Sora slowly started to come to, moaning loudly. He couldn't imagine what the hell had happened. Had something hit him? But how could an animal have been so badly knocked unconscious? Or how had it hit him on the head? His mind was racing with all sorts of questions.
Slowly, watching his every move, he sat up with great difficulty. And his head, at the point where he had been struck, was held firmly. It was as if his neck didn't want to cooperate. It was a little as if his fingers felt wet at that point on his head. He seems to have managed to get at least a good, hard concussion. And he could only hope that it was no more serious than that, and that his skull wasn't damaged. But he had neither the stomach nor the strength to investigate further.
After he had composed himself a little in this position, he slowly looked around. But he was right where he had lost consciousness, or at least it looked like it. And not a limb was missing. Fortunately. Although this whole set-up was beginning to worry him more and more. He couldn't understand a thing; he could only blink. And it didn't help that his head was about to explode, and he felt a little dizzy even sitting like that. Somehow, he crawled to a nearby tree and threw his back against it, closing his eyes. However, he immediately regretted it, for at that moment he leaned to the side and threw up.
'Not good... Not good at all...'
He wiped his mouth with his arm in a big gesture and threw his head against the tree trunk again. He must stay conscious.
He glanced up a little at the sky between the leaves. He just caught a glimpse of the sky above the thick vegetation. The blue seemed dimmer, which meant that either he had been lying here for a long time or rain clouds were finally gathering. But of course, there was little chance of the latter. The air on his skin felt as dry and scorching as ever.
He was stuck here. With no help, no weapons, and no one to come to his aid for the next few hours.
Wait. No weapon? He quickly grabbed his shoulder where he'd put his bow and quiver, but they were nowhere to be found. He did scan his immediate surroundings for them. But there was no sign of them.
He began to feel a little desperate. His heart was pounding, and he was panting for breath. Something was wrong. When he looked around earlier, he couldn't see his bow either. But he hadn't moved from the point where he collapsed, had he? That's absurd. No, it's not. No. No. No, no, no, no. The same trees and bushes, and the huge block of stone about ten metres away.
His green eyes looked deathly up at the sky, and a desperate tear streamed down his cheek. Then another, and another. He didn't want to cry. It just happened. Will was of no use here. His nervous system seemed to be kicking to the curb. It was probably the pain and blood loss. He must have really hit his head.
He spent several more minutes in this state, which might have felt like hours, when the tears finally subsided. But he didn't bother to wipe the drops from his face. He just let them cool his heated face nicely as they slowly dried up.
"You need to pull yourself together, Sora! Yes. That will be best. You must gather your strength and somehow make it to the edge of the forest. They will find you there quickly. I'm sure Dain will tell the others when he sees you haven't returned, as you usually do. It'll be all right. It'll be all right...But you've got to do something fast or you're going to leave your teeth."
He whispered to himself as he tried to slow his heaving breathing and heartbeat even more. This technique was important during the hunt, but now that he didn't know exactly how much blood he had lost, perhaps more than ever. And yet he had trusted his life to this technique when he had aimed. If he didn't release the string in time, completely still, he could easily miss the vital points on his prey.
A big breath in, and a breath out so big that his chest almost fell in. One more, and one more, until her tears were completely dry. Finally, he was able to relax completely. Next was rest, continued listening, and preparation for the journey. He must keep his eye on the goal.
Sora, now with a clear head, looked around again, and what he immediately noticed that shouldn't have been there was the rock a few meters away. Why he hadn't noticed it before, he didn't know. It was as if he had just glanced over it. But he knew now that it was not the same place where he had fallen. He had no idea where he was. He had been in the woods many times in his life. True, he always stayed in the safer parts, but he knew his way around those parts. And he knew he couldn't have come this far on his own. He would never do that. To go off the beaten path was madness.
They knocked him down, took his bow, and even dragged him away. It just sounded ridiculous.
But since there was nothing he could do about it, there was only one thing left to do. Forget about it all, adapt, and find his way north so he can finally head in the right direction home. Empty-handed, but at least alive.
Yes. At least he was alive. That was the most important thing now.
Their little village, which Dain and he called the Old Man's Walking Stick, didn't really have a name. If they ever had to refer to it officially, they would have just said: You see, we come from a little village at the foot of Mount Orto.
But in reality, they never needed it. And they probably never will.
Mount Orto was not far to the west of their village, so if you had north, you could easily guess which way to go, even if you couldn't see the sun because of the trees.
His biggest help in this regard was the simple moss that always grew on the defined side of the trees. Unmistakable and always accurate. It is rare to find such a reliable natural phenomenon in the world.
As he pondered these things, he kept spying the rock almost, almost, completely in front of him. He couldn't quite make it out, but there seemed to be carvings on it. Man-made patterns in the middle of a forest in the middle of nowhere.
He laughed hysterically as he thought about it, but when he realized what he was doing, he quickly shut up.
It wasn't that he was scared of attracting the wild animals with all this noise, but that it wasn't like him at all. He seemed to have lost his mind a little.
