BONG BONG BONG
The faint ringing of bells and the beaming of the dawn sunlight woke Rodrick up. The bells were coming from the top of the castle that loomed over Marigold City. The sound of the bells gave him a dreadful sense of evil potential and a terrible present. He had never heard these bells before, but his mother had told him about this particular sound of bells. They were memorial bells for the death of a King.
Rodrick felt the top of his head with both of his hands, felt nothing, then looked around him to assess his situation. He was sitting on a bench in front of a building with a sign that hung from a rod that sat on top of the front door. On the sign it said, "The Cenobium", it was a 3 floor brick house, with windows that were blocked by a dark sheet, and a roof made of stone and wood, which was seen as a luxury in Marigold. It seemed completely out of place compared to the lush green area around it. Rodrick knew from his many delivery trips that he was placed somewhere on the edge of Marigold.
There weren't many houses nearby, and this house seemed to be isolated from the others. It looked different from the other houses, this was the only house that wasn't made out of wood. Usually houses on the outskirts would be the homes of farmers, but in recent years farming has taken a toll due to the increase of riots on farms.
Rodrick shivered as he remembered his father commanding him to deliver a threatening letter from the King to the rioters. He had to stand atop a cow and tell the rioters to "go home and wait to be fed" whilst the cow moved and chewed the grass below. The rioters would laugh at him and force the cow to run by pressing their torches onto her. People were having way too much fun with it, eventually leading to the accidental burning of crops and Rodrick's first injury on the job, a broken arm and a concussion.
Rodrick rubbed his arm as he noticed his worn down leather bag was next to him. He picked it up and placed it on his lap, he looked through it and counted all the letters inside it. He noted that his letter to Athena was missing, but the other two letters to the Princes were there. "Perfect," he then saw his royal messaging hat and placed it on his head. He then shifted through his bag, "Where are my shoes? Damn it!" Rodrick closed his bag and threw it down next to him. Behind the Cenobium, the sun began to rise and Rodrick closed his eyes again. As he felt the heat of the sun hit his skin, he meditated, "Only two more to go," he said as he gently touched his neck, feeling an imprint of a hand there. Rodrick had 6 hours until his boat left. He realized this and relaxed, "If Athena- Pandora? If what Athena said was right, then Jeremy would be the easiest person to get the letter to."
So, by claiming this to himself all of his nerves relaxed as he fell asleep again. It wasn't even enough to fall into deep sleep as it was disrupted by a slap to the face. SMACK!
"Get up kid, this bench is not free. If you insist on sitting here, then do me the dubious pleasure of giving me at least 2 and a half marisol for a seat."
Rodrick slowly woke up, his vision was blurry, and he couldn't make out the face of the man who just spoke to him, but he responded, "Yes sir. Right away, sorry." He got up and rubbed his eyes, his vision returned to him as he grabbed his bag, slung it over his shoulder and watched the man walk away towards the Cenobium.
The man wore pink slippers, had a lean figure that was mostly covered by a brown robe lavished with foreign design, all of it was complemented by his shoulder length brown hair that seemed just as permed up as the rest of his appearance. Rodrick slowly got closer as the man started whistling and dancing as he waited for someone to open the door. Who opened it was a scantily dressed woman. The man barked as he shoved his face into her-
"Wait. That has got to be Jeremy Bela!" Rodrick said as he started running up to the door. "Jeremy! Prince Jeremy! I have a message for you!" Jeremy could not hear him, or rather he chose not to hear him. By the time Rodrick made it to the door Jeremy and the woman disappeared into the house. He rushed to the door, and placed his hand on the doorknob, "Damn it! I can't even-" he kicked the ground with his right leg, then screamed silently. "I'm underaged, but no matter the cost."
He opened the door and walked into the Cenobium. Almost instantly a scent overcame him like a wave of heat rising from a stove. He closed the door, and pushed his back against it. He took in the layout of what he assumed to be the lobby. The floors were made of wood planks, the walls were decorated nicely with pink and red cloth wallpaper. The design had all sorts of shapes sorted in a way that Rodrick was not quite old enough to know. "I'm just a delivery boy. You have a job to do Ricky," he whispered to himself as he looked at the lobby desk.
It looked as though the desk was carved into the building, and hollowed out just so a man could stand behind it. It was an elvish inspired design, a rectangle in the golden ratio, with one side of the rectangle being the wall of the building, and the other three sides being a beautifully decorated short wall. On the wall beside both sides of the desk was a door sized hole covered by a dark red cloth that hung slightly above the ground. All of it was symmetrical.
"What the hell is a kid doing in here?" The man behind the desk yelled. "Get the fuck out of here, or I'll call some knights."
"I am a messenger from the Messenger family! Rodrick Messenger."
"Rodrick Messenger eh? I thought Prince Jeremy told the King to ignore this place."
"His majesty is dead sir."
The man froze, he stuttered, "Thank the Great King. Maybe we can finally have some food around here now. Well thank you for the message, I'll deliver it to Prince Jeremy as soon as he is available."
"Eh, do you mind getting him out here now. I must directly make sure that he gets the message. You see it's company policy to make sure messages and letters get delivered on time."
"Get the fuck out of here kid! You're annoying the hell out of me."
"Sir," Rodrick raised his voice, "sorry," he said lowering it, "Can you please just get Prince Jeremy out here, I have an important message to deliver to him that concerns this Kingdom greatly!" Rodrick then pointed to his hat.
