Cool. That was the sensation the young man felt. Cool and disoriented. He looked around, slightly confused. Those trees weren’t like the ones in the forest he was in a moment ago. These trees were massive. They reminded the young man of the redwoods in California; he had only seen them in pictures and movies. They were on his list of things to see as he traveled across the country. However, these trees were different.
“Where the hell am I?”
It wasn’t just the trees; the plants as well. Some he recognized, but they too were different. Mushrooms but with slightly different shades and hues. Vines with strange fruit growing on them. This couldn’t be the place he crashed.
“Where is the trail? Where is that glowing tree? What...”
Stay calm, he thought to himself. He needed to stay calm and remember what happened. The sun was getting low, and a breeze had started to pick up. That, in itself, was a problem.
When he crashed, it was already nighttime, and it was raining.
“That stupid driver!”
He yelled in frustration. Who speeds around a steep curve on the side of a mountain in the middle of the night?
He remembered the moment. One second, he was talking along with the people in the podcast he was listening to as if they could hear him, and in the next, he was swerving to avoid the bastard going eighty miles per hour on a steep curve. His car went over the railing and rolled over and over until finally coming to a halt.
“I shouldn’t even be alive. My cuts and bruises are all gone.”
“That tree… That voice.”
The memory came back suddenly. The young man had pulled himself from the wreckage. His left arm hung limply at his side, clearly broken. His shirt was in tatters from pulling himself out and getting snagged on the sharp edges of the wrecked car.
He looked up and saw how far down the mountain the car rolled. He saw the lights from a car where he swerved through the barricade. He could make out the faint shadow of a big man getting out and looking at him.
“Help!”
He shouted and saw the man stumble back into his car and speed off. Tears fell down the young man's face. No, not tears… blood. There was a deep gash in his forehead, and it was slowly pooling blood down the side of his face.
“They warned me not to go.”
He spoke to himself softly. He turned to look at his surroundings and saw the tallest tree he had ever seen in his life.
“That couldn’t have been there.” He would have noticed.
The tree was massive, and the canopy was so thick that if he were to stand underneath the tree, he probably would not be able to see the sky. That aside wasn’t the strangest part. The strange part was the soft pulsing lights coming off the tree. He was a distance away, but he could still move, if painfully.
Lights, he thought to himself. Lights mean people. People mean help. The young man stumbled to the tree. As he got closer, he saw no one, just a clearing dominated by the massive tree. Etched into the tree were what looked like symbols and drawings. He saw warriors dressed in heavy metal. Humans with long ears wielding bows and slender swords. There were robed men with staffs pointed at giant creatures.
There was writing as well, nothing that the man had ever seen. Swirling letters and scratchy markings. All glowing—
[Welcome potential Traveler]
“What?”
“Hello? Who said that?”
[I am sentinel. You meet the requirement to travel. Will you]
The voice sounded feminine, but its tone was odd, static, robotic maybe. Kind of like how Siri sounds when you ask it something.
“Hello, I am hurt, was in an accident and I can’t—”
[Will you travel]
“What? Travel where? Listen I’m hurt—”
[Over borders, through space, into valleys… across realms.]
He’s losing his mind, that’s what the young man was thinking. He hit his head too hard, and the blood loss was causing him to hallucinate.
But something was different; this felt too real, too tangible. He touched the tree.
[Contact initiated. Preparing Destination]
The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
“Wait, I still don’t understand. Where am I going? What is waiting?”
[Power. Loss. Love. Hate. ADVENTURE.]
[Will you travel.]
The man’s heart hammered in his chest. This is impossible, he thought. He felt it though, the power the tree exuded. It was almost tangible. Suffusing every atom in his body. It was unlike anything he’d ever felt.
“Yes.”
[Again.]
“Yes.”
[Once more.]
“Yes.”
[Thrice spoken. Thrice Heard.]
[Welcome Traveler. Destination Vialia chosen.]
[Blessing UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE bestowed]
[Blessing GREATER POTENTIAL bestowed]
[Go forth unto Glory]
He remembered the encounter. Had that really happened? Was he in some type of coma? What had the tree… the sentinel said? Destination Vialia. Was he on another planet?
The young man could breathe fine. He felt fine, better even. All his wounds had disappeared.
“Ok, think Darius, this isn’t the time to freak out.”
“Right now, you are in a forest, potentially another world.”
“Maybe I should be freaking out.”
The young man chose a direction and began to walk.
--
About twenty minutes into the walk, Darius ran into his first monster. Yup, that’s the only thing it could be. The beast was small, practically a ball with fur all over and two curved horns that ended in a point like a hook. Two stout legs poked out the bottom of the furball, and a row of sharp teeth and red eyes gazed in Darius’s direction.
“I should have just died in the car crash.”
