Scratching sounds resounded through one of many luxurious bedrooms late in the night. The moon shone through the glass window, illuminating the luxurious desk I was sitting on in nothing but a fluffy bathrobe.
The tip of the feather I was holding danced across the letter in front of me, filling it out at inhumane speed.
The oven crackled a little and shone gently through the more than warm room. Crossing my legs, I stopped writing momentarily only to start with renewed enthusiasm right away.
“Do you ever sleep?” The king asked groggily and yawned a little bit on the bed.
“Mostly in the carriage …” I answered a bit disinterested in the conversation and continued to focus on my task at hand right away.
“Being blessed by the gods sure must feel nice.” He said, slowly standing up from the bed and walking over towards me.
“Its not as good as you make it out to be.” I answered truthfully. My mind was always working when I didn’t sleep which could lead to some issues if I didn’t watch out.
“Oh?” He said, caressing my shoulders carefully. “Why don’t you come back into the bed and we enjoy the sunrise together?”
“Hmm? You said yourself you wanted some sleep.” I commented, hoping he would finally drift off into the dreamland.
“But I want your company.” He said, sliding off the bathrobe from my shoulders and caressing my skin.
“And I have a whole lot of work to do. I’m planning and invasion, my dear. That’s not done on a single day.”
“Oh? How hard can it be? Just order everyone to gather on a specific date and you are done.” Was he really that idiotic? Looking over my shoulders a bit stunned, I realised he actually meant what he just said.
“It’s way more than that. Soldiers win a battle, but logistics wins the war. We will be operating deep in enemy territory, making it vastly harder to supply our forces which I why we have to keep our own numbers down. Additionally, we need guards capable of supplying out outpost, we need enough scouts to find the demons and we need mages to protect us. All this wants to be coordinated and as the kingdom didn’t wage war in the last two hundred years, there is sadly nobody who can do it perfectly.”
“So you are not joining me?” He asked as if he didn’t listen to me just now.
“… no. Except you want to stain your little guy further?” I asked and resumed writing the letter to the adventurers guild.
“No.” He laughed loudly and finally let go of my shoulders, allowing me to pull up the fabric once more. “I’m afraid I’m spent for the night.” He admitted and strolled back towards the bed. A bit annoyed, I finished my letter a few minutes afterwards and went over everything while listening to his snoring slowly increasing in intensity.
Smiling a little, I stood up from the comfortable chair to search for my attire scattered through the whole room. Not even bothering to clean his sweat off me, I wore it right away, collected the stuff I wrote in utmost silence and strolled out of the room. Closing the door behind me, I them continued to stroll through the hallways until I finally found a maid.
After dealing with the usual honourifics stuff, I got her to escort me towards the eastern gate right away.
“Are you sure you will be alright during this hour?” The maid asked, clearly concerned about the time during which I left.
“If it assures you, I do not mind you watching over me until I enter their estate.” I explained without stopping at all.
“Thank you very much.” She said, curtsied deeply and followed me with hurried steps for a minute or so. Then, we were at the Whites gate and separated as the guards welcomed me there.
“Hey, could you wake up Luna and bring her down? We also need a carriage and a driver.” I asked, just as they wanted to guide me into the mansion.
“Right away.” He said, bowed deeply and left to do his work for a while. I heard the results of that far earlier then I had seen them. Her shoes clacked loudly as she ran down the stairs, but I still feigned surprise as the heavy door opened and she jumped in my arm.
“Lu!” Warmth spread in my heard, making me relax for a minute and calm down somewhat.
“Luna! It’s good to see you again!” I explained, hugging her back tightly. Truth to be told, I was looking forward to seeing her the most while secluding myself. “Hey, hey. Do you have time?” I asked, patting her back relaxed.
“Sure. Where are we going?” She asked, slowly ending our embrace.
“We’ll have to wait till sunrise.” I said, but still pulled her hands towards the gate anyway until I found a nice patch of meadow in the small forest and laid down on it.
