Fork This Life!

Chapter 23: The Fork Can’t Move (Wait, Isn’t That Normal?)

(POV Ferdinand)

Two horses trot along a flat dirt road. It seems a painfully slow pace to be travelling at when there could be people dying every moment. “Can’t we go any faster?” I ask anxiously.

“If we were to go any faster the horses would run out of stamina all too quickly, especially since we are riding double. Trust me, this is the best pace for travelling.” Luc replies calmly.

Horseshoes continue to crunch against soil in an endless rhythm, somehow making the silence even more prominent.

I briefly ponder if there’s anything I can say to break the silence, but most of the things I think of would be inappropriate, given the situation. Mentioning the queer behaviour of the skeletons is a possibility, but I doubt it’s anything important. If the necromancer wants to divide up his forces and make it easier for us to kill them, he can go right ahead, I say.

We arrive at a village a couple of hours later, and the sun is starting to get low. It’s unlikely that we’ll be able to make it back to the city before nightfall, I think absent-mindedly, before focusing on the problem at hand: skeletons.

Dismounting from the horse, I draw my sword. ‘Forty-five, including the ones in the fields… again with the weirdness. Also, two of the skeletons here have armour and weapons.’ Informs Gerald.

My eyes narrow. Unfortunately, that isn’t all. Mixed in with the normal, pale white skeletons are black skeletons. Now, I don’t know much about skeletons, but I am fairly sure that the white ones are the weakest of the bunch. Therefore, these black ones must be stronger.

But with a couple of paladins by my side, they won’t be a threat! I charge into battle, but Lily and Luc overtake me before I’m even half-way to the group of skeletons that are turning to face us.

From atop her horse, Lily raises a gauntleted hand towards them. A holy light springs forth from her hand, and the skeletons it shines upon have their flames extinguished, regardless of colour.

Luc mimics her action, and another group of skeletons fall apart where they stand, although a smaller number than when Lily attacked.

…At this rate, there won’t be much for me to do.

I continue charging, but by the time I reach them, Lily and Luc have already cleaved through them, leaving only a single black skeleton! They head deeper into the village, leaving this one for me.

Upon spotting me, the dark flames in its eyes blaze sinisterly. It opens its jaws wide as if trying to shout or scream, but no sound comes out. Then, to my shock, it starts to run towards me. I barely parry its first blow, again finding myself startled by its speed and power.

Until now, skeletons could be described with two words: tenacious, slow. But this one moves almost as fast as a regular human, and just as strong.

Of course, that still isn’t as strong or fast as I am, so after the first few blows I become accustomed to the difference and start to retaliate.

With a kick I shatter its leg, sending it tumbling to the ground, and with another step I stomp on its head, shattering it. Much stronger than the normal skeleton, but still weak on its own.

Skull fragments crumble under my boot as I run further into the village. Everywhere I go, all I see are piles of bones. I hear sounds of combat from up ahead, so I hurry along, reaching them just in time to witness the last armoured undead get beheaded.

Lily sheathes her immaculate blade. Perhaps the only benefit to fighting undead is that you don’t have to clean your weapon afterward.

“Let us split up and see if we can find another of those cats.” Leaving her horse to graze on the grass by the roadside, Lily picks a direction and begins searching, with Luc doing the same.

‘Inside the house over to your right, the one with the broken window. It’s under the bed.’ Meanwhile, I had a helpful fork supplying me with its exact location.

Striding over to the house, I step over the fallen door through the entrance and follow Gerald’s directions to find the bedroom. Peeking under the bed, I see a pair of feline eyes looking back at me. Stretching out an arm, I try to grab it, but the cat hisses and claws my hand. I wince at the pain and try again, this time managing to pull it from beneath the bed, still flailing its limbs and try to inflict whatever damage it can.

Awkwardly trying to hold it in such a way that it can’t scratch or bite me, I hurry out of the building and call out, “I found it!”

…Well, Gerald found it, but he doesn’t want other people to know about him, so what else can I say? And I did find it. Gerald just found it first.

Lily and Luc promptly return, and I deposit the unruly cat in her hands, where it is unable to do any harm. She closes her eyes in concentration, but soon opens them again as the cat falls limp in her hands. “Again! If we were able to catch him when he is sleeping, then I would have more time…” she trails off in frustration.

“So what now?” I ask. “Clean up the skeletons in the fields?”

Lily shakes her head. “That is what I shall be doing. Meanwhile, the horses will be resting, and you will start your training with Luc.”

At first, I’m faintly disappointed that she won’t be teaching me herself, but that feeling is replaced shortly by excitement. With this training, I should be able to become at least somewhat more powerful, right?

“Come, let us find a more suitable area to train in.” Luc beckons me over, and we find ourselves an empty paddock, the animals formerly residing here having long since fled. He looks around and nods, drawing his sword. “Alright, first let us have a brief spar. I need to find out your current level of skill and style of fighting if I am to train you.”

Drawing my own sword, I say, “I reached advanced proficiency recently, if that helps.”

