It’s been several days since we last had a full meal. Ma is getting restless, and the first pangs of genuine hunger are setting into my belly.

The last haul had not been great. We've been living on scraps of meat and edible plants for the past few rises, and I’m starting to get sick of it.

(Ma, it’s almost time for me to go. They’ll be posting newbie quests in the guildhall, and I want to get there early.)

She stirs in her quilt and sits up to face me. Her frame is exceedingly small in comparison to mine. Looking into her eyes, my heart sinks a little.

Every week, she wears the same ghastly expression.

(Sun, you shouldn’t. We can wait a few more days, we’re doing fine as is.)

And every week, she tries to coax me out of hunting, as if an old woman lying in the dirt doesn’t need any more than she has been given.

(Ma, you know that’s not true. I’m going. It’s for your wellbeing and my own.)

Try as I might to keep her welfare as my foremost priority, it is hard to care for two in a situation where it is already challenging enough to survive alone. The forest gets smaller as cities grow larger and consume more resources. The space that animals have to live and plants have to grow is dwindling, affording us fewer and fewer options to gather food. I need to take risks to ensure our stability nowadays, and that entails leaving my mother alone in the hut. It’s been like this for a few months now, and not a day passes by where I don’t wish for our circumstances to change.

It’s not like she’s completely unsafe here, though. I’ve made my precautions.

Our hut has been shrouded by a light illusion as of last autumn. It wasn’t too hard to liberate some stealth scrolls from one of the town’s mages, so I’d been making a habit of doing so whenever I took a trip into town. I figured that was more than enough to keep any unwanted guests from sating their unhealthy sense of hut-related curiosity.

I remove my short bow from its wooden hook above my bed and throw my cloak over my shoulders. I kneel, and the dirt forms to match the shape of my right knee.

(Ma, hand me my string.)

She hesitates, then removes my hempen bowstring from under the foot of her sheets. She hands it to me with great care, knowing that is not an easily replaceable resource.

Now, as much as I fault reckless adventurers for many of my misfortunes, they do make it easy to acquire elusive goods on the market.

I gently take the bowstring from my mother’s skinny hands.

Ma doesn’t know I lifted this from a market stall, and I don’t intend to tell her any time soon. She’s already worried enough about my weekly excursions, she doesn’t need to know I’ve been taking detours as well.

I string the top of my bow, flip it upside down, and press my left knee into its arch. The bow bends, and I quickly fasten the bottom. I remove my left knee from its arch, and the bowstring goes taut. I sling the bow over my back.

I grab the quiver of arrows from off my sheets and clip it to the waist of my drawstring trousers. Checking my left thigh, my dagger is there as always.

I’m ready.

I push open the straw flap of our hut, and light overwhelms the darkness of our home. Ma squints to see my face. Her hazel eyes glow green in the sunlight, and she reaches out to touch my back. Her face is wrought with fear and concern.

(Please be careful, my Sun. You are my only light in this world.)

I turn around to face her, and pull the old woman into my embrace. My left arm rests on the nub that remains of her right shoulder. My heart aches. After a long time, I release her.

(I’ll be back soon.)

I flip the hood of my cloak and step out into the light.

The moment I leave, Ma crawls to the center of the hut and starts to pray.

(Please, let him return home safe.)

She cups some dirt from the ground, and lets it slip through her fingers. After her weekly ritual, she crawls back into bed and falls asleep.

The cool morning air caresses my face, and the smell of morning dew fills my nostrils.

Regretting my need to disturb the tranquil atmosphere, I stab a hole into the tree closest to the outer perimeter of the illusion. The tree recoils.

“Ow”, the ent mumbles in disagreement.

It quickly starts to regenerate the newly opened stab wound in its trunk, and squirms as if it’s trying to find its comfort again. After a short while, there’s nothing left to indicate a wound but a blade-shaped mark resting in its bark.

I bow my head in its direction.

(Sorry, I need this to find my way home. Can’t count on you being awake when I get back, sleepy old tree.)

The tree shakes lightly, as if laughing, and sways with the breeze. One of its branches bends downward to point at me.

(Just take care of your mother. She’s done enough for all of us to take a light stab once in a while), the tree jokes.

I smile gently, thankful that this one is a lighthearted soul. I nod to acknowledge his wish and begin to walk away. He speaks up before I’m too far.

“Oh, and while you’re at it, show them that the forest still has life left in it”, it chuckles. The branch it extended straightens out, and the ent returns once again to its still silence.

I steal a quick glance backward. Roots, rocks, dirt, and not a hut to be seen. Exactly how it should be.

With everything accounted for, I start making my way toward the southern town of Kralbed.

_________

I emerge from the forest’s wake, sprinting through the tall grass surrounding. The light beige of the grass masks my skin and clothes. I’m low enough to be fully submerged in the blades, so it is unlikely that I will be spotted during this particular juncture of my journey. I spot the King’s Street and continue to push through, making a quick pace parallel to the main road. There they are. My ticket in.

I slow as I pass the early merchant wagons and caravans, careful not to draw unneeded attention from those in the passenger seat.

I have a small laugh to myself, thinking that only merchants would be up as early as I am on any given day. Getting the stalls closest to the market entrance is a war waged every sunrise, they say.

My mood after this thought slowly begins to dip, however.

Having paid attention to every wagon, I noticed that the shotgun seat was seldom empty. This was extremely peculiar. I could go for many weeks without having seen a shotgunner, so the increase in security was unnerving.

“Did something happen?”, I think to myself.