“Lucy? I … I think I can feel the mana inside me now.” Luna said, laying down right beside me.
“That’s amazing! And? How far did you come with finding your own magic?” I asked, stretching my arms until my fingers touched something metallic. Not even bothering to look, I grabbed it and put my glasses on my nose straight away.
“I don’t know … its hard without a teacher.” Luna admitted, which would explain her rather slow process. I had hoped I could let her check my plan for any issues, but that was apparently out of question for the time being.
“Hmm … I haven’t studied magic at all back then, so I’m kind of a failure in that regard. But I do have a surprise for you.” I admitted, looked how the first few rays of sunlight appeared in the sky and stood up right away.
“Let’s go.” I said, giving Luna a hand to stand up right away. Walking straight towards the gate, I noticed the unpainted carriage right away, and entered it directly.
“Hannah. How have things been?” I asked, even though I could see the frustration on her face right away. Sliding over a little, I made place in the carriage for Luna who closed the door after her.
“Do you even know how impossible it is to find out anything about the demon territory? For all I know, it could have slipped into a different realm altogether.” Hannah mumbled, clearly angry at herself for not finding anything.
“Don’t worry. I kind of expected that.” I admitted to cheer her up a little.
“Why are you searching information about the demon territory?” Luna asked quite curious and grabbed her armrests as the carriage started to roll.
“Oh … we will end this war once and for all. There is enough suffering. We don’t need any more.” I said quietly looking out of the window. “But let us not talk about these depressing matters. Hannah will teach you magic tonight.”
“Right. But I do not have an innate magic, so I can only tell you what I have heard.” She admitted, cheering up Luna with that somewhat.
And so, Hannah told her what she knew and how it was supposed to feel like … or something along these lines while I looked out of the window.
“I’ll be back in a moment.” I said once we stopped and jumped out of the carriage, nearly falling over in the process. Weakened by the sun, I strolled into Tom’s mansion, collected the stuff I would need and cleaned myself properly. Dressed in a nice leather armour, I then walked back towards the carriage and sat down straight away.
“Daggers? Are we going to fight?” Luna asked a bit confused, even though I shook my head right away.
“You aren’t.” She wouldn’t be of use anyway. “But I am joining the others in the dungeon today. I always wanted to check it out.” I admitted and scratched my cheek. “And the daggers are the only weapon I can wield effectively during the day.” Shrugging unhappily, I picked up the white hat on the opposite seat and put it on my head, covering a portion of my face when I looked outside.
Slowly, humans appeared on the streets, doing what the my usually did. Walking their dogs, going through work or like us, riding the carriage to another place.
Hannah and Lucy talked intensely for the whole ride, which kind of left me with nothing to say as I had never studied how humans used magic. I knew what it could and could not do, but that was about the extent of my knowledge.
I was still happy to have her by my side and see her excitement, but I was also bummed out that I couldn’t talk with her about other stuff.
And thus, I looked out of the window at the passing mansions, the gate as we were travelling through and then at the normal houses. Listening to the approaching river, I could feel myself gulping loudly, but didn’t feel anything as we drove across a bridge I knew very well. After all, someone died by my hands there.
After thinking about the good old times for several minutes, the carriage finally stopped in front of a rather simple inn.
“Do you know in which room Sofie is in?” I asked, hopping out of the carriage right away.
“I think it was the second one from the right.” Hannah commented while I picked up a small pebble. Aiming high, I threw the stone against her window right away. As she didn’t react at all, I picked up the same stone and threw it another time. Only as I prepared to throw the third time did Sofie open her window wide and looked out of it.
“Hey, Sofie! Dress yourself! I’m going to teach you something!” I said exited and watched how she immediately closed the window once more and rushed away from the window.
It only took her a few minutes to ready up and get out of the inn with unkempt hair.
“Hey, do you know a quiet place for us?” I asked and hugged her right away.
