Chapter 1: On a Journey

Orlen:

“Orlen,” my mother called, and she was so excited I could almost feel it radiating off her like some sort of aura, “Ester’s here to pick you up!” My mother yells as she runs to greet Ester. Ester wore gray-blue jeans, with slight rips at the knees that she said were fashionable. She, like always, wore a plain white tee and some kind of jacket, her jacket today was made of fine leather, probably that of a wood skirm (geese-like creatures with leather instead of fur and live in the woods). Ester was not a blood relative of mine, but she was basically like my sister Emma except without the problems that come with siblings. Ester is half an orbit older than me meaning she had managed to have her coming-of-age ceremony in Klarj (the first of the eighteen seasons in an Orbit). Coming-of-age ceremonies were tests where people nineteen orbits in age would find out if they had any sort of magical ability. Ester had been lucky enough to have to summon magic. An ancient ability that Ogre Elders usually used. Her summoning ability was extremely useful and had already helped me out multiple times since she received it. One of these times was going to the Mid-Orbit Magical coming-of-age of age ceremony.

The Coming of age ceremonies took place in the city of life which was usually a three-week trek from the village of Azgard, but thanks to Ester’s ability she could summon a sky wyrm that could fly us there in only a few morns ( daytime is split into 14 morns while nighttime is split into 14 slivers).

The City Of Life was divine, magical, and amazing. It was hard to put into words. “Awestruck I see,” rang Ester’s voice. “It happened to me when I first saw the place. No wonder the first god decided to live here huh.” “Guess not” I replied, “though I never imagined it would be so...” “Magical, wonderful, green, or amazing” Ester suggested.

After a few days of walking around the city and guessing at which form of magic I would obtain Ester and I made our way over to the trial grounds. According to Ester, the coming-of-age ceremonies depended on the person. She had told me about hers and how she felt as though she was taken to a jungle of mythical beasts. My mother had told me of my father and how the trial for his trial had included rituals.

Sitting in my seat, my breath was once again taken away. The buildings were green and covered in intricate designs. You could tell the culture of the owner by simply looking at the house and the trial ground owner was a dwarf elder.

Once it was my turn the Dwarf came out of the house and called me in. He told me his name was “Drabe The Mighty.” (Dwarfs had always added their most honorable titles to the end of their names). Drabe told me to follow him into a room then instructed me to sit on a chair and left before I had time to ask questions.

The seat was made of comfortable yet sturdy red silk with threads of brown used to make a crown-shaped shrine with a capital M in the middle. The symbol for magic. I sat there in the room which was now as black as pitch. I could not see my own hands and the loudest thing in the room was the soft huff at the end of each breath I took. The room smelt oddly of camomile though that could have been a tea stain on my jacket. I could feel my hands clinging to the chair's gold lining when I wasn’t in the room anymore.

Although I knew I wasn’t physically there, it felt as though I had been transported to a lake only ankle-deep. The sky was a magnificent baby blue, and you could see every detail reflected in the shallow lake.

“Orlen” came the voice. “I don’t do this often, but I’ve come to meet you.” It took me a few moments to recognize the large figures standing in front of me. It looked as though a statue of the god of magic, Azgard, was standing in front of me. “Azgard…. I mean O great being is it truly you.” I spoke slowly and carefully. “Yes” came the bellowing response. “Though you mustn’t be so formal after all your father and are great friends, though I suppose that is for you to find out later on in your journey.”

I found myself at a loss for words as if I were trying to speak through noise-blocking magic. But Azgard seemed to have plenty to say, so on he went. “Now you may be wondering what sort of magic you have received, and I will soon answer that question, but you must first hear the true great prophecy. One shall walk with he who manifests his imagination, they will meet a devil and a god. Orlen you are that boy. You are he who manifests. I am sorry son, but you must figure out the rest on your own for now that you have met god you’ve got a date with the devil.

My eyes jumped open, and I felt as though I was breathing in molten gravel. I sat there for a few minutes thinking of what I had just experienced and the one thing I knew was that if I was the boy in the prophecy then Ester was the other person. After all, we had always planned on adventuring together. I might seem crazy if I told my story to anybody else, but I knew she had experienced something similar during her trial with the god of the wild, so I thought she would believe me.

That night when we met up to have dinner at the local diner the first question Ester asked me was “What type of magic did you get?” But all I knew was the name and the word manifestation could be taken in multiple ways so instead I told her about my trial and everything that had happened in that oddly still lake, though she seemed to believe it well enough after all she didn’t yell at me and call me a lunatic.

