Fork This Life!

Chapter 21: A Series of UnForktunate Events

(POV Ferdinand)

I am running. Without a direction or destination, my only goal is to get away from the man trying to kill me. I can barely tell where I am going because of the fear filling my mind, but I don’t trip or stumble as I run.

I don’t know where Gerald is, whether I’m being followed or not…

So it’s a big relief when Gerald’s voice sounds in my head again. ‘Change direction. He’s following, but I don’t think he knows where you are.’ He says tersely.

Not a moment later, he pops out of the ground in front of me and flies into my pack. Not even looking back or stopping, I turn right and continue running.

Over hills, around cliffs, my feet keep pounding a steady beat against the bare earth below.

Earth turns gradually to grass, grass turns to sand, and sand turns to lapping water – I’ve actually run as far as the ocean without noticing. Just as I’m about to turn again and run along the shore, I hear Gerald speaking again.

‘Hey. Hey, you can stop now. You could have stopped ages ago, he’s long gone. Can you even hear me? I’ve been saying this for a while now…’ He says, irritated.

Stopping, I suddenly feel exhausted and sit down on the sand. It’s as if my body had forgotten to get tired while running, and it’s just now catching up.

I take deep breaths to steady my racing heart. The air feels like it’s burning my insides, and it reminds me that I still have a stab wound in my side. Shrugging my pack off my back, I open it and search through the contents until I find a small vial.

It’s a healing potion. I keep one in reserve, in case I get serious wounds while away from a city. I pop off the cork and drink most of the contents, a red liquid that bears a strange resemblance to blood. Thankfully, the taste doesn’t share the same similarity, instead tasting like a very strong tea.

The rest I pour onto the wound, wincing in pain as the potion irritates my injuries. I watch for a moment as the wound stops seeping blood and starts closing at a visible rate.

‘You sure he’s gone?’ I ask, my mind now calm enough to talk.

He responds a moment later, sounding relieved. ‘Quite sure. You okay?’

‘Yeah. Yeah, I think so. Just a bit tired.’ I say, still struggling to catch my breath. ‘What happened after I left?’

‘We fought briefly, if you can call that a fight.’ Gerald sighs. ‘It was more me charging at him at increasingly fast speeds until I just used a whole bunch of ki to blow him away. Wasn’t able to do much damage to him, regrettably.’

I’m just glad we both managed to get out of that with all our limbs intact. ‘Did you manage to find out who he was?’

‘Better. I found out what he was.’ He says happily, then his voice turns grim. ‘A Doppelganger, at level 48.’

A Doppelganger? “What’s a Doppleganger?’

‘Not too sure myself. From what I remember, if you see someone who looks exactly like you, then they’re your doppelganger. It’s supposed to be bad luck or something.’ Gerald says uncertainly.

‘But level 48?’ I say in shock. ‘His stats must be way higher than mine.’

‘Let me just math for a moment…’ He says. Math? ‘His stat total is at least 123 points higher than yours.’

What? ‘How can you know that? Can you read other people’s statuses now?’

‘Nah. But if you get 2.5 stat points the first ten levels, 3 the next ten and 4 the next ten, my guess would be that the next ten give you 5.5, then 7.5. Knowing that, it’s simple multiplication and addition to see that you’ve gotten a total of 87 stat points from levelling, and he’s gotten 210.’ He states, as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

“Are you done talking yet?” Someone says from behind me.

My slowly relaxing mind goes into full alert again, and I scramble to my feet, looking warily behind me. Standing there with a carefree smile on his face is that same grimy old man from earlier.

Seeing that he doesn’t seem to have any bad intentions, I relax a bit. “Who are you? Why are you following me?”

“No need to be so tense, I just want to chat. Have a seat.” He says, sitting down in the sand and patting the sand in front of him. I don’t sit. “Or don’t, that’s fine too. But aren’t your legs a bit tired after all that running?”

I sit.

‘Are you talking to yourself, or is it someone invisible again?’ Gerald asks.

“Someone invisible.” The grimy old man says. “Not in the conventional sense, though. Gerald just can’t see me because I have no mana.”

