And so for the remaining days,he locked himself up, and started planning on how to go about the situation. The plan was anything but grand to say the least but with it,it could at least allow the m to leave the forest.
He neither had any magic techniques to wave out from the air nor did he have any martial arts to aid him so planning was the only thing he could do right now.
He didn't know anything about the world except for the little stories told by the strange villagers. He was so small right now and the situation was so much more vast than him. He was like a small ripple in the water,but right now this small ripple wanted to make a wave. A wave big enough to not be disturbed by others.
Success was not determined by strength alone but by the mind that plans ahead,after all.
....
Days passed and finally the long awaited day had finally arrived. The people got out of their homes slowly,one by one,upto the start of the path to the outside of the forest. The sun was coming up but they were not given the luxury as the time for a simple breakfast. They could not afford to keep the guards wait for too long,after all.
"We better hurry. We don't want the guards to get angry at us all of a sudden. Remember when one of them accidentally killed one of us because they knocked into him and stepped on his shoe."
"Even after all that,they still even let us live. They even let us live quietly in the forest for some time. They have been so good to us lately so it's best that we not disappointed them"
Their heads were down and their pathes were straight. They didn't look at anything else around them.
As they went to the start of the path,I came out and blocked them in their tracks.
They looked at me,their gazes filled with expressions of anger,confusion and thankfulness.
"What? Didn't the leader warn this new comer to get away well before the time we go?"
"We didn't see him in all this time before today so we thought he would have already gone. Why isn't he gone yet?"
"Has he lost his mind and decided to be one of us all of a sudden? Who in their right minds would choose to associate with us? Is he crazy or something? Wasn't he just a wandering traveller?
For a moment,everyone had these thoughts. Saroto could tell their thoughts as he looked at the change in their expression and eyes.
He cleared his throat then he said with an observing gaze," My name is Saroto. Or at least that is what everyone else used to call me. I don't remember my first name,let alone any other name of mine for that matter. I'm like you all in some way. Like you,I don't have a true name to be called by so trust me when I say that I can relate somewhat with what you guys are going through. We are all hated for what we are now,me included. But right now I have something you don't, a will to live,to survive beyond the 'just now'.I want you all to live as well.
The crowd the started dispersing on hearing this. Due to their individual experiences,they didn't want to linger on to those words.
Everyone is like this. Seeking comfort over truth,choosing ignorance over knowledge. This attitude runs in all beings. They had to be taught the harsh truth or else they would never move forward. They would stay comfortably until their death without having achieved anything meaningful in their lives.
The next words that came out stopped all of them in their tracks and shells.
"You will all die in two days if you go to the guards outside the forest."
They stopped in response to hearing thise words.
"How did he know that we were going to die? For how long did he know something like that? How did a newcomer like him know?"
These were their thoughts at the moment. I couldn't argue with them there. Even I was surprised that I could suddenly figure it out myself. Even considering how they had left no visible traces of their past and one could think they were just an ordinary village in an ordinary forest,the chances were close to non existent of finding out. That is,only applying by human or ordinary standards.
As I felt their murmurs grow increasingly larger, time around me felt as if it was slowing down,abnormally so.
When had it all began? It all started about the time of the eminent declaration of their departure by the leader. When he had announced it,I felt it:I was being trusted,without any say,into the future. And in that future I saw them. All of the villagers were taken to the underground capital and for two days on end,they were brutally tortured,graped and mutilated till their death. On seeing this,I tried to look away but couldn't. I tried to run away but couldn't.
I was being kept there against my will,forced to watch the grotesque scene before me until it was brutally engraved onto my mind.
Their constant screams,cries and prayers wondering what evil they did to be hated that much.
Aaaah! Please,please make it stop! It hurts...it hurts so much!
From their hairs on their heads to their toes on their feet,everything was slowly ripped out.
That was my first time seeing a beating heart out of a body.
It was an intriguing sight to say the least.1