When I was left alone in the room, I finally cleared my mind about what had happened.
'This time I really risked dying ... however, having managed to defeat that chimera ...'
My actions last day made me happy and proud at the same time, after all, in the world I came from I was certainly not considered a brave person.
I checked my pants pockets. As I suspected they were empty.
'So they used the flowers I picked for Marie…' Of course, I couldn't be sure without asking Rivorio, but I was convinced it went just like that.
I looked around, I saw my fur coat hanging on a small clothes rack, placed next to the wardrobe to my right. As absurd as it may seem, I only noticed in that instant that I was not wearing it and that both my clothes and my body were clean.
'Hmm, I guess I have to thank Rivorio for that ...'
Not being able to leave the room, I stayed all day staring at the ceiling above me, thinking back to the absurd first two days spent in my new home.
'So this will be my new home ...'. I finally felt that I really belonged to that turbulent world, and a new will arose in me: to travel the lands of that world, and to do so I knew that I absolutely had to get stronger.
The next day I was finally able to stand up, albeit with a little back pain.
I decided to leave the room, I absolutely wanted to talk to Rivorio.
I put on my fur coat and tightened the sword belt around my waist.
Leaving my room, I found myself in the living room. I saw Rivorio sitting in a chair next to the large wooden table. He was reading a book, I wanted to talk to him but I didn't know whether to disturb him.
Rivorio, realizing my presence, motioned me to sit in front of him, closed the book he was reading, and placed it on the table.
I thought he was going to tell me something, but he kept quiet, and seeing that I wasn't speaking either, he reached out his right hand towards the book he had just put down, intending to go back to reading.
"W-wait…" I got his full attention.
"Mmh ... you lined up a few ideas I see ..." He urged me.
"Um, yes ... I think so ... but how do you know?" I asked him intrigued.
"Eh, I see it from your eyes..." He replied. I did not fully understand the meaning of his words, but I decided not to investigate further about it.
"I want you to train me…" I said, and then added, "I mean, of course, if you feel like it…"
"Hmm… don't you remember our first conversation? I've already counted on wanting to train you… Ahhh, I thought you wanted to tell me something more important… like… " He didn't add anything else, however, I understood what he meant.
"II haven't decided yet whether to become what destiny wants me to be ... however I still want to travel this world, I want to see for myself what situation this world is in, and then decide my intentions after having a complete picture ... and maybe on the journey I will also find comrades in arms, or, maybe, some friends… "I said.
At my words, Rivorio didn't seem very surprised but not disappointed either.
"So you want to postpone your decision ... MMh, well, it's already a step forward ... indeed, I must say that maybe it's the best choice, at least for you..."
"Well, but before I start training you, I have to explain to you what it is that will make you stronger ... that is mana, a substance on the edge of reality and that allows you to do unimaginable things ... and, as you are a hero, mana will be essential to your growth, as heroes have a unique ability to attract mana to themselves …". I seemed to understand his words, even though I had only heard the word mana in video games or fictional stories before.
Rivorio then started a long and boring speech about mana and the history of its use. I listened to it very carefully.
He started the talk by talking about the origins of mana use by humans.
Since his speech was going to be very long, I decided to cement in my mind only the points that I considered fundamental or interesting.
<... This energy was found by sorcerers, sorcerers different from those of now, sorcerers whose goal was to find the signs of the deities in the earthly world. Rituals, often bloodthirsty, and various other practices, also often brutal,led these sorcerers to find a new "energy", a "vital" energy, in the sense that it was changeable, moved in the air, and could give life as it could lead to the death of things. These sorcerers began to study a way to use this "energy", in order to get closer to the gods. In this time the first spells were born and this strange "substance" was given the name that we humans still use, that is "mana", a union of two terms of the ancient language that these sorcerers used "Mas" and "Natara", and that is "divine gift" ...>
For some reason, even before the translation of those two words, I already had their meaning in mind.
'So it's true that I know every language … mmh…'
<... As human society began to develop in hierarchies, mana remained primarily a knowledge of the nobles. They made the growth of our knowledge about mana slow and inconstant… the mana, in these years, was used by the nobles to keep their power over the people. The breakthrough came when the man fiercely clashed for the first time against other races such as elves and dwarves, who had much more knowledge of mana. The elves were able to cast spells of a range never seen by the men of the time, while the dwarves were able to create amazing war machines and weapons that exploited mana. In these clashes between the three races, the only advantage man had was his larger population…finally, some wise kings realized that the only real hope for the survival of the human kingdoms was to make mana knowledge into the public domain, and thus also to teach it to non-noble members of the army. Man thus managed to bring himself to an equal level with the other races, and the earth knew a balance. The only beings who could have broken this balance were the dragons, however, the dragons never cared about such things as the supremacy of their race, and as a result, there was relative peace in the world. A peace that was annihilated by a single individual, the dragon "Chaos" ...>
Rivorio did not dwell much on the first catastrophe, however, I learned of two relatively important notions, namely that the first catastrophe lasted approximately from 1100 to 1252, and that at the time of my arrival in that world, it was the year 1478. I also found that the calendar for counting the years in that world was common to all intelligent races and that it was agreed upon during the period of "peace" that that world experienced years ago.
