One year ago before the eternal winter befell the village
The fields full of wheat are where the adults spend half their time while the children roam the village and the nearby forest that is barricaded by wood walls and spikes curious about what lies ahead.
Children pass by the stone temple chuckling as they run up to each other
The elder could hear their laugh from afar, sitting on the chair outside his hut feeling the warm ray of the sun.
The elder with a knife and wood in his hand continued his carving and slowly the piece of wood started to show a resemblance to that of a Manwolf.
Four long limbs and two small dotted eyes covered by thick fur.
By his side is a basket where there is a wood carving of animals like bearkin and rabbit, the elder continues his work humming with his stern look melted into a warm smile.
He closed his eyes for a moment and chuckled as he remembered his youngest son's pale face.
"Elder!" His son called him frantically early in the morning face pale and hands on both legs breathing heavily.
"Dreg, the sun's not even up! are you trying to make my back worse!?" The elder complained bags under his eyes his body curved to a perfect angle as he nagged his son.
"I swear you're the one that's gonna kill me!"
"S-sorry elder Anna s-she needs help!" Dreg's nervous voice rang from outside
The elder walks to Dreg the fastest he can grabbing him by both shoulders, The back pain he was enduring for the whole night seemed to suddenly disappear with the sudden news.
"Where!?"
"At our home" Dreg answered as he guided his father towards his house just to get hit in the back of the head before they could get there
"Who are you trying to guide, I built that house idiot!?, go get a healer!!." the elder yelled and his son came running in the opposite direction he was.
With his back bend the elder Arrived at the wooden hut where his son Dreg lives, he was welcomed by Anna with a a puffy face and sunken eyes, back against the side of the door struggling to not fall over.
Seeing the elder, Anna fixed her posture and forced a pained smile.
"Pardon my intrusion," The elder said when he entered the house, and as he passed by Anna her forced smile immediately disappeared showing the pain from her face as she followed the elder with her gaze
The elder comfortably sat on the chair of the dinner table to relieve his back before looking at Anna who was smiling from ear to ear.
"Sit," the elder said
"Y-yes" Anna obeyed a slight wince showed the discomfort she felt as she walked closer and as the elder managed to get a good look at her the first thing he noticed was the unnatural bump on her stomach which made his heart skip a beat.
The elder's face turned white.
"Stop" The elder stood up from his chair and immediately went towards Anna he offered his hand to her which she immediately took.
The elder assisted Anna on the chair before heading to the kitchen without uttering another word.
Confused Anna called "Grandfather?"
What responded was the sound of tinkering
"How many months?" the elder asked while in the kitchen.
Anna jolted up from her seat "Grandfather, you don't mean!,....I'm happy by your words but I can't be pregnant" Anna hesitated before continuing "The healer said so himself.....that I would never be able to bear a child"
"That quack's wrong, when I say you're pregnant you're pregnant. I have never been wrong, child" The elder showed himself holding a tray of cups and a kettle.
"L-let me help". Anna tried to approach the elder but his stern look stopped her from moving.
"Sit back down!" The elder raised his voice and Anna immediately obeyed like a puppy.
"Drink these Egg ginger" the elder pour it on the tea cup right at Anna's face.
"Y-yes" Anna immediately grabbed a cup and the aromatic alone made the cramp disappear.
.....
"Dear!, you shouldn't give up on life the doctor is here!" Dreg slams open the door sweat covering his worried face.
"Oh no!, d-dear your sickness i-its getting worse you've gotten fat!"
Thud
With a flash, Dreg fell to the ground a tea cup embedded on his forehead
Regaining her senses Anna looked at the elder right by her side and as the realization kicked in. 'R-right in front of his father!'
Anna started to bow her head profusely apologizing while the elder stopped her
"Don't apologize, that child is a lost cause"
"F-father" dreg said down on the ground.
"Finally calling me father? now get up! show me that incompetent healer!"
The sun slowly begins to burn away, with the light outside turning orange the children playing outside have soon gone back to their houses only the hunters are left to begin their patrol.
Dreg yawned waiting outside the bedroom door next to his father who was looking at the door with such concentration that he could bore a hole through it.
Creak
"I can't believe it myself but she's pregnant." The healer said
"I think about seven months. How come none of you notice it?"
The elder and dreg were silent "Are you not gonna answe-
"p.. pregnant.." Dreg muttered trembling for a few seconds "IM GONNA HAVE A CHILD!" He cried out enthusiastically.
It was a miracle, that his wife who was said to be cursed by the goddess of fertility was bearing a child.
Slamming the bed door open he tried to jump over his wife but was caught by the healer
"This idiot" the healer sighed almost stumbling over but he was supported by the elder tugging on his robe.
"Uncle, I'm gonna teach my child how to kill a bearkin he'll be better than brother" Dreg said with joy
"Sure, sure...you didn't even ask the gender" the healer said.
"It doesn't matter!"
The healer sighed and turned to the elder "How about you brother?"
"What is it quack?" the elder responded
"It's a boy I think" the healer said and to his words, the elder's face twisted to what looks like a smile which Dreg immediately noticed.
"Father!" Dreg called forcefully getting out of the healer's grasp and going to the elder for a hug.
"Don't idiot!, My back"
"Father I'll name him after you! how about it? you can call him junior"
"Dreg my back!" The elder bellowed hiding the scary smile he was making.
Under the orange light of the sun, the elder and the healer left leaving the two love birds alone
"You should show that smile more" The healer said and at his word, the elder's face immediately shifted to a frown
"What, did I say something wrong?" The healer asked
"Don't talk if you have nothing meaningful to say fraud" the elder answered
"What a vulgar way to talk to your brother, you shouldn't hide it even if it's ugly" the healer said with a smile. "I haven't seen that ugly smile since Helena....well died"
"..." The two talk their way until reaching each their home.
'Bring them back!' A familiar voice echoed in the elder's head making him remember the vivid picture of Dreg's corpse...
The eternal winter suddenly started two months after Anna's pregnancy was announced to the village, after finally getting over the death of his wife
His brother died from getting mauled by a Bearkin trying to save one of his patients.
There was no funeral, the body was just buried somewhere, forgotten by anyone except for the elder who visited every day even with the sudden winter he always found time to visit the grave of the person whom he thought he never really like
A month later Greg's wife died of an unknown disease leaving Greg and their six years old daughter.
"Is Mother gonna come back?" The daughter asked and the elder could only remain silent as the body was lowered to the cold embrace of the soil.
'Am I gonna lose everything?, how come they all vanish.' the elder looked at the grave
and pondered 'God, Why take someone so young and not me who's already at the end of his life?'
Two months later almost half of the woman in the village has caught the weird disease, all their crops gone unable to withstand the cold
hunger struck their village and soon all those who are able lost their strength but in the middle of the disaster, his son Greg said words of prophecy
A word from God.
'if we carry the lord's will, is the eternal winter going to end?, will my son's live?'
.....
Screams woke the elder. Back to hell he couldn't help but ponder how bitter his dream was. With the still-warm body of dreg on his lap, he wondered how much time had passed.
His emotions were already numb from all the things that happened, he looked toward his lord, and the last thing he remembered was losing consciousness while tightly hugging the body of his dead son.
His lord has its back turned against him seemingly struggling. The people that were still alive can be counted on both hands while the centipedes and beetles have vanished as if the Swarm of them never even existed.
Trembling the elder's eyes catch the knife on his son's bloody hand.