Chapter 4

I was a bit embarrassed when the shop owner kicked me out of the front counter like that; a few people there were laughing at me and talking about it. I quickly ate the rest of this magnificent thing called a chicken sandwich and left the store.

Right when I walked out of the store, I caught the eye of that strange lady I bumped into, she was sitting on a bench across the street, pretending to read a piece of paper while clearly trying to conceal her face.

Since she’s stalking me, might as well ask for some advice.

I headed straight for her, I noticed a little twitch, and her hands turned into fists as she tore the paper. She had the same look of my slaver Rolo, when I did something wrong, he would have a similar frustrated look.

“You did it again! I don’t know how you can find me so easily, but this is the 2nd damn time you did it. You really piss me off Azgarth!” she crossed her arms and tensed up with a pouty face.

I froze for a brief moment, then kept walking toward her, the name Azgarth sounded so familiar.

“Hey do you know me?”

Her face went blank.

“You don’t know? Wait… You’re one of those that lost their memory in the wormhole? Hahaha…holy shit, of all people they got you!” she held onto her stomach as she laughed hysterically.

I frowned for a bit, I have a feeling I’m going to hate this woman. Another side of me is relieved that someone knows me.

“So… Since you know me… Can you tell me a bit about myself or something?” I felt a bit awkward, because I don’t know her, but she knows quite a bit about me. I don’t like this disadvantage.

“Hmm…” she put her fist to her chin and stared off for a bit.

“I got it! I’ll take you to King Johannes, he knows you better than anyone I swear!” she analyzed my face when she said King Johannes; it seems she wants to see some sort of a reaction.

“That’s great… Where is he at?” I pointed my hands in different directions awkwardly. She laughed.

“No no no! He’s about five hours north walking distance in a city called Broke Ridge, we can leave now if you’d like!”

This woman’s extremely upbeat personality really bothers me, I know it’s fake, but she does it so damn well it’s scary.

“We can leave now. Wait… What’s your name?”

“Raven and yours is Azgarth if you didn’t know.”

I nodded.

What an ugly name Azgarth

“You have everything?” as I pointed at my own backpack.

She nodded and tapped her small empty bag on her side.

“Can you fly?”

Her eyebrow perked a bit at the question.

We were flying for about five minutes when Raven who I was holding demanded to be brought down to the lake, I didn’t understand the emergency. When we landed, she quickly got her distance from me and had a face of hatred, which I imagine is her true face that she hides from everyone.

“Why the fuck you smell so bad?! We’re flying in the air and all I smell is horse shit, get your ass in that water! Try and smell somewhat decent.” She grabbed a towel out of her bag that didn’t seem like it would fit and threw it on the ground near my feet, then stormed off and left me there near the lake in the woods.

I’ve always smelled bad so the thought never occurred to me that it’s unusual. I stripped my armor and my clothes and got in the water, it was nice and refreshing. I only spent a few minutes scrubbing the dirt off my skin; there is only so much you can clean without soap.

I dried myself with the towel then started putting my clothes back on when I heard a splash behind me in the lake.

I turned my head and saw a monster alligator right behind me, it wasn’t a normal sized one, it had to be about 6 times bigger than it, its maw could probably put all of me inside of it. Before it dove at me I activated my side step and dodged it. It turned and surprisingly moved fast toward me, I was about to go side step again and grab my sword on the ground when a shadow appeared on top of it’s head. The shadow revealed Raven, she thrusted down with two daggers that were on fire striking the top of its head, the alligator groaned then died shortly after, life essence came out and went into Raven.

“You know this fucker wouldn’t have snuck up on the old Azgarth.” She snorted.

She then moved her hands around the alligator as if she was looking for something, she then started cutting it open around the middle, where the heart would be, she slid her hand in and grabbed this purple looking crystal about the size of a walnut.

“What’s that?”

“Oh this? It’s a way to get money on this planet, all monsters have this in them, if you go to a town with one of those class rocks then there should be a convertor there as well. You put these crystal things in em and they come out as copper, silver, or gold depending how much you got. This thing should be about 1 gold coin.”

