I am currently in a block. I do not know what to do, how to advance. I am stuck doing nothing, I meditate in my normal spot.

The water drips upon my head, and I enter a trance, clearing my mind, my eyes are open but I cannot see. When I can see again it is already dark.

Another day I could not achieve greater enlightenment. Enlightenment to guide me in this world, to help me find my place.

In my dreams at night I find it, I know what I must do in my short life, but when I wake I find it all a dream.

In the morning I forage for fruit and vegetables, feeling part of the land. Afterwards I light a fire, feeling its warmth within me. Later I train feeling the air on my skull. After training I bath, becoming one with the flow of the river. Lastly I meditate to bring my understanding of this ritual to a peak.

After all this I still cannot advance my understanding of myself in this world. Another day passes and then another, and it seems as though I will never find my name in this place.

But now is different from the other days, I am in a place I never though I would be in. Between a large beast and two human children, in the middle of the woods.

I heard a noise, and without thinking I went in to investigate, much unlike myself.

But regardless of the events leading to where I am, I am now involved. The huge bear stands and raises its claws forward, as if to lunge at me. Behind my back are the children, no doubt frozen in place.

I jump to a pack of reeds and break one quickly. Now I have an improvised staff. The bear seems cautious, but no doubt if I take even a step forward it would attack.

I do just that, as it steps forward to strike me, I shove the reed to its head, it retracts before it gets hit. This time it tries with more momentum and the reeds end slaps it on the cheek. The bear stops but the reed cracks at the middle.

It looks fearfully at me as I take another staff. As I step forward it turns and gets back on four legs and runs away.

I now turn to the two children with their gazes stuck on me. “Wow, your strong!” One of them says, “You just beat that bear all by yourself.” They walk up to me.

“What are you doing alone in the woods, it is no place for children.”

“You’re one to talk, you’re alone out here too.” One of them talks back to me. “Yeah, you’re just a kid like us.” So they never saw a halfling before.

“I am a halfling, and older than the both of you combined.” Thats enough talk, I need to take them out of the forest. “We're halflings too.” They obviously lie. “We're older than you!”

Heh, what good will liying do them? “Well then, if so you are, I shall leave you two adults alone then.” Their faces are shocked.

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“Sorry, sorry, we lied, we’re not adults. We just lost our way. Please don’t leave us.” They put their arm on my shoulder, being too friendly for my taste.

“So can you teach us that ninja skills you used on that bear?” What foolish requests.

“These skills take years to learn. And I plan on getting you out of the forest much sooner. The nearest town should be… quite far now that I think about it. How did you-“

“Forget that, just help us OK?” What annoying brats.

"The forest is no place for you. Do you even want to go back?” They don’t answer and instead run away.

“Catch you at the lake!” Is the last I hear. Will they even make it to the lake safely? I try to follow them but they vanish before I can catch up.

They vanish before I can catch up.

When I arrive to the lake they seem to have prepared a bonfire on the lakeside and are already in the water, playing.

“What are you doing playing in the water? Do you not remember you need to go home?”

But their response is “We arn’t playin’ we’re fishin’, come help us.”

What?! Why would they disrupt the lives of the fish? And ruining the lakeside with bonfires. Unacceptable.

“Stop this at once, fishing is forbidden in this forest!”

“Says who?!” What is that response? “Yeah, your not the boss of us.”

Uhh, these trifling children!

“We need to eat, so we fish for fishes!” Disregarding their poor speech, I explain.

“There are plenty of fruits in the forest to go around, I will get you some.”

But they respond with “We don’t want fruit, we want fish, and then we want meat too.” I don’t know what to say.

I fix my robes to enter the water but when I look again they are gone. And written next to the bonfire is “Yur so slou see yu in tha cleereeng.”

After some time deciphering the message and taking the bonfire apart I go to the clearing closest to the lake, what trouble will they make now?

As I arrive I see what trouble it is. Flowers and saplings ruined in their wake as they build a shabby roof of some sort next to a tree.

The hammer and nails I don’t know where they got but they need to stop immediately. “STOP THIS RIGHT NOW!” I yell but they do not respond at all.

I walk over and take away the hammer from one of them with a bit of struggle. "Can’t you see you are ruining the clearing?”

But with less attitude, and even a bit of disrespect in their voices the respond with “So what? We want to make a house, we don’t have to live like you.”

“But on the expense of nature? You need-“

“No you need to relax, we don’t care about nature. We want to survive, and have fun. You are just no fun.”

“What you are doing to nature is no fun for it too. Can you not think beyond you’re-” without listening their attention diverts to something else behind them.

“Hey look, it’s the baby from before.” Behind them is a small premature bear.

“What do you mean, from before?” But I understand it all too quick when they leave their tools and pick up rocks then start throwing them at the small bear.

“Stop! STOP!” I yell but they don’t relent. “Who ever hits it on the head gets to be the king!”

They are both silenced by something louder than both of them. The same bear from before, growling from the bushes behind the smaller bear and emerging as before.

The two children are terrified once more, and I am the only one who can save them. But…

-----

I do not know what Became of them, I did return after abandoning them but there was nothing, no struggle. The bonfire, the tools, any trace of them is gone as if it was never there. As if they never existed.

The reed I used to protect them is broken, and the marks of the fight with the bear are still there. But the children, I cannot remove them from my mind, yet I cannot find evidence that they were there at all.

I am at a block still. I do not comprehend any of this, instead I live the rest of my life as I did. What have I done wrong?

I know I have regrets, I do not know what it is I regret, they were mean and disrespectful, but non the less, I look at this day as a test in my life I failed. A lesson I couldn’t learn.

If I had my chance again, I would probably fail once more. I must learn until I am ready. I must learn not only of my place, but of the place of others in this world.