Lucian grabbed the clothes beside the note: a white tunic, undergarment, breeches, and leather boots. He dressed up in the clothes, then moved over to the counter and asked Bella when his clothes would be fully washed.
Bella answered, "I believe it will be done tomorrow. The blood is quite difficult to deal with, and on top of that it needs to dry as well."
"Oh, well that makes sense. But there's something I need to grab from my pouch, and it's hanging on my belt with my clothes," Lucian asked, as he needed the money to buy beer.
"Yeah, sure," Bella said as she followed him out to where a servant was washing customers' clothes.
She walked over to where the armor and the rest lay. Right beside it lay a pouch.
Lucian grabbed the belt with the pouch as he wrapped it around his torso once more, looking towards his sword as well. Now clean, he thought about it as he grabbed it too, thanking Bella before walking out. Bella stopped him. "Wait, before you leave. Garfield said that you could meet him at the southwest administrative zone, the same one you entered in."
Lucian nodded as he walked out.
He then started searching for an alehouse, remembering a few that lay on Hushten Street, walking back to where he originally came from.
The decline in building quality was easily visible as he walked through the street. The people around weren't much better. Clothing, their overall health, basically everything about it all got worse as he continued.
Finally, as the sun neared the city walls' edge, he saw an alehouse. The mortar had slight cracks throughout. Through the windows, hardened adventurers enjoyed themselves, drinking their ale and beer while watching the orange glow of the setting sun.
"The view is quite nice," Lucian thought as he walked in through the door, going over to the counter as the candles flickered from the ceiling.
He requested nonchalantly, "Could I get beer please, and if possible, the biggest mug you have." He felt the need to properly think it all through, so he definitely needed a lot of beer to sip on.
The alewife, with her sharp blue eyes, looked at him and smiled. "Don't worry, I got you covered. Forty Rin, please." Lucian smiled as he picked up forty Rin out of his pouch, now only having two hundred and twenty Rin left for himself to spend. He sighed as he walked over to a table, letting the alewife do the rest.
He picked a seat far from the most crowded and busy areas of the alehouse as he looked through a window, seeing the orange glow slowly disappear behind Waterbridge's city walls.
Suddenly the alewife was right beside him, giving him a wink as she put down a mug the size of his head.
She walked away as Lucian grabbed the wooden mug, taking slow sips as he looked through the window. The sky now burned with a red glow.
Suddenly small white particles appeared, slowly gliding towards the ground. Lucian remembered a story of such particles before. The name was supposedly snow.
As it quickly became stronger and stronger, fully turning into a massive blizzard, everyone at the alehouse suddenly turned quiet. Lucian started questioning his own mental state once more, thinking he might have totally crossed the border now. All the people had translucent dark blue locks on them, about four times the size of a normal house lock.
Their eyes and mouths seemed to be totally encased in the last emotion their faces expressed, as they almost seemed like stone statues.
Through the door came a hooded figure wearing a giant black fur robe with white patterns flowing throughout the fabric. Flowing through the air were golden ornaments, all following a symmetrical pattern around him.
In the figure's right hand was a staff of metal swirling upwards as it bloomed into two wings at the top of the staff. The wings of the staff contained many different gems. Lucian had never seen the colors of the gems before. The gems made a beautiful arrangement of colors as they followed a symmetrical pattern on both wings. In the staff were multiple holes connecting chains throughout. As Lucian counted, he realized the man had twenty different chains, each exuding different colors and effects.
Walking towards the alewife, he grabbed a mug which she was carrying at the time, placing forty-five Rin in her hands as he walked over to Lucian, sitting himself down. Snow coated his robe as he took off his hood.
Lucian felt himself lose his grip as he looked into fractal patterns that continuously swirled inwards towards the man's pupils, shining with colors Lucian could not explain or thought were possible. He realized the man was smiling towards him, seeming to be in his early twenties, sharp rows of teeth meeting Lucian's gaze.
As the man took off his hood, revealing his medium-long golden blond hair, two pairs of translucent horns were set on top of his head, confusingly swirling in the same colors his eyes were.
"Hey, Lucian." The man greeted him as he took a swig of his beer.
Lucian looked blankly at the man, his mind totally unable to comprehend what just happened and why this man appeared to look like this. The colors of his eyes hurt Lucian's mind further. The only thing Lucian could surmise was that this man was definitely a mage, and a strong one at that.
Suddenly the man spoke up once more. "I've been planning to meet you for a long time." The man greeted, his expression bland.
"Hello," Lucian greeted back, unsure what else to do as the warmth disappeared around him. He wondered if he had been cast away to Frisillock.
"Well then, let me introduce myself first, as I already know all that is to know about you. My name is Silas Mercury, a mage, and for you, your executioner," he said, as expressionless as before.
This made Lucian jump as he reached for his sword. Silas totally ignored it, not really caring.
"Don't worry, it won't be now. I plan to do it much later in your life, when you inherit the curse that has plagued your family for centuries. The vile monster named Adam!" Silas explained, his face twisting into a frown that Lucian found unusual, despite never having met him before.
. . .
In the Kingdom of Sindam, deep in the eastern woods, Joshua was walking with a beautifully crafted stick. Deep grooves, a glossy finish, and a beautiful surface lay on the stick as it seemed to have come straight from a fairy tale, one of Joshua's supposed imprinted memories contained.
As he walked, a path through the woods opened. He saw many crimson flowers appear. Close to the flowers were creatures which swirled in blood. Joshua asked, "What is that? I can't remember anything like that ever existing."
The voice of relief swallowed his mind as it said. "That is a demon, a creature created by an old acquaintance of mine. Don't worry, they aren't too strong anymore. Their chaotic energy has started to run low in recent times."
