Born From A Divine Gamble

Over the course of his stay, they had both gotten used to the presence of the other. One didn"t want to see a soul and the other didn"t know a single one but in the end, they got along just fine. Emperor didn"t know how to do a lot of things so Chinui had to scold him often but even if he was a little grumpy in general, he wasn"t that bad of a person.

All in all, Emp had a great time and enjoyed his stay until the day of his departure came. Unaware of what day it was, Emperor just slept peacefully on the wooden floor like usual. Chinui, also like usual, kicked him weakly on his side to wake him up.

"Hey lazy kid, how many times do I have to tell you to get up with the sun! Stop sleeping and get up!"

Emperor had found out that he had the bad habit of not wanting to go to bed. It was because he had so many things he needed to do to get better at everything. On the other hand, once he fell asleep, he had an incredibly hard time to get back up. He just wanted to stay asleep and laze around all day long. He pretended he didn"t hear Chinui and moved his arms more comfortably under his head hoping to fall back asleep.

"Once you get to the school I won"t be there to kick you awake anymore. You should have taken the habit of waking up early by yourself. Get up already! Today is the day you go, you have a long road ahead of you, no time to waste sleeping here."

Being reminded of what day it was, Emp felt his heart suddenly race and all his sleepiness disappeared like smoke in the wind. He was partly excited at the idea of exploring the world and meeting new people and partly worried about leaving the place he had gotten used to.

He opened his eyes sharply and somehow managed to get up. Once upright, he rubbed his eyes with the back of his hands and awaited patiently Chinui"s explanation of what he had planned for him today. Since it was the day of his departure, it was also the day Chinui would tell him if he would give him the money or not. As expected of Chinui, he didn"t wait long at all to tell him.

"I won"t beat around the bush, you won, I will give you the gold."

Emperor answered with a big smile, unable to find words expressing his grat.i.tude towards this generosity.

"There is still a lot of things I want to tell you before you go. Go wash your face and we"ll talk during breakfast. "

Emp quickly ran to the river, washed his face with its cold water to wake himself up completely and came back to the table in front of Chinui. There was only one chair in the house so Emp had always used a big log in place of a chair. He sat on it and smelled the smoked meat and the fruits on the table. He started devouring the food without waiting any longer while Chinui talked to him seriously.

"So, listen carefully, it"s important. To get to the school, you need to go through two entire kingdoms, many towns, mountains, swamps and of course forests. You will need around forty days of travel to get there if everything goes right. Are you even listening?"

"Yes, I am." Answered Emp, his mouth full

Chinui seemed exasperated but he knew how well Emp remembered everything he said so he continued his explanation without minding it too much.

"First, you will need to follow the river down through the hills until it crosses another one. That other river, you will have to follow it back up instead of down, all the way to the mountains."

"Will I need to get to the other side of the mountains?"

"Yes but don"t worry, while following the river, you should eventually come across a road that goes through them. From there, follow the road through the mountains and continue straight forward. Ignore any branches of the road and any intersection you come across until you reach the lake of the b.l.o.o.d.y lynx. There, you will take a right and follow the sh.o.r.es of the lake. "

"Why is it called the lake of the b.l.o.o.d.y lynx?" Asked Emp curious.

Chinui waved off the question with his hand and took a big bite of smoked meat.

"No idea and it doesn"t matter. You are paying attention right?"

"Yes, yes, I won"t forget anything." Rea.s.sured Emperor. "Once at the lake, what do I do?"

"The lake is in between the kingdom of Dugo and the kingdom of Windbow. If you follow the road on the right, it won"t take you long before you get there. Continue on that road until you reach the city of Red-water. From there, you need to take the north road to Starfall village. Then, take the road through the hills that goes towards the low-woods. There is only one road through the hills so you shouldn"t get lost, same for the low-woods."

"What are the low-woods?"

"It"s a forest that looks like a plain. The trees that grows there are so crooked towards the ground that they form a great carpet. In fact, it"s so dense it"s even possible to walk on top of the forest on all its length without falling through."

"Really? That"s impressive."

