Taking the city’s main thoroughfare, surprisingly it only took a bit under an hour to reach the main gates. The gates were wide open, and the knight checking entrants into the city-proper only did their job gesturally; invasion simply wasn’t much of an issue for Varant.

As for people leaving, they didn’t even pretend to care. Ailn and Ceric walked right through.

This wasn’t really where Ailn expected to find himself, when he woke up this morning. Outside the city walls was an eclectic mix of residences and workshops: as many mansions for burghers as there were tents for migrants, and as many sustenance farmers as there were artisans.

Calling this kind of extramural space slums was definitely the wrong word, because it wasn’t within the city walls, nor was it torturously crowded. Seedy also wasn’t quite right, because there were plenty of affluent landowners who shared the space.

Free was the best word. If you decided to live outside the city, you took your chances. There were no peacekeepers, but for many it was infinitely preferable to living cheek by jowl within the city.

“You’re not staying within the city walls?” Ailn gave a skeptical glance to Ceric’s fairly lavish clothing.

“The price of adventure is hardship,” Ceric said, jingling a coin pouch which sounded rather sparse. “And… crossing tolls. It was a long way from mer-Sereia and my fortune has dwindled due to bad luck.”

“...You already used up a whole chest of gold coins,” Ailn said, in utter disbelief.

“Indeed,” Ceric said. “I spent all my money, and all my misfortune as well. I know for a fact that my luck is about to change.”

Ceric flipped open Nightwriter to an earlier entry. It looked to be about ten pages back—so around two weeks old, Ailn guessed.

‘Q: How much longer must I endure before my financial woes end?’

‘A: Concentrate and try again.’

…Wasn’t that a Magic 8 Ball response?

“As you can see, Nightwriter gave me a clear answer. It’s just like the old English proverb about wise King Lear, when he kept attempting to kill a mosquito: try, try again,” Ceric wagged his finger back-and-forth. “But I suppose it’s unfair of me to reference history you wouldn’t be aware of, Ailn.”

Ailn winced. Ceric’s rendering of the Scottish fable was so precisely wrong it was actually completely antithetical to the original story. Not to mention a bit offensive to the Scots. But more than that, Ailn had underestimated just how selectively Ceric was reading Nightwriter’s responses.

“Would you mind showing me a few more of your Nightwriter entries, Ceric?” Ailn asked.

“You can freely read it,” Ceric said, nonchalantly handing his journal over. The man’s openness and generosity continued to surprise Ailn. But so did his naivete.

Ailn flipped to a random page.

‘Q: How will I, injured and without food or drink, live to see the next moon?’

‘A: Confucius says “You have a secret admirer!”’

This one seemed a little meanspirited of Nightwriter. It felt like a miracle that Ceric hadn’t died yet.

“Now that was a tale,” Ceric remembered with a fond smile. “I had slipped and fallen into a gorge in the Carapax Crests. I was so injured I thought it really might be my time, once again. And I thought if I had any chance, it would be by traveling through the gorge instead of trying to make my way up.”

He continued: “But Nightwriter let me know: there was help nearby. And I knew no one would be down in the gorge, so with a leg that was bruised, battered, and nearly broken, I climbed my way to the main path, and found a woman who gave me provisions.”

“Your secret admirer?” Ailn asked.

“Exactly,” Ceric nodded. “I didn’t recognize her face, but I’d probably charmed the kind woman on my travels. I had no heart to tell her that we just weren’t fated, because my maiden is Adventure herself. And when we said our farewells at the next town, I could see the pain in her eyes.”

Ceric sighed wistfully.

With ten minutes walk, they’d arrived at Ceric’s place of residence, which seemed to be a room in a multi-story hostel. Which after everything Ailn had just learned on this walk, didn’t seem so bad.

With all of Ceric's unforced financial errors, Ailn wouldn't have been surprised if the adventurer was stuck in a tent in the commons. Instead, he managed to have even a room to himself, when most guests at the hostel had to share one.

They passed through the hostel’s anteroom, which had a floor strewn with loose rush, and the bottom of the huge chimney that rose through all four of the hostel’s stories. After going up a couple of floors, Ceric fiddled on his belt for a key, and unlocked his room.

It seemed Ceric had been staying in Varant for much longer than Ailn had expected. The room was clearly furnished to his taste, which suggested permanency: maps were hung all around the walls, landmarks circled with ink. A large lockbox was bolted to the floor and doubled as a chair for his writing desk.

A couple of trestle shelves stood against the wall at the foot of his mattress occupied by what could only be called knick knacks.

“That’s a lot of bags of seeds. I guess you weren’t only dealing in apples,” Ailn said, glancing at one of the shelves.

Grape seeds, barley seeds, and appleseeds.

“Yes,” Ceric frowned, “in my earliest days of Nightwriter I’d attempted to make my fortune with advanced knowledge that I fear may have been too powerful for this world. My rotten luck started then—a warning, I believe, to not abuse the secrets I’ve been given.”

Ailn flipped to the journal’s oldest entries.

