Chapter 4- Sleeping In The Fall

This is the first week of life of our little Alex in this world. During this small amount of time he mostly slept most of the time, the other part of the time he was crying for every little sensation he experienced, as it was normal for human babies to do apparently. All the crying was because of two things. The baby body he inhabited was overly sensitive as such almost everything was shock to him. The other was because the hormones of a baby had a different ratio then those of a 17 year old, as such you could say he got infantilizad.

Alex was sleeping in a wooden crib with various layers of cloths as padding. From time to timehe would wake up and start to cry and then the young midwife, that was actually a maid,(although not one using a victorian uniform) called Carol would come to see what was needed with hungry she would call his mother to feed him.

Alex didn't understand the language of this place yet nor he could talk, as his tongue couldn't move fast nor could make complex moviments that are needed to talk various languages. But still he tryed to move his tongue around his mouth to train it, this made he make various weird sound and do various weird faces, as is typical of babies.

the room where he was sleeping had a window, not one with glass but one with wooden window shutters, it was partially open most of the time to let a bit of wind to come into the room. From the window Alex hander could see some trees with red leafs falling with the chilly wind of autumn.

When our little Alex-kun ws born his father said, and I repeat "From here and now, in the date of the third sun of the fith white moon of fall, in the five hundred and eighteenth blood moon since the dispertion of our people(...)" some of you might be wondering what the thing about moons and suns means right? Let me answer it, the third sun means the third day, I think all of you get that, the fith moon of fall means the fith week of fall, as a week is the time that the moon days in one stage like full moon and such, a month is four weeks and a full cycle of the four stages of the moon.

So in summary Alex-kun was born in the fith day of the first week of the second month of fall, in this world fall starts in september and goes all the way to november as a season has three months and a years four seasons. So if put in the christian calendar of his old world he ws born in the 5th of october, and today would be the 12th of october.

Now the elephant in the room I guess, the blood moon, the blood moon is the second moon of this planet Alex inhabits, it appears in the middle of winter representing the winter solstice, and as such almost every culture in this world uses it to mark the end of the year. The blood moon is called as such because it's red, what a surprise, since it's made from different minerals then the white moon. While we are talking about moon there is this third moon that is called the soul moon, the soul moon is a blue moon that appears in the middle of summer, signifying the summer solstice.

This two moons are seeing as gods for some cultures, as rivals or as one evil and another good, but knowing who is the real God here is important okay! It's me! But as I'm so generous I will let them believe in whatever they want. It's definitly not because of the incapacity of Gods to materialize in the mortal world in any way without causing a armagedon, nah, it's definitly 'cause I'm such a good God. I'm so great! Ahaha.

Anyway as great as I am the protagonist is not me in this story, unfortunaly. Alex-kun liked to watch the leafs fall from the trees till he falls as sleep, but in another room there was something else happening.

-What should we do with Alex? He won't have any title as the second son when he grow up, it will be Perseus who will inherit it, but I only have one title anyway. Should I ask for Alex became a vassal of Lord Constantine? But His Lordship rather talent and ability than peerage.What do you think, Helena?

Alex's father was troubled, he was a almost insignificant noble that conquered the title of knight and baronet, although the title of knight is not hereditary. Alex's father was a commoner from the familyof hunters that maintained the hunting grounds for Lord Constantine when he wasn't hunting, their work was to hunt dangerous animals that might be big problem for the Lord, like wolfs and bears. As such he learned how to use a bow from early age and how to use a machete like sword for close combat if needed and to cut trees in the way. One day he was helping Constantine's son to learn to hunt. That day a boar, that is not one of the animals that he was suposed to kill, attacked the Young Master was terrified and couldn't move, Alex's father that was 20 years old at the time saved the Young Master. When the Young Master came back from the hunt with red eyes from all the crying and told all that happened in the hunt, His Lordship decided to let Alex's father enter his personal army as a low ranked soldier, lower then a squire, to prove himself, as a hunter he was a great scout and as a field forager, seeing the abilities that he had Constantine made Alex's father his vassal knight and later for his achievments he bacame a baronet and founded the village of Banuk where he governs.

- While it would cost some money, we could invest in Alex's education, not only on the sword but on art, history and economics too, the money we get from mining the mana stones could pay for it...maybe...I think. But we can't just throw Alex in the world as some peasant! It's risky but please Achilles! I don't want our family living like peasants again!

Alex's mother Helena and his father Achilles, kinda ironic if you think of it. Achilles and Helena both were commoners working in the Lord's castle. Helena was a maid that worked in he kitchen and Achilles brought meat and some herbs to her and with time they got closer, you know how it works. Anyway both of them liked to live as nobles doing little to no work and such and they wanted the same to they children. Alex had his elder brother Perseus and he had an older sister called Artemis. Perseus had 8 years old and Artemis had 5 years old, or as they say in this world blood moons.

Helena brought up one thing that I think it's interesting, mana stones, mana in this world is a evolutionary adaptation that the called Magus have. Magus is a ciantific name for the humanoid species in genaral, in this continent there is the Magus Sapiens Homo also known as humans, there is the Magus Sapiens Dryadalis also known as elfs, and the Magus Sapiens Nanus also known as dwarfs.

There are other lineages of the Magus, like the Magus Cobolorum Viridis also known as green goblins there is also the grey goblins and other colors of goblins that not only have diferent skin colors but their appearence and beheavior changes too.

The Cobolorum although have the ability to use magic they don't produce mana. Mana is a type of energy that the Magus can use to manipulate the forces of fisics. Although most people can only control one of those forces, like mass, acceleration, temperature, etc... But there is limitations on magic, it is needed a lot of mana to express magic outside of one body, in other words, you should strengthen yourself to use magic properly.

That's when mana stones enter, you can store it with your type of mana so that other people can use it. For example: You fill a mana stone with your mass type mana, then another person without mass type mana can by trying to fill the mana stone with their own mana realese the weight that the the mana converts to.

Although the magus couldn't convert amount of mana to numbers yet, you can just feel, think like how one can't convert your stamina into numbers yet but you can feel what you can still do by the sensations in your body like the feeling of burn and such.

Mana stones for that reason were pretty expensive, not unbelievably expensive but expensive like people that can afford to by new weapons every year expensive. They are that expansive because not only are they considered a luxury good and thus have taxes put into int but there is a big market for them as they are very useful and can be used as jewelry with their light blue sparkle when filled.

The Banuk village had a moutain with quite the abundance of mana stones that were the biggest income of profits of the territory, although 70% of the production of mana stones goes as tribute to Constantine since Achilles was a vassal.

Achilles was thinking of Helena's proposal then said

-You might be right... but then we won't have much to spare in case there is a war... maybe... if I ask for a favor to His Lordship to invest on Alex in exchange of an increase of 10% in the mana stone tributes then increase the pruduction of mana stones then sell most of the mana stones in stock... Let's first wait and see, let's teach him the basics ourselves till he is seven blood moons then see our situation at the time. That's the final conclusion.

-Yes, Dear...

Helena seemed a bit frustrated, but as a woman propose ideas to her husband was already something else, so she just left the room with a dissatisfied look.

While this was happening Alex was sleeping not knowing the world outside of his room and the one tree with red leaf that ocasionally fall inside his room.