—Yawn.
Thorsten watched as his reflection matched his poorly suppressed yawn, mouth wide enough to swallow an elephant as his face contorted with the motions.
"…"
When he was finally done, he wiped away the tears on his eyes then let his gaze wander outside the carriage window to find a large bird cruising in the clear sky.
His earlier excitement when they had left the towns gates had long since faded, in its place, the lethargy of an elderly sloth had taken its place.
With nothing other than sleep and staring out the window, there wasn't much to actively do other than that.
And with his stomach still in the process of breaking down the lunch he had eater earlier, a sandwich and a fruity beverage, sleep wasn't something he was inclined to peruse.
Partially due to having already been awake for so long, but mostly due to being able to feel the contents of his stomach swishing around in his stomach as the carriage continued along the dirt road.
Thorsten's mind jumped back to what had happened an hour ago, when Rowena had awoken him to eat lunch.
In the moment, he was a been surprised when he looked outside to see the procession had stopped, because in his mind, he hadn't considered that they would be taking any breaks. This, and the fact that he was of the mind that he would just eat something while he was still on the road.
It was only after he had fully woken up and seen what was happening that he realised how naive he had been; even if they did have cars, staying on the road for several hours without any breaks was not possible for a normal person.
Him expecting horses to do the same was inhumane, especially when they were traveling on uneven terrain and pulling so much cargo.
Another thing he had noticed while having his small picknick was that not the only beasts of burden traveling with them.
There were other, non-mammalian animals, but the ones that stood out most were the larger, darker, twin horned steeds a handful of the knights were riding.
They looked like horses, but the ram like horns growing from their heads and the fierce presence around them made them stand apart from the rest. Them also being kept separate from the others made them stand out twice as much.
'Now that I think about it, they were kind of like evil unicorns… bicorns, right?' Thorsten didn't dwell too much on them, his eyes lazily tracing the clouds drifting overhead.
His tongue swept across the inside of his mouth, tasting the sweet aftertaste of his earlier fruity beverage as he pivoted his thoughts.
He jumped between one incomplete idea to the other, his mind sifting through the numerable observations he had gathered in this world.
Eventually, his mind returned to a discovery that had caught him completely off guard; time.
For a while, he had unconsciously been of the mind that it passed exactly as it had on Earth; twenty-four hours a day, not a second less.
So, whenever someone anything relating to it would come up, the assimilated memories from Thorsten would quietly fill in the gaps before he ever had any reason to question it.
The realisation of this was neither grand nor brilliant; it just happened one evening where he was lying in bed and wanted to know how many hours in a day he'd spent in front of a book.
But after adding up the hours, he realised that the estimated free time would not equal to the expected twenty-four.
He'd then spend a few minutes tossing and turning before eventually deciding to consult a clock the next morning… where he saw that 12 o'clock was two hours before midday.
Though the extra hours were not the only surprise, as he had immediately gone to find a calendar to confirm a budding suspicion that had taken root with this new realisation.
That was when he discovered this world's days lasted twenty-eight hours, and its years stretched across thirteen months.
A small, tired sigh escaped Thorsten's lips as he settled his weight into the carriages leather cushions.
Looking back on it, that day stood out like a sore thumb when compared to the bleak and repetitive days he had been living in the palace.
Outside, the scenery had shifted a bit as the path ahead meandering over the rounded, hilly terrain.
Thorsten blinked slowly, his eyes searching passing the clouds overhead for familiar shapes as the fingers on his left hand tapped rhythmically on his knee.
And while his eyes were fixed outside the window, his mind had drifted inward as began revisiting a topic he had long since given up on trying to understand.
It was regarding the fairytale book he had chosen to leave behind; a decision spurred on equally by the discomfort it brought him and not needing with the notes he had already written.
But oddly enough, the subject of his thoughts was not one of the stories he had written but instead of the note he had discovered at the end.
He could understand that it was some kind of warning left behind by who he presumed to be the books author, but anything further than that was still a mystery to him.
With each attempt he made to decipher the faded ink brewing more questions than answers.
The message itself was already vague and messy, so he concluded that whatever sense he could make out of it to have strayed from the original writer's intentions—a message so distorted that its original meaning remained solely with its author.
Thorsten ran a hand though his hair, trying to sieve through the thoughts that had gone deeper than he had intended.
He tried to shift his focus towards a lighter, less troublesome topic, but his mind somehow kept finding itself returning to the idea of the note.
The tapping of his fingers slowed for a moment as his vision centred on a whale shaped cloud.
'Maybe I'm placing too much weight on what that note said...' The thought surfaced again before quietly fading.
From the prince discovering the ancient library, to the princesses forgotten magic and even the spell that saved the Sorcerer King's people—all of them had just so happened to gain what they needed just when they needed it.
'… Then again, it does make a smidge of sense if you look at things this way—'
Even without the full message to look at, he was still able to identify elements within the fairytales that matched with what he thought it was trying to say.
'—a series of events so catered that it couldn't have all been just a coincidence.'
Granted, if you looked at them as simply being children's stories then it made sense, a hero needed an epic tale; one wrought with strife to make their eventual triumph both inspiring and deserved.
But that same, almost identical pattern was observable in every single story, barring its variation and appearances.
