Something was definitely off about Mark’s new family (if you can even call it that). We had been on this new world for nearly two years (as far as I could tell), but he had still only seen his parents a few dozen times… He was taken out for walks by the maids who cared for him, but he wasn’t exposed to anything in the way of familial love or affection. And although he didn’t even notice the lack, the difference between our two families was just too large for me to ignore.

Mark was also having a lot more trouble with the language than I was – mainly because he didn’t have a purple-tigress as a mother – so I did my best to try and help him out. We still weren’t even sure what his new name was supposed to be, because the maids always called him something that I was nearly certain was a title; maybe it meant ‘young master’ or something? I wasn’t sure, but when I asked my mom she came close to freaking out, and demanded to know where I heard that word.

I had to lie, of course, but all this constant lying to my new family was really starting to wear on me. I’d heard the saying that the truth will set you free, but I hadn’t fully understood it until now. So I told her that I had heard it during the attack, maybe from one of the guards or the purple warriors. This calmed her down a lot, relief obvious on her face as she relaxed back into her chair and began to explain what it meant – as far as I could tell, it was something like ‘Chosen One’ or ‘Blessed One’, and was the term used for children of the upper nobility in The City.

Over the last year I had learned a great deal about my new home, and gradually gotten my parents used to my increasingly complex questions. There was only one City in the entire land, ruled by four Noble Houses who shared power and divided the entire land between them. The world I was born into was a very strange one, and a lot of the things I had learned made little sense to me.

For example, there was no word for ‘Country’ or ‘Empire’. There was only one land, and only one people inhabiting that land – all else was wilderness. When I asked how large the land was, mother replied that it stretched from the Sunset Mountains to the South; the Sunrise Mountains to the North; the Valley of Shadows to the East; and the Bloody Pass to the West, from which one can see the endless ocean on a clear day.

Then I learned that we were hemmed in by beasts or natural barriers on all sides, and the general teaching was that this was the entire world – the mountains stretched forever to the north and south, the sea stretched forever to the west, and the Valley of Shadows in the east was a pit to Hell. Those few brave explorers who had ventured forth over the years had either confirmed this belief or, far more commonly, never returned at all.

Our world was shaped like a squashed oval, with the mountains fairly close to the north and south, and the Endless Ocean and Valley of Shadows much further away to the west and east. One could walk north from the Sunset Mountains and arrive at the Sunrise Mountains in five days, but walking from the Valley of Shadows to the Endless Ocean would take more than thirty days. The land ran at an angle, with the tip of the oval, the Endless Ocean, to the north-west, and the Valley of Shadows to the south-east.

On a clear day I could see distant white peaks in every direction except to the north, where the peaks were larger and ever present, reaching up into the sky off in the distance. Our village was about a day and a half north of The City, and was considered the central hub for all those living in the northern area – which explains why the village is named North Stone Village. The foot of the mountains was a full day walk from here, but to actually start reaching the higher peaks would take a further two days travel into the incredibly dangerous wilderness.

All manner of monsters and beasts inhabit the areas around the mountains, with the weakest generally living closest to our lands, where the forests and gentle plains upon which we dwell slowly turn into rocky hills. Between us and the mountains lies the outer garrison of House Flameward (which controls the land to the north of The City) – and the soldiers of the garrison were exactly those painted warriors I had seen during the attack a year ago! Which means that if I wanted to train with them… I would have to swear to serve House Flameward.

North Stone village was created hundreds of years ago, along with three other villages – East Stone, South Stone, and West stone (someone obviously had a very imaginative naming sense…) and there are garrisons and farms spread out in all directions from the city now. When I asked for more details a familiar word came up: Merrik.

Mother told me that our people had always lived in The City, with its massive walls and impenetrable gates keeping us safe from the wilderness outside. Then, a man fell from the sky, dropping directly from Heaven itself. He spoke little and listened to no one, simply taking what food he needed and leaving The City. Years passed, and everyone had assumed him dead… but strange things were happening out in the wilderness surrounding The City itself: Fewer and fewer monsters and wild beasts were spotted by the scouts on the walls, until eventually there were none at all!

And thus came the birth of Merrik. His arrival changed everything, allowing our people to finally leave the protection of The City and settle lands further afield. Mother didn’t go into the socio-economic impact such an event would have on a pre-existing culture (obviously) and I couldn’t exactly ask, but from the legends and tales she told me I managed to piece a few theories together.

Originally our culture had a severe taboo against large families, probably due to over-crowding issues in The City when it was the only space available for people to live in. Then Merrik came, and we could suddenly spread out – but we did so incredibly slowly due to our deeply ingrained habit of having smaller families (fewer children). It was also very dangerous outside The City, so thick stone fortifications were built before settlers were sent out: Places for our people to hide in until Merrik arrived to save them.

Legends claimed that Merrik was immortal, and nobody has ever noticed him age – mother said he looked the same as he does now when she saw him as a child. But some of the oldest tales described him as a young handsome man… These little details were discounted as embellishment, but I found them disturbing as hell.