It couldn’t be just a coincidence. Shoving this thought to the back of my mind, I begin to tail the wagon furthest in the front. Thankfully it’s alone.

After I’ve ensured that neither the shotgunner nor the driver is paying attention, I dart out from the grass, trusting the horse’s canter to be loud enough to mask my footsteps. I slide underneath the carriage and grip the wood, pulling myself close. I tuck the end of my cloak between my knees and the undercarriage.

Now all that’s left to do is wait. We’re about 300 meters from the front gate, so I have a little time to think while the town’s tall white walls grow closer.

The main street is never crowded this early, and thankfully that hasn’t changed. Knowing that most of the town’s produce is imported, it makes my movements easier due to the distinct lack of farmers in the field. Those people are always up at the crack of dawn, so it would be nigh impossible to get into town without being noticed by someone.

We’re now close enough to the gate for me to make out two human figures. That means there’s two guards on duty instead of one this time around. This has never happened before. This town was always of the lazy sort in regards to security, so there was definitely a significant event in the last week.

I pray that the wagon check is just as terrible as usual while we near the gate. The man in the shotgun seat speaks up, seemingly addressing the guard on the left.

“Hey, Mark. Glad to see you’re doing fine durin’ these grim times”.

The guard scoffs at the man’s words, shuffles his boots, and leans against the wall.

“Ah, you’ve heard about the incidents then”.

He spits on the ground adjacent to the front of the carriage, a little too close to where my head is. It stinks of tobacco.

“I think it’s just an overreaction. Adventurers die all the time, and that’s a fact. It just happened to be that a bunch of bright-eyed heroes got caught in a pickle, and they didn’t make it out”. The guard kicks a small pile of loose dirt, and it clouds up the air.

“Some of them just weren’t cut out for the job, I guess”.

The merchant laughs as if the guard had told a joke.

“You’re telling me! At least a couple of them bought my wares before they kicked the can. Useful corpses, the lot of ‘em”.

They share a laugh, and the guard lets the wagon through. As the wagon draws further into the town from the gate, the guard on the right says, “You folk are in need of Gaia.” I silently agree.

By now, we’ve reached halfway to where the market would be. In other words, my stop. I let go of the wagon and flatten my arms to my sides so they don’t get run over. The wagon passes over me, and I stand up quickly before anyone notices I’m lying on the street.

I orient myself, pat the dirt off my cloak, and make a beeline toward the guildhall.

The town is quiet and still, the wood and brick buildings’ windows rarely shining from firelight. They’re mostly two stories, telling any first-timer in Kralbed that the town has been at least moderately industrialized. In contrast, the dirt road is indicative of the town’s current state as a work-in-progress. When that will change seems to be ambiguous, considering that I haven’t seen a visible difference in months.

Taking in all I can along the way, I find myself at the Kralbed guild’s double doors. I push through the right door, and it gives way.

I find myself in a large mess hall. The tables are empty, and the bar is clean. Nobody is here.

Well, except the receptionist. She’s always at the front desk. The guildhall is her place of residence, and she owns the place, so it’d be more surprising if she wasn’t always here. At the moment, she’s intently reading a book on horticulture, which I would have to imagine is one of her more passionate hobbies. There’s a picture of a bright purple flower on the front. I wave at her.

“Hello. I’m here for the D-rank postings. May I look through them?” I point toward the bulletin board on my right, which is completely plastered with requests for monster-slayings, gathering, escort missions, and other menial work.

She looks up from inspecting a dark green flower with wings.

“Ah, it’s you again. Yeah, go ahead. I told ya last time that ya don’t have to ask me”. She returns to her winged flower.

I frown at her indifference. Despite the convenience of her apathy, it’s somewhat annoying when she displays it. Sometimes I wonder why she even sits there. It doesn’t seem like she moderates anything.

Accepting her lack of interest in me, I turn to face the board and scan over its contents. The listings are organized into rows, based on the estimated difficulty of each request.

D is the lowest rank, and the only one I care about. Generally, it requires some newbie adventurer to kill off a number of monsters that venture off from the forest because somebody in the town doesn’t feel safe behind a meter-thick concrete wall.

Regardless of the circumstances, there is always handsome pay behind any one of these requests, whether it be in money or goods. Therefore, there is always an adventurer willing to complete them.

It takes me a while to find anything remotely close to my hut, but I finally find one. Its request is to pacify seven rabid boar that have attacked and killed local berry-gatherers near the clearing of the forest.

‘That’s perfect’, I think to myself.

I memorize the listing and start to take my leave.

“Hey”.

I turned around to face the receptionist, who had called out to me from behind her desk. She pushes her glasses up the bridge of her nose.

“Why do ya even come here if ya never take any requests? It’s been months now, and ya have yet to turn in or complete an order. Ya must be goin’ hungry if this is your job, son”.

I break out in a cold sweat from beneath my hood. I curse myself for jinxing my good luck. Quickly thinking of an excuse, I open my mouth to speak.

“I... just like to imagine I’m a brave adventurer when no one is around”, I breathe out a fake sigh, as if she had caught me.

“I hear the stories of slaying dragons and saving towns, and think, wow wouldn’t it be amazing to be strong?” I motion to the air above me like my thoughts were visible to the receptionist.

“I don’t have the heart to actually take one of these. Please indulge me. It’s just a coward’s hobby”, I moan with exaggerated sadness.

The receptionist gives me a strange look, and slowly returns her gaze to her horticulture book.

“You’re a weird kid”.

She doesn’t say anything more.

I exit the guildhall.