"Let's go then. But some important information you should know is that the wind mage turned into a rend, which means she's become a giant monster, something we should definitely not cross in any circumstance. You would need a giant army to even think of facing one, and even then you most likely will lose," Roderic explained, his expression turning quite serious.
Lucian listened and started wondering why he had never heard of these rends before, so he asked Roderic, "Okay, but I'm wondering, if these rends are as dangerous as you say, why have I never heard of them before?" Lucian's head tilted slightly to convey his confusion.
"Rends are for the most part hidden from the public. Instead, what kingdoms do is keep them as danger zones on maps that are to be avoided and never tread on. Most likely this area will soon show up on new maps produced by the kingdom and will eventually be mandatory for merchants and map makers to have before selling, as to keep folks away. And the brave ones that decide to explore those places are most likely dead, and have been kept under wraps from the public and might instead be said to have died in a different way. Anyhow, I'm only saying what I've heard from the elders in my city, so I can't say anything for sure," Roderic said, shrugging his shoulders before starting to walk the way they originally came flying from.
Lucian was enlightened as he had seen a decent amount of them on maps but had kept himself far away from them as he had heard rumors of the painful deaths people had experienced there. His feelings were all over the place though, as he was being fed a lot of information on top of being sad over his passed teammates.
But he felt the need to be strong, so he rose and picked up the meat sticks before shouting at Roderic to come back to pick his meat up and eat it before leaving.
Roderic felt slightly embarrassed by this before coming back and excusing himself before finishing up his hearty meal that was lacking seasoning.
before taking out his waterskin and raising it high above his head and saying, "To a great adventure!"
Lucian didn't have anything to use to raise above his head except his sword, but he felt it was too extreme to use in this situation, so he clenched his fist before raising it above his head and saying, "To a great adventure!"
Before both raised themselves up and left, heading for the cave.
After a bit of time had passed, they were starting to get close.
Coming near the cave, there was a slight gale swooshing over them before they saw a giant white palace floating in the air, being stabilized by four different tornadoes. This didn't fully seem real to Lucian as it was quite the magnificent palace, one that seemed to have been there way before his time.
The palace had multiple pillars all surrounding the palace. They had ancient engravings flowing upwards. The palace itself had a giant entrance, one that Lucian presumed was for a giant monster to enter. The palace itself was a giant box extending upwards, turning into a giant tower spiraling up into the air.
On top of the tower was a giant ball of air that had condensed into a visible phenomenon. The palace was beautiful, but the sounds around were extremely loud, so it was hard to appreciate its beauty.
"Wow, this does not look real. It looks like something ripped straight out of a fairy tale. Sadly, it's also the same reason why it's not possible to retrieve the corpses of my squad in the collapsed cave..." Lucian said, slightly whispering at the thought of not properly giving his squad a proper send-off. Before he managed to put his focus back on the main quest, to get horses to travel with!
Roderic wasn't too surprised by Lucian's unstable mood, as his friends had recently died. So he responded by saying, "Once I'm strong enough, I might be able to retrieve your friend's corpses. Sadly, your retainers were not as lucky... so I will need to retrieve them in a vial if it's still possible by the time I'm strong enough..."
Lucian was slightly shocked by Roderic's comment on his and Sidrian's retainers but eventually calmed down as this wasn't Roderic's fault. But he still felt a longing for the power the so-called mage had shown him, so it would be possible for him to do the retrieval instead.
Before suppressing his wandering thoughts and saying, "If we walk to the left, we will reach the horses me and my squad set up before entering the cave."
Avoiding the wind rend's palace, Lucian and Roderic continued on to the left as Lucian instructed Roderic to the way where the horses were left.
Finally arriving near the horses, Roderic and Lucian realized the horses were in desperate need of food and water as they had been staying here for a while. So both of them chose their horses and continued on to find a nice patch of grass and a river for the horses to drink from. Lucian, of course, chose his own personal horse named Excalibur. It was a rouncey horse, white in color with a yellow patch on its head.
Sadly, the remaining horses had nowhere to go, so they were released. "Hopefully they won't stumble into the wind rend's nest," Lucian said inwardly, slightly worried.
Before the both of them set off to Roderic's home city, containing lots of mages.
The Accursed City of the Shifting Sanctum!
. . .
In the Kingdom of Sindam, deep in the eastern part of the woods, slightly latching onto Mount Rafris, a villa was placed, seeming to be lost to time.
The golden radiance from the morning sun was shining brightly over the villa, making it seem like a painting.
Deep into one of the main bedrooms of this villa, which seemed to be quite old-fashioned by the standards of these times, a giant orb of blood appeared.
The giant orb of blood was hanging over one of the old-fashioned beds lying near the window, which was casting the golden radiance from the sun into the room. The curtains billowed in the wind, making the light refract and swirl around the room.