"You"ll see. There is almost nothing worth going there for, aside from the sight. Nothing interesting or useful grows there, the terrain is too treacherous to lead an army through but too thick to let people hide inside. Most don"t have any reason to go there. After the low-woods, continue until you reach the howling hill, you"ll see, it"s impossible to miss. The howling hill is a crossroad and also the border between Windbow and Artefine. You need to take the path that goes to Dark-glint from there, it should be indicated on the signpost. At that point, your trip will be almost over, you just have to continue on that road towards Bêtéclair, that"s where the school is." (1)

"That doesn"t sound that bad, I should be able to do it."

"If you are lucky yes." Said Chinui with a mocking smile.

"What do you mean?"

"The chances of you encountering monsters on the way are high but sadly I have no weapon to lend you. My blade is broken and I still need it, you will need to fend for yourself."

Emp burst out laughing.

"I"m sure if you really wanted to give me a weapon, you would find something to lend me. You should just admit that you want me to pa.s.s the test. You want me to beat a monster without help."

"Maybe a little bit of that I admit but that isn"t so important that you should risk your life for it. If you get in an advantageous situation sure take it but don"t throw yourself in the jaws of a night crawler for the test. Your life is way more important. If you do manage to kill something, don"t forget to harvest as much as you can from it, each pieces has a worth."

"Yes, yes, I know, you told me so many times already. I won"t forget."

"Good. Aside from that, I will also lend you my family name."

"Your name?"

Emp was taken off guard. What did he mean?

"Yes, you will keep Emp as your name but use Muracier as surname."

Chinui seemed to not mind it at all, as if it was a normal thing to do but Emp wasn"t convinced at all that pretending to be in the family of the great general Muracier would do him any good.

"But isn"t it a really well known name? If I use it, won"t it bring me a lot of trouble?"

"Of course, if you abuse our name to do anything dumb it will but just using it as normal should be fine. If you tell everyone you don"t have a name, first of all, people will think it strange, even orphans have a family name and second of all, you will stand out way more in the school without a name than if you use Muracier. You won"t have a choice, you will have to use a surname eventually. I even wrote a letter for the ancient in charge, you"ll only have to give it to him once there."

Chinui got a letter sealed with wax from his pocket and placed it casually on the table. On it, Emp could clearly see Chinui"s crest stamped in the wax.

"Be careful to not open it or the ancient would never believe you."

"You would really let me use your family name?" Asked Emp, still confused about how to answer this gesture. "Is that not strange?"

"What other name would you even use? You can"t just make one up, everyone will know easily and if you just take an existing one, you will get yourself an endless amount of trouble for using one that doesn"t belong to you."

But was it not the same for that surname? thought Emp. What if I get across another Muracier? Emp was not an expert in laws and rules at all but, was it not a terrible crime to impersonate a member of such an important n.o.ble family? Without Chinui there to help him, what would he do?

"Or is it just that you don"t like my name? In that case you can just refuse to take this letter." Said Chinui with a menacing tone and frown.

"No it"s fine, I got it, I will take the letter." said Emp half scarred of Chinui"s look and half scarred he would take back his generous help.

"Good!" Said Chinui, obviously pleased. "Aside from all that, don"t forget to buy provisions once you reach a town."

Chinui picked up a bag of money that he placed on the table just beside the letter and focused on his meal. He did not say a word more. Emperor was a little surprised that he had nothing else to say. Usually, he never stopped talking, he always had something to tell him to do, to remember or to stop doing.

"Is that all? Do you not have any more advice?"

"What do you mean is that all!" Exclaimed Chinui, almost throwing his whole plate at him. "I"ve been explaining things to you for months now! I"m dead tired, I have helped you more than enough already you little scoundrel."

"You are right, I"m sorry, I need to do things on my own as well, I can"t rely on you forever."

"Exactly, now get out of here and go see the world! I can"t wait to get my silence back again."

"But I haven"t finished eating yet."

"You never stop eating."

Chinui bent his body over the table and s.n.a.t.c.hed the half emptied plate in front of Emp. He ignored the pleading look of Emp, started eating what was left in the plate and showed him the door. Emp made a small disappointed sigh, picked up the letter and the money and stopped in front of the door.

