9 Chapter 7 First Holder II - Memories of the Past

The sun had gone down and the moon was already visible in the starry night sky. The villagers was enjoying the night breeze relaxing to the sound of nature, except Aki though. Jumping on her bed as she was holding a magic book shouting the spells she was reading.

"Abra Kadabra!"

"Bim bam patiboomboom!"

She continued shouting until she noticed the moon from her window. Jumping out from her bed, immediately took her magic book and her old lamo with her as she hasten to the door and made her leave. She sneaked behind the houses so no one can see her going to the forest, she doesn't want anyone questioning her for going out at night.

Meanwhile, Haru, a merchant from a far, far kingdom travelled hundreds of miles just to trade for his goods. Holding his map, questioning where he was, he seemed like he was lost in the woods. There were no forests in his map so he was starting to get worried.

Unlike the village, his kingdom was more advanced, ranging from using water as a source of electricity and having more knowledge about weaponry. He was a father of two with her wife, Hana. Unfortunately, one night, his wife went missing after going out to deliver the food that was requested from the king. She was a baker that delivers the food she makes, it was pretty odd getting a request for delivery at night but it was the king, she can never refuse it. The following morning her body was found dead near the river without her clothes. He immediately went there and as he saw her body, anger and hatredq filled his mind. There were bruises everywhere on her body, you can't even recognize her face if you dont know her. Her eyes were swollen and there were signs of blood coming out of her mouth. Haru was angered by what happened and went to the castle to ask the king for help him in finding the culprit but he refused.

"Why would I use my power for a plebeian like her?" he grinned. That moment he already realized who the culprit is, it's the king. His face shows no remorse from what happened to her and in fact he was smiling.

"But for a plebeian she was quite tasty" he whispered to his ears and those words destroyed his heart, that moment he didn't care for who he was, the only thing he cared for was to kill this bastard. He punched his face so hard that he lose his balance and fell to the ground. He continued punching his face until his face was covered in blood. Putting his hand on his neck to check for his pulse but there was none, that was the moment he knew he messed up. Luckily, there was no guards in the room so he made a quick escape but it didn't take too long to find the murder, his personal servant went in to his room and found out what happened. He spread the news to the entire kingdom and put a bounty on the culprit's head.

Haru knew that sooner or later they will know that he was the killer since he was the last one the king had met with. With those in mind, he packed his bag with his stuffs and escaped the kingdom with his two children. He went to a neighboring kingdom whis is pretty far from the old one. Weeks have passed when they were already starting to live their new lives until..

The gate of the kingdom was opened, it was a huge gate that serves as the main entrance from the outside, typically merchants from different kingdoms enter their to have their trades. But it wasn't, instead it was countless men riding on their horses with fancy man leading them, it was the servant. He was already heading outside the gate until a loud voice was heard.

"Everyone listen, Im pretty sure all of you already knew what happened to our king a few weeks ago and unfortunately, we havent seen the culprit. Good news is we already knew who HE is" Haru made a big gulp when he heard that, he's sure that the servant already knew that he was the killer. "He is Haru Taguchi, we received some information that he's now here" he announced

"I knew that name! They started living in that house!" someone in the crowd shouted, pointing his hand to his house. Haru ran to the house as quickly as possible but it was too crowded to cross through. The servant and his men had already went inside his house. The people in the crowd kept talking on what's happening, screams can be heard from the house then two gunshots pierced everyone's ears, they never heard the screams afterwards. There was a short pause until everything went crazy. The crowd went into panic and people started running in all directions but a man standing in the middle, it was Haru. He was still standing, staring at his home, wondering what happened. His mind went blank, not realizing that tears were already dropping on his face. His senses came back to normal when someone bumped into him making him fall. He was scared, not just scarred for life, he suddenly became like a kid, running as he was continuously shouting. He kept on shouting and shouting until he can't even say anything at all. He didn't mind the heavy load on his back, he didn't mind the people panicking, his family was only in his mind. His family that stayed with him through all these years, now are long gone. He is now the only one that remembers them and for them to continue to be reminisced , he needs to stay alive. Once he dies, their family will be completely forgotten in this world, leaving no marks for posterity.

He left the village devastated, he continued walking for hours and hours, passing through mountains, valleys, rivers and everything in between, taking stops each time he gets tired. Days have passed since he started his journey, he already experienced finding food in nowhere, hunting dangerous animals and knowing how to produce clean water, he was already a master of survival. He started to reach the limit of his map and that's when he was lost in the forest, leading to where it all began.