Life Story
Page 1
Ever since he could remember, Jean had been the only human living in the dwarf village of Marle. His foster father, the dwarven locksmith Heath, would only tell him a friend had entrusted him with Jean.
However, Jean already knew the truth. The children of the village often threw stones at him and mocked him, saying he was an orphan abandoned at the foot of a tree.
Instead of stopping the children, the adults of the village looked upon him with suspicion in their eyes. Whenever something was stolen, Jean was the first to be accused. Accidents, disasters, the townsfolk would blame every misfortune on Jean.
Each time, his foster father walked on, head hanging low. Jean always felt terrible.
Page 2
As he grew and became taller, Jean stood out more and more in a village of dwarves, his gangly form becoming yet another irrational subject of mockery by the dwarven children. Jean started keeping to himself in the house and helping Heath's locksmithing. At least this way, he could lean a skill and be of some use to his foster father.
One day, as he was moving some materials to the storehouse out back, he came upon his father surrounded by a group of villagers.
They berated Heath for teaching a human lockcraft, for even taking in one such as Jean, while he desperately tried to defend his foster son.
Seeing his father persecuted for his son being human, Jean decided then and there that he had to leave the dwarven village.
Page 3
So that was exactly what Jean did, despite Heath's protests. Ten years soon passed, and he has made his living through the Adventurer's Guild, never once returning to the village.
His skill as a locksmith helped with dismantling traps, making him highly-sought-after by many. There, Jean did not stand out because he was human, and it was not uncommon for some of them to have grown up without knowing their parents. For the first time Jean felt like he was allowed to be human.
Everyone in the guild knew of Jean's hatred for dwarves, as he refused to team up with any regardless of how handsomely the job paid.
Yet if he were drunk enough, he was known to start bragging about a certain dwarf, saying with a nostalgic look that, one day, he would get a rare ore that no one had ever seen before and take it back to them as a gift.