Born From A Divine Gamble

Chinui was a man who attached a lot of importance to honor and duty, in particular toward one"s family. It was a skeptical man who never believed anything that was said to him unless it was proved true. He would often question the same thing over and over and verify every little details to make sure there was no mistake in the information he had. This was the main reason explaining why he often got annoyed at Emp since nothing he said could be proven without a doubt. Still, it didn"t take long to Chinui to figure out that Emp was a very simple man, mostly because he didn"t have the knowledge to act otherwise. He believed Emperor"s story was the truth but never said it out loud since the proof never appeared.

Chinui was a practical man who saw value in everything and hated to waste anything. Maybe it was because of the wasted life of his brother, thought Emp. Or it was because he hated wasted things that the death of his brother affected him so much?

It was all those characteristics that had led him in those woods. His story deeply linked to the Steelwood empire.

Chinui explained to him how at first, a long time ago, a greatly greedy king decided to conquer all nearby kingdoms. Despite his greed, he was a master tactician and easily forced the other kings to bend the knee to him and swear him allegiance in exchange that they kept their realms. He became the first emperor, the king of kings, his kingdom made up of many conquered kingdoms.

The other nations bordering his new empire became nervous. Afraid of being swallowed as well, they made many an alliance. It didn"t take long for the leader of each alliance to be declared emperor as well. This is how most of the empires present to that day had been made.

At that time, the kingdom of Grandbois was lead by a king of the same name. It was him that took the initiative to unite the nearby kingdoms. His own domain was large and rich and his army powerful but he wasn"t talented in things related to war himself. He made the wise decision to entrust all his troops to the general Muracier instead of taking command himself. Once all the kingdoms where united, they both quickly understood that Grandbois would not be able to keep it together or protect it without Muracier and the general didn"t want to lead an empire and did not have the qualities to do so.

They came to an agreement that pleased both of them and gave both of their name to the empire making it the Steelwood empire. Grandbois would grow the empire like the woods that covered his country and Muracier would protect it from all menace. For each generation of Grandbois emperor thereafter, there would be a general Muracier to help him keep the empire prosper and secure.

Chinui had been the most recent general of the empire. Like his ancestors, he had always been loyal and had done his very best to protect his homeland from all threats. But, in a large battle against hordes of savage creatures, said enemies managed to surprise his troops.

Before taking a decision that would influence all his armies, he sent out many scouts and waited for their returns to check twice and trice more the information he had received.

The emperor Billow Grandbois who had insisted on following him to the battlefield panicked at the idea of the b.e.s.t.i.a.l horde nearing them. Without asking for his opinion, he commanded the twelfth company to intercept the beasts behind Chinui"s back. On the order of the emperor, the company marched and never came back.

If the beasts had managed to surprise them, it was because they were mounted by cursed-bloods h.e.l.l-bent on driving out humans form their territory. When Chinui confirmed the news, he prepared his troops for the a.s.sault and with the appropriate strategy, his loss should have been minimal.

When the movement of the twelfth company was finally discovered and relayed to him, he barely had enough time to reorganize the troops before the attack could rush into the breach in his defense line. Counting the entire twelfth company, he lost a little more than two thousand men where he should not have lost two hundreds.

When he understood what had happened, he became furious. Not only had he bypa.s.sed him, he had told no one what he was doing which could have cost them the entire battle. So many good soldiers had lost their lives in their scramble to plug the breach and so many more had been sacrificed for the impulsive decision of an emperor who had absolutely no tactical knowledge. Why only one company and why the twelfth in particular? His anger was once again multiplied when the death of his blood brother, commander of the twelfth company, was confirmed.

Having lost all control of himself, he went and screamed of rage at the emperor. He, insulted by the behavior of his general towards one of the most powerful person on the continent, told him to calm down if he didn"t want to lose his position as a general. Still mad with anger, he screamed at the emperor that if he thought he could keep his throne without the Muracier it was wishful thinking.

He threw his commanding badge at the feet of the emperor, told him he would not come back for as long as he would be emperor and left with the bloodied corpse of his brother in his arms.