“There is an old watchtower nearby.” She said and pointed towards a stone tower a few hundred metres away after I let go of her.
“That’s our goal then!” I exclaimed and went over to it right away, being followed by all of them. True to her words, it was abandoned, but still in a rather good condition. Hannah and Luna stayed downstairs to train magic while I brought Sofie upstairs right away.
“Beautiful.” She exclaimed, looking over towards the orange sunrise.
“It truly is …” I mumbled, wondering how I should start this conversation. “… the gifts you know of aren’t the only thing Irminsul gave you.”
“Huh?” She asked completely surprised.
“I am aware there are apostles in this world. You do have strength we can only dream about, which is also why we need you to stand up against the demons.” I explained, hoping she wouldn’t inquire too much about my knowledge.
“The demon king … he is also an apostle. Is fighting him really alright with you?” She asked quietly. It was true that I was ‘representing’ every god on this planet. But that didn’t mean I couldn’t do anything against the actions of a random one.
“I do not believe the majority of the gods is behind his actions. As such, I am more than willing to step in. But let’s not talk about him. As I said, Irminsul gave you something else as well. A piece of herself resides within you, strong enough for you to use it.” I explained, desperately hoping I wouldn’t need to explain her too much about this.
“And … what does that mean?” She asked right away, still looking towards the orange sun.
“… how do you view the gods?” I asked slowly.
“As almighty beings.” First of all. No. They weren’t almighty. Together they were. But not alone. Defeating a single one of them though was an impossible task. They would just keep coming back.
“… how do they look?” I asked, not really satisfied with her answer.
“Just like us?” She assumed, clearly not on the same page as I was.
“And that is where you are wrong. They do not have a real presence. They are everywhere. We live inside them, we are – for the most part – a piece of them.” I explained, which may have been a little too confusing, but she did understand it rather quickly nonetheless.
“So … we breathe in a part of the god of air?” She asked quickly, to which I could only nod happily.
“A tiny, tiny bit. He doesn’t realise you do though, at least not consciously, just like you don’t feel every cell in your body. The bodies you had in mind are just their vessels, a place to put their consciousness and that’s it.” I explained quietly.
“… what does this have to do with me?” She asked rightfully.
“The Irminsul put a portion if herself within you. It is a tiny bit, but maybe enough to do some things with it.” I explained, doing exactly what a friend of mine wanted me to.
“Does everyone of us apostles have such a thing?” Probably? The demon king definitely had his one under control already. Otherwise I would have been able to look at him as we met all those years ago.
“I can only guess ...” I said which wasn’t even a lie. The probability was high … but not a hundred percent.
“And you?” She asked and gazed over towards me with interest in her eyes. The thing was that I didn’t have a tiny bit of any god inside me. My whole soul was build out of death but I was still separate from Aska.
“Me? I’m no apostle. I don’t have such a thing. But I may be able to awaken yours.” I explained, shaking my head in denial.
“Will you train the others as well?” She asked, but I kept on shaking my head. I would not train them. Definitely not. If anyone learned to resist my magic, it would spell trouble for me.
“I was not specifically asked to do so … and I’m probably not able to.” I admitted straight away and leaned onto the railing. “So keep this a secret, alright?”
“Alright.” She said, joining by my side straight away. “How can I start using this power?”
“There are provably two ways to achieve that. One is by going wherever you find life. In a maternity hospital for example.” I explained. I learned to feel death this way, although it was a tedious and long process.
“And the other one?” She asked, which did make me a little bit uncomfortable.
“Try to get a strong reaction from your life by seeking out the opposite. Go to a graveyard for example.” That was the same reason I sought out life as well, consciously and unconsciously alike. My mind always reacted positively to it, even though I couldn’t feel it. Well, I did hope that by training Sofie, she would be able to let me sense her life at some point for real.
“In that case, the dungeon is probably the best place for me to be in.” Sofie said, which didn’t surprise me at all.
After all, that place was teeming with undead.
