A New Call, and My First Encounter…

It's midday, and Cari has made some track to the outer section of the forest, nothing monumental has happened since helping that flower, and he's been wondering a few things as he traveled, one of the latest ones being…

"What should I say, or more accurately 'do' once I make contact with the humans? It's obvious I can't talk, and I doubt I can make do in conversation without communication.

Luckily enough, as En gave me his knowledge, it also came with the understanding of the common speech! Even though I can't respond, I can at least understand them, and I am sure there can be some other way to communicate, like answering yes and no questions…

And then there's also the fact of that practice En gave me, considering the development of the village I saw, I don't think I need to worry much about my abnormal condition getting out.

But the most troublesome thing is…

The animals!"

Thankfully, he hasn't seen one as of yet, he is at the furthermost edge of the inner part of the Ginnimos Forest, so meeting one here was unlikely, however, he has gained multiple memories so far of seeing animals eat mushrooms as a source of food, even some of the races ate it as a delicacy, even if they weren't 'alive' like he was and conscious, just seeing it gave him the shivers.

"I'll need to learn to avoid them, or at the very least, escape them… I'm not ending up as someone's dinner!"

He resolutely thought that as he jumped over a root; he has crossed a couple during his trek, they were still fun, but as he thought more and more, he noticed it less and less, till the point it didn't bring anything out of him as he focused on his thoughts.

He also had been trying to speak random things as he traveled, and, as always, all that came out was abnormal, low and dull sounds.

~Allloooooona~

Once he landed, he noticed a hint of brown at the furthest part of his vision, exciting him, he started to jump at a faster pace.

"That must be the outermost of the forest. While I haven't quite figured out the exacts, I have my own guidelines on what to do, and if I find myself in a precarious situation, I'll either run, hide, or a combination of both, with my small size, I can hide almost anywhere."

As he approached the outer section, he noticed how different the trees, grass, heck, even the atmosphere started to feel different…

"The trees look so much more sturdier, large, and, brown! The grass and leaves look more of a dark shade of green, this part of the forest looks more dense and vigorous, nature-bound, warm!"

While the leaves made a never-ending sea of green in the air, it didn't quite impede the light from making its way to the ground, and the scale of it all was massive; the trees looked even taller than the previous ones, giving an immense amount of space between the ground and the bunched-up groups of leaves intertwined together, making a greenery celling essentially.

As he crossed between the inner and outer part, he found it actually quite strange how the two border each other… it was a clean cut, almost too straight & clean, too abnormal in a sense but still somewhat ordinary looking.

"Bizarre…"

He was squirming his way into the outer into the new section when he felt something, once again… a feeling not quite belonging to his body, but to someone else's , but this time, it felt more… big, large?

He couldn't find the word, just… of a larger scale than the flower, and this time, it felt less directed at him, but more frayed and indirect, but the level & amount of terrible-feelings was equal, if not more-so than the last time, which considering how it's spread out instead of concentrated, yet more significant to the amount the flower had, indicated worry out of Cari.

It was north-east bound, a whole-other direction than the human village, but he didn't care, he immediately started heading into that direction, as a feeling of unexpected urgency started to erupt from Cari, as he approached and got more and more closer, the feeling was getting exponentially stronger; while it was the same for the flower, it was on a much smaller degree, making it easier to handle.

He started to feel lightheaded from the amount of it forcing its way into Cari's head, and he started to slow down, as he couldn't deal with both it and his accelerated speed, but, unwilling to slow down, he pushed forward, until he accidentally collided into the tree's root with his lower half.

His mind was getting so disorderly that he couldn't even perceive the pain of getting dragged across the group from inertia, much less get up from his position as he fell face-first into the dirt as he tried to, so Cari laid there, unable to both process his thoughts or move with this feeling starting to dominate his mind, if he had not learned to fight against it with the flower, he would've fallen long ago.

"....."

He couldn't think anything at a conscious position, but at a subconscious level, he was thinking of why he was putting himself through this in the first place…

The amount of pain was unbearable, and his body was already crumpling like a piece of paper; it was all too much for both him and his body to handle, his newborn body just wasn't meant to handle this influx of pain, negative pressure and stress, it was obscene in both caliber and amount…

Yet, even with all of this against Cari…

He still remembered that someone else was feeling this, going through it, right…this…second, they were dealing with such an tremendous amount of pain, on their own…

He hated that…

He truly hated that an existence, just like him, was going through such a horrid amount of pain, just to experience it-

'They are feeling worse than this…'

The idea of them feeling much worse than this, that he was not even close to the level of pain to whatever being was feeling this pain, was gut-wrenching; to think he's not even close to the amount of pain they were going through set off something in him.

