“Midway upon the journey of our life

I found myself with a forest dark,

For the straightforward pathway had been lost.

Ah me? How hard a thing it is to say

What was this forest savage, rough, and stern,

Which in the very thought renews the fear.”

Inferno, Dante, Canto I Lines 1-6

Light broke upon the horizon, shooting streaks of color into the sky. Greyson knew this not from being told, or from the wonderous advertising from a commercial that told of the majesty of the sunrises on this serene landscape, but from the light blasting through the window and hitting him directly in the face at the ass crack of dawn.

Now, for an inn, this feature may have been after a coin flip, either a distinguishing characteristic or the reason for its price. The problem with this was that the sun would only hit you in the face if one was laying in the center of the floor, where the large bed most surely, was not located. For the first half of the night, Grey had laid in the bed. It was fluffy, contoured to all of his curves and felt as though one was floating on a cloud. Therein, lied the problem. While he had become exhausted and fatigued in his living hell of a world, not once (aside from accidently on purpose knocking himself out) had he slept. With not having any beds or even proper materials for a bed. His resting portion of the day, when the light slightly dimmed, was in the middle of a field that he had cleared of rocks and flattened, where he would lie on his back and attempt to sleep.

Apparently, this habit had now come to bite him in the ass. The bed had been too soft, too everything that had caused him to toss and turn for an hour or so before he gave up and moved to the floor. Fortunately, it seemed that Eli didn’t have any of these problems. After their meal in the inn’s main room the night before, Grey and Eli had made their way up to their room where Eli promptly launched herself into the bed, snuggled into the pillow and muttered a soft good night to Grey.

The morning light brought with it all of the thoughts that Greyson had been procrastinating on dealing with. The last day, while more interesting and filled with excitement than he had any hope for anymore, he had mostly been going on impulse and gut reactions. While he didn’t regret any of his actions, at the same time, he knew that it wasn’t a strategy that would always work. He had been acting like a big shot and just forcing his way on issues, eventually he would meet someone he couldn’t force. As the old adage goes, there is always someone better out there, and Grey wasn’t naïve enough to think that he was the strongest everywhere.

With these thoughts in mind, he decided that it would probably be best to start laying down some plans and work with the people of this planet. He sighed a bit inwardly, it looks like he would indeed be helping that bastard of a commander. Well, maybe this would also be a good opportunity for him to start training Eloise.

While I want to say I can always help her, it would be best if she didn’t need my help in the long run. He thought while nodding to himself.

Sitting up, Grey decided to let Eli sleep as long as she wanted before they would start making their way to the forest, so he slowed his breathing and entered into meditation. He was slowly extending his senses and trying to learn more about the world he now found himself in. While the mana he was used to using seemed to work so far here, he didn’t become able to wield it without spending thousands upon thousands of hours (he guessed) studying and learning how mana interacted with the normal physics of the world he had come from. Grey staid in place for another hour or so before Eli’s stirrings caused him to come back to himself.

“Good morning little one.” Grey said softly. Eli, upon waking up had immediately frozen in place, unsure of where she was. At hearing Grey’s soft voice, she bolted up in her bed and looked at Grey sitting on the floor.

“Papa” she said sleepily rubbing one hand to her eyes to wipe away the sleep. Chuckling slightly at this sight, Grey got himself up and made his way over to her. One hand mussed her hair as he sat on the edge of the bed near her.

“Did you sleep well?” She nodded with a slight smile on her face. Eloise could not remember the last time that she had felt safe and protected like this, nor what it felt like to have family.

“That’s good. So, I know you’re just waking up, but we’re going to be heading out to find those other people today so we need to get moving soon.” Grey said. He paused for a minute thinking about how to say his next part.

“I was thinking that we’d also use this trip to start training you a bit more.”

“Eli become strong like Papa?” She asked him her eyes widening and a hopeful look spreading across her face.

