Inside the room I had rented out, I sat myself down on the edge of the bed. Being forced into another world had pretty much kept me preoccupied, even the thought of being an undead had been placed on the back burner due to how busy I had been trying to figure everything out. And not only was I in a state of confusion, it also seemed like fate had one out for me. Only until now when I had a chance to pause for a moment did I really, truly realize I wasn't the same.
Looking at the bed that wouldn't be used for sleep, I decided to turn my focus away from my longing of the past. "Lilana..." The name of the granddaughter that was mentioned in the unknown mages notes. "Ah, his name was Horrus if I remember correctly." Recalling the conversation I had over heard, Horrus had been the name of the unknown mage. Thinking back about how I had pretty much ransacked his house, I gave a small prayer for forgiveness to the mage that was once called Horrus.
I pulled out the book that I had taken, carefully observing the book I began to plan out my thoughts. "If I want to open this book, I'm going to have to meet up with Lilana... Hmm, now that I'm sitting here thinking about this, wouldn't this girl just go to here town? She seemed to care about here grandfather enough to make a ruckus outside. Haa, I wouldn't be having this problem if I wasn't so stuck on learning offensive and defensive magic. Had I known I would die so early in life, I would have learned some support magic."
Realizing I started to get off track, I pulled myself together. "Well at least I have a long time to plan out my moves." I pulled of my glove and stared at my skeletal hand. "Didn't expect myself to be so weak. To think that I'm so close to founding out a new type of magic to me and yet." I didn't finish my sentence. Normally being emotionally strong, there wasn't really anything I couldn't pull myself out of. But the longer I stared at my flesh-less hand, the more I longed for my past body.
A couple hours passed before I could pull myself away from my self loathing. I had gone through countless emotions within those hours like everything had been unplugged. Why had the gods played with me so? A skeletal body with the emotions of a human. Not being able to eat or sleep, yet longing for both. Questions that won't be answered and yet I had sat there for hours searching for one. "I... I might actually go crazy if I keep this up." Saying this out loud to myself, I got up from the bed and looked out the window. "I'm gonna have to let myself fall into the abyss of magical knowledge if I don't want to break into insanity." whispering this I stared out of the window to look at the now rising sun.
I walked out of The Pig's Belly and was greeted by the silent streets of Rhanoa. With the sun just starting to rise, not even merchants had begun their day. Walking towards the entrance into Rhanoa I had spotted a peculiar shop. Grabbing my attention I approached the closed shop and began to window shop. All sorts of trinkets had been placed around the store. They ranged from accessories such as rings and necklaces, to horns, powders and the most intriguing item. A small crystal like object the size of fist.
The reason for my interest for the stone was due to being able to feel the mana. Unlike the mana that surrounded me at all times, the mana that was contained inside the crystal felt like it already had its property changed. I pulled myself from the window of the store and took a look at the sign that was posted on the store. "Mozaar's Magic Store... Well isn't that quite the... plain name." Staring into the store once again, I decided to come back to this store once I finished my current objective. Continuing forward to go backwards I exited Rhanoa and started heading towards the ruined town were Horrus had once reside.
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After the bad news I had received from my classmates, I was pretty much forced into the room we had rented. I was so shocked to hear about my village and what had happened to my grandfather, that at one point I had tried to make a mad dash towards my village. My friend Malia had locked me inside the room with her continuously calming me down. After weeping for god knows how long I had fell asleep. After the sun had raised higher in the sky, my classmates and I had grouped up and left the port town of Rhanoa.
Sitting on the carriage we had brought with us I looked out towards the vast sea of forests. I didn't realize how anxious I was until Malia spoke out to me. "How are you feeling Lilana?" Malia had said in a gentle tone while looking at me with her warm brown eyes.
"I'm... I'm fine. Sorry about yesterday, I know I shouldn't have tried to run out like that but..." I looked down trying to keep myself together. Malia had pulled my head onto her chest and started to comfort me again.
"I know its hard for you right now Lilana, its fine if you want to cry." She continued to stroke my hair, even with being the same age, Malia had a very motherly feeling. Whenever something went wrong she was always right there to comfort me. I pulled myself away from her and shook my head.
"Thanks Malia, But now isn't the time for me to cry. I... I need to figure out the state of my village and what had happened to it. I still can't believe that my village was destroyed while my grandfather lived there."
"Master Horrus also had Sir Lennerd with him didn't he?"
"Yeah, Uncle Lennerd was staying with Grandfather. That's all the more reason as to why the Norria Village shouldn't have been taken down by some monsters. Plus, there aren't any monsters living in the forest here that are strong enough to take down Uncle Lennerd."
This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it
"Maybe some new monster moved into the forest then." Another one of my classmate had stated.
"That wouldn't be possible Krist, my Grandfather is a great mage that studies summoned monsters and creatures. If a new type of monster suddenly starting making a nest in the forest my Grandfather would have known."
"We will found out more when we get there, so lets conclude this topic. Lilana should also rest a bit, I'm sure you haven't realized how anxious you currently are but I can see it taking a tole on you." Malia had said this while embracing me with another hug. Now that she had pointed it out, I felt a bit fatigued. I took Malia up on her offer and used her shoulder to take a rest.