Joshua nodded as he was quite intrigued by who this acquaintance to Father could be. Perhaps it could give insight into how Father truly is.
"Well then, are those flowers also connected to this acquaintance?"
"Yes, you are in fact correct. Many around Sindam worship him as a god who is believed to give powers for the sacrifices the worshipers give. The name of the city where those worshipers stay is called the Crimson Bloom City, an old rend nest which they took as a gift from the Primordial Blood, as they call him." The voice calmly explained, some nostalgia resurfacing in his voice.
"The Primordial Blood? That's one hell of a name, huh. Your acquaintances sound crazy!" Joshua screamed as he alerted the demons. He picked up one of the crimson flowers. "These are quite pretty. What are they called, Father?" Joshua asked as he sniffed the flower, a pungent smell of blood seeping into his nose.
"They are called bloody marys, a name given for their pungent smell of blood and association with innocence. They are one of the things the Primordial Blood truly introduced into this world. They are often used in rituals where they sacrifice young virgin humans to the Primordial Blood."
As the monsters swirling in blood ran towards Joshua, leaving bloody imprints in the soil below, Joshua smiled. Massive spikes grew through the ground, piercing the monsters. But as they were made solely of blood, they continued on. Joshua created a giant man-eating plant, devouring multiple of the monsters in one fell bite.
He laughed to himself. Father once again tried to remind him to act more holy. Joshua brushed it off, feeling himself growing in strength.
He continued on the path as the woods split even wider, obviously influenced by Joshua's growing power.
. . .
In Solarin, in the medium-sized city of Waterbridge, inside an alehouse sat Lucian as he asked, "Who is this Adam?"
"I don't really know myself, but through my precognition, I've seen glimpses of him in the future controlling your body. Through the precognition I get every month, I get more and more understanding of the person who appears in these futures. You've been my target for years now. But the most important thing to know is that I believe him to be the epitome of sin, a rot at the very core of existence." Silas's expression grew grave.
"Sin?" Without hesitation, Lucian grabbed the scabbard of his sword as he pulled it out in one clean movement in an attempt to separate his head from his body. But once he reached his neck, he realized the same dark blue lock which all the others had was now on his right hand, the one he grabbed his sword with.
Lucian shouted, "I would rather die than become some vessel for a sinful beast!" His determination for death now absolute.
The man looked towards Lucian in a way which shocked him to the core. "No. I can't allow that. I refuse to continue killing innocents. And the only way to do that is to finally end Adam for good. To do that, I require that you manage to allow him to descend among us. For that to happen, you need to continuously use your rend until Adam and your balance becomes one, allowing Adam to cross over into your body. Is that okay?"
Lucian's arm started to shake, which confused Silas. Suddenly, Lucian started to tear up.
Weird. A regular human managing to surpass my Lock Paralysis? Lucian's face grew in desperation, the tears swelling and falling, but the expression on Lucian's face wasn't of a man crying. It was of one angry at it all. He wanted an end, to finally rest in his grave and perhaps gain Sorin's approval and become one with the sun, as all faithful believers do. Though, as he had followed a man devoid of that religion, perhaps the salvation of the sun was now gone.
"Calm down, Lucian. You are acting too rashly. Do you want to be the one to slay Adam, or do you want to be one of his many, many victims who have flowed through your family for centuries?" Silas's expression was now back to normal, though his fractals flowed more quickly inward than before.
Lucian, shaking, thought about it as he realized that to atone for his sins of following a man like Roderic, perhaps he should be the sacrifice to lay Adam to rest. Then and only then could he get a position in the ever-large sun.
The tears on Lucian's face slowly disappeared as he sat himself down, weirdly composed compared to what just happened.
"Well then, Lucian, let me give you one piece of advice while living your final moments out. Don't shine too brightly. The brighter you burn now, the darker the world becomes for those left behind when your light goes out. So don't think of living your final years out with a country wife. Continue on your adventure with Roderic."
Lucian looked blankly at him. "Why must I spend my final moments with him?" Slight disgust now being shown.
"The reason why I think you should travel with Roderic is because of his nature preventing him from feeling for anyone, no matter what he believes or others think. He is, after all, a soulless man living on a thread bound by the two worlds. That is exactly why you must remain with him. Leaving a burden on someone you love is the cruelest thing you can do, especially to someone as significant as a wife." Silas reasoned, as he swung the last bit of beer left from his mug as he waved Lucian bye.
A long tunnel appeared, seeming to have been ripped straight out of space as he walked through. The locks popped open and everyone felt confused and out of it, realizing that massive walls of snow were now everywhere. The alewife almost fainted when she saw that her mug of beer had been replaced with forty Rin, believing that a ghost might have swooped in and replaced it right in front of her.
Lucian looked out towards the snow as it had settled and no more came from the sky. If he was to not truly follow the man's commands, perhaps he should just cut his neck right now.
He grabbed his wooden mug, drinking slow sips, his eyes cloudy, his eyebags apparent.
He started questioning why the world was so cruel to him and what he must do as pictures of a strange man appeared in his head repeatedly. A man with crimson eyes, sharp fangs, and a vile smile. The looks of the man were basically a perfect match with Lucian, making him quickly connect the dots pointing him towards the man named Adam.
As he realized that it must have been a call from Sorin himself, a path he must follow to the end to earn a place along with Sorin in the sun.
He tried his best to make a grin as he slurped up the rest of his beer, walking out towards the snow with what could be assumed to be confidence.
His goal apparent: continuously train his swordsmanship against Roderic until he becomes strong enough to truly follow his principle.
The principle now fully encompassing what Lucian was and will be, a true adventurer, a man for the people and a devote follower of Sorin.