‘Q: Will crop rotation work in this world?’

‘A: Be the change you wish to see in the world.’

‘Q: How do I implement crop rotation?’

‘A: Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet.’

‘Q: Why are my crops not growing?’

‘A: When all else fails, try to have fun.’

“You uh, tried to do crop rotation with grapevines and apple trees?” Ailn asked.

“It was a brilliant plan,” Ceric said, digging through his lockbox. He didn’t question Ailn’s knowledge of crop rotation, which Ceric apparently believed was beyond the agricultural practices of medieval times. “With each passing season, I could create wine, beer, and cider in turn.”

Literally right beside the hostel, a sustenance farmer had a field properly split into oats and beans, with a third of it left fallow.

Ailn could not even begin to fathom how deeply Ceric misunderstood agriculture. Did he just rip out saplings every three months?

“All things considered, I think it was a blessing in disguise,” Ceric said, pulling out a book from his lockbox. “After all, had I succeeded the way I’d hoped, I would have been stuck in one place, instead of free to ride the wind.”

“...Or you could’ve hired tenant farmers,” Ailn suggested, against his better judgment.

“Ailn, I hardly had the capital to build apartments,” Ceric said impatiently. “And if I had, I really would have been glued down! But no matter, take a look at this. Seeing as your family are seignurs to the city, I believe you’ll be interested to learn about the conspiracy I’ve been uncovering.”

Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation.

“A conspiracy?” Ailn asked, a little surprised to hear his new family mentioned.

Ceric had been treating him so casually, Ailn had started wondering if Ceric knew who the eum-Creids were.

“I believe this entire city, no, this entire duchy, no, this entire continent may be in danger,” Ceric said, holding out a book whose worn leather cover indicated not only age, but use.

The spine was cracked, and the cords binding the pages were beginning to tear. Flipping it open revealed the pages themselves were discolored, with noticeable dark smudges showing where they’d probably met oily hands.

“This strange book is one of the great mysteries of this world,” Ceric lectured Ailn. “Whence it originally came, none knows. But it is ancient, and I daresay one of the most widely copied and distributed—often found in lodgings such as this hostel.”

“That’s a rather disconcerting illustration,” Ailn said, frowning at the open page.

There, below the title ‘The Codex of Hidden Paths’ was what at a glance seemed like a normal, if badly drawn inked portrait of a woman sitting on a stool outside her house, her features shaded by nighttime. A closer look, though, revealed the creepy truth: the ‘woman’ was a shadow, and the figure cast to the wall wasn’t simply a silhouette.

She was a fully detailed human figure, distressed by her predicament, her form stretched just like a long shadow at sunset, and her features warped to match.

It was as if the real person were being cast by the shadow.

“You are quite right my friend,” Ceric said somberly. “And it is that same disturbing content which has led many to declare the book evil.

As for the text, here’s how the first page went:

* Would you seek me?

* Shall I let you into my cathedral?

* In which shadows do you think I lurk?

* There are so many seekers, and so many shadows.

* Shall I let you into my cathedral?

* In the crevices of your heart, how many have you counted?

* Were I the beautiful beyond compare, would you slaughter your village for me?

* There are many things people have slaughtered for.

* Do you think it was worth it?

* Do you believe justice is an exception?

* When the light of justice shines upon you, do you think your eyes won’t glint?

* Is death's embrace shadow or light?

* If truth is bright, then what is its shadow?

* If lies are but shadows, then is death itself a lie?

* If life eternal is a falsehood, then does death not shine like the noon sun?

* And if the light of the sun is death, should we not seek solace in shadow?

Ailn didn’t find it quite as disturbing as the illustration. It wasn’t as if the text was uplifting—the first book within was titled the ‘Terminus’ after all—but there was a reason people said pictures were worth a thousand words.

“Are you saying you’ve cracked some sort of cipher?” Ailn asked, raising an eyebrow.

“I’ve received the key to the cipher, my friend,” Ceric said. Excitement was bleeding into his gesturally heedful tone. “There I was, walking along a narrow and deserted alleyway in the industrial quarter of the city—”

“What? Why?” Ailn’s eyes narrowed.

“Nevermind that, Ailn! I heard the scrape of stone, and a man’s eyes met mine. And he acted as if nothing of interest had occurred—which only made me more suspicious,” Ceric said. “Naturally, I also acted as if I hadn’t seen anything, and went on my way. But within ten minutes, I had returned and was jostling the stones to find any that were loose. And what should I find, but this?”

Ceric pulled out a small piece of parchment—durable looking, it was probably vellum, actually. Scored neatly along all four sides, it looked like it had been prepared with care.

And on the vellum: ‘Terminus 1:15:13 1:2:7’

Ailn scanned the verses of The Book of Hidden Paths.

“Noon, cathedral?” Ailn glanced at Ceric. “What makes you think the continent is in danger, exactly?”

