About a month before Arquins meeting with The Order
"Oh no" I thought, "it seems like they are here again." Once in a while there is always some royal who wants to use me as a pawn in their arsenal. I almost thought they were finally leaving me alone with how peaceful and quiet my life has been getting. But it seems that I was mistaken. I can definitely tell that these guards are looking for someone. They aren't even from this country. I'm currently in Grams, but judging by their purple and yellow emblems they looked like they were from the kingdom of Sewol. But what would Sewols royal guards be doing here?! The best course right now is to quickly pack my things up and be ready to run away if needed.
I quickly moved into my house, which was more on the humble side but the more average looking the safer, and started packing the most important, basic seals, a dagger or two, some dried food and some clothes. Good I have everything I need
Once I had everything prepared I peeked out of the window… my suspicions were confirmed, what they were holding seemed like a scroll containing some text and a photograph, if I'm not mistaken that must mean they are searching for someone valuable. Photographs are usually expensive to make since the devices for their creation are complicated and break often.
"Should I just run right now or wait?" I thought out loud. It is likely that even if they are not searching for me they wouldn't be pleased to see me.
The guards decided for me since I was the next house that they visited, they seemed to be talking to each other about something quickly before they started knocking… more like punching the door. Since I had no choice ( and having them broke my doors or windows is out of question too ) I opened the door. There were two of them, one on the right was reading the scroll again and the one on the left seemed to be studying me. From their look it doesn't seem like they are exactly recruiting for community work.
It seems like I was the one they were looking for after all, the one on the right quickly looked at the photograph a few times again before he looked at the one on the left. They both said in unison. "Req of Dras, we seek you as per request of our glorious king Megora. Our king has sought you for eternity and wants you to see him as soon as possible. You should be honoured by his choice of you and you only to be his right hand in both battle and strategy." They said simultaneously and visibly very dishonestly. I'm not surprised, they were tasked with finding some random commoner they don't know anything about just because the king wants him for something. I responded firmly with "I am sorry but I have to decline, I'm not a mercenary and never was, and I ended my career as a soldier few years ago. They looked at each other before turning back to me confused. "But we just said that our king has honoured you with the right to be his right hand?! What do you mean 'I'm sorry' ?" They were split between being dumbfounded and angry at me. After few seconds it seemed that the anger has won. "You disgrace shouldn't have the chance to answer, the glorious king of Sewol has chosen you, you cannot refuse this opportunity!" They were getting more irritated because it seemed that except for them finding me, nothing was going how they expected it. " blasphemy you just committed, speaking against the kings wishes. You commoner scum don't even know what an honour that is." This was getting really sad really fast, they were repeating all the words about 'honour' and 'opportunity'. After what felt like eternity they finally realised that I wasn't listening and tried to switch to force. "If you don't come with us you will be accused of blasphemy against the king, that is punishable by death. Come with us and we might drop at least some of your charges." I see they resorted to using mental pressure. But I was dead set on long before they arrived. I'm not serving someone who's mind is set only on power. Well… I don't want to serve anyone but that's a different story. The guards then finally realised that I might not be reacting the way they intended to their threats, to which I responded with. "Do you recall in which country you currently are?" They looked confused but the left one said "Grams. But what does that have to do with anything?! We said you are coming with us." I got the answer I needed so I continued with my speech. "Then you know that your power doesn't apply in this kingdom." They didn't expect these words but it looked like they knew that from the start. With how their faces changed more and more to anger throughout the conversation I gave it 5 minutes at most before they would resolve to physical methods of convincing.