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73.84% Tales of Tomorrow / Chapter 47: Chapter 47

Chapitre 47: Chapter 47

Clothed in thick furs and linen held together by leather stripes Alvar trudged tiredly through the thick snow that had began to fall upon the north of Tyria at the end of August and had developed into a heavy blanket once December arrived plunging the whole Shiverpeak mountains into an anxious mood, despite the serenity the white snow provided for the Norn.

The main reason for the anxiousness, that hung like a veil over Hoelbrak, was the memory of the day Jormag and his forces had breached their gates and the words Jormag left behind in its wake.

The Norn had naturally started to prepare to the best of their abilities and even begun to plan the relocation of their people into safer territory but had underestimated how much of a logistical undertaking that would actually be and thus ended up stuck under thick sheets of snow while each day the fear of another attack Jormags grew.

Alvar meanwhile had lost himself in a vicious cycle of a training regime that brought him to the brink of collapse, mentally and physically. Sjorn had been unforgiving in his drilling which more than once resulted in Alvar not being able to walk for two days straight.

His grandparents had naturally been worried sick about the hardcore training regime Alvar was undergoing but after they had gone to Sjorn to ask him why he was pushing Alvar so hard had been informed about the things going on behind the scene and thus stifled any protests that may have come up otherwise.

In the end Alvar's near self-destruction had paid of though. One month ago, in the beginning of November to be exact, Alvar managed to awaken and connect himself with the mana inside himself, causing Alvar and his teacher Sjorn no small amount of pride as they had achieved what many had deemed impossible.

What followed Alvar's awakening though was something he definitely had not seen coming. While his training continued like normal, this time enhanced through mana flowing through his every fibber, Sjorn's role changed slightly.

Instead of only sparring with Alvar and nearly cutting the lad to pieces with his axes, as Sjorn had decided promptly "no more blunt weapons for you, lad", he now added salt to injury by throwing the wildest curses at Alvar at all times of the day, poking and prodding at Alvar's ego, self-worth and any open wounds the man could find with the only purpose in mind to tick Alvar off and let the lad lose his control over his emotions, which indeed happened a few times, and in reaction to that grind Alvar through the ringer once again, even more viciously than before!

Over the last couple of months, even though Alvar had learned a lot, he had come to see Sjorn as a vicious genius that seems to possess the ability to screw him over no matter how hard Alvar tried to do his best in every sense of the word.

Yet again, Alvar could not deny that Sjorn's strategies seemed to work, no matter how crude they were. After the first few weeks of constant insults the man had switched to a more insidious approach as Alvar seemed to grow numb to the pricks and stabs directed at his ego.

As Alvar had already awoken his mana and learned through the constant fighting to utilise it naturally in motion his training was changed from the fast paced combat, which had served not only the purpose to help Alvar understand and utilise his mana but also to strengthen his muscles and enhance his knowledge over the various weapons he fought with, to an exhausting slow-motion training that demanded Alvar's every drop of attention that he could spare in order to reign in his mana's thirst, as it had taken on what some would describe as "battle-fever", to rush forth and decimate all hindrances.

While Alvar was running through the motions in sweat producing slowness Sjorn would occasionally throw an insult in Alvar's direction when the lad least suspected it and rattle his concentration whenever the heat of the rising emotions would surge through his body and drive the redness onto his face. Not only once did Alvar lose his cool to Sjorn's backhanded schemes, but every time he did he grew to regret it immediately…

While his training under Sjorn had continued in that fashion his sessions under Isolde grew sparser by the day as the old Havroune had told Alvar that he had learned a lot form her already and was decent enough at defending his mind without her support. Of course he was no master or even expert at the art but that would come over the years as he only had to keep up the exercises the old woman had given him for practising his mind arts.

Thus, as his evening lessons with Isolde grew sparser Alvar found himself, for once, clueless and restless as he had nothing to do with his spare time. His friend Veli most of the time had duties to fulfil for the guardians and only on the weekends found time to spend together with Alvar, same went for Gerdi, though Alvar had not for the first time wondered what had happened to the girl that particular night but in the end discarded those thoughts as he himself had changed that night as well.

