Back to Farholt

As they approached the group of villagers Denzel called out to the Party.

“Who goes there!?”

“We’re the ‘Greenhearts’ a group of Adventurers that were dispatched by the Guild to investigate the Zone that popped up in the area behind us,” Ulrich replied gesturing back at the slowly disintegrating dome that once covered the entire forest.

“I see well thank you for your hasty intervention but…” Denzel’s eyes glanced over the Party noticing Kyle twitch at the mention of the Party’s name which he had never heard before, cursing inwardly at drawing more attention to himself Kyle watched as a twisted sneer stared to appear on the face of the Paladin.

“But we need to know something,” interrupted Thomas who had of course also noticed Kyle’s presence in the group and elbowed Denzel as he walked up to the man causing him to wheeze slightly from the impact.

“Would this have something to do with the remains we found in the Zone?” Ulrich, noticing the exchange between the two me asked bluntly causing muttering to break out among the villagers.

“So, we were right then, young Ben had indeed entered this Zone, what a shame,” replied Thomas shaking his head sadly, pausing momentarily to glare at Denzel he continued, “You travellers must be tired I’ll send my Companion Alistair on ahead to let the Innkeeper know to expect guests, you can rest in Farholt,” at his words the small owl nodded and flew off in the direction of the village.

Kyle was briefly shocked at the revelation of who had likely perished in the Zone, Ben had been the boy who had tormented him the most over the years due to losing his father in the monster attack that had cost Kyle both his parents, he felt a small amount of sadness despite this as it no meant that Ben’s mother was now all alone, something that Kyle understood all too well.

The Party agreed that resting at a nearby village sounded like a good plan, casting slightly apologetic glances at Kyle’s hooded figure as they did so, but didn’t really have any way of getting out of it without seeming rude, and besides they had the remains in Theodore’s inventory and were loath to just pass them on.

The journey to Farholt was a sombre one with most of the villagers keeping quiet as they had all known Ben and knew that someone would have to break the news to his mother. Trailing slightly behind the rest of the villagers, Thomas and the Party members quietly talked among themselves as Thomas wished to get as much information as possible before they reached the village.

By the time they had reached the village the sun was beginning to set and many of the remaining villagers were waiting for the group to return. Ben’s mother looked around desperately for her son but none of the villagers met her eyes and as Thomas pushed his way to the front she collapsed in anguish already having guessed at what the priest was going to tell her.

As the sobbing woman was led away by her friends Thomas turned to the Party with a grim look on his face, “That’s the worst part of my job,” he sighed tiredly. “Anyway, we better get you shacked up for the night follow me,” he said leading the party away as Denzel watched with an angry expression on his face.

When they arrived at the Inn, Kyle was relieved to see that Al had cleared out the villagers for the night, allowing the Party members to relax.

“Welcome to you all, it’s good to see you kid,” the large man greeted them as they walked in the door. Kyle smiled as he breathed in the familiar smell of Sam’s cooking in the air and hugged Al, the others smiling at Al’s discomfort.

“It’s good to see you too Al, been a rough few days.”

“Apparently so, I heard about what happened to Ben, seeing something like that is rough, but please, take a seat everyone,” he replied and once everyone had been introduced they started talking.

“So, what’s up with that Paladin back there? He seemed like he had it in for Kyle pretty bad,” asked Resald to much nodding from the others.

Looking at Kyle who shifted uncomfortably Thomas replied, “Well that’s a long story, in short he hates Kyle because of something that happened the night Kyle’s parents died.”

“What happened?” asked Claire who had long since noticed that Denzel was a Paladin of Asteria which meant that he was the man that caused Kyle’s reaction in the forest regarding her own relationship with Asteria.

“Kyle’s parents were killed by a large pack of Barghests,” Thomas continued drawing a surprised gasp from the Party who knew just how dangerous those monsters were. “When Denzel led some guards out to try and help, they were slaughtered, and Denzel was the only survivor. He blamed Kyle’s parent and wanted to make an example of Kyle himself-” he said drawing an outraged squawk from Claire who quickly apologised and asked him to continue.

