school and thinks people from your world are heroes or something.
Kelsey let out a genuine laugh. “Not a problem, he can ask as many questions as he wants, I’ll wait with you until the Classer shows up.” She looked down at Charlie and sat down on the ground. “You’ve got a few minutes buddy, use them wisely.”
Kelsey, Caroline, and Charlie spent the next several minutes chatting about what life was like back on Earth. Their conversation was interrupted when a man wearing a cloth shirt, jeans, and black leather boots suddenly appeared next to them. The newcomer was also wearing a necklace with a rectangular sheet of white metal on the chain. He had short black hair, a well-kept beard, and bright green eyes. He had no visible weapons. Holy shit… that guy is fast. I couldn’t see him move, even with my domain. He entered my domain and appeared beside us in an instant without so much as disturbing the air. Just how strong is this guy?
Standing up warily, Kelsey nodded to the newcomer before saying goodbye to Caroline and Charlie and continuing to Whitebranch. She had no desire to hang around someone she didn't know that was potentially a hundred times stronger than her. Once she got out of earshot, she was able to use her domain to see the Classer speaking quietly to Caroline and Charlie before helping them untie the cart and make their way towards the bridge. He seemed very patient and understanding. He even pulled the cart for them. If anything, that guy is their savior, not me. All I did was kill an evil tree.
The rest of her journey to Whitebranch was completely uneventful. She spent most of the time thinking about that Classer that arrived to help Caroline. He was so strong. That is the kind of strength I need. With that kind of power, I’d be able to find Thadius in no time. Feeling a new sense of determination, Kelsey started moving more quickly and spotted Whitebranch in the early evening.
Whatever she had been expecting, Whitebranch was not it. When she passed through the tree line and could finally see the town, there were a few things that stood out to her immediately. One thing was that it was much larger than she expected. She expected the word town to mean maybe 10,000 people. That was not the case. The town had thousands of buildings and Kelsey estimated that at least 200,000 people must live within the large ivory-colored walls that surrounded it. Another thing she noticed was that there was a large slums area positioned directly in front of her, right outside the western gate.
But, the most prominent feature, by far, was the thousand-meter-tall pure white tree that rose from the center of the town. Its branches spread across the entirety of the town, providing a constant shade with their beautiful white leaves. It was the tallest thing besides mountains that Kelsey had seen since arriving in Anoura. It was tall enough that she was shocked she hadn’t seen it before coming closer.
She thought back to her journey here and realized that this must be what she had seen peeking over the forest the day before. It was so tall that she had mistaken it for a snowcapped mountain.
Putting the thoughts of the tree aside, she moved her attention downwards towards the slums.
This town is clearly very wealthy, why the hell do they have a slum of what must be 20,000 people outside the walls. How could something like this happen? The slums look new too. She could actually see buildings that were in the progress of being built. Knowing she wouldn’t get any answers standing in the middle of the road, she continued making her way towards the town.
She spent another half hour making her way down the cobblestone road before arriving at the slums surrounding the western gate of Whitebranch. As Kelsey walked through the hastily constructed buildings, the first thing she noticed was not the smell, or the shoddy construction of the handmade wooden buildings surrounding her, it was the people. These were people who had faces etched with grit and determination. She could see small gardens, cooking fires, and dozens of brightly colored clothes hanging from lines along the streets. This was a community forged through hardship and mutual support.
There were certainly people who were filled with despair, but there were many more who were filled with hope. Kelsey didn’t know what was going on, or why this slum was here, but she was eager to find out. Walking up to a man who was directing the construction on a new wooden building, she tapped him on the shoulder and asked “Hey, sorry to bother you. My name is Kelsey, can I ask you a question real quick?”
The middle-aged man with thick mutton chops turned around and looked Kelsey in her eyes, an easy smile on his face. “Absolutely, my name's Alfred, what can I do for ya miss?”
“I’m new around here, I was just wondering. Why are these slums here?” she asked a bit awkwardly. She found that there was no easy way to ask, ‘why is the town not letting you in and forcing you to live in your own filth?’
“Sure. We’re refugees from a small town to the west of here. We lived out in the grasslands till the Centaurs went and got themselves enthralled and started attacking us.” he said nonchalantly. “This slum is just a temporary solution until the nobles are done figuring out what to do with us. The previous Mayor left office right after the Centaur attack happened but before we began arriving, so the new guy is just trying to figure it all out as he goes. He’s come down and talked with us a few times. Seems like a good guy.”
Kelsey wasn’t so sure about his assessment of the mayor being a good guy if he was letting the refugees live like this, but she didn’t want to question his judgment, so she thanked the man and continued deeper into the slums towards the gate. During the next half hour, she stopped and asked a few more people the same question, she continued to get different versions of the same answer. They all said that they were refugees and the mayor was figuring out how to get them safely in the city.
The main thing that surprised her about the slums was the shockingly low amount of crime. Like always, Kelsey maintained her domain the entire time she was making her way through the slums. The only instance of something questionable was a child taking a piece of fruit from a stand as he and his mother walked by. He was so young he likely didn’t even register it as something wrong to do. A few seconds later, the mother saw the boy had the piece of fruit and made him tell her where he got it so she could pay the shopkeeper.
This was truly a tight knit community through and through. The other thing she learned was that she needed a way to filter out information from her domain. Being around all these people was an information overload. She wasn’t a fan of being able to see into the private rooms of couples who were trying their best to increase the number of children in the world. Once she noticed something like that, it was incredibly difficult to stop noticing it. She also wasn’t willing to turn her domain off, as it was her first line of defense if something was wrong.
Eventually, she made her way to the gates of Whitebranch and saw two guards blocking the door leading into the town. Unsure what to do, she decided on the direct approach. She walked up to the guards with a smile on her face and waved at them. “Hey guys, mind if I go in? Got a letter for the Guild Master from Owen down at the Plains bridge.” She pretended to pull the letter from the simple cloak Lisa had given her, but in reality, she just summoned it from her vault. She showed the two guards the seal on the envelope, they regarded it for a few seconds before nodding their approval and opening the door for her. “Go right on in ma’am. Have a pleasant stay in Whitebranch.” the guard on the right said to her as she passed him.
“Thanks, I’ll try.”