Before the man could speak, more winged wolves emerged and made their way towards us, growling and howling as if to communicate with each other. The beasts seemed to be intelligent they were surrounding us, sealing off all possible escape routes.

There was a bigger wolf standing directly in front of the man and I, the leader of this pack I assume. He was noticeably larger than the other winged wolves and whenever he growled the demonic beasts shifted position as if they were taking orders. It had a long horizontal scar along its face, right below its eyes, and kept its glowing red eyes fixed on us. The man in front of me stood up, and took a couple of steps forward until he was in the middle of them all. With each step he took, I could feel the ground gently shake, and the demonic beasts must have felt it too as they all began trembling.

The giant winged wolf growled, and the two beasts on our right leaped forward, bearing their fangs at us. I reflexively tried to step backward, but the pressure from the man before me made my movements awkward, making me trip over a root behind me.

The man stood there and swung his sword towards the beasts while they were still not mid-air, not actually hitting anything directly. Suddenly the winged wolves were blown away, alongside everything that was behind them. Everything was gone, the trees, the beasts, the ground, all that remained was a barren path of destruction.

The man then raised his hand, while the monsters just looked at him, no longer growling. With a snap of his fingers, the beasts instantaneously burst into flames, and just as quickly they turned into ashes, making it difficult to believe that they were alive mere seconds ago. Even the leader of the pack was gone, but unlike the other wolves, his bones remained. His overwhelming presence was nothing when compared to this man’s power.

The Forest fell quiet, no sound was made, and the figure in front of me turned around, facing me. He was staring at me for what felt like an eternity, his eyes devoid of any emotion; and took a step forward and simply vanished from where he was standing. Before I could even react, he was already in front of me, his hand holding tight onto my throat lifting me off the ground.

He opened his mouth and spoke a language foreign to me, but whatever he was saying was of little interest to me. I was more interested in getting him to release his hand, but regardless of how hard I attempted to scratch and kick him, his grip would not falter. I desperately fought back, as my sight began getting out of focus.

He then abruptly let me go, releasing his hand and making me fall to the ground. I coughed, struggling to breathe, each time I inhaled air, a stinging pain grew in my chest. My vision became blurry from both the tears welling in my eyes and being so close to passing out. For some reason he let me go, maybe he took pity on me, or maybe he didn’t see me as a threat, but regardless of the reason, I was just grateful he had let go of me.

He spoke again, slowly this time, but I still could not understand anything of what he was saying; he spoke a language I never heard, I never even heard anyone speak a different language. I always thought everybody in this continent spoke the same language, so he must be from somewhere far away.

As I tried to stand, the man took a step forward, and a surge of indescribable fear gripped me, causing me to fall backward. He took another step forward, leaning so that he could get close to my face; once again he began speaking, much more slowly this time, but his words were still incomprehensible to me as he spoke a foreign language.

He sighed deeply, giving me one last look with a strange mix of disdain and sorrow, and started walking away, leaving me behind. Why is this all happening? Tears began to flow, and I just stared into the empty space, silently crying. My face became all hot, my lips were quivering, and I couldn’t hear anything anymore.

My mother is gone. My father is gone. Mr. Saintsworth wants to kill me. I almost died just now. There are demonic beasts everywhere here, and they all seem terrifying. Everything that is happening to me is my fault. If I just stayed home, if I didn’t bump into that monster, if I didn’t tell him where we lived, then my parents would still be alive. We would be having dinner right now, we would still be together, and they would be happy.

I collapsed onto the cold, hard ground as I felt all energy leave my body and began crying even harder, my screams echoing into this hellish forest. My mind went blank, I didn’t even know how long I stayed like that. For the first time in so long, I cried, I wailed so loudly that my face began to hurt, but I just couldn’t stop these feelings. The sadness and pain I was feeling seemed endless, and an insurmountable weight sat on my chest.

If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

Who knows how long I stayed like this, but when I no longer had any tears to shed I just stared at the sky. What should I do? What even can I do? I couldn’t go back to Arzamac, I didn’t have a home anymore, and no one would even want to help me. And this is even assuming I could get back to Arzamac, The Forest seemed like a maze, and even if I knew how to get back, a demonic beast would most likely find me and kill me. Or even worse, Saintsworth could find me.

Why should I even bother doing anything? I don’t deserve to live; it is my fault that the only people I ever loved died. What right do I have to even be alive?

The trees would normally never show the sky, but the path of destruction caused by that man made it possible. There were so many stars in the sky, that I couldn’t help but think how beautiful it was. There was so much beauty above and so much pain below; everywhere beneath that sky has seen pain and will continue to see pain. This would never change as long as there are those monsters who are so strong that they can hurt us just because we are weaker. Why would the Gods let us live like this? Everyone always prays to them, I have prayed to them, prayed for mother and father’s happiness, and yet they still died.

If the Gods never existed, if Demigods never existed, we could still be happy. But what could anyone do? As long as I am alive I will continue to suffer, and I will never see my parents again.

As dark thoughts forced their way into my mind, I heard footsteps approaching me, but I didn’t even have the will to care anymore. The man from before came into view, and without a word, he grabbed my blood-stained shirt and threw me over his shoulder. A great feeling of astonishment overwhelmed me, not being able to understand what he wanted to do, or why he would even come back.

He began speaking once more, and I still couldn’t understand what he wanted to say, but something was different this time; his voice wasn’t emotionless anymore, his voice was soft, almost reassuring, and he spoke slowly like he wanted me to understand him. his words were still a mystery, and all I could feel was a growing sense of bewilderment.

A distant screeching noise pierced the air, and both the man and I snapped our heads in the direction of the noise. This time, the man put me down gently, making sure that both my feet were on the ground before letting go of me.

Two figures emerged from the trees on our right. They were demonic beasts, locked in a brutal struggle. The monsters belonged to the same species, they resembled humans in body, seemingly no different from the bodies of any other person I have ever seen, but they had the heads of goats. Their horns were large, curling into themselves, and they kept trying to ram into one another. They headed towards us whilst they were fighting, but before they got even within arm’s reach of us, the man swung his sword, not hitting anything directly, and yet the monsters were split in half, and their bodies dropped before us. He then stabbed his sword into the ground and scanned our surroundings.

The Forest was alive with unsettling noises coming from all around, hinting that the number of demonic beasts must be high. The Forest is huge, but there shouldn’t be this many monsters so close to us. Are they after something? Or… someone? I thought, my gaze shifting to the monster of a man before me.

For the first time, I was able to look at him properly: he had long, dirty blonde hair, that fell to his shoulders. He was tall, taller than anyone I had ever seen. His shoulders were broad, and his back was wide, covered in scars, and he had a dark mark engraved on his skin right below his neck, resembling a pair of wings.

He turned around, looking at me, and smiled briefly before facing the trees again; he then raised both his arms and clapped his hands, and an eerie silence fell over The Forest. All the noises around us stopped abruptly, and fires were ignited behind the trees, and just as quickly they extinguished, just as they did before with the winged wolves.

The man grabbed his sword and, to my shock, stabbed it through his hand, and yet no blood came out of his wound. In fact, there was no wound at all. He put the entire sword through his palm until it disappeared, but his hand was completely fine. He turned around, and once again picked me up and threw me over his shoulders.

He jumped, reaching one of the highest branches of surrounding trees, and then he leaped from branch to branch, until we put some distance behind us. His steps were quick and light, and even the thinnest of branches he was leaping off managed to hold both of our weights. We kept going until we reached a giant tree, far larger than all the others, and found one branch where he could comfortably stand. He once again put me down gently, making sure that I was steady before fully letting me go.

He opened his mouth, but hesitated, perhaps remembering that we spoke different languages. He then looked at me, his expression completely changed, softening, now looking at me apologetically. He took a step toward me, and put his hand on my head, and whispered something.

A burning sensation engulfed me, a pain greater than anything I ever felt, and I found myself unable to move. It was as if someone set my head on fire, and no matter how much I tried to move, I just couldn’t. My body was frozen in place, with no control left over it. And then memories began to appear in my head, memories of when I was younger, of when I used to play with my father, of my mother taking care of me when I was young, of meeting Saintsworth, of fighting with my parents. I remembered so many things, all at once, making me feel as if my head was about to explode. Then, as abruptly as it began, the pain stopped.

The relief I felt at the pain stopping was short-lived as I looked up, looking at the man who saved me and who just made me feel this incredible amount of pain. He looked back at me, his expression still apologetic, and then he kneeled before.

“I’m sorry, Caine,” he said softly. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”