To find an answer

I had a dream. A dream of someone sacrificing themselves to create something. I don't understand why. Why would you not like to stay another day, to watch what else might come next? Instead you choose to let go of everything you love and everything that loves you. For the sake of your last creation to be witnessed by future generations. Don't do it! Don't leave them suffer like this! Don't go! Please!

And then I wake up. I'm lying on the bed. I try to move, but immediately I feel some pain on my side.

I see. It's the injury I got from fighting the jawcrawler. It still hurts, but far less than I expected.

I hear a door open and I see an unfamiliar woman's face.

- So you're finally awake. You took some beating for sure.

- Where am I?

- You're in the village chief's house. I'm the chief's wife by the way.

- I see. How long was I out?

- About half a day or so. It's already morning.

- That long huh. Anyway, where is the man I came here with?

- He is currently teaching the hunter some tips for hunting. After he brought you here, he made you drink some potion. After that he went into the forest for a couple of hours to see if there were any more magical creatures in the area. Later he came carrying two bodies of what he called a "Jinglin" and a "Muruzhi". They were pretty big, I'm surprised he could carry them all the way here, let alone defeat them.

- Knowing him, he dragged them all the way here. Did he tell me what the potion was, when he made me drink it?

- He did. I think he said it was a healing potion.

- Then why am I still feeling pain?

- I don't know. You should ask him when you see him.

- That I do. But what is that smell?

- Glad you asked. The man you were with told me to prepare some food soon, because you are gonna wake up soon. So I did. And would you know it, you woke up just as I was done making it.

- Thank you. I am starving.

With some pain I made my way to the table and ate my breakfast with thankful comments to the lady who made it.

After breakfast, I went to the hunter's house but I didn't see anybody home. I expected them to still be in the forest training or something, and I started to walk to the stables where we left our horses.

Some time passes and I start to grow impatient. I go to the hunters house again and this time I see two small children in the house. Boy and girl. I go ask them about the hunter.

- Do you know where the hunter is?

The girl answers.

- He is still training with that awesome guy. He told me and Markos some hunting tips and we went to the forest for a while to learn.

The boy then started talking.

- But then uncle told us to start heading back home so that our mom wont get any more angry at us than she will be.

- I see. That must be a real bummer for you two. Are you two going to be hunters some day?

The boy answers.

- No we won't. Mom would never let us. But she told us that we should know how things like hunting and plowing work on top of our literary study.

- Yeah. She told us that it is our duty to know all kinds of stuff before one of us becomes the next village chief.

- And that's going to be me.

- No. You are far behind me in our studies so it's going to be me.

- No me! You can't keep up with the labor we are supposed to learn here. You barely could keep up with us in the forest.

- Well I don't need to since I'm a girl. Boys always do the physical labor in the house.

- That's not true! There are plenty of women in the fields as there are men. You just don't want to do that since you are bad at it.

- Lies! I would never back down for reasons like that!

- Then next time we are asked to do some plowing, we compete, which of us can plow more ground than the other.

- It's a deal then. I won't back down so easily. I will train myself so that I can prove to you that I am going to be better than you as the next village chief. I won't lose to my younger brother.

I silently witnessed a sibling quarrel while waiting for the hunter and Aktor to show up. And after the siblings calmed down, I started chatting with them about their daily lives as such.

So after a while of chatting I hear two men walking from the forest. And would you know it, Aktor was dragging another dead magical beast that looked like a horse sized white cat with three fluffy tails.

- Got ourselves some real dangerous magical beasts this time. Could have been catastrophic before it would have died from the heat.

- I see you are doing some big favors for them.

The hunter starts shouting.

- It must be thanks to the gods that he came here! It was amazing how far away he saw this beast before throwing his spear. I got some real training to do on my end.

- It was pretty far from the village, but if it would have come here it would have been devastating.

- So mind telling where this is from?

- As I told Hans here, this fellow is called locally "Koltal-kis" and commonly known as "Three tailed snowcat". And as the name suggests, it lives in a cold tundra far north of here. They have devastating elemental magic along with some tough fur. They are extremely resistant to ice and fire type of magic as well but their fur is really sought after for people who travel in cold climates.

Aktor smirks a little.

- See, even I can sometimes distinguish something worth some money.

- But it seems it's only for some really expensive stuff, right?

