Chapter 11

I look at the sword and see that it has cracks on it. Maybe I could do something about it.

"Take me to your village" but before that I need to get a place to stay or to eat at the very least.

I need to know how to go by everyday in this world and for that I need a good start.

"Ok, mister. Visitors are always welcome in our village" the young man smiles, he puts his bag on his shoulder and takes his things in hand.

"What's your name kid?" I ask the lad. It's not like I can go on calling him 'you' or something else.

"It's Laraye hono,sir and yo-"

"Well then Laraye, you go on ahead I will soon catch up with you in just a moment" I cut off his sentence midway. I know what he was going to ask, he was going to ask what my name was.

It is too early in my journey and I can't go trusting strangers, even if they are friendliest person I have ever met. With that said, Laraye starts to walks on ahead and I look for the suitcase that came with me.

"Wher-...there it is!" The suitcase was lying just close to me. Seeing that the suitcase is unharmed I probably think no one tried to do anything with it. I open it to see if everything is there.

"Everything is in its own place. Hmmm? What's this?" I notice a scroll in the suitcase. It wasn't any scrolls that I brought into this world, it was a different one.

I take the scroll and untie the knot.

"What?" I don't believe it.

"Dear son," it is a letter from mom and dad. I eagerly read the letter.

"How are you? We hope that you are holding up well. Knowing that you are our boy means that we probably don't need to worry about anything. You must have grown up to be quite a man. You should know son, we are the proudest and happiest parents and you being born to us was a gift that was sent from heaven. We are truly grateful to have had a son like you.

The new world might be tough and a little behind your own world's time" what do you mean by little? This place is like medieval times.

"But we know that you can pull through it. You strength, wisdom and skills should leave you unmatched in other worlds. It is dangerous out there, do not trust many people like you trust people on Earth." I know. I am already on it,

"Never leave your pride as a blacksmith of the Linndon family." I won't mom and dad

"It is sad that we had to leave you so early in your life but we had stayed longer than we should have. I hope you can forgive us." Apology accepted.

"Good luck on your journey, Duero. Even if we are worlds apart we will always love you son.

-Roger and Clara Linndon"

Mom and dad! Tears run down from my eyes and makes its way over my cheeks. I can't believe the first thing I do in the other world is cry, I hope no one sees me like this. I quickly wipe the tears from my eyes. I take a bottle of water from my suitcase and wash my face. I wipe my face dry, "I will do my best mom and dad!"

The scroll burns down and vanishes into thin air. "A one time reading, huh?" I wonder if magic is real in this world.

The lad mentioned something like 'quest' I believe. What did he mean by that? Is it like slaying monsters? Or something else?

I will need to inquire about the details later but first, I need to go along with him to his village.

I close my suitcase and take it in my hand. I walk upto him. The village called ciciona is not far, he points his finger to where his village is when I asked him and I can see it.

This place is magnificent on its own. Unknown and beautiful flowers, a grassy plain and maybe who knows, I might run into a monster or some weird creature along the journey.

We arrive at the village and there seems to be many people here, it is quite lively. People are chatting, kids are having fun and there shops on side of the path.

"This is Ciciona village" the lad introduces me to this place, "You can find a place to stay at lodges, food maybe served there and for supplies there are a lot of shops here and it is very cheap but they are of good quality" he is now in tourist guide mode I guess. I have to say that he is pretty good at this.

He said cheap but I don't know what is cheap in this world. I see some fruits at a shop and I walk towards it, "Sir what would you like?" The shopkeeper asks politely.

"Aaa Laraye how are you? Is this man with you? You must be showing visitors around again." The man seems to be an acquaintance of Laraye.

"Yeah. This mister seemed to be interested to come here. He said he was travelling."

"I see. What do you do for a living if I may ask?" The shopkeeper inquires. I don't know why he is asking me this but it can't hurt to answer.

"I'm a blacksmith" I reply to his question.

Their eyes lit up and they seem to be surprised for some reason. It makes be cautious and I take a step back,

"what? What's the problem?" I ask.

"We are in dire need of a blacksmith!" The shopkeeper says, "You see, grandfather of Laraye here is one of the best blacksmith in the village but recently he have been suffering from illness. The machines and agricultural tools need to be repaired and new ones are to be made. If they are not made then this year's yield is going to be less. But Mr.Hono is ill and no one is here as skilled as him to repair them."

"I see" I nod as I hear the story of Laraye's grandfather.

"So will you be willin-" the shopkeeper tries to continue but I stop his sentence.

"I must admit that it is a terrible situation but I just came to this village and I know nothing about it." Actually, I just came to this world and know nothing about it but, oh well.

"I will need time to consider if I will be willing to do it." I tell them.

"Oh well. Take your time, but please do consider it. We will even reward you for it." The shopkeeper says.

Is he trying to lure me? Maybe. But I don't know what he means exactly by the word 'reward', is it money? Food? Clothes? Free service?

For now I will play it cool instead.

"So what you want to buy sir" the shopkeeper asks.

I don't know what I want. Maybe I can ask the lad for some kind of recommendation on this.

"Hey Laraye" I turn to the lad, "Which is your favourite of these fruits?" I ask my question.

