Know that I am with you, even in the darkest of times. The Torment is made to strengthen you, not to break you. There will come a time when you must fight for your freedom, but that time is not now. For now, behave as the perfect slaves, but keep pride in your heart. – The Torment. Chapter 5, verse 12

The journey to Solom would be one that takes weeks. We decided that 2 days rest would be sufficient to heal enough to go on the journey. Since Teacher Grimshaw was the one who discovered me, he became my Advocate. A role in which he would take me to Solom and when there, ask for my official acceptance in the Teachers faction.

Before all that, though, we had to get out of Taurus. While we were freed Gar’shan, we were not citizens of Taurus and never would be. The vigiles, and any other citizen of the nation, had the right to stop us and demand our papers to show that we had a right to be walking wherever we had been stopped. Master Grimshaw said it rarely happened, especially for new Teachers, as we had lost our hair.

Gar’shan had strict rules to follow from the scriptures regarding hair. A man’s hair was never to be shorn, as it could be used target spells and curses against you. It wasn’t a law, but Gar’shan culture evolved complex braids and hair weavings that denoted your age, status, personality, your tribe, and other information. A woman’s hair, on the other hand, should be shorter than 6 inches when living in a foreign land. This was to protect women from foreign aggressors. Most enslaved female Gar’shan cut their hair as short as possible, so as to appear ugly to Taurons.

This made our people stand out to Taurons. The culture here was entirely different- men had short hair and women had long hair. We seemed freakish our men seemed effeminate and our women seemed masculine. This caused all sorts of rumors that our men behaved like women and vice versa. This was neither true or false- each Gar’shan chose their own way in life when we are free and there are no ‘men duties’ and ‘women chores.

Because my hair had fallen out, I just did not look like a Gar’shan. Yes, I had fair skin as opposed to the Taurons’ olive skin and my eyes were lighter, so a reasonable Tuaron could tell I was actually Gar’shan, but I did not scream Gar’shan. Losing my hair had inflicted a psychological scar, and the benefits were not outweighed by the negatives. I felt shamed by not having hair, naked and vulnerable.

My master, Master Palion, had given me my freedom happily. He liked my family, as we had done hard work for his family for generations. He was also kind of fascinated by our culture and listened to our scriptures and readings with a polite, but patronizing smile. I am sure we seemed quaint to him, foreign and weird. But he let us practice our culture as we wished and even let us have the middle of the week off to celebrate and rest. After purchasing my freedom, he had given me a writ of freedom, saying that I was his ‘employee,’ and I had the right to travel all of Taurus if I needed to.

Of course, we never told him our secrets that were revealed after a testing. That was told just to Gar’shan and to our knowledge no Tauron had ever learned our people’s secrets and insights into God’s system. It was just too sacred a knowledge to be profaned by our slave-master’s ears. We were a proud people, despite the years spent in slavery. Many a Tauron tried to beat that out of one of us, but few succeeded.

During my two days of rest, my brothers and father could not stop looking at me, their freed brother and son. My father was proud of me, as was Sal. Joel seemed a little jealous of me, but that was to be expected. They also tried to spend as much time as Master Palion would allow with me. We talked about stories and my mother, funny memories of each of us from when we were little. We all knew that I was going away and we might never see each other again.

When I was alone, I meditated on the concept of Tal’Lat, or ‘God, the Father’. Teacher Grimshaw suggested I think about everything in regard to the word and its meanings. What the word looked like, how it was perfect in nature, high in the middle and ends. We discussed how when written, Tal’Lat looked almost like a ‘w’ in the Tauron alphabet. I did this not for the sake of meditation, though I had learned that skill quickly after meditating for a half an hour. Nor did I do it just for the sake of having learning or adoration of God. Teacher Grimshaw assured me that if I meditated long enough, I would get my first Nomenclaturist revelation. He couldn’t tell me what to meditate on as that was a personal journey and depending what I thought about would give me the power tailored to my mediations.

I was lucky in a way, and unlucky in another when it came to revelations. I did not have to spend XP on purchasing a first level revelation, they came free. Each name of God imparted 5 different revelations, each one more elaborate and powerful than the next. However, to get it I had to spend hours learning, meditating, and thinking about the name. He said that many Nomenclaturists eschewed the gathering of XP in favor of revelations. Some- the wisest of them, Teacher Grimshaw argued, took a balanced approach to revelations, and still tried to gather XP. In a way, the free revelations would allow me to focus XP into my attributes and skills and grow more powerful more quickly. But time was XP, as Grimshaw always stated, and I had to spend much time on revelations. I decided I would learn revelations, but not solely at the expense of XP.

