The crab and the enchantress stepped out of the ruined building and into the gloomy daylight of Condor. The bleak environment seemed to dull out the world’s colors and the windy breeze made even a crab feel chills down his spine, despite having neither skin nor backbone.
Ruby, whose vivid scarlet vestments seemed to be the only thing unaffected by the dreary aura of the land, stood by the door like a fiery beacon in the wasteland.
“Go on, you should talk with your friend now,” she said, gesturing towards the side of the house. “I hope we will meet again soon.”
Balthazar walked around the front of the dilapidated building. Druma and Blue were still hanging out by the road, but not playing as usual, for even they seemed to be affected by the mood of the town.
Off to the side of the Birdwatchers secret headquarters, near a torn fence, sitting on a half-broken stone bench, was the young archer, leaning forward and staring emptily into the blade of dried grass he was fidgeting with in his hands.
As the merchant passed Jasper, who was quietly leaning against the house with his arms crossed and one foot pressed against the wall, the man gave him a brief nod and left towards the front door, passing on the task of watching over the recently awakened adventurer to the hesitant crab.
With tentative steps, Balthazar approached Rye, placing himself next to his bench and looking towards the bleak, gray horizon in front of them.
“Hey,” said the crab in a quiet tone.
The young man continued staring at the piece of grass wrapped around his finger, but his gaze was somewhere else far, far away.
“How… are you feeling?” Balthazar insisted.
Rye inhaled shakily and raised his head, now facing forward, but still not looking at the crab.
“I don’t know yet,” he said in a hoarse voice. “It’s a lot to take in at once.”
Balthazar’s words vacillated for a moment. He usually had no trouble talking his shell off, but when it came to more sensitive or heartfelt conversations, he always felt like a fish out of water.
“What do you remember?” the crab asked.
“Not much.” Rye paused, eyes fixed on a broken bell tower across the next street. “Nothing at all, actually. It’s hard to explain.”
The crab nodded quietly.
“It’s like…” the young man continued. “I can see the empty spaces now. They were always there, but I just couldn’t notice them, but now I see them clearly, yet they’re just… blank. Just a void where I know things should be, but just aren’t.”
“I can only imagine how it feels,” said Balthazar, “but it must be frustrating.”
The human’s shoulders slumped. “It is. Do you know that feeling when you know that you know something, it’s on the tip of your tongue, but you just can’t quite recall it?”
The crab shook his shell up and down. “Oh yes, I get that a lot with regular customers at the bazaar. I know their names, but just can’t for the life of me remember them. Too many names, too many humans that all look the same.”
“Faces…” Rye murmured. “You know, I can’t understand how I’ve gone this long without even considering it, but I had parents. Of course I did, but somehow I didn’t even think about that. Now, I can almost remember them, as if I could reach them if I just stretch my fingers a little more, but I’m still not quite there. Their faces are just a hazy blur I can’t reach through.”
The crab and the human sat under the cloudy sky for a few more moments, silent, as the bitter breeze over Condor swept dead leaves and dust around them. Balthazar finally broke the silence again.
“So what do you intend to do about it now?”
Rye let out a deep sigh.
“I don’t know. Part of me wants to lash out. Rage and fight against something, anything. Just vent my anger over what was ripped out of me, until I can get my memories back, fill the void and restore my past life.” He paused and let his head hang again, staring at the dirt ground below. “But another part of me just wants to go back to how it was before. Blissfully ignorant to it all. When what I didn’t know couldn’t hurt me. And it all just hurts so much now.”
The young man placed his forehead on his palm and shut his eyes like someone struggling against an agonizing migraine. Balthazar wanted to say or do something, but no right words came, and placing his massive pincer on the boy’s back didn’t feel like the most comforting gesture to make at that moment.
“I’m pretty sure I had a sister,” the archer suddenly said, without lifting his face from his hand. “I can’t remember her name, her face, or even how old she was, but I have this vivid impression in my mind that there was a sibling there before, in my previous life. How could I forget that? I’ve been running around this land all this time, completely unaware that there was someone out there, probably missing me, mourning me, while I pranced around playing adventurer. How messed up is that?”
Balthazar let out a small sigh of his own.
“Yeah, it must be… tough. I can’t pretend to relate. I never had parents. Or brothers and sisters. Or any family at all, really. It was just me alone in my pond, ever since I could remember. The first time I ever felt I had anything close to a family was probably when I got Druma, and Bouldy, and Blue. In a way, Madeleine as well, and… maybe even you, too. Sort of. I can’t imagine losing all memory of you guys.”
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Rye raised his head and finally looked at the crab.
“Madeleine…” he said, with a heavy sorrow in his voice.
“Don’t worry,” the crab said. “We will find her. Ruby gave me a lead on the wizard who can help us. He can tell me how to fix Bouldy, and I bet if someone would know how to track down a dragon, it would be that old lunatic. His place is pretty far, but if we get on the road now, I’m sure we—”
“Balthazar,” the archer interrupted quietly. “Please stop.”
“What?” said the surprised crustacean. “Oh. No, you’re right. This was a rough day for you. You’re in no condition to get back to traveling right now. We should take the rest of the day, rest up, and then tomorrow morning, as soon as the sun is up, we can head off and—”
“I’m not going with you,” Rye declared.