“‘The Codex of the Hidden Paths’ has existed in this world for over a thousand years,” Ceric leaned in and spoke in a hushed tone. “It is a manifesto of heresy and conspiracy to lead a cult of death, Ailn. I suspect we’ve stumbled upon what this world’s religious authorities have tried in vain to pin down. The cult itself!”

“Are you trying to prove it exists?” Ailn asked.

“And perhaps catch its leader,” Ceric said solemnly. “By exposing what deeds it commits in the shadows, we can bring an end to this millenia-old mystery.”

“Look, in principle, I think conspiracy is a valid consideration, for lots of things. Including this. A small-time conspiracy, probably, if it’s not some game,” Ailn sighed. “Do you really think we’re going to catch a cult that’s evaded detection for over a thousand years… by going to church on a Tuesday around lunch?”

“Even cultists must go to work on Monday, Ailn,” Ceric threw up his hands in exasperation. “And sometimes they have to do their secretive operations on Tuesday!”

“Alright, fine. We’ve got about an hour and a half to make it to the cathedral, which gives us plenty of time,” Ailn said. “Why don’t we check it out?”

Ailn wasn’t a fan of wasting time, but looking into petty crime was an expedient way to really get into this world’s nitty gritty. If Ailn knew anything about people, it was this: people who think they’ve got a secret leg up tend to find their way into crime.

He had a hunch that less conscionable reincarnators would be like moths to flame.

Sometimes you just gotta go and see how the sausage is made, right?

But just as Ailn was thinking this, four—no, five—rough-looking guys in wool that looked a little too fine burst into the room.

“Damn!” Ceric yelled out. “They must have caught onto us!”

Ailn was stunned. They cared enough about a guy picking up a scrap of vellum that they’d send five guys? The cathedral was open to the public, anyway!

It looked like none of them were armed at the moment, so Ailn went for it—kicking one of the guys’ knees as hard as he could, and managing to get the guy who tackled him right after in a chokehold.

Unfortunately, Ailn and his attacker both fell to the ground, and Ceric had barely gotten in a couple haymakers before he got restrained and smashed across the face with a right hook. That meant there were two guys free to kick at Ailn’s head. It only took four or five kicks before he was too dazed to meaningfully fight back.

“What the bloody hell?” One of the goons rubbed at his jaw and spit blood onto the floor. “Got a lotta gall, you do, tryin’ to strike us when he’s the one who’s owin’ coin.”

Ailn groaned, hoping he hadn’t just taken half a dozen kicks to the head trying to protect Ceric from loan sharks.

“Think we should take that guy, too?” the tallest guy asked.

“Hell, probably,” one of them shrugged. Curly-haired, and without much of a chin—guess he was their leader. “We oughta make sure he’s too terrified to go snitchin’.”

The smallest guy picked up the two books on the floor, stacking Ceric’s small journal on top of ‘The Book of Hidden Paths.’ He didn’t seem much interested in Ceric’s journal since it definitely wasn’t saleable.

“Ayeee! It’s that cult book! The real gloomy, whingin’ one,” he said. “Think we could sell it?”

“A book does sell for some coin,” the curly-haired man said. “But that book’s common like dirt. Don’t bother unless this one’s fine.”

“It’s not.”

“Well, there you have it,” the curly-haired man replied. “Now, let’s take a look at this one… Oh shit. Do you lads know who this is?”

Ailn scowled as his hood was removed.

The curly-haired man just sneered back.

“It’s the dimwit son of the yum-Creeds!” he yelled.

“It’s eum-Creid, sir.”

“God, who cares?” the curly-haired man spit at the floor again. “We can’t take him. His imbecile sister thinks too much of him.”

“She’s a fake, sir. Didn’t you hear the rumors?” the tall man asked. “I don’t think the new Saintess cares about him at all.”

“...You believe that rot?” the curly-haired man glared. “God, you’re gullible, you know that?”

Meanwhile, the small guy started cackling. He’d been thumbing through Ceric’s journal and reading Nightwriter entries.

“Aye, boss! This guy, Ceric, reckoned he’d catch himself a cult!” He kept flitting his eyes, amused, from Ceric to the journal. “Q: How shall I catch The Covenant of Shrouds?”

“What, the shadow fairies?” the curly-haired man asked. He looked like he was trying to keep from cracking up, but he couldn’t stop the smirk on his face. “Boy, you two surely form a pair, don’t you? That how you tryn’ step up to that Yum-Creed name, you dumb pup?”

“...eum-Creid,” Ailn muttered.

“Shut up!” the curly-haired man glared at him. Then, giving him a light slap on the cheek, his lip curled up with a cackle.. “Ailn, here’s a word of advice. Choose better friends, eh?”

The rough guys all cut up laughing, and Ailn felt his head thud against the floor. Soon, all the petty criminals were shuffling out of the room, dragging Ceric along with them.

Lying there for two or three minutes to get his bearings, Ailn looked over to his right, where Ceric’s journal had been dropped to the floor, the page the goon had been reading still visible.

‘Q: How shall I catch The Covenant of Shrouds?’

‘A: You will soon be surrounded by friends and laughter.’

Ailn, once again, groaned.