The world was big.

In the body of a child, a fox was a wolf and a wolf was a beast.

Adam didn’t usually entertain himself by going outside, finding the easy comforts of books and studying to be much more to his liking. Old, before-all-this-happened Adam would be appalled, but he was long gone by now, so he didn’t really matter. The only real reason Adam, or Evil God Antenora, would personally go out into the wide world, was to play childish pranks on a little village about 9 kilometres from the mountain he and his fellow Evil Gods made their abode. The mountain was known as “Nihil Est”, but that’s unimportant.

Sneaking off to misplace a common household item and watch one of the two dozen or so villagers angrily search for it only to eventually give up was one of the highlights of Adam’s everyday life. He didn’t have many happy memories of the outside. But fooling around with the villagers of Nihil Hinc was fun, and he could barely keep up his “Anonymous” spell because of his insistent giggling. Thankfully, the Divine Class Spell was competent enough to mask absolutely everything about the one under its effects, but that wouldn’t be the case if it was cancelled.

Maybe he should head over and say hi? No, it’d be a pain to have to establish a mental link with them all, and even worse to explain how he knew all of their names. Let’s skip that. Grasping his chin between his thumb and index-finger, Adam was thrown into deep thought as he started pacing forwards.

The area around the second-biggest mountain on Lutum was a pine-forest filled with horrid beasts, all of them possessing the strength to easily dismember a normal human. But the inhabitants of Nihil Est were no normal humans. Even the lowest, most common of cultists possessed the power to easily make their way through the dark, heavy forest entirely on their own. If anything, this was a given, and it served as a rite of passage for newer members. The number of dead bodies and powerful beasts littering the woods truly betrayed its name, Nihil Usquam. Who had even come up with these names?... Oh, yeah, he did. Adam. The greatest name giver of all, who named a nearby city after his former pet, Mittens.

Speaking of that city, if he wasn’t planning on heading back to Nihil Est anytime soon, he might as well go sightseeing, right? And right as the thought that the world suddenly became all topsy-turvy, and a strange, unfamiliar sense of inertia took over his mind. He was rolling down a hill. Man, he really didn’t look where he went, did he? After tumbling over himself for about ten seconds, he finally ground to a halt by the end the little hill.

Standing up, he silently brushed off the yellow, wilting spruce needles covering his oversized, black cowl like little embers in the darkness of night. The sun was smirking down at the strange world he found himself in, but despite how strong the sun usually was, it did nothing to shine through the thick brisket of trees, creating a strange, dark world where an eternal night reigned. However, no matter how effective the pines and spruces were at blocking out the light of the sun, they did nothing to deafen the screams of humans.

Wait, what?

“AAAAAAAA HELP MEEEEEE MIRIM, KRATOS, SAVEEEE MEEEEE-!!” a shrill voice resounded, forcing Adam to desperately clasp his hands over his ears to keep out the sudden noise, a murder of Armed Crows quickly taking to flight from the sudden surprise.

‘What in the world-?’ was all Adam could think. The voice continued screaming bloody murder for a good three minutes, a loud thumping always following it until it finally grew so loud that Adam was assured whoever was in possession of such a fearsome sonic weapon would surely find him at any time, and they did.

From within a little bush, a woman suddenly burst out, followed closely by an oversized beaver with a mouth-full of their characteristic front teeth, making it seem to smile radiantly. This proof of atheism was a so-called “Smiling Beaver”, as the surrounding townsfolk called it. Terrifying creature. Nobody liked it. Hadn’t he once attempted to wipe them off the face of Lutum back in the day?...

The woman, dressed in a strangely long chainmail, quickly ran about halfway through the clearing Adam had found himself in, before finally noticing his silent presence.

“HUH?!??!” was all she could shout before the Smiling Beaver groaned loudly at her in a threatening manner. “I-, uh-, what?!?!” the girl exclaimed, before spinning around on her metal-studded heels to face the Smiling Beaver.

‘Quite the pickle, eh?’ Adam thought to himself. He hadn’t really planned on killing anybody/anything today, but if the situation called for it, then…

“Y-, you stop right there, you weird-ass monster! Or-, or else!!” the warrior-like woman threatened, suddenly removing two pikes from their place on her hips.

‘...If you were going to fight him, why wait until now?’ Adam thought slowly, absentmindedly noting that he was not actually on the receiving end of the term “weird-ass monster” for once.