“If that’s what you want, we can work to make you even stronger than me.” Grey said both serious and with a bit of laughter in his voice.

“Can you show me your stats so I can start planning out what to do?” He asked. Without a thought Eli nodded quickly and a screen popped into view in Grey’s vision.

Personal Statistics

Name

Eloise Rhine

Age

4

Race

Human/Nixie

Level

1

Class

Singer

Job

None

Health Points

60

Mana Points

80

Stamina

51

Strength

4

Vitality

6

Dexterity

5

Intellegence

8

Wisdom

3

Charisma

85

Skills

Enchanted Voice (passive): Beginner II

Grey’s eyebrows rose a bit at looking over her information. He couldn’t entirely remember all of his folklore so he wasn’t too sure what a Nixie was, but it did explain her ears. Additionally, she was only 4 and already had a class! He sighed internally wondering where the justice was in this multiverse that she already had a class where he didn’t. Pushing off those types of thoughts, he nodded to himself.

“So, you like to sing?” A nod.

“And you don’t like to talk too much because of your voice?” Her head dropped down and her happy expression fell. She did give another small nod. At seeing this, Greyson guessed that she had had a number of problems because of this, and that it mostly came directly from her Nixie heritage.

“Well, you don’t have to worry about it with me. I happen to think you have a lovely voice and you wont be able to make me do anything I don’t want to.” Grey said giving her head a pat. Tears formed in her eyes and she lunged forward to hug Grey. He left her cry for a minute before he decided to try and lighten the mood a bit.

“That means no extra ice cream no matter how much you enchant your voice.” He said in mock seriousness, garnering the giggle from Eli he was hoping for.

“What is ice cream?” She asked him curiously.

“You don’t know what ice cream is?! This cannot do, we will have to find some as soon as possible!” They went back and forth joking around about everything and nothing as they finished getting ready and having a light breakfast at the inn.

“Alright then, lets go grab our directions and make our way out of here then.” Grey finally said as they wrapped up making their purchases from the market. Grey had bought a few essentials that he remembered from when he used to go camping as a kid himself. He knew that he should be able to hunt food down, but making sure they had sleeping bags, a tent, some cookware and a few other odds and ends (no duct tape much to his displeasure) were somethings that he wasn’t willing to give up.

On his perusal of the market, he had run into a shop that sold enchanted items. Seeing this, he had dragged Eli over there to look over their wares. With Greyson coming from Earth, a place he did not believe had any magic, or if it did, nothing he knew about it, he had read stories and played the occasional video game that had magical items. He knew these were typically expensive items, but curiosity more than anything else made him want to at least have a chance to look over what was possible, and he hadn’t made off all too bad with the reward from dealing with the cultists and returning the captives.

Grey saw knives, swords axes and armors of all shapes and sizes prominently on display. While they were interesting, such as weapons that could emit a low grade magical effect on the damage they gave or resist certain elements, it was the items that were at the back of the room in a small corner that caught his attention.

The first of the items was called a Ring of Holding. The ring held a pocket dimension that allowed for the storage of up to five cubic meters of items. In addition to the space, time also passes so slowly within the space that it might as well have been a stasis field. The item was too perfect for Grey to be willing to leave without. The problem was that it cost ten gold. Additionally, Grey had found another ring that nullified magic for another two gold. While he wouldn’t want the nullification ring for himself, he did think that it could help with Eli’s passive magic until she was able to control it. This made it a necessity for him.

While he stared at the items the shop owner had come by, noticing the man and child in strange clothes staring at some of the more expensive items in the shop.

“I see that these beauties have caught your eye. I must say, they are exquisite and well worth the price. You have a very discerning eye.” The portly man with what had to be a waxed handlebar mustache stated.

