Jacob woke to light streaming in through the curtains. When he opened his eyes and looked around, he saw that he was not in his room, and he began to panic until he remembered the events of the day before. How he was in another world, and had been transported to it along with his classmates! He glanced around the large room that they had given him which could fit three of his bedrooms back home inside of it. It had two large windows, facing the inner courtyard of the castle, as well as a large dresser for any clothes and finally the large four poster king size bed he had slept in. He got up and made his way to the common room where he saw that Max and Alexis were already sitting on the couches. He noticed a smell and saw that the table had a wide array of breakfast from eggs and bacon to toast with butter.
“Good morning you two” Jacob said “I hope you both slept well.” Then he went to get a plate full of breakfast.
“Hey Jacob” Max started “ I didn’t sleep much because I was so worried about what was going to happen to us. Why did you volunteer to fight so easily?”
I paused as I thought about his question and search for an answer but then I shrugged and look to him as I said “what other choice do we have? It may have seemed hasty and thoughtless, but do you really think they will continue to give us free room and board if we were to tell them no?” They both look shocked as they considered the implications of what I told them. “We need to take every advantage we can get while they are still being kind to us because we have absolutely no one and nothing in this world besides each other and if they decide we aren’t worth their time, they are as likely to throw us out as anything.”
“ They couldn’t do that to us could they?” Alexis sounded frantic as she continued “ they can’t take us from our homes, and then just kick us out!”
“He’s not saying that that is what they will do is just saying that it is a possibility that we need to consider. I hadn’t thought of it, but I agree, we need to get as strong as possible so we can stand on our own two feet.” Max look determined as he said that.
Oh yeah, Max is definitely the one out of us who is going to be the hero. And I can already tell he’s not just thinking of himself but of everyone. Jacob thought to himself.
Over the course of the next 30 minutes, everyone emerged from their rooms, and once everyone had had their fill of breakfast, we talked about what we should do for the next three days. Everyone agreed that we needed to find out more about this world, but we did not have time, for each one of us to search out all the information so we decided we would delegate. Mary and I would research the history of this world and country to see what we could find out, Ramon and Max would go talk to some soldiers and see what kind of training we were looking at, Isabell, and Alexis would find out as much as they could about levels, and what we could do with them, lastly Andy would find out what he could from the staff about what they thought of us. We would meet back here at the end of the day to discuss what everyone had learned.
After we asked a castle servant to show us the way Mary and I went to the library to begin doing research on the history of this world.
“Where should we start?” Mary asked while looking straight at me.
“I think we should split up and focus our efforts. How about you take the history of the demon king and the heroes and I’ll take the specific history of this country. Then when we’re done we will pick something else.” I told her my thoughts.
“That is a great idea Jacob!” Mary’s smile was so bright when she looked at me that it made me blush and look away.
Just like that we began our research. We passed the time going from book to book, sometimes skimming them and some reading deeply. I learned that this kingdom of Lightfell used to be much larger after it was founded by the first hero after he defeated the demon king. The name was also different, The Kingdom of the Light, the name was later changed after the kingdom actually fell after a brutal civil war after the second hero defeated the demon king. These days the Lightfell kingdom was much smaller than the two kingdoms that bordered it to the north. The Tristan kingdom to the northwest and the Holy Republic to the Northwest. Both of those two countries were founded by members of the second hero’s party after he returned to Earth. There were a few other smaller countries that were North of those two but we would look those up later. The Lightfell kingdom was situated at the very southern tip of the only continent that their maps depicted named Avriel after the planet. It appeared that the country had had its ups and downs and was in a perpetual state of war with its two neighbors. The war wasn’t filled with large battles but mostly skirmishes of one against the other over minor land grabs. The other two countries did the same to each other, but every few couple hundred years a new ruler would rise up and decide they wanted to reconnect the Lightfell kingdom again. When that happened all out warfare would begin but the Lightfell kingdom never won because the other two countries would join forces temporarily to repel them. It was confusing to me that a king would try this even though they knew they would lose until I read a particular passage in a book that I was shocked to find there.
It is in this authors’s most humble opinion that the reason that time after time a king rises up who is foolish enough to challenge our neighbors alliance is that they must do it! The Aritorius family can trace their lineage back to the very first ‘Hero King’ and they justly feel they are the rightful rulers of the lands. Therefore when enough time has passed and a new king takes the throne who is hot heated and hot blooded, then they must take action and go out to re conquer the lost lands. Tragically they always lose in the end because it is hard enough to defeat one country, let alone two even if your country has the better and stronger army of any single nation. It is with great relief that so far no king has been so foolish as to wage war too close to the coming of the demon king when all countries must set aside their differences and defend the continent from his horrid armies.
