The Holy Spring

The road to Estrall is long and arduous.

I have been walking for three days and still haven't seen a single sign pointing to Estrall. Before I left Edensville, I asked several people which direction Estrall was in, receiving the same answer every time: 14 days by carriage southwest.

I would have taken a carriage, but not only was the road not a direct path, but I also got a strange feeling from the carriage drivers. They all had weird, defeated eyes, like nothing they ever did would change their lives. I decided to walk the entire way, which would take me an undetermined amount of time.

Thus far, the journey has been relatively uneventful, with the occasional wild deer coming to investigate me. I also do the majority of my walking at night, mainly because it is currently the summer and is as hot as Muspelheim. The nights are cool and comfortable, especially with a nice breeze flowing through the trees.

As I travel, I find myself becoming closer and closer to nature; My senses are heightened slightly, allowing me to hear and see more than I could when in the city. The nights are becoming brighter as time goes by, despite the lack of moonlight. The only way I can determine I'm going in the correct direction is because of my compass and my mother's bow, which gives off a dim glow due to the runes covering it.

I reckon it's been several hours since I started walking tonight, the sun setting shortly after I awoke. The trees in this section of the forest are more giant than they have been, clearly a different species. They are so much more extensive, in fact, that I can no longer wrap my arms around them. They are also clearly much taller than before. Not only that, but my rate of travel has dropped drastically due to having to step over the massive roots of these trees.

As I reach a small clearing, just having exited an extremely thick portion of the woods, I look at my compass, which I had been checking regularly to not get lost, only for the said compass to have a reading drastically different from the one I saw not 30 seconds ago. There was almost a 90-degree difference.

I scratched my head in confusion, and I wondered what was happening.

"How? I was just walking straight through…" I scratched my head in confusion. Wasn't I?" Just then, I got the Idea to simply retrace my steps, which was relatively easy as I had moved the brush and left a slight path from where I had come from.

As I walked back into the thick brush, I watched my compass constantly. The readings were the same for about 20 feet, but then the compass needle suddenly changed back to the correct reading; Southwest.

"Something is messing with my compass!" I exclaimed out loud. I had no idea what was happening, but clearly, I was being messed with in some way. "Okay, let's think here for a second, how is something messing with the compass? Magic? How do compasses even work?"

The compass is attracted to something, right? Something in the north? Then, whatever the compass is attracted to in the north isn't strong enough to attract it to this area. Does that mean there's something important in the direction of the compass?

Or something dangerous…

And then I heard it. A sound that triggered another memory flashback.

A bloodcurdling scream.

…

"AHHHHHHHHHH!" A womanly scream emanates from inside the cabin, causing my father and I to whip our heads from our spar to it.

"MOM!" "VEL!"

We instantly sprinted to the house, my father practically disappearing from his spot and appearing in front of the door in the blink of an eye. He ripped the back door from its hinges and dashed inside, and as I arrived at the door, I saw an intense scene.

My father was standing helpless in front of a man shorter than him by a good bit, a man who had brutally removed my mother's hands and now held her by her hair with a short sword aimed to slice her neck wide open.

I puked out my lunch at the sight.

My mother's eyes were watering in pain, even as her hands began to slowly grow back. My father was clearly pissed, but he could do nothing but watch. I could see my mother and father exchanging a look, clearly worried about one another. As they did this, the man chuckled darkly, sending a chill down my spine and weakening my knees.

The man, who was covered in black from head to toe, removed his mask as his deep red eyes shined with killer intent. His face was average but covered in scars. One, in particular, covered the rest: a dark scar that came from his upper left eye down to his chin in a slicing fashion, clearly made from a sharp weapon of some kind.

Then he spoke, in a deep and evil voice that attributed to his image perfectly, "Thür Gunvaldsen, United Gulven calls for your head. And by the looks of it, your son's as well. Don't worry though, unless she interferes, Your bitch will keep her life." The man's words enraged me beyond belief, my fear exiting my body faster than it had arrived. It was a trait I received from my father, who also seethed under the man's cold, uncaring gaze. Clearly, the two men had a history.

"You die. NOW." Thür said between gritted teeth, clearly trying to control himself despite his immense rage.

The Gulven man suddenly dashed forward, slicing at Dad with two swords, one of which came out of nowhere. The swords didn't even pierce my father's impenetrable skin, but Dad was knocked back through the wall to my right. The Gulven assassin lunged after Dad, my father sending me a signal to help my mother. I nodded, which he didn't even see, and dashed towards her, helping her up despite her hands being almost entirely regrown. Not even 1 minute had passed since they were lobbed off.

