Leaving Home

No one understood why the mercenary assassins allowed be to escape with that crossbow. There was nothing magical in those things I took with me from this adventure, but that weapon was a really fine piece of art. Light, precise, powerful for its size and carefully maintained to make no noise when armed. There was poison in two of those bolts and all of them were made of noble wood and excellent steel. I think the captain of the soldiers registered this in his mind as one of those unsolvable mysteries of life.

In any cases, powerful spellcasters are infamous for not pay enough attention for the value of non-magical items. The fact that one of those assassins was a half-elf and the other her mother made this explanation easier to swallow. Most people easily believe anything that makes elves look spoiled, arrogant and a bit disconnected from reality.

This experience taught me how much I had been taking my family in this world for granted. Part of me still reacted to this people as if they were Non-Player-Characters in some sort of game. Instead of real people, related to me by blood.

Not just that, I was constantly thinking about how much I wanted to start a family. Be a father, raise children. I seldom considered that implicitly included being a husband. Not just have casual sex and variated levels of mutual discomfort about eventual expectation of one part and the other. Actually build a long-lasting relationship.

I didn’t even had understood yet the legal implications of marriage in this nation. What religious expectations where present, if any. My focus was elsewhere, I am sure people talked about those things, but I didn’t paid enough attention to understand or remember.

I was too absorbed by the fantastic, and military, aspects of History Lessons.

A bunch of girls and boys from my age had grow with me, in those 9 years in our village. I knew the names of several but could hardly remember any detail about any person, except for superficial physical characteristics. Even those boys I had fought years before, I wasn’t sure if they had bad feelings about me.

I think some of them felt bad for me. My father seemed to be exaggerating a little bit in his punishment for that one isolated incident. I was not sure, however. I never asked anyone.

Unfortunately, I didn’t got the time to do that. Because the entire village was moving that same day.

The soldiers would take the fortified core of the settlement. Only the people needed to help them would be staying. Everyone else should move from those mountains, because the region was about to became the frontline of a war.

Some opportunistic nobles in a neighbour country had allied themselves with traitors in our nation and barbarian tribes. An invasion was moving, with mercenary orcs ahead, to take the lands near to the border and fortify position. No one could be sure if they would stop there or move deeper and try to isolate our capital from the rest of the country.

Whatever happened, this region was not a good place for peasants right now.

Father was sending mother and the children to stay with some people he knew. Friends in another country.

He would stay and help the soldiers. Was not his choice, entirely. He would prefer to protect his family in this dangerous journey, but that was not possible. Stay by his own initiative as voluntary was the best way to not end up conscripted, and **** to choose between desertion or military life for as long as the country needed him. First option means **** sentence if caught, second often means the same, whatever happen.

“Your mother and your siblings will be travelling trough Imperial Road, in a caravan protected by soldiers. I have friends I trust accompanying them, they are as safe as anyone can be during times like that.

I need you to take a different path. I got a letter from my mentor. The person who taught me the art of swordfight.

I never told you about that, but your grandfather, my father, was born a nobleman. He rebelled against his family to marry a peasant, village mage. However, before that he had the best mentors money can buy. One of those was this woman, a beast-person from the Demon Continent. They kept contact even after my father became a proscript, and accepted to train me when became clear that I needed some extra help.

I had been teaching you some of the disciplines she practices. Which are martial arts from the beast-people, developed from what they learned from actual demons in their continent in the west.

She accepted to take you as apprentice when you where ready, and this experience proved to me that you are. I am sending you to the city where she live.”

That was the first time I heard this noble origin mentioned. Obviously that was not a pleasant topic for my father to discuss.

I was, however, more interested in this “demon continent” talk. I was vaguely aware of some war between humanity and the demons, some 3 thousand years before I was born. Was not clear to me if it was History with a little myth or myth with a little history. By the clear absence of demons and practically any other non-human in the surrounds I was assuming the demons had been extinct or at least severely reduced in population.

Adding to my confusion, I had noticed many times that people like me get the title of “Evil Demons”, never occurred to me that this name implies the existence of Good Demons. Or, at very least, neutral ones.

Father gave me the short version of that tale.

“Demons are all beings that came to this world from other realities, after the Forgotten Ancient abandon our world.

That was rare, very rare. However, a little more than 6 thousand years ago a large invasion of demons appeared in all parts of our world. There was 3 thousand years of wars between the native races of our world and those demons. Mainly the Ephemeral humanoid races, and the elves, some Royal Fae too, joined the fight to support their less powerful cousins. Most other Void Races kept neutrality and ignored the conflict.