Following that thought, Adam realized something else, namely why she was only now standing up for herself. Him. How could she simply run away, leaving an innocent “human child” to be gobbled up by a Beast? She seemed virtuous enough, anyhow. She had a short, brown bob-cut, clear green eyes, and a face full of freckles. Her figure was somewhat slender but was clearly well-toned beneath the chainmail, leather trousers and everything else that adorned her warrior’s body.

But even with a “100% certified human child” to protect, all this equipment and everything, a Smiling Beaver would still prove far too great of a challenge for her. Smiling Beavers were more than just oversized beavers, after all. With ebony claws as sharp and strong and obsidian and a mouth full of ivory teeth strong enough to bite through metal as if it was crackers for tea, it would prove a worthy opponent to any worthy Adventuring Squad.

A single little warrior girl simply wouldn’t do, no matter how much she wanted to defeat it for the sake of this “totally not Evil God 10/10 certified human child”. Maybe he should help before she gets hurt?... Then again, if he did, she might realize something was up and, like, report him to the authorities or something? Lots of things could happen. She might have a mental link with some nearby Sorcerer who had simply decided not to show themselves yet. She had been shouting quite a few names during her “escape”, after all…

But, before the two mismatched opponents could clash, forcing Adam to make a decision, another group of people emerged from the bush, all panting and heaving as if they had run a marathon, which they pretty much had, considering that these people were, most likely, her party members. There were about four of them, a large, well-built, somewhat tanned man, with a short stubble and uncertain eyes, a mature-looking woman wearing long, yellowish robes stained green by grass and black by fire and a beanie, an old, tired-looking man wearing a strange combination of ornate light-blue robes and a metal chest plate, and, finally, there was a young boy, of about 13 or 14 years, wearing a matching little robe, but with an Enhancing Collar and a pair of Dejourdices, which were a pair of gloves meant to transfer Magick more easily, something the Enhancing Collar did as well. Clearly, it was a Warrior, a Witch of Flames, a proficient Priest, and his newbie apprentice.

Both the Witch and apprentice were panting up a cloud, hands on their knees, fully unable to keep the same cool that the Priest and the Warrior possessed.

“Ramona! Finally!! Why didn’t you stop soone-, oh,” the Witch seemed to be about to really chew the warrior girl, but must have noticed Adam, as well as the Smiling Beaver, both of which were now staring at her expectantly. “Oh, um, carry on,” the Witch encouraged, waving a hand dismissively. Ramona, the warrior girl, looked a bit depressed at this but didn’t say anything else.

“Tiftos, go join Ramona, will you?” the old Priest told his apprentice. Tiftos didn’t seem too happy about this.

“If I get hurt, will you heal me, Master Pellons?” Tiftos asked timidly as he pulled at the edges of his gloves nervously. Master Pellons simply shrugged and pointed to the little battlefield. Sighing that grave sigh only few can produce, the young boy slowly and trembling circled the Smiling Beaver at a distance of about five meters, before finally finding himself standing beside Adam himself.

“Bro you alright you need healing or something?” Tiftos whispered, squatting down beside the “young boy”. Adam, who certainly did not want to establish a mental link with any of these strangers, or pretty much anybody else, for that matter, shrugged fiercely, hoping dearly that the message of “no I do not want healing” passed over without misunderstanding. “Oh Tzar, where’s the wound? I’ll heal you up real quick and easy okay?” Tiftos said as he stretched out his hands towards Adam’s naked-under-the-cowl body. Adam instantly retreated, his head shaking back and forth like a metronome on crack. “What, you don’t want to be healed?” Tiftos asked, somewhat flabbergasted. Most people, especially children, would be giddy at the opportunity at being healed, not only because the sudden influx of Magick can heal even old or unseen wounds, but also because it could possibly awaken the Cerritulus, allowing the healed to awaken Magick. This was an exceedingly rare event, but it did happen.

So, why did Adam not want to be healed? Well, for one thing, he did not have a Cerritulus to awaken, neither did he have any actual wounds to be healed. But, the real kicker here, was that if he allowed this child to send Magick into his body to search for imperfections, two things would happen. One, he would discover that his insides are, in fact, (oops!) all slugs, and two, that he is filled to the brim with volatile, corrosive Magick that would lash out at him the second he touched it. So, healing was not an option. But, Tiftos relented.