Coughing slightly Thomas did so, “So I hit him from behind with my Smite Skill, the mark of which you may have noticed on his armour and took the boy here to be raised, however Denzel himself felt that the incident was a stain on his record and he has held it against the both of us ever since. Now, would you care to tell me why you are so interested in such a thing young lady?”

“I myself am a member of Asteria’s Church and am horrified to hear that a Paladin of our church has been acting in this manner,” she replied.

“Hmm,” Thomas hummed as he looked at the petit blonde before asking, “And how does this help anything?”

Claire smiled grimly, and the others felt a slight chill run down their spines as she replied, “Suffice to say Mr. Denzel will be receiving a visit from a very angry High Priest. All Paladin’s are expected to act in accordance with the will of their faith and any allegations against them must be taken seriously as their actions can cause the people to lose faith in the church.”

Thomas understood very well how ‘grumpy’ the High Priest would be when they found out about how Denzel had planned to treat a recently orphaned boy. Asteria’s church was known for its orphanages and many of its priesthood came form these orphanages themselves, he had himself considered sending a message to the Church of Asteria but knowing how other religions often considered the Church of the System to be little more than glorified mages, as the System itself wasn’t a god, he had decided against doing so.

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“So, your plan is to get him Excommunicated?” asked Al, whose face was a little pale.

“Well let’s hope it doesn’t come to that, there are too many ways that can go wrong, but that’ll be up to the High Priest that comes to check things out,” Claire replied seriously.

Looking around she noticed some of the other people in the room weren’t quite following the conversation, “Excommunication means his Class will be forcibly changed from his current Paladin type to something else dependent on how he reacts to being Excommunicated. If he reacts poorly he could become a type of Fallen Paladin, that sort of Class, while not technically forbidden if someone gains it through their Class choices, if a Paladin becomes one after they’re cast out from their church, the church often attempts to detain them as they often know a lot about the internal workings of their church. The other options are a Knight-type Class, which isn’t treated as badly, but the last option is for those who feel a sense of remorse for their actions and is known as a Penitent.”

“You can forcibly change someone’s Class!?” exclaimed Kyle in surprise.

“Only certain people, like a priest of sufficient strength and even then, only if they share the same deity as you,” Claire replied making the others breath a sigh of relief, that sort of power could completely ruin someone’s life so the limitations on such a thing were something to be thankful for.

“Well that explains why the Empire has so much difficulty keeping its slaves then, if they could actively change someone’s Class we would be in a whole lot of trouble,” said a relieved Resald.

“Sounds like you’ve got a history with those fanatics, but yes that is one of the reasons they aren’t even more powerful than they are,” said Al glancing sideways at the elf.

“But we can get back to that later it looks like Sam just finished cooking dinner,” and sure enough the monkey- shaped companion was carrying out the first trays of food from the kitchen.

To everyone’s relief there was no pork in any of the dishes Sam had prepared that evening and they all enjoyed their meals before returning to the previous subject.

“So, I feel like I’m the only one in the room that doesn’t really know what the ‘Empire’ that we’re talking about really is,” Kyle said finally, as he looked around the table.

“Its true name is ‘The New Byzantine Empire’ and they’re a human supremacy group that splintered off from Christianity, one of the religions of the old world that is still around today, but back when the world as our ancestors knew it ended, many couldn’t handle the changes. Meeting the other species of intelligent life, what we now call ‘Races’ due to the majority being able to interbreed, caused even more problems and eventually a number of splinter factions travelled to the East and established the basis of what is now the empire,” explained Thomas, who grimaced as he didn’t really want to expand on what was a touchy subject for most humans who didn’t live within the empire, especially considering the non-human company in the room.

“But what’s currently causing the problems people have with the empire right now is their national policy of enslaving non-humans,” said Thomas as he tried to return the subject to today’s problems.

