Here's the first chapter of the story and no, there are no tournaments yet. The prologue is a bit further in the story.
EDIT: I upgraded chapter one to my liking. I think it's way better now.
Chapter 1: introduction
Hello, I am Joshua Osgar, or just Josh in short. I have brown hair and brown eyes. Some people call me handsome, some people don’t. I have always dreamed of being a knight and to fight in tournaments, but so far I am too poor for that. I’m also member of the Osgar bloodline and the original Blue emperor himself was originally my family. I am currently 14 years old and I live in a town called Drewdale. My house is in the west section of town. It’s a small house and I would have liked another, better house, was I not an orphan. It has only one floor and is split into 3 sections: Bedroom, Room with table and a room with a fireplace, for cooking. I live there with only my sister. I work at a farm a bit east of Drewdale, where I earn some money to keep us alive. My sister mainly does the cooking and buys food at the market. Drewdale is a town in Osgar and is surrounded by deep forests. The road west of Drewdale leads to Kindrake, where a rank 8 tournament is located. In this world, we have several gods we worship. For us Osgarians, the only god is Lufia, god of growth and harvest. We make sure we burn some grain in the fireplace every morning to honor him.
When I woke up, I noticed it was late in the morning. ‘Time to get up’ I thought. I stepped out of bed and put some clothes on. My sister was still sleeping, so I woke her up and said ‘I thought you were coming to the farm with me today?’ ‘Yes’ she replied ‘But Greg is not here yet, is he? Maybe we should go to his house.’ She said while putting some clothes on. My sister, Rinsi Osgar, or just Rin, is a pretty woman of my age. She is rather tall and has long red hair. I like how I can really sink into her dark brown eyes. She is smart too and can handle a knife pretty good. “We do not have time for breakfast, so lets go to Greg to see what is keeping him from coming.” She said.
We stepped out the door after burning some grain in the fireplace and locked it. Then we took the road leading to Greg’s place. “I heard his parents got back from the tournament.” Rin said “Really? They usually are away for quite some time.” “Yes, well, it is something I heard, so I am not really sure.” I knocked on the door and awaited awnser. ‘Who is it?’ we heard. ‘It’s us, Greg, open up!’ Greg is my best friend. He helped me with a lot of things. His parents bought my house and gave it to us. I owe almost everything to them, so I respect him very much. When the door opened, Greg stepped out and shut it really fast and said ‘You guys, what are you doing here?’ ‘You were late,’ Rin replied ‘so we came to pick you up.’ “Let me at least grab something” He said. We waited outside untill he returned. “What are you bringing with you?” I asked. “None of your business” He replied.
We walked on the street when we passed the market. “Ah, looks like a new load of grain has arrived from Hillside” said Rin. Hillside is a village to the east of Drewdale, There is lots of rich soil there so lots of food comes from that place. “We can use what we earn today to buy some supplies” I said. We left town and headed for the farm. There are some bandits in this region, so we had to be very careful not to make to much noise. The road to the farm was about 2 miles and it took a while to reach the farm. There were lots of trees and bushes. “Lots of places to hide in” I thought. “I smell something rotting.” I said. “Yes, I do too” said Rin. “It’s probably nothing, or not much” I heard Greg mumbling. “What’s with him?” Rin whispered to me. “I don’t know, he seems to be in a bad mood.” Upon reaching the farm we all were shocked about what we saw. The farm roof had collapsed and there was lot’s of rubble to be cleaned up. There was smoke coming from under the rubble and I smelled something burning.
While wondering what had happened, Hank, the man who Greg and I worked for, came walking from the back of the farm and greeted us. Hank is old, he’s nearing 40 and requires help a lot of the time. He is small, but also stronger then you would think he is. He has blond hair with grey eyes. He always has a certain smell around him that makes you feel comfortable and relaxing. ‘The storm caused me roof to collapse.’ He said ‘There is alot of mess to be cleaned up and I could use your help.’ Hank stared at Rin as he hasn’t seen her before. She shuffled with her foot. ‘Hank, meet Rin, my sister’ I said ‘Rin, this is Hank the man who I work for’ ‘Greetings sir, I would like to help’ Hank turned around and stared at his house. ‘Ok, I want you to go to Drewdale and get some wooden bars and branches for the roof’ Hank hands me some money. ‘Here’s some money that you’ll need. Now go and don’t come back without the stuff. Take the cart and go!’
We left the farm. When we reached the forest road Rin said: ‘I didn’t notice any storms. I would say he’s hiding something.’ ‘Don’t say that!’ I shouted ‘You have no clue how much Hank has helped us in the past! He would have told me if something had happened.’ ‘I agree, Hank would never lie to me.’ Said Greg. ‘Let’s make sure we buy the stuff and…’ I didn’t end what I wanted to say. I felt huge pain in the back of my head and collapsed to the ground. ‘Let’s get the other two!’ was the last thing I heard before passing out.
I stood in the middle of an arena. The arena had a faint red glow around it and I smelled rotting animals. I shuddered. “Rin? Greg? Are you in here?” I shouted. No response. Upon closer observation, I noticed that the arena didn’t have a red glow. The walls were made out of stone, but they were covered with blood. There was blood on the ground too. The sand was dark red. “Well, well, well, what have we here?” The icy, dark voice scared me and I slowly turned towards the source of the sounds. There was nothing. “Over here!” This time, I quickly turned around. What I witnessed, was not supposed to be seen by human eyes. A woman, dressed in black, with black hair and a black skin. There were two things that made her really scary. She had glowing red eyes and she was flying in mid-air. She was very tall and she seemed capable of killing me, so I didn’t reply “I was hoping for your sister, but it seems the bandits have other plans with her. I should really punish the fools” she said. “You!” she touched my forehead with her finger, leaving a red tattoo. “Go now and be sure to stay with you sister, things might happen to her.”
I woke up after a while, but I couldn’t move yet. The sweat was still on my face and I was cold as hell. I turned my head to the right and saw Greg, knocked out on the forest floor. I saw something I hadn’t noticed before. He had a faint red tattoo on his head. It must have faded over time ‘Get your hands of me!’ I heard Rin shouting. ‘You’re all mine.’ said an unknown voice, followed by the ripping of clothes. ‘No! Get off! Get off!’ Shouted Rin. “Is he trying to…?” I went berserk. I stood up and ran towards the bandit, who was not paying attention to me. I grabbed my knife from my belt and stabbed the bandit in the back 3 times. The bandit screamed in pain and tried to throw me off his back. After a short struggle, I managed to thrust the knife in the back of his neck. Suddenly, there was lots of strain on the body I was holding and the bandit collapsed. As I stared at the body, I heard someone approaching. While I was turning, I got smashed in the face by a heavy mace and slammed against a tree.
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