With none of his friends having the time to spend the evening with Alvar he mostly hung around at home, helping his grandmother with cooking, cleaning or repairing stuff at the house. Even though his help was appreciated his grandmother, more regularly these days, began to nag Alvar to find himself a nice girl but the boy had absolutely no interest to pursue those annoying, giggling beings which haunted his friends Veli's every waking second of the day, with that one brunette being the main one on the boy's mind, whatever her name was again.

Under the creaking of the door angles Alvar walked inside the warm home and stomped of the thick snow that had gathered at the bottom of his boots and began to cover his coat as well.

"I'm home!" Alvar called into the house while in the motions to free himself of the cold white snow all over his clothes but surprisingly didn't receive a reply, meaning his grandparents must be out of the house.

'Weird…' Alvar thought to himself as they usually were at home at this time of the day but after mulling it over for a few seconds just shrugged his shoulders and simply decided for himself that they must have something to take care of.

Not minding their absence for the moment Alvar discarded his heavy clothes and after grabbing himself a hot mug of tea from the stove fell into the soft, fur covered chair that stood before the bonfire, enjoying the warmth of the home he so loved. Life was good sometimes indeed. If only his muscles weren't always so damn tired…


L’AVIS DES CRÉATEURS
bobbarker12 bobbarker12

There you go. Hope you enjoyed it^^

Only a small time skip as some big changes in the narrative are upon us and I didn't want to tell them through a flashback or something :-)

next chapter

Chapitre 48: Chapter 48

Hidden in the shadows of the hallway that connected the great hall with one of the meeting rooms in its back Gerdi moved as silent as possible and, due to her inborn talent for being silent like a ghost if she wished to be, managed to do so just fine.

After she had advanced leaps and bounds under her mentor's tutelage Gerdi, the only one of the students, had received a special mission and she had sworn to herself not to fail at any costs! After all, it was only thanks to her master's graciousness, that she was even able to experience this exhilaration she was feeling right now while sneaking past members of the mist guard that stood guard like stone statues, tense and ready to respond to the slightest movement in their vision.

But Gerdi knew they would not see her as she had become increasingly good at hiding herself and her intentions after living amongst former friends and family without those noticing even the slightest bit of her changes!

With a small grin, while shoving those distracting thoughts to the back of her mind, Gerdi rounded the last corner and could already here a few voices talk. A few seconds later she was, clothed completely in black with charcoal smeared around her eyes to hide the small flashes of skin, crouching in the deep black shadows of the wall as the torchlight provided in the room only illuminated small areas and thus hid her perfectly.

After making sure she would not be discovered Gerdi concentrated on the conversation and, just like she had learned, opened her mind and began to note down the whole conversation in her mind as if in a trance, all the while growing more and more disbelieving at what she was hearing.

"The preparations have been made. All we have to do now is barricade ourselves and wait for spring to arrive before our people can leave Jormag's territory for good!" A middle aged woman spoke as she was brushing a strain of her greying hair out of her face while all the other people in attendance either nodded or scribbled down something or the other on a piece of paper.

"How goes the preparation of our forces? Are our warriors ready? It is near certain that Jormag will send his troops once he discovers our plans to evacuate the Shiverpeak mountains and seek shelter in the south." Another person asked into the dimly lit room, someone Gerdi couldn't make out but judging by the person's voice must be a male, old probably.

"Pff, 'near certain' my ass! There is no way in hell Jormag is going to let us leave his grasp voluntarily! Here, in his territory and directly under his nose, the fucking wyrm is able to control us however he sees fit and could probably end our race if he so wished. Only the gods know why he hasn't done so anyway…" Another man, a warrior, Gerdi guessed by the outfit the man was wearing, replied back. Something about the man's voice seemed eerily familiar but Gerdi shoved that thought to the back of her mind, discarding it as unimportant information.

"Isn't that obvious Sjorn? Without us Jormag will lose all supplies when it comes to possible servants! Us leaving will blow a hole into the dragon's plans for sure. So? You haven't answered Erik's question. How are the warriors coming along?" The middle aged woman from before asked into the grumbles that were exchanged in between those that were present and sitting around the big round table.

