'Til Kingdom Comes - The Banished Prince Vol 4: The System

Pawns

Saturday, 26th November 1442

The moment we reached the destination, we disembarked and offloaded the tins of biscuits that Heather had bought earlier at the grocery store for the 3 mythical races that we would be meeting them shortly after we had summoned Doc, Perky and Aragorn to the temporary encampment.

After I had used the spatial storage pouch that was given by Doc, he arrived shortly followed by Aragorn while Perky was summoned by the pebble with the rune markings that it had previously passed me during the first meet.

"Good morrow, His Majesty. It had been a week since we had last met and we wished to relate to you about the report that my wood elves had reported to me a few days ago."

"This has to do with some abnormal activities around Blackthorne. Our wood elves had detected a certain kind of barrier that disabled them to use their low light vision to see beyond the barrier."

"The barrier was protecting something within it and we are unable to pinpoint the actual source of the anomalies."

"However, as what my other scouts had informed me, there was something weird going on around there especially the growth of the trees that were not supposed to be there at all."

"Like for example, the trees that would normally grow in fertile and black soil, would not actually grow on land that is ferrous."

"I guess Doc here would be able to explain to you well about lands since he would normally dwell on the surface and below it."

Aragorn greeted me the moment he had been summoned and Doc continued the conversation the former had with me seconds ago.

"Yes, Mars. That is right. The land in that area has iron deposits and normally nothing would be able to grow there. Even grass would shun the area and the only thing you could find there would be an iron mine."

"There's nothing for us to dig there, too, His Majesty. The only thing we would be able to find is those black deposits where the Blacksmith love."

"If its silver, the experts would be called Silversmith and so on et cetera. Right now, its all black, black, black soot all over the place and I do not like to be near them as well."

"There's no yellow metal for me to collect down there and it is as barren as a camel's back...!"

Hmm, these gnomes are really into gold nuggets the size of a baby's head and I don't think they would be venturing deep within the area to check the anomalies.

However, I think the dwarves might be able to shed some light on the findings and I turned to them instead.

"Well, Mars...to be frank with you, the invisible barrier would only work on the surface, theoretically. However, it would not be able to work on undergrounds dwellers like us. So, what do you want to find out right now?"

Doc offered his help since he knew that the firstborn were unable to accomplish such a task as their vision had been blocked and there was no way to see the kind of abnormal activities that were going on there.

"I am not sure Doc, but whatever information that you are willing to share with us would be greatly appreciated. Furthermore, I would be needing Aragorn to perform other tasks that you might not be able to do it as well. So it is kind of fair, don't you think?"

Doc nodded his head and informed us that the other dwarves were already there to receive the recipients of the mithril and obsidian pieces.

We thanked him for the process of the exchange of hands for the pieces as Doc informed that the obsidian pieces may be up to 3 tonnes and the mithril was capped at 1 tonne for us.

"Say, Doc. Don't mind me asking and don't mind me answering too. Besides these mithril pieces, what do you actually do with it?"

"It seems that you had collected these pieces incessantly for the past centuries and I am sure you intend to make something out of it right?"

Doc looked at me from head to toe and I realised that I am asking something taboo from him.

Its the same question that had been presented to him 300 years ago during Robin the Hood era and here again he had been asked the same questions once again.

"It would be best for me to know and for you to find out, Mars. This question had been asked by you before and now I am repeating to you the same answer."

"So, go and find out what you had been missing and I hope you could find the answers to what you are seeking."

"Sheesh... This little old man is really a pain in the butt. Why can't he just answer my silly questions and get over with it?"

"I can't see s**t of what he was doing with all the mithril except the ones that had been hanging around Aragorn's neck since the day we met him till now."

These thoughts ran wild inside my brain as I thought about what Robin the Hood would be doing if he is in my position right now, 300 years later.

Would Robin the Hood chide with Doc after he had to wait 3 centuries for the goddamned answer?

"Alright...I guessed the answer that you gave to Robin the Hood was the same and well, we will find out on our own then."

"So, right...once you had discovered the secrets behind the invisible barrier, do let us know about it."

"By the way, you mentioned that your scouts had uncovered it about a few days back, right? So it means that the barrier that was set up was recent and fresh."

"Any ideas of who would have made such a barrier and for what reason?"

Aragorn looked up at me and answered the questions that had been thrown at me. "I have no idea which race would be putting up such a barrier and the reason behind it."

"Frankly, I don't think I have a good feeling about this since it would be done either by the ogres, trolls or even goblins. There are so many classes of mythical underground creatures that it would be hard for us to distinguish them."

"Sorry, Doc. We didn't mean you at all."

Doc shot a glance sceptically at Aragorn with a crooked look on his face and replied nonchalantly, "No problem there, old friend, new friend."

