Athelei felt sick like he had never been before.
It had only been a few hours of riding in the carriage, and Athelei had already thrown up a few times. The bouncing of the bench made his stomach lurch each time.
It was quite frankly, worse than looking at dead bodies.
At least with corpses, you could look away. On these merchant carriages, Athelei had no choice to stay on it if he didn't want to be left behind.
He was sick.
He felt like dying.
Athelei could only thank Libra that when merchant caravan reached a certain landmark, they stopped and set up camp.
"Blergh..." Athelei threw up what was now just stomach acid and collapsed by the bushes at the edge of the camp. A river was flowing nearby that he could use to wash his mouth, but the world had yet to stop shaking.
It took him a few minutes, but eventually, Athelei was able to stand back up. He used Judgement on the river water and confirmed it to be safe. He gargled and rid himself of the taste of acid.
"A month or more of these carriage rides will kill me." Athelei heaved as he had a few gulps of the river's sweet freshwater.
It was late in the afternoon now and the sun was about to set. The merchants' usual schedule had included them spending a night or three at Mist Pine but that place was utterly destroyed. There was nothing to do there. If not for the Harmonic Knights having been near there in the first place, perhaps there wouldn't have been any survivors at all.
Athelei sighed as he usually did whenever he looked back at what happened. He had been listening to everyone talk about quite a variety of things and that was how he continued to learn about the ways of human life. It was quite pleasant to hear about the Harmonic Knights' timely aid.
Sitting by the riverside, Athelei fiddled with the grain-sized orange gem in his fingers. The adults were all busy setting up camp and had exempted the sick kid from having to do anything. Athelei took this opportunity to openly study the [Passive Effect] of Judgement.
"Status," Athelei commanded and an orange Cosmic Interface appeared before his eyes.
[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]
=} User: Athelei (Tier 0 User) {=
=} Interface Authority Level: 0.2 {=
=o=o=o=o=
=} Skills {=
- Orange Analysis Skill: Judgement (Level 1/5)
=o=o=o=o=
[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]
Seeing the smaller, but purely orange screen, made Athelei nod in approval. Hiding wouldn't prove to be difficult. He could just use one type of Cosmic Interface colour in front of others and use his tri-coloured version when he messed around with his fog-body.
"Open the [Information Network]," Athelei commanded once more,
[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]
- Command acknowledged.
- Location confirmed.
- User status confirmed.
- Connecting to Information Network...
- Connected to Information Network—Oxhor.
[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]
"Oxhor?" Athelei's brows were raised as a few suspicions arose in his mind but were quickly calmed. "Curious... Curious... The universally accessible Judgement has a label?"
Athelei shifted the language of his Cosmic Interface into Illyasian and was intrigued by what he saw, "Ho? Their word for what should have been 'universally accessible' is simply 'accessible anywhere' if directly translated to my language. I may be overthinking this, but that's... suspicious." Athelei muttered to himself before switching his language settings back into his personal, abstract-looking language.
He then directed his attention to what was essentially a search bar, and used the keywords,
"World map."
[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]
- Command acknowledged.
- Supplying relevant information...
- Search results yielded three (3) 'World Maps' uploaded from the planet of Oxhor.
- ...
[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]
Athelei squinted when he saw the words, 'from the planet of Oxhor' written in his language. He decided to change his language into Illyasian again.
The results truly were suspicious,
[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]
- Command acknowledged.
- Supplying relevant information...
- Search results yielded three (3) 'World Maps' uploaded from the people of Oxhor.
- ...
[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]
'It's 'people' now instead of 'planet...' Athelei thought to himself as he whispered, "Curious and curiouser."
Athelei couldn't help but chuckle as he thought, 'I should have realised it from the way they say "Cosmic Interface and Nebula Gems." In my language, the words "cosmic" and "nebula" have meanings. In the Illyasian language, it's simply the names of the interface and the gem. They don't have a word for the cosmos, nor do they know what a nebula is...'
Athelei looked into the now darkening sky.
A few stars were twinkling in the far, far Eastern horizon and the faint shine of the moon already made its presence known. Athelei smiled as he stared and recalled five words.
=o=o=o=o=
The Gods are not gods.
=o=o=o=o=
"Hah," Athelei returned to what he originally wanted to do with the Information Network.
He selected one of the three "World Maps" that had been supplied by his fellow orange Nebula Gem users and studied the map.
The world in the eyes of the people of Oxhor was a single continent in the shape of a diamond with four sides. Every corner of the diamond sat in a cardinal direction and eight countries populated the continent.
The largest country was the Holy Nation of Illyas and it sat at the northern corner of the continent. It was bordered by Illum on its south-west, the Wilderness at its south, and Lav'Li at its south-east.
Any area not at Illyas' south was the ocean.
The eastern corner of the continent housed three countries: Ao, Erris, and Is'thal.
The southern corner was only wilderness.
The west corner had two countries: Hille and Halle which were divided by a large river.
Now, although the continent was shaped like a diamond, it was not perfect. On the diamond's northwest side, right under the country of Illum was a crack in the land, where a very wide 'river' ran through the continent. In fact, if viewed by a normal person, it was more of a sea instead of a river. The other side was never visible when you stood on the shores of one side.
This river flowed into a lake in the middle of the continent. Again, this lake was more like an ocean or sea. It was larger than the entire country of Illyas by itself.
At the lake's centre, sitting directly in the middle of the continent and exactly lined up with the planet's equator, was a circular island.
It was simply called "The Pearl" by the brave adventurers who found themselves there.
Athelei recalled what he saw of the planet before he allowed himself to be turned into a human child and thought, 'It seems like their exploration of the planet has yet to be completed. It makes sense. They haven't even filled the continent up with countries just yet.
Athelei then searched up what the Wilderness was.
It was quite simple. It was essentially a vast expanse of land that mostly occupied the centre area of the continent. All of Oxhor's countries bordered the sea after all.
The Wilderness was filled with many dangers and people only took the seaside routes to go to different countries: It was risky to cut through the Wilderness where monsters were rumoured to roam.
The wild animals were frightening enough, what more were those 'monsters' that the adventures spoke so much about? Thus, not many risked it, but every country sought to expand inland as much as they could.
Adventurers loved to tell stories about what would happen if a country governed The Pearl in its entirety. Some claimed that The Pearl was where the gods lived and orchestrated the rest of the world while others claimed to have visited The Pearl and said that it was a land of milk and honey.
A few even said that it was a land populated by monsters born from the people's nightmares. No animal or human could survive there.
As for what the truth was, the public had no knowledge of it.
Athelei was loving what his birthplace was like so far. There were many things to see and so many endings to expect.
He then switched his access to the Information Network and found himself in what seemed to be a forums area.
Somehow, Athelei's eye twitched when he saw the different tabs that signified different countries.
He navigated to Illyas' tab and found many posts that included the latest happenings of the country and the most prominent one was the destruction of Mist Pine.
Athelei read the article and confirmed its accuracy, thinking, 'Wow, orange Nebula Gem users have such a convenient system for them. They're all connected. I wager that most of the populace of Oxhor is an orange User given how instantly useful it is.'
Athelei then noticed several subcategories and was in awe, 'It's also great for entertainment in the midst of all that information! Thallium Yan really checked all the boxes for what to gift me—from the scroll to the colour of my Nebula Gem, it's all so well thought out!
'This is a great tool for me. I can seek answers from the Information Network and use it to blend into society.'