She looked up into my worried eyes with an intense expression, and I immediately knew she didn't need my help. She stood quickly, having recovered from the shock of losing two limbs at once, and grabbed my arm. We immediately ran out of the house, my father's fight, destroying trees indiscriminately in the Dragonlord's forest. As we ran from the house, my mother now carrying me due to my inferior speed, we quickly arrived at a tree big enough for my father to fit inside horizontally. Mom placed me down in front of the tree and looked me confidently in the eyes.

"This tree will keep you safe, Magni, for it is a fragment of the world tree, and you are one of its many children. Stay. Here. We will take care of the intruder." My mother said with authority, instilling in me the fear that if I moved from this spot and didn't die to that man, she would show me Valhalla's gates herself.

As she left, I heard the man laugh maniacally. Words were exchanged that I couldn't hear clearly, and then a loud booming noise followed. After the booming noise sounded, several spells were created by my mother, a prominent druid. Several minutes passed by, and finally…

Silence.

Despite my overwhelming curiosity, I stayed put with the tree. I had no idea who won the fight, but it was clearly over.

My parents won, Right?

They were invincible, after all.

Despite training this entire time, I could never beat my dad in a fight. And my mom could make miracles happen—she could regrow limbs in minutes, after all! There was no way they lost!

Then he arrived.

The man in black was covered from head to toe in blood. Whether or not it was his was unknown to me, but he had clearly won the fight.

He beat them both.

Even if they didn't have their weapons, it shouldn't have been that easy, right? My parents were Heroes! They saved the world once! How!

"Boy, what is your name?"

"What did you do to my parents!" I screamed, confidence overflowing from me. For some reason, this tree gave me comfort.

"They lost. I will be returning to Gulven with their heads and destroying their bodies. And you, Boy, will be coming with me. Now."

The tree pulsed with energy, banishing my growing fear and causing me to turn towards it. Then, without warning, the tree sprouted vines from the bark and wrapped them around my limbs. I then became fearful and worried that my mother had lied to me about the protection the tree provides. I began to struggle to escape the tree, yet failed miserably because of its strength. As it dragged me towards its bark, the man in front of me looked confused, clearly not understanding what was happening.

"Is this one of your mother's spells?" He asked himself, but just loud enough for me to hear. This immediately filled me with comfort, as the man was likely correct. If my mother was confident that a tree would protect me, then it would keep me safe, so I stopped struggling. This immediately sped up the spell, which caused the man to freak out slightly. He then threw his dagger at me, and just as I thought it would pierce my head, the tree's vines stopped the knife with ease. The blade didn't pierce the vine, instead bouncing off and clattering on the ground. The man quickly became annoyed and drew his sword, immediately slashing it in an arc. This sent an arc of energy toward my neck, but the tree simply pulsed with power, and the high-density energy was dissipated before it ever reached my neck.

"What!" The man was now infuriated about being bested by a tree. I laughed at his plight on the inside, but as the tree began to close around my body, I began to feel sleepier than ever. As I closed my eyes, falling into sleep, I caught the image of the assassin slashing his sword in anger numerous times, just for each one to fail pitifully.

…

As the memory flashed in my mind, and I was able to understand it, my knees dropped to the ground.

Water came to my eyes, and without a sound, tears flowed down my darkened face. Even the many insects around me paid their respects, the entire forest becoming utterly silent. You could only hear my ragged breathing and tears hitting the leaves below me.

My world just came crashing down around me.

Dad…

Mom…

The two most influential people in my life… Murdered! 

By one man!

A man of the United Gulven.

"You. Will. Die. The most painful death I can give you. I will make you suffer a thousand deaths worth of pain, and only then will your true pain start."

A scream erupted from afar as I vowed revenge, bringing me out of my brooding. I looked towards the sound, considering whether or not to help this poor woman.

Yes. Not on my watch.

I ran towards the noise as best as I could, the trees seemingly clearing a path for me to help this woman. The screams were getting louder and more desperate, and I attempted to increase my pace.

Then, I saw a faint light in the distance, peeking through the trees as I ran in the dark. I ran faster.

As I was running, I noticed that the screaming was actually in the direction the compass had pointed earlier, but I put that thought aside as I summoned my father's battle-ax and prepared for the fight of my life.

As I broke through the trees into the lightly lit clearing, I ignored its beauty and quickly scanned the situation for any danger. In the clearing, standing over a pair of women, one of which was unconscious and being cradled by her companion, was a beast twice my height. Its most notable features were its massive horns, black skin, hooved feet, and cow-like head. It stood on its hind legs and was raising a battle-ax over its head. I drew my bow on instinct, quickly drawing the extremely taut string, not even being able to fully draw the string, and fired at the beast.