"Well, good bye then, see you next time."

"Mhn, later." Answered his mentor.

Neither of them was used to farewells. Emp got himself outside and closed the door without turning back. He walked to the river and finally started his journey to the great school.

It was a good day for travelers, it reminded him a lot of the day he was created. A clear sky, a comfortable temperature even for the early hour and a breeze to animate the leaves around. On his right, the river splashed about like usual and from time to time, he could see the shadow of a fish through the water.

Emp regretted not being able to do the trip in the company of Chinui but at the same time, he felt that not constantly hearing his voice would probably be quite relaxing. He had become so used to it that he often made dreams in which Chinui criticized everything he did.

He appreciated the calm he had just gained but was also very eager to meet some new people. He impatiently awaited to meet a mult.i.tude of weird strangers and wondered if they would be like Chinui. In the mean time, he could only calmly follow the river flow.

Chinui had told him that the forest, and the rest of the world for that matter, was covered in all kinds of monsters but, of all the time he spent in the woods already, he had not seen a single one. He felt that his luck was so great that the chances of him meeting a monster in his travel was minimal. The trip would no doubt be very relaxing, thought Emperor while stretching his arms.

Around midday, he stopped to raise the hammer and take a light dinner before resuming his tireless walk. Of the entire day, nothing special happened. When evening came and the sun started to go down, Emp searched for a good place to rest. He wanted a place where the trees distanced themselves from the river a little to give him enough s.p.a.ce to make a small fire but finding such a place proved to be extremely difficult. Most of the riverside was filled with tall trees leaning towards the water to steal the sun from it. If not, big rocks covered in moss blocked all the usable s.p.a.ce, they were comfortable to walk on sure but not suitable to make a fire on. He ended up finding a place where a tall tree had fallen over its fellow trees opening up a good s.p.a.ce.

He collected small wood from the fallen trees, used it to prepare a spot for a fire and sat on the riverside with his fis.h.i.+ng rod. He still had provisions but since he was right next to the river, it was probably a good idea to catch some more fish.

While waiting for a catch, he searched his surroundings with his eyes, looking for trees with limbs large enough to support him. The reason for that was because Emp slept much too deeply. It was almost impossible to wake him which wasn"t a good thing at all when sleeping alone in the woods. One time, to make him understand, Chinui had played a trick on him. While Emp slept, Chinui had rolled him inside his blanket, lifted him up before placing him back down outside in the garden and buried him halfway before Emp noticed that something was wrong. This had taught him that if ever a predator or a wicked individual found him sleeping, he would have the time to die three times before he even woke up.

So, to live through a night outside in the woods, Emp needed two things. An extraordinary hiding spot and an even more extraordinary luck. For him, the only way to live was to fall asleep high in a tree and hope nothing would find him. Looking around, he finally found what he was looking for, a tree with some great limbs and an even thicker trunk. He didn"t take the time to go examine it from nearer since he was still fis.h.i.+ng.

After having caught his first fish, he lit a fire like Chinui had taught him and cooked it. Of all the meat he had the chance to taste up until now, the fish"s wasn"t quite his favorite but he didn"t hate it either. In fact, he had not tasted something he didn"t like yet. After his fish had been prepared, cooked and eaten, he went back to his fis.h.i.+ng spot to catch another. He did this until the darkness had invaded all his surroundings.

In the end, he managed to catch five more that he threw in his bottomless bag. He had tested it with Chinui, the food he placed inside stayed exactly as how it was when he placed it there. If he got the fishes out in a month, they would still be good to eat. This bag was really an incredible object.

After his catches were put into safety, he doused the fire and went back to the tree he had identified earlier. A good chunk of the branches on one side had been ripped off by the falling tree. One of the biggest limbs on the other side was separating itself in two at the base making for a large surface. He climbed there with difficulty because of the lack of branches to use in the lower end of the tree. Once comfortably positioned up there on his perch, he prepared himself to sleep. He wasn"t that high but he knew that if he fell, the shock would be painful. Enough to wake him up, he hoped. Aside from that, missing half of the tree branches left him a little in the open but it was probably still the best place to lie down in the area.