“Oh come on, relax man, it’ll be over in just a minute!” he argued, moving in closer to the now standing Adam. This boy… he wouldn’t give up, would he? Adam knew there was only one thing to do. And with all the pride of a being that hadn’t worn clothes since the early 200’s After the Rip, Adam easily cast off the cowl, standing broad-legged and wide in front of the young boy. “U-, uwaaaa!! Yo, what are you-, p-, put that back on kid, I don’t even-, ok ok I won’t heal you!!” Tiftos exclaimed, his pale face instantly growing as red as a cherry as he desperately tried to cover up his face and eyes. Nodding almost solemnly, Adam reached down and put the cowl back on, his facial expression never once changing, neither in embarrassment nor shame.

“We should assist,” the large warrior-like man stated bluntly, his hand already resting on the hilt of his broadsword. His voice was hoarse yet extremely certain. He’s probably the leader, right? He should be, considering how authoritative he sounded.

“Nah, they’ll be fine, it’s just a beaver,” Master Pellons, waving his hand dismissively.

“Well, uh, alright,” the warrior replied, removing his hand from the hilt in defeat. From the corner of his eye, Adam could notice Tiftos shedding a single tear in despair.

A loud clang resounded as pike and stone-hard hide met, a trumpeting bugle to announce the beginning of the fight. Tiftos, muttering some strange slang Adam didn’t know existed, stumbled to his feet, cleared his throat and raised his hands in preparation. But before he could reach for the Beginners Lexicon of Easy Spells hanging from his belt on his right side alongside various potions, herbs and colourful crystals, Master Pellons cleared his throat meaningfully and sent a glare his way. Tiftos tried to measure up with a pitiful gaze, but was quickly beat by his master, and thus averted his gaze meekly, his hand rising up alongside his other.

The battle was decided the second Ramona’s pike failed to pierce the hide. She didn’t seem too experienced, and despite her acrobatic abilities in evading the Smiling Beaver’s attack and stabbing at various other parts of its hide, she simply couldn’t do anything about it. Tiftos even tried to buff her up by shouting a short chant in Demonic, but it simply didn’t help. So, a stalemate quickly formed, and after a while, Adam’s hyperactive tendencies, that were usually dulled by constant, uninterrupted reading, started rearing up, and after a while, he simply couldn’t stand by doing nothing.

He couldn’t do anything too drastic since if he showed off just a fraction of his power, he’d reveal his identity and have to dispose of this whole party, which would alert the guild responsible for keeping track of all these Beast-killing parties, whatever it was called nowadays. Back in the 250s or so when he’d briefly dabbled in joining their ranks, it’d been called Te Deum Gratis Subjectuation, or the Guild of Monster Subjectuation. Since then, knowledge regarding the nature of the then-called “Monsters” had risen substantially, so it really shouldn’t be called that anymore. Plus, Demonic wasn’t too popular in official businesses anymore, most people using Pterical for such things.

Oh, right, he was in a battle, wasn’t he? A simple spell, simple spell… He waved his hands nonchalantly(unlike Tiftos who was forming Magick Circles with stale, trembling fingers, his voice uncertain when using them) and activated the low-level Spell with as little Magick as he possibly could. Hm. Something felt… strange. His Magick wasn’t as it usually was. Something in his hand… Opening up his clenched fist, Adam noticed a small, almost unnoticeable hole opening up, and out of it, a single snail slowly crawled out.

‘...What the piss?...’ Adam questioned, his eyebrows scrunching together in disgust and fascination. The dark green, purple-ringed slug slowly floated up into the air, before positioning itself before the Magick Circle, where it slowly melted into a bundle of green liquids, started spinning into the general shape of an arrow, and hung there, unmoving. Adam had used this Spell too many times to count, so he knew exactly what he had to do at this step. Rising his right hand into the air, the green arrow moved with him, and when he made a throwing sort of movement towards the unguarded Smiling Beaver, the arrow was flung at the Beast.

The Smiling Beaver was unable to even groan out before it was dead, melted into a black, smoking unrecognizable pile of goop. Silence reigned. Everybody was staring at Adam, who still had his right arm stretched out. An Armed Crow cackled somewhere.

“By the Czar and his Concubines, what was THAT?!” Tiftos finally shouted from right beside him. Adam flinched at the sudden noise and turned to him.

