“Honestly, Alarion.” Elena sighed as she led Alarion through the dim hallways of the manor-house. Originally the vacation home for some Ashadi noble, the keep had been renovated with modern artificer lighting and plumbing but little could be done about the labyrinthine design. “If you had told me you skipped breakfast because you couldn’t find the dining hall I would have taken you sooner.”
“I didn’t think it would matter.” The youth answered honestly. “It isn’t the first time I’ve gone hungry.”
The words made her frown, though the expression softened when she saw it mirror on his face. “Children are not supposed to go hungry. You especially. You are already stunted for your age.” A thought crossed her mind, and she narrowed her eyes at him. “You have a hunger condition, don’t you.”
Alarion tilted his head to the side, briefly missing her meaning before it clicked into place. “Status. Notifications.”
There it was.
> [Hunger – Minor] – 10% malus to all attributes until sated.
Damage notifications had been more of a distraction in a fight where one good hit was the difference between life and death. Enough of a distraction that Alarion had simply turned them all off.
Oops.
“So not only were you fighting a dragon tailor made to be your equal, but you were doing so while suffering from a hunger malus.” Elena shook her head ruefully. “Trim your notifications, but never turn them off entirely. The system notices things you don’t.”
“The System?”
“The Vitrian name for the Ur-Magic that gives rise to awakened.” Elena said with a wave of her hand, her mind searching for a word as she switched languages
Alarion nodded then, much more familiar with the latter term.
“We call it the system because it is structured, organized. Systematic.” She continued. “It quantifies and qualifies everything. Your hunger, how fast you are, the abilities you have. It can see into your emotions, to know when you are afraid or entranced. No one can see fully into the thoughts and desires of another, even with magic, but the System can. In some ways it knows you better than you know yourself.”
“Is it… a god?”
Elena raised an eyebrow. “I thought the Ashadi didn’t believe in gods?”
“My mother was from Imuria.” Alarion clarified. “She fled here before I was born.”
“Twice a victim then. I’m sorry.”
Alarion looked up at her, his eyes briefly narrowing as though he wanted to say something more. Instead he looked away and continued his earlier thought. “She taught us there were Lesser, Inner and Outer gods.”
“Us?” Elena asked.
“My sisters.” Alarion replied, suddenly quite interested in the floor ahead of him.
“Ah.” Elena winced. She’d never asked the full details on the other graves in the basement where the boy had been found. She hadn’t wanted to know. “What did your mother say about these gods?”
Alarion scratched at the side of his face, playing for time as he wracked his brain on half forgotten stories. “The Lesser gods are the closest. The gods of rivers, mountains and idols. The Inner gods are further away, across the seas and the land, but much stronger. There are four of them, or some say eight. And the Outer gods live in the sky, outside the world.”
“Your mother was wise.” Elena smiled. “There are indeed powerful regional spirits, creatures given strength through belief in places of worship, though their numbers have dwindled in much of the world. Those would be your Lesser gods, more commonly called Thoughtborn. And the Four Mothers are very real. I believe one is even quite close, just across the Middle Sea.”
“And the Outer Gods?”
She shrugged. “Some Vitrians venerate the Mothers, but ours is not a particularly pious society. There are those who pray to distant, unseen gods, but I have never seen their faith rewarded. If a thing does not make itself known, I’m not inclined to call it a God.”
“And the System?” Alarion asked, bringing their conversation full circle.
“Who knows.” She shook her head. “I am no scholar or theologian, but as far as I understand, the Four Mothers existed before the System and were changed by it as much as the rest of the world. Anything that can change the nature of a God, of the world itself, seems like it could be called a God in its own right, but I see no reason to worship it.”
“It didn’t always exist?” Alarion inquired with some surprise, picking up his pace slightly as the smell of fresh cooked meat wafted from a set of open double doors just ahead.
“No, it has not.” Elena replied, lengthening her stride to keep up with him. “I am not even sure if the system is older than this manor.”