Historian Victor Avon Straus
Wow it was shocking to me that anyone could be dumb enough to try that after the first few times that it failed but no it seemed that over the last 4,800 years since the first time someone tried to reunite the nation and failed, it was attempted another 11 times!
“Have you found anything useful?” I jumped violently when Mary came up behind me and asked that.
“Yeah,” I replied and began to tell her what I found and that it seemed just 50 years ago there had been an attempt by the previous king to reunite the country. It was the closest one had ever been to a hero summoning and apparently he had thought he would catch them unprepared and win quickly.
Mary looked troubled when I finished. She then began to tell me what she had found. Apparently the Demon King was an entity that had existed since before recorded history. His army of demons would terrorize the humans and Demi-humans of the world near constantly. Anytime they built something up then they would come tear it down. Then the gods gave the humans the summoning ritual that summoned the first Hero and his two companions. They went out and waged a brutal campaign against the demon king’s army before eventually defeating him. Then 1000 years later the demons had reappeared and the people of the Kingdom of the Light summoned another group of saviors. This time five of them. They once again defeated the demon king. The next time the people decided to summon the saviors a little early to have time to prepare them since they weren’t exactly sure when the demon king resurrected. When it failed they tried again and again every day for two years until it worked. They realized that the gods would not let anyone be summoned until the demon king was revived and from then on that is how it was done. Everything she read seemed to indicate that the people of this world just accepted the fact that there was a demon king who revived and that saviors would arrive to defeat him.
“Did it give you any specifics about the hero and his powers or what level they had to achieve to defeat, the demon king?” I asked Mary.
“No it did not say that, it did tell me that everyone in this world gets their classes at level 10 and the hero and his party are no different.” Mary shared with me.
“Well, I think we should see what we can find out about classes next” I told Mary, she agreed so we moved over to a section that seemed to be set aside for classes. The library we were in was appropriately massive for the capitol of a nation. There were books 10 feet in the air on shelves with row after row of hand carved wooden shelves. There were murals on the ceiling depicting vast battles and the figure with the shining sword which I now knew to be the hero.
We both picked an end and began to read on the classes. Once we were done and met in the middle I wasn’t sure what to think. Unlike games from back home where you would choose your class the gods here chose it for you, of course you could influence it by doing specific actions and learning specific skills before taking your class but someone who was destined to become a warrior could never become a mage. Someone who was going to be a rogue, could learn skills about archery and possibly get the ranger class. The classes could then be specialized at level 25 and you would get to choose from some options that were determined by your skills, stats and experiences. The notable exception to this would be the hero, whose class would never change.
Anyone could learn any skill, but there were bonuses to leveling the speed of your skills depending on your class, a warrior, who was trying to learn magic skills would have reduced learning speed compared to learning a weapons skill.
Just like that the day had passed for us, we couldn’t tell because there were no windows leading into the library, but it had been some time since we had eaten lunch of meat and cheese that a servant had brought us. But we were informed by him, and another servant that it will be time for dinner soon, and we will be dining with the king and princess again.
We followed the survey back through the different Corredor‘s to reach the dining hall, and as we walked, I paid the pictures and tapestries more attention. Now that I was more informed of what they were representing. In some it showed multiple people with the hero, defeating armies of monstrous looking beings and another’s the hero was by themselves. Most of the heroes appeared to be men, but I saw an occasional one that was a woman. When we made it to the dining hall, I saw that we were the last to arrive and everyone was in the same seating arrangements from the night before, so Mary and I quickly got to our places. Once we had been seated, servants brought forth another lavish dinner with many different kinds of delicacies.
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There was no talk while we ate, but when we finished the king started off with “well how was your first day in our land? I was very interested to hear that you all broke off and we’re doing different things in the castle. Some of you were asking some interesting questions.” he finished talking while looking at Andy.
Max glanced around at everyone before he started off by saying “ The hospitality you and your people have shown us has been wonderful but we were just wanting to learn about the situation that we had found ourselves in as much as we could.”
