Arc 2: The Road Of First Light

After a few days of walking, we eventually stumbled upon the road Uno was discussing. Although he called it a road, it was more of a dirt path. This road was probably used frequently in the past and was now deserted.

We started following a direction as suggested by Uno since it would inevitably lead us to a city. I got excited as I started seeing more animals and different types of trees around. The forest surrounding the mountain stronghold didn’t have many animals because of, obviously, the large presence of undead.

But as we move further from the stronghold, life reappears. We had not seen any animals for at least a few centuries, so we enjoyed the scenery more than we thought. However, the master chef in my group was thinking something else since she hadn’t gotten fresh ingredients for a long time.

Although I sent countless numbers of scouts through the years we spent inside the stronghold, the information they could gather was limited. After all, most of the scouts were mindless beasts I had created. We did, however, send some volunteers to scout, but they usually ended up dead. When they returned from the spirit world, they would go in a sour mood and refuse to go out again.

“Oh! Oh! A deer! A deer! I haven’t seen one since the Yoke of Endlers!” I excitedly pointed at the deer. It got scared by my excited screaming and ran away.

“Heh, great. Boss, you scared it.” Uno snickered. As he walked with the group, he would whistle some tunes that we had heard of a hundred times already. The bushes near us started to rustle.

“Uno! I hope it’s the deer again!” I exclaimed in excitement. I held out my orb to capture a picture of the deer. This orb was used for creating light, but after studying photography through light magic, I managed to reverse-engineer it to capture pictures. I gave one to everyone as well. 

Take a snap, and save it to your gemstone. Shove the gem up your skull to view, literally. Creating a camera was not impossible for someone who had lived for over a thousand years, really.

Instead of a deer, a large horse came out. An armored man rode the great beast who looked as surprised as we were.

“Greetings, travelers. Judging by your clothes, you all must be...pilgrims. Am I right?” The man inquired about our group.

“Pilgrims?” I asked.

“Yes, this road leads to the Great Holy City of Aon. Are you not a pilgrims? I can help lead the way, too,” The man replied.

The great Holy City of Aon? I looked at Uno. He gave it a thought, but after straining himself for a while, he gave up and concluded he had no clues. The scouts I sent out never mentioned such a city, either. However, I felt like I heard of that place, like it was a very familiar place as if I had been there. Regardless, since this man wanted to guide us there, we might as well have a free tour guide.

“Of course we are! Look at our clean, fresh white robes! We are totally not the walking dead!” I said as Uno facepalmed.

“Eh...ok. Whatever. Just follow me.” The man, clearly confused, led the way.

I observed the horseman closely as we traveled along the dirt road. He wore no helmet, proudly showing his short blonde haircut. From my memories, the area around the stronghold had no nation whose natives had blonde hair. Perhaps, after a thousand years, demographics could change as time went by.

He wore a dirty white tabard on his chain armor, indicating that he’d been patrolling lately. On his waist were a sheathless longsword and a pouch. With all these points, I concluded that his gear was not exceptional.

Furthermore, was he very skillful in guarding a road all by himself? Or could the nation of Aon not afford too many guards? Do all guardsmen have mediocre equipment, such as this man? My first encounter with another nation did not lead to answers but more questions.

He was intrigued by our behaviors of holding orbs and pointing them at objects and animals. No, not intrigued; his more like creeped out. To loosen his tension, I initiated a conversation with him.

“So, we may have heard of the Aon, but we’ve never been there, hence why we’re on our pilgrimage. Can you tell us more about it?” I asked him.

“Certainly. There are a lot of people that ask me that, so I’m not surprised. The Banisher of the Undead Saint Geraldine founded the Great Holy City of Aon…” He went on and on about the city’s history and significance, but I wasn’t interested in that.

“Oh, wow! That’s very interesting, indeed. But can you tell us more about places we should visit?” I asked the important question: Where do we tour first?

“There should be some priests that lead pilgrims around, but you should try the Great Cathedral. Many priests tour the holiest sites of man,” The man answered.

More free tour guides! This city is amazing!

“Boss, I’m not sure if we should really be going to a place dedicated solely to the celebration of the destruction of the undead…” Uno whispered to me nervously.

“Nonsense. We’re pilgrims,” I answered back.

“No, it’s not about the disguise; it’s about the Gods’ and Goddesses’ power that could potentially destroy us just by being in…” Before Uno could finish, one of my companions excitedly pointed out a city in the distance.

We all fell silent. The great towers almost felt like it was trying to touch the skies, the magnificent walls decorated with beautiful works of art if you don’t consider the fact that they’re depictions of the undead being smitten into a thousand pieces, and the beautiful golden doors.

The city was built on top of a beautiful river, with waters so clean the reflections on it colored a magnificent blue over the streams.

“The river looks faintly familiar. Very bad memories, though,” My chef commented.

“It looks nice, though,” One of my other companions remarked. The river complemented the city’s beauty, giving it a tranquil scenery.

The man on the horse was probably used to this and gave us a few moments before continuing on. He led us to a paved road away from the dirt road. More and more people started to come to our view, giving a refreshing feeling compared to when we were alone on the dirt road.

I could only guess that the dirt road was no longer in use due to this paved road which could be more convenient than the previous road, hence the reason for the lack of travellers on the dirt road.

“Boss, Boss. Take a photo of that side of the wall!” One of my companions said.

“Yeah! Yeah! That’s a wonderful shot! Oh ho! Look at that detail on the gate!” I commented back.

We got so excited as we took more photos that we did not notice we’d already reached the front gate. There were a lot of pilgrims entering and leaving the city. Not just pilgrims, merchants, mercenaries, farmers, and soldiers.

The man who guided us eventually met up with another man with the same uniform as him.

“Ah, Egbert. Guiding lost sheep again? They really need to promote you. You seem to be the only one who is so full of life in this job,” The guardsman said to the horseman.

“Well, a job’s a job. Pilgrims, this is where I depart. This man will help you out.” He rode off as soon as he said his farewell.

“Welcome to the Great Holy City of Aon, pilgrims. Before you can enter, you’ll need to pay a small fee. Just one piece of silver,” The guardsman announced to us. He’s clearly experienced with handling foreign pilgrims. He showed a piece of coin.

“Er...we only have these coins.” My group gave one coin per person to the guardsman.

“Wow, the beauty of these coins with great details! Hold on, I’ll have to weigh these.” The guardsman was astounded by the coins. He weighed the coins and then checked for authenticity. He confirmed that we gave him real gold coins, but he didn’t know how to give us change.

We weren’t really bothered by material wealth, so we just excused it as giving donations as a sign of faith. We went through without trouble afterward. The inside of the city was much more amazing!