He shakes his head and swings towards me, his sword little more than a gleam of silver, faster than I can react to. I try to block, but I am barely able to raise my sword half-way before his sword stops just short of my forehead, making my whole body break out in sweat. “It does not. Two men can have the same proficiency in a skill, yet entirely different methods of using it. The only way for me to truly understand how you fight is to fight you.” He says, lifting his sword away from my face and taking a step back.

“Again.”

This time he lets me attack and calmly parries every one of my slashes, his green eyes steadily tracking my movements as I endlessly try to breach his defences.

“Enough.” Luc says eventually, sheathing his sword. “I think I have a clear enough picture of how you fight, now.”

Hands trembling, I lower my sword and try to steady my breathing. Now that I’m not fighting, I notice Joe sitting on the fence nearby, a stalk of wheat wiggling about in his mouth as he chews on it. Where did he even get that; aren’t all the crops here dead?

“Not terrible for someone who has obviously never been trained, but not great, either. However, that just means you have much room for improvement. Let us start… with the basics.” Luc grabs my hands, shifting them slightly on the hilt of my sword.

“At least part of the reason why you are so tired right now is because your grip and stance are sloppy.” He explains. “You aren’t exerting as much strength as you could where it matters and are exerting too much where it doesn’t. There are many other problems with your style of fighting, but we’ll start with that…”

(POV Gerald)

Hello, I’m bored. ‘Hello Bored, I’m insert-name-here’, I hear you say? Haha.

But seriously, not much happening for me, lately. A bit of recon here, some chatting there, and the rest of my days are silence.

I’m half tempted to notify those paladins of my existence just so I have freedom to move about again. Plus, there are a whole bunch of questions I would be interested in asking someone a bit more knowledgeable than Ferdinand.

But anyway, all I can do is the usual training – minus some of the more showy skills, for obvious reasons – and watch what’s happening. Ferdinand’s currently getting a bit of training, which is nice to see. I’m watching that closely, for future reference. Never know when I might get a skill that allows me to assume a human form, after all.

Although, given my stats I’d be more fit to be a wizard. Then again, with the strength and dex enhancing traits I have, perhaps melee combat would be the way to go… I’d really rather use magic, but it will depend on whether I can find something with a good trait.

Intelligence and wisdom… all I can think of in terms of intelligent animals are dolphins, and for wisdom I’m drawing a complete blank. I mean, they say owls are wise, but are they really?

Then, what about monsters? I can think of plenty of ‘intelligent’ monsters, but that generally means they are of a similar level of intelligence as a human. I need something particularly intelligent or wise. Mind flayers come to mind. I didn’t get it last time, but maybe if I come across another, evil one in the future?

Dragons are often depicted as intelligent, and wise too. But… I don’t think killing a dragon is currently within the range of my capabilities.

…Not much else I can think of, but what to do? After all that time playing it before, I pretty much hate minesweeper now. I suppose the only thing I can do is meditate.

Meditate the days away… Patience.

Telling myself to be patient seems almost like an insult, after how long I’ve waited…

Days and villages go by, a constant life of travelling, fighting and training… for them. Guys, reckon we can switch places for a bit?

“Almost sixty in this village, with four of the armoured ones. Looks like we managed to get to this one in time, some of the villagers are still fighting.” As always, I inform Ferdinand of the movements within the village as soon as we get in range.

“Ugh, scratch that, the last one just got mobbed. Well, at least this time we’ll be able to recover their bodies.” Every single time, there hasn’t been a single corpse in the village, as if the villagers had just vanished and been replaced by skeletons.

…Except that would mean there would be way more skeletons in each village.

By now, I am quite curious what exactly that necromancer is doing, so I am keeping a close eye – so to speak – on the events currently happening.

The skeletons are carrying the bodies to the center of the village, where the usual cat is watching them. Once they are all there…

A huge mass of mana appears in the village, the suddenness of which temporarily blinds me. Seconds later, It disappears – and along with it all of the bodies and the skeletons carrying them.

Eh?

Did they just teleport or something?

I’m so shocked and confused that I miss most of what Lily is saying about summoning magic. Right, makes sense. By now, I reckon I can say ‘because magic’ to anything that I don’t understand.

Alright, whatever, moving on. Ignoring what just happened, the rest is as usual: run into the village, re-kill all of the undead, find the cat, cat dies, move on to the next village.

Some adventurers turn up now and again to help, which is something, but the army is still conspicuous in its absence. By now, anyone with half a brain in this empire should be able to see that the necromancer has some ties to people in the top echelons of society.

But then again, some of the nobles and city lords seem to have less than half a brain. How on earth has this Empire held itself together when most of the people of importance are blithering idiots who, when not sleeping, are either spending money extravagantly, losing themselves in debauchery or yelling at some unlucky chap in the street because their face looks funny?

Honestly, I hope the rest of the world isn’t like this.

(POV Ferdinand)

Crackling, the fire spits out a spark which curves through the air, landing only to wink out a moment later. I roll my stiff shoulders; the rigorous training of the past week has been taking its toll on my body.

Gerald is lying somewhere in my pack as usual, probably bored out of his mind, as he so often tells me. Like me, Lily and Luc are seated around the fire, sipping at bowls of vegetable stew.