Scratching sounds resounded through one of many luxurious bedrooms late in the night. The moon shone through the glass window, illuminating the luxurious desk I was sitting on in nothing but a fluffy bathrobe.
The tip of the feather I was holding danced across the letter in front of me, filling it out at inhumane speed.
The oven crackled a little and shone gently through the more than warm room. Crossing my legs, I stopped writing momentarily only to start with renewed enthusiasm right away.
“Do you ever sleep?” The king asked groggily and yawned a little bit on the bed.
“Mostly in the carriage …” I answered a bit disinterested in the conversation and continued to focus on my task at hand right away.
“Being blessed by the gods sure must feel nice.” He said, slowly standing up from the bed and walking over towards me.
“Its not as good as you make it out to be.” I answered truthfully. My mind was always working when I didn’t sleep which could lead to some issues if I didn’t watch out.
“Oh?” He said, caressing my shoulders carefully. “Why don’t you come back into the bed and we enjoy the sunrise together?”
“Hmm? You said yourself you wanted some sleep.” I commented, hoping he would finally drift off into the dreamland.
“But I want your company.” He said, sliding off the bathrobe from my shoulders and caressing my skin.
“And I have a whole lot of work to do. I’m planning and invasion, my dear. That’s not done on a single day.”
“Oh? How hard can it be? Just order everyone to gather on a specific date and you are done.” Was he really that idiotic? Looking over my shoulders a bit stunned, I realised he actually meant what he just said.
“It’s way more than that. Soldiers win a battle, but logistics wins the war. We will be operating deep in enemy territory, making it vastly harder to supply our forces which I why we have to keep our own numbers down. Additionally, we need guards capable of supplying out outpost, we need enough scouts to find the demons and we need mages to protect us. All this wants to be coordinated and as the kingdom didn’t wage war in the last two hundred years, there is sadly nobody who can do it perfectly.”
“So you are not joining me?” He asked as if he didn’t listen to me just now.
“… no. Except you want to stain your little guy further?” I asked and resumed writing the letter to the adventurers guild.
“No.” He laughed loudly and finally let go of my shoulders, allowing me to pull up the fabric once more. “I’m afraid I’m spent for the night.” He admitted and strolled back towards the bed. A bit annoyed, I finished my letter a few minutes afterwards and went over everything while listening to his snoring slowly increasing in intensity.
Smiling a little, I stood up from the comfortable chair to search for my attire scattered through the whole room. Not even bothering to clean his sweat off me, I wore it right away, collected the stuff I wrote in utmost silence and strolled out of the room. Closing the door behind me, I them continued to stroll through the hallways until I finally found a maid.
After dealing with the usual honourifics stuff, I got her to escort me towards the eastern gate right away.
“Are you sure you will be alright during this hour?” The maid asked, clearly concerned about the time during which I left.
“If it assures you, I do not mind you watching over me until I enter their estate.” I explained without stopping at all.
“Thank you very much.” She said, curtsied deeply and followed me with hurried steps for a minute or so. Then, we were at the Whites gate and separated as the guards welcomed me there.
“Hey, could you wake up Luna and bring her down? We also need a carriage and a driver.” I asked, just as they wanted to guide me into the mansion.
“Right away.” He said, bowed deeply and left to do his work for a while. I heard the results of that far earlier then I had seen them. Her shoes clacked loudly as she ran down the stairs, but I still feigned surprise as the heavy door opened and she jumped in my arm.
“Lu!” Warmth spread in my heard, making me relax for a minute and calm down somewhat.
“Luna! It’s good to see you again!” I explained, hugging her back tightly. Truth to be told, I was looking forward to seeing her the most while secluding myself. “Hey, hey. Do you have time?” I asked, patting her back relaxed.
“Sure. Where are we going?” She asked, slowly ending our embrace.
“We’ll have to wait till sunrise.” I said, but still pulled her hands towards the gate anyway until I found a nice patch of meadow in the small forest and laid down on it.