After he had wandered for a while, he buried himself deeply in this forest and had not come back out for more than ten years. According to him, his ancestors were probably shriveling their roots (1) at the idea that he had given up the protection of the empire but he didn"t care. Billow Grandbois didn"t deserve the protection of the Muracier. Even if he feared what might happen to the citizens, he still did not have the intention of coming back and had not spoken to anyone since then, aside from Emperor of course.

In life, he had told Emp, you never know what might happen. Sometimes victory is the same as defeat. Sometimes, life just stabs you in the guts without warning. Nothing is ever certain unless you can read the future.

Even if he had said all this in a fit of anger, he could not take his words back and like his name, his words where made of steel. He could not go back however much he worried.

When Emp had showed up, he had decided that he should do his best to help him for it would probably be his last chance to help the empire. If Emp had told the truth, he felt compelled to make a better emperor than Billow out of him. If he had lied, Chinui would at least feel like he had made a better person out of him and even if he never came back, maybe a descent general would one day take his place.

He didn"t have much time ahead of him but he was still determined to do his best to teach him as many things as he could in this short span of time. This was because of three things.

Firstly, there was of course the possibility that Emperor would make a difference. Even if tiny, he could not ignore it.

Secondly, he quickly saw that his guest was completely ignorant. He did know how to write and read but did not know anything about history, geography, the simple workings of society, the cursed-bloods, the beasts and monsters, the laws and so on. Whoever where is parents, they were particularly strange. They hadn"t taught anything to their son. Even the shepherds and the farmers knew more than Emp and still, they also knew how to take care of animals and fields for which his guest was also clueless. How could he ever throw out that clueless kid? If he did, he would probably die of some obvious thing in the following week.

The third reason was that, even if he didn"t want to admit it, he was feeling lonely. He had seen no one in ten years after all, speaking to someone was doing him some good. He never had a wife nor an heir and neither did his little brother. He had never been good with women and did not have the time for love to begin with. His brother had been much better but sadly, he had been the first to die. He still had some cousin born from branch families but they would probably never be as good a general as the main branch. He did not have the time to teach him the art of leading an army but teaching him simpler things was still enjoyable for Chinui.

Every morning, Chinui taught him all kinds of practical things. He taught him how to fish and set up traps for example. In the river, the fishes were small but numerous and Emp only took a couple of practice sessions to be able to catch enough for the both of them. The small traps Chinui taught him to set up were simple, his favorites were the snares. He did not catch many prey in them but when he did he rejoiced for his next meal. Chinui also forced him to take care of the fish and the meat by himself, be they rabbit or partridges. At first, Emperor felt sickened by the task of opening up those small animals but after a dozen times, he was almost accustomed to it.

Chinui taught him to not waste any parts of his catches. It wasn"t as important for a small rabbit but for larger prey, in particular monsters, everything was valuable.

Skin and fur to make clothes, the meat, the bones, the claws and fangs all had uses. For most monsters, many of their organs also had important uses for mages, alchemists or healers of all kind due to their often strange properties.

Chinui also taught him how to take care of the garden and how to cook. Since Emp had no experience at all with food, everything he ate had a brand new taste and he loved all of them. He also tried to teach him how to use a bow but Emp never achieved to hit the target. Only practice would let him improve but Chinui still had many more things to show him so archery practice would need to be done on his own after his departure.

Finally with two long sticks, he taught Emp the basics of sword fighting. Chinui felt relieved that Emp was much better at this than he was with a bow. Every move and details he showed him where quickly understood and copied with talent. He seemed to have a fantastic memory for this kind of thing. Chinui guessed that when Emp would arrive at the school, he would definitely not be the worst of all students at it. Some that practiced since they were small would not be that far ahead of him even with their years of practice.

Every day, all morning long, Emp was driven to physical exhaustion with exercises and practical teaching but in the afternoon, it was his mind that was put to the test.

Every afternoon, Chinui taught him what he needed to know about the world. The G.o.ds had given him basic knowledge about human beings but not on how they acted or the world they lived in. Maybe, for them, the world didn"t matter much since they could just change it however they pleased. He did not know anything about the world but he did know how to read, write and calculate which was apparently rare.