Interesting, so adventurers must be quite wealthy if they are strong. Another thing is Raven is strong… A little too strong. She is definitely going further than the capabilities a human should have. Even more than me with the animal aspect and class, she’s in a whole other league.

“If you don’t mind answering… How did you just do that so easily?”

She was in thought for a moment as if she wasn’t sure how to answer that question, or if she should.

“I’ve ascended a few times, so I’m extremely stronger and faster than someone like you who are what we call zero.”

“Can you clarify a bit on that?”

“So to ascend you need to get life essence. You understand that at least right?”

I nodded.

“Now when you get close to ascending you’ll start feeling it in your chest, like you just know if it’s coming soon, maybe within a month time I’d say. So a few things happens when you do ascend, you get new abilities from your animal aspect. You get one for your class one also which I say is more important since most people’s aspect is useless in my opinion, the class one is really who you are, obviously you are a fighter which is I’d say is the most common class, I’m a thief a bit more uncommon I’d say. When you ascend, you also get skills from your class, which is much more beneficial to actual combat, but on top of that if you are a fighter you will become much stronger, as in if you were a mage you’d be able to cast much stronger magic. I can tell your aspect is half way decent, a flying one is very useful compared to lets say a fucking squirrel. Another thing, don’t ask people about their animal aspect, it’s one of those taboo questions to ask here. So we should head out soon, we don’t want to be in this part of the forest at night.”

We flew off again, it was mostly flat here and trees as far as I can see. After 30 minutes, I saw what looked like a castle in a large clearing of forest, inside the ten foot walls were stone buildings, while outside of the walls were many wooden houses and farms. Raven motioned for me to land outside the gates before we enter.

Just like the other town there was a few guards out front but these ones seemed to be much stronger looking. When they saw Raven, they immediately went to attention and saluted as we walked by.

The streets were crowded with tired looking people as it looks like everything was closing down for the day, Raven received a few looks from people that recognized her, it seems like she’s somewhat important.

We left the outer city interior and entered the inner city wall, we went through the gate and the city guards did the same thing as last time.

Everything seemed to be upper class; people wore better clothing, better armor, and had a more pompous posture. It seems like a lot of the inner city people are successful adventurers and merchants.

After ten minutes of walking inside the inner city, we finally got to the castle door. A few guards were here as well but in much better gear than the other guards. They moved out of the way of Raven, but one of them looked at me and even though he had a helmet on I saw that familiar look in the eyes…Fear.

He brought his spear at me at speeds I couldn’t even see, and had it at my throat, the tip slightly breaching the skin which caused me to bleed.

“What! What is he doing here!? We must kill him now!” the guard yelled with anger, even though it was shaky.

“Put your damn spear down Phillip, you’re a royal guard act like it. Azgarth is my guest.” Raven said with a slight grin.

The man looked hesitant, but he had enough discipline to bring his spear back, he eyed me with disbelief as I entered the castle.

We walked down the hallway toward what Raven said was King Johannes war room, which is where he was most of the time apparently.

“Why did that guy want to kill me?”

Raven looked at me then squinted slightly at the wound on my neck that’s now healed.

“Believe it or not Azgarth, these people from our world know you, and you could say that you weren’t very well liked. Trust me…”

I shrugged at that, couldn’t really blame him I guess for reacting that way.

Raven opened a door up and walked in motioning me to follow. We enter and the circle room with a large table of an unfinished map. A man was moving stone pieces on it before he looked at Raven. A smile was appearing on his face until he turned to me, his smile went away and his green eyes were still, he didn’t move a muscle. This went on for about ten seconds when he cleared his throat.

“Azgarth…”

The man looked to be in his late twenties, well-groomed brown hair that was shoulder length, tall, muscular, fair skin, and his face seemed to be perfect. He’s the most charismatic man I’ve ever met.

So this is King Johannes.