‘I should say something…’ Adam figured, lowering his hands. He couldn’t speak, he didn’t want to establish a Mental Link out of nowhere, so, that left…

Adam sighed internally. He really wished he had taken more time to study this instead of, well… studying everything else. Trembling ever-so-slightly, he let his hands rise again, and formed a simple chain of movements, signing “hello, how are you?” in Movement Speak. He hoped to the Gods that one of them spoke it as well.

“...What’s he doing?...” the Witch wondered aloud, voicing the question on the minds of most of the group.

“It’s Movement Speak,” Master Pellons explained, “but I can’t understand what he’s saying.”

“I, uhhh, let me seeeee… I’m doing fine, thank you?” Tiftos suddenly replied, making a few simple movements with his hands as well. The group stared at him with eyes the size of saucers, and Adam couldn’t keep himself from smiling broadly. “What? My mother was deaf! You’re not deaf, are you bro?...” Tiftos asked, turning to Adam, who quickly shook his head in denial. “Oh, wondrolicious, I’ve never been good at the signs and stuff,” Tiftos said, sighing contently.

Adam quickly figured out what he would say next.

“Thank you for help. Got lost. Can’t speak,” he signed in the air with slow, uncertain movements. Tiftos nodded largely.

“He said thank you, and that he’s lost and mute,” Tiftos explained to the rest.

“How did you do it?” Master Pellons asked, with a curious, accusing voice. Adam felt panic grip his heart but didn’t show it.

“Am strong magician. Name is… have stick, will write in ground?” Adam asked, holding out his hand. Tiftos translated what he said and handed Adam a small, soft stick. It would do.

Adam decided to just go with the easiest answer and wrote “Adam B. Windsley” on the ground. It wasn’t a lie, but by the standards of Lutum, it wasn’t exactly true either. Tiftos held out his young, unscarred hand.

“Nice to meet you, Adam!” he greeted. Adam did not grab his hand. Consensual or not, he never wanted to feel a human touch him, ever. Unless he was yeeting that bastard to the third circle of Hell.

“Not touch me, scared of touch,” Adam signed in the air, giving Tiftos a strong, unyielding glare.

“O-, oh, is that why you didn’t want me healing you? Since that would have needed me to touch you?” Tiftos asked, a bit nervous at how stern Adam was being.

“Oh!” the Witch suddenly declared from behind them. “But it can’t be… is it?...” she asked herself, suddenly doubting her epiphany.

“What can’t be, Mirim?” Ramona asked, still panting a bit from the battle.

“Adam B. Windsley. It’s the name of that unknown big-shot scholar, remember?” Mirim explained, waving a hand at Adam as if she was supposed to recognize him, which would have been physically impossible since Adam had never once shown his face in public. If he did, he’d have to explain why he was a nine-meter tall slimy abomination upon the face of Lutum. Ramona shrugged.

“Hrrg, I tried to get you to read his A Brief Explanation of Magick Typing, but you just wouldn’t listen, would you? I’m telling you, if you ever picked up a Grimoire, you would have been a great Sorceress, you hear??” Mirim ranted, getting a bit too personal for Adam’s tastes. Ramona rolled her eyes.

“And I’ve been trying to get you to work out, but here we are,” she retorted. Adam tried to signal his discomfort to Tiftos, but he seemed too caught up in it to see it. Sighing inwardly, Adam reluctantly clapped his hands together to catch everybody’s attention, whilst at the same time trying his best to ignore the fact that a “human” just touched him. Everybody turned to him.

Using the soft stick from before, Adam circled the name he had written on the ground, and drew an arrow from the name pointing to himself.

“...I knew it!! By the Ten Divine Gods may I have your signature?? Please???” Mirim pleaded with glittering eyes, quite literally throwing herself at his feet. Adam took a step back to make sure she didn’t touch him. Signature?... He was always sure to sign all the documents he sent to the Academy of Magick for publishing, but signing for an adoring fan… now that, that was something new. Adam could feel a blush creep onto his cheeks.

Sure, he should be used to adoration and devotion, he was the subject of revere for a whole cult, after all, but… Not from someone who simply respected his academic successes.

“What write on?” Adam asked Tiftos, making a little “writing” motion in the air.

“You’re going to humour her?! Seriously?...” Tiftos asked, before reluctantly opening one of his many satchels and removing a piece of sharpened charcoal.