Rivorio then focused on the focal point of his speech, that is, a first introduction on how to use mana.
{TO BE CONTINUED}
"What idea do you have about mana?" Rivorio suddenly asked me."I don’t know ... but ..." Having no direct experience with this "energy", I focused on thinking about fantasy stories or video games from my world where it was present."Mana ... I think it is a kind of energy present in nature ...and which can be absorbed and fruited to do absurd things ... like spells or other ...""EHH, of course, of course, I was asking you more in detail ...". Rivorio muttered, "well, actually mana itself is hard to describe, as its nature is changeable and sometimes it behaves as if it were made of matter, other times it feels like something else ... mana, as you said, is present everywhere in nature, and sometimes it is also present in objects… ”. He paused with thoughtful faces, "For a human being, imagining mana is difficult, that's why first of all you need to learn to perceive it ... after you are able to perceive it, you will finally have an idea of what mana is ..."'Oh … mmh, indeed, if I ex
I followed Marie to the inn, where a small banquet organized by Lilya and Tom was waiting for me. Like the first time, as soon as I walked through the door of the inn, everyone inside turned their attention to me, however, this time their gaze was filled with gratitude.Some people approached me, thanking me and shaking my hand as a sign of respect, and others asked me how I had done it. Finally, they invited me to drink and eat with them, I couldn't tell them "no", and so, a kind of party began, a party that gave off a familiar warmth, in which, strangely, I never felt out of place.The food wasn't much, and the beer wasn't the best, however, everything in there seemed to taste better.We danced and sang in chorus for hours, not worrying about the noise we made, until it got dark.Many began to doze off on the ground and the party slowly faded away.Only Tom, Lilya, Marie, and I remained awake. We sat in creaking chairs and around a circular table. As soon as I sat down, my head beg
As soon as I asked him, I saw in him a reaction that I did not expect. It wasn't irritation, that in his eyes was fear, fear of rethinking the past.We sat facing each other as we ate breakfast on the table in the living room.He didn't seem to have had a hangover from the previous day, maybe he had drunk some of his potions.I strangely did not feel bad, just a slight headache.I had just asked Rivorio why he didn't leave the house.He tried to sidetrack the question by changing the subject several times, however, his tactic didn't work for me. I wanted to know about his past, my grandfather always told me: >."I don't want to talk about it ..." Rivorio finally admitted that there was something in his past that he didn't want to talk about."Mmh ... but ... if you tell me about it I cou
I spent most of the following months training and studying the plants and animals in the area, which I needed to survive out there.First of all, I had to learn how to perceive mana. To do this, I followed the advice of the book that Rivorio had given me.As Rivorio had also told me, the book explained how the simplest way to achieve this was to risk your life in deadly combat with preferably magical beasts.However, as much as I wanted to perceive mana as soon as possible, I would not have willingly wanted to risk my life. For this, I decided to follow another path described by the book, based on meditation, breathing exercises, and physical effort.Meditation, thanks to the herbal tea for which Rivorio gave me the recipe, turned out to be quite simple, in fact, already after five days I was able to meditate for hours and hours without getting tired.Physical exertion, as reported in the book, served to make the body aware of mana fluttering in the air, and was obviously achieved wit
Rivorio then began to tell me in detail about the northern part of the region we were in, advising me to choose the fortress city of SaarKal as the first stop on my journey. SaarKal was not a very large city, having a population, at the last census, of about 18,000 inhabitants; it was, however, the fastest-growing city in the region. Tom then spoke to me of many rumors that indicated this city as the city with the strongest body of knights in the region, and that, that was the reason for the splendor of the city. Rivorio then showed me the roads I should take to get to SaarKal. This city was northwest of where I was and it would take me three weeks on foot to reach it. 'Mmh ... and those two cities ...' I noticed two cities quite close to each other, these seemed bigger than SaarKal. "Sorry Rivorio ... and these two cities?" They were located in the extreme northeast of the Saar region. "Ehhh ..." At my question, Rivorio frowned. "These two are the cities of Fo and Vert ... they
When the sun went down we decided to settle on a natural clearing among the trees, staying close to the road that led north.Fortunately, the first day of walking ended smoothly, in fact, we did not meet anyone that day.The group of merchants I traveled with consisted of three people: a man in his fifties named Ruh, a woman and a man in their thirties, named Sofie and Rick. Apparently, the latter had decided to start a family when they arrived in SaarKal.Ruh had a massive physique, was tall, and dressed in a dark gray medieval tunic. He had blue eyes and short blond hair. The first time I saw him he gave me the idea that he was some kind of Viking or something, he didn't look like a merchant at all, and instinct told me he was very good at fighting.Sofie and Rick, on the other hand, didn't have the same "aura" as him, they looked like two normal merchants. She was dressed in a dark blue suit, now a bit worn, while he had a thin physique, and did not seem to hide much strength. They