To avoid any dispute, the children carried the tins of biscuits and handed to them the assorted one, the OTAP one and lastly a tin of pineapple shortcakes.

"WOW... I sure missed those biscuits, His Majesty. Could we come over to your town, if we have some coins, to go and purchase more of these biscuits?"

"Our kin loved to eat them and they had been harassing me and wanting me to go to the town and collect them. I did explain to them we need those silver and gold coins but uummpphh...!"

Artemis, which is chattier than Aerin had his mouth clamped shut as the two of them were either trying to shut one another or simply continue the disrupted conversation.

"Don't think too much about the coins. You may come up to our village and meet Jennings or Hereford if you need extra fresh ones."

"Other than that you could ask around to anyone you knew and then you could get as many as you want. Or... would you like to spend a few days over at our town instead after this?"

I offered the deal to them and they all looked expectantly towards their Great Elven King. Their king reluctantly let them go after being persuaded by them like two small children.

"Settle the shipments of the mithril and obsidian pieces first and be the eyes for the Wood elves adventurers, alright?"

Aerin and Artemis eyes lit up as they replied in unison and immediately informed me not to leave them as they summoned the overhanging vines and started to swing up and away with it towards the direction of the balding Hellsgate.

"Kids will always be kids, don't you think so His Majesty? Well, at least they are always together wherever they went and we have no worries if they wanted to stay over at your town for the time being."

"So how are they doing when they were over at your place the last time?"

Aragorn was concerned about the so-called kids and we wondered how l would relate to them since they would prefer to be staying on top of the dwarf orchard trees.

It looked a bit weird as they were found to be sleeping on the ground at most times, especially for Aerin who was not the one that needed medical care before.

"Yeah, kids will always be kids and how I wished that certain kids do not grow up at all because when they reached adulthood, it is much harder for us to pull the reins on them."

"Don't you think so, Aragorn? Do you have kids of your own, my good friend?"

Aragorn looked at me and laughed loudly, and we were oblivious of why the reason he had laughed so heartily.

After he had settled down and finished laughing, Aragorn looked at me and told me, "What do you think of Aerin and Artemis so far? They are very close to each other, right and also when I appear here, they would be along with me, am I right?"

I pondered for a while and finally realised what Aragorn was implying. "Hahaha...! We had known each other for so long and only today we had known that Aerin and Artemis are related to one another as blood brothers and sisters...!"

"And look at you...You are their father after all...Hahaha. We never had the wildest idea unless you had given us some hints beforehand...!"

I was surprised that Aragorn had never mentioned and also had never shown any hints or clues that Aerin and Artemis are his children after all.

"Do you know, His Majesty... When comes to ruling a kingdom, there is no brother, sisters or even son nor daughter. Family is family and royal subjects are royal subject."

"It is like oil and water which could not be mixed at all no matter how long one stirred it up. That is why I am truly indebted to you in saving my only son and also Aerin's only brother when he got his arm chopped off."

"He would definitely be in a miserable state and without a function of an arm, I don't think he would be able to become an Archer and would be treated as an outcast and would only be staying and sulking at home for sure."

"So you understand my situation right now, His Majesty? A father that is not allowed to show his fatherly love towards his own children and always would put the interest of the kingdom right before family."

"That is one of the reasons why both brother and sister are always here with me by my side and they were not allowed to call me Father or Daddy et cetera outside of our circle."

"Only when we have removed the bow from our backs, then we are considered as a family. Otherwise, they are considered as my royal subjects."

Our children were squatting down and listening to what was mentioned by Aragorn as we do not suspect that Aerin and Artemis were siblings and Aragorn was their father...!

Even how harsh the rulings of other mythical races, they were hoping that I would not follow the footsteps of Aragorn and regard them as royal subjects or citizens, rather than being regarded as them as our children.

At least in this juncture, they understood that the way of upbringing from other races, especially from the mythical ones are much more regimental than the one their Daddy had implemented.

As for me, its always a carefree manner but when it comes to protecting the citizens and the interest of our town, they knew that their Daddy would be the one running at the forefront of the battlefield.

As we were talking leisurely with the rest of the mythical races and opening up the tins of biscuits, we heard some crackling over the communication sigil and the message that got transmitted over was none other than Artemis.

Somehow, his voice sounded strained and we could barely hear what was going on.

"Hello... He... Enemies... Sighted... Far... Alerted... Backup..." The message was intercepted by us and the transmission was very bad that it was only received in packets and not in a full sentence.

A worrisome look passed on Aragorn's face as he picked himself up and informed us that he would be going towards the direction of the distress signal.

Doc and Perky were equally worried and then decided to chip in and help them out as well. "We would be right back, Mars. We leave the gifts here first. Hope there would be nothing amiss about this."

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