Two Worlds – The Boy And His First Rune Stone

  Tanner Tattone had just turned eighteen, the legal age to purchase a rune stone, the sun barely risen as he collected his stash of coins, his spear, his leather armor and was saying a running goodbye to his parents who were having none of it. Tanner’s father, Roln, stepped in front of the door saying in a stern voice “At least give us a hug before you run out to your death.” Guilting Tanner into slowing down and turning towards his teary mother he said “Right, sorry… I was excited.”

  “Please be careful honey, and write often, we’ll miss you so much!” His mother, Elizabeth Tattone, barely managed to get out over the tears.

  After a proper goodbye was had Tanner found himself traveling down the road between Barton and Zrora. Barton was a small hamlet of about one hundred people, not much happened there and Tanner was glad to be leaving it behind. The allure of Zrora and its potential too much to ignore. Tanner had been working and saving every scrap of gold he could since he was twelve in order to purchase his first rune stone, he had it all picked out and everything! *Lunge* would be his first skill even if he had to scour every rune stone shop in Zrora.

  He’d been practicing with the spear for as long as he’d been saving and he thought himself a deft hand with it. *Lunge* was the first step towards him soaring the skies and skewering his enemies as an Aerial Knight. The Aerial Knights had a few standard rune stones to collect before one could apply to the organization so he would sign up as an adventurer and work towards collecting those needed runes.

  It was a few days travel by foot to the city of Zrora which held the Two Worlds Adventurer’s Guild, his destination after obtaining his first rune stone, and he couldn’t wait. Thankfully the occupants of Zrora held most of the monsters back, at least on the western side of the wound caused by the World Eater. Tanner shuddered, he had seen paintings of the wound, and everyone could see the World Eater’s mass outlined in the sky at all times. It was a massive ball of orange and red sticking out of the side of Rivas,

  the mother planet.

  Artwork had shown the wound and it was grizzly, the World Eater was siphoning essence out of the planet in a whirlwind like funnel of energy, its teeth latched onto Rivas. The wound could only be seen from a small corridor east and west of the World Eater because the things massive mouth was blocking sight of it from anywhere else. The capitol and the rest of the east had been lost to monsters and the weird dungeonous growths that seemed to infect the mother planet after the World Eater’s attack. Zrora stepped up to the challenge and has been holding the west so far and Tanner planned to do everything he could to help hold out and maybe even push the monsters back.

  “A solution to the World Eater had to be found at some point, right?” Tanner thought to himself while he walked.

  The first night of travel found Tanner tired, he hadn’t ever walked this long before. He found a nice spot on the side of the road to set up a camp and pulled out a bit of food. He had packed some grapes, a bit of dried meat, some crackers and a flask with a bit of juice from fruit local to Barton. As he ate, he mentally stepped through his spear forms. He hadn’t any formal training, but he had sparred with the guards that would be stationed at Barton from time to time and they showed him a few forms to practice and stay in shape with. After he finished eating and wrapping the food back up in cloth he stood and dusted himself off and set to actually practicing those forms in the flesh.

  “Can’t allow myself to get rusty, no matter how tired from walking I am!” Tanner declared while performing a slow hook, grab, and throw maneuver. Full of youthful energy Tanner practiced until he dropped. Now thoroughly exhausted he crawled into his tent and slept, no stranger to sleeping on the ground was he.

  The next morning Tanner woke and had some small breakfast of more grapes, dried meat, crackers and juice – that was all he had packed for the trip. He performed some limbering stretches and then packed the camp up setting off after everything was put up. Two more days of walking ahead of him Tanner pumped his sore legs and thought of how great a Zroran bed and a bath would be. That night was much the same as the previous night, Tanner pitched his tent, had some food and then stepped through his spear forms.

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  On the third day Tanner finally came to the main road running East/West along Erebus, the large continent he was on, this road actually had some people on it while he walked it. There were horse drawn carriages that passed him by, soldiers walking west along the road to unknown destinations, and even occasional other travelers heading west. Tanner had been warned to be weary of highwaymen on the road, but he was youthful and had that sense of invulnerability that most his age had, which is why that third night as he saw a small merchant caravan parked at the side of the road setting up camp he walked right over to them and introduced himself.