The blood orb pulsed as it converged and expanded, manifesting bones that rapidly assembled into a full skeleton. Muscle tissue, brain tissue, and various organs began to form around it. Before the tissues could attach themselves, a translucent chain appeared along the spine, snaking upward into both arms. The tissues then moved as one, overlapping and spreading until they completely wrapped the skeleton.
The bloody part of the transformation was complete. A naked humanoid figure now existed where only blood had been moments before.
The figure's skin came alive as hair sprouted forth. Eyebrows formed, body hair spread across the flesh, and thick hair grew from the scalp. Suddenly, two eyes burst out, placing themselves neatly under the eyebrows. The two irises' color was the same golden hue the light from dawn was scattering throughout the room.
The figure's process seemed to be complete as he fell down, landing on the bed. The end result was a young man.
This man was laying in the old-fashioned bed naked, as if he'd been sleeping there for decades.
The man had long, light brown, straight hair, as well as thick and lengthy eyelashes. The lashes seemed to be of the dark brown variety compared to his light brown hair.
He had quite the toned body, as well as his skin being slightly tanned.
This man exuded a holy air, one that a true prophet could be compared to.
His eyes widened, his pale gold irises shining brightly from the golden light being spread from the window.
Immediately feeling a sharp pain shooting through his head, he pressed his left palm onto his forehead to try to reduce the pain.
Suddenly a voice sounded inside his head, one of confidence and relaxation. "Good morning, my ."
The young man responded back quickly, seeming to be confused. "How are you... where am I, how am I!?! What is going on?!?" The man seemed to start stressing.
"You are my creation, and I have created you for a reason."
"What sort of reason? Also, how am I? Before you explain anything more, I need to have a grasp of myself first. You said something about me being your creation!?" The voice's words only caused the poor young man even more stress.
"You might believe yourself to be a real human, but that's only imprinted knowledge.
Knowledge I have given you so you can complete my mission. The mission is your purpose and will always be your purpose." The voice was calming, causing the young man to calm down instinctively.
But still, the stress and worry the young man experienced from hearing his words caused him to still tumble around, trying to deny his existence being only a toy for this voice to play with.
"You must just be a figment of my imagination... There is no way I'm some sort of puppet that you can play and toy with!"
The voice, still calm, said, "You are Joshua. My creation and guide for all humans."
The voice saying his name caused something to click in his brain. It was as if he had heard someone calling him Joshua before. This made him realize that he might actually be some sort of creation that this voice had made.
"What do you mean guide? Why will I be guiding others and to what purpose!?" Joshua expressed, still confused and stressed.
"This purpose will be revealed once you have gathered enough humans under your wing. I will then reveal the next step for you as to complete my mission and your purpose's completion."
Joshua was even more confused but still asked, "Okay then, if I supposedly follow along with what you call my 'purpose,' how will I rope in all these humans?" Joshua felt this was a necessary question as he had nothing to really impress anyone with...
"You are my creation, so of course you will be created with magical abilities; abilities that you can use to affect humans to follow you. But be careful, as there are other humans with similar effects which are demonized by the public. They are called mages. They make a contract with a god named the Binding Abyss, which allows them to use the abilities which are made from their alternate version from another world named the Lunar Rift.
"So I want you to act as a prophet, one that will show the people your holy abilities bestowed by god, and guide them."
Joshua was very against the idea of acting as a fake prophet, but he had nothing else to cling to. He had no choice. He felt like a fish that had been stranded in a desert with no ocean in sight.
"Okay... where will I start then?" Joshua said, feeling his gaze drifting to the golden radiance from the window, his expression looking lost.
"You will start your journey to the Kingdom of the Sun, Solarin. If you head west from here, you will be in the right direction."
Joshua, who was completely naked, pushed himself off the bed, standing up as he headed to the closet of this room.
"I'll follow the 'purpose' you gave me, but I'm doing it for myself. I will try to find my own purpose in this, one that you won't have control over or be directed by you."
Joshua said, trying to make himself feel better about the situation he was placed in.
"You can try, but the more you learn, the more you will understand that your true purpose is the one I have given you."
Joshua didn't respond, instead putting his focus on trying to find something he could wear in the closet, if possible something holy and refined so as to be able to act as a prophet the voice wanted from him.
Suddenly a thought struck Joshua. Who is this voice anyway? He then mustered up the confidence to ask this unknown existence, "What are you anyway? And if possible, I want a name?"
"My name? What am I? That you will discover when you reach your purpose. For now, call me Father."
"Father..." Joshua wasn't too shocked by this, as this so-called father had been secretive the entire time. But still, why Father? Because I'm his creation? No, then he would be my creator... Ehh, I'll ask this supposed Father later once we have warmed up a little.