"Calm your tits woman. If you had let me finish I would have told you by now…" The man Gerdi now identified as Sjorn replied back, which caused her and a few others in the room to chuckle slightly at the man's words, even though Gerdi tried to stay as silent as she could.

"How dare you…!" The middle aged woman grit out through her clenched teeth while Sjorn didn't seem bothered by her angry posturing even the slightest bit.

Instead he just continued to talk in his rough voice. "My troops are coming along nicely but they still have a long way to go until they are ready to face the ice creatures under Jormag's command. Well, our veterans probably could but we don't have many of those as most died in the long night 12 years ago. So you see, the sooner we leave these mountains the better!" The warrior answered and hit the desk before him to accentuate his point which in turn earned him cheers and applause from his fellow colleagues.

Meanwhile all Gerdi could do was sneer in contempt at the pathetic group of Norn before her. Her people truly had sunken far if they decided to run away from their destiny to join and serve under her master. But then again she could understand them a little bit as they stood against an ancient dragon and hadn't really had a chance to begin with…

Focusing back on the meeting Gerdi listened a little bit longer to the ongoing meeting with mostly logistics being discussed until she deemed the information she had found satisfying and began to sneak back out of the meeting room. She had a report to make after all…

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Veli was strangely feeling restless tonight. Yes, he had been restless rather often the last few months ever since Jormag decided to pay them a visit that one night, but usually those periods of restlessness subsided after he made himself a warm milk with honey. Tonight though that was not working even the slightest bit. Thus, in order get rid of the energy in his body, and with it hopefully tiring himself out Veli snuck out of his house and entered into the cool air of the night.

After throwing his fur mantle over his shoulders, and after letting the shudder the cold air gave him run its course down his back, Veli began to jog with his boots causing crunching sounds in the snow out into the night, all the while letting his mind wander as his feet carried Veli to wherever they felt would be good to go tonight.

On his nightly run Veli passed by houses with smoking chimneys, the smoke being the only signal that the long wooden houses were inhabited in the first place as no light was visible in the dark windows.

Soon Veli's feet carried the lad past the house of his girlfriend Brunhilde, the girl that had occupied his dreams most nights and caused quite a few messes under his bedsheets when he woke up in the morning. Shortly Veli played with the thought to break into her room through her bedroom window but not soon after that thought had sprung up in his mind shook his head at his own idiocy and increased his tempo to get out of this part of Hoelbrak before he decided to do something even more foolish.

Running past his training grounds Veli soon reached the market place and with swift strides had soon left the cozy little town square behind until he entered the part of the city where Alvar lived.

Veli didn't know how often he had run over to Alvar's house in the past, be it to meet his friend or just to have another safe haven if at home broke out another quarrel between his parents that had become more and more frequent over the years, and was always welcome with open arms.

Shortly letting his thoughts linger on his parents and their slowly cracking relationship, Veli realised that he probably only became who he was today due to his parents and his upbringing. That realisation set a few more thoughts into motion until he shoved all those uncomfortable musings to the back of his mind and returned to the warm and fluffy feeling Alvar's home had always caused inside of him.

Sadly, as Veli realised, even his safe haven wasn't without problems as Alvar and his family had been struck again and again by misfortune, one as horrible as the next. Strangely though that had never diminished the warm welcome he had experienced whenever he came to their house but he was glad for it none the less.

With a small smile Veli left his safe haven behind himself and ran down the small road that lead him into the direction of the great hall until he heard the faint sound of something hard impacting another hard entity. Now curious Veli decided to follow that sound until he came upon the sight of his friend Alvar practising once again on the wooden dummy.

"Truly, no rest for the wicked, is there?" Veli murmured to himself with a slight grin on his face and swiftly jogged over to his exercising friend. At least he wasn't the only one that was restless tonight…


L’AVIS DES CRÉATEURS
bobbarker12 bobbarker12

Sorry for the late upload. Wasn't sure at first if I should write today as I was feeling kinda unmotivated. But no matter, here it is. Hope you enjoyed it^^

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