Gary started crying as happiness began to overwhelm him. After all, it was his dream to become a knight. Seeing this I remembered, in the end, Gary was only five years old. Even though he often acted more mature for his age.

  As Gary was walking off the stage our eyes met. He quickly rubbed his tears away and gave me a thumbs up. I had never seen him act this way before, and honestly, didn't know how to respond.

  A couple more contestants took the test before me, ending in the same result as previous contenders. Gary was the only one who had passed so far.

  It was my turn to step on the stage, as I walked up to take my position opposite the doll the villagers started talking.

  "It's him, the cursed boy"

  "Did you hear what happened to his father?"

  "Does he think he can become a knight?"

  Their words didn't matter to me cause right now, I only had one goal in mind. I took out my sword and held it in my hand ready.

  ****

  Wilfred and Barnado were sitting next to each other discussing the contestants of the village.

  "It looks like there will only be one from this village"

  Barnado said.

  Just as Barnardo had said those words something seemed to catch Wilfrieds attention. It was the boy who was coming to the stage.

  "The boy has red hair!" Wilfred said jumping out of his seat.

  "Ah, yes and so this marks the fifth one," Barnado said putting his hand on Wilfred's shoulder to calm him down.

  Delbert was now in the rotation of assessing candidates. He didn't think much of the village or the common folk and never suspected much out of them.

  When Ray had appeared on stage with his red hair, he could see Wilfred getting exited from the corner of his eye. This only infuriated Delbert more. He didn't believe in the so-called prophecy. He believed that all knights should come from a noble background, how could the hero come from a village like this.

  With ray standing firm with the sword held in his hand, Delbert could see the confidence that Ray had. Upon activating the doll Delbert decided to do some tinkering. He went behind the doll and whispered.

  "Level 3"

  Unlike with the other contestants, the doll started to move towards Ray. As the doll quickly dashed with its wooden legs at full speed.

  Wilfred stood up in his seat.

  "Delbert how could he!"

  Delbert thought if the prophecy was true and this person was meant to be our saviour, then this should be an easy task of someone so great.

  The doll continued to move towards Ray until the strike was inches away from his face. When suddenly a wooden head could be seen rolling around on the floor. The doll had stopped in its tracks.

  Ray had swung his sword so fast that no one was able to see. Only the three knights from Roland had seen Ray's magnificent speed.

  Once the news of his father sickness had reached Ray's ears, in preparation for the upcoming exam Ray had decided to hunt some more Basic tier beasts. He had obtained some crystal and right now his points had reached 36 compared to the 7 they were before. Ray had felt as if he had taken control of an entirely new body.

  *****

  With passing the test, the knights had told me and Gary to say goodbye to our families and pack our belongings. I knew this would happen as my father had informed me that once you passed the test you would start straight away.

  I headed home to get a few things. honestly, I didn't have much as I didn't care for human things, none of this stuff meant anything to me. Before leaving I went to the room my father was occupying.

  I saw him lying there repeating the same words about the shadows.

  "Dad, I passed the knight exam, I know you probably can't here me…… but I will find a way to make you better. "

  As I said these words my dad stopped speaking for a few seconds. I didn't know if it was my imagination or not but a slight smile seemed to twitch on his face. My father was still in there fighting.

  I headed out to the front door to say my final goodbyes to my mother. My mother's tears hadn't stopped since she heard the good news. She had always been a worrier.

  "Ray, I want you to take this with you before you go" She handed me a blue circular pendant and proceeded to put it around my neck.

  "It's a family heirloom, hopefully, it will bring you good luck just like it did with me." She said.

  With my goodbye to my parents done I proceeded to head to the carriage at the edge of town. I was happy to finally be leaving this place once and for all. There weren't many good memories I had of this town. The very few that I did have with my family and Amy had now become bad ones.

  As I reached the edge of town the three knights were sitting on their horses waiting. Inside the carriage, I could see that Gary was already sitting inside. I quickly ran over to the carriage and hopped in picking a seat away from Gary.

  As the carriage went away from the village I looked at the view one last time.

  It had been 3 hours since leaving the village with Gary, and we still hadn't said a word to each other. The silence was killing me. being the adult I decided to break the silence first.

  "So what happened to Amy I didn't see her around?" I asked.

  "She went to Roland academy, didn't she tell you?"

  "The mage school!" I stood and shouted.

  In all the times that we had spoken, she had failed to mention that she had magical abilities.

  In the middle of our conversation, the carriage came to a sudden halt.