In fact, he was so ignorant that Chinui didn"t know where to start and threw all sorts of random information at him without any particular order. He wasn"t that good at that kind of teaching but luckily, Emp had no trouble remembering everything he said. Since he knew how to write, Chinui started by telling him why it was so unusual.

Reading and writing wasn"t all that useful for most people. The n.o.bles mostly knew because it was considered disgraceful to not know. The merchants used writing frequently, they taught it to their kids so they would be able to take the business over when the time came. Artisans knew how to calculate but did not learn often how to read. Some well renowned masters in their respective crafts knew and wrote some compilation of their knowledge. The rest of the population, aside from mage and those in more academic lines of work, had no time to waste on things they would never use and limited themselves to simple numbers. They knew enough to use money, count livestock and the likes but would rarely go above the hundred mark.

For emperor, it was more like an absence of disadvantage rather than an advantage. Since he didn"t belong in any n.o.ble family, it was mostly useless knowledge for now. On the other hand, once he got into the school, he would blend in more easily with all those rich young people. Chinui even told him that a good half of them only learned once there.

Chinui then took his time to explain to him how the society worked from the most basic things like shaking hands all the way to what a king actually did. There was so many things to remember and so many t.i.tles and ranks to know.

Many of the empires on the continent worked in similar ways and many customs were shared as well. In the Steelwood empire, the emperor himself was at the top of everything and he had the rights to do almost anything. Since the emperor was also the king of Grandbois, a regent was named to take care of the kingdom while he personally oversaw the empire.

Next, just below the emperor, there where kings, each taking care of their own kingdom. In Steelwood, there were five of them excluding the emperor. They all had the full control of their respective kingdom and the emperor almost never intervened in their affairs. There was even a time in the past where two kingdoms included in the empire went to war against one another without the emperor lifting a finger. It all depended on the situation, politics and the relative safety of the population.

Bellow the kings were the dukes, then the marquis, the counts, and finally barons all possessing territories of various sizes throughout the empire. All of those people were expected to do a certain things related to their t.i.tles and their descendant would inherit their position. Then there were city lords charged to take care of a town for the local higher n.o.ble. Banneret and knights where the lowest of the chain having gained honorary t.i.tles and were expected to lead troops into war and monster subjugation.

The knights were both numerous and few. Most family members of n.o.ble houses were knights and a kingdom at war could send hundreds on the battlefield. Chijou had been a knight. Anyone worthy could become a knight but since they were expected to buy their own equipment including horse and armor, very few ordinary person ever became one. When a knight wasn"t from a n.o.ble family, it was almost always someone from a rich merchant house. Most common folk were forced to join the rank and file or become a death seeker if they wanted to fight for what they held dear.

Aside from having to buy his own equipment, a high n.o.ble or at least a city lord had to recognize your valor and bravery before you could be recognized as a knight. Once done, the knight would enter the service of said n.o.ble. Rarely, a knight with no master showed up, sometimes having declared themselves knight. Those were either honourless killing machines or saints too concerned in the well-being of the peasants and lowborn citizens to waste time prancing around in the manor of a n.o.ble.

After the n.o.bles, three social cla.s.s made the bulk of the population. Those three all shared the same laws, rules and benefits.

There were the merchants, generally richer and sometimes almost as powerful as n.o.bles. They were the ones who made the money flow through the kingdom and everywhere else in the world.

There were the artisans, respected for their talents everywhere, without them, no decent life would ever be possible.

Finally, there was the common folk, tavern keep, farmer, shepherd, butcher, messenger, lumberjack and all those things that made the world turn.

Still bellow them stood a last group, the slaves. Bereaved of almost all rights, they did all the ch.o.r.es that their masters gave them or died. Once a slave, they weren"t considered human anymore, they were tools which their master could dispose of however they pleased. Usually, their ranks were filled with unredeemable criminals, war prisoners and cursed-bloods.

