There was the distinct smell of mildew throughout the prison. Well to be completely honest, the term “prison” seems like an exaggeration. If anything the building Asher was in was more like a “drunk tank” from his old world in terms of functionality. Yes, there was a guard or two present, but this seemed like the type of place to put a petty thief, or maybe some hot heads who got into a fight. It was at this point when Asher was contemplating the differences between holding cells and real jail that he noticed something suspicious. He had a small urge to sleep, but as he looked around he saw that everyone was soundly in la-la-land, counting imaginary sheep.

As the interesting phenomenon fully developed, and Asher’s interest had reached its peak, he heard footsteps. A man completely hidden behind a gray cloak walked down the aisle of cells, past a sleeping guard, and stopped squarely in front of Asher’s cell.

“Interesting..” the man mumbled to himself, “The master has wished for your prompt extraction from this place and that you be brought to him immediately. What say you?”

“Not like I have much of a choice here pal, I’m kind of in jail,” Asher said nonchalantly and shrugged his shoulders “Wait you’re not some kind of evil mastermind here to whisk me away onto the path of planetary destruction right?”

“I don’t feel I should dignify that with an answer, but you are a child, so no. I’m not. I’m just here to get you out on my master’s orders, and with that being said,” the man pulled out a small leather bundle and unfurled it. The bundle was filled with tools of various types and sizes. The man looked at the lock for a brief second, promptly pulled out two tools, and with practiced movements the *kerchink* of his cell unlocking could quickly be heard. The tools were then placed back in their respective spots and the bundle hidden somewhere beneath his cloak. The man placed his hand on Asher’s shoulder and said “Come, the master waits for us.”

Jandar found himself in the throne room of Duke Bennett, bowing, as is custom when in the presence of his majesty. He raised himself back to perfect posture and looked at the Duke who was sitting on his throne with a small cadre of his advisors nearby.

“Sir, I am happy to report that the Black Dragon seen outside the city has been dealt with.” Jandar said with a bit of hesitation in his voice.

“Chief Knight, what troubles you? This is most definitely good news, but it is strange news to be receiving so quickly. Dragons are no meager threat, did the beast fly off to go terrorize some other area?” The Duke said as his advisors began to mumble amongst themselves upon hearing the good news about the dragon. With the potentially catastrophic outcome a dragon could have brought to their lives and city, it being dealt with brought a noticeable relief to the atmosphere in the throne room. Duke Bennett’s brow grew slightly tense as he waited for more details to come from his Chief Knight's mouth.

“Sir, the dragon did not fly away and we didn’t deal with it. A child did.”

“What?”

“A child,” Jandar said, the tips of his elven ears beginning to flush with the outlandish things he was saying. “When we found the dragon, half of the suppression force fled due to the beast’s roar. It had a Fear inducing effect and those not strong of will quickly found themselves out of the fight.”

The Duke sat forward with his hands resting under his chin hanging on every word his Chief Knight spoke. The advisors also found themselves listening intently.

“The dragon already looked injured by the time we had laid our eyes on it, and it appeared to be fighting a young child. The child wielded some type of incredible magic power, and eventually the boy single handedly killed the black dragon.”

“Where is this boy now Jandar?” The Duke said sitting up straighter than before, seemingly excited by this fantastical story.

“After the boy killed the dragon, he fainted. We immediately took him into custody and brought him to the holding cells. I even had a brief conversation with him as we brought him to the holding cells.”

Upon hearing this, a look of worry and confusion made its way onto The Duke’s face. “Jandar, you took a boy who you witnessed kill a Black Dragon, and put him under the same level of security that we keep the city’s everyday rapscallions?”

Jandar’s ears completely flushed when the realization of The Duke’s implications hit him in the head. “How could I be so stupid?” Jandar mumbled to himself. The Duke let out a hearty laugh and stood from his throne. “My dear Chief Knight, you are noble, but sometimes naive. Let’s pray this child does not have the same temperament as those in his generation tend to have. If what you say is true, that boy can throw a costly temper tantrum.”

As far as prison breaks go, this is probably the most laid back one Asher had ever heard of, maybe Hollywood had warped his idea of what a prison break was like. Lots of planning, maybe some ropes and a computer to digitally hack into all the locks with lines of code streaming across the screen like the Matrix, and a cool soundtrack playing in the background. In reality, him and the cloaked man had just walked out the front door and onto the street. Goodbye mildew, hello city, and what a city it was. The different smells, the hustle and bustle of people going from one place to the next, various stalls peddling their wares to passers nearby. The cloaked man looked down, “Follow me young one, we are only ten or so minutes from our destination, also put this on and pull the hood up.” The man tossed Asher a cloak similar to his and Asher heeded the man’s advice.

“No point in breaking out of jail if I can get spotted right after,” Asher thought to himself.

After a few more minutes of walking the two found themselves standing in front of a large estate. If Asher had to put a name on it, he was definitely looking at a mansion. They made their way down the walkway and the man knocked on the door. As the door opened Asher saw a familiar face.

“You! You’re the one who was with that elf that took me in!” Asher pointed at the man who opened the door. The man smiled back at him.

“Aldren, my name is Aldren little one, and yes I was. I told Jandar not to take you in, but he’s kind of a stickler for rules...so I decided to take matters into my own hands.” Aldren looked at the cloaked man and nodded at him, “Good work Wallace, you can go change back into more comfortable clothes.”