The man sighed, "Damn it. The knights wouldn't even remove you from the premises with that dumb hat on," he said under his breath. "Sit down, I'll call him over." The man climbed over the
Rodrick looked around the lobby and sat on a deep red couch. While he waited he thought back to his encounter with Athena and the cult-like environment that reminded him only of books he's read.
"What was that? If she sneaks out to that sort of thing, then she must not have told anybody else about it. What cause was she talking about? I wonder if all of them were mages. Are they elvish? That Elephanta dude was definitely not human, no one has that hard of a grip. Wait, Athena did say to curse me, so I guess he was using magic. Oh wait I do remember reading something about a potential rebel group. I thought they were just remnants of the rioter group from so many years ago. What is taking Prince Jeremy so long?"
Rodrick looked at a clock on the wall that seemed to scream out the time whenever he focused on it. He also noted the strange symbols that outlined the circular device. "It's been a minute, where is he?"
Rodrick stared at the dark red cloths that covered the door sized holes. He imagined himself running in there, going room from room asking for Prince Jeremy, probably interrupting people's sinful times. He felt as though that is what someone of his job as a delivery boy who delivers no matter the cost no matter the place would act. He laughed at himself as he started getting up, but instantly sat back down the moment the man behind the counter came back.
"He said he'll be out in 10 minutes at most. Get comfortable," the man said, chuckling to himself as he opened up a book and started reading it.
Rodrick tried to relax, "I wonder if I have to do my other deliveries. I guess I'm excused. Rodrick would wait 2 minutes before he went digging into his bag and taking out sheets of paper, he took a single one and started folding, creasing, and shaping it into a paper crane with immense speed. He smiled as he silently challenged himself to make another one but faster.
He went to work, going through paper after paper trying to beat his own time. Each mistake made was met with a frustrated grunt. Each successful attempt came with a grand, "Yes!" Each time he ran out of paper (of which he had 20 sheets), he would start to dismantle all of his cranes and think deeply exactly what had happened to him till this moment.
Yet he tried to work past it, he excitedly set all the sheets of paper back up again just to feel his neck and stretch out his collar. Despite that he worked past it, his drive to improve his time motivated him to the point where he lost track of time.
By his 10th dismantlement, his palms were drenched with sweat, as his neck seemed to pulse. By his 15th dismantlement he had already beaten his time, but he felt like he could go just a little faster; by this point he had Pandora's mask etching itself into the lids of his closed eyes. By his 30th dismantlement, he felt like his breath was gone, he wasn't even attempting to beat his time anymore. He was trying to catch his breath as he dropped all the sheets of paper on the floor.
"Hey! Clean that up. I have a specific way of-" the man paused as he assessed the situation and jumped over the desk and came up on Rodrick. "Do you need help?"
Rodrick slowly got a grasp of his breath by gasping for it. "How much fucking time has passed? Where is Prince Jeremy?"
The man looked at the clock then looked back at Rodrick who was holding his neck with one hand and picking up papers with his other.
"It's been an hour."
Rodrick paused, he then quickly picked up all of his papers and shoved them into his bag. After that he grabbed Jeremy's letter and stormed deeper into the Cenobium. "Hey, hey where are you?"
"Don't shoot the messenger! I must complete the delivery."
The man sighed as he made his way back to his desk, "I don't get paid enough for this." When he walked in front of the same door-sized hole that Rodrick ran through he screamed in, "Don't go in there kid! Aaaaah I'm going to stop you! Don't go in the last door at the end of the hallway on your first left. Not that one. Yeah, go back one. Perfect!"
Rodrick yelled back, "Thank you" as he ran down the hallway and reached the last door. He knocked on it as hard as he could and waited. After waiting a few seconds with no response he knocked 3 times as hard as he could and got a response, "I'll be there shortly.
When the door opened a couple seconds later, the same scantily dressed woman, this time wearing Jeremy's robes answered the door. "What do you need?" She asked.
"I need to deliver Prince Jeremy a message."
"Tell me the message."
"It's important that I deliver it."
"I'll go tell him that." She closed the door on him. Rodrick stood there for an unbearable amount of minutes before he began tapping his feet. He knocked again as hard as he could, 3 times. Still no response after waiting another few seconds.
Enraged, his neck pulsed, and he began kicking the wooden door with his right leg with all his might. After his first kick he felt a sudden rush come over him as he thought of all the times his father forced him to get better at delivering letters and his powerlessness from his experience with Athena. He continued to kick the door each with more force than the last. Between each kick he grunted and slowly erased the image of Pandora's mask that showed up whenever he closed his eyes. "May the Great King damn you in life, open this door!" His next kick after that broke the door open.
He was out of breath and limped while he made his way to the singular bed in the room. On the bed were several naked women who stopped whatever they were doing and a naked Jeremy Bela who increasingly grew angry. "What brings your hubris and beastmen like attitude to my bedroom."
"Dismiss these women. They won't want to hear this."
"What gives you the authority to tell me what-"
"Your father is dead, Prince Jeremy. You will be crowned Regent King until Prince Richmond returns. At that point if the Kingdom is all in one piece, you will be given his majesty's resorts and beaches to own for yourself." Rodrick slightly moved his royal hat on his head, then handed the closest girl to the edge of the bed Jeremy's letter. She passed it back to him as he looked dumbfounded. Rodrick then attempted to kneel as best as he could, however he slowly started getting aware of the pain in his right leg. After not receiving a response, Rodrick got up and limped his way back to the lobby. "Oh, I should have said, they probably shouldn't hear this, instead of they won't want to hear this. How could I have slipped up," he laughed as he picked up his bag and made it out of the building.