Captain Angelton walked toward Blackwood and Williamson, while keeping his eyes on the edge of the forest. “Diligence is focus in practice,” he told himself, as he checked his sword for freedom of movement.

“Men! Report.” he interrupted them, as he walked up.

The soldiers straightened up and saluted with an arm to their chests. The captain gestured for Blackwood and Williamson to come closer. He returned a quick salute to the rest of the men, and they returned to their business.

In Williamson’s hand was an arrow and a broken strap with a buckle. Showing the arrow to the Captain he said, “It was the Gurs. No doubt about it. Looks like 30 to 50 of them. Small patrol, must have snuck past the front. I have no idea how they got this far North without anyone noticing. The scouts found the trail. It wasn’t easy, but it’s hard to hide a trail while they were carrying a lot of food and goods from the raid. We should find them before nightfall.” Williamson tossed the arrow and strap onto a pile of others and dusted his hands.

Looking around he sighed and continued, “This wasn’t even a military convoy, these were just basic merchants and travelers heading to Dorchester. We found the manifest in the lead wagon. No persons of interest, or suspicious cargo. We even found the remains of everyone on the list. Well, some of them seemed pretty torn up by scavengers in the woods, but nobody seems missing. That just puts more stock on these being soldiers led by a knight and not bandits. I’ve never seen a merchant train hit by bandits that didn’t do a little kidnapping along with their reaving.”

The Captain was looking around as he listened to the report. His sergeant’s conclusions were justified, but worrying. ‘This was too close to Dorchester. How did they get past the front and this deep into the Strates without anyone noticing. If this is the first we are hearing of them, then why hit this unassuming merchant caravan? What aren’t I seeing?’ he wondered.

Looking at Williamson he said, “We don’t know if we’re being pulled into a trap. When the scouts return with their report, send them right back out to do a sweep around the bandit camp, or wherever they are hiding. Something about this doesn’t sit right. I want at least triple their number when we hit them. When we head back, I’ll get the court mage to thoroughly scry the area, maybe there are other groups that are trying to draw out our numbers.” He then turned to Blackwood. “What can you tell me about the boy. You find anything in the records?”

Blackwood waved for him to follow, and walked over to a makeshift table filled with the records of the merchant train. Every bit of paper they could find was being searched with skills to deduce the history of the parties involved. He picked up a small ledger and handed it to Angelton.

He pointed out an entry and said, “Here is the boy’s application for the train. He is listed as a guard banishment. Back in his home village of Oakleaf, he got into a feud with a local merchant over continuously stealing peaches. According to this, he didn’t even need the food, just liked peaches I guess. His parents had enough when the village wayfinder and leader consulted them. According to this, they gave him a whooping and sent him to the merchant train guards so they could take him to Dorchester and sign him up for the guard. I guess they hoped he would get his annoying nature beat out of him in training. Doesn’t seem to be a bad kid. However, there are a few things of note.”

Shuffling some papers, he pointed out the boys picture. In the upper right corner of the page was a detailed drawing of the boy in full color that was done during intake with the merchant guard dispatch. They were always thorough, and it only took a few seconds to make a pretty accurate likeness of someone.

Blackwood pointed out a few things, “You can see that his eyes didn’t used to be that weird pale blue he has, and his hair used to be brown. Even his age is off. He is supposed to be turning 14 in two months. We double checked if he is someone else, but the face matches, and everyone else is accounted for. I have no idea what happened. But I gotta tell you Captain, this kinda freaked me out.”

Captain Angelton took the ledger with wide eyes. “I’ve never seen anything like this. I’ve heard of premature awakenings under stress, but nothing with physical or mental changes.” Nothing about the kid was normal. He didn’t seem dangerous, just weird. Regardless, dealing with issues like these wasn’t his responsibility. “OK, I’ll take the ledger and application with me when I take him to the Center. I’ll let them deal with this. We have Gurs to kill.”

