The Monarch

Chapter 2

The one who yelled at me, who I still didn't know the name of, seemed to be the head cook. Although most of the main dishes were already out on the center table, this man seemed to be in charge of anything else people would need.

He went on a rant about me and my past mistakes. Basically, as far as I could tell I had a track record in breaking stuff. My new name is William, I am 14 years old (funny how I'm actually more than 20), I live in a large house, have a large and rich family, and can't do anything right. He seemed to explain all of this indirectly in less than three sentences. Although he took a full sentence on his own to explain how bad I was at daily tasks.

"Jesus, Will!" he yelled again, this time a little quieter, "I can't trust you with my glasses. Go out at the front entrance and usher in any guests that haven't arrived yet. There should be a few. Talk with Ildrid, she'll fill you in on who hasn't arrived yet. I know ushering is the only thing you're decent at, but try not to creep out any guests, okay?"

"Yes sir," I said, turning backwards with confidence. Then, I slowly turned back around and faced the chef, "sir, where is the front entrance."

"Jesus, how dumb are you? You've been working here for a week and you don't even know your way around yet?"

"Sorry," I said, shrugging, "I guess it's a habit."

"Well, as a habit, it better disappear. When you go back into the ballroom, the hallway to the front entrance is just across from the wine table. but," the man said, cringing a little, "don't. whatever you do, don't walk right through the ballroom. Go around."

"Yessir," I said, turning around.

Luckily, these people thought I had a useless personality. Normally I'd hate people thinking that of me, as I was rather intelligent and was able to get my bachelor's in education in just a year and a half. Although, in my current case, being thought of as useless may help me explain how I wouldn't know some basic things about William's past.

I spent the rest of the evening learning what I could about the area around me, and my own life, or the life of the person I had 'spawned in as'.

Although, the woman who was already ushering people in, who was named Ildrid, was a strict woman who didn't talk much. I couldn't learn anything from her, and that left me with only what I could see with my eyes.

Based on the guests that I could see come in through the night, and what they arrived in, and especially what the building was revealed to be, it appeared that I was in the 1600s with large stone walls and candlelit hallways. The front gate had three hooks to lay bars down, all leaned to the side of the door. I could see the castle guards just outside of the front entrance, watching carefully while wearing full sets of plate armor. While the building matched the 1600s, the clothing matched the late 1700 European fashion. It didn't appear that this world had guns, and still had armored guards with swords rather than uniformed guards with muskets.

But what surprised me the most was the night sky. Normally, I would look up and see a familiar sight, with the constellations of the season and the moon, depending on how full it was. Although, as I looked up at this night sky, the constellations that I was so used to were completely gone, replaced with strange patterns. Even the moon I was so familiar with was nowhere to be seen. I didn't even know which way was north.

Before I knew it, 'work' had ended and I was dismissed by the man who yelled at me earlier, who's identity still remained a mystery.

Now for the big question, where the hell do I live?

I ended up wandering around town, inspecting as much as I could about it. Although, the house designs still appeared to be the 1600s. The streets, however, were larger than modern streets and not nearly as mucky as 1600 streets would be. If anything, they seemed cleaner than today's streets. I was completely confused at the turn of events, and my tired body ended up stumbling on a park nearby. I rested in the fields below the trees and ended up falling asleep underneath.

When I woke up, the first thing I did was explore again. Even asking one person what the country was like wasn't super strange. A simple explanation like 'i'm a tourist,' or, if they personally knew me, I could explain 'i'm getting this info for a friend, they're new around here.'

A few people didn't know as much, and I soon discovered the general population didn't have the ability to read, mainly because this town was the poorest of the poor. The only thing that attracted wealth was the nobility, and they only came because this region had the best views on Vercottia lake, the largest lake around. If the lake didn't exist, this entire village would be wiped off the map.

The country I was in was called the Kingdom of Aierdonia. Where I was currently was called the Vercotti country. It was poor, with 90% of the population being illiterate. Although, they specialized in trade and agriculture. This raised a bigger question, as to why they didn't fish from the lake. The answer was that the lake was completely frozen over, had been for centuries. This troubled me because the outside air made it feel like June.

