Chapter 2 - The world as the boy knows (1)

The four seasons of the central plains were clear and vibrant.

Spring brought vibrant flowers and the gentle breeze, slowly warming the hearts of all those who had survived through the harsh and cold winter of yesteryear. Animals crawled out from their holes as hunters and gatheres ventured out into the forest to replenish their foods as farmers started upon their crops.

But quickly, Summer comes along and breaks this fantasy. Farmers worked under the blazing sun as the royals stayed cool within their mansions and their little magic gadgets that kept them away from the heat. With the occsassion monsoon that caused the world to become wet for over a week at once, it was the most 'active' season of all. People who would have visited the south would say that the summer was like being in the south. Except down south, it was like this all year along.

Autumn was the season of harvest and preparation for winter. The soldiers would return from their battlefields to help with the harvest whilst the merchants were busy stockpiling foods for the upcoming winter when prices of food would rise.

And of course there was the harsh, bitter winter. The ice cold winds of the nothern Frozen Wastlands drifted down onto the central region as the world would become blanketed in a sheet of white snow.

There was a small boy, the same boy who had been casted aside in a random alleyway a few months ago, staring at the snow that was slowly drfiting down from the skies.

It wasn't quite cold enough for the snow to stick but the boy instincively knew of what of coming.

"Winter..." The boy looked down at his hands.

It had been almost half a year since he had left the alleyway. He knew he had no place to go and this world was not a kind enough place to host a random kid that popped out of nowhere. Everyone had their own mouths and their own children to feed.

This world was not a kind place for an young orphan.

Thankfully the boy was not alone. There were many homeless people and he had watched them from afar and slowly learned of their ways.

There was shelter within the sewage tunnels during the days when there weren't much rain. Of course this place often flooded when there was rain so it wasn't suitable as a permanent shelter but none of the homeless ever had such a thing.

Next were the various churches but this was not an option for the boy.

The churches only demanded one thing: Faith for their representative god.

However the boy did not quite feel comfortable with such an act so he had no choice.

Instead he relied upon the black cloth he had woken up beneath.

Somehow, this cloth never got dirty or wet. And it would somehow self-repair itself whenever it was damaged.

Of course the boy didn't know that there had been various high level engraving magic casted upon the cape as it was a cape for a knight captain.

Anyways, the boy would use this cape as a portable tent or a sleeping bag of a sort.

During the rainy days he could cover himself with it and attempt to sleep until the rain passes or until the sun rose and he could enter a public area with a roof.

And during other nights, he would wrap himself up within the cloth and hide in the darkness of the alley. Staring up into the stars as he slowly fell asleep.

But the cold... This was not something the cloth would be able to keep away.

The two silvers he had recieved had long been spent. It wasn't much after all.

The boy learned about the currency of this world. Or at least what he could witness with this eyes.

There were 4 types of coins the boy knew about. There was a brown coin people called copper. This wasn't worth much. A typical stale bread the bakery put on sale before it started to mold would be sold for a few coppers. A hundred of this would make one silver.

The silver was the most well-rotated piece of coin. The majority of trades would be done with this silver coin as something such as a common piece of cloth being a few silvers and tools or weapons costing dozens or more. A hundred of this made one gold.

Gold was something the boy could only watch rolling around the hands of the wealthy. Their luxurious lifes granted them the privileage to spend multiple, if not dozens, of gold every time they left their mansions. The boy drooled at how many stale breads he would be able to buy with such an amount of money but quickly woke up at the fact that he would be robbed the next second.

Thankfully he was a small kid with almost nothing under his belt. Otherwise he would've been robbed multiple times over. The majority of backstreet thugs or robbers did not target small boys such as him but rather people such as drunk pedestrians or normal folk who happened to stumble upon the wrong alleyway.

The last of the coins was a platinum. He had only seen this coin once and knew that it should be worth around a hundred gold coins. He witnessed a very rich looking man flicking a very shiny and large coin at one of the merchants in the luxurious shopping district, where the boy had gone to look for a meal in the trash bins of restaurants, and noticed the merchant hurridely preparing dozens of golden coins to make up for the change.

Of course the only thing he had left now were 13 copper coins. Barely enough for a week's worth of stale bread even if he rationed it out.

The boy leaned against the riverbank under the snow, covered in the black cloth as he stared into the river that cut across the city.

Money was hard to come by for small boy such as him.

The majority of his earnings were made from delivering messages between the commoners or the occsaional coin he would pick up from the ground.

The 2 silvers he had started with had quickly disappeared after he spent a whole silver in a new attire which was now a ragged old shirt and a pair of dirty shorts. The other coin mostly on food.

He pulled out the small note from his pockets which was now almost torn apart and ragged around the edges.

He had gained help from one of the knights walking by in deciphering the words and knew what the note said. He knew that this note was from the person who had given him this cloth and the 2 silvers and had basically saved his life. Wishing day by day to learn who had helped him in order to thank him.

But at the same time, to recieve more help. To emphasize again, this world was simply not kind enough for a boy like him to survive.

And now with the snow falling upon his shoulders and being out of money, helplessness consumed the boy. He knew that he would have to crawl into the sewers and fight to survive the upcoming winter...