Truffles

"If you can't push it out by force, can you change the currents so that it would move towards that eruption location." it considered for a moment then nodded in agreement. There was just one small problem left as it couldn't speak the location of it.

"Earth, please form us a map." the earth started to shift gently around him. It started to form, mountains, valleys, and cave systems. The boy didn't ask that but this was something only it knew and it wanted to do a good job maybe even impress the boy. Water chimed in and filled all the places with water that were sure to have some.

A few minutes later, in front of the boy was a pretty good replica of earth. Of course, he had asked for a map but instead had gotten a globe. He wasn't disappointed, but rather enthusiastic. He even praised the earth and water's cooperation.

Suddenly a blade of grass hopped on the globe, pointing to the location of the boy and where they were at the moment. A tiny hot pebble suddenly flew past them and fell into a sea on the other side of the globe, representing the place where magma was attempting to transport the unidentifiable object.

"Why did it have to be this place," he sighed, cursing at his luck.

"I'll go take a look at it and then we'll discuss things again."

As suddenly as they had come, they left, like they had been dismissed by the boss.

There was nothing else to it. He went to the steam to clean the blood and went back into the hut. He stuffed all his things into the bag and looked around for a minute.

He had lived here for almost two years. And now he was leaving. He felt a little bit nostalgic to remember how he had built this hut, the bed inside, and even the basin in the corner was carved by him.

Yesterday he had thought that it would be a shame to leave, he had liked living here all alone, with no social standards, no technology, no comforts. Was he heading back to that easy life now? He was reluctant to return. Yesterday he still had a week to come to terms with it but now, with this much panic from the Avatars, he had no choice. He had to take a look at that thing. What it might be? He was very curious about what it was.

A feeling, a strange one started to emerge. It was so tiny at first, so he didn't notice it at all.

There was another feeling in his chest that he liked a lot, excitement. He was very excited to know what would happen next. Two years ago before he was sent out, he was feeling bored and hoped to find something interesting in this training exercise. He did find it exciting at first, but as time went on, it got boring again. He was just restless because he didn't want to go back to those social standards that he had to be interested in when clearly, he was not.

Outside the hut, he waved to it as if leaving an old friend and walked away.

* * *

The town was situated in the center of the valley.

The journey to it was long. He had built his hut far away from it, for the sole purpose that none of the townspeople would bother him. The whole reason for this exercise was to temper one's self, but he had grown to like it.

The walk to the village lasted for over eight hours. Well, it would have been shorter if he didn't see a wild bore sniffing around. It was big and it was alone. He took it as an exercise once again.

The hunt started when noticed it.

He had made a long-range weapon but they wouldn't do much to it. After all the animal was known for its thick hide unless he could shoot the arrow right in its eye. He wasn't this confident in himself and what good would it do, to get one eye. The animal would get mad and the hunt would be even harder, no it would be too erratic.

What he was aiming for this time was a one-hit kill. He knew where to aim, he just needed the right moment. He was stalking the boar that was just sniffing around. He'd made sure he's sent wouldn't be blown over to it. It took him an hour to find the right place and exact timing to secure the one-hit kill. The boar's side was facing him, it hadn't moved for a few seconds and only sniffed at the ground as if it had found what it was looking for.

The boy seized the moment shooting out of his hiding place and stabbed the self-made knife into the soft part of its armpit, piercing its lungs and heart. The boar was so focused on his search and didn't even react. His life ended then and there. It took a minute before the bore stopped twitching and most of its blood ran out.

Just to make sure, the boy then looked at what the bore was sniffing at. At first glance he didn't find anything, but as he thought of something he started to dig at that location. With just a few scrapes with his hands, he felt something different. It didn't feel like a stone, so he scraped around it and stared at the thing. Sure enough, truffles.

As prominent as his family was, even they had only ever tasted it but not seen a whole truffle before. His family has never been the kind to spend money on things that weren't really important. Also, his family took what they couldn't get with friendly words. In other words, his family's reputation was always on the tip of a sharp blade. It could tilt to one side at one moment and to the other side at the next moment.

That was all grandfather's fault. Things are better now since the grandfather had gone missing and was presumed to be dead. It wasn't a happy occasion for the family but it wasn't entirely sad either. Some even sighed in relief.