He quickly fell asleep, tired from the long walk and woke up the next day, sore all over but still alive. Since both the tree and its limbs had been ma.s.sive, they had been enough to keep him suspended the whole night. He made sure there weren"t anything suspicious around him or lurking on the ground before he clumsily climbed back down. A quick stretch, a hammer lift and a breakfast quickly devoured later, he was already on his way.

While he was following the riverside, he had all the time in the world to think about anything that crossed his mind. For example, his belt buckle. The belt itself was quite good but the buckle was way too large in comparison. He felt that maybe if he had been twice as tall and muscled like a bull, the buckle would fit him but for now, he was only looking ridiculous by wearing it. It was true, it was as big as his whole hand! It gave the impression he was a kid trying to look beefier than he really was. Sadly, it was the only belt buckle he had so there was nothing he could do about it.

He also wondered if he would end up hurting his feet or his legs with all that walking. He already felt exhausted but it was mostly due to the hammer, his vigor came back before noon. After another small dinner and many more hours of walking, he reached the point where the two rivers joined. He now only needed to get on the other side and follow the other one back upwards.

Since the river seemed calm and shallow, he felt like it would be possible to just walk to the other side from where he was. To keep his clothes dry, he removed everything he wore and put it all in the bag before tying it up around his neck. He entered the water and walked towards the middle of it. the water was so clear that he could easily see his feet at the bottom and since he was taking his time to get across, he wasn"t afraid to slip and fall.

The water wasn"t that cold but the waves combined with the breeze were sufficient to make him s.h.i.+ver. Bellow his feet, the rocks were small, smooth and surprisingly comfortable to walk on. Of course it wasn"t as comfortable as his boots but the sensation wasn"t unpleasant at all. Once he got to the center of the river, he turned towards the direction it flowed and contemplated the stream.

He stayed there for a long time. Behind him, the two branches of the river joined and in front, they flowed together towards the horizon. His body disturbed the flow and changed the angles of the waves that fought each other afterwards to take back their place.

If the two rivers could join like that, he asked himself, could they part again later? If that was the case, how did the water droplets know which of the two branches they belonged to?

He caught a fistful of water in his palm and raised it in front of his eyes. The water imprisoned in the cusp of his hands s.h.i.+ned in the sun but the beauty of that spark, he told himself, could not be compared to the magnificence of the river itself. He let the water flow back down between his fingers while thinking that it was their whole that made the beauty of the river. Destiny had brought all those water droplets on the same path and had united them for a while. If destiny wished for it, the droplets would part again and there was nothing they could do against it.

In a way, it was not unlike how he had crossed the path of Chinui for a time before being separated again. He wondered how many more droplets would accompany him in the river before he reached his destination. How many more encounter and separation would he see? He couldn"t wait to join up with the river and meet all those other droplets. (2)

From the middle of that river, it seemed even more impressive than when he watched it from the side. He understood very well why the trees were bent like so over the river. They all wanted a part of the light belonging to the river of course but mostly, he believed, they wanted to look at the river from a better angle. If the sun were to find itself just above the river, he imagined very well the sight of three streams. One made of light, s.h.i.+nning in between two steams of darkness made by the trees walling it from each sides.

The show reminded him of the scene he had witnessed on the day of his creation. What he saw now was as beautiful as what he saw then, even if entirely different. He wondered if all the rivers were as magnificent. If he made his way to another river, would he find the same presence there? Or maybe each river had its own unique charm, its own individuality.

Was it possible to recognize a river from a mere sight? What about other kinds of landscapes? Was there any other place in this world hiding such a beauty or was it instead omnipresent and he had just not taken the time to see it earlier? Did other people know or were they living in such a beauty without seeing? If he stayed there until nightfall, would he see but the same spectacle drowned in darkness or would it be its own surprising sight?

Later, once he felt like he had absorbed as much as he could from this vision, he restarted his steps towards the opposite sh.o.r.e and reached it quickly. Feeling refreshed, he quickly clothed himself and hit the road again, this time, going against the flow instead of with it.

That day, nothing else happened. He caught more fishes and wasn"t disturbed in his sleep.

