After a dozen meters, the hallway terminated into a large entrance foyer. The room must have been more than ten meters high and twenty meters across. Everything in the room was adorned with some scarlet decoration. Red tapestries hung from the walls, red carpets lined the floors, and red drapes hung from the windows. At the back of the room just above the stairs and across from the main entrance hung a large, unfurled banner of a yellow salamander on a scarlet background: the symbol of House Feldrast.

The last time I had seen that symbol, it was flapping in the wind above a small army of mind-slaves and rotting zombies. The original Thale Feldrast had experimented extensively with dark magic by the time the game had started, and this fact was apparent in his military force. He had flayed the minds of his soldiers until all that remained were husks which felt nothing but blind loyalty and murderous rage. When those mindless soldiers were inevitably killed, Thale would reanimate their destroyed bodies into zombies that were incapable of even those two emotions.

I found the original Thale’s methods distasteful. While there was nothing necessarily wrong with necromancy, his usage of it was dangerous. I would know, my main account in [Ferrum Online] was a necromancer. A powerful mage could control about a dozen undead at once. If the mage were to summon too many undead, however, they would be able to break out of their mental shackles. The undead would revert to their natural, violent state and start attacking everything near them. Necromancy was the magical equivalent of an oil spill. If you didn’t clean it up, it would destroy everything for miles.

No tool was necessarily evil, but Thale used his tools in an evil way. I promised myself that on my mission to defeat Lothar and save the world, I would not utilize those methods if they weren’t necessary.

I crawled to the other side of the foyer. It was much too early for me to be using the stairs, so I used the pathway that ran just beneath the banner of House Feldrast. As I crawled, I spotted a man dressed in gambeson armor and wielding a sword sitting on a chair near the main entrance. I did not know the man’s name, but the crest of House Feldrast was printed on the tabard he wore over his gambeson.

Looking beyond the guard for a moment, I saw a thick blanket of snow. This was common in the Northern Realms. A permanent layer of snow coated the ground for most of winter in this part of the world. Life in the Northern Realms was tough. The harvest season was short, powerful monsters roamed the deep forests between the cities, and outlanders from the Barren Wastes frequently attacked. It was only the abundance of Hellfire that allowed the people of the Northern Realms to reliably survive the winter.

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

Luckily for me, the guard was too busy staring at the front door to notice me. I snuck past the entrance foyer into a hallway opposite the one I had just entered. Just as I entered the hallway, I heard footsteps approaching from its far end. I frantically backtracked and squeezed myself under a small display cabinet that had been pushed against the wall next to the family banner.

“Thale! Thale! Where are you!?” Melissa shouted as she ran down the hallway and exited into the main foyer. I saw as the hem of her skirt and white slippers passed by my hiding spot.

Melissa saw the guard and shouted down to him. “Sir Walter! Have you seen Thale!?”

“No, I have not,” the guard said gruffly. “Is he missing?”

“Yes,” Melissa said. “He was with the Count, and now no one can find him!”

“I will begin looking immediately,” Sir Walter said sternly. A moment later, I heard the harsh sound of steel boots against wood as he ran off.

Oh, calm down, Walter. I had just escaped adult supervision a few minutes before. It wasn’t like I could open the doors to the outside or reach the knives on the upper shelves.

“I hope he’s okay,” Melissa said to herself once Walter had left. A moment later, she ran toward the hallway that I had come from.

I felt a bit bad about the worry I was causing. All things considered, though, I figured that there were extenuating circumstances that made my escape more understandable. I had just been subjected to six months of grueling boredom, and this was my first opportunity to get a real grasp on my situation. Plus, this would be a good learning experience for everyone. The maids and my parents would learn that I wasn’t necessarily in danger just because I had disappeared.

I squeezed my small body out from under the display case. It was lucky for me that the furniture in the hallways and foyer had legs rather than flat bottoms. There was just enough space under the display case for me to fit underneath. I crawled down the hallway and entered the first door I saw. There was a door about twenty meters down the hallway and to the left that was ajar. I suspected that Melissa had left it open when she was searching for me.

The heavy door opened once I leaned my whole weight upon it, opening it to reveal a library that was almost the size of the foyer. Several long mahogany bookshelves stretched from one side of the room to the other. Each bookshelf contained four individual shelves, and the shelves were absolutely stuffed with books. There must have been hundreds of books in that room. The ancient tomes beckoned me, each a treasure trove of priceless information.

A shabby work desk and chair had been placed in the corner of the library. From the ground, I could see a slip of parchment hanging over the edge. Writing material! I crawled over to the furniture and grabbed the table by the leg. Even with my abysmal strength, I could still manage to move the table slightly. I shook the table as vigorously as I could, and the equipment atop it slid off.

I reached for the objects that had fallen off the top of the table. In my small hands, I victoriously held a slip of parchment and a fountain pen.