The arrow didn't go where I had wanted, instead completely missing the beast and hitting a tree in the distance, causing it to explode. I almost cursed, but I still had the positive impact of distracting the beast temporarily. Confused, it stopped its swing and looked towards the exploded tree in the distance.

I used its distraction to my advantage and picked up my ax, which I had dropped to quickly draw the arrow. The beast's ears heard me coming, but it turned towards me too late, as I had already sliced the back of its knee.

The beast roared in pain as it dropped to the ground and looked to its right, finally spotting me for the first time. It tried to stand, but quickly roared in pain again and fell on its left hand and knee. I took advantage of the opening, rushing forward to decapitate the beast. However, the beast had other plans as it swung its ax desperately at me, forcing me to block with my ax and be thrown backward.

I slammed into a tree, nearly losing what little lunch I had eaten, and looked up at the beast. Even from here I could tell that some small slashes on its body from earlier were healing slowly, so I couldn't win a game of attrition. The healing wasn't on par with my mother's, but the tendon I had slashed would surely be healed in a few minutes. This forced me to play aggressively, which I don't mind, but I certainly can't win a long-term fight without backup.

That's when all of my prayers were answered, as the woman on the ground to the left of the beast aimed a spell at me. The next moment my body felt like it could fight all day, and I smiled in approval.

I dashed forward, exchanging a thankful look with the woman and a challenging one with the beast. The boost was significant, as I reached the beast quicker than usual. Before the beast could swing its ax, I was inside its guard, swinging it with all my might at its right arm, slicing it clean off but getting punched away by its left arm in the next instant.

The beast roared even louder than last time, releasing energy I recognized all too well. Berserker rage.

A power my father had released while fighting a wyvern that attacked our cabin once. My father was able to kill the wyvern with his bare hands with the boost in strength and speed, but became like a mindless beast. Not only that, but his body started healing itself, which isn't usually possible for humans.

I quickly became scared of the beast, as its arm would likely regenerate in minutes now, and its tendon wouldn't take longer than 20 seconds. I need to end this now, or never.

I pulled out my mother's bow, which glowed brightly with runic magic, and pulled back with all my strength. With the buff from the girl on the ground, pulling back the string all the way was much more manageable. I calmed my breathing in an instant and pulled back the string, taking aim at its chest and letting the arrow fly.

Time seemed to flow slower than normal as I watched it fly from the bow. It flew through the air beautifully, quickly reaching its target. The beast tried to react and catch the arrow but was slightly too slow. The magic arrow quickly reached its chest, piercing through the skin and into its chest cavity. And in the blink of an eye, the arrow exploded. The beast's guts followed quickly after the explosion, flying in all directions and making a mess of the area.

I won.

I felt the buff from the girl wear off, and I quickly felt like falling to the ground, but I kept standing from pure adrenaline. I walked over to the clearly relieved girl and her unconscious companion. The girl noticed me walking over but instead focussed on healing her friend, who was covered from head to toe in bruises. The dumb beast had beaten her to a pulp, it seemed. The girl wasn't speaking as she healed her friend, so instead of standing there like an awkward idiot, I decided to look around and observe where, in fact, I was. The clearing was large, about a 300 ft wide circle, with a lake taking up a large portion of the area. There was also a small temple in the clearing. The temple was made from bright white stone and had various carvings that seemed to tell a simple story. In the center of the temple, a platform that magically floated 4 feet above the lake and had floating steps leading to it, was a stone-carved elvish woman with wings. She carried a harp and held one hand in the air. Her mouth was open as if she were singing.

I walked over to the temple, carefully climbed the steps despite them being rock solid, and stood in front of the deity. Words were carved into the statue below it but written in Old Elvish, so I couldn't understand them.

The way the elvish write has always confused me, even when it was explained to me by Mom. She had apparently taken the time to learn elvish via her apprenticeship when she was younger. Elvish letters are similar to Norse letters, but an average person could never learn Elvish. This is because elvish isn't written normally; it is written by imbuing magic into the words themselves. This is why only elves can create magic scrolls or scrolls that release spells when imbued with magic.

Their writing is made to be unrecognizable as writing via magic. You can't even begin translating their language unless you know how to decode the magic first. My mom tried to teach me the way, but it was so confusing that I gave up.

However, as I stared at this statue's letters, I realized something strange. I could read the words—and I didn't even know how. But something confused me as I read them.

"The Holy Spring of the Saintess, Vellaria Buscahll."