It was a dense forest with trees everywhere. It was very far from the castle and the town. There were no roads in the forest.
There are only the occasional goat paths, and if you were to wander through these woods alone, you would most likely get lost.
This is the Border Forest in the northern part of the continent of Heneruk. Few people venture deep into the Border Forest.
But the Boldo family is not well off, and with food scarce, even the eldest son of the family cannot afford to sit in the comfort of their castle and be pampered.
Aldes, the 12-year-old eldest son of House Boldo, with his three vassals. It had been almost a fortnight since they had left Arenberg Castle.
Aldes has brown hair and blue eyes. He was neither tall nor short for a boy his age.
He was handsome, but he came from a poor family. He was not popular among the noble families because of his secretive nature.
Even his three vassals were not expert hunters. Their hunting was not at all like that of the nobility, with its many hounds and drivers.
Even the firstborn of House Boldo had to hunt in the forest, far from the castle, for food.
'We left the castle. It's been almost a fortnight, and I've only managed to kill a small boar. If I go back to the castle, I'll be in trouble with my lord.'
Woodod, the burly captain and drillmaster of the cavalry, turned to Aldeth with concern.
'We need to kill at least five animals, the deer we missed, and three boars, so do your best not to tarnish the reputation of the drillmaster.'
Aldes said.
The other vassals who hunted with Aldeth were the cook and the coachman. The only other vassals hunting with Aldeth were the cook and the coachman, and although Master Udod was skilled with the bow, they hunted without a guide, and even when they spotted animals, it was not difficult for them to escape their surroundings.
'Let's go deeper. Further north.'
Aldeth looked at the sun in the sky, measured north, and pointed.
'Aldes, if we go too deep, won't we get lost?'
Libo the cook said.
'Take a small boar, and stick it on whose nose?'
It was a difficult task, with no hounds and no herder, but Aldeth wanted to do what his father, Hugo, had told him to do.
And so it was. Aldeth and his vassals were travelling north, deeper into the forests that bordered the border.
Tall, dense trees surrounded them, and the ground was dark with little sunlight.
Aldeth felt that if he encountered bandits in this place, he would be robbed of everything he had.
In the meantime, he had learnt swordsmanship at Arenberg Castle, under Udoð.
He trained and learnt hard, but at only 12 years old, Aldeth lacked the strength of an adult.
So it was, after an hour of walking deeper into the bordering forest.
'There, there's something over there.'
Fuso, the coachman, spoke in a low voice and pointed with his hand.
The group all looked in the direction he pointed. They could barely see the mule deer's body through the grass, but they could see its antlers.
Woododd made a hand signal, telling them to spread out. Aldes, Ribeau, and Fuso spread out, centred on the mule deer.
Woodod drew his bow from his back and strapped it to his quiver.
Woodord prayed that he would not miss. If he missed this time, how much longer would he have to wander the woods?
He pulled the string, and just as he was about to release the bowstring, a raven, perched in a pine tree next to the roe deer, cawed. The roe deer, hearing the wings, stopped grazing and ran.
Woodod fired his bow, unsure of what to do, but the roe had already taken off.
The group sighed as they tried to surround the buck. One of the men ran after the deer.
Aldes sighed, not knowing if a man could run and catch the buck.
As Aldeth ran, he remembered a story he had heard from the bachelor Wintry. When the ancients hunted, they would chase and throw stones at the animal until it tired.
Animals have a lot of hair, so if they keep running, they get too hot and can't keep going, but humans, although not as fast as animals, have less hair on their bodies, so they can cool themselves down with sweat. They can run for a long time.
Aldes chased the roe deer until it collapsed from exhaustion. He was going to chase it down and shoot it with his bow.
'Aldes, how far will you go?'
Fuso, the coachman, shouted after him.
Aldes heard the call from behind him, but he knew that if he took his gaze off the roe for a moment, he would lose sight of it as it ran through the dense grass. He didn't answer, but kept running.
The vassals heard Aldeth running through the grass and chased after him for a while, but eventually lost him.
'You shouldn't have left, alone, like this.'
Chef Libo said.
'Let's split up and find Aldeth.'
Drill Leader Udod said.
'Scatter, and where will we meet again?'
asked Fuso, the coachman.
'All the trees and grass look the same. We can't pick a place, but we'll find Aldes as best we can, and when we meet, we'll shout, and if we follow the sound, we'll find each other!'
'Wait, we need to share food and water.'
Said Libo, the cook, who was in charge of the group's food and water. Libo divided the food and water into thirds and gave them to Udod and Fuso.
The three now separated and set out to find Aldes.