For the cursed-bloods in particular, even those who were not slave weren"t treated much better and even a small mistake could shackle them to a collar. When Chinui was speaking of cursed-bloods, Emperor could clearly see the hatred in his eyes. He obviously disliked them and approved of their unfavorable treatment. Such hatred couldn"t only be explained by the death of his brother in the battle against them. It seemed rooted in the depths of his mind from a very long time ago.

Aside from all those, sometimes, a very poor family had to offer one of theirs in exchange for enough money to save the rest or, even more rarely, a group of slavers attacked a small village and took everyone for profit.

Three other groups of people stood on the side and protected the rest from other empires and the world itself. There were of course, the soldiers, duty bound to protect the empire, the kingdom and the town where they were keeping watch. They also served as peacemakers, guards and law enforcement. Since the dangers they were expected to face each day was enormous, they were amongst the most paid people in the empire.

Then, there were the mercenaries, tempted by the gold but not the duty. They preferred to be paid for a specific task and be free of refusing insane commands or free of following whoever they liked in a war.

The last group was mostly made up of freaks who liked to bend the law or completely ignore it. Instead of working in large armies, they preferred to believe in individual strength and worked in small groups or even in solitary. They were known as the death seekers. Described as adventurers, sometimes hero, sometimes vagabond or flat out criminals but most of the times, suicidal. Everyone appreciated their presence because they took care of any and all problems.

When the army could not deal with some monster terrorizing an out of the way village, they were the ones who would put their lives at risk for a hefty sum of money or a barrel of ale. Most of their adventures ended up badly for the unprepared. Some chained quest after quest, hoping to save the world before dying of exhaustion. Some went hunting in the most remote parts of savage lands and never came back. Most had the eyes bigger than the stomach and took a mission way to dangerous for them thinking they would come back to live in glory and luxury.

They were jacka.s.ses, even those who survived were usually feeling the irresistible call of danger and took an insane pleasure of running towards their death. Rare were those that made themselves a name and those were so powerful they could do almost anything. Some dedicated their entire life to the hunt of a specific type of creature out of some grudge or uncanny talent for killing them. Those were called slayers, they were undefeatable specialist against a very specific thing. Many found their deaths when they encountered an unexpected quarry.

Soldiers and mercenaries didn"t have a lot of respect for death seekers but everyone agreed on saying that if there had not been any death seekers, every kingdoms would have fallen long ago. The reason was simple, horrors scoured the land and the army simply could not be everywhere at once. There were too many dangers and not enough soldiers, not enough walls, not enough bravery.

The monsters encountered by the protectors numbered three big types. Firstly, there were the unnameables of chaos. The common folk just called them horrors. There was never two of a kind, always a uniquely deformed and bloodthirsty monster. They made no difference between man and beast, they where unhinged and mindless terrors that killed everything in their way. They destroyed forests like villages and no one knew were they came from. They just appeared somewhere and started wreaking havoc, never stopping until they met a violent death at the hand of heroes or armies. Of the three types, they were the most feared, the most unpredictable and often, the most dangerous. Glory awaited those who managed to defeat an horror and most of the time, an entire company or rarely, a legion of soldier was sent to stop them.

Then, there were the natural beasts. They were the most numerous but also the simplest to manage and understand. They were only bigger and stronger types of animals. Each species were largely doc.u.mented and lived only in a very specific region. It was dangerous to enter their territories or to anger them but with a little knowledge and precaution, even a group of normal villager could get rid of them without too much trouble. Some species had even been domesticated with time and now had a lot of uses from merchandise transportation to construction work.

Lastly, there were the unnatural beasts, those were the ones that caused the most problems. Even if the horrors where way more dangerous, the unnatural beasts compensated raw power with cunning intelligence and often, sheer number. if the natural beasts were simple to describe and stayed similar to more docile creatures, the unnatural did not follow the same limitations. For example, a natural beast could simply be a giant horned boar, they were easy to recognize and understand, they were just larger more aggressive boars. The unnatural on the other hand often had some strange abilities or form that made them much harder to deal with. In their ranks there were dragons, invisible stranglers, woodland horrors and so on.

