A dark shadow named Lili was swiftly running through the forest, while dressed in her overly large black cloak which made her look like a small black ghost. The cloak was in fact so large that over one-third of it was simply being dragged along the forest floor.
Soon along her path came a fallen tree which she nimbly jumped over like a parkour expert, but as her feet touched the ground on the other side of the fallen tree she felt a sudden tug at her cloak. Unprepared to meet this sudden turn of events she was quickly taken off guard and tossed on her back.
"Ahh." She groaned in pain. Opening her eyes she quickly noticed that her new cloak had just gotten stuck on one of the fallen tree branches.
In annoyance, she stood back up and unbounded her cloak from the branch and took a quick look around. The forest was quiet and seemed to stand still. The sun was shining brightly down past the many trees and their leafy branches letting her see clearly around her. And to her relief no one had seen her humiliating fall.
She was alone within the forest, and that arrogant boy was nowhere to be seen. She could still remember it so vividly and still feel the after effects of his fearsome slaps. But now a day had passed, her bleeding had also passed, she hoped. And her soreness was gone, and along with all of this her confidence had also somewhat returned to her.
Quickly learning from her mistake Lili threw one side of the cloak over her shoulder and tied the end of it to the other end of the cloak that was still hanging on her side. Now she truly looked like a black ghost with only her cute face and slender legs showing. And one could also see her leather band around her right leg which held her trusty stone knife.
In fact under her cloak she had her two leather pouches, one filled with water, and the other filled with berries. With this she felt quite confident of herself. She was going to travel light and travel fast. She would find civilization, get hamburgers or something really tasty and return home before it got dark.
Satisfied with this she then continued on her journey. Although quickly after some tens of minutes of running through the forest her stomach started aching again and there was blood. She also for whatever reason felt really fatigued like her stamina had just given out and then she fell to her knees in exhaustion.
She was panting for breath and already sweating a little and now in need of cleaning her lower half again. Damn it seemed that this journey of hers wouldn't be as easy to accomplish as she had hoped.
***
After some more running through the seemingly endless forest and seeing the sun already beginning to fall, she started to wonder just how far had the boy managed to go. He hadn't been well prepared at all for a long journey, she at least didn't see a backpack or any supplies on his big body, and yet he was nowhere to be seen. Surely he couldn't have gone that far in a day, there had to have been a town or some village close by, right?
But then again Lili did wonder if the boy was not actually even real but a ghost or a hallucination of her own mind? Maybe she was just going crazy within this forest and nothing that had happened was in fact real. Maybe even her being here wasn't true and she was in fact back in her old home sleeping peacefully and with a protein bar as her sleeping friend.
Oh she could have really used some protein bars on her journey right about now. Just where was a convenient store when you needed it?
Unsure of where the boy had gone she decided to just press onwards towards the direction she thought that the boy had gone into. And soon the terrain became a steep climb up a hill and she now found herself starting to sweat greatly. Had the boy truly gone this way, surely not? She reasoned to herself as she soon found herself climbing up an ever-steeper and steeper hill.
Pushing away some bushes along her path she then came to a stop. Taking a moment to calm her breathing she focused and listened to her surroundings. In the distance over the hill, she could hear the faint sound of a small stream.
Holy shit. She thought to herself. She had only been going through the forest for a few hours or so and she had already discovered a potential stream.
Realizing this she felt like face-palming herself. Before she only bothered to go a few hundred meters away from her home, if only she would have gone a bit further then maybe she could have actually found other people already. Although she herself did realize that even now she was pretty young and going alone so far from home even now was extremely risky.
Shaking away these thoughts from her mind she pressed onwards. Making her way through the hills forest shrubbery she started to hear the flowing water louder and louder, it sounded like there was a small waterfall up ahead. Then it finally came to her full view. On the hillside, there truly was a small pond from where water was overflowing down the hill into an even larger body of water below.
Seeing it she figured that there must have been some underground reservoir of water inside the hill that was constantly pumping up water into the small lake and had then created this small waterfall in the middle of the forest.
However it was quite disappointing to see that there in fact was no civilization anywhere to be seen here like she had expected. It seemed her adventure wouldn't come to an end so easily.
Crouching at the side of the clear water pond she couldn't help but take a small sip of its clear water. In some cultures, people said that such places were sacred and could heal and give a person a longer life, kind of like the water from the Holy Grail is believed to give eternal life.
Thinking of it Lili quickly took another sip and another, a long life did sound kind of cool. And who knew what she might gain if she actually jumped into the water, would she then become a muscular man like that boy?