The next day, he quickly felt the difference between the path he now followed and the path of the day before. The slope wasn"t going in the same direction. He had not understood it while he was going downwards but now that he was climbing back upwards, he understood that this part of the trip might be a little more tiring than he had first antic.i.p.ated. That slope was invisible to him, so softly angled that it seemed flat to him but for his feet, it represented a much harder challenge than before.

Because of the height and density of the surrounding trees, he was unable to see the hills and the mountains he was supposed to cross. He wondered if he would pa.s.s them by without noticing.

The weather still felt nice that day but for some reason, the birds seemed more distant than usual. Nearby, the leaves still rustled in the wind but they weren"t accompanied by the usual chirping of small animals. He felt sorry he couldn"t enjoy the usual melody he had grown used to.

Sometimes, on his path laid enormous rocks, companions to the many small waterfalls littering the river. Sometimes he climbed them and sometimes he made his way around them but every time, he took his time to not injure himself or let the river out of his sight. Those minor setbacks did not stop him from acting like usual and he did not forget to use the hammer at midday.

That afternoon, he was climbing atop a boulder when he suddenly stopped on top of it. He had not yet straightened himself and his hands were still laid on the smooth and warm surface of the boulder. He had stopped because something didn"t feel right. s.h.i.+vers were running through him from head to toes and he couldn"t pinpoint from where that sensation had come from. He had never felt like this before in his life, was it the so called fear? His heart was beating strongly against his chest as if to jump out of it but he still did not quite understand. What was going on? He desperately looked around for the cause of his current state.

On either side of him, two dead trees were extending their leaf lacking limbs far into the sky. Was it what had caused his state? A lack of leaves? Probably not. In front, big rocks and boulders covered in moist moss and encased in roots paved the riverside. Everything seemed normal.

Just after the boulder he was standing on, there was a gap, an empty s.p.a.ce where another rock should have been but wasn"t. It wasn"t that strange either, that kind of unexpected dent in the terrain was what made the beauty of the landscape, it wasn"t what had scared him either. Above him, there wasn"t anything unexpected either aside from the impression that the branches of the nearby trees were slowly closing in on him due to his fear. Bellow him, there was only that enormous boulder...

An enormous boulder, smooth and warm...

Among tens of big mossy stones, moist and cold...

Had he unknowingly stepped on a creature? Why did it look so much like a stone? Was his mind playing tricks on him? Probably not, his hairs were standing so much on his scalp that they could have flown away by themselves at any seconds now. He couldn"t possibly have imagined that fear. But why had the creature not attacked him yet? Maybe it had not noticed him? He felt it was impossible to not notice something climbing on top of you.

Then, was it waiting for something? What? For him to fall in a trap, or run away? How to escape the thing? He didn"t even know what it was for sure. Did he have the time right now to check in the book of answers? Probably not. He checked around him again, this time for a path to escape.

He would never have believed to be able to feel even more scared than this moment but it would indeed be the case. The leafless trees had gotten closer still while he was thinking! When he had the impression that the trees were closing in on him, it had not been just an impression! How could he have been such an idiot?

As if to confirm what he had just understood, the earth shook, the ground split and the wood cracked. The earth was thrown in all directions as a plethora of roots detached themselves from the nearby rocks and from under the earth to lift the boulder he was crouched on. The two great trees he had previously thought dead were now more akin to gigantic hands with fingers full of sharp claw-like branches as they quickened the pace at which they reached towards him. The boulder, many times bigger than it had seemed once out of the ground, rose quickly into the air. If Emp had not been crouched on it at this moment, he would probably have fallen off already.

In a mere moment, he had been lifted far above the tallest tree. He was under the impression that the earth itself was alive. Bellow the boulder, a mix of earth, stone and wood formed the body of the beast. The two tall trees weren"t it"s arms but merely it"s tiny hands, the rest was made out of writhing roots and vines used to lift up the body and hands of the t.i.tanic thing. If he had used Chinui"s house in comparison, it would have taken at least five of them atop each other to reach the height of the beast.

