The building looked recently renovated. He recalled hearing rumors about a massive fire that had occurred in this exact location previously. It was genuinely nice seeing that the citizens of Port Vexis were actively rebuilding their own neighborhood.
The people who had been cheering eventually walked past him, continuing further down the road toward what appeared to be a community gathering near the public well.
He saw a young woman wearing a thick knitted sweater and dark leather trousers approaching from the doorway of a whitewashed structure. She had brown eyes, brown hair, and fair skin that complimented her sharp look.
"This is the orphanage Valen was..." Lucid started, trailing off as he noticed the fresh coat of paint on the doorframe.
The woman gestured toward Lucid, inviting him inside alongside a handful of other local residents who were walking forward.
Lucid walked up the low stone steps toward the porch with Ayame at his side.
"Young man," the woman said, wiping her hands on a cloth. "Are you perhaps an acquaintance of a young man named Pilt?"
"My name is grace, a relative of the former owner."
"Pilt?" Lucid repeated.
He hesitated for a moment. "I am sorry, that name does not..."
He had heard the name Pilt countless times by now from harbor traders, and he knew who Valen actually was under that alias, but the distinction between their identities remained genuinely confusing in casual conversation.
"The Generous Scoundrel?" Lucid offered instead.
The woman nodded once, her expression hardening slightly.
"A young man came here to Port Vexis and completely flourished the economy for the entire town, including the slums," she explained.
"My late relative used to work here. When she passed away, I came after hearing the news that he had offered a generous down payment from loan sharks."
She frowned slightly, staring down at a wooden ledger in her hands.
"She passed away after she signed his papers, as I was away in the capital of Vex at the time."
'Is she angry at Pilt?' Lucid wondered, watching her tight mouth.
"I know him," he announced bluntly.
Suddenly the young woman on the porch relaxed her shoulders, letting out a heavy breath.
"I am so sorry, Elke," she said softly, seemingly addressing someone else entirely.
"The owner of this orphanage wrote so much about the good deeds Pilt has done for these children. Though it was as if she wrote it like impending doom was arriving at our door."
She shook her head and looked back up at Lucid. "I cannot keep my anger, especially during such a holy month. What is your name?"
"Lucid," he said.
Her face lit up with sudden intrigue.
"Well, happy Saint Lucid's month," she said with a bright nod.
Lucid looked genuinely confused. "I see your parents named you after him," she continued.
"After whom?"
"Lucid."
"But I am Lucid."
She shook her head, giving him a skeptical glance. "Do you live under a rock?"
"He lives in a train," Ayame clarified.
'That is not helping!' Lucid screamed internally.
"I am talking about The Holy Pilgrimage Month of Saint Lucid," the woman explained, adjusting her sweater.
"It is folklore, much like a legend, but still a well-known, celebrated tradition throughout the Scattered Realms."
She paused, then added, "Well, other than a couple of other stubborn factions who do not observe it."
She rested her hands on the wooden porch railing. "We do not know whether it is entirely true or not, but long ago, after Mother Fate sacrificed her flesh and her eyes as the twin moons, the land was in constant war.
Humans waged conflict against each other constantly, and there were rumors of other external deities that came from beyond the Scattered Realms, often inciting people against one another."
Lucid listened carefully, absorbing every detail without breaking eye contact.
"And in that time of war and eternal dusk, when light was scarce, a man, so bright, carried a lantern and illuminated the darkness," she continued, her voice taking on a storytelling cadence. "
He went on a long pilgrimage across the territories, teaching the ways of humanity, sharing philosophical insight into basic things."
"What kind of insight?" Lucid asked.
"It was rumored that he carried knowledge beyond even the Monoliths and deities that were outright foreign," she explained. "Some speculate he came from a long, ancient time before even Mother Alisia gave herself up.
Others claim it was Mother Fate herself who blessed this young man, marking him as a prophet in times of need."
"And what happened to him?"
She shook her head.
"We do not know," she said. "We know far more about the Monoliths and the outer Scattered Realms than we do about him. It happened more than a thousand years ago, I fear. Some scholars in the capital still debate whether he was even real."
She offered him a polite, practical smile. "So congratulations. You happen to share the exact name of one of the most influential figures in the history of the Scattered Realms."
She tilted her head, adding matter-of-factly, "But you are not special. There is an estimated twenty percent of males who carry that exact name throughout the Scattered Realms."
Lucid raised an eyebrow. "You count names?"
"I am an administrative employee in Vex," she said smoothly, as if that explained everything.
The woman paused, her eyes lingering on Lucid's face as she considered something further. The afternoon light cutting through the open doorway caught the dust motes floating between them, highlighting the worn wooden grain of the porch railing. She seemed to be weighing how much patience she should extend to a stranger who wore a bright orange vest and carried the name of a historical ghost.
"Well, I am not too educated in formal theological matters," she admitted quietly.
She reached into the deep side pocket of her knitted sweater and retrieved a small, thin volume. She slid the book across the flat surface of the wooden railing toward Lucid.
The cover was simple. A single embossed rose was stamped into the dark green binding, and the corners were sharp and unbent. It looked entirely new, lacking the grease stains and sea salt residue that coated almost every other piece of printed paper in Port Vexis.
"The Journey's End," Lucid read aloud, looking at the block lettering stamped above the rose.
The woman gave a single nod. "Give it a read, especially during such a holy month. Simple tales and fairy tales often give us adults much clearer insight than philosophical scriptures, or even organized religion."
Lucid picked up the book and turned it over in his hand. It was remarkably small and light, almost the exact same size as the pocket curse handbook he already carried around in his vest. He tested the weight for a second before sliding the green volume into his pocket right next to the manual on hexes. Carrying bedtime stories alongside instructions for spiritual warfare seemed to summarize his entire experience in the Scattered Realms so far.
The woman stood up from the railing, brushing a few stray crumbs of bread from her trousers.
"Would you like to come inside?" she asked, gesturing toward the open doorway of the orphanage. "Do you have anywhere else to stay for the night? I heard from the harbor clerks that you are a sponsored individual, someone backed by the Queen herself."
Lucid raised his eyebrows. Harbor gossip moved faster than the coastal ferry. He had only been in Port Vexis for a short while, yet the local administrative workers were already trading rumors about his connections to the royal palace in the north.
"You should rest up inside so you can catch the next void train tomorrow morning," she added practically. "The berths at the station fill up quickly once the holiday crowds start moving toward the capital."
Lucid raised a bare hand to stop her before she could start preparing a guest room.
"No need," Lucid said. "We are leaving today."
"Today?" she repeated, looking at the late afternoon shadows stretching across the dirt yard. "The roads north get dark early, and the fog off the marshlands is thick this time of year."
"We prefer the fog," Ayame stated from her position near the iron hitching post. Her pale eyes scanned the empty street behind them with sharp impatience. "It keeps the priests from aiming their sticks properly."
The woman looked at Ayame for a second, then nodded as if that explanation made complete sense in a port town like Vexis.
Lucid looked down at the wooden floorboards of the porch, his boot tracing a small knot in the cedar plank. The mention of the orphanage and its late owner still hung in the air between them, an unresolved debt that belonged to someone else entirely. Yet since Valen was not here to defend his own reckless methods, Lucid felt an odd obligation to clear the air before they walked away.
"And on behalf of Pilt,"