Chapter 1: Chapter 1 One or Two
Lord Of The Stãrs
Chapter 1 One or Two
"Where am I?" Mat stood up and looked around, he saw that he was in a grass field. It was night and many stars glistened in the night sky. The smell of flowers danced around him as he laid back down.
Mat looked up and admired the night sky as he basked in the Moon's light. A smile crept up onto his face as his eyes felt heavy. Mat closed his eyes and he felt relaxed.
...
"Solemn! What are you doing!?"
What the, Who is Solemn? Wait, why am I so small? This isn't my body. Where is my body? Wait, am I in the body of a kid!? An old woman walked up to Solemn and poked him with a cane.
"You know you can't be on the roof."
The roof? What ro-ooooh, I'm on a roof, wait, why am I on a roof? What is happening? Didn't I die in that hospital?
Oh well, I have always lived by the motto fake it until you make it. Even though I have no idea what's going on, I should go along with what's happening to find out. I find it funny how people just don't get how I can just go along with things that they couldn't. Solemn stood up and went down the ladder.
"Are you ok?" A young woman with brown hair and blue eyes, who looked to be around 23 ran up to Solemn. "Did you fall?" She checked to see if Solemn had any injuries.
"No I didn't fall, and I'm fine" I feel so weird being talked to as a kid, I am 31 years old, well I do have a different body so can't judge them. I wonder what this world is. I need more information as I am severely lacking in general knowledge.
"Come on let's go inside before it gets dark." The young woman gestured for the two to follow her inside.
Once Solemn walked in he heard a voice from a girl with Dark green hair who was holding a teddy bear. "Hello, Solemn did you get scolded or what." The sas on this kid is crazy, what are they feeding her, Sas pasta and sas bread?
Once Solemn and the two women sat down inside the young woman's smile turned from caring to straight up spine chilling. What the, why is she giving me that creepy smile? Is she going to kill me?
The young woman took a big breath and shouted out "WHAT WERE YOU DOING ON THE ROOF, DO YOU KNOW JUST HOW WORRIED I WAS FOR YOU? YOU COULD HAVE FALLEN! YOU ARE ONLY SIX, WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO SAY FOR YOURSELF?" The younger woman baraded Solemn for a couple of hours without stopping. Throughout the whole ordeal, the old woman was just sitting there eating some snacks.
Solemn felt a sudden surge of drowsiness as Solemn gained the memories of the original Solemn. What, are these the memories of the real Solemn? How did I gain the memories of Solemn all at once, shouldnt that overload my brain? The new memories are probably the reason I am so tired.
The name of the woman yelling at me is Rebecca, and the old woman is named Margaret. There are 14 kids here, the one In this room enjoying the show with the teddy bear is Melicine and there are 7 other girls aside from her and they are Alice, Selty which we would always call Salty, Elise, Juli, Relem, Kat, and Felice. Come to think of it everyone has a weird name because Margaret's taste in names is worse than the disappointment I gave my mother. There are 5 other boys aside from me who are Bob, Josh, Ross, Gary, and Michele.
Thankfully ever since Margerate named me and Rebecca had had enough she named the rest of the kids which were Alice, Bob, Ross, Josh, and Michele. This place is actually really well-kept, I think the reason for this is that there is a guy in the capital who has a crush on Rebecca but is too chicken to confess so he just helps to spend as much time with her as possible.
To be honest, I think Rebecca is using the fact he has a crush on her to get the chores done quicker, poor guy he's being used. I should apologize before the issue escalates. "Sorry Mother" Solemn looked down and avoided the woman's deadly gaze. Hopefully, I won't get in too much trouble. I think the reason the rule exists is because there used to be 15 kids but one fell and snapped his neck. I don't remember him too much since I was only 4 when it happened.
The young woman was not anyone's biological mother, but she preferred to be called mother. Even though she wasn't our true mother, we still thought of her as our mother. Come to think of it, I don't think anyone has ever called her by her name.