After taking a few minutes to think she left saying that she had eaten her fill and would tell me something important tomorrow.

That night I slept like a rock. I had visions about the basics of what my magic could do which, according to just about everyone who underwent the coming-of-age ceremony, was supposedly normal. Manifestation magic gave me the ability to think of something and manifest it into reality, however until I got more accustomed to this magic, I would have to think about how something was made and how it lasts or the item I manifest would disappear in about ten minutes.

I went to the gates of the city where I had promised to meet with Ester, though the unsure expression on her face didn’t make me feel at ease. “I’ve known the prophecy since my trial,” Ester started. “I just never thought you were the boy in it, though I guess it makes sense. Though there is one thing that Rangard (God of beasts) told me that Azgard seemed to have missed out.” “What is it?” I asked anxiously. “This” Ester said while simultaneously pulling out a reading stone. Reading stones were rare and priceless, and with good reason too. After all, they did show you your status and tell you about any skills or levels you gain from slaying monsters. “It’s amazing that you have a reading stone but how and why do you have one?” I ask. “Well, Rangard gave it to me and told me that once I figure out who the boy from the prophecy was we’d have to raise our status and level until the stone turns green.” Said Ester, “Oh and he also gave me one for you.” She said while handing me the stone.

Reading stones work strangely. You tap them twice to find out your status, they hum when you gain a skill or level and change color depending on your current level boundary. However due to how scarce in supply they were it was difficult to know which level boundary a green glow indicated until we got it ourselves.

“Well,” Ester said, “I guess we’ve got some monsters to slay and magic to learn” “I guess we do,” I responded, and off we went, riding away on an adolescent wind wyrm’s back on our way to the nearest dungeon. Dungeons were abandoned areas where monsters roam free. The further into a dungeon you get the more difficult it is to slay the monsters and at the end of the dungeon there is a dungeon ruler which is the strongest monster in the dungeon.

We went to a dungeon about three miles south of the City Of Life. The start was located in an abandoned wood elf camp in the middle of a great oak forest. According to the adventurer’s guild, this dungeon consisted mainly of Grems and reapers, which were supposed to be easy enough for a pro adventurer to deal with but for a bunch of newbies going to this dungeon was like volunteering to live in hell (especially while I was still figuring out my magic’s capabilities).

As we entered the first thing, I noticed about the woods was the vast canopy of lime-green leaves produced by each tree. I could feel my feet quivering in my boots and I could the soft huff and puff of myself and Ester’s breathing. A small breeze seemed to be constantly blowing through the forest making an eerie whistling noise. The feeling of fear radiated from me and Ester so powerfully that it was almost palpable.

A few paces later Ester’s sky wyrm, now named Wirke, had come to a sudden halt. Ester had once told me that skywyrms could smell and identify monsters or animals, and right now I was hoping for the latter, but alas my luck was not so great.

I realized what the monster was before Ester did but by the time I went to speak Wirke was already there ripping the Grem’s head off. Ester stood there, completely, and utterly aghast, as blood flew and painted the grass a maroon red. We had not been appreciative enough towards Wirke until this moment, after all without him that could have been one of our heads flying to the ground.

We decided that we should have Wirke function as an emergency support guard, so he would only interfere when we needed him to, this way we could get a little stronger without worrying about fatal injuries.

About twenty minutes later we ran into a smaller grem which was perfect for me to test out my manifestation magic on. I decided to make a small tomahawk which, according to the visions I had been having, was easy to sustain. The tomahawk was far more detailed than I had imagined. It had designs from my hometown, the symbol for magic, and my initials and magic symbol. It was light to hold and smelled of walnuts and warm leather.

It seemed that Ester had also been staring at the tomahawk as it formed piece by piece out of thin air, this also meant that I would get to slay the first monster which I was secretly thankful for. I decided to throw the first tomahawk since I had accidentally made two. The tomahawk missed but that was fine since it distracted the grem and gave me enough time to close the space between us and slice at the grem’s head. Its head did not fall off in one smooth motion like with Wirke, but the grem was dead and I felt great. I had done it, really done it. I had slayed a monster and used my magic.

We kept on going and we decided to take turns killing monsters that showed up alone. By now both of our stones had hummed eleven times though the last two hums occurred almost simultaneously. When we took out our reading stones to check our stats, we realized that the reading stones had changed from a dimly lit gray stone to a slightly brighter green stone. Another thing we realized was that we now had an instruction board on our stones, which was odd since nothing like this had ever been recorded.