How did he… He knows about Gerald, as well? What? Wait… “I remember you! You’re that fortune-teller from way back in…” I try to remember exactly what that city was called.

“Fiso City.” He supplies. “Honestly Ferdinand, you stayed there almost a year, and you still don’t know the name of it?”

“How do you know about us?” I ask, thoroughly confused.

“One second…” He starts writing rapidly in the sand, his finger a blur as it moves. “Can’t leave Gerald out of this, can we?” He finishes writing a few lines, wipes the sand clean, and starts writing again. “To answer your question, you already know I can see the future. It’s much easier to see the past, or even the present. Of course I know about you and Gerald.”

I’m not sure if that’s how it works… But then again, I’m not sure it isn’t. “Who are you?” I ask. Everything about him is so strange. Knowing about things that should be impossible for anyone to know, being unharmed from a strike of someone at almost level 50…

He thinks about it for a second, then smiles. “You can call me Joe. As for the reason I’m following you, it’s to ask if I can follow you around on your adventures.”

…What?

“Don’t worry, I won’t be a bother. I can take care of my own meals and accommodation, and I won’t get in the way in fights.” His finger continues to dash across the sand as he says this, although I don’t see him glance down even once.

I frown. “I’m not having a stranger following me around for no reason.”

He shrugs. “All right then.”

I look at him for a few seconds longer, but he doesn’t do or say anything else besides look at me steadily. Shrugging myself, I get up and dust the sand off my pants. Grabbing my pack, I start walking along the shore towards Liensport city.

‘Well, that was strange.’ Says Gerald.

‘Yes, it certainly was…’ I trail off as I looked over my shoulder. The gri… Joe, was still following me. I stop and turn around to face him. “What are you doing?”

He scratches his head. “Well, see, when I asked you if I could follow along, I was just being polite. I’m following you regardless.” He says, smiling abashedly.

For a moment, I’m lost for words. The way he acts is so abnormal that I don’t quite know how to treat him, and this is coming from a guy who has a talking fork as a friend. I can’t help but remember how the doppelganger’s spear slipped right through him, and how he was right behind me after I ran as fast as I could until the ocean. And thinking about it, he wasn’t even out of breath.

He probably wouldn’t be a hindrance in combat like that, and with skills like those, it shouldn’t be hard for him to provide food for himself.

“Alright.” I concede reluctantly. “You can follow me, but take a bath first, would you?”

Joe freezes. “Damn.” He swears, looking down at himself. “All that time, and not a single bath. No wonder people weren’t eager to get their fortunes told!”

He looks back at me. “Just a minute, please.”

And then he sprints into the water, until I can’t see him anymore.

…Times like these, I start to wish I was still a farmer.

(POV Gerald)

Welp, that was more than a mite strange. Writing in the sand by an invisible hand, detailing the other half of Ferdinand’s conversation, and there isn’t even a depression in the sand where I presume the owner of that hand was sitting. Nor footprints. Nothing, really.

If not for the writing, I might’ve thought that Ferdinand had gone a bit loopy.

And now we seem to have another member in the party. Yay.

Still, I think I can metaphorically breathe a sigh of relief now that we aren’t walking towards almost certain death.

…Is that a death flag? Maybe? Eh, we should be fine.

I suppose we should be considering whether it’s safe to return to Liensport or not. After all, the doppelganger knows what Ferdinand looks like. But then again, there’s that Harry guy. The doppelganger said he knows who our informant was, so he’s definitely in danger.

We can’t just leave him to be killed, so we should at least alert him before moving on to another city. Conversing with Ferdinand, he quite agrees, and is understandably eager to get away from anywhere the doppelganger may be able to track him down.

It doesn’t take us long to get back to the city, since all we have to do was follow the coast. It’s a strange feeling, returning to a place where everyone was nonchalantly going about their daily lives when we’ve just returned from a legitimately life-threatening situation.

Repeating our actions from last time, I communicate with Harry, telling him to get out of the area for a while and briefly explaining why. Then we leave again, as quickly as we came.

(POV Harry)

The day after the voice first spoke in my head, it speaks again.