The king chuckled and responded “ I cannot fault you for trying to learn everything you can about where you are and who we are. I hope that in time you will come to see us as a second family in this to be your home.” The king had a kind smile on his face as he said this wow the princess beside him looked annoyed. “ tomorrow I believe you all should meet the Royal Tailor in order for him to get your sizes and make some new clothing for you all since you came to our world with just what you are wearing.” All of the girls looked excited to hear that they would be getting new clothing.
Ramon, who was sitting beside the princess again turned to her and asked “ will you be joining us at all tomorrow, princess”
The look on the princesses face said she wanted to be anywhere than around us, more than she absolutely had to, and she opened her mouth to seemingly respond with some scathing remark but the king beat her to it “ she would be delighted to accompany you all to the tailor. She would be able to give some expert advice on what is fashionable today for you all.” the princess looked at her father, but before she could say anything, he gave her a look that was obvious to mean for her not to say anything right now, and she turned back and gave a pain smile to Ramon.
“ I will see you all at the tailor, now, if I may be excused by still have a few tasks to finish before bed.” With that she stood up from the table curtsied to everyone and left in a hurry.
Max turned to look at the king and asked what I believe we were all thinking “ Why does it seem as if she does not like us? I was under the impression that everyone would be happy to have the hero and their companions here.”
The king look troubled, and he was quiet for so long, that I believed we were never going to get an answer, but eventually he just side, and his shoulder slumped as he told us the reason for her seeming dislike “ she has a good reason. It is because if the hero is one of you young men, you are the only hope for our kingdom to survive after the demon king has been defeated.” Everyone looked confused as he finished and were glancing at each other but before anyone could ask him anything, he continued “ you see the leader, ship of our kingdom is passed through the male heirs but my wife fell ill many years ago, and has been bedridden ever cents, that is why you have yet to meet her. Because of that, we only ever had our daughter, and so her husband will be the future king of the nation. Under normal circumstances, I would marry her to the son of a duke of our kingdom and everything would be all right but because of the actions of my father years ago, starting a war, so close to the time of the demon king, our neighbors, are angry with us. Once the threat of the demon king is over, they have determined that they will join forces to crash our kingdom, and then divide up the spoils between themselves, so that they will no longer be a Lightfell kingdom. In order to avoid that happening, we have two options before us. Either my daughter marries is the newly crowned king of Tristan kingdom, and they absorb us and our kingdom will be no more or if the hero is one of your boys and we can convince you to stay then she would marry you and you would be our next king. The other countries would never invade, while we had a hero as our king because they could not help to defeat him in battle.”
Jacob looked around while the king spoke, and he noticed, Ramon looked excited by the thought of being with the princess, while Max just looked thoughtful it would be pretty incredible to be with a princess and then you would be king on top of it! The fact that she is gorgeous definitely helps too but it is not something I would ever have to worry about. One of the others will definitely be the hero. Jacob thought to himself.
“Is there anyway to know who is the hero is yet?” Alexis asked
“No” the king replied “it is sad that when the magic reaches out to your world, it finds a collection of individuals who all have the potential to be the hero and summons you all here. Then the gods choose one of you to be the hero upon advancement to Level 10. It has become a tradition for all of you, too level at the same speed, and then kill the final creature that you need to advance to the next level at the same time in order for everyone to have the opportunity to become the hero. Some in the past felt that the first person to reach level 10 would be the hero, but that was never proven true. Now I think it is time we all retire for bed and I will be happy to answer any more questions at dinner tomorrow night.”
We all scrambled to get up and perform some semblance of a bow, even though none of us knew what we were doing. We then returned to our room.
“Could you imagine? Me as a king and married to that beautiful princess.” Ramon had stars in his eyes as he imagined his future.
“ There’s no guarantee that one of you boys will be the hero” Alexis look smug as she chimed in “ It could be one of us girls.”
“Everybody knows that the hero is always a guy Alexis” Ramon rolled his eyes as he replied to her.
“That isn’t actually true” Mary spoke up “Jacob and I read that there have already been girl heroes.” Mary seem to shrink into her self, as everybody turned to look at her.
“ I think now is a good time for all of us to share what we learned while we were doing our research today.” Max ever the calm thinker interjected on what was about to be a heated argument.
“All right Max” I replied, “ I’ll go first” I then proceeded to tell them what Mary and I had learned about the world we were in. The of the nation, and what we had learned about the demon king, the heroes and classes in general. When we were done Isabel spoke up and said she would go next.