With the constant shaking of the carriage, I ended up waking up. Even with the short nap I did find myself to feel a lot better. After conversing with my classmates, a little after an hour had passed we had made it to Norria Village. The six of us had stepped off the carriage and just stared at the now ruined village. I could feel my heart drop at the sight of my destroyed home town.
Malia, Krist, and I had formed one group while my other classmates had grouped into another. With the two groups formed, Lester my classmate in the other group had called out to us. "While this place may be in ruins there could still be monsters in the vicinity I want all you to proceed with caution. When you're done investigating we will meet back up at the entrance to Norria Village." After receiving orders from Lester both our groups had started to move in different directions.
I had told Malia and Krist that I wanted to straight to my Grandfathers place. They both nodded in agreement with me and started to walk towards my Grandfathers house. Looking at all the ruined houses on the way, I could feel tears starting to form. Malia noticed this and tried to comfort me. I knew that it could be dangerous here but the more I walked through the destroyed remains of my Village I couldn't help but want to crumble down on the spot. With Malia's help we managed to get to my Grandfathers house.
Two big gaping holes marked the side of the house. One was on the bottom floor while the other hole was where my Grandfather had put his office. We stepped into the house and made our way up to my Grandfathers office. Looking at the room, everything had been scattered around. I examined the room to look for anything out of the ordinary only to notice that there hadn't been any sort of remains. "If Grandfather had perished along with Uncle Lennerd, wouldn't there be some sort of remains? Now that I think about this properly, I don't remember seeing any sort of remains anywhere and yet." While thinking of what might have happened to cause all this, I heard Malia shouting
"Lilana! Krist! Somethings wrong here! There's... There's Think fog covering the village!
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After some time had passed since we had split up from Lilana, Malia, and Krist. Harold, Delilah, and I had walked quite the distance away from the Lilana's groups. Moving around the ruined houses and searching for any sort of clues, Harold and Delilah had pointed out what had been on my mind. "Hey Lester, have you noticed?" Harold had said while walking towards me.
"Yeah, I think we all have pretty much come to notice that there aren't any bones anywhere."
"..." Harold looked hard at the ground trying to think of a reason as to what exactly had happened here. As I was about to tell Harold not to think about it now, Delilah came into the house and gestured us to follow her. Snapping Harold out of his thoughts I began moving towards Delilah. "Did you find anything?" I asked her.
"Yeah I found something in the streets a little further ahead. I think It might hold some clues as to what had happened here." After talking for a brief moment we all ended up walking towards two clumps of steel.
"This is what I found." She said solemnly.
"Hmm, a random suit of armor in a deserted village. Plus, there's only one suit of armor here." I questioned. While think about why a suit of armor was here Harold had pointed something out.
"It looks like this armor was in battle, and from the looks of the damage it sustained, it must have been quite the battle."
"Isn't it obvious for a suit of armor to be damaged in battle Harold?" Delilah had said. Wondering why Harold had pointed out something so obvious I then quickly noticed why he had said what he did.
"I see you spotted the reason why I said those things Lester, truly the man worthy to be class president huh, strong and intelligent hmhm." Not following the conversation Delilah had a look of confusion on her face.
"Its as Harold had said, this suit of armor had definitely seen some fierce battle. And with the looks of it in pieces like this, the man inside the suit should have surely died but..." As I was about to continue on, I found a strange mark on the inside of the suit of armor. Taking a closer look at the mark I pulled back in shock. Both Harold and Delilah flinched due to my sudden movement and came over to help me up. "What happened Lester?" Harold asked.
"Are you alright?" Cutting Harold off Delilah jumped in looking worried.
"I'm... Alright." I said quietly. Harold and Delilah both sighed and relief. "Delilah, Harold, we should pull back, find Lilana's group and leave this place quickly." I said this while turning from the suit of armor and walking towards the carriage.
"Whats the matter Lester?" Delilah questioned
"That suit of armor was involved in foul forbidden magic." I answered.
"WHAT!?" Both Harold and Delilah and shouted out.
"I looked accidentally found a runic mark inside the suit of armor. But even without knowing what kinda of ruin it is, with all the evidence we found surrounding this village I'm pretty sure that this place was involved in some sort of forbidden magic. This is just speculation but I still think we need to leave this place now." I said as I upped my walking pace.
As we quickly walked back towards Master Horrus's house, before we even got half way there we were suddenly beset with an unnatural mist. The mist that surrounded the village was quickly turning into a think fog, and in a matter of minutes. The once clear village was now covered in a white sheet. With the sudden fog appearing before us, Harold, Delilah and I, got into a battle ready position. Not knowing where the enemy was, or even if there was an enemy, we all had our backs to each other so as not to get taken in from the back.
Carefully watching my surroundings I noticed something. Two blue dots that floated in mid air. gradually getting brighter the blue lights stopped moving all of sudden. And after what seemed like an eternity staring at the dots a voice called out in a chilling manner. "Sorry but, I'm gonna need you to sleep for a bit." And before I could call out to my friends, I felt a strong hit and passed out.