Arc 4: What families entail
Road to a Hero:
Three chances in another world
Chapter 1. Greenvale
After all the events at the capital and his time with Rosemary last night you would think he would sleep in, but Gray wakes up early, gets dressed, and starts to walk downstairs.
Gray {Mmmm…that smell…pancakes!}
Gray enters the kitchen to see Edward cooking breakfast.
Edward: “You weren't supposed to wake up this early.”
Gray: “I've been sleeping a lot lately…who told you how to make pancakes?”
Edward: “Op…Ophelia showed me…”
Gray: “Have um…have you talked to Soku?”
Edward: “No…she’s been sleeping since yesterday.”
Gray: “When Ophelia died…Soku awakened.”
Edward: “A Mark of Providence… one awakened on her chest. She will know what it does when she wakes up.”
Gray: “So where are we?”
Edward: “Greenvale…A village in the mountains where the leviathan army goes to train.”
Gray: “For a place called Greenvale it’s cold as hell! It’s even snowing outside.”
Edward: “I guess the name is misleading…want some coffee?”
Gray: “Yeah sure.”
Edward: “So are you and Rosemary a thing now?”
Gray: “OH! Um…yeah I guess…”
Rosemary: “You guess!”
Gray: “AH! Damn, don’t sneak up on me like that!”
Edward: “Man everybody's woken up early, wanted to surprise everyone with the food.”
Rosemary: “Well I’m glad you made it, thank you.”
Gray: “Yeah thanks for the food and junk.”
Edward: “Well eat up, we gotta go talk to the captain.”
Gray: “Captain?”
Edward: “His name’s Gordan Hill, the best archer in the world, can be a secondary head captain to the Leviathan army…but now that Musashi has…well now he’s the head captain.”
Rosemary: “Should we let Soku sleep…or?”
Gray: “She needs to rest, now let's go talk to Hill.”
They hear a crack behind them, and they all look to see Soku standing in the doorway dressed in winter attire ready to leave.
Edward: “Oh…hey…”
Rosemary: “Soku…I’m so sorry…”
Gray: “FINALLY SLEEPY HEAD! We gotta go and you’re the first one dressed in the right clothes, wait for us here because I’m not walking out in that snow with just a jacket. I'm terrible in any kind of rough weather.”
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Soku: “Alright I’ll wait for lazy asses.”
They all walk back to their rooms.
Rosemary: “Shouldn’t we console Soku?”
Gray: “In my experience…holding in emotion means it’s gonna all come rushing out at some point…and we’ll all be there for her, ready to take on her pain with her.”
Edward: “Seems a little hopeful.”
Gray: “Well with that giant ass L we just took, hope is all we got.”
Edward: “I agree with you there.”
Gray: “Wait where the hell's Julius?”
Julius: “Right here.”
Gray, Edward, and Rosemary: “AHHH!”
Gray: “Don’t sneak up on us like that!”
Julius: “But…I was here the whole time.”
Edward: “Uhhh…yeah now that I think about it you’re right…sorry bout that.”
Rosemary: “Come on now let us get dressed!”
Soku: “I have been waiting for like ten minutes, GET OUT HERE!”
They all stumble out of the cottage, dressed in winter clothes.
Julius: “There you are!”
Once again they all scream in unison.
Julius: “Why are you screaming miss Soku? I was out here the whole time you were waiting…”
Soku: “Oh…uhh that’s on me my bad.”
The village is warm, filled with homes covered in snow. Kids playing with their parents in the snow, and others training.
Gray: “Pretty chill for a war village, no pun intended.”
Soku: “I’m gonna swing at you.”
Gray: “Did you ever figure out what your Mark of Providence did? Or how did you even get it in the first place?”
Soku: “It’s weird…after I awakened it…it felt like I always had it…like I always knew how to use it and what it did. Then it just happened, all the mana I could spare without dying funneled into the mark and then blasted its way out at full force. It’s either it takes all the mana I got or none of it, I can’t decide.”
Gray: “Gale force.”
Soku: “What?”
Gray: “Call it something like that…I suck at names.”
Soku: “Whatever.”
Edward: “I saw him when we got here but that was a shit show. We were all injured so we just got a house to stay in, but if my memory serves correctly then his training facility should be around here…oh there it is up that hill!”