Shifting his focus, he put his mind back on getting something to wear. In the closet he found a plain white linen shirt as well as some earthy brown linen pants. At the bottom he found a pair of simple leather sandals, and to finish off his clothes he found a pretty expensive seeming robe to put over himself. It had a deep dark blue color with golden patterns spreading over the entire robe. It was quite exquisite and slightly surprising of a catch, but looking outside, this seemed to be a pretty expensive villa.
"Hey, Father, I'm wondering, is this villa mine? Because it seems pretty old and broken down. It's like the owner just up and left." Joshua asked, trying to poke out some detail about his past or his creation from Father.
"Sadly, my powers only let me choose a location to grant you life in Sindam and not in Solarin. My goal and your purpose are in the Kingdom of the Sun, Solarin. So I chose an abandoned villa that was placed far in the outskirts, so you have a place to prepare yourself for the journey." The Father calmly explained.
"Hmm, fair enough." Walking down the spiral staircase, he found the kitchen of the villa. Sadly, there was no food to be seen.
Abruptly, the Father echoed inside his head, "Joshua, I will now teach you one of your many powers. Power of growth. This will be your first power granted to you by me."
"Power of Growth!? What does that do? Does it make plants grow wild or something?" Joshua scoffed back, even still feeling a sense of excitement. Because in his so-called implanted memories, humans shouldn't have powers, except for maybe the mages Father mentioned…
"You're kind of correct, I'll give you that. So first of all, you have the ability to make life blossom. If you were to activate this ability, all sorts of plants will start to grow rapidly. You can to an extent control what type of plants will grow, but you're still kind of weak, so you won't be able to grow a ton of varied plants based on your wants and needs. But still useful to show off in front of your followers and grant them sustenance on a pilgrimage." The Father explained.
"That's pretty useful. Food might not be too much of a problem then." Joshua stroked his chin while a grin sprouted out, his hand holding onto the lower cabinet of the kitchen.
"But you did say first of all, does that mean I have more powers in growth?" Joshua asked, feeling quite spirited knowing that if he was at least some abomination of this Father, at least he'd have some powers to support himself with.
"If you didn't cut me off, I would have continued. Anyway, what I was saying is, second of all, you have the ability to control the direction of growth. If you're in a situation where you need to defend yourself or create a bridge, you can control the plants to grow in whatever direction you want. This could subdue your target by not allowing them to move, overpowering them with branches and plants alone." The Father explained once again, clearly annoyed this time, yet still radiating that inexplicable sense of calm.
"Third of all you have the ability to age humans up and down. This power for now is only touch based. And it will be extremely hard to use for defense or attack, but I believe it will be useful to help your followers be capable of following you for long periods of time, as an old person would be quite annoying to the pilgrimage." This time emanating a sense of malice, still somehow calming Joshua.
"Weird, this calming feeling is strange. He hasn't done anything to harm me, but I still feel like he has some kind of evil plan for me… I can't be sure for now though, but that aura he just gave off just doesn't sit right with me…" Joshua thought to himself, now feeling suspicious once more. But he threw it out later as he felt excited to try out his new powers. First heading out the door to the wilderness as there wasn't anything noteworthy to take with him, except for a bag he found.
"So likeee… how do I activate this power?" Joshua asked, trying to expel some sort of radiance towards the plants.
"Stop talking so casually. If you're going to act like a prophet, you will need your words to give off wisdom. What you are doing will only cause people to chat with you like some sort of friend they visit from time to time. Of course, if it wasn't for your purpose, then talking casually would be fine. Anyhow, getting back on track. How you will expel your abilities is via a chain that is inside of you. This chain is the connection between you and me. This is what causes us to be one and the same. All you need to do is imagine this chain and let all of you into it. This will cause the chain to activate, letting you choose what power to expel." The Father explained after lecturing his creation a little, as to not let an attempted descent of a prophet fail because he was just too casual.
"Whaaaa… come on, like you said you made me, so why are you lecturing me about the way you made me?" Joshua felt slightly confused. But he focused back on what Father said. He then imagined a chain inside himself, then letting all of him flow into the chain. Suddenly a reaction happened—his body glowed a golden light, his irises turned a deep golden shade. He felt himself being able to pull the ground up by just lifting his hand, letting himself guide it.
"How thrilling," Joshua said to himself before putting it into practice. He imagined himself grabbing the ground, then swiped his hand upward. Suddenly a giant apple tree grew high into the air with a single apple hanging from it. Joshua controlled the branch, bringing it down to his level, then grabbed the apple and took a bite. "Nice, tastes yummy."
"Apple huh." Father reacted to Joshua's choice.
"I had a craving for an apple just now, so I decided I'd grow an apple tree."
Joshua then asked, "Regardless, I feel it's about time I get back on track, so which way is west?"
Father responded by saying, "To your left."
"Okay then," Joshua responded before lifting his leg and shifting it over to his left side before finding a path. At the same time, he was munching down on the apple before throwing it away.
Suddenly a gentle smile appeared on his face.