“It is not.”
The booming voice brought Alarion up short, his body tense, knees bent, arms halfway at the ready. A reaction that summoned only laughter from the far end of an exquisite dining table that dominated the center of the hall.
Backlit by a crackling hearth it was hard to make out much of the man. Even seated he was quite large, broad in the shoulder and thick in the arms. His hair was dark and put up in a tight topknot that showed his hair thinning at the temples, while his beard was short but roughly trimmed in fashion that gave him a rugged feel. He was dressed casually in a loose grey linen robe that was partially open over his broad chest, with the only oddity an unusual leather bracer on his left arm. He looked eerily familiar, but Alarion could not place him.
Stolen novel; please report.
“The boy is still jumpy.” The man’s voice was more jovial now, and Alarion felt he recognized it even more than his features.
“I am jumpy.” Elena scowled. “You had me halfway out of my skin. What are you doing up?”
“My bed is cold and empty. Filling my belly seemed a half-hearted alternative, but it was preferable to nothing.”
“The face!” Alarion blurted out.
The man only chuckled, his features only growing more recognizable by the moment as Alarion’s eyes adjusted to the light behind him. “That had best not be some new Ashadi insult I haven’t heard.”
Alarion’s hands mimed a repeated upwards motion as the youth struggled for a better way to express the thought in his head. After a moment of charades, it clicked for Elena and she helpfully translated. “He saw you when you overtook the Ordinate to speak to me.”
“Yes!” Alarion nodded briskly, suddenly free of the great burden of trying to explain himself.
“Ah. I have been called worse, I suppose.” The man rose to his feet, a turkey leg still clutched in one hand as his back straightened, his chin rose and his voice adopted a formal tone. “I am Dar Elzmir the Third. By grace and selection, the Provisional Governor of the Province of Ashad Minor. Seventh Seat of the House of Hunger.”
“I am Alarion.”
“And you are the man keeping my wife out at all hours?” When Alarion’s face registered only confusion at the innuendo, Dar’s formal attitude deflated with a sigh. “She told me you were rather simple.”
Alarion shot Elena an annoyed glance.
“I meant it as a compliment.” She protested against his stare. “That you were uncomplicated.”
“Mm.” Was Alarion’s only reply, his ire tempered by the presence of cooked meat, bread and vegetables just waiting to be picked over.
“The system is four hundred and seventy-six years old.” Dar said, returning to his earlier thought as though they had never left it. “The original flagstones and crypts predate the system by at least a century, though the actual manor has been burned down at least once since then.”
“Thank you husband, for the history lesson.” Elena replied dryly.
“Now he knows.” Dar shot back with a smile. “This education kept you up late, and me by extension. Best make it productive.”
Elena snorted over the sound of Alarion tearing into his meal. “We are up late because the boy is too stubborn to quit. Even to his detriment. And he has no sense of direction. Sound familiar?”
“Not in the slightest.” Dar replied.
“Clearly.”
Dar ignored the remark, digging into his own food for a short time before speaking further. “How did he do?”
“Adequately.”
“I’m right here.” Alarion protested around a mouthful of food.
“And you did adequately.” Elena said cooly. “Your stubbornness is considered a flaw for a reason. If you had followed ZEKE’s advice we would have already advanced well beyond the need for the Void Arena by midda-”
“He is still making attempts?” Dar asked, bewildered.
“He decided that an Imperial Greatsword is the preferred weapon of a malnourished orphan.”
Dar’s only response was laughter. Boisterous, full throated laughs punctuated by a pair of dull strikes of his closed fist on the long table.
“I am glad you are so amused, husband.”
“How can I not be? Your tin man must be having a conniption.” Dar replied though his few remaining chuckles.
“Darling.” Elena scowled.
“The Steelborn must be having a conniption.” Dar replied, raising both hands in surrender that Elena only grudgingly accepted. “You will be needed tomorrow as well then?”