Almost like he planned it, the reinforcements from Dorchester arrived. Men started hitching horses to wagons and everything was put in order relatively quickly. As his men worked, Angelton turned to look for the boy who was the biggest anomaly in this mess. The kid was pestering a soldier to continue casting a clean spell on him. He seemed to be very intently staring at the soldiers hands and saying “Again, please” over and over. ‘Is he trying to learn magic by watching?’ The captain wondered. It was very difficult to see the kid as anything other than an idiot.

---------

Everyone was mounted up and we headed toward what I was told was “Dorchester”. It was the largest local city and it was surrounded by towns and villages. As the largest city, it was where the army was stationed to protect the locals while being a preparation point for ongoing conflict with Islangur, which was far to the south. I was told that the region we are in is called “The Strates” after the line of lords called Strattings that rule this part of the kingdom. From what I could tell, the area is huge, and the fact that a raid happened this close to Dorchester has all of the soldiers worried.

I just wanted to see a map along with a globe. Without a frame of reference, none of this meant anything to me.

I also learned that I can sense magic, or essence as it is commonly known. My pride was immeasurable until I found out that everyone can sense essence. In fact, most children can sense essence. Not only does it not mean anything special, it is also useless. At a basic level it is only good for knowing that something is agitating the local essence. So, I won’t be learning any spells by following along with their casting.

This had me inquiring about HOW someone went about learning spells. According to a nice soldier that didn’t mind continuously casting clean on me as we rode (regardless of how many times he assured me that it won’t help me learn it), the way to learn spells is also commonly known. A person has to first be able to influence the essence around them. Usually through meditation and focus you can adapt your ‘feeling’ the essence into ‘probing’ it. Eventually, you can manipulate it and finally start making patterns with the streams that are all around us. He called it ‘essence weaving’, ‘patterning’, or my favorite: ‘stamping’.

You start with manipulating, or ‘weaving’, raw essence. Then you move up to creating patterns infused with essence. And when you are really familiar with the spell or pattern, you can stamp it into existence with your center. Stamping is the fastest way to cast a spell and the most powerful. It stresses your center like crazy, but you’re directly influencing the world around you.

I thought to myself, ‘That sounds so bad-ass I don’t even mind calling it ‘stamping’. Although it does remind me of people who used to collect stamps and wasted everyone’s time by talking about them. I’m pretty sure they also called that stamping.’ As these thoughts rattled around in my head, I continued to bother the poor guy whose name I never bothered to learn.

After an hour, I realized that I wasn’t paying attention to where we were going. In the movies and stories, the camera always follows above the column of soldiers providing a grand view of the surroundings. For me though, I was surrounded by large smelly men that blocked my view of the forest, which stopped me from seeing anything in front of the column. So it was a pleasant surprise when we cleared the forest and started to spread out.

Now that I could see a little more, I noticed that off in the distance there were large walls that must have been 100ft high, with towers spread about in a circle so large that the walls seemed almost flat. ‘Now THAT is a fantasy city. And what the hell are they defending against?’ I wondered.

Covering a fair bit of distance before the walls was a city in and of itself. There were small businesses and homes all around the outside, but they looked so tiny next to the behemoth of a wall. The men just calmly rode on, used to seeing the great wall of Dorchester, as it was so named in my head.

It took another hour before we finally arrived at the buildings outside the wall. I realized that the wall was much taller than I thought. There were some small walls and defenses, but nothing that compared to the wall I couldn’t stop staring at. The damn thing became more imposing the closer we got to it.

The people were dressed in what I thought was a typical medieval fashion. Wool clothes with leather belts and boots. The city was clean, and the roads wide. Plenty of space for everyone, though they did respectfully move out of the way for the soldiers. Nobody seemed to be afraid of them, so I guess it wasn’t a totalitarian state or despotic rule. ‘No joining the revolution it seems,’ I grouched.

Looking closely, there were people using random abilities all over the place. Glowing lines from a parent attached to a kids back, like those kid-leashes suburbanites used back home. And there was a vendor with a magic glowing sign above his door that said “Veranus Enchantments for Home and Work. You need it, we have it. Be better than the others.”