The cloaked man who was named Wallace nodded back at Aldren, “Thank you Master Aldren, it is always a pleasure to serve when I can. I will return promptly.” Wallace said as he walked into the house and disappeared down one of the various hallways in the mansion.

“Please come in,” Aldren said and gestured for Asher to come inside. Asher walked in and the door closed behind him. “Let’s go to my office and talk things out.”

The mansion had an interesting layout, there were two floors from what Asher could see with a grand staircase directly in the middle of the building to grant access to the upper floor. On the main floor to the left were two hallways with doors lining each side and to the right seemed to be a large kitchen area and dining room. Asher found himself following Aldren up the stairs and a door was directly across from the top of the staircase. As they walked towards the door Asher took notice of two more hallways on each side with a total of four hallways making up the floor plan of the second floor. Aldren opened up the door to his office and in they went.

The office looked like a study that would rival any major scholars from his old world, books lined the walls, and there was a big wooden desk in the middle of the room. Aldren took his seat at the desk, and motioned for Asher to sit at one of the chairs in the room. The chair was more comfortable than it had any business being, what was it some kind of medieval La-Z-Boy? Just as Asher was getting comfortable in the chair, a knock came on the door.

“Come on in Wallace,” Aldren said and in came an older man in a butler uniform with white hair and a sweet mustache. If anyone could pull off a mustache Wallace could and the slight crow’s feet near his eyes gave away his older age despite having a seemingly young face.

“Wallace is my Head Butler, most loyal confidant, and one of my best friends.” Aldren said matter of factly.

Asher saw the butler taking out a kerchief and wiping away a tear, “Thank you Master Aldren, it touches an old man’s heart to hear those words.”

“So as I’ve said, I’m Aldren, the master of this estate. The things we will be discussing will not leave this room. What is your name?”

“My name is Asher, it’s nice to meet you, and you know...not be in jail for my first day being here.” Asher laughed, not totally used to his prepubescent voice. Hopefully puberty doesn’t suck too much with the accelerated aging and all. Aldren laughed as well and smiled. “Yeah, I can’t imagine prison being the best welcome party to a new city. Where are you from?”

“I’m not from here.”

“I know that much, I mean where exactly, what city...country..continent.” Aldren motioned with his hand in a circular motion.

“I mean I’m not from this planet,” when Asher said that Aldren abruptly stopped jokingly motioning his hands as if he was trying to gode an answer from the boy and Wallace quietly cleared his throat, “What that’s not normal?”

“You’re an otherworlder! That makes so much sense now,” Aldren mumbled “Asher keep this to yourself for now, don’t tell anyone else because no, being an otherworlder is not normal on Solaris.”

Asher gulped.

“It isn’t completely new, in the stories of old, otherworlders were more common, but in our modern era they aren’t an occurrence that happens very often, if at all.” Aldren continued “In older eras, Otherworlders were summoned by a strong magic user, a group of magic users, or sometimes brought by the gods when they took a more active role in playing their divine games, for all intents and purposes Asher...you’re special.”

“Well I was on my planet one day and the next thing I knew I was being chased down by a dragon. Anyways, when can I be an adventurer?”

Aldren looked a bit confused by this question that seemingly came out of nowhere. “Adventurer? You can’t be an adventurer…”

“And why the hell not?” Asher immediately shot back

“Asher, you’re technically a fugitive right now. You have no support system, no one to lean on, and you can’t be sticking out too much...while we’re at it, Wallace can you please go fetch the scanner?”

“Yes Master Aldren” Wallace left the room and returned a few moments laters with the same kind of crystal ball you’d see your every day fortune teller with.

“Asher, could you please place your hand on the ball, it will give us some basic information about you… there are more in-depth scanners but this basic one should serve our purposes for now.” Aldren said to him as Wallace handed the ball over. “Just focus on it, it isn’t anything complex.”

Alex focused on the ball and the following information came up:

Name: Asher

Race: Human (Variant)

Level: 3

STR: 18

DEX: 18

CON: 18

INT: 18

WIS: 18

CHA: 18

Aldren let out a surprised whistle and Wallace gasped a soft “Oh my..”

“What, what’s wrong?” Asher began to look a little worried. Aldren looked at him softly and smiled.

“Asher...you’re kind of a freak. Even for an Otherworlder, your base stats are monstrous. Average people range from 8-10 in a stat. It is common for adventurers, and other similar professions to get a single stat are two into the teens, but to have everything at such a high level. I’ve never heard of it.” Aldren continued “And your level, level 3 is uncommon. Average citizens are level 0, new adventurers are typically level 1 or just at level 2. Veteran adventurers are in their mid to late 2’s and the elite are level 3.”

“That level isn’t correct for me on the ball..” Asher said a bit hesitantly “Do I tell him the truth? Ah fuck it why not, he’s been nice so far” he thought to himself.

“Not correct as in you’re not level 3? It could be possible that your Otherworlder status could be messing with the scanner..” Aldren began hypothesizing.

“No, it isn’t correct because I’m actually level 5.” Upon hearing this Aldren and Wallace’s eyes grew large and they both nodded to each other.

“That settles it,” Aldren said “From this point forward...I’m taking you into my care and you’re gonna be my son.” Aldren closed his eyes and nodded satisfied.

“Huh?”