“On my robe, my robe! No, wait, I might erase it accidentally, hrrm, how about you just brand it into my skin??” Mirim almost demanded, her suggestions going from 0 to 100 a tad too quick for Adam to follow, so he simply wrote it on her right sleeve. She sulked a little but seemed otherwise absolutely ecstatic.

“Oh, uh, you never did explain, what are you doing out here? And naked, to boot?...” Tiftos asked, having inadvertently taken the role of leader for the group’s conversational efforts. Adam looked down at his black cowl.

“Got lost,” he quickly signed in the air, giving no further explanation.

“Oh. Okay, I guess-,” Tiftos answered, not exactly happy with the response but being unable to rebuke it.

The big warrior man stepped forwards.

“You will join us,” he stated decisively, his arms crossed and his legs wide, a perfect picture of the do-as-I-say-or-else mentality. Adam thought for a second, before giving a thumbs up.

“What-, how, why?” Tiftos asked, neither understanding why Kratos would ask that out of nowhere, nor why this Adam character would agree to it. Didn’t Mirim say he was some big-shot sorcerer? Then again, he didn’t seem to be more than 9 years old, so his brain might not be sufficiently developed?

Whatever the case, this was definitely strange. Sure, Mirim was a scholar junkie, but he had never seen her go this ga-ga over someone before, and he had seen her when they met Fernigus Platos, a very famous sorcerer and scholar. Very famous. That’s about all Tiftos knew about him. But was this little runt really that big of a deal?...

Regardless of how strange this all was, the stars in Mirim’s eyes expressed her opinion on the matter better than any words possibly could. Tiftos’ Master, Pellons, seemed just about to fall asleep, and Ramona seemed just as confused as he was. But, as things soon turned out, he did just a fine job as one of their ranks, easily shooting down as many Beasts as they could spot, and, eventually, they had gotten to where they needed to go, which was the west side of Nihil Est, where a famed Herbalist was said to have gone missing. They did not find him.

They soon headed back to their carriage, and with a new member in tow, they travelled to the great city of Mittens.

‘It still exists?’ Adam thought to himself. During all of this, he’d pretty much only “spoken” to Tiftos, who turned out to be a pretty pleasant chap, although he did get uncomfortably close at times, especially with his questions, like why, if he was supposedly a great sorcerer, was he just a kid? And why was he ACTUALLY in that forest?...

Every single time he asked this, Adam would ask him something about himself, like who his master was, how did they meet, that kind of stuff. And Tiftos, as the attention-deprived teen he was, answered all of these questions with just a little bit too much enthusiasm.

As it turns out, Pellons was not only Tiftos’ master, but also his adoptive father, and the two were actually quite close. Or, at least, they had been, until Pellons had decided that modern Sorcery was bad and that he would personally teach his son the proper ways of a priest, which included a faithful devotion to The Five Good Gods that Poliousy was so known for. Tiftos actually admitted that he had, at one point, gotten quite into the religion of The Five Evil Gods, the so-called Cultism. Nobody knew why it was called Cultism, and it didn’t seem to mean anything in any language, but Adam knew perfectly well why he had named it that, he just didn’t think it’d become the actual name of the “religion”.

Nervously sweating, Adam attempted to steer the conversation to something else, but Tiftos grew surprisingly adamant in “confessing his sins”. Apparently, he had actually, at one point, sent a few prayers their way, and although he hadn’t had a favourite or anything, he knew for a fact that Mirim would, on occasion, pray to the Evil God of Disgust and Despair, also known as the Dark Scholar due to the rumours that those in his personal entourage are all well-known sorcerers, although this has never been confirmed. Adam felt just about ready to explode out of embarrassment. Could that cult really be called a religion?... I mean, sure, they were probably objectively in the right since their “gods” DID actually exist, but…

Could those lumbering buffoons really be called gods? He sure couldn’t. He was just a man, who happened to be in a really strange situation. He deserved neither the title of god nor the reverence that it brought. If anything, his Evil God status had brought him countless hardships, and although the access to as many books and as much Magick he could possibly want was certainly enjoyable, he could have easily made do somehow even on the outside, just as he was doing… now.

Adam thought about his situation for a second. He had taken the form of a lowly human, shown mercy to a lowly servant, ran away from Nihil Est, and joined a merry band of whoever-these-are. If he returned straight away they might treat it like they treat his monthly trips to Nihil Hinc, but… he wanted to stay a little while longer with these people.

Just a little while.