Today was about a week away since the beginning of the expedition and the group was resting until the next light approached when they would begin to move again. It may have been the lull period now, but there was still no meaning in taking on unnecessary risks.

Alz was currently in the sitting within the arms of an elven women staring into space with hollow eyes. He protested, he struggled, he tried to get out of it, but all his efforts only proved that resistance was futile, so he had now accepted it.

At the same time, soft sensation on the back of his head and warmth from the arms cuddling his neck all reminded him of a time he missed, and he also began to feel that this arrangement wasn't so bad after all.

"Hey Alz! Help me take this guy out, look what he did to my face!" Kleiz was lying flat on the floor with mud all over his face as he called out to Alz with some jealousy in his eyes.

A lively glint flashed in his eyes as Alz turned towards Kleiz, but a voice interrupted him from behind before he could even reply, "Why do you guys keep dragging lil' Alz into this, stop dragging him into your silly games?"

"Yeah, haven't you all been beaten enough by him already? Why do you guys keep calling him over when you all clearly can't win." an unpleased voice travelled from another elf who was sitting in front of Alz with clear displeasure in her tone.

The two melodic voices were pleasing to the ears but spared no expense towards the wounded pride of the warriors present. Dry laughs spread across the makeshift sparring grounds as the elves looked away from Alz with awkward expressions.

The statements were harsh, but none of them present, even including the warriors who were currently keeping guard could refute them in the slightest. They had been holding daily sparring sessions during the breaks since they left the village.

Initially, the others hadn't called Alz over and he didn't try to join in either. However, after they broke the ice between them, the warriors extended an invitation to Alz to which he accepted in heartbeat to get out of being babied.

Despite his display near the field before they left the village, the warriors didn't think too much of it at the start, thinking that he was just a child. However, what came after left their mouths agape as they looked at Alz with awe and dejection.

Alz was undefeated. Their thoughts of taking it easy on him got blown out of the water with his display of skills, allowing them to learn first-hand how Polon felt over the three-day period, shattering whatever pride they had over Alz due to their seniority over him.

Naturally, they didn't give up and continued to invite Alz over, but they quickly got stopped by the complaining women who didn't want to give him up to the warriors.

"Haa...Looks like I'm stuck here"

Caught in the middle of this, Alz could sighed inwardly as he felt the arms tightening around his neck, knowing that there was no escape for him this time. There was nothing bad with how the female elves were treating him, but he was afraid of indulging too much in this warmth.

"Stop playing around and get your asses moving, the area has already begun to light up. You guys can play all you want after we cross the border." a serious voice suddenly came from the forest near the group, directed towards the sparring ground.

Silhouettes began to appear one after another from different directions, adding up to a total of ten. They were the patrol group who had just returned to the group after noticing that the skies were getting brighter.

"Let's go!" the elves wiped the awkward expressions off their faces and said with enthusiasm as they began to move. Kleiz also wiped the mud of his face and stood up, moving into his position in the formation.

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Alz was also finally released as the supporters began to rise one after another as the expedition continued to march onward.

Alz had learnt many things about the forest that he didn't know during this trip, broadening his knowledge on the placed he lived in. He had previously known that the forest was roughly split into five different sections, with the capital in the center and the others pointing towards the four cardinal points from the capital.

The Calla tribe was located within the southern part of the forest, something that was common knowledge back in the tribe, but this was the first time he had heard of the different conditions between each section.

He had always found it weird that there was only one other creature living in the forest ever since he left the archives, something he had never read too much into before he entered the archives.

The pictures and descriptions of forests in the past depicted of a large ecosystem with diverse species living within which lay in stark contrast with the forest he lived in.

Hence, he had brought it up during one of the breaks in the past few days without carrying much hope in obtaining a clear answer.

To his surprise, one of the elves revealed a look of surprise and praise as he looked at Alz then, providing him with an answer that caused his blood to boil over in excitement.

While this might have seemed like an obvious question at one glance, the elves at the Calla tribe had been raised under the conditions of being one of the only two creatures in their habitat with next to no external contact.

Additionally, there was constant pressure on them in the form of the trials, resulting in many of them subconsciously accepting the conditions as the norm and only beginning to question them as they got older.

He would not have been as surprised had it been any of the other elves who brought it up, but Alz was still just a child yet he had already started to think about these things seriously. Of course, he would not have been as surprised at this had he known of Alz's encounter with the archives.

Regarding this, he knew more than the average elf in the tribe as he had been to the capital once in the past as a messenger, allowing him to learn more about the forest.

The elf began to explain what he knew to Alz, to which Alz raised even more questions each time causing him to fall into deep thought. Eventually, a heated discussion sparked between the pair as they continued to delve deeper into the subject.

Many of the elves who were sparring or sitting around also gathered near the pair as they listened to the discussion between the two that lasted nearly two hours, enlightening them with new facts and they hadn't thought or known of before.

There was a clear border that separated each of the sections, natural borders that existed since and unknown period in the past. When Alz questioned him on what the elf meant by a border, he simply smiled mysteriously and said, "You will see soon."

The South was the only exception among the five where there were no species inhibiting it apart from wolves, apart from elves that is. The wolves were also only extremely aggressive in the South, actively seeking out and attacking elves.

This apparently wasn't the case in the other parts of the forest where wolves were commonly tamed and used for hunting instead. There had been many efforts made to probe its cause, but the reasons behind it eluded even to this date.

The elves who learnt of this for the first time were naturally shocked, but the few who already knew of this simply fell silent. This was a sensitive topic for the southern tribes and those who knew it were forbidden from speaking of it, hence few elves knew of this in the tribe.

Alz was naturally extremely shocked by this, feeling like someone had stabbed him in his heart. Intense fury burned in his eyes for a moment but faded off quickly before anyone noticed, hiding within his heart.

The other four sections were home to many different species of wildlife and even had other types of trees although they were still few in number. The Eastern and Western sections had similar amounts of resources and were home to the middle-sized tribes.

The Northern and Central sections were the areas that flourished the most, with the Northern area having only marginally less wildlife and biodiversity as compared to the Central zone. The North was also home to the largest tribe which was comparable in size even to the capital.

Returning to the present, the group were steadily moving forward when suddenly, the monotonous scenery before them finally showed some change.

There was an invisible line that seemingly separated two different worlds a short distance ahead of them. On one side, grey toned trees with dull green leaves spread out endlessly, giving a dreary feel to the entire region

On the other side, the trees came in different shades of brown and green thickets were littered around the area, bringing a fresh breath of life. The patches of grass also looked brighter and various different herbs lay around in abundant quantities.

"So, this is the border"

Alz looked at the scenery before him with shining eyes, inadvertently hastening his steps while taking wider strides forward.