In any case, the demons lost the war for the most part. Except in the vast Wester Continent, where they are now practically the only free race left. There are beast-folk and a few other races more or less related to demons by now. However, most other humanoids living in the Demon Continent are slaves.

Demons have as many tribes as we have races in our world, and they as different from each other as the races natives from our world are, if not more. Not all of them are enemies of humanity. And not all of them are “Evil”.

When we say “Evil Demons” we are referring to demons that kill the babies in the belly or their mothers and are born in their place. Pretending to be people like us.

Those demons always bring disgrace and immense catastrophe to humanity.

Most humanoids from this world do not like demons much, due to that long and bloody war between us and them. However, those who have lives as short as ours, or shorter, tend to feel that the Demon Wars are far too distant in the past. Unlike elves, who in some cases remember what the world looked like before the Demon Horde start their invasion.

We don’t make much difference between demons and other non-humans, I think. Even if we know the difference from history lessons in school.

On the other hand, most humans do not like non-humans, by default. They may get along with one non-human or another, never feel comfortable with the idea of large groups of non-humans close to them.

For the most part the feeling is reciprocated. I visited dwarven cities and you hardly ever find a non-dwarf in their streets. They open specific sectors to outsiders, in specific periods of the year, and this is it. Compared to elves, dwarves are very open to outsiders. Elven folk kill trespassers on first sight without ask any questions, most the time. So, humans are really not out of the ordinary, we prefer our own kind, like mostly everyone else.

Now, of course, there are places with a more chaotic and intense mix of roots. Merchant Hub, Scholar State-Cities.

The place where I am sending you, is a Port-City. Up there you will find far more variety of languages and ways than you are used to have here.

I don’t have to tell you to keep your thoughts to yourself. You are reserved to a fault already. That will serve you well, specially right in the beginning of your life up there.

Just don’t hold your feelings too much. Give people a chance to earn your trust, from time to time. The Dog knows how much your mother and I tried to do so, and failed! Try to be happy, if possible, some now and them.

It is not always a bad idea to say something silly.”

Chapter 7

Mrs and Mr Solar travel together. Mr Solar is the Caravan Master in charge of the group that I was accompanying up to Hydra Cross, There I am supposed to rent a room in some inn and send a letter from my father to his mentor at to Sweetpot Riverport, I may have to wait a couple weeks in Hydra Cross, all by myself, until my new mentor make contact.

That’s a lot of responsibility to put on the shoulders of someone who will reach its tenth birthday in another week. However, I suppose this make sense, since this is a mostly medieval society. Besides, we are in times of war now, or so close to that that does not really matter if war was not officially declared yet. During war time families must settle for imperfect solutions they would have avoided in times of peace.

I suppose I cold find my way between the cross and the riverport, considering the map it does not look like a huge distance. Compared to the travel between here and Hydra Cross it is practically nothing. On the other hand, I am hiding the fact that I have lived my live up to mature age on another planet, and have complete memory of that past existence. I don’t want to call attention to myself by being too self-confident or too mature for my age.

In this world that will be my first experience more than a fell days of walk distant from my home. First time I will be alone, without my parents to look after me and tell me what to do.

People isenkaied on this world is killed. Since the natives consider us Evil Demons. You will not blame me too much for not taking chances when I can avoid to expose myself; By just obeying my father.

The Solar couple could easily pass for brother and sister, if they wanted. Both are white, red haired, short, and very fat. Both are pleasant, good natured, people.

About half of the mules in the caravan belong to them, and they rent some to people who don’t have their own mounts. Father gave me Patience, his favourite mare, and got me also a mule, to carry the tent, the food and water I could need for the travel, between stops. We would be travelling for a couple months and turn out that water is more cumbersome cargo than you would have imagined when you cannot count on finding fresh sources of it every other day.

I would be eating lunch twice a week with the Caravan Master and his wife, and I don’t think they would let me start the rest of the time if I ended losing my personal supplies. However, my mother had insisted that I should prepare my own breakfast, lunch, and dinner, most the time. And carry something sweet for my deserts, also. Was her way to “teach responsibility”;

She had raised strong opposition against her husband’s decision to send me to his mentor. She wanted to stay with me and take me along with my siblings to this place. That seemed to be safer. However, my father had his mind made about the main subject.

Was a practical decision, not just an emotional one. I am sure eating all my meals with the caravan master and his men would have been far more expensive than carry and prepare my own food. It meant I had to have a second animal to take care of in the road, but the caravan master had already defined how much they would pay me for both animals at the end of our time together. They would give me the payment in Hydra Cross. That way I should have enough money to stay there for a little longer, if anything didn’t happened according to my father’s plans.