If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

‘Wow, even the subtext of the world is all about personal improvement. It’s kinda depressing that I’m going to have to get over the idea that people will pull others down to lift themselves up.’ I thought to myself. It seems the fabric of this universe is completely at odds with the unhealthy competition I was comfortable with.

I also just realized that I could read without any issue. ‘Nice! It must be part of that skill for Common I got,’ I thought.

As I kept up my observation of the town, I saw that my first impression was incomplete. Although the focus was definitely about how great each merchant was, there were still subtle digs at the competition. Regardless of how personally awesome someone is, there are only so many customers out there. Businesses have to advertise, and maybe subtly imply that “we’re the best, so choose us over them”.

‘I wonder if there is identification magic that can unquestionably PROVE one way or another if someone is better. Maybe there is a magic yellow pages that updates who the best is at giving haircuts in a locale. When a diner says they serve the best hamburger in Dorchester, they can actually prove it. That’s trippy.’ I mused as we moved through the town.

Coming up to the wall, there was a giant tunnel with a spiked gate. Even with the gate up, it was very imposing.

As I was in the middle of the column, I couldn’t see what was happening up front, but I was content staring at the freaking abomination that was the wall. ‘Is that 200ft? Maybe it’s 1000ft. I’ve never seen something that size, so my frame of reference is not helping at all. It must be the height of a downtown apartment building.’ I thought in wonder.

Finally, the men around me started to move again, and my eyes snapped back to my surroundings. I adjusted my seating as we entered the tunnel, my attention on my horse.

I imagined I would have had more trouble riding, but when they aren’t moving fast, I don’t have to do anything. I just had to sit there and try not to do anything that would influence what the horse is doing. It had seemed perfectly happy to just follow the other horses. I checked my “identity” (I still think it should be called status), and I didn’t even get a riding skill. I suppose I’d have to actually steer the horse in order to be considered a rider. ‘A bunch of other skills went up though. Analysis, Observation, Listening, and a ton of others. Do people actually follow all this?’ I doubted it.

The tunnel must have been as wide as an entire football field. How much stone must be in this thing? Embedded in the walls were doors, and arches. Shadows covered small terraces for guards to rain down death to invaders. Looking at the ceiling, I noticed little bulbs of light up in corners that looked like they were hovering. They kept the tunnel well lit. This place was awesome.

Through the opening on the other end, you could tell this was now the real city. Stone houses and roads, gutters with steel coverings, street lamps that were currently unlit. Multi story buildings with curtained windows and those plant boxes hanging from the side. It was unreal to the point of being cliche. This is almost too fantasy-like. Where is the inconsistency that pulls the eye? There wasn’t even a weird smell. What happened to the horse droppings? It was so normal that I got a headache just trying to spot something out of place.

The sound of the people going about their day seemed to inspire the column to start moving faster, and we quickly approached a walled off compound. It made sense that they were stationed near the gate.

Like a bomb going off, everyone started to go in different directions. My travel companion (whose name I still don’t know) told me to dismount, then immediately walked off with our horses giving me nothing but a nod and a smile. So, I just stood there in the middle of all this activity being completely ignored. It was impressive how no one seemed to be bothered by me just standing in the middle of everything.

“Alright young Nero, come with me.” I heard from behind me, causing me to jump a little.

I turned to see Captain Angelton standing there, already changed out of his full plate and now in chain mail and without a helm, his blonde military haircut now on display. He still had his blue tabard and sword with him, but he looked significantly more relaxed. Yet, I noted that he was still unnecessarily large. Once he saw that he had my attention, he immediately turned and walked away.

I hastened to catch up to him as we walked out of the compound. The Captain gave a nod to the gate guard. I tried to keep next to him, but I seemed to always be a step behind him. I got the distinct impression that he didn’t want to talk to me anymore. His brow was furrowed and he walked with purpose. He seemed to have a lot on his mind, and was just trying to get this last duty finished before he could move onto more important things.