But this perspective wouldn't work if he wanted to delve deeper—to understand them, and the intent behind that message—he'd have to view each story as an embellished recount instead of a simple fairytale.
He had already tried to explore the stories from a more conspiratory perspective when he finished breaking it down. And a common factor he'd discovered was that:
All of them, every single story had each of their heroes gaining the 'something' that allowed them to reach their goals.
No matter how insignificant that 'something' was, it was always the missing piece in the puzzle that somehow always fit in where it was needed.
If this was your normal children's book, then maybe it could be excused as fate of the main character's halo, but such a convenient excused wasn't something he would be satisfied with for a conclusion.
Even with the characters who an argument could be made towards them not having received much, the simple fact that their stories were triggered by an exterior force was clearly no coincidence.
For example, the boy who would eventually become the Hero King had his village lit ablaze by bandits after he had turned down the man's offer.
That tragic event had both relieved him of the debt he felt towards his grandparents as well as becoming the foundation on which his knight's path is built upon.
And then, there was the explorer who discovered the city at the edge of the world; a criminal exiled from his home who was given an impossible task as the condition of his pardon.
Following a series of fortunate coincidences and run-ins with the right people, the explorer eventually discovered that very same item while sailing the vast and dangerous oceans to reach the world's edge.
Although the argument could be made that he wasn't a criminal, as this was merely speculation built upon noticing that the ship had a tailored Jolly Roger instead of a coloured flag.
Even if he did consider it, it only affected his original assessment of the character and not the greater whole.
Something always happened.
An event that tore the heroes away from the lives they had been living and set them upon a path they would otherwise never have walked; towards achievements that they themselves had never dreamed of.
It was almost as though every story had been waiting for that single moment, expecting it, even.
'A catalyst...'
His finger continued their rhythmic tapping against his knee.
He had no proof that the stories were connected by anything more than coincidence.
Even so... He found it difficult to believe that so many lives could all change in exactly the way they needed to without some outside interference.
'… But who—No. What?'
If what they had lived was only a part of another's game, then who were its players?
Of the possibilities that came to mind, he could find neither a motivation nor a hint of their presence.
A heavy, defeated sigh left Thorsten's lips as he realised that he had hit another, higher wall.
'… I'm just going in circles.'
His forehead rested lightly against the cool glass that was the carriages window.
Outside, another oddly shaped cloud drifted overhead.
'That one looks like a chicken… a duck?'
He stared at for a few seconds longer, trying to decide which of the two it was before finally concluding, 'Other than being able to fly, they're both still birds.'
Just as that thought faded into the back of his mind and his eyes had wandered elsewhere—
'… Huh?'
—Thorsten saw a torpedo shaped blur tear through the head of the chicken shaped cloud, the dispersed clouds trailing along its tail as it flew overhead.
"Umm…?" He was at a loss of how to proceed, then ended up just staring with his finger pointed and jaw lowered as he processed what he was seeing.
Rowena noticed him in the corner of her eyes, looked up from her book towards him with an inquisitive brow raised.
"Is something the matter?"
"I think—" Thorsten started, not entirely sure if what he just saw was real, "—I just saw a dragon."
With an amused smile on her face, Rowena leaned over and pointed towards the other, smaller, winged creatures trailing behind the initial beast.
"That's just a gale of… obsidian scale wyvern, it appears." She hummed softly before adding, "It's quite rare to see them during the day, especially during this time of year."
Thorsten couldn't find the words to respond, his focus entirely on watching the flying creatures, or rather, wyverns soar through the clouds.
He did wonder for a moment how Rowena was able to identify the specific type of wyverns they were, especially when he had barely been able to identify one as not being a bird.
But those thoughts didn't linger, he just figured it had something to do with the glasses she had perched on her nose and left it at that.
Even after they had flown far into the horizon, Thorsten's thoughtful gaze stayed fixed on the spot they had disappeared from.
It wasn't entirely due to his being amazed but rather due to the relief he felt now that he was finally thinking straight—he realised how terrifying it would have been if the first one he was actually a dragon.
Ancient creatures that had long since disappeared from the world, leaving behind only distant descendants whose blood had thinned over countless generations.
A faint chill crept up his spine as his mind drifted towards the only dragon he had ever known of.
Not a true dragon, but an artificial imitation made in their image by their very own descendants.
A product pieced together from the buried remains those ancient creatures had left behind; all within a metal shell with embroidered scales.
He recalled how despite its strength, it was supposedly only able to exhibit a fraction its model's power.
Yet despite that, it was a boss so overwhelming that the threat of its was enough to end century long feuds as they united to resist its mechanical wrath.
It was the type of enemy that even if you were successful in defeating it, the half of the world that hadn't been turned on its head was either burning alive or drowning slowly in the aftermath of the battle.
Failing to stop its completion was so detrimental that most players would rather start a new run then salvage whatever remained from the ashes.
Thorsten quietly exhaled as memories of his attempts at it began surfacing in his mind, but he forced them away as quickly as they came in favour of smaller, more manageable flying lizards.
Although they weren't revered like dragons, wivern's still stood out amongst the other descendants due to their close resemblance.
'It would have been nice to see the wiverns a little closer.'
Thorsten's eyes lingered in the empty stretch of sky for a moment longer, before closing them to pass the time with a short nap.