All things considered, it looked like a fine plan.

Speaking about animals, the caravan had a mascot. That was Silver, she was the first horny-rabbit I ever met.

Horny-rabbits are magic beasts. They can be as little as a mouse, but some are as big as a large Earthling dog. Silver was about as big as your average golden retriever. Think about a hare with sheep horns, she was very friendly but looked us with a diabolic smile sometimes. Those beasts are the reason why caravans in this continent cannot use wagons or carts when they must travel through open fields and hills. Carriages are not used outside cities either, because of them.

Supposedly some deity long time ago created those animas to fight his enemies, which used huge animals as mounts. The horny-hares attack any animal larger than a horse. They have the impact of a cannon ball, or worse, due to their high velocity. Their natural magic prevents any damage from impact, therefore they jump away and immediately attack again. Until the large beast stops moving.

Problem is, of course, they don’t see the difference between a wagon and a large animal. Imagine hundreds of those animals attacking your caravan, time and again, until your cargo is completely destroyed.

They don’t see very far in dense forests, and don’t seem to like mountains all that much, so is relatively safe to risk use wagons in those areas. Calculated risk. In open plains is out of question, the rabbits are everywhere and in large numbers.

Immense trouble.

On the other hand, they can be nice pets when raised from young age. Don’t talk but are almost as intelligent as a gobbling or kobold. Twice meaner too, but said to be loyal to their owner.

I was surprised to realize my discomfort with this situation. To travel alone, in the body of a child. With no adult to take care of me, specifically. No one I knew before that moment.

I had to scold myself many times during that first day, and in the days after that.

When we were not moving we were either eating or sleeping, setting camp of dismantling the camp to move again. We would stop in temporary trading camps and visit permanent trading posts to buy supplies. There was nothing to scare me in those plans. I was familiar with the routines of making camp and preparing food during hunts. This could not be any worse!

There was the orc and the waargs around in those mountains. I suppose it was dangerous enough to give me rational ground to be worried. Least in the first few days. This was, after all, close to the frontlines of a boiling war.

After three days moving mostly down mountain I realized that I wasn’t thinking about the orcs and the actual risk of our caravan being attacked and butchered by mercenaries of bandits.

I was worried about being alone, in the middle of a bunch of people I knew nothing about. After 9 years surrounded by familiar faces, in a place that I had learned to consider as my hometown. There was families of highlanders here, peasant folk, people like those people I knew, but they didn’t knew me and vice-versa.

Was my first real opportunity to make friends in this world. I had just decided that I would no longer treat the people in this world as NPCs of some videogame of RPG.

I should talk with people, initiate conversations.

However, despite realizing that, I did the opposite. Because I just didn’t knew how to brake the ice in this situation.

On the bright side, I had escaped the test all children in this nation are supposed to do when they reach 12. According to the news that arrived to us in the fourth day after we leave the village mages had being called to the capital, to replace the more qualified mages who had being incorporated to the war effort, Education had been suspended for a period of three years. Possible it would take longer for public schools to start again. I no longer needed to worry about fake incompetence to fail the magic test on purpose.

Three days later was my birthday. The caravan leader and his wife congratulated me, some of the warriors who protected the caravan did the same. Was a happy moment.

Everybody was still a bit tense, because that was still too close to the disputed territory, and there was signs and news of orc attacks still arriving from all directions.

Silver was the only member of the caravan indifferent to this tension. Brave horny-rabbit!

Our caravan was attacked for the first time in the night of my birthday. Nice gift.

Wasn’t much just some arrows coming from the trees.

Then another dozen, from the opposite side. Hit some guards, poison killed four of them in hours, their blood turned black and stinky as soon as they died, and our caravan master got the corpses burned immediately to prevent any risks. Orc shamans are notorious for some specific kinds of spells I was **** to assume. Not that 2 level spells or higher would be more common among orcs than they are among humans, necessarily.

You just do not take some risks when you can avoid them. You understand.

The caravan guards didn’t show any sign of panic. Sadness ratter than fear, then cold determination to get us through that. What suggested to the that those where not shopping mall security kind of guards. They had seem some ugly stuff before, and that though was more reassuring to me than I can put in words here.

In those mountains there was some choaking points we could not avoid, so, was not always possible to change direction. We had to walk into some ambushes along that way before we leave the mountains.