The meditations were tough. I was meditating with a specific goal in mind, which was kind of antithetical to mediation. I shared this frustration with Teacher Grimshaw, and he commiserated, but he couldn’t help me with the problem as he wasn’t a Nomenclaturist.

On the second night of mediation, I was thinking about Tal’Lat and my own father. How my father was a guide, a protector, and an educator. He loved me fiercely and sacrificed a lot to be with me. He was almost a perfect father, and he reveled in the role. I wondered if God, the father was the same. I was idly thinking these thoughts when all the sudden I received a notification.

You have earned your first Revelation: Tal’Lat: the protector! You gain 10 xp for learning your first Revelation!

I nearly fell out of my bed with surprise and quickly thought about the revelation and what it meant. I intuitively knew what it was and did so the moment I thought of it. I merely needed to mention Tal’Lat out loud or in my head and a protective shield would appear on whoever I wanted, including myself. The shield could soak the first 2 full damage dealt to the person as long as it was within 30 minutes of the casting. It cost 1 Zeal point.

That was not bad, not bad at all! This was the first lowest power from the first and easiest name. Would all revelations be as powerful? I then discovered that while I did not have to spend XP on it to learn it, I could level the power up to offer more protections with XP, at the cost of 25 times the new level. When I told Teacher Grimshaw, he celebrated the win with me and told me that that was indeed the least power of the Deific Nomenclaturist powers.

I then had a decision to make: should I think more about Tal’Lat or should I move on to the second name in the scriptures? I asked Teacher Grimshaw and he suggested I stay with Tal’Lat. I was already thinking about it and yes, it would take longer to gain the second revelation, but the revelation would be more powerful once I did get it. I decided to heed his advice and continued my meditations on Tal’Lat.

The time I spent with Teacher Grimshaw was interesting. He told me about the expendables and how they were used. I realized my health was too low and that I needed to increase my Brawn attributes as fast as possible. Having the Tal’Lat: The protector revelation effectively gave me a total of 6 HP in a fight if I needed it. I only had 7 zeal, however and could only get 1 back in a day, though Grimshaw did say that some food gave back Zeal when eaten. He knew some recipes for Zeal and other recipes for other expendables.

I was slowly gaining back my strength, though I could see why most new teachers needed a week to recover. When I finally stood and moved around on the second day I was shaking with exhaustion after 2 minutes of movement. Teacher Grimshaw promised that we would leave tomorrow and that he would take it easy on me for the first few days. “You do need the exercise, however. You are a little too scrawny, and the hiking will help you.”

I was ready to give my goodbyes. First, I walked slowly to Master Palion’s Manor. It was a tall and large building. It was very boxy in shape, at three stories tall and nearly 25 feet long and nearly half that in width. The frame was made with grey-blue slate and stones. It was a massive building that was, in comparison to other wealthy Taurons, about average size. Unless a Tauron was poor, Taurons lived in splendor and opulence. Even the poorest family of Taurons were given a house slave, so their lived were relatively easy as well.

I knocked on the door, and Hecot answered the door. I always liked Hecot. He was a prim and proper Gar’shan and always seemed cool and unflappable. When he was not on duty, however, he could tell the best stories and jokes. Hecot smiled at me. “Congratulations, young Vin. I was excited to hear you had been freed, though sad to learn you had passed the test. You will carry a lot on your shoulders and for that I will always be grateful.”

I thanked him uncomfortably, and he let me in the house, making sure I had no mud on my feet. He then led me to Master Palion’s study.

“Master Palion is waiting for you, he has been excited to see you. Be careful, he knows you passed the test and will want to know as much as possible.” I nodded at the warning. We had worked out a story to tell, a story that all teachers who were enslaved told their masters.

The door to the study was opened after being told to come in and I looked around. I had only been in Master Palion’s study a few times in my life, both times to quickly deliver something.

The study was a room of wonders. It had scrolls and books piled high and in bookcases. Trinkets and sculptures decorated the room. Most of them were statutes of Tauron deities and heroes, but I noticed a few Gar’shan statues, likely stolen from Solom when the Taurons defeated us 200 years ago, at the start of The Torment. I was not sure how I felt about that. I liked Master Palion, and he had been good to us, but he was still my slave master and had separated me from my mother by selling her. It made liking him hard, though he was remarkably likeable.

There were maps displayed. I looked at one quickly. It was a map of the continent, Shara. The southern third of the continent was the nation of Taurus and the northern third was the kingdom of Yeshua. In the northern most peninsula was the small territory of Solom, where my people had come from. Ocasia, the city where I lived, was about 160 kilometers from the norther border of Taurus. I looked to Master Palion.