“He obtained a quest to defeat the illusion. So unfortunately. And he is still unfamiliar with the keep besides.”
Dar’s brows rose as he regarded Alarion with renewed interest. “A questing power. At your age. Hmm. How many charges do you have?”
“Charges?”
“He is asking how many times you can use it per day.” Elena explained. “You should not share such information with strangers, generally, but my husband will keep your secrets.”
“One.” Alarion said after a moment’s hesitation, before adding, “Though my flaw makes the power assign its own, sometimes. So I still have one available.”
Dar nodded thoughtfully. “You look utterly exhausted. Give yourself a quest to get eight hours of sleep.”
Alarion looked at him as though he’d gone mad.
“He has a power similar to yours.” Elena explained quickly. “If he makes recommendations like that, I would heed them.”
“Alright.” Alarion agreed tentatively. “How do I do that?”
“Think about the power. Then think about what you want the goal to be. It should not take more than a few seconds of concentration before…” Dar smiled as his pupil blinked at the sudden appearance of something invisible in his field of view. “There we are.”
> Work hard, Study well and eat and sleep plenty.
>
> Description: You’ve done the first three. Now do the last one. Or else.
> Success Conditions: Sleep a minimum of eight hours, uninterrupted.
> Failure Conditions: Fail to meet the success conditions within the next twenty-four hours. Fail to fall asleep within the next two hours.
>
> Reward: ???
>
> Penalty: Double severity and duration of Sleep Deprivation condition.
“It doesn’t list a reward.” Alarion said with some dismay. “Only penalties.”
“That is common. The System does not want you to attempt to, game the System, as it were, by suggesting dozens of possible quests until you find one with a reward you desire. If you are repeating a similar quest over and over, it will usually tell you the expected reward. Otherwise it will not tell you the reward until you accept, only the penalty.”
“Your power also will not tell you about possible stretch goals.” Elena added. “Sometimes exceeding the base requirements within the timeframe can permit higher rewards.”
Dar smiled in agreement. “Go ahead and accept the quest.”
Alarion shrugged and mentally accepted the quest as instructed. In an instant, the reward condition changed.
> Reward: Automatically gain the Well Rested condition for 8 hours upon waking.
“So many people are uncreative with their powers.” Dar explained. “They have a questing power, so they need to use it for grand goals, to slay dragons and save princesses. But the potential for such a power is so much greater. You can set all sorts of training goals with your power, which will make you far more adept when the time comes for a real challenge.”
Alarion frowned. “Mine says I’m supposed to slay a dragon.”
“And sometimes you do need to fight a dragon.” Dar conceded. “I did not mean to undermine your resolve. Allow me to apologize. Girl!”
The soft sound of two slippered footsteps barely announced the young woman as she appeared at the Governor’s side. One moment the space had been empty, the next a demure young woman lingered just behind and to the left of Dar’s chair.
She was a curious girl. The dark leather and metal of her armor matched her shoulder length hair, but contrasted heavily with the teal cloak hemmed in violet that marked her as a member of the House of Hunger. She was slim and pretty, pale and serious, but also quite young. Alarion’s age, perhaps a year older.
“Sir?” She asked, as unshaken by Alarion’s shocked reaction to her presence as Dar and Elena were to hers.
“Alarion, this is Sierra, my equerry and… second cousin?” Dar explained with some skepticism of his own words.
“Once removed.” Sierra explained helpfully with a smile that did not quite reach her eyes. “I manage the household, deliver his orders in absentia and serve as a first line of personal protection.”
“Ostensibly.” Dar commented dryly, as though they’d had the conversation too often. “Tonight and for the foreseeable future, however, I will be seconding you to the boy. At least until he gets h-”
“Sir!” She protested.
“Are you asking me to repeat myself?” Dar asked. His tone was casual, his eyes fixed on Alarion. But his smile was gone.
“No!” The girl replied in haste. Her gaze briefly flicked over Alarion with just a hint of distaste before she added. “No, sir.”