I quite liked the first chapter, there were many moments that made be exhale audibly through my nose
However, there are a few things I would change. Firstly, I feel like Harendall losing his verbosity around his cat was a little strange, as if he lost an important character attribute. That being said, when he is verbose, maybe tone it down a little. Remember that you are trying to appeal to teenage-ish people.
Additionally, I noticed that the plot progresses rather quickly, with a very fast pace. At certain points it felt a bit ‘clunky’. Like the spherical object of magic imprinted with the number 8 of the variety ‘04’ mentioned above, some more in-depth descriptions would be nice.
Lastly, many of the dialogue sentences follow a similar pattern:
"Dialogue", said the character.
While you have found alternative words for ‘said’, many of these talking segments follow the same structure, what is being said followed by who said it. A nit-pick, I know, but it helps with cohesion. For example, I would re-write this sections:
Original
“Dinkums, you sure blurt out a lot of nonsense for a creepy gravekeeper. Go bother someone else.” Snapped Jordan before the gravekeeper could go on any further. “But young lad, you are the only human being capable of withstanding the pressure of the adventure I am offering you.” Replied the gravekeeper.
Like this:
Rewritten
“Dinkums, you sure blurt out a lot of nonsense for a creepy gravekeeper. Go bother someone else.” Snapped Jordan before the crazy old man could go on any further. The Gravekeeper grew frustrated. “But young lad, you are the only human being capable of withstanding the pressure of the adventure I am offering you.”
If you could tie in more elements of cohesion and what-not, I’m convinced that this could turn into an extremely solid novel. Good work, I look forward to chapter 2!