Anyway, the lake had nothing living underneath, or at least nothing viewable. The ice itself was almost thirteen meters deep. Fishing from it was impossible.

The area above Vercotti country was the golden district, where the capital was. As far as information from the villagers, that was just about it. I had no information on how to get back, and as far as I was able to tell, I wasn't even in my own world.

And asking for a library just gave me weird looks. Somebody even asked if I wanted books to build a fort out of.

I couldn't, of course, tell them that I could read. After all, I didn't even know if I could read. Sure, I could read English. But I was uncertain whether this world used English.

Hopefully, it did.

Eventually, after exploring for three hours, I finally found somebody who recognized me as a family member, rather than a passerby. I talked to them a little while trying to not seem as strange as possible.

I learned that my name is William Vercotti, the youngest son of 18 children (I know, I was shocked as well), and the last in line to the Vercotti merchant guild. I learned my father owned the merchant guild, making him the richest man in Vercotti country.

For a moment, a small glimmer of hope flashed in my eyes.

Although, I soon learned that even though the family was rich, only the house head lived in wealth, mainly because of his connections to the guild. The family's head, my father, was disliked by the whole community and even his own family. He hogged his wealth and destroyed my newfound plan of using his wealth to find my way home.

I sighed in disappointment, the dream of using large family wealth to learn more disappearing before my eyes.

Although, now I knew where I lived, a large manor along the edge of Vercotti lake. Just like the townspeople had said, it really was frozen. They, however, didn't explain it's size in detail. It was huge, crazy huge. It was basically an ocean, I couldn't see the other side at all. The only reason I hadn't seen it before was because of the town's natural elevation related to the lake. The buildings blocked my view completely.

And, as my position as the 18th child, I wouldn't be getting many benefits from my father or mother. As far as I was able to tell, my father was the only one in the family that knew how to read, but he was away on a business trip. Seven of my brothers and two of my sisters had already moved out of the house and into the golden district in search of fame and fortune. Only nine children remained. five of those being female and four of those being male. My mother had apparently passed away last winter due to a deadly disease.

Luckily the manor had a library, and it was all in English.

I woke up a week later, stuck out of options. The library had nothing but love poems and 'how-to' books. Nothing of value at all.

After a few days of investigation, I finally concluded the library's state. It was safe to say this library would only result in a dead-end.

A dead, f*****g, end. Literally, everything in the library, from the smallest scrap of paper to the largest book, was completely useless.

I was completely disappointed and confused about what to do next. Of course, I also had to pay attention to the restrictions like a 14-year-old like myself had.

And I also had to explain why I was stuck in the library for 8 hours a day to my family members, who all believed that I didn't have the ability to read. I shrugged off their questions and assured them I wouldn't be going back up again.

Then, the day after the fifth, something interesting happened at breakfast.

That day, a stranger came to visit us. He was tall, wearing a light blue cloak. His skin was as pale as snow, and his eyes were empty and devoid of emotion. Yet he smiled when he saw me. Then his eyes turned my siblings and chuckled.

"Shall we eat?" he suggested to the oldest child, who nodded happily.

A few minutes later, the stranger was sitting at the breakfast table with the rest of my present family. Of course, the head chair remained empty. I looked down at my meal, eating it without thought. However, I was more concerned with the man in front of us.

"Sorry," the man said, looking at me. Apparently, he had noticed me staring, "I haven't introduced myself. My name is Allen Lorathania. I work for the Aierdonia rangers guild. I'm here to explore the country for powerful individuals to join our ranks."

"The guild is recruiting again?" The oldest child asked. The man nodded. The rest of the family looked overjoyed.

"However, the recruiting process is cruel. Only ten percent of our applicants will make it in this time. Unfortunately, the other ninety percent will not make it out alive. Are you perhaps interested?"

"Definitely!" The oldest exclaimed, "How do you apply?"

"Hold on!" I interrupted, then looked at Allen, "What's the rangers guild?"

"You don't know, Will?" the oldest child asked, "The rangers guild is a group of elite warriors employed by the king himself!"