“Lucy? I … I think I can feel the mana inside me now.” Luna said, laying down right beside me.
“That’s amazing! And? How far did you come with finding your own magic?” I asked, stretching my arms until my fingers touched something metallic. Not even bothering to look, I grabbed it and put my glasses on my nose straight away.
“I don’t know … its hard without a teacher.” Luna admitted, which would explain her rather slow process. I had hoped I could let her check my plan for any issues, but that was apparently out of question for the time being.
“Hmm … I haven’t studied magic at all back then, so I’m kind of a failure in that regard. But I do have a surprise for you.” I admitted, looked how the first few rays of sunlight appeared in the sky and stood up right away.
“Let’s go.” I said, giving Luna a hand to stand up right away. Walking straight towards the gate, I noticed the unpainted carriage right away, and entered it directly.
“Hannah. How have things been?” I asked, even though I could see the frustration on her face right away. Sliding over a little, I made place in the carriage for Luna who closed the door after her.
“Do you even know how impossible it is to find out anything about the demon territory? For all I know, it could have slipped into a different realm altogether.” Hannah mumbled, clearly angry at herself for not finding anything.
“Don’t worry. I kind of expected that.” I admitted to cheer her up a little.
“Why are you searching information about the demon territory?” Luna asked quite curious and grabbed her armrests as the carriage started to roll.
“Oh … we will end this war once and for all. There is enough suffering. We don’t need any more.” I said quietly looking out of the window. “But let us not talk about these depressing matters. Hannah will teach you magic tonight.”
“Right. But I do not have an innate magic, so I can only tell you what I have heard.” She admitted, cheering up Luna with that somewhat.
And so, Hannah told her what she knew and how it was supposed to feel like … or something along these lines while I looked out of the window.
“I’ll be back in a moment.” I said once we stopped and jumped out of the carriage, nearly falling over in the process. Weakened by the sun, I strolled into Tom’s mansion, collected the stuff I would need and cleaned myself properly. Dressed in a nice leather armour, I then walked back towards the carriage and sat down straight away.
“Daggers? Are we going to fight?” Luna asked a bit confused, even though I shook my head right away.
“You aren’t.” She wouldn’t be of use anyway. “But I am joining the others in the dungeon today. I always wanted to check it out.” I admitted and scratched my cheek. “And the daggers are the only weapon I can wield effectively during the day.” Shrugging unhappily, I picked up the white hat on the opposite seat and put it on my head, covering a portion of my face when I looked outside.
Slowly, humans appeared on the streets, doing what the my usually did. Walking their dogs, going through work or like us, riding the carriage to another place.
Hannah and Lucy talked intensely for the whole ride, which kind of left me with nothing to say as I had never studied how humans used magic. I knew what it could and could not do, but that was about the extent of my knowledge.
I was still happy to have her by my side and see her excitement, but I was also bummed out that I couldn’t talk with her about other stuff.
And thus, I looked out of the window at the passing mansions, the gate as we were travelling through and then at the normal houses. Listening to the approaching river, I could feel myself gulping loudly, but didn’t feel anything as we drove across a bridge I knew very well. After all, someone died by my hands there.
After thinking about the good old times for several minutes, the carriage finally stopped in front of a rather simple inn.
“Do you know in which room Sofie is in?” I asked, hopping out of the carriage right away.
“I think it was the second one from the right.” Hannah commented while I picked up a small pebble. Aiming high, I threw the stone against her window right away. As she didn’t react at all, I picked up the same stone and threw it another time. Only as I prepared to throw the third time did Sofie open her window wide and looked out of it.
“Hey, Sofie! Dress yourself! I’m going to teach you something!” I said exited and watched how she immediately closed the window once more and rushed away from the window.
It only took her a few minutes to ready up and get out of the inn with unkempt hair.
“Hey, do you know a quiet place for us?” I asked and hugged her right away.
