Now that the bitter truth Lord Sebastian had kept hidden all these years had finally resurfaced, it threatened to break their family.Ezra had been raised as a noble and was always led to believe he was a Romanov. All these years he had endured all the mockery and ridicule without losing hope because he wanted to prove himself to his father and bring honor to his family.But now that Lord Sebastian had revealed he wasn’t his own son, it left Ezra disillusioned and aimless. “Who….am I really? Who are my real parents? Why did they abandon me?” The questions came pouring as Ezra struggled to hold back his emotions. The storm raging inside his heart threatened to wreak havoc on the man he had called ‘father’.“You are Ezra Romanov. I am your father, and Lady Fiona was your mother. You are my son.” Lord Sebastian reached out to hold Ezra, but he stepped back, pulling away from his embrace.“All these years…I kept calling you my father. All these years…I kept believing that I was a Romanov
Ezra slowly clambered back to his feet and dusted his clothes, ignoring the threats from the bandits around him.“Are you deaf, pretty boy?” one of the rogues yelled. “Did you not hear what our boss just said?”“I heard him all right. I just don’t give a damn,” Ezra snapped back at him, his eyes gleaming with rage. “Get the hell out of my way unless you want to go back home in a wheelbarrow.”“You son of a gun!” One of the younger bandits corked his revolver and prepared to shoot Ezra in the leg when their leader stopped him.“Calm down, Willy. This one’s an angry young boy way over his head.” He chuckled, staring at Ezra from head to toe. “Judging by your clothes I’d say you are quite well off. Probably a noble, eh?”“I’m a Gunner,” Ezra replied curtly.“And which noble family do you belong to? I reckon your wealthy parents will pay good coin to see you alive again?” The bandit leader stepped forward and pulled back the bolt of his rifle. “My name’s Harwin. What’s yours?”“I don’t ha
Ezra realized he had set foot inside Centaur territory and immediately became cautious of his surroundings. Before venturing deeper he downed a healing potion to mend his fractured collar bone.“You need to be careful, my Lord. The Centaurs are a lot more territorial than bandits and excel at setting traps and ambushes,” Marlin advised as Ezra headed deeper into the forest.Having no experience of dealing with Centaurs, Ezra had no idea what to expect. All he could think of at this time was reaching the monastery and uncovering his past.“It must be heart-wrenching to know you are not a noble at all but some stray orphan abandoned by the peasants,” Marlin whispered, touching Ezra’s weak nerve.Ezra tried to ignore his comments, but the old Gunsmith kept poking him till he could not take it anymore.“If you don’t shut up this instant, you’re going to be in a world of pain!” Marlin chuckled at this. “You already know you cannot hurt me. I am a part of you now.”“You still need to feed
Ezra found himself in a precarious situation. He had been poisoned by the barbed vines and was now being hunted by a group of Centaur Warriors who had already picked up his scent. The Centaurs were among the few non-humans who still hated mankind. Though their populations had dwindled over the years due to the extensive raids carried out by the royal knights and paladins, the survivors still remained a huge threat to all humans. Since Centaurs possessed the upper body of a human and the lower body of a horse, this gave them the dual benefit of having binocular vision as well as strong hind limbs for chasing prey and fleeing from pursuers. Being humanoid hybrids also meant that Centaurs possessed an extremely high level of intelligence and excelled at working as a team and setting traps and ambushes. Hiding behind a tall woody tree, Ezra peered around the corner and observed the Centaur Hunters nearby. They were inspecting the corpses of their fallen brethren and trying to figure o
Slowly but surely, the poison was starting to take its toll on Ezra’s body. His labored breaths caused him to cough violently, and he could feel a dull pain in his chest. With his fingers and legs trembling, he had no hope of shooting a running Centaur. However, the ring of fire prevented the Centaur Warriors from fleeing. “We need to put out the flames, or the whole forest will burn!” The Centaur Chief yelled between coughs. The other Centaurs started looking around for stones and pebbles which they could dump on the burning leaves to extinguish the fire. But the dense gray smoke made it extremely difficult for them as it filled their lungs and stung their eyes, bringing them to tears. Ezra peeked from cover and reloaded his Angus rifle with Flameshot Bullets. Dizzy and reeling, Ezra could not see his targets clearly as everything kept spinning around him. But he could hear the Centaurs yelling and running in panic. Even though Ezra could not aim properly, he lifted the rifl
As the forest burned, the flames danced over the treetops and dense gray smoke spiraled upward, blanketing the undergrowth. Alarmed by the wildfire, the animals scurried away and the birds flew off to seek refuge in distant trees. The Centaur tribe quickly forgot all about the intruder and focused all their efforts on averting the disaster at hand. The women rushed back and forth, carrying pails of water to dump on the flames while the Centaur Brutes started chopping down the burning trees to prevent the fire from spreading. This calamity kept the Centaurs distracted for now, but Marlin knew once they were done dealing with the forest fire they would put together a hunting party to track and kill the intruder responsible for this. “Damn it! Why do you always need to put us both in danger?” Marlin was seething with anger but there was little he could do without his body. “I swear being bound to you is a greater punishment than being eaten by ghouls!” Despite Marlin’s taunts and insu
Ezra’s head throbbed in pain as he looked around, but his chest had stopped hurting and he no longer felt dizzy. “How did I even get here?” he questioned, puzzled by it all. The last thing he remembered was plucking mushrooms near the brook. Looking at his hands he noticed they weren’t trembling anymore and he could even walk straight without stumbling. “Did the poison just wear off? But how?” “It did not wear off. I saved you, my dear Lord,” Marlin muttered. As Ezra looked at his hand, he noticed something strange. Marlin’s cursed eye had turned cloudy white and his lips looked parched and withered. “What the hell happened to you? And how did we get here?” Marlin opened his lips, but his voice sounded scarce and shaky. “I intertwined my soul with yours and took possession of your…body. I brought you here, brewed the...Dewglaze potion and saved your life. But it took a great toll…on my powers. I need to sleep…now. You can thank me…later.” With that, Marlin closed his lips and shu
Ezra felt like he simply could not avoid getting involved with the deities no matter how hard he tried. It was as if they were pulling the strings of fate from above, and he was being forced to obey like a puppet. Every choice and every secret led him to one shrine or another and there he would inevitably find himself entangled in the net of fate. Although Ezra still had his doubts about the robed one standing before him, there was no way for him to be sure he was telling the truth.“How do I know you’re not lying?” he asked. “The God of Magic does not have any physical form. Those devoted to him merely worship the elements and pray to the sacred arcane crafts.”Oferion smiled and replied in a soft voice, “You are as skeptical and inquisitive as your mother. I like that in a child. It often leads to a more thorough judgment and a more well-rounded character.”“You said you knew my mother.” Ezra paused midway before adding. “You said her name was Alantra Fien, but I think you don’t kn