The day Emperor listened to Chinui"s explanation about monsters was the day he understood what was wrong with the cursed-bloods. Many species of unnatural beasts possessed some human traits and could even sometimes communicate clearly in human language. There were some bipedal creatures or some more disturbing like a serpent with a human head. Some had established primitive society in the depths of the earth and others knew how to use tools and weapons stolen from humans. Lastly, some even needed humans to reproduce, mostly in case of unis.e.xual species.

Since all cursed-bloods possessed some strange physical traits and some even possessed innate powers beyond human capabilities, they stood somewhere between man and beast. How could you trust someone sharing traits with the beasts outside the city walls? Many had even hypothesized that there were in fact no difference between cursed-bloods and unnatural beasts, they were only at the most human end of the monster spectrum, at least in terms of intelligence.

There were many dozens of cursed-bloods species, all looking more or less like ordinary humans. If their ancestors had been human, that would explain why it was possible to conceive a child between a man and a cursed-blood but in that case, what kind of atrocities had their ancestors done to be transformed like so?

Either they were beasts or their ancestors had been cursed but either way, they stayed abominations in the eyes of most. They occupied a foggy and confusing zone in a society that didn"t know what to do with them. Should they invite the beasts at their tables running the risk that they would end up on the menu or should they lock them up even if they may be more respectable than many a man?

In this world where danger lurked at every corner and behind every tree, where people died by the hundreds everyday at the claws of monsters, most people chose to take no risks even if it made them appear unkind. Since everyone acted this way, what wrong was there to crush the cursed-bloods beneath your boots? After all, they weren"t even human.

"If they are that afraid, Why not just kill them instead of letting them inside as slaves?"

"Because we need their hands. There are not enough people for all the work that must be done. Not only that but there are some jobs that no one wants to do, it is easier to sacrifice cursed-bloods to those than to convince honest workers with a huge payment."

"I see."

Since emperor had never seen a real monster nor a cursed-blood before, he did not know what to think of them. Chinui felt like they were a bad thing but that did not make it the truth. Chinui didn"t entirely believe Emp"s story either. Emp felt like he needed to see for himself to understand better like how Chinui required proof for his story. At least, he would keep Chinui"s distaste of them in mind.

Ordinary people had all grown up while being told repeatedly that cursed-bloods were bad, scary and bellow them. Emp did not feel the same as them, all he had been told was to become an emperor and that they counted on him. He felt like those people would not understand this just like how he had a hard time picturing how exactly where the cursed-bloods evil. Anyway, it didn"t matter, he wasn"t a cursed-blood and whatever he thought of them would not change their situation.

Going back to the monster talk, there were as many ways to defeat them as there were varieties of beasts. Swords and bows where widely used but the most effective way to kill them was by far magic. Not many could use magic but those that could use even the simplest spell could gain enormous benefits in fame, money and of course survivability. There were many magic types in this world but they all fit into three great group. There was the magic of the body, mostly called self magic, the magic of the mind and the magic of the soul.

Self magic was the simplest and was mostly used by warriors. Every magic that was cla.s.sified as a magic of the body would let the user influence his own body. It could let someone see further and in more details, let them lift impossible weights, run faster and so on. The power of self magic seemed to be directly linked to the stamina and muscle ma.s.s of the user. The more healthy and vigorous body someone had, the better his self magic would be.

Mind magic was the kind of magic people usually referred to when they spoke of spells. With specific words, gestures and ingredients, magic users could influence the world around them to make almost anything happen. Fireb.a.l.l.s, stone walls sprouting from the ground, controlling plants and healing serious injuries in an instant where all things that were possible with mind magic. To use this magic, the spell caster had to draw the necessary power from the world itself instead of from his own body which let them do much more than self magic could. The only real limitations were the talent of the caster and his supplies of ingredients.

The last type of magic, the magic of the soul, was the most mysterious and the rarest. It was a strange magic halfway between self magic and mind magic. The goal of this kind of magic was either to let the world influence the body or the body influence the world. That magic could make someone invisible, prolong the life of someone, boost regeneration, metamorphosis and even a certain control over life and death. Aside from the rare few who knew how to use this magic, no one knew were the energy it used came from.

