The Innkeeper

“Have we met?” Lex asked, completely oblivious to her angry looking expression, mostly because she looked like a cute little doll. “You seem familiar, but I don’t know many people here.”

“You sat next to me at the mess hall! And now you’ve done it again. The entire hall is empty, why do you have to sit next to me? I like my personal space!”

Suddenly, Lex recalled the embarrassing encounter and couldn’t help but laugh. He took a look around the hall and, indeed, there were many empty chairs.

“My bad, I’ve been really out of it so I’ve kinda just been running on autopilot,” Lex explained as he got up and moved to a different chair. But, while he was no longer sitting right next to the familiar girl, he was still close to her.

“My name is Lex by the way,” he introduced himself, but the girl just made a ‘hmph’ sound and looked away dramatically flipping her hair as she did.

Despite his stressed mood, Lex chuckled. To be honest, he really wasn’t in the mood to be chasing girls. But, on the other hand, socializing a bit might be good for him. It wouldn’t help anyone if he burnt out due to stress.

A short while later, their professor entered the room. He was an old man, with a massive bald spot on his head, crowned by streaks of white hair. He was a thin man, almost frail looking, but walked with the vigor of youth.

“Welcome to the ‘Basic History of the Crystal realm’. Despite the title, we do not study history too far back, and our course begins 100 years prior to the Kraven war. As most of you know, most of the basic level subjects focus on things related to the Kraven, for they have dominated the trend of the realm these past few centuries. If you want to advance your knowledge beyond the region of influence of the Kraven, you will need to take the more advanced courses.

“Our lesson begins on the day of the coronation of King Cornelius II, after his father passed away on the battlefield. Back then, he was still a boy at the tender young age of 16. The Hum nation did not exist back then, and the territory that composed it…”

Contrary to Lex’s expectations, he actually enjoyed the history class a lot. The focus of class was not specific dates, or remembering numerous people, but rather a few key people who influenced monumental events.

For example, neither the heritage nor any significant life events of King Cornelius II were discussed before his crowning, because it was only after he became a King that he became relevant to the history of the realm.

Back then, the Hum nation consisted of hundreds of smaller countries – of course, smaller only being a relative term. From Lex’s understanding, some of the smaller countries here were bigger than continents back on Earth.

Cornelius, who inherited a country at war, led the most successful campaign conducted by a human, and expanded his country by so much over the next century, no one dared to challenge his reign.

When the Kraven war started, approximately 300 years ago, Humans were not originally involved. There were two races whose territories neighbored the humans, namely the Sentinels and Varns. The Kraven came from somewhere far away, beyond the scope of understanding of the humans, and waged war with whoever they could reach. Roughly 80 years after the humans heard of the Varns being at war, the Kraven’s finally took enough to be exposed to human territories as well.

No one expected that they would involve the humans in the war, for that should be to their disadvantage, but they did. Not only did they wage war, they came with a fury that wiped countries from existence in a matter of days.

Realizing the seriousness of the matter, Cornelius convinced the humans to band together to face this threat, and paid a great deal to even request the Sentinels’ help.

Finally, the humans were able to hold off the assault. But hold off did not mean reclaim, as slowly and steadily the human forces were worn out, and once again started to lose land. That was when, under the leadership of Cornelius, the Hum Nation was founded.

For the first time in history, faced with the threat of extinction, humans put away their petty grievances and joined together to face the threat. As for those who resisted, Cornelius gathered them up and used them and their entire families as the first line of defense against the Kraven.

But even so, slowly and steadily, they continued to lose land. It came to the point where the border to the Sentinels was exposed, and they too became involved in the war, not for profit from the humans, but to defend their own lands.

While humans had been on the losing end of the war, guided by one concentrated effort, human technology and civilization underwent a time of rapid expansion. Their cultivation techniques improved. Their weapons became deadlier, their warriors fiercer, their resolve stronger.

That’s when grave news came from the Varn. The Poliods, the first race to encounter the Kraven had been completely defeated, and the remnants of their race escaped wherever they could. They joined the other nations in their war efforts, for though they had lost their home, the race was not dead. They fought for the hope that one day, they would succeed.

All of this happened in the first 150 years of war, and there was another 150 years or so to cover when the class ended.

Their professor told them that he would first give them a general overview of the history of the relevant time periods before they delved more deeply into significant events.

The class ended, and the students started to disperse, but Lex remained seated. All the other students had some knowledge of the war. Only he was just learning of it for the first time. This war, whether he wanted it or not, was very significant to his immediate future for unless he found a way to return to the Inn, this was his war too.

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