He turned in the other direction and took off. He heard the beast running after him. He turned his head to look back and saw the monster closing in on him.
“Go away!”
Darius began rolling on the ground. He tripped. He must have snagged his foot on a root or something. The monster was almost on top of him; he could hear it getting closer and its snarl of triumph. He jumped up quickly.
“Stupid tree could have at least given me something to defend myself.”
The monster charges to take a bite out of him but he dodges to the side and kicks out with a sharp and sturdy kick. The creature yelps, and he feels something inside the creature give.
The thing is weak, he realized. Just that one kick and it's rolling around in agony. He approaches it, and it rolls away and tries to jump at him again. He was ready for that and punched it right between its horns. The creature howls in pain. Two stomps and it stops making noise.
“Well, that was unpleasant.”
It wasn’t the first time he had killed something. He spent a few summers on his uncle’s farm, and he had to help slaughter a goat or two. Some people might find that sickening, but Darius was no fool; you had to eat to live, and curry goat was his favorite Jamaican dish. Thinking on it now, it had been a while since he had eaten, and he felt his stomach growl. Curry Goat, stew peas… oxtail! American food could never compare to his mom’s cooking but right now he would have settled for a cheap burger.
“I wonder if this thing is edible?”
More rustles behind him. He turns and sees three more of the creatures.
“Hah, you think one or two more of you can scare m—”
Three more of the creatures appear at the side of him. The young man smiles.
“I should have died in the crash.”
Another twenty minutes in a random direction, and the stupid creatures were still after him. They sounded angry, whether that was due to him heroically killing their friend or him not allowing them to eat him he didn’t know.
He was getting tired, and it was dark now; the sun had finally finished its descent. He was running with reckless abandon. Any minute he could trip, and this time it would be the end of him. He saw something shiny up ahead. He kept running towards it; last time he ran towards light he ended up in another world. Maybe the same thing will happen again, and he ends up home.
“Yeah right, it’s probably another monster.”
He burst through the bushes into the clearing and came face to face with a wolf… a cub? The thing was so small, like a puppy, but it was definitely a wolf; the fangs and claws spoke for themselves. The light was coming from the wolf; it was a brilliant silvery glow. The wolf saw him and growled and bared its fangs.
“Listen boy I’m not going to hurt you.”
Darius turned to run; he could hear the creatures approaching. He took off through another path up ahead. He heard the creatures slow and didn’t see them chasing him. No, they were surrounding the wolf.
That was good, right; he was in the clear; he could just keep running. The creatures would eat the wolf pup, and he would get away. He turned to keep running.
“Damnit.”
The creatures surrounded the wolf and made hooting sounds as they closed in. The wolf snarled and howled, but the creatures weren’t afraid; they had the numbers. The little wolf began to whimper.
Suddenly, the two-legged creature that ran away earlier came back with a large stick in its hand. It swung the stick hard into one of the creatures, and it fell on the floor and did not get back up. One of the creatures jumped and chomped down on the two-legged creature’s arm. The thing made a loud noise as it kicked the monster repeatedly. The monster let go, and it brought the stick down hard on top of its head. Two more monsters charged, and the man dodged and kicked and swung, but there were too many. Already, the wolf could see and smell the blood leaking from the man. Suddenly, one of the monsters turned on the wolf. It must have seen that its friends had the creature with the stick under control. It started towards the wolf, and the wolf whimpered. Then the man was in front of the wolf. Blood dripping from a dozen cuts and bites. The monster jumped at the man, and the man screamed in fury and swung the branch in an arc, hitting the monster so hard the stick broke and an eye popped out.
He was defenseless now. Darius knew this would be it; he had taken out four of the creatures, but he saw three more, and he was sure more were lurking close by. He was defenseless without his stick, so he turned and grabbed the wolf in his arms; the wolf gave a yelp of protest but it must have realized Darius meant no harm.
He turned to run and felt a sharp pain shoot up his leg; the creature had bit into his leg.
“Gahh”
He cried out in pain and kicked at the thing. It let go, but his leg was ruined; he wouldn’t be running in this condition.
He fell to his knees and cradled the wolf as it whimpered in his arms.
“Sorry, little buddy, looks like this is it.”
The four creatures circled him, and then a flash of silver appeared. The biggest wolf Darius had ever seen in his life appeared. This thing was the size of a minivan and glowed pure silver. It howled and then ripped into the creatures with such violence that Darius almost puked.
The wolf turned towards Darius cradling its cub, and the cub jumped out of his arm to what Darius assumed was its mother.
The mother nuzzled its baby and looked at Darius. This is the part where he gets eaten, he thought. Thankfully I won’t be awake to feel it; he felt his body shutting down. He lost too much blood. His vision swam and darkened. The last thing he saw was the mother wolf’s form shift into a tall lithe woman.
“I should have just died in the crash.”
Then it was dark.