Chapter 9

Grandpa’s Diary

Evening came quickly and soon it was time for dinner. We didn’t have a banquet like yesterday. Instead, I had my dinner in my own tent accompanied by Adira and Aboo who was eating outside, and when we finished we went outside to the large bonfire where many people were waiting for us.

They were all waiting for my story tonight and I think that they had high expectations because of last night’s story.

I hope I don’t screw this up.

This time I decided to go with a somewhat different story: Aladdin’s Lamp.

“There was a poor boy named Aladdin,-“

***

“Ugh!”

‘Grandpa! I don’t care about the stories you told them! I need to know how you got back home.’

Lily was frustrated. As much as she would love to read over her grandpa’s diary slowly and enjoy it because it turns out that everything that happened was actually real. Lily was given the job of finding the way back home for Lucas and her classmates.

‘That’s it, I’m just gonna skim everything until I find how he got back home.’

Grandpa’s Diary

People seemed to like that story even more, the next day they packed up and began their pilgrimage. Apparently it will take about three weeks.

I have gotten a better understanding of the tribe and the people seemed to have accepted me. I have a good reputation among

the children and they always come to me for stories. They’re cute kids.

I try to help where I can by help feeding their livestock and other odd jobs.

I became fast friends with Aashiq and my relationship with Adira got deeper.

(Skip a few pages)

In the second week of traveling, we came across a sand giant. I heard it was an earth elemental spirit that uses the forces of nature and it is very powerful. It was enraged that we came across its territory and the tribe sent roughly 200 scorpion riders to deal with it.

I saw the battle from afar and the sand giant was humongous. It was at least 30 feet tall if not taller. I heard the warriors say that only an 8-star adept or higher would be able to kill the sand giant. The most that the warriors can do is delay it and give the tribe enough time to pass through its territory before they retreat.

The battle looked incredibly dangerous in my eyes. The sand giant picked up the scorpion riders like they were little toys and threw them around and it controlled the sand around to create sinkholes, but the scorpions were too fast and they circled around while the warriors barraged it with arrows covered in their aura.

Aura. It’s something that I first saw when two warriors got into a serious argument and they had to settle it with a duel with the chief as the judge.

At first I thought it was some sort of magic but Aashiq later explained to me that it is the power from the soul that humans are able to use to strengthen themselves. Of course, not all people are able to utilize aura. Only those talented and strong enough are able to. In this tribe, pretty much all of the scorpion riders are able to utilize aura. They are called adepts.

I learned that there is a ranking system for adepts. It goes from ranks 1-12. Most of the adepts in the tribe are either one or two star adepts. The strongest in the tribe is the chief as a five star adept and he is acknowledged as the greatest warrior of the tribe.

There are about 500 scorpion riders, which means that only 500 of the 8,000 tribe members are adepts.

(Skip a few pages)

After traversing the desert for over three weeks my skin has gotten a lot tanner but I have definitely become more fit. I have been training with the warriors because it gave me something to do and I figured that the stronger I get, the less I would have to rely on others and then I would have a better chance of getting home.

At first some of the warriors sneered and made fun of me for not knowing how to wield a scimitar but they eventually got used to me practice with Aashiq as he gave me pointers.

***

We finally arrived at the pilgrimage site. It was a huge canyon and there was a cave at the end of it. And on top of the entrance of the cave was a humongous sculpture of a scorpion that was beautifully carved with amazing detail. I was simply awed by its magnificence. There was also an altar that was about three stories tall in front of the cave.

The tribe began to set up preparations for the ritual to summon the godbeast.

(Skip a few pages)

The ritual ceremony was very long and intricate. The shaman of the tribe was chanting something in a weird language that I couldn’t understand. But for some reason his words sounded mysterious and powerful. Soon enough, rumbling could be heard from the cave. Soon I was able to spot two red dots shining in the darkness of the cave.

The chief walked up to the center of the altar and cut the palm of his hand and raised it up towards the cave where the two red dots were shining.

I somewhat braced myself to expect a large scorpion and I was not disappointed.

The scorpion was huge. Even larger than the sand giant that we met about a week back. Its body was completely black and it had humongous pincers and it actually had three stingers instead of one.

The godbeast approached the chief and I don’t know if I was daydreaming or not but the scorpion shrank. Like a lot.

I couldn’t believe my eyes. The Great Scorpion shrunk into an incredibly beautiful woman that seemed otherworldly.

Her skin was literally pitch black like how she is in her scorpion form and she was wearing a beautiful white toga for some reason and she also had her three huge stingers like they were tails that protruded from above her buttocks. And did I mention that she was tall? She is tall. She towered over the chief by at least two feet. And the chief is a tall guy. He is probably six foot three inches.

All the other tribe members were prostrating before them and the shaman ordered the offering to be brought up.

It was a huge pile of crystals pulled by a scorpion and it left it on the altar. At least I thought they were normal crystals until Adira informed me that they are soul stones. They have various magical properties and many more that are undiscovered and they can help mages and they are basically coveted by almost all magical beings.

