Volume 1 Chapter 9 Goodbye Pavv

Jack was awoken in the deep of night by the Overseer, the woman told him to prepare himself as they were going to leave very soon.

The boy didn’t understand, earlier they were telling him that they were going to leave in the morning. But as the Overseer seemed serious about this, Jack took what was precious to him.

After packing up his clothes, taken the Bone Ring, the beast fang and the drawing of his mother, and walked out of his little room.

He was greeted by an adolescent wearing a Church’s dress, the young adult said to follow him.

While walking the young man introduced himself: “My name is Therio Valte by the way, I will be your personal guard for the trip to the Cathedral of Lowlight.”

Jack hastily answered: “Happy to me you, I’m Jack Lynch.”

Even though the adolescent was walking, Jack had difficulty following. Lynch had to run after the young man to catch up.

Jack had to make the boy slow down. So he asked a very important question in the judgement of someone's personality.

Jack asked: “Therio? Therio? What’s your favourite animal?”

Valte answered slightly ashamed: “The rabbit, why?”

Jack's eyes started to shine. He was happy to finally meet someone with the same tastes as him.

He said: “What, me too?!”

And with that a long lasting friendship started. Therio took the tired kid in his arms and continued his walk.

This friendship seemed almost forced, but Jack was too excited to notice and Therio only felt a soothing warmth coming out of his new friend.

They soon arrived in front of a carriage. Therio put Jack in before closing the door, inside was the Overseer; she invited Jack to sit before telling Therio to start moving. Jack realised she was blind, he wondered how she knew where he was.

As Therio acted as their coachman, the woman started a conversation with Jack.

She said: “A big life awaits you; you were one of the four chosen by the goddess to act as her hands and feet.”

Jack asked: “What is even special about me? I’m just a normal countryside boy.”

The middle-aged woman answered: “Nothing currently, but soon you will become the greatest tool of justice. That is if you let the Church of Eryn guide you on the real path.”

Jack didn’t know what to answer, thus he asked another question: “Is it too much to ask what happened to your eyes?”

The blind woman kept silent.

Jack quickly excused himself: “I’m sorry to have asked if you don’t want to talk about it.”

The Overseer replied: “I willingly lost sight, I was able to see the face of the Goddess, so I chose that it would be the last thing I would ever see.”

Jack was taken aback, he was pious but not to the point he would make himself blind for his faith.

With that the Overseer did not continue talking; they seemingly had a tacit understanding because Jack kept silent.

Jack's young body was however not able to continue for very long, the kid was slowly overwhelmed by the fatigue and the sweet sensation of sleeping.

When the boy woke up they had just stopped at a small village, the Overseer was still watching over him. He got up, saluted the blind woman and got out of the carriage.

He saw not far his friend Therio who was talking with the village chief, Lynch sat on a box and waited for Valte.

Before long the adolescent came back with a bag of food, he saw his little friend and swiftly approached.

The knight gave the kid a piece of bread and sat down. Jack started to voraciously eat the food given to him.

The young man asked: “Are you not sad to leave your hometown?”

Jack replied: “A bit but it’s not like Pavv will disappear overnight, I can still go back someday.”

Valte looked at the kid before saying: “But are you not disappointed in leaving people behind?”

Jack replied with a reminiscent look: “There's nobody back there that I really want to see again, apart maybe from Father Alger. My mom died of illness and my two best friends burned in their sleep.”

Therio looked at him and said: “I don’t either have someone waiting for me anymore.”

The knight tried to cheer up the atmosphere: “But don’t worry, I won’t die and leave you behind.”

Lynch let out a little laugh and said: “Thanks, I won’t abandon you either.”

The youngling asked his friend: “Why did we use this old coach when there was the cool brand new one back in Pavv?”

Therio replied: “Oh, well we had to trick a bad guy into thinking you were still in Pavv.”

Before Jack could ask another question the Overseer asked the young knight to stand guard around the carriage and signalled Jack to enter.

She said: “Young one, today is the day you will take your first step in Eryn’s path, I am going to ask you which kingdom that the Goddess governs you which to follow?”

Jack eagerly replied: “I want to follow the path of Light.”

The Overseer continued: “Very well, if you truly are one that was chosen by the goddess awakening one of her Paths will be trivially easy.”

She said: “I will now open your Chus aperture, accept it and explain your understanding of the Light Path.”

She took out a bunch of rare ingredients from her bag and started breaking them up using a mortar and a pestle. After making a powder, she mixed in water and her own Chus. The herbal tea of plants, meats, ores and Chus was then cautiously given to Jack.

After smelling the sweet perfume of the drink, Jack resolutely drank everything in one gulp.

Jack swore he had never tasted something as bad, the odour was a lie; there was no word to describe the bad taste of the drink.

But before he could think more about the taste of the brew he fell into a coma. Jack awoke in a dark place.