If the orcs had a large contingent, or if they really wanted to block our way, they could have done that. Was my impression, and I listened conversations between the guards that confirmed it. This was not hunting to kill, was ratter a recreation moment for the orc recruits. If they saw signs of weakness they would came in **** but otherwise they would not risk their lives.

Orcs are stronger than humans, some 5 times stronger on average, One and a half times our size and three times the weight of a human as big as they are, due to denser bones and muscles. All that strength means they can afford to use much stronger bows. A crossbow can surpass that strength, of course, and we have some big crossbows in our side, but those weapons are heavy and take time to reload. Even in the hands of men who really knew what they where doing.

Orcs are natural warriors. I don’t want to go in the culture versus nature debate here, but in their case those things are nor in opposition. They are very fast and very nimble for their size and weight. On the other hand, they are not idiots. They can calculate cost-benefit as well as any human merchant.

They slowed us down, killed another two soldiers, and three other people, including a 12 years old girl and her 7 years old cousin, hit by random orc arrows. No ork was wounded or killed in this operation. One of the guards managed to hit a waarg with his crossbow, probably not a fatal wound by itself, but was enough to make the orcs more cautious. This was no actual mission for them, no matter of honour. Just good fun.

Eventually they stopped following us. Either got bored of had to join their bosses in some actual battle.

Ten days after I leave home I felt something strange, hard to describe. A wave of cold, a change in colour, but there was really nothing actually changing. My senses could not detect anything. Was ratter an internal sensation, but was around me, not inside. A moment later I realized what it was.

The cloaking spell those magic-assassin had mentioned.

My grandmother in this world had been some sort of Demon Hunter. Before her **** she must have abandoned her secret order, or something like that. To keep her family safe from retaliation she placed some powerful spell in her son, or in the house where they lived, or both. That was probably what had prevented the magic-assassins from finding my father. I had just moved beyond the reach of this magic.

As those things work, if I was not mistaken, it meant I was not for the first time in my life exposed. Anyone trying to use magic to find me from distance had a chance to succeed now. If before they had being blocked by my grandmother’s spell.

If the old woman had lived all her live hunting and killing people like me, isenkaied in her world, was a nice irony that in life she has protected one of her sworn enemies. Because being born from her blood I had being protected by her hiding spell.

On one hand, those two magic-assassins should now be able to easily locate my position. They knew me personally; That was a suboptimal situation, for me.

On the other hand, I wasn’t sure how many more people would be able to find me from now own.

I could not be sure if Demon-Hunters can find Evil Demons like me anywhere on the globe; Supposing that world is even a globe. I wasn’t sure about that, maps here never indicate what is beyond their borders; No one ever described the shape of size of this world to me in school. Out village mage only told us about was inside the know world. I assumed this had to be a planet more or less like Earth, based in my notions of basic Astronomy from Planet Earth.

Now that I was thinking about, magic kind of changes the portfolio of possibilities a bit, does it not?

Orcs behind us, mountains too, the world ahead. We would pass trough two thirds of our nation. In two months, give or take. I wondered how a central govern could keep power having to deal with that much distance. Travel was hard, slow, and didn’t seemed to be too dangerous once we put some distance between us and the border, but even them. The number and level of skill of those guards didn’t suggested save roads should be considered the rule.

I actually allowed that doubt to escape from my mouth one day, taking with Mrs and Mr Solar.

“Public Education network” said the fat merchant man. “That, and also communication spells. The main cities are magically protected and have each and certified mages have cheap means of communication between their strongholds in every city or protected fortress. They can talk to each other from the opposite sides of the nation as we are talking now. Is really expensive, but when necessary they can even magically travel from one city to another in the blink of the eye; Must be very expensive, because they almost never do it, but is a resource available for emergencies.” Pointed the merchant woman.

I gave most my sweet deserts to younger children in the caravan. That helped the process of making some friends among my travel companions. Most parents look you favourably when you show kindness to their young children and manage to make the burden of a travel like that a bit less heavy.

I would have gotten my first kiss in this world from that half-elf girl. Who was knocked out and tied. If I had taken advantage of this situation to kiss her mouth. What I absolutely did not! Because, who would do such a thing? I got another kiss in this caravan, from the elder sister of that girl who died from an orc arrow.

A long, wet, kiss under the stars.

She was just grateful for the kind way I treated her remaining young brother. I was really not expecting this kiss. Her gratitude would not go any further than that, I must say, but was a great experience. To be a 10 years old boy, being kissed by a 16 years old girl, in this world.

For once in this life, I felt normal. Like a normal person is supposed to feel without taking notice of being feelings anything in particular.

Then we reached Hydra Cross.