"Go to your room and think about what you have done." the young woman said while massaging her temples. Solemn headed to his bedroom as it was better to comply rather than argue. Solemn opened the door and looked at his room in astonishment and horror. The room was filled to the brim with books of all kinds. How did the original Solemn even sleep here? After climbing on the books, he found his bed and went to sleep.
"Breakfast!"
Solemn jolted awake, the smell of eggs, ham, and potatoes danced around Solemn. He fell down the stairs but played it off and kept running to the table. There was a long wooden table with many children sitting in their respective chairs and the old woman from before was handing out the food and cooking.
Mother doesn't cook for us because she is still learning, and the last time she tried to cook something without help, she burned down the kitchen. But at least we have a better kitchen now. There used to be some lead plates, but everything since the Emperor of Alono announced that lead was poisonous they were banned from kitchens.
Many people say that the ban on lead being close to food was one of the only good decisions made by the Emperor. A boy with red hair who was named Bob tried to sneak an extra egg onto his plate, but the old woman slapped his hand away.
"No more food until you're done with the food already on your plate. And Melicine, stop poking Bob with a fork or I will ground you." Melicine then copied Margerate in a mocking tone. "Girl, what did I tell you?"
Melicine looked back at Margerate and while twirling her hair said, " I don't remember since it was not impor-" Before she could finish she was hit in the head with a shoe from Rebecca. "Oooooo, Melicine is getting in trouble."
"Shut up Alice, at least I don't look like my hair was painted cyan." Alice's veins were practically bursting from annoyance and anger. "Bitch your hair looks like barf."
"ALICE, MELICINE, STOP THIS NOW AND GO TO YOUR ROOMS!" Rebecca grabbed the collars of their shirts dragged the two kids and went upstairs. Damn, those two really do go at it at times. Selty tapped Solemns shoulder and said, "Hey, wanna go and play hide and seek with us today?"
"Sure." Solemn accepted the invite since it was the perfect excuse to go and map out the surroundings. Thankfully, I am a master bullshitter so I can come up with a way to explain why I am acting differently if they find out. Solemn started to eat his breakfast and reluctantly finished all of the food on his plate.
This food is so good, I thought that with the lack of spices, the food would taste bad but it's good. I wonder how Matgerate did it. everyone was done they met up under a large Sakura tree. I did not know Sakura trees could get to 130ft.
"So who wants to be a seeker, we need two volunteers"
Both Solemn and Melicine who had somehow gotten ungrounded volunteered.
"Ok 1, 2, 3…. 1000" When Solemn finished he saw Melicine rush towards the first person she saw with incredible speed and a smile on her face. Damn, she is fast, I am pretty sure she is going over 30mph. While she finds them I am going to map the area out.
…After 3 hours…
After mapping out the area I have learned that three miles two o clock from the orphanage is a cave that is hard to spot and get into. I have also learned that a river runs from 4 miles 10 o clock to 6 miles 6 o clock.
"Hello!" Melicine who had sneaked up on Solemn jumpscared him. "Hello, what do you need?" Melicine smirked as she hopped down from the tree. "You think I would not notice You are not helping, how stupid do you think I am?"
"Come on we should head back." Melicine started to walk back with Solemn. "So why do you wear your hair in a side ponytail and enjoy battle so much?" Melicine started to ponder the question and said, "Well it is because my role model has a side ponytail, and I just love the thrill of battle."
"It's kind of funny we are opposites as I hate battle but we are still such good friends." Melicine turned her head to look at Solemn before muttering something to herself. "Hey let's make a promise, let's make a giuld once we grow up. It will be 8 years until I hit the legal age of 16 and 10 for you but I'll wait. After all, I will need a good strategist."
Solemn put his hands behind his head and sighed. "It seems I have been caught." Solemn then tried on a rock as he was not used to his own body yet. "Haha, even though you know where to go to avoid others you still suck at combat."
After a while of walking the two finally made it to the meeting area where Roxy was trying to beat Bob up. "You stupid boy don't you ever touch my books ever again."