The instruction board was like the rest of our stats a hologram that appeared when you tapped the stone twice, except unlike our stats which were simply written in white cursive, the instruction board seemed to have an urgency scale with green for what could wait, red for urgent and purple for in between. At the top of our instruction board was the task which we had just completed. It now had a line through it and was erasing itself. Everything about seemed mysterious but then again, these reading stones were bestowed upon us by the same gods who granted magic, so I supposed it was sensical enough.

Our most urgent quest now seemed to be using our newly found skills which we received when we reached level ten. Ester had received the ability to talk and translate any language including monster, beast, and spirit. I had received the ability to write spells which if spoken in the ancient language, were supposed to work. For example, if I were to have written down a spell to create a fireball reading the incantation would make one appear, but controlling magic was something I was very new to and would need to practice.

After using our magic and getting a little bit better at controlling our new skills, Ester could now call help from nature spirits who possess elemental magic, and I now had a chant written down for a fireball, an icicle, a wind arrow, and a small stone (I had also learned how to make them move and how to “throw” them at a target).

Even though we had cleared the quest we’d been given and there wasn’t any left, Ester and I decided to keep going through the dungeon until we hit our next level boundary. By the time we had hit level twenty, we were about halfway through the first section of the dungeon, and it seemed that there were no grems in this area, this most likely meant that we would soon encounter our first reaper, which Ester and I decided to face together.

The reaper, like a spirit dryad (not a monster), was shaped like a human torso with a head and arms, though unlike spirit dryads the reaper in front of us had no legs and seemed to be a flying skeleton with a cloak as dark as night. In the hood of the cloak, you couldn’t make out many details but one thing that you could see was the bright red glow at the center of its eyes.

Before I could tell her otherwise, Ester had jumped into the battle, and I felt myself move to follow her. I had conjured a rapier this time, knowing I would need the extra space it provided, after all a reaper’s scythe was as long as I was tall, and the blade was the length of my arm. By now I had gotten used to focusing on multiple things at once, this was incredibly important because of how easy it would be for either my spells or my rapier to disappear if I focused on one too much.

As I threw a barrage of drill-shaped stones at the reaper, Ester spoke to the spirits of the forest and managed to get the help of multiple light spirits to help her form a laser strong enough to injure the reaper. Her magic was amazing and difficult to put into words. Rather than saying an incantation like I would she simply asked the spirits for their aid and thought of the spell she wished to use. As she held out both hands and closed her eyes a shimmer of golden glimmering power formed in front of her, and though it may not have been large, the amount of raw magic power in it was sure to pack a punch, and it did. I jumped back as the laser was unleashed, afraid of being hit. This turned out to have saved my life since the laser not only disintegrated the reaper's skull but also kept going until it hit the ground, right where my head had been only seconds ago.

“That was amazing Ester,” I said, “That’s surely the most powerful spell you’ve cast today.” “Thanks” came the reply, and though it was short it was full of joy. “What do you say we set up camp and call it a day?” I asked. “Yeah, I’m exhausted,” Ester said as she lay down using Wirke’s wing as a blanket. Even though I was barely awake I decided to try to find something for breakfast tomorrow before I hit the hay.

Ester:

I awoke to the smell of hog-bird sandwiches and fruits indicating that Orlen had made breakfast, which I was infinitely thankful for. “Ester, you up yet?” Orlen asked. “Yes, but please do give me a moment to wash up, I smell like a pile of rotten rabbits,” I replied. “Do hurry, if the food starts getting cold, I’ll have to eat for the both of us” Orlen said jokingly.

As I plunged into the nearby river, I felt reborn. The feeling of the cold running water against my skin was unimaginably blissful. I got dressed and made my way up towards Orlen to have breakfast. Orlen must’ve been waiting since when I came back, he was at the table with the food untouched. We finished eating and caught an adult hogbird so we could feed Wirke. Although we were still in the dungeon, we were at the first tavern which was a safe spot full of holy magic which is used to stop monsters from wandering too close. Even though the first tavern was quite close to the start of the dungeon, the next tavern was about halfway through, and we had barely gotten a fifth of the way through.

