Chapter 15: Leaving

The sun began to rise and brought light to the city. The clouds were colored golden and the light that escaped between them dyed the city with color.

Franswift stood on the pavement of what supposedly now his house, yet he will be leaving. Beside him was Bylun, while in front of him was Wilhelm.

Franswift and Bylun wore the same armor and had the same bag on their back for rations, but they differed in their choice of weapons. They were clad in brown leather armor. Franswift had multiple weapons, A spear and javelins on his back, a long sword beside his waist, a dagger strapped to his leg, and a round shield strapped to his arm.

Completely different from Franswift, Bylun weapon were his two black gloves and each had a white lined vortex inscribed on the palm area.

Wilhelm had held the two boys who had already prepared for the entry trial from going. He had something to say to them.

“From now till you gain high ranks in the training you will have no further support from me, you had the best resources for your growth. I had given you the quota of my family which will get you the best conditions in the training, you will realize the amount difference there.” Wilhelm then stared intensely into Franswift eyes. “I have given you the best, now show up what you will offer in return, don’t disappoint me.”

Franswift turned serious as he stood upright and said in a steady voice, “I assure you I will not.”

Wilhelm faced towards Bylun, “Although both of you did not enjoy the same treatment before the training, we have been training you for years. You have consumed other resources that Franswift did not and trained more than he did. Thus, I expect more from you.”

Bylun also immediately stood upright and said, “I will meet your expectations commander.”

Feeling satisfied at their response Wilhelm waved his hand and said, “Then go, I have nothing more to say.”

Franswift and Bylun nodded and turned around to walk towards the gate of the city.

Looking at the silhouettes disappearing in a distance, Wilhelm’s mouth began to stretch into a smile.

Vali who was lurking in his shadow as always could not comprehend it, the lord who had seldom smiled had been doing so, a lot, recently.

Appearing behind Wilhelm, he wanted to ask but could not. He did not want to question his lord.

“It is alright Vali, I will tell you.”

Wilhelm turned and looked at Vali still with a grin on his face, “Vali, do you know what’s the best thing to break a stalemate is?”

“...”

“It is a variable. The bigger the variable the bigger the chaos it will make. Franswift is that variable and his abilities makes him such a big one that even sometimes I don’t know what will happen. But, if there is one thing I do know is that he is on my side.”

The grin wore off from Wilhelm, “All he needs to do is make Mabuz anxious, the more he is, the higher the chance he messes up.”

Franswift looked around as he walked out of the cleaner and more organized city gate than the one that has been in the slums. People going in and out passed one by one as the guards required them to verify their tokens through a strange black device. The device had a spherical shape with a hole in the middle emitting blue light every time it scanned a token.

Franswift put the token he had gotten from Wilhelm in front of the device, the light turned green and the guard allowed him to pass through.

Out of the gate, it was still the same brown land, but a completely different scenery. There were different paved out roads with a sign on each road naming the destination, carriages with their driver waiting for travelers, and merchants laying things on the ground for customers. The whole area was surrounded by a tall fence and the entrances were guarded, but they did not require identifications.

Franswift was stunned but did not show it on his face. When he came here previously with the beggars as a child they always begged around the fences, they never knew there was such a vibrant life inside. It was the exact opposite of what they were going through.

“What are you doing, we need to be there early.”

Franswift woken from his trance walked again with Bylun.

They took one of the roads, the sign was pointing towards a place called the night forest, and Franswift felt that the place would be no stranger to him.

Before reaching the entrance of the fence, they were stopped on the road by two ghost guards.

“State your business here.”

Bylun immediately answered, “We are candidates for the training.”

Bylun handed a black envelope out of his pocket and gave it to the guard, he then glanced at Franswift indicating for him to do the same.

Candidates? Franswift raised an eyebrow intrigued, he did not care to ask Wilhelm about the details entailing the apprentice training. He thought everything would be explained there. He also thought there was no need, because even if there was danger involved if he could not overcome that in a training then really everything was for naught.

Despite what he thought, Franswift quickly took out an envelope that had been previously given him by Wilhelm. There was a slight difference between his and Bylun, his had white markings around it.

One of the guards took the envelopes then passed them on the same strange spherical device. Franswift noticed there was a slight pause in the guard’s actions when he saw his envelope.

The guard said, “You are clear to go.”

Franswift and Bylun bypassed the guards and then finally reached the fence. What was strange was the entrance was closely guarded and no one was allowed to enter and leave. It was surrounded by other kids who seemed also ready for their training as they all appeared to have their weapons and armors on. But no appeared to cause a ruckus as they all waited.

Franswift and Bylun walked around the crowd, they choose an empty area and waited.

Franswift stood beside Bylun who had been leading the way from the beginning and asked, “What are we waiting for exactly?”

“Like I said we arrived early, we are now waiting for all the other candidates to gather until the specified period comes. I don’t know if you know this, but you will be choosing other candidates who are going to be a part of your team. It is one of your privileges.”