From where he was, he could clearly see the mountains, he could even see a cliff side not far from there where a chunk of the mountain seemed to have been ripped out of it. It didn"t even cross his mind to admire the landscape. He did not have the time for it. The hands of the giant were closing in on him. He guessed he would have greater chances of survival by trying to climb down the thing than by trying to fend off the trees used as its hands. He quickly let himself slide off the side of the beast and barely escaped the claws. They rammed into the boulder, leaving deep trenches in the stone and making the whole creature shake while Emp tried to slow down his fall by grabbing at anything projecting out of the beast.

Dirt and small rocks that had not been able to keep up with the sudden movement fell all around him towards the forest bellow. Large roots writhed in front of him as if to catch him while he pa.s.sed by. He gripped holds that came near him before quickly letting them go in favor of newer ones further bellow, dodging the tentacle-like roots.

The body of the beast was bent backward by the shock of its own hands which eased his descent for a brief moment but he was far from reaching the ground still when the thing regained its composure.

Still far below him, he could see a mult.i.tude of agitated roots easily comparable to a sea of snakes. If he fell in them, he had no doubt it wouldn"t end like he hoped it would.

In the meantime, the beast had started advancing toward the cliff, maybe unknowingly. Did it even have eyes to see where it was going?

Chinui had told him to run away if he encountered something too dangerous but how could anyone outrun something so big? His path downward was blocked and there was nowhere to go upward either, his only hope was to defeat it.

The claws of the beast attacked once more, this time, slower as to not injure itself again. thanks to their reduced speed and the highly irregular shape of the beast, he managed to dodge them again by jumping from hold to hold. The branches still managed to lacerate his left calf. He had never injured himself that badly before , in fact, he had never injured himself at all. The pain and surprise almost made him release his hold but thankfully, the fear had already locked up his muscles which saved his life.

That thing had to had a weak spot, or a dead point in its perception he could use to escape it. He couldn"t go down because of the roots but staying up there was equally suicidal.

The beast dangerously neared the cliff, it would probably hit it soon. Maybe if he was high enough, he could use it to escape. he doubted the thing could climb. All he had to do was reach the top of the cliff. He started to climb back up the beast as fast as he could while still somehow dodging the claws. At his back, he could feel the cliff getting nearer and nearer as his clothes were slowly getting thorn apart by the sharp branches and twigs darting at him from all over.

The beast finally got angry at its inability to get rid of the puny Emp climbing on him and decided to try and catch him instead. Emp was now in a difficult situation because if it was somewhat possible to dodge the haphazard swipes of the beast, a spoon could hardly miss a piece of carrot in a soup. Covering him with its entire hand would be easy, what"s more, the cliff was nearly upon them.

Emp had no choice now but to take a risk and jump with all his strength away from the body of the beast and unto its earthy arm. He barely managed to grip it with the very tip of his fingers. The beast, intent on making him fall from it at last, raised its arm in the air but only managed to give Emp a good spot to nudge his feet into, securing his hold. It"s on that ridiculous scene that the beast slammed its whole body into the cliff.

Never had Emp heard such a powerful sound. Even if the monster wasn"t that fast, its impressive weight of stone and wood was more than enough to break down part of the cliff and cleaved the rock upon dozens of meters. The arms of the beast still risen in the air did not smash completely against the cliff but the shock still sent Emp flying into a ordinary tree and finally, back down on normal ground.

Mere meters away from him, the arms of the beast crashed down on the forest atop the cliff and sent dirt and splinters flying once more into the air. Just above the edge of the cliff, The boulder he now saw as the head of the beast peeked menacingly just beside him. The thing had no facial features but an eerie blue glow seeped from the giant fissures its claws had made in the rock, reminding him of his hammer.

Without knowing what madness took hold of him, Emp got back up as fast as he could and ran straight towards its head before it regained its senses and dislodged itself from the cliff side. He jumped once more on top of the boulder and picked up the hammer from his bag.

He lifted it as high as he could and smashed it back down on the rock skull of the beast with all his remaining strength. A frightful shrill resounded and part of the boulder cracked like an egg following the trenches already present before half of it caved in. A glowing and viscous blue liquid rushed out of the opening like a waterfall and the creature shook in its entirety.