Even though I was against the idea of splitting up, there was nothing I could do to stop Orlen when he made his mind up. He made us each a map of the area and we set off in opposite directions deciding to meet up at tunset. The main goal of us splitting up was to gather resources and find any gear or valuables. Even though he said that splitting up was necessary to cover more ground quickly, I knew he mainly wanted to use this as a form of training, which meant that I would too. Even though everybody has their magic, there are certain skills aside from magic that can boost your battle abilities. These skills are obtained not by level but by experience and practice, sort of like how if an amateur cast a fireball it wouldn’t be powerful but if a master of the same level cast a fireball it would have overwhelming strength.

After about four morns of walking, I had gathered about two days’ worth of food, and I had managed to find a backpack though I couldn’t manage to open it, so I decided to bring it back with me. As I made my way back, I heard the sounds of countless birds like a well-trained musical symphony. The sounds produced were beautiful and I couldn’t get enough of them, but I had to move on if I wished to get back to the tavern in time.

The stained-glass windows of the tavern sparked a radiant orange, and I could smell dinner showing that Orlen had come back early. Orlen’s mother owns a diner that has a reputation so great I knew about it on the other side of Magna (the continent they live on). His skills in the kitchen were extremely helpful and I could always count on his determination and discipline.

Orlen had somehow managed to find a bull gator, an extremely rare delicacy. He always had a way to find rare things which according to Orlen was thanks to his blood magic. Blood magic is a form of magic passed down through a bloodline. The ability differs slightly between each user, but the boosts gained stay relatively the same. Orlen had received his dad’s blood magic though he was unsure of the name since his dad died when he was an infant. Orlen’s blood magic boosts allow him to do physically impossible things like jumping a four-meter vertical and having the same senses as a shadow dragon. However, he hasn’t been able to use his sixth and seventh senses yet for seemingly no reason.

After dinner, we gathered all that we had found onto the table. Orlen had managed to find enough food for the next three days and a similar backpack to what I found though he had managed to open his. Inside it was a map of the dungeon and although it was far older than the maps we brought, it had far more charted and even had the second half of the dungeon charted. “ This is the terrain around the back of the dungeon. But didn’t you say that the furthest anyone made it was halfway?” While Orlen tried to figure out what the map meant I figured I’d have a look at the rest of the gear in the backpack, after all, there might be something else that could help but Orlen had come out of his thoughts, and beat me to it.

“GOD'S GRACE THIS IS IT” Orlen burst out while gazing in awe at some sort of object in a piece of cloth. “What is it” I questioned. “It’s a journal,” he said and when I looked at him all confused, he showed me. “See the name on the side. And the crest. That’s God’s Bane’s journal and not just any party either. It's Rem’s party!” As he said this Orlen’s face grew into a smile so large it seemed like it stretched his face. Mooks were a sort of magical part of your body that everybody had. It was different for every person, but it always changed the way a part of you looked and for Orlen, his arm had spots of flesh which were replaced with a magic substance, and like all mooks, they changed depending on emotion. However, if you wanted to find out what emotion each change meant you’d have to spend time observing the person's mook. I had observed Orlen’s mook when I first moved into their home as a way of passing time before I was comfortable talking with the townsfolk. And his mook had just turned into rushing water which showed excitement.

Orlen:

After collecting some more monster drops, we headed back to the City Of Life. Our inn was on a street named after the god of innovation. Valgard. The inn itself was covered in magical symbols to boost luck and improve mood. It was obvious a forest dwarf had designed this from the way it was built using living trees. As the tun set, the circular window on the top floor caught the tun and started to shine like a rainbow with arrays of colors shining onto the street and lighting up the area. The inside of the inn was just as fabulously designed with distinctive designs for sleeping quarters and the guild. Unlike the guild Ren was in, this was a local guild meaning you could sign up as an adventurer and rank up, but you would not be a guild member, so we signed up and took our first quest together. While I had not been ranked yet, Ester had been E-rank and moved up to D-rank over last orbit, but she thought that if we kill monsters the same level as in the dungeon we could rank up to C-rank in a few weeks. We took a job for a giant waterhawk which was a C-rank monster meaning that if we completed the job I would rank as a C-rank adventurer. When we arrived at the spot of the sighting, I could smell something like human bones but with something acidic as well. When we came across webs, we would cut them down and store them, since they could be sold for silver.

Stolen novel; please report.