It was sometimes hard to see the difference between soul magic and the other two types. Chinui tried to explain it to Emp with an example about a sword slash. Someone using self magic would be able to make his slash stronger and stronger because of the magic amplifying his physical strength. Soul magic on the other hand would not make the slash stronger but could let you throw the energy of the slash away from the sword across long ranges. A soul magic user could then cut his opponent in half using his sword without ever getting near him.

The difference between mind magic and soul magic was much harder for Chinui to explain. He tried his best but in the end, it was clear that even him had no real idea on how it all worked. In the end, the best he could muster was that both could make you invisible but the mind magic would force you to not see them while the soul magic would let you see through them.

After all that magic stuff, Chinui went on to explain things he described as "actually useful knowledge". He had a whole lot of customs and beliefs that everyone knew about and applied without thinking to explain. There were so many that Emp was certain he would end up forgetting some of them. Chinui probably forgot to mention some too because of how simple they were. Many of those were rules about the roles of everyone and how to behave with others. The rules about how to behave with n.o.bles were especially complicated but Chinui told him that there would be an entire cla.s.s about the subject in school mixed in with etiquette. Emp already dreaded them.

Chinui was afraid for Emp reputation, after all, he wasn"t doing all this so that Emp would disgrace himself first thing after entering a town. At least he hoped he would remember enough basic things to hold a normal conversation without looking like an idiot. He needed to not ask crazy questions like why did that guy have three wives or why that one forced his kids to take care of the horses instead of letting the slaves do it. Everyone had a place and a task and everyone expected the others to mostly conform themselves to these roles. Emp was expected to know them as well. He understood most of them but he had a hard time with all the exceptions. Why could they not all follow the same rules? Emp had a very good memory and did not have a really hard time remembering everything but all those exceptions seemed to be overly complicated.

For example, it was customary to hang fresh fruits over entrance doors to scare evil spirits away unless the door was facing the north in which case, it would instead stops said spirits from getting out of the house, trapping them inside. He thought it sounded somewhat strange but luckily, other rules made much more sense to him. In case of an attack, it was the duty of the men including n.o.bles to defend women and children with their life on the line unless their work was judged essential like the only blacksmith in town making weapons for the rest. The women also had the right to fight but most preferred not to and those that did have the strength and courage to fight often became famous.

Since catastrophe often happened, the dead piled up really quickly. This resulted in two things. First, they had to do something with all the bodies. In the Steelwood empire, the dead were buried in the woods and saplings were planted on top of the graves. It was believed that the spirit of the dead would then inhabit the trees and help the future generations through the objects made from its wood.

The second thing was that because so many men died all the time, there were many more women than men. Women usually lived at least twice as long as their husbands and most took over the trade of their dead partner. Wherever you went in town, most shops and workshops were manned by women. Chandlers, bakers, butchers, carpenters, shop keeps, merchants and even smiths were dominated by women of all ages.

With most men dying so quickly, people had taken two habits. They married young but waited after the man first fight to do so. The first battle was the most deadly, if a man survived his baptism of blood, his chances of survival greatly increased. Families, to protect their daughters from bad choices, often chose to keep away suitors who had not spilled blood yet. After all, it was really easy to verify with the help of the hunting card.

Apart from that, a bunch of small rules and customs applied to couples. A couple should not be more than one degree of n.o.bility apart from each other but the rule was often ignored. It was usually the women who chose her husband with the approval of her family and the would be husband. n.o.bles sometimes went at it in reverse and let an important male heir choose the girl he wanted or offered their daughters for some political or territorial benefits. Polygamy was common as well and encouraged since without it, more than half the women would never get married and more importantly, the population would quickly dwindle. A woman could only bear one child at a time but who knew if their partner would live long enough to give them a second one? And even if he did live long enough to sire more children, many of them would die in tragic fas.h.i.+on before reaching adulthood and then, nearly half the surviving boys would die in their first battle. Depending on the place, it was sometimes more and sometimes less but overall, only forty out of every hundred kids survived with thirty of them being women.