- That is something up for debate. Now how is your injury?

- I'm in some pain, but it's bearable. What was on that potion anyway?

- It was a potion that boosts your body's healing capabilities by some pretty huge margin. It just takes some time to completely heal.

- I see. So it isn't instantaneous healing. That explains it.

- Yeah. I spent as much money as I could on other stuff, so I had to skim a bit on the healing potion. I wouldn't have let it get to the point of being life threatening.

- Didn't really look like that back there. You were nowhere to be seen.

- I was watching from a safe distance.

- I see. So are you going to skin it then?

- Yeah. Just about to.

Some more time passes when Aktor teaches the kids how to skin animals. Then we head to the village chief's house to drop their kids off and say our goodbyes to them. Aktor gets some other pelts from the chief and some other stuff. Probably from the magical creatures from yesterday.

Then we go get our horses from the stables, pack our stuff, and get moving back to Thorn. Since we got a long way ahead of us, I decided to ask Aktor some stuff along the way there.

- Since you seem to like to talk about magical creatures, why don't you tell me about the other two creatures you hunted back there.

- Well since you asked. "Jinglin" is a lengthwise three horse sized, blue electric lizard. It lives primarily on huge jungles. About a midpoint on your way to the great soul tree in Ehen. Their scales are impervious to electricity and it can spit out a slime ball that contains a huge dose of electricity. They can, if they are desperate, release all the magical electricity they have on them in a small area. And they can decide how much of it they will release. So They can do it multiple times. There are some parts on them that are valuable, but I can't remember which. So I left the corpse to them to eat.

- Is it safe to eat?

- I am positive it is safe. And now that I think about it, the scales are the valuable part. You can create some good light armor with it. Shame I didn't think of taking some. Oh! And they are commonly called "Jolt lizards".

- Then what about the other one? Muruzhi was it

- Ah, yes "Muruzhi". More commonly known as "Devil's bug pet" or just "Devilbug". They are essentially two dogs sized dragonfly of sorts, small eyes and deep red and black coloured skin and fur. Found in the mountains of Youling. They have a nasty way of shooting darts that paralyze you in an instant and it has the ability to find the creature that has been poisoned, even if you just smell the venom, no matter where poisoned target is brought. So saving someone requires killin it and if you don't, it will call its friend to assist on the hunt. You see. They hunt in groups of three, most of the time.

- Sounds nasty. Is there anything of worth in their bodies? I imagine the poison is quite sought after by some.

- It sure is. They are sought after more commonly for antivenom. Because the venom is effective for about four hours. And that is on a small dosage, on a high mountain range. The local cats called "fuzu" are immune to the venom and actually hunt these creatures. They are actually used as pets there. The ones they can tame that is.

- I hope I never venture there by myself.

- You better not. The locals don't travel far from their villages with no less than groups of four. And they are trained to hunt them.

- You really like to talk about these things.

- Well it just happens that I know a lot about these things.

And then we traveled a couple of hours with some minor chit chat until this conversation started.

- What was this test for?

- To test if you are strong enough.

- Strong enough for what?

- To travel to a place south-east of here called Taican kingdom. An elven kingdom.

- Why would you have to test me for that?

- The way could be dangerous since it is mostly inside parts of Ehen.

- Why would we need to go there?

- There is an elf who knows a lot about magic and the magical happenings in this world. I need to go there to perhaps find an answer as to why creatures are transported all over the world to places they should not be. It's for the sake of that village too. And you need to meet him because he might find out about you and your memories. There is another person we also could visit, but they are far harder to reach. Even this guy is hard to reach by normal means, and I don't personally want to meet him, but he is our only lead.

- I see now. So you have been thinking that a lot. Will the village we came from be safe for the meantime.

- I don't know. I trained the hunter for emergencies. I plan to request guards to be sent to other villages as well, but they are short of manpower, so I don't think it will help much. I will try all the guilds I can think of that could help, but still, I don't think it will be enough to save all the civilians.

- So after we get to Thorn, we will do that and then immediately set off?

- No. It will take a couple of days of convincing people that they don't see what's going on. And you, in the meanwhile, shall go help people hunt some magical beasts. For the sake of training yourself, and for the sake of the safety of the people who can't protect themselves.

- Got it. I shall do that.

And so nine days will pass.