Their God apparently restricts them from eating meat unless they have to. Personally, I enjoy a good steak, but this isn’t half bad either.

Like every other night, both of them have taken off their armour and are instead dressed in simple tunics and leggings. Like this, I can hardly liken them to their usual appearances – armoured holy knights that will dominate the battlefield or heal the wounded wherever they appear.

Finished gulping down the stew, I set the wooden bowl down to one side; it will be cleaned before we leave in the morning. Stomach full, a question comes to mind that I can’t help but voice: “You two are very strong, so how is it that I’d not heard of you before we met?”

Luc lifts his gaze from the fire. “We come from the far north, so it is no surprise that you never heard of us.” He looks over at Lily, a hint of amusement in his eyes. “Besides, even we did not know of each other before this. It was only when I was upon the Empire’s borders that I heard our lord’s voice telling me where to find Lily, and that she would be leading the mission here.”

My eyebrows raise involuntarily. “You get along well for two people who barely know each other.”

“Why would we not?” Luc shrugs. “We serve the same God, after all, and Lily is such an accomplished wizard that it’s hard for me not to be in awe of her.”

“While I appreciate the sentiment, I am only proficient in a few miscellaneous magical skills, and cannot claim to be anything more than average in other areas.” Lily leans forward, warming her hand over the fire. “Rather, your skill with the sword is much more impressive. It approaches that of the old masters where I live.”

Luc smiles slightly. “My sword master says that he’s nearly out of things to teach me. Soon, I’ll only be able to rely on myself to improve further… How about you, Ferdinand? What are you good at?”

Taken by surprise, I say the first thing that comes to mind. “Farming. Farming was the only thing I was ever good at.”

“Why did you never go back to farming, then?” Luc asks curiously.

I’d never thought about it before, so I take a moment to think before answering. “I suppose I saw too many people who needed help, and not enough people who were helping them. If I went back to farming, that would mean more people wouldn’t be able to get that help.”

“How noble. You might do well as a paladin yourself.” Lily says, then turns to – was Joe sitting there this whole time? That guy is so quiet that it’s hard to notice him, I swear. “And how about you, Joe?”

I don’t expect him to answer, but to my surprise, he does. “Actually, I’m a farmer too.” Pulling a straw hat from behind his back, he places it on his head. “It’s hard work, y’know? Figured I’d take a short break. After all this ends it’s back to the farm for me.”

‘Call me sceptical, but I don’t believe him.’ Says Gerald.

‘You could hear what he’s saying?” I ask.

‘Nah, he’s writing it on the ground.’ I look, and his finger is indeed on the ground. It is still right now, but I know from experience that it can go at incredible speeds.

I go back to the original topic. ‘But does it mean anything if he is lying?’

‘No.’ Gerald sighs. ‘It doesn’t. Or rather, it would make less sense if he is telling the truth… but either way, we know too little about him to determine anything. Even friend or foe… although from his actions so far, it’s neither. Really, there’s no point in thinking too much about it.’

…I never did.

“How close are you to finding the necromancer’s location?” Luc asks Lily in the meantime.

Lily takes out a map and looks at it. “Very. The directions I am able to find with every one of those cat familiars are quite inexact, but if I can do it one, maybe two more times, I should be able to narrow it down to one area.”

Furrowing his brows, Luc asks, “And if he has not been staying in one area?”

“It would make this more difficult, but in that case there should be larger deviations in the directions, and a pattern we could follow.” She answers.

“Then it looks to be a big day tomorrow. We should get some rest.”

A dim, pale light shines down on the world as Teroc glowers down, alone in his own piece of the sky.

One ghostly pale hand resting lightly on the rails of the balcony, a young man looks up at the sky and shivers. Turning around, he walks back into the room, pulling the gilded doors closed behind him.

He glances briefly at the large bed, with its silken sheets twisted into knotted clumps at the foot, and walks instead to his desk. He sits down. With a practiced motion, he reaches under the desk and presses a concealed button. His other hand enters a number combination, and a slight ‘click’ notifies him that the secret compartment is unlocked.

Apparently, the man thinks that even this is not enough security, because the book he slips from the compartment is itself padlocked. Taking the key from where it hangs around his neck, he unlocks it. Glancing fearfully about the room one last time, he opens the book and flips through to an empty page.

Taking up the magical pen on his desk, he begins to write.

Night 257.

Questions surround me no matter what answers I give, and those who should be loyal hounds bay for my blood without regard for what I feed them. I fear that soon all my plans will unravel and with them so too will the noose be tied for my demise… Oh, how I wish that I could simply leave this all behind.

But archers lay in wait to fill me with arrows, daggers lurk in the night and soon enough my own soldiers will march against me. Only here am I safe, and yet even here my ‘protectors’ will tear me limb from limb if I so much as utter the wrong word.

What a fool I was, what a fool I am! If only I had never been brought here! If only I had run when I still could! Too late. Too late.

I still cannot sleep.

A tear glistens against his pale skin as he once again locks the book, places it in the compartment and resets the mechanism. Head in hands, he weeps.

Gerald: Status

Ferdinand: Status