Materia Book 1: A Survivalist's Guide

“Verily and well met! I will begin this journal by musing on the essence of language. Language is the fabric that knits together societies, it weaves into our stories, it darns our relationships. It is our greatest tool for survival. Unfortunately I was thrust from death and stripped of my greatest joy. But fear not my friends because with my great knowledge I will be over to overcome this piddly obstacle. I spent my first few days soaking up the environment studying these large creatures who speak foreign words. But alas I wasn’t able to quite overcome it. I needed more research and more adventure. Thankfully a small goblin child named Gearorge introduced me to some kindred spirits and we set off to brave the new world! By staying put and inspecting our camp. Other refugees informed our scrappy team that their loved ones were taken. Dragged off into the night by dangerous foes. Of course we do what heroes do and spring into action following a muddy trail left by the mysterious villains. We trail the trail and find a pretty glade and a dragon who takes up residence in it. The dragon speaks our language, which is curious to me. Gearforge helps this small poor creature by fixing a clock and is rewarded thusly. Continuing to trail the trail the muddy tracks turn into two sets of footprints. Somehow we are able to ascertain with our great detective skills that one track is an angry mob. It leads to a smoldering village. Fire still licks the tops of buildings and the air is thick smoke. My eyes sting as I step into the desecrated village, my chest pounds with anxiety, my head swirls with questions. Who could have done this? What should I do? And are there any books I can translate? I unfortunately do not find any words but instead a child. Cowering in a building covered in soot. I cast detect languages to speak with this child but she refuses to speak and cannot understand me. With a bit of quick thinking and fast magic I disguise myself as one of her kind to get her to converse. It works, of course. She tells us that creatures like me came to the village and rained down fire from the sky. I am sobered by this information but alas there was no choice but to leave her behind where she would be safe and pick her up later. The tracks diverge and we choose to follow the large folks instead still intent on finding the refugees. It leads to a clearing where we find a group of them clearly ready to fight. I am able to disarm them with my wit and charm and they decided to capture instead of kill us! They take us into the city and I use my great brain to listen to them speak. With each word I place another stitch to weave my understanding of their great language into my being. We are led into the city and come to some big doors with giants towering over us. They let our captors and us pass and we are forced to follow through and thrown into a prison with no recourse to correct this massive malicious mistake. At least for a few minutes until a giant walks up, who speaks to us in our language. He introduces himself as Gorian of the Nephilim Giants. We convey our story and he seems to believe us, saying that we can ask for him if we ever need him. But enough with all that! For my rapt readers I have finally done it, I have cracked the code written myself into the narrative and can speak the language of the people.Huzzah!”