“There is an old watchtower nearby.” She said and pointed towards a stone tower a few hundred metres away after I let go of her.
“That’s our goal then!” I exclaimed and went over to it right away, being followed by all of them. True to her words, it was abandoned, but still in a rather good condition. Hannah and Luna stayed downstairs to train magic while I brought Sofie upstairs right away.
“Beautiful.” She exclaimed, looking over towards the orange sunrise.
“It truly is …” I mumbled, wondering how I should start this conversation. “… the gifts you know of aren’t the only thing Irminsul gave you.”
“Huh?” She asked completely surprised.
“I am aware there are apostles in this world. You do have strength we can only dream about, which is also why we need you to stand up against the demons.” I explained, hoping she wouldn’t inquire too much about my knowledge.
“The demon king … he is also an apostle. Is fighting him really alright with you?” She asked quietly. It was true that I was ‘representing’ every god on this planet. But that didn’t mean I couldn’t do anything against the actions of a random one.
“I do not believe the majority of the gods is behind his actions. As such, I am more than willing to step in. But let’s not talk about him. As I said, Irminsul gave you something else as well. A piece of herself resides within you, strong enough for you to use it.” I explained, desperately hoping I wouldn’t need to explain her too much about this.
“And … what does that mean?” She asked right away, still looking towards the orange sun.
“… how do you view the gods?” I asked slowly.
“As almighty beings.” First of all. No. They weren’t almighty. Together they were. But not alone. Defeating a single one of them though was an impossible task. They would just keep coming back.
“… how do they look?” I asked, not really satisfied with her answer.
“Just like us?” She assumed, clearly not on the same page as I was.
“And that is where you are wrong. They do not have a real presence. They are everywhere. We live inside them, we are – for the most part – a piece of them.” I explained, which may have been a little too confusing, but she did understand it rather quickly nonetheless.
“So … we breathe in a part of the god of air?” She asked quickly, to which I could only nod happily.
“A tiny, tiny bit. He doesn’t realise you do though, at least not consciously, just like you don’t feel every cell in your body. The bodies you had in mind are just their vessels, a place to put their consciousness and that’s it.” I explained quietly.
“… what does this have to do with me?” She asked rightfully.
“The Irminsul put a portion if herself within you. It is a tiny bit, but maybe enough to do some things with it.” I explained, doing exactly what a friend of mine wanted me to.
“Does everyone of us apostles have such a thing?” Probably? The demon king definitely had his one under control already. Otherwise I would have been able to look at him as we met all those years ago.
“I can only guess ...” I said which wasn’t even a lie. The probability was high … but not a hundred percent.
“And you?” She asked and gazed over towards me with interest in her eyes. The thing was that I didn’t have a tiny bit of any god inside me. My whole soul was build out of death but I was still separate from Aska.
“Me? I’m no apostle. I don’t have such a thing. But I may be able to awaken yours.” I explained, shaking my head in denial.
“Will you train the others as well?” She asked, but I kept on shaking my head. I would not train them. Definitely not. If anyone learned to resist my magic, it would spell trouble for me.
“I was not specifically asked to do so … and I’m probably not able to.” I admitted straight away and leaned onto the railing. “So keep this a secret, alright?”
“Alright.” She said, joining by my side straight away. “How can I start using this power?”
“There are provably two ways to achieve that. One is by going wherever you find life. In a maternity hospital for example.” I explained. I learned to feel death this way, although it was a tedious and long process.
“And the other one?” She asked, which did make me a little bit uncomfortable.
“Try to get a strong reaction from your life by seeking out the opposite. Go to a graveyard for example.” That was the same reason I sought out life as well, consciously and unconsciously alike. My mind always reacted positively to it, even though I couldn’t feel it. Well, I did hope that by training Sofie, she would be able to let me sense her life at some point for real.
“In that case, the dungeon is probably the best place for me to be in.” Sofie said, which didn’t surprise me at all.
After all, that place was teeming with undead.