  “Hello there!” Tanner called out, as he walked up to the group. There were three carriages, the horses to pull them, and eight people setting up tents and sleeping bags. As Tanner approached an imposing looking man, roughly 6 feet tall stepped out between Tanner and the group.

  “Sod off, kid.” The obvious hired guard said.

  “Now now, he looks harmless enough” an older man called out, turning towards Tanner.

  “Yea, until his slits your throat in the night and takes off with a carriage.” the guard grumbled. “I’ll be watching you kid.” he further stated while returning to setting up his own little section of the camp.

  “Don’t mind Darrel, he’s a bit high strung. Great guard though, him and Talon took out a couple of wolves just last night that were after the horses. I’m Gregory, and you are?”

  “Tanner! Tanner Tattone from Barton.” Tanner called out, arriving a moment later in front of Gregory and offered his hand which Gregory took. “I’m heading to Zrora to pick up my first rune stone and join the adventurer’s guild. Was hoping I could join your group for the night, safety in numbers and all that.”

  “Don’t mind at all Tanner, the adventurer’s guild huh. Yea – you look about that age, let me guess… Spear at your back.. you’re going to be looking for *Lunge* aren’t you, hoping to get in with the Aerial Knights?” Gregory presumed.

  “Wow, yea that’s right! How’d you know?”

  Gregory chortled loudly and stated “I’ve seen a few spear wielder’s, they all want to join the Aerial Knights. Tough job though, make sure you don’t skip your leg exercises.”

  Tanner nodded solemnly at that, Aerial Knights jumped a lot and needed good leg strength to keep it up.

  Tanner set up his own tent, and then helped some of the others finish setting theirs up. The conversation and food flowed which Tanner appreciated after three days on the road by himself, not even seeing another person. After dinner Tanner did the usual and performed his spear forms which Talon, the other guard, seemed interested in and ended up joining Tanner and performing sword forms.

  After a bit Talon asked “Want to spar?” and Tanner jumped at the opportunity, he loved sparing.

  The two stepped a bit further away from the camp, so they wouldn’t throw dirt and dust into the camp and faced each other. They both nodded respectfully, signifying the start of the match. Tanner being the less experienced and less patient of the two struck out first, he rushed forward and struck out with the spear at Talon’s chest, which was easily parried by the man’s shield. Talon replied with a sword swing from Tanner’s outside, to the left, but Tanner was expecting it and swept the shaft of the spear vertically left just after being deflected and blocked Talon’s swing, sparks flying off the colliding metal.

  Tanner jumped back a step and adjusting the grip of his hands on the spear shaft, giving himself a bit more length, pressing the attack again he thrust out strike after strike keeping Talon on his back foot preventing any sort of attack. Tanner having the reach advantage utilized it for everything he could until he got around the shield and hooked the ridge at the end of his spear on the inner edge of the shield, twisted his wrist, pulled, and sent the shield flying away from Talon. About to step in again and further press the advantage Talon jumped back and put his hands up in surrender.

  “Well done, well done! You are better than I was expecting with that spear.” Talon stated.

  “Thanks, I’ve been using it for a while now.” Tanner responded, breathing a little harder than normal.

  “You might have a shot with those Aerial Knights after all, if you keep that up.”

  Tanner beamed at the compliment, and ran over to retrieve Talon’s shield handing it back to him.

  They joked around a bit after than, and then separated to sleep. The morning eventually arrived and both groups had some breakfast, broke camp, and set off together towards Zrora. The road was surrounded by thick forest and had been for some time. Thick tree’s blocked the view in all directions as the road curved a bit from this point, however, around mid-day the road straightened back out and the first sights of Zrora could be seen in the distance, a couple hours later in the early afternoon the group arrived at their destination and parted with Tanner thanking Gregory, the guards, and the rest of the caravan for the company Tanner went off in search of his first Rune Stone.