I was just pulling the cart and thinking. The only things that distracted me was that once or twice an hour, Patir corrected my course, as I was apparently slowly drifting from a straight line. I swear to God, the native people of this world has a superhuman sense of direction. Perhaps it comes with never having been able to navigate by landmarks due to the ever present fog.

“Yian!” Patir yelled. I thought I was about to be corrected again, but “Don’t you think it’s about to camp?” I suddenly noticed it had become pretty dark. I was so absorbed in my thoughts about what to tell them and how. I had reached some conclusions at least.

First off, I don’t want them to know that I know God, or that I am Yos. Given how people treated the hero as the pope because he was God’s messenger, I don’t want them to tell the church because it is for the greater good or whatever. This also means I won’t tell them I came from another world, since such a fact is also usually tied to the heroes, but I feel better about it since I hardly think it is relevant anymore. Obviously, I don’t want to be an actual legend of an evil entity to them.

Secondly, I don’t want them to know I am immortal. Again, there’s a chance it will connect me to being Yos, but I also remember the way certain members of Ahorn’s group reacted when I came back to life. They were disgusted. I don’t think these guys will react the same way, but I won’t risk it.

And thirdly and perhaps contradictory, I want them to know I don’t age. It will be obvious sooner or later, so if I don’t tell them now, it will be obvious I kept things hidden. I also have slight hope that Yasia will lose interest, if she knows I am really an old man. The trick is how to fulfill both my second and third wishes, but I think I found a way.

The last thing I want to do is introduce them to Dixy, but I will wait until I have talk with her, so that we can get our stories straight.

“Right, let’s settle down for the night!” I say as I slow the cart to a stop. Patir and I break off some branches of nearby trees for wood and light a fire. Yasia has already sat down by it and I go to fetch Kassa. As I lift her up, she gives a stir.

“ughhhh…” Sounds weakly from her.

“Kassa? Did you wake up?”

“my head… hurts… So thirsty… and hungry… it hurts…” Her voice sounds weak and pathetic. I immediately fetch her some water and salted meat which she chows down like it is her first meal in ages. After a solid ten minutes of high-speed feasting, she stretches her body.

“Damn, that hit the spot! Shit, what happened? Where are we?” She freaks out as soon as she regains her senses.

“I saved you” I say quietly. She suddenly pats over her own body.

“Huh? How long has it been? Where did all my wounds go?”

“I saved you just before it was too late. I used my magic.” I explain to her calmly.

“Magic like that exists? Shiiit, that’s crazy.” She muttered the last part seemingly to herself, but I caught it.

With Kassa up and about, I wanted to start preparing to make food by fetching my cauldron and what few ingredients I had brought. We really only have enough supplies for a day or two, I think. But as I brought it over to the fire, Yasia jumped up and wanted to snatch it from me.

“This is the wife’s job!” She stated, as I gave her the waterskin, vegetables, meat and water. As we sat around the fire I drew my breath and started talking.

“I am going to tell you all about myself now.” Attention was centered on me quickly. I talked about the village where I grew up, my distanced brothers and my cute little sister, how my father died and Jorgen took me in, how Hannah taught me magic and I went to the city. I talked about Jorgen’s death and Hannah’s virtual one, how I was doing a great job as a fledgling hunter in a great clan with many friends. I talked about Bosir, Atna, Asger, Kamas, Caper, Toben, Mynie, Bern, Larn and even what little I remember of old Sirgut. I feel tears welling up in my eyes as I remember they are all gone.

I talked about how Asger died in front of me, though I downgraded the dragon to regular monster.

“Hmmm, must be tough…” Was the reply I received. I quickly glanced over their sympathetic faces. It made me feel a bit bad for twisting the details, but I continued nonetheless, there was more to come.

We had started eating at this point.

I then told the first fabricated part, about how I discovered my gift and the fake nature of it.

“Time doesn’t affect me if I don’t want it to.” Was the thing I had concocted. “I don’t grow old, I don’t need to sleep, I don’t need to eat or drink. All those grow with time that I can choose to not affect me.” I was actually pretty proud of it. Everyone had baffled looks on their faces.

“Ha, that explains how you can look so young at that age!” Patir laughs. Wait, he only thinks I am like 35, right? Boy is he in for a surprise.

I then told them about Atna and how we fell in love. As I did so, Yasia seemed to become very irritated, but I continued. I told about her wanting to take her grandfather’s seat of power, her desire to become king and was interrupted once again by Patir.

“King? What is this? A fairy tale?” No kings have existed since the hero, after all.

“Calm down, it will all be explained.” He sits down, looking a little disgruntled.

I tell about how we roused support from the Silvestri, again with some intervention by Patir, but I basically ignored it and continued, and then about how Atna was kidnapped by a noble, how Mynie betrayed us, Caper and Toben died and we chased her to the city.

I explained how we split because of injuries and how my last comrade told me to give up, but I stormed a noble’s estate single-handedly before being captured. I then again downgraded my imprisonment by being incased in metal, to being moved to a faraway prison.

“That explains how you ended up in the frontier.” Patir says to himself. I sigh a little and explain the context.

“They guards stopped coming all of a sudden and I was left alone in that prison. I started to weaken the stone walls little by little with by bare hands, before I finally got out… It took me more than 800 years.”

As soon as the last sentence is spoken, all look at me with their mouths hanging open.