As the tentacles at the bottom raged and shamelessly destroyed the local flora, Emp placed the hammer back inside his bag and used all the energy he had left in his legs to fall on top of the cliff. He watched powerlessly as the arms of the creature slid mindlessly from the top of the cliff towards the emptiness after the edge. The beast detached itself from the cliff before it fell backwards into the forest with tons of dislodged rocks. A last rumble shook the forest as the beast hit the ground to never again get itself back up.

Emp was sprawled at the edge of the cliff, breathless and his mind spinning. His calf hurt and his back burned, he had no strength left but he was happy. No, he was more than happy, he was ecstatic he had won! His first victory! He didn"t think that victory would come this quickly or that his first fight would be this scary. Even if the creature had pretty much defeated itself, he never wanted to do that again.

When he had found himself dangling by the very tip of his fingers to the beast"s arms, he had been convinced he would fall to his death. If he had been just a little bit weaker, he wouldn"t have reached the arm and would have fell, just a little bit less endurance and he would not have been able to hang on, just a little bit slower and he would have been ripped apart by the razor sharp branches. That day, for the world, he had become a man, for him, it was only the proof he needed much more training with the hammer.

Bellow, the blue liquid continued to flow steadily from the creatures skull, too far away for him to hear it soak the earth. Up top, parts of the cliff still detached themselves from the rest because of the great collision and fell loudly on top of the enormous corpse.

Emp took a while to take back the control of his breathing, all the while looking at the devastated landscape the creature had made. After, he managed to rise into a sitting position, he got the Book of answers out from the bag and asked it what was that creature.

"A woodland horror, often confused for a Lumberjack eater by the more ignorant. Like mankind feeds the pigs to better eat them later, the earth gives life to man to better devour them. Woodland horrors are often taller than castle walls and guard towers, they hunt any and all creature stupid enough to disturb their endless sleep. They sleep until a prey present itself to them, they consume it and everything else in a ten kilometer wide area before going back to sleep. It is said that the liquid contained in its head is the best fertilizer there is but it is sadly also the rarest since nothing short of a couple dozens of mages or an army equipped with many a siege weapon could possibly hunt it down."

Emp ignored the bits about armies and how scary it was and focused on the fertilizer. If that liquid was such an extraordinary fertilizer, he absolutely had to pick it up. He doubted very much that anything else on the woodland horror had any value, it was mostly stone and wood after all. The blue liquid on the other hand had to be worth a lot of money if they had to dispatch an entire army to get it.

He wondered how he would ever get back down there. The cliff side didn"t seem as st.u.r.dy as it had before the woodland horror had smashed into it. He had no confidence of being able to climb down, more so in his exhausted state. He was aware that he had only defeated it due to luck but he really didn"t want to leave the treasure behind. He needed to go back down there anyway to reach the river once again.

He felt the cliff was really annoying but he couldn"t get angry at it. If the cliff had not been there and if he did not have the Great overburdening hammer with him, he was pretty sure he would already be dead. If to kill this creature one needed to break the boulder that served as its head, he readily believed there wasn"t many who could boast to have killed one. Maybe a good shot with a catapult or a ballista could harm it, or some kind of spell since the book had talked about mages.

What had gotten into him to go back there to attack the beast once he had reached the safety of the cliff"s top? That had been way too risky. He had taught he saw something important and jumped on the weak point before he could even register what he had seen. It was only now that he understood how much what he had done had been stupid.

He stood back up while putting the book away and examined his wounds. His clothes were soaked in blood and ripped in many places but nothing aside from his calf seemed too bad. He used what remained of his clothes to bandage the wound and got a new set to replace it. It hurt but it did not seem that bad, it would probably heal by itself.

(1) Bêtéclair means "Lightning beast" in french. It"s an horrible name in English but sounds great in french. It"s supposed to be said as Bite-hey-clair.

(2) I am not trying my luck with philosophy here, I"m not going to pretend it is deep or anything. It is just a way for a guy less than a year old to cope with his separation from the only person he knew. I do not think Emp actually knows what is philosophy so you can interpret that whole thing however you like.