The part of the hillside we were on was full of life with trees and animals everywhere you looked. And the smells of forest flowers were impeccable. We kept walking for about four minutes before I smelt something that made me shudder. “STOP!” I screamed, and Ester stopped looking equally confused, annoyed and flustered. “What is it?” she asked. But I couldn’t say it. I feared that if I said it, it would be true, and I certainly didn’t want that to happen. I stood there wide-eyed and frozen looking behind Ester. My mook had now turned to what looked like melting ice, this indicated fear of death and when Ester saw my mook she went silent and slowly turned while walking towards me. In the lake that Ester had stood in front of only minutes ago was the dead body of a giant water hawk but what terrified me was that the figure in the glimmering water was a water dragon. Water Dragons were S-rank monsters who were usually dealt with by parties of at least two S-rank adventurers.

I had started racking my brain trying to figure out how we could survive this, but I’d never been in a situation like this before. “It's ok,” Ester said soothingly. “NO sudden movements and if you’re going to use your magic. Use it behind your back, ok??” “Yeah…Thanks”

The water dragons’ scales glistened and shone underneath the shower of the tun cast upon them. It was a glorious creature with a baby blue face to match the clear sky and a deep ocean blue on its body to match the water. One could tell it was quite the old and experienced beast from its sheer size and the variety of scars on its neck. “Hey, Ester” I called “You see those scars on the dragon’s neck? You think we could take it if we aim for those?” Ester looked at me. For a second, she was flabbergasted by the idea of fighting a dragon, but she too knew there was no way we could run from something like a water dragon and Wirke couldn’t out-fly it either.

“Sure,” She said, slightly hesitant. “But you need to keep it busy while I send up all the flares, ok?” “I got it, and here keep this,” I said while giving her a picture of Wirke, Ester, and me. Keeping a dragon busy was no easy job and I didn’t have Wirke to fly away on without Ester and there were no fairies to heal me either.

I knew Ester was gonna take a hot minute to take care of the flares but I was now at a base level of thirty and a man capacity level of five which meant I would at least have a little bit of a chance at taking this thing on, and even though I was supposed to fight the dragon with Ester she had to run to the top of the mountain if she was gonna shoot the flares, and there were sure to be monsters to slow her down meaning that I was realistically alone. And that was my biggest fear right now, was surprisingly not dying, but dying alone.

I tried my best to hide my fear and look confident. “Come at me, you filthy pig-horse!” The remark was not very well thought out, and I knew that even though it couldn’t understand what I was saying, it could hear my tone and knew I was insulting it. The giant beast squatted as if preparing to jump, but then its wings started flapping and the monstrous gush of wind made from each flap shook the floor itself and sent me flying up into the sky though that was not exactly a bad thing, after all how else would I get on the dragon.

As I soared through the clear, now scarlet-tinged, sky I made myself a pair of throwing daggers and a longsword, and though the sword was quite heavy it would let me block deadly blows from the dragon's now flailing tail. After narrowly escaping a bite from the predator’s giant teeth, I stuck the longsword into the beast’s neck to stop my fall. An enormous roar erupted from above, but I was simply focused on getting onto the dragon, not being killed, and stalling for time. But then I got an idea so crazy that even if it worked it could kill me in the process, though right now a chance of death was better than being eaten. Reading stones only show readings because people imbue them with their magic, however, I’d heard stories about people over-imbuing the stones and causing explosions so that’s exactly what I’d do.

I sprang up to my feet and climbed the dragon’s neck ignoring the cuts and grazes from the beast’s scales, and then once I was almost at the head of the dragon, I manifested the sharpest and most powerful sword I could and stabbed deep between the dragons’ scales. Then, using the handle of the sword as a stair, I leaped onto the dragon’s head and imbued all of my remaining mana into the reading stone jumped towards the water and through the stone into the gawking mouth of the water dragon and watched it travel down the dragon’s esophagus and down towards the lungs and heart. As I hurtled towards the water, I saw three blood-red flares rise and explode high above signaling an A-rank enemy or higher.

I hit the water and was surprised to hear an explosion above me followed by the sound of gushing blood. As I popped my head above the water’s surface, I was sprayed by a fleeting attempt of attack by the dying dragon, with scalding water hitting my left arm giving a burning sensation though the lake water had cooled it down, so it felt like an overheated bath. But injuries aside I had done it. I had done it!!!! But as a smile grew on my face my eyes went to darkness and I was out cold.

Ester:

As the flares went off in a crackling boom, I heard a great old roar from the dragon’s direction and remembered. Remembered why I was here; I was here to set the flares so we could get back up, but I needed to get back to Orlen. I was almost halfway to the lake when I heard the giant boom and felt a great spatter of mana but not just any mana, Orlen’s mana. My mind rushed to the worst, and I ordered Wirke out to fly me to Orlen but what I saw was amazing and awful. Orlen had managed to slaughter the dragon, but he was now floating in the now blood-red lake unconscious and covered in cuts, grazes, and burns.