Some small part of Cari was trying to stop himself, make him see reason…

Saying that this was risky, stupid, and idiotic; that putting themselves through this level of pain and torture for a single, individual, "random existence", is ludicrous, not worth it, and to stop this nonsense immediately.

As Cari listened to this smallest part of himself rave, he agreed with it, but… he found there was just something wrong about just not doing anything about it to him, only two words popped into his head...

"Warmth...

Kindness."

He found himself smiling for no particular reason, with nothing but one, singular thought resounding throughout his mind, silencing this part of him, unknowingly, forever…

"To strive in the face of resistance, of opposition, is what it means to be strong, and to do that for the sake of another, is what it truly means to be kind at heart."

This opposing force of negativity, pain, and torment being held over him, cracked, and was weakening bit by bit, losing its grasp; with every thought, Cari was gaining his bearings, standing taller than he ever did before…

'help.'

'Help…'

"HELP!!!"

He finally managed to forcibly get his head and uncontrollably shaking body under control as he got up, and sped at an even faster rate than before.

Cari didn't notice at the time, but his glow concentrated on his body, leaving a flickering green light outlining his body as he jumped from one spot to the next.

At one point, a deep imprint of his body was made in the ground from the amount of force pressed against the dirt.

He approached whatever was feeling the pain with a feverish fervor, the horrible feeling still present in his mind, and soon enough, he noticed the outline of what seemed to be an old village, which although worried Cari, did not stop him, as the feeling was eclipsing at this location; whatever was feeling this horrendous pain was here…

He locked onto the building where the pain was coming from, which coincidentally, was surrounded and packed in its porch by beings of green colored skin.

He didn't focus on the looks as he rushed at the building; there was a back & forth ramp before the porch, which was leveled off the ground by multiple beams of wood, along with the main, circular-ish building of a dull, yellowish stone like material with a straw roof.

Thanks to the somewhat lanky bodies of the entities, Cari weaved through the pairs of legs as he finally slowed down upon seeing the being that was emanating the pain that has been overwhelming his head…

It was resting on a bed; it was taller than the rest of the individuals, only by a small margin though, somewhat lanky like the others, green as well with a sort of dull-cyan color for hair trailing from the head to slightly below the shoulders, however, the green was extremely pale, and currently, someone was holding its hand.

Almost immediately, the people behind Cari started to speak, however, it went unnoticed to both him and the being holding the unconscious persons hand, as both were under heavy influence, one with negativity & pain filling their very body, and the other with grief & fear plaguing his mind…

That one was crying.

Before they could even finish a word, Cari made multiple miniature jumps, from the floor to the desk beside the bed, right beside the one's head that was creating all the negativity, opposing the one sitting in grief.

He assessed it, and found what was causing so much pain…

The body was ridden with injuries, ranging from wide wounds carved into the body, to pieces of flesh being missing, to even blood leaking from the eyes that were bandaged, which made Cari uncomfortable.

He didn't spare a second look to either the others or even if he was safe before he began working.

First, he used lifelight to scour the body to see any leakage & loss of life energy, which, seemed to be massive as the silhouette was almost completely empty; whatever happened to this one, it was not a normal occurrence.

He immediately spurred to action, he used all the pain he has been receiving from this person as the foundation to provide a sense of a 'target' with the person to make the healing more effective, along with using both his and the environments life energy and letting loose his glow.

"Restore…"

The surroundings lit up instantaneously, the surrounding people were shut up by the instant glow, and the one standing near to the whole thing stopped crying as he was caught off guard by the instant feeling of…warmth?

They all felt it as it soothed their panicked body and soul; it was as if they were in their safe space where all was okay, it felt like an overbearing, smothering sense of safety & comfort, like you were in the embrace of those dearest to you, it pacified yet dulled their minds, but this was only for an instant, as they snapped out of it once they saw what the mushroom did next.

The entire room which was filled with the green light suddenly was loaded with thousands of tiny, speck-like balls of energy as they revealed themselves throughout the room, and they all gathered to the open space of the roof, then, they all started to flow like water into the injured person, along with more of them seemingly flooding out of the mushroom.

They were being healed at an immaculate speed, wounds to shallow cuts, disappearing as if they never existed in the first place, the parts missing seemingly being filled in by the orbs of green energy before becoming the solid regular flesh of its skin, and from multiple points of its body where the life energy was entering, its skin color was returning, all the blood left on its body disappearing along with the orbs as they dispersed into the body as all the energy coursed at an constant speed.

The process was no longer than a minute and no shorter than a couple dozen of seconds, yet it felt so mesmerizing and captivating that they all were unsure of how exactly long it was.

By the time the glow dissipated along with the orbs, the body was fully healed along with the body no longer radiating that pain that was making Cari go crazy…

Once he was done, he checked the body one last time to check, and he found the body no longer leaking abnormally from the injuries, and the amount was replenished to a healthy quantity for the body, at least what he thought was a healthy amount...