" ? " He seems to be confused. "The crocoberry is really good. It is juicy and tender, sweet and fresh on the inside" he seems to be liking this so called crocoberry.

He pointed towards it and it doesn't look bad to be honest, as a matter of fact, it looks even delicious than the fruits I even on Earth. Judging by looks though, I still don't know how it tastes.

"Well... I will be taking five of the crocoberry, thank you" I face towards the shopkeeper.

"Five?!" The lad is surprised, "but it costs four silver for one itself" perhaps he didn't think I would buy more than just one. I have some coins in the suitcase perhaps it has silvers that he mentioned. Let's see....

I search my suitcase for the coins .. hmmmm ... I am rummaging through it ... Aah found it. It seems to have been in a pouch, no wonder I couldn't find it. Do I have silvers?

Yep! I do have silvers, in fact I have so many silvers. My family really did mean it when they said that I was prepared for a thing like this. So it was four silver for one of those 'crocoberry', was it?

So five of them makes it twenty silver coins. I take out twenty of them and hand it over to the shopkeeper.

Even the shopkeeper seems to be surprised. Is it surprising to have such amount of money? O should be more careful next time.

"Um ... Could you perhaps put it in a cover for me?" I ask the shopkeeper.

"What? Ye .. yeah ... of course!" He still seems to be in shock of seeing that much amount of silver.

When I was searching the suitcase I found another one of those pouches and it had fairly a good amount of coins ... But they were gold in colour. Does it mean that they are more valuable? How would they react if they saw that much gold coins? I should probably hide it for now.

" Here you go sir! " he hands over the the crocoberries to me and I take it.

" We will get going then. Bye " the kid waves his hand to the shopkeeper.

" See you next time, Laraye " the shopkeeper waves back to him and we start walking again.

" Is it true? " The lad asks me a question out of the blue.

" What is true? " I ask back. Honestly, I did kind of know what he was referring to but I just wanted to make it more sure.

" The fact that you are a blacksmith? Is it true? " he seems to be interested in my profession of being a blacksmith, huh?

" Yes. I am a blacksmith." I look at him and his eyes are sparkling with excitement.

" Woah! That is so cool " he is brimming with excitement the way I see it. "It is like you can make cool weapons and things from scratch. My grandfather makes swords and they are very cool " he is hyped up now. I guess when being young you have that much energy.

" Have you made any weapons before? " He asks me and looks in my direction.

" I have certainly forged quite a lot of weapons in my life. " I reply to his question.

" What were they made of? " He asked me a second question. But I was left with many questions than answers to his question. What does he mean by what were they made of? There are only some materials that are used often but it is kind of obvious what materials they are usually made of.

" What do you mean by what were they made of? " I ask the lad with confusion.

" I mean by what elements did you used to use to enhance the weapon and what crystals did you use to build the whole weapon? " the lad asks and I am left clueless.

What?! Elements?! Crystals?! I am all the more confused.

... Wait. Wait wait wait! I think I remember something of this sort. It is from a book that my grandfather wrote. It had something to do with this. It had something written about elements.

Yeah, it did deal with elements and a special technique of forging which was not useful to me at the time and I thought it was not useful but it just might work in this world. I need to know more about these elements.

" No, I did not use anything of such sorts most of the time. " I am just going to roll with it.

" You did not use elements? " He asks. This lad keeps asking questions, I guess he is just curious.

" I made swords the old fashioned way. No special elements. " I say to him.

" But why not? " The lad seems to be confused now.

" I guess you could say, the skills of a swordsman does not depend on elements but how good the sword can fit the swordsman's skills and it is a blacksmith's job to make the perfect sword " I say to him. I am not wrong by saying so.

" OOOH! " he is even more excited now. I did not know he could be even more excited. " So did you make good swords? " He asks.

" Good? " I made some of the finest swords ever but it was on earth, " Yeah I did make good swords. "

" So tell me, Laraye. Where can I find a place to stay? " I believe he can help me find a place to spend the night.

Cheap or not, luxurious or not, I just need a place to sleep and think.

" Yes, I know a place. My family runs a lodge and you can stay there if you want. " he suggests.

" Doesn't your family run a forge? " I thought his grandfather was a blacksmith.

" Well my grandfather from my father's side runs the forge and the lodge is actually run by my mom's family. " He answers.

" And you want to become an adventurer? " I actually took a guess as he was carrying a sword and was on a quest when I met him.

" Yes. How did you know? Are you perhaps a psychic?" He is shocked but my guess was correct. And I learned that psychics actually exist in this world, good to know.

" It wasn't much of a difficult thing to guess. "

" I want to become an adventurer but my rewards from the quest I use it to buy things for the forge and all. It is not enough for me to but equipments. " He says.

" Rewards from quests are that low? " I thought it would be more than enough.

" No, it's not that. With my sword I can't take on big quests and I don't have much experience with this sword as well. " He looks disappointed from saying that.

It seems that he needs a better sword than what he has now. But .... The sword he has is quite beautiful and carefully made but not to perfection though.

His grandfather really did put a lot of precious his time and effort on making it and it did kind of pay off. Though it has scratches and is breaking, it could be revived from its current state with just some touches.