Master Palion was a larger man and a man who talked quickly, always telling grandiose stories. His eyes twinkled with intelligence and had an avid interest in my people. It was slightly patronizing, as if he thought our culture was somehow inferior to his culture. Most Tauons, however, thought that and therefore utterly dismissed it, having no interest in slave cultures. That served to our benefit, generally.

“Well, hello Calvin,” Master Palion gregariously announced. “My apologies for not seeing you since your test. Hecot assured me you wanted to time along to process the passing of the test. About passing your test, this is something almost unheard of. I have been told that since you passed your test, the whole Gar’shan community paid for your freedom, which I happily gave at the lowest price legally allowed. But I have been told that passing your test is a bad thing. Why is that?”

“Hello, Master Palion-“ I started to say. He corrected me quickly.

“You may address me as Citizen Palion now, you are freed after all.”

“Oh, yes. Thanks Mas- Citizen Palion.” I said, the words sounding mumbled and wrong in my ears. I never called a Tauron ‘Citizen’ before. It was always Master, Mistress, Mrs. or Mr. Whenever in doubt, you would call them ma’am or sir. Never Citizen.

It was alarming that he knew passing the test was bad. Who told him that?

“The test is simply testing the knowledge of culture, the scriptures, and the language of my people. It is a bad thing, as knowing all that is a drain of resources, and that drain is placed on all the community. We must be made free according to the scriptures so that we can serve as teachers to the community. There are always too many of them, and while they seemingly provide value to our people, they do not add anything of concrete value in exchange for all the money they cost. We must pay their room and board, along with their freedom and all the tools and scriptures they need. But we must be honest in our answers. I really should not have paid much attention to my lessons when I was young. Mother taught me too much at too young an age.” My answer was rehearsed, and we brought in my mother to the answer to make Master- Citizen Palion guilty.

He did seem to get a little pale at the mention of my mother and his smile faded a bit.

“Now that is interesting, shall I say Teacher Calvin? Or are you retaining my name. You are welcome to it. It is an honorable name to have.”

“Yes, sir. I will be keeping the name since you have given me permission.”

“Now what you say is interesting. I have read your scriptures. In all of The Creation or The Histories it says nothing about the test.” He asked this and was extremely interested in my answer. This was going into unrehearsed material. I had to improvise.

“It is not in the older scriptures, but it is in The Torment. The guide on how to live under Tauron rule. It is a short part of the scripture and is ever changing. They are not even all the same, as some of the teachings are different. Some copies do not even mention the test.”

“Ah, yes, I have heard of The Torment! The Tauron government is supportive of it, as it says a slave must not rebel against his, her or their master. I had not had a copy of The Torment. Perhaps I should read it, I had originally dismissed it as Tauron propaganda. Do you have a copy of this?”

Hecot cleared his throat politely. “Master, you do have a meeting in a few minutes, shall I say you are delayed?”

“No, no- this won’t take much longer. Listen Teacher Palion, I have a gift for you. I have been told that teachers travel a lot, and I had Hecot gather some supplies from you, and the cook helped.”

The cook had a name. Her name was Amylia. Citizen Palion Cook and never referred to her as anything else, and that always seemed to bother me for some reason.

“My thanks to you, to Amylia and to Hecot.”

From behind the desk, Palion took out a genuinely nice backpack. It was better than the one we had scrounged up, and it seemed filled with supplies! I took the backpack from Palion and once again thanked him.

“Please, visit me anytime you want. I am sure you will want to see your family, and I would be pleased to see you and hear of your travels. Best of luck to you, Calvin.”

Hecot led me to the entrance of the house. I quietly thanked him for helping me out of having to talk about the test more than I needed to. He looked around and seeing no one, he gave me a quick hug.

I spent the next few hours walking around and thanking all the slaves that were within a decent distant from my house. They were all thrilled to see that I was freed, but sad to see me go. More than one expressed their regret that I passed the test, mentioning how hard my life would be. I graciously responded and promised that I would use my freedom wisely and with humble faith, and that I would never forget their sacrifice they made to free me.

That night, I got to visit with my family for one last meal. I told them of seeing Palion and what he had given me. It would save my family and my community a lot of money, as we would not have to buy as many things to survive the long trek to Solom. I gave my father some of the donated money to distribute back to the slaves.

We drank some and celebrated our relationship warmly. I grew saddened that I would have to leave my family, and I admit I cried a bit, as did my father and brothers. It was for a good cause, but it was still hard to say goodbye. I went to bed after eating and woke up an hour before dawn when Teacher Grimshaw knocked at our door. I looked fondly at the house I grew up in and said my goodbyes again, this time silently so as not to awaken anyone.

My adventure had begun.