He needed medical attention and my eyes teared up with joy when I saw the white and blue cross on the side of a Bear bird signaling that help had arrived. The Grizzly riders took him and me on to the largest bear bird and told me to send off Wirke since he couldn’t keep up. I did as I was told and before I even opened my mouth to ask whether or not Orlen would be ok the man who was leading the Bear-bird I was on said “ He’ll be aight’, he seems like a strong chap that one taking down a water dragon single-handedly is something that only an adventurer S-rank or higher should be able to do, especially one that large. Oh right, my name’s Albert Ling, and I’m captain of the Grizzlies though you can call me Al” “Thank you. Al. Truly you might’ve saved Orlen’s life.”

“Like I said I’m captain of the Grizzlies, it's part of my job. And what’s your name by the way?”

“My name is Ester.”

“A fine name if I do say so myself. What rank is that Orlen lad anyways?”

“This was his ranking mission, though last I checked he was around level thirty the same as me which is about B-rank.”

“Well, he must’ve pulled a miracle or two to get away from an experienced water dragon alive. Did yer see how he did it ?”

“ No, I was the one who set off the flares and you arrived at the lake at the same time I did.”

“Guess we’ll have to ask him when he’s up and running.”

“You know Orlen and I have never managed to choose between the Grizzlies and Gods’ Bane although whichever guild we join we’ll be as happy as a Grand-Boar at dinnertime”.

“Well, yer about to see the guild of the Grizzlies right now, and if you choose our guild yer’ll be more than welcome.”

As he finished talking, we started into a steep descent and the guild came into view. It was an amazing view with a golden Grizzly statue perched above the name ‘Gold Grizzlies’. When we entered the building, I realized the difference between a normal guild and a named or group guild. A named guild was designed in a way to represent its pride name and style of battle.

“You aint’ ever seen this kind’ve guild have yer?”

“No, this is the first named guild I’ve been in. Hey Al, what do you think Orlen and I will be ranked in this guild?”

“ Well, yer said that you were level thirty, and you were previously B-rank, so you’d be at least A-rank. Yer mate Orlen here did manage to kill a Water Dragon which he’d be S-rank or higher and you might get ranked the same as him since you were there when the Water Dragon appeared.”

Orlen:

When I came to, I found a man who looked to be in his late twenties with a scruffy beard and curly brown hair, blue eyes, a green jacket, and on that jacket, right above his heart was a Great Bear-bird with a scar through the right eye, the emblem of the Gold Grizzlies, which apart from Gods’ Bane is my dream guild.

“What are you staring at?” I tried to change my tone slightly to make my voice louder but what came out was more of a wheezy voiced remark.

“You’re awake!!” I noticed Ester’s moot on the end of her hair was tinged like deep ocean water showing worry.

“I’m fine Ester you don’t need to worry about me so much.”

“Yes, I do, you’ve just gone against an overly experienced S-rank water dragon, beat it, lived by the skin of your teeth, and been unconscious for the past three days.” When Ester was done talking, she was huffing from the effort of talking without taking a breath.

“Wait. Did you just say three days?!?”

“Yes, Orlen. And there is something we need to ask yer. And I’m captain of the Grizzlies but you can call me Al” The one who spoke this time was the scruffy bearded man.

“Wait, are we at the guild of the Golden Grizzlies?”

“Yer got that right matey”.

“Hey Orlen, how did you do it” As she said this, Ester looked confused and worried at the same time. “Kill the Water dragon, I mean?”

“Well, I may have blown up a reading stone inside the dragon by imbuing the stone with all my mana.”

The look of shock and confusion on Ester and Al’s faces was vivid.

“But how in the name of the gods. I mean how’d yer think of that one mate?” The look on Al’s face was somewhere between flabbergasted and amazed.

After a while I said, “Honestly I’m not sure but could I speak to Ester in private for a moment?”

“But of course, lad,” Al said as he walked out of the room.

“What do you think of the guild Ester?”

“It’s fabulous. I mean I can see myself in that adventurer's robe.” A burst of light from the mook which tinged esters hair showed me the response was genuine.

“Well, that’s perfect since I’m thinking of joining the Grizzlies and giving Ren’s guild a run for their money.”