“Yeah, a pity that I only have four gold at the moment or I’d take them right now.” Grey said. Internally, he was debating whether or not it was worth just taking the items. Both would be incredibly useful, but he wasn’t sure if he could really go through with it. He did have the power to do so he knew, but as a wise man once said, ‘With great power comes great temptation.’ He sighed to himself at that moment, knowing that he wouldn’t blatantly rob the man no matter how much he wanted to at the moment. It was in this sigh, that he caught sight of another item sitting on the shelf. He quickly used Observe on it to make sure his assumption was correct.

Item: Small Mana Stone

Mana: 198/200

Grey kept his face crestfallen while internally he was dancing a bit of an Irish jig. A plan came together in his mind.

“I don’t suppose you’d take a bit of a trade would you?” Grey asked, keeping his voice a bit dejected.

“Well, that certainly depends, what do you have to trade?” The portly man asked, one hand coming up to twist the waxed mustache’s end into an even tighter curl. Reaching into his pocket, Grey let a portion of his mana flow until the mana formed into a sphere. He mentally increased the pressure that he put onto the mana, until the marble sized ball began to take physical form. With a bit more pressure and adding in a bit more mana until the mana crystallized into a perfectly formed spherical gem. Drawing his hand out, Grey held up the marble to the mustachioed man.

“Well, I found this a while back and its brought me a bit of luck. Is it worth anything to you?” He asked.

The salesman looked at the pale blue gem held in the stranger’s hand and had to stop himself from showing any reaction. As a merchant, he had long ago gained the Appraise ability and he couldn’t help but to be shocked by what the information told him.

Item: Perfect Mana Gem

Mana: 10000/10000

The small mana stone that was on display at his shop was listed for four gold in an of itself. A mana gem, let alone a perfect one could be sold for at least a few platinum if one could even find buyers out in the outskirts of the kingdom. A greedy devil appeared in his mind, and the rotund man smiled as only a used car salesman who was about to steal all of your money could.

“Well, it does appear to be quite beautiful. I believe we could incorporate it into one of our designs, however it would not constitute a full payment. How about two gold and the stone for the ring then?” The man said with a voice tinged with false regret.

“I don’t know, I wanted to be able to get the Nullification Ring as well… Could we do two gold and forty silver for both with the stone?” Grey asked hopefully, acting as though he was unsure about parting with his ‘lucky’ stone.

“Done. If you would give me the stone and the coins, we can settle up right now.” The man abruptly closed the sale. Grey smiled to himself. He knew this merchant was robbing him blind, based on the small mana stone he saw, but the rings were more important to him than money at this point. The merchant had just showed that what Grey could conjure up at a moment’s notice could be worth a large amount of money. He was willing to let him be greedy at this point, for no other reason than he apparently didn’t have to care too much about finances in this world with his abilities. The two men had quickly finished up their transaction and Grey and Eli left the shop.

As they left, Grey passed over the nullification ring to Eli, while he put all of their day’s shopping into what he was going to call his storage ring.

“What’s this?” Eli asked with a bit of a puzzled expression on her face. It wasn’t that she didn’t like the present, just that she knew Grey had paid a bunch of money for it.

“Well you see, if you wear this ring, I don’t think that your voice will be able to enchant people anymore.” Eloise’s eye went wide at this.

“Really?” Her hopeful expression widening on her face.

“Really really. Now you’re just going to have to talk to me all the time, and you shouldn’t have to worry about it. If you do need to use your magic though, all you should have to do is take off the ring.” Grey said with a bit of a laugh in his voice. Eli quickly shoved the ring onto one of her fingers and the magic sized itself to fit her tiny hands.

“Papa Grey is the best papa ever” she said hugging him tightly. Grey just laughed this off and swung her up so she could ride on his shoulders again now that he didn’t have to physically carry all of their goods everywhere.

With this, Greyson and Eloise made their way to the guard station, grabbed their map and looked out into the wild forest that began only a few hundred paces from the western gate.

“You ready?” Grey asked looking down at Eloise, who had decided to walk and sing around him. With a quick nod, the duo began their trek into the forest.