I jerked my little head towards the source of the sound and saw a middle-aged man with a square face and a naked hairy chest pointing his stone-spear at me.
Daney, that disturbing freak was squatting in the corner of the room with a heavy stone on his shoulder. Butt-naked and sobbing, he wasn't faring well.
Although I welcomed that sight at first, as I thought deeper, I felt a strange fear seizing my heart. In fear, I reasoned to myself, 'Daney is probably being punished, and since kids could be punished so ruthlessly here, my upcoming days would be harrowing. My father was such a gentle and kind man, to only discipline me and punish me with words.'
"Kid?", a hoarse yet kind voice broke my chain of thought as a burly giant, around 7 feet tall stared at me intently, waiting for me to speak something.
I wanted to faint again but this time, somewhere in the back of my under-developed mind, I had the realization that if I fainted one more time, I might not ever be able to open my eyes again.
I gulped unknowingly and replied in a fruity, adorable voice,
"Uncle, I lost my way. Please help me find a way back to the capital of the Leer Kingdom."
The man scrunched his eyebrows for a few seconds before scratching his head as he replied,
"I've never heard of this place kid. As you might know, our Rohanic tribes have limited contact with the city people. They're thugs and looters, often trying to take advantage of us. There was this one time Iā"
To my surprise and dismay, the stern and uncompromising brutish uncle turned out to be a jolly and chatty one but the words coming out of his mouth were so strange that I found it hard to share his enthusiasm. So, I interrupted him as he was beginning to open up and said,
"Uncle, I'm not lying, I don't know anything about Rohanic tribes. I don't know how I got here. It happened too magically." I sobbed a little with a shaky voice near the end of my sentence and tucked my chin near my breast to appear even more innocent.
But instead of the sympathy that I was expecting, I was greeted with a weird silence which was soon broken from the shout of a miserly bug, slowly being crushed under a heavy stone in the corner of the room.
"See, Old man, he's a LIER."
The burly uncle had his mouth open in an O-shape as he ignored Daney's off-handed remark and asked me with a contemplating look,
"You don't know about the Rohanic Tribes?"
"No"
"You sure?"
"Yes, it's a strange name"
"Why?"
"What?"
By this point, we didn't know how to talk further. I tried to break the silence that was growing increasingly awkward
"Uncle, why are there no stars here?" I asked the question that was unsettling to me the most about this wilderness.
"Eh? what is 'stars'?"
"Uncle where am I?"
"How did you even come here, kid?" My questions and his answers both led to increasing confusion.
After a few more awkward conversations like this with the burly uncle, who later told me his name was Danulo, I got a general understanding of the area where I was lost for the past few days.
This was the 'Forest of calamity', the den of heinous criminals and magical beasts. Other than the Rohanic tribes, who have been surviving in the jungle for the past few decades, it was practically avoided by everyone other than the vagrant criminals hiding from authorities and the rogue adventurers testing their luck by fighting magical beasts.
From what my father told me about magical beasts in his lectures back in the day and what Uncle Danulo told me, I gathered that magical beasts would just be the evolved form of wild animals, with magical powers related to their affinity and superior intellect.
Magical beasts are usually divided into three major ranks, corresponding to the ranks of human mages and warriors i.e. low-grade magical beasts graded 1-3 and mid-grade magical beasts grades 4-6. Magical beasts beyond grade 6 usually become so strong that they can even change their forms and mingle among humans, therefore, they are called 'demons' by the masses.
According to Uncle Danulo, the forest was home to magical beasts as strong as grade 5, and even those are too strong as the strongest mage from the Leer Kingdom, where I come from was only grade 4.
Magical beasts are a rarity in the peaceful outside world. They're feared for their ability to wreak havoc and take countless lives and they're desired for their corpses.
Their durable skins and mana cores, which help novice and adept mages increase their affinity with the core's element, could fetch prices ranging from 5 silver coins to hundreds of shiny golden coins in the free market of the Ro-han city, far west of our current location.
Uncle Danulo was a warrior, a powerful one. When I asked him about his power, he didn't know how to respond and so he told me he could lift boulders five times as tall as him with one hand.
Although I didn't believe it entirely, I knew that it was possible as I'd heard rumors about strong warriors from my father. Warriors followed the same grades and divisions of power as mages, from grade 1 to grade 9, but in the Leer Kingdom, there were no warriors beyond grade 3, and even those that were grade 3 were the commanders and generals of mighty legions or private guards of rich aristocrats.
However, it still wasn't possible for them to lift a boulder that heavy with ease. Although I believed he was exaggerating his abilities, I didn't dispute him out of fear of inciting him.
Soon it was about to be the night again, Daney was pleading continuously to Uncle Danulo while he was telling me about the customs that I would need to follow within the tribe.
As I was wondering about the bizarre lifestyle and culture of the Rohanic tribes, which seemed to have three divisions, uncle Danulo said something that alerted my dull little head at once,
"Little Ryne, you remind of a little girl that the Contas found some days ago and have been worshipping her ever since. Haha, if you meet those idiots, just stay far away, otherwise, they would infect you with cowardice as well. Moreover, that little girl has white hair, you know, white, haha, really suits the Conta people to have a 6-year-old cowardly goddess with white hair."
'White hair? 6 year old? appeared out of nowhere? Is it HER? How's this possible?'