Before the twins, lay small piles of the items which had been taken from the rest of the bags.

Besides the meagre amounts of bread, dried meat and berries that could sustain them for two or three days at best, there were two short lengths of rope, three flint knives, three empty water flasks and six arrows in the collection. That's without including the larger three-pronged piece of rope which they had only recently unfastened from their ankles.

Despite the desolate situation, the twins were actually feeling a sense of accomplishment. After all, this was actually the most possessions they had ever had to their names.

Looking over their new belongings again and again, their smiles grew larger and larger as they giggled like goblins while huddled over their hoard.

"You know… Now that the wolf is gone… we could go back and get the stuff that was in the bags I dropped." Rykar's eyes may have been on the pile in front of him, but his mind was on the treasures left scattered in the rest of the forest.

Feeling like a newly awakened dragon, he already had dreams of scavenging everything he could to increase his treasures.

"True… and there's the one that got muched… I don't care, if his bow isn't broken then it’s mine!” Loki replied. ‘Just like Rykar, his eyes similarly glistening as he regarded his new riches. "And since the bow is mine, I get the arrows. You can't use them anyway."

"F*ck that! You can't take all the best bits. What am I meant to do, hunt with a tooth pick?” Rykar slapped his brother’s hand away before he could take the arrows. “If you get the bow then I'm taking the arrows, you can go find your own. I can use them in traps or to stab stuff!" Rykar snapped back.

Although he had no use for the arrows, he found it hard to let go of all the best things without a fight. The arrows were definitely the most valuable things in the pile besides the daggers, and the food would be split evenly regardless.

"Oho, is that right? I think you'd find it pretty hard to use the bow or the arrows if I hadn't pulled your dumb ass up while the wolf about to give you a ‘massage’ earlier." Loki wasn't letting this one go. "And I lead the way here. Practically, this should be my tree in the first place."

"HAHAHAHA, what!? I’d like to have seen you make your way in through that damn hollow after you finished breaking your leg by tripping over nothing. I carried you here AND pushed you in ahead of me! Do you know how much emotional trauma you owe me for!? I basically gave my life for you!!!"

"Correction, you pushed me in AFTER I helped you up! So that means you only helped me because I helped you. You wouldn't have even had the chance to help me if I didn't save your ass! And the rope was tied to you! If you didn't take me then you would have gotten chewed up too. Don't pretend to be an angel you b*stard!”

"WHAT!?!?"

Shrieks and yells marked the beginning of the trade deal between Rykar and Loki. Arguments and counter claims were thrown back and forth for over and hour before they settled on a common ground.

Loki achieved his demands and was allowed to take the bow, if they found it, and all of the arrows. In exchange for this, Rykar would get two of the three daggers on top of the rights to call dibs on any two things they came across in the future.

For the rest, they simply took turns picking things from the pile one at a time.

. . .

In a corner of the room, the twins sat at a short wooden table, occupying the two stools present while tearing into tough pieces of grainy bread. As the food entered Rykar, he felt slightly baffled. He was used to smaller portions of food and being able to feel satisfied, however the was currently eating an even larger portion than usual and he couldn't feel anything.

It was as though the food was falling into a bottomless pit. He wasn't feeling hungry, but he felt ‘empty' in a way, as though there was a hollow within him.

Slightly perplexed, he wolfed down the last few bites of his bread as he saw that Loki was already finished with his food. After stowing a few pieces of leftover bread away next to the bed he had claimed, Loki made his way towards the door.

Standing up, Rykar followed after his brother. Before exiting the hollow, he glanced around the room once again. Silently he hoped that they would be able to stay there for ever after getting their mother back.

It was warm and more comfortable than anywhere he had seen in the village. There were two of nearly everything including beds, shelves, a central fire pit, a table, stools. Hell, there were even books taking up an entire two thirds of the wall space.

They hadn't been taught to read so they had only left them in their place after a brief look, but damn, 'We have books!'. It seemed like they had only left the village a day ago but that moment had marked the ascension from hell straight up to heaven.

Walking out from the entrance, I was just like walking out from a normal door, the transition was smooth and the moment of awkwardness that they had been expecting never came. A few steps after exiting, they looked back once again to see that the tall entrance was gone, reverted back to the small hole that one would have to crawl through.

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Surprised at what was happening, Loki looked at Rykar before slowly walking back towards the entrance. Instead of trying to crouch down to the entry they could see, instead he simply walked forward with his arms outstretched cautiously.

Once his hands came into contact with the tree trunk above the hollow, they simply passed through without issue. Waving his hands a fire times, he walked forward with his eyes shut and when he opened them three steps later, he was safely inside the cabin.