"We do a lot of things. Mainly, we patrol the borders of large forests and mountains, protecting the civilian population from monsters. But, every now and then the king will command us to slay dragons or giants in the wild. We used to go by the Aierdonia Adventurer's guild, but that made us sound like mercenaries. We work for the crown, not the people."

"Wait, we?" The others gasped, "You're a member? You're a ranger?"

"I said I worked for them, didn't I?" Allen shrugged, "I've been assigned to this region because I grew up here. I knew your mother quite well. It was sad to learn of her passing."

The mood in the room dropped for a moment before I continued the conversation.

"So? What are the merits of getting in?" I asked.

"For the glory, obviously? To be a ranger is to be given the elite title. Everybody in the kingdom will adore you," The others chimed in. Allen, however, shook his head.

"I'm going to be honest, most of the members are working for the pay. It's a job directly in control of the crown. It's one of the highest-paid in the country. Rangers are also allowed through every door in the country, except for the king's throne room and his bedroom. A ranger's badge is a skeleton key for the country."

"Who would need a key like that?" The others asked, some confused.

I nodded, wanting that skeleton key, "How do you apply?"

"The event starts in one month, in the country's capital. It's a week-long trip on horseback, so come prepared. Once you get there, you can find the signup sheet in the ranger's guild headquarters. I've gotta warn you. The event is a tournament. You'll be going up against people your age, but there's still a lot of danger involved. Please be careful."

The country's capital, Zeinich, was large and drastically different than Vercotti Country. The ride there was long and hard, just as Allen had said it would be. We barely had enough money and food to last us the entire trip.

Zeinich's population was nearly 1 million, which was extremely large for the time period. Most of the buildings seemed to be built with the same infrastructure as some 1600 and 1700 buildings of my world. Just like in Vercotti country, the roads were surprisingly clean, devoid of horse manure or dirty rain.

The Ranger's guild was closer to the center of the city, which was considerably richer than the outside. The buildings were much bigger and much more expensive than the previous ones. Most of them were up to three stories tall, and some special ones were four stories. ost of the citizens that were walking on the edge of the road wore similar clothing to the same nobility that I had encountered my first night here.

The guildhall itself was five stories tall and several buildings wide. When we went inside, we were surprised by the number of people already waiting. the crowd seemed to be made of nearly three hundred people, all waiting in line for the reception desk, located some two hundred feet away.

Most of the people waiting in the line were older and bigger. Some had mean scowls on their face and wore thick armor to hide their battle scars. As I noticed the long line length, I walked up to the closest person to me and asked.

"What's the line for?"

"The ranger's guild is recruiting, moron," the person replied rudely. I nodded, wishing they would die a horrible death. Then, I lined up at the end with the rest of my siblings.

The line moved slowly and without much effort. We could barely find anything to do the entire time we were waiting. As the hours went by, our stomachs started to growl in defiance. Most of the people lined up near us brought snacks and bedrolls to ease their suffering.

Finally, after nearly twelve hours of waiting, the line finally brought us to the front, near the desk. The tired employee waiting for us greeted us with a faint smile. They had dark bags under their eyes.

"Hello!" She greeted, "How may I help you today?"

She yawned as I answered her question, "I'd like the nine of us to sign up for the Ranger's Guild tournament."

"That's great!" She happily said, "I'll get you nine of these. Go ahead and fill them out right here. The line is rather long."

"Of course," I nodded, yawning as well. I took nine sheets from the lady's hand and handed them to my siblings.

Then, I started to fill out the information listed nearby. My siblings, unable to read or write, asked the employees nearby to help out. After we had handed in the rest of the papers, the lady continued to speak to me.

"Great! Go ahead and follow me," The lady stood up, then opened a door close to her, allowing us in. We followed the lady inside, then through a few more similar doors until we finally stopped in a small room.

The room was tiny, really only capable of fitting a max of five people inside. The employee had us all wait outside, only allowing one sibling inside at a time. They would close the door for five minutes, then reemerge with a small paper in their hands.

When I finally went inside, I noticed a small crystal ball in the middle of the room.

"Go ahead and place your hand on the orb and we'll begin."