"Hey! Natsuki! Come here"
A young boy called as he ran up a hill. The boy's name was Riku, he had blonde colored hair and fair skin, his eyes were deep blue in color and his face, although still young could easily put most beautiful girls to shame.
Behind him was another boy, this boy's name was Natsuki, he had long black hair which could easily reach his waist, his skin was extremely fair and glittered under the sun. Natsuki's eyes were also black in color and he had this joyful look on his face which added to his attractiveness. In short, he was handsome.
The two boys climbed to the top of the hill and began scouring the surroundings, their goal of coming to this place was find a rare flower which only grew on the top of this hill. The flower was called sun glow flower and was ranked as an uncommon grade material.
The two young boys looked through every inch of the hill top before coming together to calculate their gains, they brought out the flowers they were able to find which amounted to ten.
Natsuki looked at his friend Riku waiting for him to say something about the amount of flowers, he couldn't tell if it was small or enough, after all, it was he that requested them to come here in the first place.
Riku looked towards the sky, he was seemingly in deep thought which prompted Natsuki to not disturb him. After a while of waiting, Riku finally spoke.
"My mum didn't tell me how much to bring back so I guess this should be enough, but just in case let us look for more"
The two separated again to look for more sun glow flower, it was hard to find so they ended up staying till late evening. The two met up again and calculated their gains, the second search had earned them a total of thirteen flowers which brought their overall total to twenty three.
"This should be enough"
Riku said after going through their findings.
"We should probably head back, it's already late"
The two then began heading down the hill. The sun had gone down so it was a lot harder to navigate their way. The trees were somehow taller and thicker than they remembered... or so the darkness made it appear.
After a few hours of roaming about, the two concluded that they were lost, it was impossible to find the way back to their houses in the darkness.
"What should we do?"
Natsuki asked, he wasn't too concerned about their situation since he had no family who would look for him. He had grown up in a orphanage and after he turned ten he escaped and wondered till he found himself in the village where he met Riku.
Riku on the other hand was different, he had a family and people to care about him so staying in the forest was not an option. The two looked around some more, they were searching for anything they could use to trace their way back to their village.
Time passed considerably, by this time Riku and Natsuki had lost the strength to look for anything, they just laid lazily on their backs while gazing at the stars. Natsuki who was more used to this kind of life told Riku to sleep and let him keep watch, he was just a common grade human but he was confident in his combat abilities and was sure that he could at least protect Riku if anything happened.
*
Natsuki's eyes opened in a flash and in an instant he was on his feet, he had heard some whispers coming from close to the place they set their camps, he looked into the distance and saw light, although it was a little dim, Natsuki had no problem seeing it due to how dark the hill was.
Natsuki was not sure what the light was but he knew that they were not alone, he immediately woke Riku up while putting his hand over his mouth to prevent him from making noise.
"Someone is coming"
Natsuki whispered into Riku's ears, he then got up and began walking towards the light stealthily, he was very conscious of his surroundings making sure not to make any unnecessary noise.
After getting close to the source of the light, Natsuki picked up a stick, he wanted to use it as a weapon in the situation whereby the source of light was an enemy.
The source of the light paused for a little after Natsuki got closer, then it began heading towards their camp with speed. The speed of the light was too fast and in the blink of an eye, it was already beside Natsuki.
Natsuki looked back in order to warn Riku but a hit to his chest made him unable to. He clutched his chest in pain while looking around to find the attacker, the light was gone now and the hill was back to its original dark state. Natsuki looked around in vain as he could not find his opponent anywhere.
Although he was in pain, Natsuki was still able to move, he staggered and leaped towards Riku's direction when he felt something hard hit the back of his head. Natsuki was thrown to the ground unable to do anything as he held the back of his head which was now bleeding.
Riku had heard some sounds of fighting and decided to escape, he ran towards their camp to look for anything that was of value to him. Natsuki had given him a set of instructions before he slept informing him that if anything should happen, he was to flee without looking back.
After looking through their camp and picking out things which he knew he would need, Riku began running away trying to get as far as possible from the camp site.
After running some distance away, Riku looked back to where he had heard the sound of fighting, he waited for sometime, believing beyond all reasonable doubt that Natsuki would somehow come following him at his back like usual. Time flew by and the sun came out but there was no Natsuki, he looked towards his back only to find out that he had somehow made his way out of the forest.
Riku was stuck, should he go back to look for Natsuki or should he head towards the village and inform them about what happened?
After contemplating for a while, he decided that if he was to fight those guys alone then the chances of him coming back alive were slim, he took the safer option of returning to the village and then informing them of the incident.
Since the sun was out, it didn't take Riku time to arrive at his village. He looked in front of the village gate and saw a group of people standing outside it and having a heated discussion.
Riku walked towards the group, he scanned through the people in the group faces confirming that they were all people he knew.
"Riku!"
Riku paused after hearing the familiar voice calling his name, he looked back and saw his father running towards him. His father's hands were wide open as he threw himself all over Riku, tears were flowing from his eyes as the thought of losing his only child overwhelemed him.
"Natsuki is..."
Riku's voice trailed off as he remembered what had transpired the night before, he felt very useless and powerless, the thought of him ever abandoning Natsuki was something he never thought he would do.
His father looked at Riku, he understood what had happened and knew it was too much for a child the age of Riku to bear.
"Go inside and meet your mother, she is very worried about you"
His father said, he then looked towards the rest of the villagers gathered outside,
"Let's go, we won't stop until we recover Natsuki's body, he is an important part of this village whether we like it or not"
The group then proceeded to scour the hills in search of Natsuki.