“I’m all in to join, but competing with Ren’s guild is quite a challenge, I mean sure the Grizzlies are competing with them in terms of strength, but their reputation is nowhere near Gods’ Bane.”

“Starting from the bottom and climbing up should be fun, don’t you think?” A grin had grown on my face and it had thereafter transferred to Ester’s face.

“Okay. Ok, let’s join the Grizzlies. We’ll help them climb up the ranks and soon enough we’ll be the top guild in the country of Fiar, and soon enough the planet.”

Ester:

“Ok let’s join the Grizzlies. We’ll help them climb up the ranks and soon enough we’ll be the top guild in the country of Fiar, and soon enough the planet.”

I had said that but could we do it? I mean us a bunch of rookies who got lucky with their magic and ran into a water dragon. Could we do this?

“Don’t sweat the small stuff” Orlen advised.

“Huh?”

“You’re mooks as tangled as a whistle-spiders’ net”.

“Oh, uh right.”

“Well don’t just stand around. Let’s go get lunch and then you can tell me what’s up.”

Lunch was amazing and though it wasn’t as good, it reminded me of my Ma’s cooking.

“Oi…Oi….ORLEN.”

“Yeah?”

“Were you listening?”

“Uh yeah sorry.”

“Ok, I’ll say it again. I think we should train for a while.”

“Ok, what are you thinking?"

“Well, I was thinking that maybe we could split up during training?”

“Uh, I mean why?”

“I just think that’ll be for the best. After all, we wouldn’t be able to train under paths-masters together.”

“We could if we wanted the same job skills.”

“Well I know you’ll want to be a warrior-mage, but I’ve wanted to become a hunter-priest. Plus I turn Twenty soon and you’ll be twenty in six months which means we need to swear a pact to a god, so that we get a blessing or divine protection, or both.”

“I guess that’s fair, but only if we keep in touch and meet every second month. We’ll train ‘till I turn twenty.”

“Ok, I’ll tell the captain that we’ll be on a training excursion for the next six months.”

“Hey, Ester.” I said, “You sure you wanna do this?”

“Positive as a Peacock.”

“Ok. Sounds good.”

Ester went off to talk with the captain looking happy, but being alone sucked so I needed to find a good paths-master.

Paths-masters are people who have mastered certain job skills and offer guidance to those whom they think have potential.

Ester:

Since Orlen had woken up I’d been that I needed to get far, far stronger. Orlen had already noticed that there was something on my mind, so we decided to talk over some food.

In the end, he agreed to split up for a few months to learn from some path masters, but he was skeptical, and rightfully so. After all, most people only get their job skills when they earn a reputation as an adventurer.

Either way, it was time to go talk to the captain about our training leave.

“Hey Ester, how’s it been?”

‘Uh, good but I need to talk to you about something.”

“Alright. Whatcha say Ester?”

“Orlen and I are going to take a training break and work under some path masters.”

“Aren’t ’cha gonna get some rank and reputation first?”

“Well, we think that’d be easier if we got stronger first, after all, it's easier to start at a higher rank than to start down low and climb.”

“All right, but don’t ’cha think you should get yer’ blessings first?”

“I’m training to be a hunter-priest, so I’ll see to it that my paths-master guides our blessings just right.”

“Well, when are yer leaving?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Alright then.”

I had quite a few reasons to do this, some due to Orlen, others for the guild, which was currently known as a rescue guild instead of an adventurers guild. Her other reasons were things like the fact that she wouldn’t be able to deal with a water dragon and Orlen did.

I hadn’t told Orlen yet, but I had already decided who my Paths-master would be, they were extremely well known as the strongest huntress around, and she was also a worshiper of Rangard, the god of beasts whom I meant to obtain the blessing of.

Orlen:

It was the day we were heading out, and I didn’t know what to think about it. I mean, why go now, why not later? When he brought it up to Ester, she changed the subject which made him think there was something else going on, maybe she was trying to get a secret meetup with Ren to train her or something.

Either way, he wasn’t going to fall behind. And if she was going to get somebody, she knows that’s at the top to teach her, then so was I.

It was a barren road down east that led to a two-way fork in the paths, where they would go their separate ways. They had exchanged notes with the exact location of the other person as well as the name of their Paths-master. However, they had agreed to only open the envelopes once they had split. This way we wouldn’t be able to tag along as they would be too far gone on their road.

Anyway about a day later we made it to the fork, said our goodbyes, and exchanged letters. A few morns later we would each make it to a town where we would take a mover cart to our destinations and then eventually once we had arrived, we would open the letter and find out what the other person was doing as well as where they were.