"It's quite peaceful isn't it Melicine."
"Yes, yes it is."
...
Once Solemn finished, he went to his room and retrieved his hidden stash of money. Over the years, the original Solemn had saved 235 cams. One cam was about $3.
Wow, the original Solemn was good at saving up, $705 is a ton of money, especially for a 6-year-old. I wonder how he got this much money. Oh yeah, I remember now, Melicine and I share this money. I will only take 5 cams with me since I don't want to be a walking atm, oh, and I should also take 5 cams to bribe the city guard into letting me in without an adult.
Ever since the Emperor allowed slavery again people have been abducted off the streets every day, except for celebrations because there is at least one guard per 5 people which is insane. I do have to not use slang in front of others since the slang I know is different from the slang in this world.
Every day I find myself hating that Emperor more and more. Solemn put on his shoes and headed out north towards the capital of Alono. I believe that the city is called Curren. I scouted the city when I was playing that game but that was during rush hour so I couldn't see much. After five minutes, Solemn made it to the gate. The gate was huge and had engravings on it, if I remember correctly these are Coloradoian.
"Halt! Identification, please." The guard who wore heavy armor and a spear blocked the way for Solemn.
"Here you go" Solemn handed the guard 33 cam. "Thank you for complying. You may pass through the checkpoint." The guard pocketed the money and opened the gate. Solemn then went through the gate.
The city was quite massive as the capital was so big there were 3 mayors. I believe that the city is only the size of Central Park but has an underground area. The city towered above the clouds and at the very top was the Royal palace. Ever since the immigration act, people of all cultures have been moving into Alono, so the city looked like a mixing pot of everything. As long as I don't go to the underground I will be safe.
The people and the guards would force the lower class and homeless to live in the underground as it would "keep the unsightly out of mind, Curren is separated into 4 areas, the East is for business, the North and south are for people, the West is for the recreational facilities, and the middle is for the royal family and government.
Curren was like this for as long as anyone could remember. Curren is the widest in the middle and gets smaller the farther up or down you go. The only problem is that one of the floors collapsed in the bottom so only 30% is available. The Emperor doesn't want to use funds from the rapidly decreasing treasury even though 3.7% of the Empire's money is used by him for his entertainment. Which is equivalent to 37 million cams.
Solemn walked through the busy city. There were musicians, magicians, and shops everywhere. People were painting, enjoying their time, practicing, everything you could think of. You could hear the music everywhere you went. Some played classical songs while others played folk.
This place is so busy and full of talent, not to mention the variety of cultures. I wonder where the main plaza is? What I need is to find work so that I can save up more cam.
Before I explore I should ask about the zones from a local. Solemn entered a café called "Meso"
A small bell rang as he opened the door. He saw a man with dirty blonde hair in bartender attire cleaning a glass."What would you like?" What do you mean what would you like, I am 6. Oh, I almost forgot there are no laws against it. "Can I please have your recommendation? So can you tell me about the city?"
The bartender slid over a drink that was green and had a smell of plants. There are 10 sections to the city, I will list from top to bottom. The highest is the high peak which houses all the important nobles and royal family, the second is the Artist and Musicians layer which as the name suggests houses most artists and musicians. The third is the handout layer which has most parks and malls, fourth is where the military and government operates. Fifth is here and is the commercial layer, and sixth is the residential area. Seventh is the utility ring, eight is the rave layer, ninth is the place where gangs are and all of the shady places, and the tenth is where the homeless converge."
Solemn looked at the bartender confused while drinking his drink. "I thought it was separated into five sections, is it not?"
The bartender chuckled, "Kid, let me tell you something, never trust official information. The government is even more corrupt than the Emperor."
"So kid, wanna work here? I can tell you have what it takes and I just fired an incompetent employee, I mean I killed him but anyway. What I need is someone who will search for more information, I will pay 10 cams an hour. The only requirement is that you allow us to orchestrate a false death. So what will you choose?"
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone