The company was still clueless on how to get back on the road. They explored the entirety of the forest but found no way out. The traveler did not give up, though. He tried to climb the trees, junp over the bushes, and even look into every rabbit and fox hole they found. Though the animals were long gone from here, it was clear that before the cultist cast his spells, they lived here. Perhaps they would return once the curse was broken.

Regardless, the efforts of the unconventional wayfinder bore no fruit. The company ran out of ideas just as fast as they ran out of rations. The food and drink they bought in the latest town grew thin. Without animals to hunt and without water to drink, they would not survive for long. The whole group was exhausted and silent. Not a word came from any of them. They were all lost in thought.

Maybe that's why they could hear it so clearly.

The sounds of crying flow through the woods. It was quiet, but undeniably there. 'Did someone else get trapped here?' The man asked himself. He and his guides started to make their way in the direction of the sound. It was far away from them, almost at the other end of the trapp.

Wolf was the first to see it.

'That spineless bastard,' he cried in anger. 'How could he target a helpless child?'

When the others caught up to him, they were all shocked, but the traveler more than any other.

Between the two trees, there was a little boy. Could be no older than eight. He buried his face in his hands. He was crying and sobbing. He did not even notice the group. He just stood there, with all his sorrow, alone. No adult or parent was in sight.

Just the boy.

'Oh my. This is horrible!' said Scythian. 'How could he even find his way here? He must cry out of fear.'

'What do we do now?' the enraged veteran asked. 'Do we take him with us? We don't even have enough supplies for ourselves.'

The shocked warrior did not hear the question. His thoughts raced in his head.

'How could he be here? Why does he see this? Is this another trick of the spell? How does the cultist even come up with this?'

His heart grew heavy. Like if it were in a grip. All at once, the pieces came together in his mind. It was not the spells doing.

Still, what should he do about this? What could he tell the boy? He did not have the answers. But in his mind, he knew he had to talk to him. He had to talk to this child. This time, he did not want to run from him.

'Wait here,' the man told his companions.

They looked puzzled but did not ask a thing. The traveler approached the sorrowful child.

'Hey, kid.'

The man approached the child, who, in fright, took two steps back.

'Hey, hey. Its okay. I'm not here to hurt you. No one is going to hurt you here,' he said, sitting down on the ground and watching the child's reaction.

The little boy stopped; he still had tears in his eyes. He stared at the man. There was silence. The boy saw something in the man's eyes. Understanding.

'Why don't you tell me what happened?' The man smiled at the child.

'I don't want to. You would not care. It's a stupid thing anyway. Im stupid for thinking it.'

The man felt a grip on his heart. He knew what happened. He knew what the boy felt. He knew why he thought that.

'No, you're not,' the listener said. 'You are smart. Really smart. Whatever you feel now is neither stupid nor invalid. Please. Tell me. I will listen.'

He handed a rag to the boy. The little kid took it and wiped his tears, blowing his nose even. With a sobbing voice, the child started to speak.

'Well, I wanted to talk to my mom. She was in a hurry to work, you see. I have a little brother. I love him. I really do, but the child stopped for a moment.

'Go on, I will not judge.' Said the wanderer, kindly. The child came closer and sat down in front of the man.

'I feel jealous of him. You see, ever since he was born, he has gotten all the attention from my parents. As if they forgot about me. They don't play with me. They don't care about me. I feel like my mother does not love me anymore,' the boy started sobbing again. 'I tried to talk with her about it, but... but she just said that... she said... she told me to "leave her alone with my stupidity",' the boy started to cry harder. His little heart was broken.

The gentle listener saw the pain in the child. He grabbed the rag from the kid and started to wipe his tears.

'Shhh, shhh. There, there. It's okay; there's no one to harm you now. You are safe.' As he wiped away the tears, he remembered the feeling. The hurt. The abbandontment. And he also thought. Of what could have been.

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It took a while for the little one to calm down. The man patiently waited, and when he did, he started to speak.

'There. I know what you are going through. I know what you think. But I think that your mother loves you very much. And she never wanted to make you feel this way. She just did not grasp the true depth of your feelings.'

The child looked at the traveler.

'But why? Doesn't she care about me?'

'She does,' answered the man. 'She's just having a hard time showing it, I believe. At least not in the way that you would need it. She does not know how to do it. She doesn't have a sibling, right?'

The boy shook his head.

'She is not familiar with what you feel right now and has never learned how to help it. She is just a human. And humans make a lot of mistakes. This is just one of hers.'

The kid looked at the traveler, asking.

'What about my father? He has a brother.'

'Have you ever heard him talk about his feelings?' replied the man.

Again, the boy shook his head.

'You are their first child. They don't know how to be parents.'

'So that's it? I'm stupid for expecting them to know how to care for me.

'No,' said the man quickly. 'Just because you know the reason behind someone's motives and actions doesn't mean that they are right or that they are free of responsibility for their actions. Or, in this case, that your feelings would be invalid. And even still, Your mother should not have dismissed you like that. She should have listened, or said that you would talk about it when she got home from work. It is a big mistake on her part. Especially in respect of what you will think after that incident. What you think right now and what you feel right now are valid. No matter the reason why someone made you feel this way,'

'But, if she would care, she would want to know how I feel,' replied the boy.

'Again, she does care. She wants to know if something hurts you. But sometimes it is hard for people to understand the kind of love the other person needs.'

'But its so simple!' snapped the kid. 'I mean, you just have to listen to the one you love! Try to understand that person. Show compassion. It is so logical!'

The wanderer chuckled. Even at this age, the boy sought the reason behind his actions and the ways of the word. Even if it was naive of him, He wondered for a second, wondering if that naivety had ever truly left him.

'You will find that most people—including yourself—will not act according to logic, especially if emotions are involved.'

'It sounds stupid and overcomplicated,' scratched the boy's head.

'Oh boy, you have no idea,' replied the man with a big smile.

The little boy smiled with him. For a moment, he forgot what he was sad about. But the moment had passed. His face soured. He looked at the man.

'Still. I don't know what to do with this pain. I still feel worthless. I still feel like... like...' The child could not finish the sentence. He did not have to. The man knew exactly what he wanted to say. He knew the feeling all too well. And because of that, Precisely because of that. He knew what to say. What he needed.

He placed his hands on the boy's shoulders.

'Listen to me and listen well. That feeling is in you. That little voice in your head telling you that you are worthless and that you don't matter is wrong. It's lying to you. It is a false voice; do not listen to it. Your feelings matter. Your existence matters. You matter. And you are not abandoned. You are loved. You don't have to earn that from anyone; you don't have to perform any great acts for it. You deserve it. You always had, and you always will. Never let anyone or anything make you think otherwise. And I promise you that I will always be here to listen to you. To hear you out and to comfort you. Because I love you, kid, and because you matter to me. More than you know.'

The boy started to cry. But this time, because of the joy and the words that he wanted to hear, The words that did not come from his mother. But from himself. He hugged his older self. Who whispered something in his ears? The child asked with a soft voice.

'Do you truly believe that?'

'I know that,' said the traveler.

'Thank you.'

The child started to dissapear and came apart with a distinct light. Until the comforted hugged nothing but the air.

The man got up. His company watched from the same place they had noticed the child for the first time.

'What was that? Another trick?' asked Wolf.

The man gave an undernoticed look to the Hollow. It was a look that the creature took as 'Nice try,' at first. But the prey's face softened. It turned into another expression. 'Thank you.'

'It was,' said the man. 'Intended to break my resolve, no doubt. To make me collapse under the weight of my doubts and to abandon our quest to make it out of this forest. It was a memory of mine. Back from my childhood. It was true. Every word of what the child said. I remember those feelings as well. This was the first time I can remember that I felt them. I did not know how to deal with it back then, so I guess it just stayed with me since.'

The wanderer, for a moment, remembered the situation of old. But now he reminded himself of the same thing he told the child. He still smiled. Scythian noted that.

The veteran was puzzled.

'But how would the cultist now use your own memories against you?'

'I don't know. Magic?' The traveler shrugged.

'No matter how he knew,' the spearman joined the conversation. 'I'm glad you could pull yourself through this challenge as well, lad. And all on your own!'

The traveler turned to his mentor.

'No, I did not do this alone. Your words helped me through it. Thank you. With your help, I was able to give myself what I needed back then.'

'Don't underestimate yourself,' the warmaster said. 'Our words might have helped, but you were the one who did the work. Not everyone can break a magical attack like that. You need a tremendous amount of will for that.'

The man was struck by those words. Will I be able to break magic? One of his teachers mentioned something like that. He even gave him...

He suddenly started to go through his backpack in search of something. He unpacked everything, from the top to the bottom. Wolf and Scythian did not understand what was going on.

'Uhm, what are you doing?' asked the berserker. The seeker did not answer. 'Do I even have it?' he asked himself.

Suddenly, he stopped. He pulled out a little black notebook. It had a leather cover. Some paper was ill-adjusted and almost fell out. The man opened it and pulled one of the papers out. Then he packed everything back. He knew what he had to do. He turned to his guides with a confidence they rarely saw from him.

'I know how to get out of here,' he said. His voice was determined and strong.

'We have to go back to the spider web.'