As we passed by a food stall, I realized that I hadn’t eaten since my miraculous body snatch. So I said “Hey Cap, you mind springing for some food? Maybe a Soda or something? I haven’t eaten all day and it must be close to dinner time, eh?” With a smile on my lips and a hopeful look in my eye, I levered all my considerable charisma to ‘bum some grub’.

With a small glance to his side down to me, he replied without breaking stride “What the hell is a Soda? Never mind, it doesn’t matter. We’ll be at the center soon, and they’ll be serving dinner there. I’ll introduce you to the in-taker, and they’ll get you all set up. Don’t worry son, Oglivarch takes care of her own.”

I really need a map. I thought I was in the kingdom of “The Strates”. Sufficiently chastened to hurry up and be quiet. I followed the Captain, admiring the buildings and people. Everyone seemed to have somewhere to be, just like back home. Surprisingly, I felt no home-sickness, or desire to return to my distant relations or semi-friendly coworkers. I felt free and in control. I luxuriated in all the new sights, smells, and sounds. I heard a soft chime all around me and the air seemed to thicken for a moment. My steps halted and I looked around confused as to what just happened.

A couple passed by on my right and both offered their congratulations, as the man patted my back, and they resumed their day. I thanked them by reflex and turned to the Captain, who was staring at me with those piercing gray eyes of his. He walked right up to me, looming over me like a teacher who just caught their student cheating.

“Boy, did you just level? How the hell did you already level, you haven’t done anything since we found you, right?” He damn-near accused/questioned me.

I cleverly replied, “Um…. One sec.”

Name

Nero Walker

Level

2

Race

Human

Growth

0%

Tier

1

Condition

100%

Age

14

Center

100%

Body

0

Mind

0

Soul

0

Confluence

10

Stars

1

Pillars

0/0

“Yup, I leveled. I feel great too, is that 100% condition, how does that work? Oh, I got a star. What do I do with it. Pillars are listed too, but aren’t available.” I read out what I thought was interesting information, which apparently it wasn’t because the Captain didn’t seem to care.

He almost growled, “I’ll ask again, and this time I expect a direct answer. How. Did. You. Already. Level?”

Completely caught off guard and confused, I closed my identity and looked up at him. “I have no idea why you seem angry, I didn’t do anything. You’ve had someone standing next to me almost the entire time I’ve had a status page…. Um… identity. Is it really so weird to level this quickly?”

Without even batting an eye, he replied “Yes. It’s weird. You have to DO something to grow. You have to commune with who you are as a person. You have to acquire new knowledge and experiences. You have to become more than you were just minutes before. It’s supposed to take time, and effort. You’re not supposed to level by staring at that woman’s ass like you were a few minutes ago.”

I think I have a pretty good read on this straight laced captain by now and I was currently feeling great thanks to my recent level. So I smirked and crossed my arms like the little shit I was. “First of all, you know that everything I’m seeing is brand new to me, considering I don’t remember anything. Second, I’ve learned stuff. Like that vendor over there is selling something called ‘maginopes’ 3 for a 2 valens. And third and most importantly, that woman’s ass was worth some introspection and consideration. You need to start looking around. There is NEVER nothing to experience.” I finished with what I hoped was a profound look on my face. I paused and looked down for a second to think whether or not that amazing last line made sense. ‘Yup, checks out,’ I decided as I nodded and looked back up at him proudly.

The look on his face was priceless. If this growth thing works the way I think it might, I’m surprised I didn’t level again. He stood there in stunned silence, now standing like an immovable pole in the middle of the walkway as people passed by. Confusion and Contemplation clear in his features. I watched him struggle with what I said for a solid 15 seconds; it was glorious. Finally, he seemed to come back to himself and grunt, as if to clear the air. He resumed his calm but authoritative tone and said, “Come boy, we’re almost there.” I just chuckled and followed along.