Gray: “Damn it’s cold!”
And that's when Gray sees the home. It looked like a Japanese in with red wood, decorated pillars, and a style of roof exotically the same to what Gray is used to. Whether that be a coincidences or not is left to be decided, although, it's interesting either way.
Rosemary: “It looks warm up there though.”
Soku: “So is this guy nice or….”
Edward: “Well…uhh…”
Edward knocks on the sliding door, then slams it open and an old man stands uneasy.
Gray {This guy got one of those top not things, and you can see a few white hairs in his beard. This dude gotta be around his forties or fifties then. And is he wearing a kimono!? What the hell's that about?}
Edward: “Hill.”
Gordon: “Helsing.”
Gray {Uh oh.}
Gordon: “Nice to see you again boy.”
Edward: “You as well!”
Gordon: “Come on inside now, and tell me anything you learned from that horrific encounter."
Edward: “We did learn about the Pillars' abilities.”
Gordon: “Can you state them for me?”
Gray: “I think Prometheus is the leader…and he popped Kioshi like a damn tomato…he overhauled her body.”
Rosemary: “And that Litch Lazurus…his scythe stole Musashi's soul…
Soku: “That snake man Severus didn’t do much…he could stretch his limbs and heal them too.”
Edward: “And that girl in the bird-like black armor. I think she was the one removing Kioshis Marks of providence…the bird of sin…that’s what she resembles.”
Rosemary: “That Rosine girl…she wore a necklace that looks like the one the bird of sin wears.”
Soku: “And that same girl wasn’t at the ballroom when we got attacked.”
Gordon: “So the daughter of the Ravorian queen is a traitor…or Ravoria is on the side of the Sect.”
Edward: “It is a possibility.”
Gordon: “Alright we gotta talk about what we’re gonna do. The Sect can’t stay in control of an entire country.”
Gray: “Right on the nose there.”
They walk inside and sit down on floor mats.
Gray {These mats and this table reminds me of Japanese-style furniture.}
Gordon: “We need to come to an answer. Julius, you aren’t a spy are you?”
Julius: “No I am not.”
Soku: “I can’t read him.”
Gordon: “Me neither…okay, we’ll come back to that. Does anybody have any ideas?”
Rosemary: “We can’t go on an all-out war…”
Edward: “And if we do…Valatrositice might think we turned against them…unless they planned this.”
Gray: “That girl Rosine…you said that necklace she was wearing is rumored to be the bird of sin…the same one that helped kill Kioshi and Musashi. So Ravoria might be against us too.”
Soku: “So we need to be able to take out the Sect without drawing attention…”
Rosemary: “I assume those Future pillar guys won’t always be there though. They seemed to like it wasn’t all that important to them. Like they were proving a point, that they could do it so they did do it.”
Gray: “Wait…what about Athens…I was told they were in a civil war…and they weren’t at the candidate's selection. So in my opinion they aren't compromised and if we help end their war we might be able to get their help in taking back Walgonia.”
Edward: “It’s a shot in the dark but it’s all we got.”
Gordon: “I agree…it might not be sound but what else can we do.”
Soku: “So do we leave immediately…or?”
Edward: “I say we stay here for a bit,a month or so…then we go out.”
Gray: “You guys are fine in strength but Soku and I are lacking.”
Soku: “Yeah we are kinda behind.”
Gordon: “Look I can help Soku but I’m not a master swordsman, so I can’t do much for you Gray other than hammering in the basics. But on the top of this mountain…A god of war named Ryo, a master of the spiritual arts, that’s more your forte for what I've been told.”
Edward: “I just need to keep training…same with Rosemary, in terms of strength it would go, Julius, then me, Rosemary, Gray, and lastly Soku.”
Gordon: “Musashi sent me letters talking about you, and how you would lose too much stamina too quickly. You damage your body without thinking of what might happen after. From what I've heard your body can only handle about thirteen or so percent of your mana if one hundred is the limit.”
Gray: “Only thirteen!? Damn…”
Gordon: “I see it as a good thing, in a month your body has grown fast as well as your skill. Wait until the new year, that’s when you’ll go. So spend your time getting over what happened back in that nightmare of a castle.”
Gray: “We’ll get on that.”
End of Chapter One.