For the next few minutes, Rykar attempted the same while they played around with the weirdly non-extstant but very real looking wood around the hollow. This also led them to realize that aside from the two meters wide entrance that they could see from the interior, the rest of the tree was very much real from the outside. And very much hard.

After satisfying their curiosity, they made their way towards the location the wolf pounced upon Rykar.

The scene was still exactly as they had left it. Two bags had fallen from his back at the time and been ripped open by the attack. The contents were still sprawled over the ground with the small number of berries having already been mushed into the dirt.

Both Rykar and Loki were now each carrying an intact bag on them, Rykar with two daggers on his waist while Loki was only carrying one, however he also had the arrows fastened to his side using the remains of the torn bag Rykar had initially brought into the cabin.

This encounter was rather fruitful, there was another length of rope and two hard pieces of bread along with a brittle net which, when used for catching small animals like rabbits, it would be perfect. There was also another water sack which actually had a little left inside but, due to how thirsty they were, they drained the contents before putting the empty sack along with the torn-up bags into Rykar’s empty pack. Although they couldn't think of a use for the rags, they felt as though they shouldn’t be letting them go to waste.

With their newly found capacity for memory, they had no trouble retracing their steps despite the twists and turns they had taken to dodge trees during their escape. Although the chase had felt like it lasted forever, it took them under 10 minutes of walking to make their way back to the demolished body of James.

Flies had already set onto the scene with a weird smell starting to come from the body. Feeling sick, neither of the twins walked any closer after they stood around three metres from the corpse.

"As you said, it's your bow. Why are you taking so long to go get it?” Rykar jested while clearly stating his stance as he noticed the intact bowstring. During the attack, the bow must have slipped from the boy’s shoulder and made its way to his waist, which explained why its body was now firmly planted under his ass.

"Pfft. I don't expect a scaredy cat like you to get it." Loki edged forwards as though he was afraid the body would spring to life at any moment like the zombies he had heard about many times before.

The closer he got, the more tense he became as the smell became more rancid and the buzz from the flies began to make his skin itch.

Finally reaching the side of the body, Loki gave it a few kicks to make sure there were no sudden movements, which resulted in a wave of flies storming out from his mangled clothing.

'Please don't wake up. Please don't wake up. Please don't wake up.' Loki was half praying half screaming within his mind as he lowered himself to the ground. From the back, Rykar was craning his neck to get a better look without daring to step any closer.

Without giving himself any time to lose his resolve, Loki stood over the body and grabbed the two ends of the bow before slamming his eyes shut and holding his breath. For the next few moments, tears threatened to break loose while he shuffled the bow from side to side in order to get it so slip out from under his body.

With the body of the bow towards the back and the string to the front, the body was literally in the middle of it which caused the bow or the string to snag on bits of his body occasionally before Loki was able to get it free.

With a final tug, he fell backwards and landed awkwardly on the ground with his eyes still tightly shut, but in his grasp was the bow he had won the rights for! Blood stained his hands as the sticky liquid dripped from the roughly crafted bow but it was nothing short of a treasure for Loki who had always wanted to learn archery.

"HAHA, I told you I would get it! Let's go!" Rykar had been edging over in order to get a look at the bow when Loki suddenly shouted and bolted in the direction of the cabin. He could hardly hold in his excitement but at the same time knew that staying in the middle of the forest surrounded by the scent of blood was an idiotic activity.

Rather than strolling through the woods in the same relaxed manner they had come, this time they were running while laughing between themselves after throwing caution to the wind. Flushed with excitement as they raced in the direction of the cabin. Rather than taking the path they had escaped in, they took the most direct route, avoiding the winding path for a straight one which winded up showing them a nearby section of the forest they had missed out on.

As they were only around a minute or two away from the cabin, quiet gurgling sounds started to make their way through the trees, drawing the attention of the twins and putting an end to their laughter instantly as they skidded to an abrupt stop. Eyes facing the ground, they listened attentively while being ready to escape in another direction at a moments notice.

“Do you hear that?” Rykar whispered.

“Obviously, but it doesn’t sound like an animal…” Loki replied uncertainly.

Despite having never used a bow, Loki shakily took an arrow from his makeshift holder and knocked it, while Rykar pulled out his daggers before they began moving forward at a snail's pace, actively avoiding all the twigs and leaves possible.

After only moving a few tens of metres, smiles and laughter once again radiated from them as they looked upon a small spring which had just caused them to draw their weapons.

They ran forward, eager to dip their faces into the water and drink their fill before the other.