Balthazar froze, looking at the adventurer with quiet surprise.
“You’re… you’re not?” he finally said, after an endless few seconds where nothing but the sound of dry leaves blowing in the wind could be heard around the dead garden where the crab and the human sat.
“No,” the young man said, hanging his head and hands again as he planted both elbows on his knees.
“But… we need to find the dragon. To find Madeleine.”
“I know. Trust me, I know. But right now I’m in no shape to be going out there looking for a mythological creature in some unknown part of the continent when my head is barely able to think straight.” He turned his distraught gaze to the crab. “I’m a mess, Balthazar. As much as I want to help, I can’t. Not right now. I need… I need time. To think, to figure things out. To figure my own self out. I’m not even sure who I am anymore.”
“You’re her hero,” Balthazar said quietly, a sad frown on his expression as he stared at the adventurer. “Nobody else will care about a poor baker from some small town. The only one Madeleine can count on to come and save her is you.”
Rye shook his head.
“That’s not true. She has you, too. You’re out here, far away from your home, which you had never even left, looking for her, just like me. If someone can find Madeleine, I’m sure it’s you.”
“But I can’t rescue her alone,” said the crab.
A faint hint of a sad smile appeared on the boy’s face. “You’re never alone, Balthazar. No matter where you go, you always have friends. You can’t help it.”
Balthazar felt a knot in the pit of his stomach, like a painful void. It made him sad and deflated like a hunger for pastries typically would, but he knew this was different, and somehow even worse.
“But what about you?” he asked. “What will you do?”
“I don’t know yet,” Rye said. “I’m not giving up on Madeleine, but I also can’t take on all of this without first getting my head in order. I need to be alone for a while, with my own thoughts, out there, in the wild. That’s usually how I find peace to think. Whatever comes after that, I don’t know yet.”
The crab sighed. “I mean… I get it, but at the same time…”
“This isn’t goodbye,” the archer said, standing up from the broken bench. “I’ll find you again. I promise. Just please give me some time to process all of this.”
Balthazar’s expression was still dispirited, but he quietly nodded in agreement.
He didn’t like it, but he understood it.
After going to Druma and Blue to say his goodbyes, the young archer took off on his own way, alone.
Soon after, the crab and his two remaining companions departed as well, through a different road, ready to leave behind that dreary place called Condor.
***
In a small town somewhere else on the continent of Mantell, an adventurer stepped out of a blacksmith’s shop with a brand-new steel longsword strapped to his back.
Ren flexed and stretched his arms, still adapting to the tight fit of his new armor, now a combination of boiled leather and steel pauldrons, instead of his previous handmade furs and pelts.
After having arrived at his first human settlement, the newcomer had spent the first couple of days learning as much as he could about the place, all while asking as few questions as possible, to not raise suspicion about himself.
Through pure observation skills and lots of eavesdropping on other people’s conversations at the local tavern, the champion-class adventurer quickly puzzled together that there were many more like him around the land. Other adventurers, heroes from some unknown land that took on quests and were well regarded by most, and that, as far as Ren understood, nobody really knew the true origins of.
They apparently were much more common in large cities, and seldom seen at small settlements like the tiny lumbering town he currently found himself at, unless some quest led them there. That served the clever young man just fine, for he did not want to risk being exposed as an outsider himself. At least not until he felt ready enough for it. Ren was always one to keep his cards close to his chest, something that came from his many wins at poker tournaments.
While there, the new arrival also quickly figured out the most efficient way to earn some quick coin. Using the alchemy skills he picked up during his first days in the forest, he took to crafting some extremely basic concoctions that, while trivial to brew, revealed immensely popular at the local inn for their hangover curing properties. This earned him a nice chunk of money, which he used to buy some gear upgrades.
“This should do nicely, for now,” Ren said to himself, while admiring the sharp blade of his new weapon under the sun’s light.
Having taken more than a few sparring lessons during his university years, the prodigal young man felt more than comfortable picking a longsword as his weapon of choice until something better came along.
But he knew those were all steps on a long climb to real power.
Power he would need in order to find and confront his target: Balthazar.
Ren still knew very little about this mysterious merchant who seemed to be responsible for his arrival in that world, other than whoever he was, he was likely a dangerous figure, which he would need to approach carefully.
Now that he had studied the place enough and was feeling ready to move on from the small town, the adventurer decided it was the right time to ask some questions without fear of having to make a quick escape.
Sitting at the counter of the local tavern, the champion ordered a drink before leaning closer to the tavern keeper and asking, “Say, I’m looking to buy something, and I heard there’s a merchant called Balthazar that might have what I’m looking for. You wouldn’t happen to have seen someone by that name pass through here, would you?”
The bald man behind the counter cocked an eyebrow at the question.
“Can’t say that I have, sorry,” he responded, before going back to rubbing the inside of a tankard with his rag.
The adventurer nodded to himself. There wasn’t much else to go on with, he would have to just keep asking until something came up.
If only he at least knew more about the merchant…
Suddenly, Ren felt a tap on his shoulder. Turning around, he found a small young boy staring wide-eyed at him, face full of freckles and a head of bright ginger hair.
“I’m sorry, I couldn’t help but to overhear your question,” said the excited boy. “Are you looking for Balthazar too?!”