But then Lilis thoughts were cut-off as she suddenly heard loud shouts of men down below the small waterfall. The men sounded aggressive which frightened Lili as she remembered what that single boy had done to her. The men were also accompanied by the sounds of something metallic, to her it sounded like the sound of men covered in armor moving.
Going down on all fours she silently crept to the edge of the small hillside plateau and carefully peeked at the men below. And indeed there she could see a group of 7 lightly armoured medieval men with metal helmets that were held on their sides leaving their white skin, not so handsome faces and blonde hair on full display for Lili to see.
They also had wooden shields on their backs, swords on their sides and some even held spears. And over the armor, the men wore plain red tabards with no insignias.
The men were standing at attention as another much larger man compared to the rest came out of the forest. He had a fully enclosed helmet in his hands and a nasty scar going across his thuggish-looking face. The man looked and sounded like some British gang banger as he was barking orders at the other men.
"Fucking hell lads, the fuck are you doing laying around here for, you fucking lazy bastards! You know the contract we are on, so stop lazing around and start looking for those lassies! I for one don't feel like being in this forest for any longer than I absolutely have to. So get to it lads and afterwards let's go get some ale at the tavern!"
In response, the men yelled in unison. "Yes Boss!" And then they ran further into the forest where they seemingly had their horses waiting for them. Climbing atop their horses the men moved out of Lilis sight somewhere further into the forest to her left.
Seeing the men riding horses that were seemingly effortlessly moving in the forest, trampling all the plants and bushes in their path made Lili feel jealous. She also wanted a horse like that and more specifically a white beautiful horse. But more than that she felt quite shocked by the mens way of speaking, it didn't sound anything like that boy or American in the least. The men sounded more like they were some kind of football fans from the United Kingdom.
Seeing them leave out of sight Lili felt relieved. They definitely weren't giving her good vibes. People like them were best to be avoided at all costs. Only if she still had her trusty side arm and muscles then maybe she could try and talk to them, but not like this. Right now being as small as she was, she held no chance against 8 fully armed medieval British hooligans.
Hearing no more thuggish talk in the distance, she quickly got on her feet and continued her journey. Going down the hill she came to the location those men had just been at. There she could see their horse trails moving in two directions, but there was also the stream that was leading in a third direction.
Seeing this she felt a bit conflicted. Along the two horse trails, she knew for sure that there would be people to be found there, but on the other hand, they weren't the type of people she wanted to meet. With this in mind she decided to follow the small stream towards civilization.
Having already seen 9 people in the span of a few days, Lili felt that she was now closer than ever before to finding civilization and her destiny. In a small excited tone of voice, she pumped her little fist into the air and cheered.
"Here I come, you medieval hamburgers or whatever it is that the people here eat."
***
At the same time a certain Prince Arthur Pendragon was travelling upon a massive black stallion, while accompanied by master Reinhardt who was also dressed in black and riding a similar type of a black stallion. The two were heading towards Reinhardt's former home, Castle Leo.
For Reinhardt it was a great occasion, because now finally he would get this prince to meet with his granddaughter. And through the two youngsters union, his and his best friends the Kings family would be united by blood. Like so the Dukedom of Lionheart's position would be forever secure on this Island of Albion, and the two would forever be allies.
After that the King would only need to marry one of his daughters to one of Duke Westfields sons and then the two Dukedoms and the Royal family would all be one. There would be stability and hopefully peace and prosperity for the coming years.
And as for the 14 year old Prince Arthur he just felt happy knowing that he would be finally allowed to get a girlfriend. Sure the girl was supposedly only 8 years old, but it wouldn't be long till they were allowed to become one and he would finally be a man again.
Though he did find it strange that the girl had never been shown in public before and not even Reinhardt had seen her or knew her name. But still he trusted Duke Leo Lionheart and his family to give him the perfect little princess to marry. Although he did doubt that the girl would be as beautiful as the one that he had met within the forest, which now had left him troubled.
On one hand he intended to do as he had done this far and be the perfect son. He was going to marry Duke Lionheart's Daughter and be fateful to her and be only with her. But after having seen that girl in the forest, he felt so conflicted. If he didn't take her, then surely someone else would. And with her being a bit of an airhead and wild as she was, her getting claimed at a young age by some deceitful scumbag seemed a certainty. So as much as it pained him to do, he had to have her as well. It would be a great scandal and damaging to his reputation, but he didn't care, in a few years time he was going to find her again and then take her for his own before anyone else could.