Now, where was I? Oh yes. My cannon fodder, I mean, childhood friends. One person that deserves more description is Lilly. Sweet Lilly. She had flaming auburn hair and a pair of equally fierce green eyes to go with it. She was a little warrior, and everybody, including me, had a crush on her.

“Are you bullying the smaller kids again, Reed?” And before Reed could even deny these accusations, he’d see a fist flying into his face. “Valerian! Aunt Ivy saw you being sneaky!” Boom! And then he was sent flying from corner to the other. Oh, me? Well, I guess I took a few hits as well, nothing really spectacular. Valerian was the one that was at the receiving end most of the time.

It was little wonder Lilly was capable of fighting at such a young age. After all, her parents were both royal guards of King Oleander. Great old man. Long white beard. He didn’t last very long, unfortunately. But we’ll get to that later.

Lilly was living with her grandparents, but her parents regularly came over and taught her a lot of… fighting techniques. I mean, what parent doesn’t love to go home and show their six-year-old kid a thing or two about the stock exchange, aromatase inhibitors, or pouring concrete. Yeah. It totally makes sense.

But above all of this, Lilly was an extremely pious girl. Unlike her parents, Lilly wanted to become a practitioner. Yeah, these are devout followers, kind of like monks, only with less celibacy or misogyny. Everybody respects you when you’re a practitioner. You get to wear elegant linen robes that are color-coded depending on which Order you are in. Did you swear to adhere to Nu’s teachings of love and equilibrium? You’ll be dressed in white. Pledge yourself to protect the weak, no matter the cost? Welcome to the Order of Seth, here’s your vegetable-green outfit. You might know this already, but we had a total of seven deities: Next to Nu and Seth, there were Osiris, Horus, Isis, Nephthys, and Geb. Each Order under their command came with certain perks. Let’s look at Nu, for example. If you joined her Order, you not only received the primary combat education but also access to a plethora of books in the fields of mathematics and astronomy. Most of Nu practitioners were scholars and civil servants. If you chose to become a combat practitioner in this Order, however, you’d belong to the few elite soldiers this kingdom has to offer. And if you are the cream of the crops there, it is highly likely that the goddess Nu herself will bless you, enhancing your physical capabilities and endowing you with the gift of magic, if you don’t already possess affinity towards it.

The top position was becoming a Representative of a deity. The god or goddess in charge will bestow upon you even more power, and it is said that some Representatives serve their gods for several hundreds of years. That’s some dedication, I guess.

Naturally, a lot of children (probably their parents!) aspired to become a practitioner. Fame! Glory! Good pay! Pensions! Whatever the reason, you’d have children lining up each year before temples, trying to get accepted. Obviously, not anybody can become a member of an Order. Each deity has its requirements, which ranged from being proficient in magic, displaying extraordinary strength, or being merely good at negotiating. But once you’re in, you’re set. And career choices are near indefinite. Yeah, Orders do not only offer a religious sanctum, but they are also exterminators, diplomats, handymen, you name it. Wherever there’s trouble, they’ll come and fix the problems for you. No need to bother settling payment issues with that plumber who used cheap spare-parts, but billed you the brand ones. Whatever Order will gladly take care of you! For just a small fee, there will be no plumber to settle payment with anymore!

You may have guessed it by now, but our gods are very real. They resemble us a lot, albeit they are slightly taller and their skins are very dark. Some have feline traits, such as cat eyes. Or they might have outlandish hair colors. Whenever they make an appearance, you can be sure there’s a commotion.

Back to sweet Lilly. While Lilly had no aptitude in magic, she had keen combat skills. And she dreamed of becoming a Nu practitioner. Good for us that we had a Nu temple in town. I’m pretty sure she would have quickly passed the recruitment test, which required maneuvering through deadly Parcours and mock battles with high-level practitioners. Unfortunately, Lilly would not live until the recruitment year. To add further insult, she was the reason I got into a mess in the first place.