‘Sorry about this, but you may have a level 48 doppelganger coming to kill you. He’s the one who killed Richard, and he said that he knew who provided his location to us, so you should probably disappear for a while.’ He said.

Not what I was expecting of the day when I woke up this morning. ‘And he let you leave?’ I ask sceptically. The man I met yesterday didn’t look anywhere near strong enough to face off against a level 48.

‘We managed to run away, since we couldn’t do much damage to him. He covered himself in some sort of red armour, apparently. Oops, been speaking too-’ The voice stopped.

…Really? I met – didn’t even meet you, I only ever heard your voice – yesterday, and you expect me to believe that I have someone coming to kill me? Hah! It’s more likely that this is a ploy from someone aiming for my position.

It wouldn’t be hard to incriminate me if I suddenly disappear. People would have their suspicions, but if I don’t turn up to dispute it, they might just shrug and give it to him.

Still, by that same notion, it’s likely they would have hired an assassin to tail me as I went into hiding and make me truly disappear for good. I’m not suited for combating stealthy opponents, especially since I haven’t seen much combat in the last few years.

How could I find, and ideally kill, an assassin before it kills me? Unfortunately, I doubt I can enlist the help of a wizard. We have so few and they’re all overworked as it is…

…No choice but to draw him out, huh?

That said, it would be suicide to do so thoughtlessly. If I’m to do this, it will be on my terms. First, a place.

I seem to remember…

Thumbing through the mountains of files stored neatly in cabinets behind my desk, I select the one I’m looking for. This one is new, I got it only yesterday. Looking at it, I read through the details: tonnes of supplies had been moved from a particular warehouse near the docks. In other words, it is now empty, and it will be another few days before it is filled up by another shipment again.

A large, open space was perfect for my needs.

Now for equipment. It would seem strange if I were to go around at work wearing my combat gear, so I wait for the end of the day before I head to the armory. Taking a small, intricate key from a pocket within my coat, I unlock my personal storage chest.

I unstrap the rapier from my side. It’s an ornamental piece, and doesn’t even have an edge, so I would hesitate to even call it a weapon. The rapier in the chest, however, is a true blade, crafted from the rare metal: mithril.

Unsheathing it partially, I test its edge with my thumb. A thin line of blood wells from a paper-thin cut, making me smile despite the pain. Truly an exquisite piece of work, sharp as the day it was first honed to a razor edge and without the faintest trace of rust or wear.

I put the blade to one side and lift my armour from the chest. Brown with faint lines of gold, it is of fairly simple design, but despite looking similar to leather armour, it can deflect arrows and blades alike with relative ease as it is in fact made from the leather of a wyvern.

Stripping off my coat, I don the armour over my soft undershirt, rolling my shoulders as the familiar weight settles over them. The only item remaining inside the chest is a small pouch, which I attach to my belt. A bag of holding, as expensive as it is useful. Through some strange wizardry that I don’t understand in the slightest, it is somehow able to contain a volume about three times what it appears to be, while completely eliminating the weight of those items.

This one contains a collection of useful potions, some money and a few other items that should be helpful.

I leave the building and head for the warehouse, sticking to busy streets to dissuade potential assassins.

Of course, it very well may be that there are no assassins, but in that case, I’ll just be a bit late for dinner. No harm done. Perhaps I could even make use of this opportunity to do some light training, and get myself back into practice.

There are a couple of guards patrolling the place, but not nearly as many as there would be if the place was loaded with goods. After a few minutes of observing their movements, I take advantage of a gap and slipped inside.

Shutting the door silently behind me – bless oiled hinges – a large, open space greets my eyes. I briefly glance around the rafters, just in case anyone is there, and walk to the middle of the space. The only sound is that of my own footsteps, vastly different to the bustling noise of the headquarters.

Reaching the centre, I take a deep breath and settle myself into a state similar to the ‘vigilance’ skill that sentries and guards often possess, but rather than focusing on eyesight, it focuses on hearing: ‘hearken’.

Through it, I can hear the footsteps of the guards outside, still on patrol. The gentle lap of water against the piers. A breath of wind subtly breezing along.