The age of adulthood wasn"t a fixed number. A boy became a man after he spilled the blood of a monster or another man for the first time and a girl became woman after she bled for the first time. It was really convenient for Emperor since he had no idea of what was his physical age and, if he started counting since the day he was created, it would take a long time for him to reach adulthood. Once someone became an adult, it was expected of him to make his own place in the world but it did not change much for Emp since he had to take care of himself from the start.

Once adult, a lot of things you did not have the rights to do became possible. Most importantly, it gave you the rights to buy weapons. Emp thought it was somewhat strange that to have the right to buy any weapons, you had to kill something first. Chinui told him that the rules didn"t forbid someone to make his own weapon and didn"t forbid parents to lend weapons to their kids to complete the test. They just didn"t want a bunch of kids running around town with blades waving for no reason.

"But what about the orphans?" Asked Emp.

"It"s simple." Answered Chinui. "Either they are extremely lucky and talented or they become slaves willingly to escape death."

It felt a little unfair to him but since there was nothing he could do about it, he quickly forgot and asked his next question. How did they know if someone did or did not pa.s.s the test? It was a very simple answer, it was once again because of the hunting card. It was often used as a ident.i.ty card since it was mostly foolproof.

Chinui told him all about it in details. The first thing he told him was that he had no idea how it worked but it did. Mankind mostly believed that the G.o.ds had gifted this to them but weren"t sure why aside from the obvious convenience it presented them. It was impossible to cheat the hunting card, impossible to falsify and the thing was really smart. If you won the t.i.tle of best cook of the empire as a result of a contest, the card would display it, no need to do anything at all. You have the n.o.ble t.i.tle of baron, the card knows and displays it. You tell people you are actually the king in disguise, the card will stay blank revealing your lie.

Bellow the t.i.tles section there was the main point of the hunting card, a list of every kill you ever made sorted in chronological order. The thing itself was divided in two, a side for harmless prey and the other for everything else. Every kill was represented by a small picture and the written name of the creature. In the case of Emp, the first section was slowly filling up with fishes and rabbits and the second section stayed empty. For Chinui, in the second section, there was a list so long that it seemed to never end. Most of the kills were cursed-bloods but besides them, there was mostly other human beings and strange creatures Emp didn"t recognize.

Chinui told him that the hunting card always knew to which category a kill belonged, even if you believed otherwise. For example, a young n.o.ble could want to cheat the test easily by paying people to tie up a creature and present it to him defenseless. But, if he did kill it like that, the card would register it in the harmless prey section for the n.o.ble and put it in the other section for the group that had captured it for him.

Finally, Chinui told him that even if the card itself could not be cheated, people looking at it could. The card allowed some secrecy by letting you hide some information like part of your name or t.i.tles but never to change them yourself. For example, Emperor could hide his full name and only keep his nickname Emp written but could not change his name to something else entirely. It was also possible to trick someone with illusion magic, making him see something else entirely but if you had enough talent to do that, there would surely be many easier way to go about your business than casting complicated spells to trick the minds of onlookers.

To answer the question Emp had first asked, shopkeepers only had to ask for the hunting card and if there was anything at all in the second section, it was proof you pa.s.sed the test and were considered adult. It was also quite useful for death seekers to prove their hunts had been successful.

Emp absorbed this information and everything else Chinui said like a sponge. He loved to learn new things, he felt compelled to expend is knowledge. It was to complete the task his creators had given him of course but also because he genuinely enjoyed it. Or, had he been created to enjoy it to compel him to reach his goal? In any case, even if he had not enjoyed it, he wouldn"t have the time to complain about it nor the energy to do so. He felt tired all the time but still did everything Chinui asked him to do knowing that it was a great help for his future.

(1) shriveling their roots

In the Steelwood empire, they do not dig traditional graves. They grow trees out of the corpses of the dead instead. It would not make sense for them to say that they turned in their graves. Instead, they say that if you displease one of your ancestors, the roots of his tree will shrivel up to express their anger.