And so, Ruh told me his story and how he had met Rick and Sofie.Ruh, as I had guessed, was once a warrior, or rather, a knight belonging to an order called "Lion's Heart". This order, as the name suggests, was made up of the bravest knights of the Saar region, and was born about seventy years before my arrival in that world.When this order of knights was born, this world was at the dawn of the advance of the Plagues armies, especially the first Plague from the north, in the Saar region.All the craziest and most complicated missions that were devised to try to stop the Plagues were given to the knights of this order.Ruh was born in a small town northwest of a few inhabitants named Vidù. This town fell to the First Plague army when Ruh was only 8 years old. Almost all the inhabitants of Vidù were massacred.Ruh was one of the few who escaped this massacre, hiding in time by his parents in a secret underground closet. Ruh, that day, from that closet, heard the screams and the bodies
"It's starting to get chilly, maybe I should have dressed more ..."Eizo Gigli, a young man about to turn twenty, said to himself during a solitary excursion to a wood in the Alps, on an August morning.He was dressed in ocher yellow shorts and a midnight blue gym jacket, with tall dark brown boots on his feet, thinking it wouldn't be so cold.He had come to Italy from the USA with his parents for the funeral of his paternal grandfather and to meet his grandmother whom he had not seen for many years.Eizo was in fact half American, on his mother's side, and half Italian, on his father's side. He was average tall, had curly black hair, dark brown eyes, and long eyebrows; in his life he has always played sports, inheriting his father's passion for football, and for this reason he had a sporty and agile physique.If you're wondering why his parents gave him a Japanese name, well, both his father and mother have always been passionate about Japanese culture, and it was on one of their tri
And so, Ruh told me his story and how he had met Rick and Sofie.Ruh, as I had guessed, was once a warrior, or rather, a knight belonging to an order called "Lion's Heart". This order, as the name suggests, was made up of the bravest knights of the Saar region, and was born about seventy years before my arrival in that world.When this order of knights was born, this world was at the dawn of the advance of the Plagues armies, especially the first Plague from the north, in the Saar region.All the craziest and most complicated missions that were devised to try to stop the Plagues were given to the knights of this order.Ruh was born in a small town northwest of a few inhabitants named Vidù. This town fell to the First Plague army when Ruh was only 8 years old. Almost all the inhabitants of Vidù were massacred.Ruh was one of the few who escaped this massacre, hiding in time by his parents in a secret underground closet. Ruh, that day, from that closet, heard the screams and the bodies
When the sun went down we decided to settle on a natural clearing among the trees, staying close to the road that led north.Fortunately, the first day of walking ended smoothly, in fact, we did not meet anyone that day.The group of merchants I traveled with consisted of three people: a man in his fifties named Ruh, a woman and a man in their thirties, named Sofie and Rick. Apparently, the latter had decided to start a family when they arrived in SaarKal.Ruh had a massive physique, was tall, and dressed in a dark gray medieval tunic. He had blue eyes and short blond hair. The first time I saw him he gave me the idea that he was some kind of Viking or something, he didn't look like a merchant at all, and instinct told me he was very good at fighting.Sofie and Rick, on the other hand, didn't have the same "aura" as him, they looked like two normal merchants. She was dressed in a dark blue suit, now a bit worn, while he had a thin physique, and did not seem to hide much strength. They
Rivorio then began to tell me in detail about the northern part of the region we were in, advising me to choose the fortress city of SaarKal as the first stop on my journey. SaarKal was not a very large city, having a population, at the last census, of about 18,000 inhabitants; it was, however, the fastest-growing city in the region. Tom then spoke to me of many rumors that indicated this city as the city with the strongest body of knights in the region, and that, that was the reason for the splendor of the city. Rivorio then showed me the roads I should take to get to SaarKal. This city was northwest of where I was and it would take me three weeks on foot to reach it. 'Mmh ... and those two cities ...' I noticed two cities quite close to each other, these seemed bigger than SaarKal. "Sorry Rivorio ... and these two cities?" They were located in the extreme northeast of the Saar region. "Ehhh ..." At my question, Rivorio frowned. "These two are the cities of Fo and Vert ... they
