A Jaded Life

Finding the town of New Dawn, as the community was called, was only the first step that needed to be taken. Next, we were planning to figure out if the community was limited to the roughly five hundred, maybe five-hundred and fifty, people who were living in that bowl or if there were more around. For that, we checked for tracks and freshly trod paths, finding that the people hadn’t just settled that one bowl but that there were multiple farmsteads in the area, all built recently and connected to the main village.

It took us most of the night to check these places and by the time dawn was starting to light up the clouds, I had a fair idea how many people actually lived here, a number that came a lot closer to a thousand people than I had anticipated. These people might truly be the ones who had the best chance to withstand anything this new world was throwing at them, making me just a little apprehensive about the obvious and easily visible temple in the middle of their town. But then, maybe I shouldn’t be so surprised, the Gods had a vested interest in making sure that their devouts were well-placed to establish communities and order after the change, allowing them to have their worship become a cornerstone of the newly established society.

That was doubly true if something I hadn’t fully considered before held true, namely that the EXP I had gained for teaching magic in the past came from Lady Hecate or were granted due to Her blessing. If that was the case, any blessed or anyone connected to a deity might get EXP for teaching something within that deity’s domain, meaning somebody with the right divine connection and a large community to teach might get more EXP than even I did. While I wasn’t sure about the scaling and what diminishing returns might do to that calculation, I couldn’t automatically assume that I’d be the most powerful, it might serve me very well to remain cautious. Sure, levels weren’t the biggest indicator of power, my vast array of elemental affinities and the effects of the Dragon-Touched Trait added a lot to my strength beyond anything I had on Mundus, but that didn’t mean I was invincible, not by a long shot. Cautious paranoia would have to be my constant companion, especially if I decided to visit the village.

It was a bit of good fortune that the dawning day was cloudy and overcast, with little sunlight managing to force its way through the clouds. So little, in fact, that I could easily move around without getting my body roasted by the hostile rays of its light, meaning it was about the perfect opportunity to visit the town, offering to trade with them.

After discussing our options, I had decided that I would make the initial contact all on my own, while the other four waited in a nearby cave. The simple fact was, if I was alone, I had the most options to escape, either by stepping into the shadows, by taking to the air or by pushing my body beyond what would normally be possible and outrunning most foes. Sure, some of these tricks could be duplicated by one of the others, but I was the only one who could perform all of them.

Due to all these considerations, I made sure to move in a wide circle, avoiding to come down directly from the mountains and instead travelled laterally alongside the slope, using the remains of an old hiking trail. It wouldn’t get me to the town, whoever had picked the location had chosen one that wasn’t near any of the old roads or trails, but the trail I was on was close enough to give any traveller a good chance to spot the village, at least if they were fairly perceptive.

Taking my time, I simply kept walking, before making a show of looking up and sniffing the air, frowning when I noticed the distinct scent of smoke in the wind. If anybody happened to be watching me, they would be able to see that I followed the scent until I came across one of the footpaths connecting the outer farms to the village and decided to follow that path. The whole thing was a bit of play-acting, sure, but while I was relatively confident that nobody was watching, I wasn’t completely certain, thus, I played my role, just in case.

Maybe it was for the best that I had acted in that way, as the first contact with the villagers didn’t come, as I had expected from my previous observations after I moved through the relatively narrow gap carved by the small river but before that when a shepherd noticed my approach. Sure, I had noticed him and his flock before he noticed me and I’d have been able to avoid them without too much trouble but maybe this was for the best. To my surprise, the guy didn’t even blink an eye at my decidedly non-human looks, something that was fairly obvious thanks to my pale, blue skin, the long ears that peeked out of my hair and said hair, with its veritable rainbow of glimmering sparks, courtesy of my vastly expanded elemental affinities. And yet, he looked at me as if meeting somebody non-human was an everyday occurrence.

Soon, greetings between the shepherd and me were exchanged and soon, I could begin to put my story to the test when the guy asked what I was doing in the area, and why I was travelling in general. Maybe it was a good thing that my story wasn’t too complicated or too far from the reality of my experience, namely that I had started travelling after the Change hit and was essentially looking for a place to settle down but no place had called to me yet.

For once, my usual taciturn manner was quite useful, allowing me to answer questions with very few words and obfuscate things I didn’t want to share without alienating the guy, doubly so when I admitted that I hadn’t talked to anyone for almost two weeks, allowing me to blame my lack of communication on disuse instead of secrecy.

At that point, the guy, a not-quite adult named Marik, was almost desperate to guide me towards their village but the sheep he was watching couldn’t be brought back just yet, so he could only give me directions. Those sheep were a curiosity in and of themself, back at Apple Gate Farm, all the animals in the vicinity had turned feral but here, an entire flock of sheep was guarded by a single man, with only a stick to guide them and ostensibly to protect them from predators. A quiet and well-concealed Observe told me that Marik was far from able to protect anyone from anything serious, he was barely level twenty, while, to my amusement, the ram was level twenty-two. Granted, when I Observe’d two random sheep for confirmation, I learned that these were only level ten and twelve respectively, meaning the ram was simply an outlier.

But, regardless of fairly powerful sheep and weak shepherds, I wasn’t here to meet with random people, I was here to trade and so, I continued on my way and soon, I was walking alongside the small river and into the valley the village was in.

There were no real guards but more than enough people were out and about to notice my approach and one of them came to meet me before I could get into the actual bowl the village was in, let alone close to any of the buildings.

“Greetings,” the middle-aged guy nodded, looking at me with a frown on his face. In turn, I got more than enough time to give him, and the other villagers I could see, a close look, taking note of their clothes and, more importantly, their weapons. None of the clothes I could see was particularly high-quality and I could easily see that it was a mix of old clothes from before the change, often mended, and some new clothes, made from simple homespun fabric. Their weapons, on the other hand, were all made after the change, of that I was fairly confident, but not purely as weapons. Sure, if a hammer or hatchet struck somebody, that body would be in a lot of pain, but they were carrying tools that could be used as weapons, not weapons that also served as tools. The distinction felt important, though I couldn’t quite pin down why.

“Greetings,” I returned the nod before continuing, “I am a traveller, looking to exchange some of my wares and would ask for the protection of guest-right while within your village.”

I had considered the best way to get access to the village for quite some time and decided that, ultimately, acting in an open and upfront manner was the option with the highest chance of success. The temple in the middle of their village spoke of a divine connection and with guest rights upheld by that authority, I wouldn’t have to worry too much, I would be protected. Sadly, from the looks of it the guy who had approached me first didn’t know what to make of me, or my question, looking at me with confusion and a clear inability to answer my request.

Luckily, he wasn’t the only one to approach me, behind him came a younger man, maybe in his early thirties, wearing similar clothes as the first man but the clothes were their only similarity. The younger man had a clear air of authority and, maybe more importantly, he could easily be the reason why my non-human appearance hadn’t raised any eyebrows, as he had a sizable pair of wings on his back and was radiating a faint air of divine power, underpinning his personal aura that marked him as somebody who had crossed the first divide. And yet, despite all that, he looked at me with friendly, welcoming eyes and a smile on his face.

“Enter New Dawn without malice and you may leave without hindrance, this I promise on Lady Frigga’s name,” he intoned and for a moment, I could feel a smidgen of divine power bind him to his promise, a binding that echoed around me when I accepted his offer in the spirit it was given. For as long as I held the peace within these parts, I would be safe. Somehow, that gave me a great deal of additional confidence.