“When they started out the empire didn’t keep non-humans as slaves, they discriminated against them sure, but they didn’t start to take them as slaves until about a hundred years ago. The relationships between them and the surrounding countries that treated non-humans as equals had been seriously worsening and the leader at the time a man now known only as ‘Iulus’ decided that he needed to make a statement and claiming to have received a message from his god started to raid villages and capture any non-humans he found,” Thomas stated sadly.

“But what about the other countries, why didn’t they do anything?” Kyle asked.

“Oh, they did, but it seems that the empire felt it could do as it wished for a reason, their troops, while outnumbered had some elite groups that laid waste to the allied armies. How they got so powerful we still don’t know, they could have found a particularly powerful dungeon or even something that we’ve never seen before, but they managed to cause enough casualties that the other countries had to quit the field,” explained Thomas.

“And after that they erected a magical barrier around the country that they let down periodically to raid the nearby countries, sometimes they get driven back but not without more people being taken as slaves. I’ve even heard rumours they’ve started enslaving humans as well,” finished Ulrich causing the others to look at him in shock, “sorry, I come from an area near the border of the empire so I actually most of this myself.”

“Anyway, that’s enough of heavy subjects for now we’d better head off to bed for the night, I want to be report back to the Guild as soon as possible,” said Ulrich and they all dispersed to their rooms.

Once they were inside their room Fi finally opened ger mouth, “So, what do you think of all that?”

“Apart from the fact that everyone’s been keeping secrets?” Kyle asked raising his eyebrows at her, “Oh, don’t look at me like that, I know I’ve got my own secrets and I’m not actually a member of their party anyway.”

“I was actually talking about the subjects of Denzel and the empire,” she replied drily.

Kyles face flushed with embarrassment, “Ah, well naturally I’d be happy to see Denzel punished for everything but why the empire? I mean it’s not a great situation but there’s not a lot I could do.”

“There might be some related missions at the guild, what about then?”

“I still don’t think it’s a good idea, I don’t even have a Tier 2 Class what am I supposed to do against soldiers?” asked Kyle.

“And if you were?”

“Fi, why are you pushing me on this?” Kyle asked irritably.

Fi sighed and met Kyle’s eyes before answering, “You just seemed very interested in the empire, and I was wondering why.”

“Look Fi, honestly, if I could do something about it I would, I don’t like the idea that humans are going around enslaving people, but I can’t, I don’t have enough power to even consider it right now.”

“Very well, we can always revisit this at a later date, but that is a good enough answer for now,” Fi replied cryptically before curling up for the night. Kyle watched her for a while with a confused look upon his face before shrugging and following her example.

The next morning the party gathered at the town gates and said their goodbyes to Thomas and the villagers who had turned up to see them off. Claire shot a somewhat sinister look towards Denzel as she turned to leave causing the older man to frown at her back.

Kyle relaxed as they walked down the road the stress caused by returning to the village leaving his body, “So I think I’m going to try and do some training on the way back,” he said as they left Farholt behind them.

“Oh, that’s a good idea we might join you, what have you got planned?” asked Resald.

“Just some running for now, I want to see if I can raise my base Agility and Endurance, maybe unlock a Skill, you know, now that I’m starting to reach the limits of what my Class can give me.”

“Alright, sounds good,” said Ulrich, “I’ll join you as well.”

Following Kyle’s lead, they started jogging on ahead of Claire and Theodore who watched with amusement. Once they were a little ahead Kyle turned around and ran back. After repeating this several times, the differences between the three became clear, Resald was the fastest, and had enough Endurance that he could stay ahead of the other two, Ulrich was a little slower than Kyle in his heavier armour, but his Endurance was much higher and soon he too was pulling ahead of Kyle.

They kept this up for as long as they could but eventually they had to stop to rest finding Claire had also decided to do a little training and had a few small lights orbiting her as she walked. Once they had recovered from their exertions they once again started training and soon could see their destination on the horizon.