"Okay, so how do we find out what my quest is?" Liam could feel frustration growing in him with Ezra and the whole situation. He also started to think the quest would take longer than he'd like.

"Usually the traveler just goes about his business and then the quest sort of presents itself. Sort of like how we met. You just ran into me."

"You ran into me!" Liam corrected.

"Details, details, just let me tell you about our world. You have entered the land called Snotworld. We are named this because of the great snot mines in the Booger Mountains not far from the capital city of Phlegm. The people of this land are called the Snots, although those of wealth and position are called Boogers, and the rest of us are called, Little Snots."

Liam stared in disbelief at Ezra for a moment. He then began to realize it was no less strange than anything else he'd experienced up until that point. He figured he should probably just listen for now.

Ezra continued, "So there is a country to the south of us who are our mortal enemies. They refuse to call this land Snotworld, but refer to this planet as "Hanky" and will often attack and seek to wipe out all the Little Snots. Back a few years ago, they made it through our defenses, and we had to flee into the Booger Mountains. There is a great keep there which we call the Clogged Sinuses, hidden behind a large waterfall we call, The Great Runny Nose."

"So, welcome to Snotworld!" Ezra wiped his nose with his hand and offered it to Liam.

Liam was so grossed out that he almost threw up his soup, but didn't want to be rude. He slowly took Ezra's now sticky hand and shook it.

Liam sat in silence for a moment or two. It all seemed strange to him. His head was spinning and every minute that passed made him miss home more. He had to start to make sense of some of it all. "I just have one question. Why are all the princesses up on top of mountains?"

Ezra looked thoughtful for a moment. "You know, now that you mention it, that is kind of strange. I mean, where would they get new dresses to wear each day? No princess is going to wear the same outfit two days in a row."

"Really, Ezra? Really? That's the only thing that seems strange about each mountain having a captive princess on top of it?"

Ezra stared back at Liam for a moment as though he found it difficult to understand Liam's question. After a moment he simply continued. "So, Snotworld is normally ruled by a king. This king is chosen by a magical box in the castle. After a king dies, they use the special key and open the box. In the box, each time a new king is needed, a note appears with the new king's name and that person rules until they die."

"Normally? You mean that's not the case right now?" Liam asked.

"Normally that's the case, but right now they seem to have misplaced the key for the box. The king died last year, and no one knows how to open the box without the key. So Smeetho, that was the royal advisor, stepped up and named himself Regent until the key is found and the new king is named. The king rules in the castle in the center of this city, and the city's name is Kings-Home."

"Kings-Home? That's not overly creative." Liam didn't want to be difficult, but it was all a lot to take in, and he was feeling very irritable.

"What do you mean?" Ezra asked.

"Kings-Home! Home of the King! Don't you think you could have come up with a more creative name for the city?" The frustration with everything that had happened today from his run-ins with Harry to being sucked down a toilet into another world to everything here in Snotworld had brought Liam to a point where politeness was no longer important to him.

"I don't follow you," Ezra replied.

"AAAAAAHHHHH!!! Kings-Home? Home of the King? This is the King's Home?"

"Ohh... when you put it that way it makes perfect sense, doesn't it Masha?" Ezra looked over at Masha with a look that seemed to say, 'Just go with it... this traveler may not be all here.'

In response, Masha screamed something unintelligible at Liam and brandished the soup ladle at him in a threatening manner.

Liam decided to drop it. He knew he was in a world where many ways of doing things and ways of thinking were completely different than his world. He would just have to learn to roll with it.

Just then the door burst open. An old man leapt into the room and screamed, "Where's my soup???"

I hope you are enjoying the first part of Arestana: The Key Quest. Keep reading to find out what happens next! If you want to get a hold of this entire story, you can pick it up from Amazon, Chapters, Foyles or just about everywhere else!

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