“We actually went to princess Alicia about our questions, since she is our age. She was much nicer to us girls, but after hearing what the king said it makes sense. Pretty much what she told us was that you gain levels one through 10 through killing things for the most part. When you kill a creature, you receive experience points based on the level of that creature. No matter what creature it is you always get the same amount of experience per level but once you are 10 levels higher than it, you no longer receive experience for killing something. You can also get experience through leveling skills, but it is not very much until you have taken your class after level 10 and you level skills in your focus then you receive more than just regular skills. Anyone can gain any skill through hard work, but raising the level for skills that are not in your class and much more difficult than ones that align with your class. Everyone who receives a class will receive at least two skills specific to their class, unless they have already trained the skills and in that case, they will get a free, skill level. She did mention that the hero is the only class that is different. Every hero begins with one unique skill that no one else has, and only they possess. It is impossible to know what the skill will be ahead of time, and people believe that it is unique to each hero. The first hero had a unique skill that gave them incredible storm magic, whereas the second hero had a unique skill that made them impossible to beat with a sword. She told us that there are 100 total levels, but no one has ever been recorded in history making it to level 100. And she said that the problem is that it is so difficult to find enough enemies at a high enough level to continue leveling, and it is so hard to defeat these enemies when you do find them that most give up on leveling. It is rumored that the first hero was level 91 after he defeated the demon king and that is the highest anyone has ever heard of. The current highest level person in this kingdom is the captain of the kings guard who will be training us at level 75. he is believed to be the highest level person in the world right now since the Lightfell kingdom has the largest number of dungeons, and the highest leveled ones. That is why they are considered to have the single, strongest army in the world.” Even Isabell, who was used to standing in front of crowds, and cheering was looking a little sheepish after giving that long speech.
Max went next, and to summarize what they learned from the soldiers and guards. We would be trained in all manner of weapons for a few days before they took us to a low level dungeon, and.’ power leveled’ us until we reached our first class all together. Once we reach that they would focus on acquiring more skills and leveling those skills that were centered around our class. Once we had gained, the appropriate skills, we would begin going to dungeons in order to raise our level as fast as possible, because if this demon king summoning followed the usual patterns, then the small countries to the north would begin small groups of demon soldiers attacking in a few months. That surprise me until Max revealed that the demon king was always revive somewhere in the far far north, where humans were unable to survive, due to the harsh cold.
That only left Andy to go, and we were all really curious to hear what he had asked people that got the king’s attention. “ well, that just leaves me, I talk to the servants, the staff, the guards, even the kitchen help. And for the most part, everyone share the same opinion, and most of them even seemed sincere. They were all nervous about the time of the demon king, but were excited. That the hero was here to protect them. The people have an almost reverant devotion to the hero, and that bleeds over into those who are in his party. There were a few people that thought we were too young to live up to their expectations, but even those still believe that the hero would win in the end. Now what was really interesting was whenever I would ask people, why the demon king was revived and why no one had ever done anything to stop it. It made everyone nervous and no one would give me a straight answer as to what was going on. I think that they were hiding something that is common knowledge to them, but not to us”
We all agreed that something about that sounded fishy. After that, everyone began to go to their bedrooms until it was just me Max and Isabell left. I gave Max a look and jerked my head towards his room, and his eyes got big before he smiled and chuckled as he got up and headed to his room.
“So Isabell how are you holding up with this?”
Isabel’s head jerked up when she heard me say her name and she seemed surprised before she responded with “I am doing all right. All things considered. I miss my family and my little brother especially my little brother Andrew. I hope they are doing all right and aren’t starting to wonder where we are since it has already been a few days.”
I was shocked when she said that because it made me realize that I haven’t shared some thing that I discovered with everyone “ actually, they might not even know that you are missing yet” she seemed shocked when I said that and so I continued “ well from what I read in the library about the previous heroes. It appears that time does not move the same in this world as ours. And according to what previous heroes have said, it seems that for every 1000 years that pass here, only 100 pass back on our world, so our parents may not even know we are missing for a few more days here. Even if it takes us a few years to kill the demon king and go home, not much time will have passed.”
There were tears in her eyes when I finished, and I worried that I had said something wrong or but I realize she was happy when she told me “that is great! I was so worried that it might take years before we defeated the demon king because we had to get strong enough but not that much time will pass back home! Thank you so much Jacob I will be able to sleep much better tonight knowing that.” With that she got up to go to her room, but she stopped and leaned over, and before I could figure out what she was doing, she had given me a kiss on the cheek before she left for her room. I sat there for a few minutes, with the biggest goofiest grin on my face before I decided to go to bed myself.