Gestation by John Gold (love books to read .txt) 📗

I’m going to have to cross all of Congul and most of the next continent…on foot.

“Why a bandit?”

Hela started frowning the second she heard the name Zirda.

“That’s where convicts and prisoners run off to. Your killers, too, trying to avoid the long reach of the law. It’s No Man’s Land. A huge area of lawlessness. Now, do you understand what other people thought when you asked them about Zirda and how to get there?”

“Got it, thanks for explaining. Could you show me where it is?” I pull out my map.

“It’s around here, though I don’t know where exactly. But I’m getting tired of your surprises! Where did you get a map like this?”

I put it away and look at her triumphantly.

“I traded a black pearl the size of my fist for it. Okay, time to run—maybe, we’ll see each other again.” Hela just stands there, her mouth agape.

Homeward bound.

I slip on six red master rings and set off at a speed of forty kilometers an hour. I’m not getting tired, but that isn’t fast enough. Even though a pet is the only thing that would solve my problem, there isn’t much sense getting one.

My path lies through woods, fields, mountains, and even the sea. But nobody stops me. I’m on my way home. I see castles and cities, people and other creatures. When I run through an elf forest regardless of the fact that it’s forbidden it’s my perception that saves me from the traps and ambushes they set. I’ve been running away my whole life, so I’m able to get away from them and escape their dominion. It’s a small piece of the Golden Forest marked on my map as a gray spot.

I run through areas populated with orcs and trolls. Suddenly, enormous steppes pop up, and trees are fewer and farther between. Next is a rocky wasteland with one mountain range following the other.

In a small town in the middle of the continent, I stop by the auction and pick up my money. The amount totals 22.5 million gold. A quarter of it comes from two full sets of plate armor I got from the raid bosses, while the third dropped a pair of swords that went for two million.

The first thing I do is convert it all into real-world credits and send it to Malcolm to found the orphanage with. For the last three months, Vaalsie has been calling me to ask why I haven’t taken the tests for my basic education, and I’ve been completely refusing to work with him. He’s just Eliza’s lackey. I’m getting transferred in two weeks, which will be the end of my problems. I’ll slip right out from under his nose with a month and a half left before my fourteenth birthday.

The very southern tip of Congul is home to the port city Nikat. It’s protected from the land side by a tall castle wall, and from the sea side by a fort armed with powerful weapons.

I get to it at night and run smack into the closed gate. It’s quarantined, so they aren’t even letting people in during the day, though I don’t want to run all the way around. Diseases don’t scare me.

City walls are nothing compared to the holes in Hell, so I quickly get in through the fortifications and take off running toward the port. The guards notice me when I leap down from the wall, and they set off after me. A few of them are just as fast as I am, though I leap off a pier and dash across the water just before they catch me.

It’s a long time after midnight. As soon as I get to the nearest island, I find a spot in a tree and fall asleep. It’s been fifty hours since I last rested. I need a break!

Two-thirds of my journey is in the past, and I’m on an island between Congul and Ovidius. Whales, sea monsters, warships, and fishing boats far out at sea surround me, and I enjoy taking a moment to look around. By the evening of the second day, I arrive in Ovidius and decide to stop for more rest. I climb up into a tree and nearly jump out of my skin when I see a monkey staring at me in shock. It even shares its food with me before dashing off to the next tree over. The locals’ Level 50 means nothing to me, and they aren’t aggressive at all. I log out of the game.

When I log back in, I find myself on a small island in the open water. A tornado whirls nearby, kicking up the water, and large waves crash against the shore. I must have been swept out to sea during the storm. That’s an interesting effect to keep in mind.

I have to run through the poor weather, though it just cheers me up. I haven’t had this much fun in a long time, in fact. I get to the first cities by the evening, and the people there take no notice of me. Good, nobody’s looking for me after breaking into Nikat and running from the guards. Although, nobody knows who I am there.

On the outskirts of Imir, I find traces of recent battles. The forest has been burned to the ground in places, though I’m still overjoyed to be running through familiar terrain. War, destruction, villages, and the smell of the woods and water all make me feel like I’m home.

∞ ∞ ∞

There were three people in the office, and the mood was all business. The girl was trying to convince her two bosses of how important it was to increase her financing.

“Alfred, you’ve seen the results! The kids have no problem adapting to the groups at their orphanages, fights and other deviant behavior have dropped precipitously, and all I want to do is boost the number of game centers.”

“I get it. You want to expand your program, but what’s the point of that? We think it’s the game itself