By now Ester would have made it to her destination but I was going to meet up with my Paths master early since he was meeting by the waterfall about a mile from the fork. He would bring a Mover cart and we would be able to catch up on what we had done over the five orbits since I last saw him.

I was born during the great arcane war, a war so large not one magician or adventurer who considered themselves a warrior was involved in the battles. My father, being a magician of the high arcane court and a professor at the Arcane Academy (that I will be attending from age twenty-one to twenty-seven) was called up to fight against the god of the undead “Sinary”.

My father and his fellow magicians had been winning against the undead army until Sinary decided to break a divine law and fight a human outside of a duel. The magicians tried to kill the god but even the elder Orc’s strongest drakes could not subdue him so my father was tasked with the job of holding Sinary back long enough for the rest of the forces to retreat and then use his strongest binding magic to seal him away.

My father agreed, though he knew that no magic could bind the god of the undead after all he could simply unbind himself using his army. So instead, my father decided to pour his very life energy into an attack that would render Sinary incapable of continuing battle for at least a decade. A devil fallen; that is what they called Sinary.

As I pull up to the waterfalls, I can see a man dressed in simple gray swimwear meditating under the falling water, and with a sigh, I realize why he wanted to meet me at the falls.

The falls are a feed from the river “Arc” known for the way it looks like an arc as well as how the water is a shimmering purple thanks to a fight between two gods where their blood, purple ichor, rained down from the heavens and filled this river with magic.

Anyways the shimmering and rippling waters of the river Arc are all I could see, feel, and hear. Mikey, my paths-master, had decided that there was no better way to learn how to take in the magic around you than to only have magic around you.

And of course, he couldn’t let me off with simply floating in the middle of the reservoir at the bottom of the falls. No, instead Mikey said that I need to “Climb up to the highest fall and let the water crash onto the skin of my bare back”. Why you ask? Why would a friend of my father go out of his way to make my life more difficult? To laugh. That’s right, Mr. Mikey Dereo finds this funny, but of course, I knew that this wasn’t even close to the last time something like this would happen which is a part of why I chose him. I mean seriously like what was I thinking?

“Hmmm??? Who do you want to pick as your paths-master Orlen??” Oh, I think I’ll pick the guy who’s going to make me suffer most because No Pain No gain am I right? No, I was not in fact right I could not have been more wrong even if I willingly jumped into an active volcano. Honestly, I should have asked a friend of Rem’s or something not this lunatic.

But still, now that I am FINALLY out of the water after five morns, (THAT’S RIGHT, FIVE I mean can you believe this guy), I have finally had some time to think about my poor decision-making and I think that I have, possibly, just maybe made a good decision. After all, Mikey is incredibly powerful and if this is how he trains then surely it should work for me too right? Either way in three months’ time Mikey and I are going to head up to meet Rem and Ester so that Rem can conduct our blessing rituals.

“Hey Orlen, do you know how your magic works?” asks an anxious Mikey, though I’m as lost as a space pig when it comes to why this is so important.

“Yeah, I just think about what I wish to make, and ‘poof’ it's there, but now that you mention it I can only make simple weapons, nothing enchanted nor spellbound.”

Mikey’s stare remains unwavering and now unconvinced as well.

“You're sure you just think about it, do you clear your mind, or meditate or something?” Mikey asks as though he knows that I’ve lied, but I’m sure he doesn’t blame me, after all, I hate my magic as much as I know he does.

“Okay,” I say with a sigh, and Mikey knows why. “Yeah you're right I do have to think about Dad, but why didn’t you just ask, I mean I’m sure you know that’s how family magic works.”

Family magic is a term used to describe a magic that is similar to that of one of your parents, and in my case, I have to think about my dad. And yeah, I know I said that I was born during the war my father died in, but for some reason, Mikey simply won’t tell me, I can sense my dad’s memories as well as how he acted and his personality. It's as though somebody put a scoop of rocks into the water and expected them to mix in without first pounding them down to powder.

“Well see the thing is manifestation and creation generally aren’t common magics, so I would have thought that everybody’s version of it would be different,” Mikey says this with an apologetic smile glued on his face, but he’s got nothing to apologize for. He had a valid reason and it is a tough topic for both of us after all losing the best friend whom you’ve known since you were a mere coddle-bae has to be as bad if not worse than losing the father you only knew for the first few orbits of your life.