He took a deep breath and touched his head again at that point. A great pain ripped through his brain as he did so, so he stopped immediately and raised his hand in front of him. It was a little bloody, but at least it wasn't a fresh, bright red colour on his fingers. He then glanced at his other hand when he noticed that it was also bloody, although it must have been there for a while, as it was almost completely brown and dry.
Then he remembered that he had examined his wound once before. Or at least he intended to when he came to. He just failed to check that it was bleeding. But at least now he knew.
He sighed and blinked a few times. His vision seemed a little blurrier than usual, and he was even a little cold. He quickly touched his forehead and waited a moment. The fire was hot. He also seemed to have a fever. Honestly. That was all he needed on top of everything else.
He swallowed. He could still taste the bitter taste of his vomit in his mouth, and his throat felt quite dry. Water. Of course, he hadn't brought that with him. He didn't want to carry any extra weight. But he figured he'd be done soon enough, and when he'd cleaned the animal, he'd take a few sips.
"If I don't get out of here soon... they won't even find my body."
Sora muttered to himself, a little annoyed when he couldn't take it anymore. The rest period was over. It was time to hit the road. He didn't know how far he was from the usual trap she always used, so he couldn't waste time waiting for it to get better. Right now, it was as if staying would only make things worse.
He dug hard into the dry duff beneath him with one hand, while he gripped the bark of the tree with the other. He was trying so hard to somehow pull himself up off the ground that his hand leaning against the tree was chafed and bleeding. But he didn't care a jot about that at the moment. At least now he was on his feet.
Again, the unbearable nausea set in, but there wasn't really anything left to let out. One more point for the empty stomach.
He glanced at the tree beside him. There was a direction, pointing right towards the stone tablet.
'At least I can take a look at it'
Sora thought to himself. Her curiosity was proving insurmountable, even in this situation. And anyway. What harm could it do to look at a rock? It's just a simple piece of rock, and it's completely in the way anyway.
He took a deep breath and staggered forward from one tree to the other, almost in chicken steps. It felt like an hour when he finally got to the rock and leaned against it, gasping slightly for breath, fighting the constant nausea and black spots in front of his eyes.
'Overcoming an obstacle'
"HA-ha.."
He laughed a little bitterly, then raised his eyes to the blackboard. But there were no letters on it. Only a strange scroll of vines, he thought he could make out. It was amazing. It had Sora spellbound.
He ran one hand over it carefully, tracing every tiny indentation in the patterns.
As the breeze moved the canopy over his head a little, the light fell on the patterns as if they had brightened. They refracted the pure white light in a rainbow of colours.
'This stone... could it be made of a special material?'
Sora began to examine the material more closely, but other than the patterns, he found nothing.
Once, a villager found something similar on the mountain. But it was a round stone, and when they opened it up, hundreds of crystals were revealed. Sora must have been about ten years old. That was the first and last time he saw such a thing. The villager who found it had disappeared the next day. The adults said he had moved away. Of course, Sora didn't think much about it at the time. Sometimes she went up the mountain with Dain. For several days, they poked at the rocks, but found nothing of the sort. By now, they'd forgotten all about it.
"Argh!"
He cried out in turn and immediately jerked his hand away from the stone. There was a deep gash in the centre of his palm, and large droplets of red blood dripped to the ground.
"F*ck! Even this?"
He growled as he urgently tried to stop the bleeding. Today, it seemed the whole world was conspiring against him.
His blood was on the ground and on the rock. As Sora looked at him, he pulled his mouth away in a grimace. It was as if that colour laughed at him and his incomprehensible curiosity.
"All right. Be happy with my blood! I have watered you. Now you will not wither away here alone... Even if I didn't mean to do it..."
He added the last half quietly, annoyed, and started the journey home again. His hand was still bleeding. His clothes were almost soaked in his own blood.
As he stumbled forward, it got darker and darker, and he got thirstier and thirstier. He felt like he was swallowing sand. Even his tongue felt rough. He could almost sting the roof of his mouth and make it scream. But he couldn't make any noise. At least not any louder than his stumbling.
It was too loud. One foot, then the other. His heartbeat, pounding in his brain and throat. His forced breathing only made his throat drier.
Slowly, it went completely dark; he couldn't see past his nose. Only one thing kept sounding in his head. Just one more step. Just one more. Soon, he would be there. It wouldn't be long before he was out of this hell.
But slowly, he could barely keep his eyes open and walk straight. He had no idea how long he'd been wearing his feet out. It seemed too much. But he couldn't just give up. They were waiting for him at home. He knew they were waiting for him. He couldn't let them down. He couldn't make them sad.
It just kept going forward and forward. The goal was in his mind's eye. He was almost home. He was close. Really close.
But then he just tripped over something and fell on his nose. But instead of just falling on his stomach, he felt the world turn upside down. He rolled down an incline at full speed, hitting every possible limb, and when he finally stopped and tried to get up, for the second time today, he was greeted by darkness, being a good friend.