His taxed mind from both the process of the healing and from the pain was finally able to be relieved.

With the immense burden off his shoulders, Cari was able to finally think clearly without the stress & negativity clouding his mind.

His head was immensely dizzy with the sudden retreat of the stressing factors, with his body following suit, as his head kept dipping from one side to the other.

Cari was able to keep himself up with the will to make sure both he and the one he healed were alright, as he was unsure if the healing was completely thorough and if he was in the safe position to rest.

"What do we do?"

Someone from the crowd murmured, which went unheard from Cari as he was still very much faint & shaky.

They were unsure on just what to do, this situation was completely unexpected and unforeseen, they were too deep in thought before to even think of what to do with the situation when the mushroom made its appearance, now, it was even more confusing on what to do, as it just healed who they were fretting over, they were too much in a state of shock and confusion to think of the action to take.

From the front of the group, side by side, three figures emerged, they approached the bed, with the one on the left of the trio a step further than the other two.

It was the Chief's daughters and their mother, and they were walking up to meet with the one who was watching over their beloved in the bed, the Chief himself, who was too shocked himself to think of what just happened.

Once the three of them came to his side, they stood together in silence for a bit, as they were still just a bit too dumbstruck to say anything, they looked at each other, the person in bed, then at the mushroom who just solved their grievous problem in the span of less than a minute...

"This is a miracle…"

The mother of the daughters spoke as she placed her hand over her husband's, as his was over their oldest, the one in the bed, they embraced each other, as the newfound tears on their faces were of happiness, with the other two joining in on it.

A rough voice, although a bit unsteady and light from the previous crying, spoke with a confidence of a leader, and the love of a father.

"Then let's thank the one responsible."

With that, they heard the shifting of the blanket, and the father & mother felt a tug on their hands, and they noticed their daughter start to shift on the bed, as she naturally used her free hand to take off the bandage from her head.

Once it was off, and her eyes opened, blue, she looked from her mother, to her sisters, to her father.

"Dad…"

The voice itself wasn't weak at all, which was expected from one near death's door, it was only slightly meek from just waking, but that was all I took for the family to immediately all collapse onto the girl, smothering her.

"Mom! Dad! Lisa! Amara!"

She started to sob as she listed off each of her family members, as if she hasn't seen them for a long time.

They were together and crying for a solid minute or two, with the crowd also being affected by the overall atmosphere, a few sniffling and some even shedding a tear, seeing the heartwarming moment of their leader.

It looked like they weren't going to stop anytime soon until an audible ~thuk~ sounded throughout the room, it was small, but with only the short sniffles and mumbles of comforting reaffirmations from the family, there was no-one that didn't hear it.

Everyone looked towards the sound, most already half-knowing what caused it, and their thoughts were confirmed when they saw the mushroom fell on itself, now in a sitting position; its head was no longer dipping from one side to the other but its whole body was vibrating to no end.

The oldest was feeling a bit odd when looking upon the little one, it felt like she already knew it, yet she knows with clarity she never came into contact with… whatever this creature is, as if recounting a fact, yet the feeling persisted, denouncing the fact.

She already knew it healed her, as no one in the entire village has the ability to heal, and this one was the only new 'thing' that could be the cause, and there was this subtle, yet noticeable connection that she could feel, it was waning, but it clearly directed towards the shroom, it felt… like it was 'used' for some purpose, which she guessed had to do with how this little one healed her.

She felt ineffably indebted to the little one, and was feeling concerned as its body was very telling to its current condition.

Cari saw how she was now up and alright, and that alone sufficed for him to relax, and as he was unconsciously closing his eyes from the relaxing feeling of the stress retreating, he noticed a pair a hands moving directly towards him as his eyes fully closed.

The last thing he felt and heard before he slipped to unconsciousness was something cozy and someone speaking the words…

"Thank you…"

"…"

"Is it…?"

"Just sleeping… despite it looking like it's not breathing, it feels… so warm… it's okay, just resting, it must have exhausted itself."

"You can hand…it…to us, Olivia, you should get some more rest, your probably still very tired…"

"No, I feel alright now, I… don't feel tired, weirdly, at most, hungry."

The father sighed, as he relented, not wanting to push anything more after this straining event, even after almost giving in to death, her oldest daughter was still as feisty as ever.

He smiled to himself as he turned to the crowd and announced, with his daughters behind him holding onto him, with his wife by his side holding his hand, with the oldest daughter sitting up in the bed with a gentle smile, with Cari on her lap, on top of the blanket…

"LET US HAVE A FEAST FOR SUCH A WONDROUS MIRACLE!"

The crowd cheered onward towards the beautiful skies as the crowd immediately dispersed out of the house into groups as they chatted away.

It is now early evening, and that is how Cari came into contact with the goblins…