Barely a minute later, I hear a body hit the ground, and then another. My hand tightens around the hilt of my rapier and draws it silently from the sheath.

The door swings open. A bloody spear head precedes the entrance of its wielder as he steps inside. My eyes narrow. There is this sense of… familiarity about him that I can’t quite place.

I take a second, more careful look at him, and a name almost forgotten over the years floats to the forefront of my mind. “Rodney?” I involuntarily utter in my shock. He looks different, but that can be attributed to age…

But then again, he’s dead. He can’t be here… and that leads my mind to other possibilities. He must have been why Richard came here. Demons, he said… He would be concerned about demons, but not enough to come out of retirement for it. He would have just sent a message back here, and wash his hands of the matter.

However, if his son was involved, it would all make sense. But how?

My mind flickered back to earlier today. ‘level 48 doppelganger’, the voice had said, and it suddenly seems much more plausible than it had earlier. And if so, I am in trouble.

“A doppelganger, is it?” I say, hoping to buy time.

His face twitches slightly, before he reigned it back into an impassive mask. “You know, I used to enjoy talking to people before killing them. Seeing their fear, their pain.” He says quietly. “Then I lost my arm.”

I glance to his side and see the empty sleeve. I’d been so focused on his face that I hadn’t even noticed.

Without another word, a red mist explodes forth from his body, bringing with it a primal fear.

My throat tightens, and my mouth draws itself into a grim line, but it isn’t because of the fear. It’s because I recognise the mist. Only the most brutal killers, the ones who truly enjoyed the pain they cause, can wield it, and it is as dangerous as it is rare.

Even as my mind is coldly recalling information on it, my hand is transporting potion after potion to my mouth, and my legs were rapidly shifting me backwards to gain distance.

Within a few seconds, the mist settles around his body and spear in the shape of armour, making my blood run cold. He must have killed several hundred people to be able to physically manifest his killing intent, perhaps more than a thousand. I can’t even begin to guess, because I have never seen it before, only ever heard of it.

It looks as if escaping this battle alive will be no easy feat.

Calming my nerves, I raise my sword, rouse my fighting spirit and leap into combat, flinging an orange vial ahead of me.

(POV Gerald)

How do you evade pursuers? In all honesty, it’s as easy as breathing, if they don’t have tracking skills. Just head cross country, disappear into a forest or something, and hey presto! As far as civilisation is concerned, you don’t exist anymore.

Well, in this world at least. Back on Earth, search parties and things would be organised… but you catch my drift.

Unfortunately, Ferdinand has this strange attachment to having good food, shelter, beds etc. So, we have to figure out a way to confuse any people that could be tracking us. Fortunately, we don’t have a set destination, so we can go any number of directions.

For now, we are heading north and west, heading across the land to a place called Tikse city. It’s not linked directly by roads to Liensport, so any trackers shouldn’t assume we’d go there. Of course, if they have magical means of tracking us, we’re screwed. Always look on the bright side of life, right? We should be fine.

From what I’ve seen, there aren’t many wizards in the cities I’ve seen so far, so it’s unlikely for there to be one with that particular ability to be chasing us.

And it might be just the Doppelganger following us. Or it might be nobody. I mean, I haven’t seen anyone. There probably isn’t.

With Ferdinand’s experience and my skills, travelling over the countryside is a breeze. I find a wild animal when we need food, one of us kills it and Ferdinand cooks it. I keep watch at night, Ferdinand keeps our course and we keep each other company with idle conversation.

Apparently the person following us – the invisible one – is this old man type character, and he’s quite strange, according to Ferdinand. He’s never seen Joe eat or sleep. Instead, Joe often just looks up at the sky all night. Ferdinand tells me that when he wakes up, Joe is usually in the same position as he was when Ferdinand last saw him the previous night.

I really don’t like it. I can’t see him, which means I won’t be able to notice or stop him if he ever does something. Still, Ferdinand says he’s a good person when he’s not doing weird things, so I can give him the benefit of the doubt – for now.

A couple days later, I see something emerging on the edge of my vision. It’s a village… and it’s currently inhabited by skeletons.

Again!?

Gerald: Status

Ferdinand: Status