I focused my eyes back to the ritual and the Great Scorpion proceeded to drink the blood of the chief from his hand.

Then the Great Scorpion used her middle stinger and touched the chief’s forehead lightly and a bright light was emitted from their connection.

Suddenly a voice rang out from behind.

“We’re being attacked by the Brown Hawk tribe!”

***

“Lily it’s time for dinner.”

“Huh?” I looked up and saw that Dylan and Jacob were already gone. Lucas was the one that notified me.

‘Dang. Things were just getting good.’

“So did you find out any interesting information on how to get back home?” asked Lucas.

“No, not really, it was mostly just stuff about his time at some tribe in a desert.”

I felt bad because they depend on me to find a way back home but I wasn’t able to show any results.

“Hey, it’s no big deal, cheer up, it’s not every day that you get to travel to a completely new world.”

Lucas is such a nice guy for trying to cheer me up. I felt myself blush a little when I saw him smiling at me with that gorgeous smile of his.

“Hahaha, you’re finally here. Come, sit. You’re honored guests at my home.” The deep voice of the mayor resounded throughout the halls.

Dylan and Jacob were already seated and the food was being sent out by the servants.

The food was okay, I assumed it was because of their lack of spices or their technology was far behind ours, that it didn’t suit my tastes. But my hunger soon overwhelmed me and I ate unsparingly.

During our meal Mayor Ferbias, turned out to be a pretty cool guy with very good manners.

He eventually asked us where we’re from and Lucas was honest with him and told him that we were from another world.

Surprisingly, he didn’t seem very surprised. “When you live in a world of magic, anything is possible.”

“Can-can you help us find a way home?”

“It is a man’s duty to help those that are in need. I would be honored to go on this epic journey with you.”

‘What the hell? It’s that simple? Does he have some ulterior motive? Or is this just his character?’

Lily was suspicious about his actions. No one just randomly helps strangers on a mission to go back to their world.

“Dylan, where did you learn to fight? Based on your aura, you should roughly be a three or four star adept. You’re quite the genius for your age.” said the mayor.

“My grandpa.” Dylan curtly replied and went back to eating I silence.

There was an awkward silence after that and so I interrupted it with a question.

“What about you mayor Ferbias? What rank are you?”

“Haha, I am a seven star adept.”

“Really? Isn’t that really strong? I bet there aren’t that many people as strong as you.”

Based on grandpa’s diary, the chieftain of the Black Scorpion Tribe was a five star adept, so the mayor should be much stronger than him.

“What is the highest rank of adept?”

“Twelve star adept is the highest rank and when you become an ten star adept you are able to contend with godbeasts.”

“What are godbeasts?” Jacob asked.

“They are the gods’ creations. Some are children of the gods and others reached that state by an amazing stroke of luck or some

type of mutation. They are considered demigods.” Ferbias answered.

‘Wait, but in grandpa’s diary the tribe worshiped a godbeast… Do they have different beliefs?”

“Hold on, you said gods, as in you have multiple gods?” Lucas said.

“We have many gods. Too many to count. But we have the god pantheon which is a council of the twelve most influential and powerful gods. They are the ones that are mostly worshipped.

You’re world must be very different. Do you not have multiple gods? Also, you seemed surprised about aura, does your world not have adepts?”

“Well, the place we come from has many different religions, 4,000, I believe. Many believe in different gods or God and many are branches of others that separated through the passage of time. I’m personally a Christian, so I believe in only one God.” Jacob explained.

“We also don’t have any adepts in our world either nor any magic. I mean there might have been hundreds or maybe thousands of years ago, but nowadays magic is considered a fairy tale.” Lucas added.

“But how come your friend Dylan here can use aura?”

Everyone stared at Dylan as he put a piece of meat into his mouth.

He looked up. “What you call aura, I call qi. Martial artists and monks in ancient China discovered it thousands of years ago and it was passed on generation after generation. Qi is everywhere around us, the air, water, earth. But compared to this world, the qi is infinitely more abundant than ours. I’m assuming that’s the reason why you guys are able to use this “aura” thing.

Normally, martial artists control their qi inside of their body to strengthen it from the inside and that is how they are able to perform inhuman feats and are much stronger than the average person.”

“Woah… so you’re saying that those historical figures like Br*ce Lee and those ancient Chinese generals were all able to use qi?” asked Jacob.

“Yeah, pretty much. But in our world everyone with enough training and years of discipline is able to utilize qi. But, in this world it’s apparently very rare for an adept. So, I’m assuming that the techniques that we use in our world are far more advanced and efficient than yours in activating qi.”

“Ho ho. Interesting. I’m going to have to ask you to teach me just how advanced your world’s aura circulating techniques are.”

The dinner ended pleasantly and Mayor Ferbias volunteered to show us around but I refused saying that I was tired, but I really just wanted to keep on reading grandpa’s diary and find a way to quickly get home.