I spent most of the following months training and studying the plants and animals in the area, which I needed to survive out there.First of all, I had to learn how to perceive mana. To do this, I followed the advice of the book that Rivorio had given me.As Rivorio had also told me, the book explained how the simplest way to achieve this was to risk your life in deadly combat with preferably magical beasts.However, as much as I wanted to perceive mana as soon as possible, I would not have willingly wanted to risk my life. For this, I decided to follow another path described by the book, based on meditation, breathing exercises, and physical effort.Meditation, thanks to the herbal tea for which Rivorio gave me the recipe, turned out to be quite simple, in fact, already after five days I was able to meditate for hours and hours without getting tired.Physical exertion, as reported in the book, served to make the body aware of mana fluttering in the air, and was obviously achieved wit
As soon as I asked him, I saw in him a reaction that I did not expect. It wasn't irritation, that in his eyes was fear, fear of rethinking the past.We sat facing each other as we ate breakfast on the table in the living room.He didn't seem to have had a hangover from the previous day, maybe he had drunk some of his potions.I strangely did not feel bad, just a slight headache.I had just asked Rivorio why he didn't leave the house.He tried to sidetrack the question by changing the subject several times, however, his tactic didn't work for me. I wanted to know about his past, my grandfather always told me: >."I don't want to talk about it ..." Rivorio finally admitted that there was something in his past that he didn't want to talk about."Mmh ... but ... if you tell me about it I cou
I followed Marie to the inn, where a small banquet organized by Lilya and Tom was waiting for me. Like the first time, as soon as I walked through the door of the inn, everyone inside turned their attention to me, however, this time their gaze was filled with gratitude.Some people approached me, thanking me and shaking my hand as a sign of respect, and others asked me how I had done it. Finally, they invited me to drink and eat with them, I couldn't tell them "no", and so, a kind of party began, a party that gave off a familiar warmth, in which, strangely, I never felt out of place.The food wasn't much, and the beer wasn't the best, however, everything in there seemed to taste better.We danced and sang in chorus for hours, not worrying about the noise we made, until it got dark.Many began to doze off on the ground and the party slowly faded away.Only Tom, Lilya, Marie, and I remained awake. We sat in creaking chairs and around a circular table. As soon as I sat down, my head beg
"What idea do you have about mana?" Rivorio suddenly asked me."I don’t know ... but ..." Having no direct experience with this "energy", I focused on thinking about fantasy stories or video games from my world where it was present."Mana ... I think it is a kind of energy present in nature ...and which can be absorbed and fruited to do absurd things ... like spells or other ...""EHH, of course, of course, I was asking you more in detail ...". Rivorio muttered, "well, actually mana itself is hard to describe, as its nature is changeable and sometimes it behaves as if it were made of matter, other times it feels like something else ... mana, as you said, is present everywhere in nature, and sometimes it is also present in objects… ”. He paused with thoughtful faces, "For a human being, imagining mana is difficult, that's why first of all you need to learn to perceive it ... after you are able to perceive it, you will finally have an idea of what mana is ..."'Oh … mmh, indeed, if I ex
When I was left alone in the room, I finally cleared my mind about what had happened.'This time I really risked dying ... however, having managed to defeat that chimera ...'My actions last day made me happy and proud at the same time, after all, in the world I came from I was certainly not considered a brave person.I checked my pants pockets. As I suspected they were empty.'So they used the flowers I picked for Marie…' Of course, I couldn't be sure without asking Rivorio, but I was convinced it went just like that.I looked around, I saw my fur coat hanging on a small clothes rack, placed next to the wardrobe to my right. As absurd as it may seem, I only noticed in that instant that I was not wearing it and that both my clothes and my body were clean.'Hmm, I guess I have to thank Rivorio for that ...'Not being able to leave the room, I stayed all day staring at the ceiling above me, thinking back to the absurd first two days spent in my new home.'So this will be my new home ...
At the moment of my awakening, I found myself in a rather familiar room, it was the bedroom where I had my first sleep in that world. I was therefore in the residence of Rivorio. 'How did I end up here ...' I noticed that I did not feel pain along my body, it surprised me not a little, so I tried to sit up, however, as soon as I tried to lift my torso, an excruciating pain ran all over my back. "AHHKh!" As absurd as it may sound, the back pain I felt at the time was even worse than what I felt during the fight with the chimera. I remembered, then, that it was the same in football, and similarly in all sports, when you recive a foul, the real pain comes at the end of the day when your body has cooled down and the adrenaline in your body is reduced. Because of that pain, I could not help but lie down again. *Gurgle My belly began to grumble, I was incredibly hungry. Unable to move, I realized that my only chance to get Rivorio to notice me was to scream, although I didn't like the