Page 3336 -- CCLXXXI.

Chapter Two Hundred Eighty-One: ‘The opening of the dark chorus...’
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Loren Lighteyes tapped his foot against the stony floor, trying to have patience and not quite succeeding. Joining up with Caster Egmond’s new sect within the Freeman Fellowship had certainly proved to be a roller coaster so far.

In just the last two weeks, they’d visited half a dozen Abolish strongholds--and it wasn’t entirely clear why, either.

Obviously, Caster had plans, but he apparently wasn’t yet keen to share the details of them. And while being kept in the dark was nothing new to Loren, he still didn’t exactly love it.

Loren’s reaper, Rezolo, seemed to think that it was some type of recruitment drive. With Loren being the first one to join up, it made sense that Caster would want to gather more followers.

But if that was what he was doing, then he sure had an odd way of going about it. Because Loren was still the only one following Caster around.

Maybe the Marauder of Calthos was just being picky. That was what Rezolo kept saying, at least.

And there was some logic in that, too, Loren supposed. Viable candidates for the Freeman Fellowship were few and far between within Abolish, and if Caster wanted to be even more strict beyond that, then Loren had a feeling that they might never find anyone else to join up at all.

But the main reason he didn’t entirely buy Rezolo’s interpretation of events was because Caster wasn’t just going around and striking up conversations all the time. That was part of it, sure, but there were also times when the man simply stopped, closed his eyes, and stood still for a while.

It was almost like the man had just suddenly decided to start meditating out of nowhere. Loren had never known anyone to meditate standing up--and so randomly, too.

And when Loren asked him about it, Caster gave one of the strangest answers he’d ever heard.

“I am communing with the land,” he’d said.

Loren had of course asked for elaboration, but he hadn’t gotten it. Instead, Caster just promised that all would become clearer in time.

Pretty damn odd, this Marauder.

And then, of course, there were the arguments. Despite visiting so many Abolish strongholds, Caster wasn’t exactly acting friendly towards their hosts. Sometimes, he seemed to enjoy antagonizing them. Other times, he clearly enjoyed it.