Aldes continued to run after the roe deer, ready to run for hours, adjusting his stamina as he went. Still, he hadn't lost sight of the roe deer.
The roe deer ran, rested, and ran again. If it were a fast leopard or wolf, it would have kept running, but humans aren't fast, so the roe deer was taking its time.
It seemed to think it could outrun him at any moment.
Aldes decided to keep chasing until it was tired. For more than an hour, Aldes continued to chase the roe deer.
The roe deer ran slower and slower. Aldes felt that if he could just push himself a little harder, he could catch it.
Aldes was closing the distance between them. The roe deer was getting hungry. It began to graze at rest.
The roe deer was 10 metres away. Aldes thought that at this distance, he would be able to hit it with his bow.
To take down a roe deer with a single shot, it's best to aim for the neck.
The roe deer didn't move any closer to Aldes. It continued to graze.
Aldes fired his bow, aiming for its neck. The arrow went straight through the roe deer's neck.
The roe deer jumped around, writhing in pain from the arrow in its neck. Blood was gushing from its neck.
Aldes thought that at that rate of blood loss, it would collapse soon.
Struggling, the roe deer soon collapsed. Aldes approached the roe deer and, with the dagger at his waist, stabbed it in the neck, killing it.
'My persistence has paid off,' he thought.
After more than an hour of running, I was thirsty. There was no stream for miles around.
Water and food belonged to the cook, Ribo.
Aldes was thirsty, but he was also hungry. He looked around, but there were no vassals in sight.
The thought of carrying the heavy roe deer alone made him dizzy.
I had to shout, to call them over here.
'I'm here, come here.'
Aldeth shouted, and shouted again, and again.
He was hungry and thirsty, and his throat was burning from all the shouting.
It was hard to scream anymore. Aldes wiped the sweat from his forehead with his hand and looked up at the sky.
The sky was supposed to be blue, with white clouds, but that was not what Aldes saw.
He could see a tree as big as a castle. Aldeth looked up even further, and he could see the whole tree.
Aldeth was amazed, wondering if there was ever a tree this big in the world.
Aldeth pulled his roe deer and walked toward the big tree. It was hard work, but he didn't want to leave his kill behind and let the other mountain beasts eat it.
Already exhausted, I felt like I was going to collapse as I dragged the roe deer. As he got closer and closer to the tree, it looked bigger and bigger, like a mountain.
Aldeth was not so much hungry as he was thirsty. Upon closer inspection, the tree was an ash tree.
Aldes looked around the tree, thinking that he could chew on some of its berries to rehydrate himself.
Fortunately, there were plenty of berries on the ground. Aldes laid his roe deer on the ground and picked up the ash berries.
The berries were small, and he would have to eat dozens of them to quench his thirst.
Taste wasn't important to Aldeth right now. Once on the ground, he continued to pick and chew the berries.
He swallowed the water from the berries and spat out the rest.
Aldeth chewed more than thirty ash berries.
Finally, Aldeth was able to quench his thirst.
Aldeth leaned back against the trunk of the tree. After a while, he was so tired that he fell asleep.
And he dreamed.
On the ground, there were many soldiers and creatures fighting in a tangle. One of the soldiers stood out.
A man with brown hair and blue eyes like Aldeth's.
His swordsmanship was exceptional. With two swift strokes, he severed all nine of the Hydra's heads.
Several of the lizardmen and ogres were decapitated with a single blow.
The demons were numerous, but where the brown-haired man swept, their heads fell off in a huff.
Soon, the plain was clear of all the demons, and only the army of men remained.
The people and the brown-haired man shouted in triumph.
'Lord Aldeth. Aldeth. Wake up.'
Aldeth heard someone calling to him in his dream.
'Aldes.'
Drill Leader Woodord was shaking him awake.
Aldeth opened his eyes.
'Aldeth. How long have you been asleep here?'
Udod asked.
'I don't know. I think I caught a roe deer, got thirsty, picked some fruit from a tree, and fell asleep.'
'It's been two days since Aldeth ran out of the forest to find the roe deer. You don't know how many times we have screamed at the top of our lungs to find you. What is a tree as big as this mountain, by the way?'
Woodod looked at the tree's leaves and fruit.
'An ash tree, indeed. This is the Boundary Forest. Aldeth, you should be on your way to the castle by now, and fortunately, in our search for you, we have killed two boars, and you have caught the roe deer you were chasing.'
Udo patted the belly of the roe deer on the ground.
'Woodod, did you just say that it's been two days since you've been separated from me?'
'Yes.'
Two days had passed since Aldeth had fallen asleep at the base of the ash tree. It felt like a lie.