‘One, two, three…

One, two, three…’

I counted the steps in my head to stay conscious and in the same rhythm of running. If I were to stop, it would be an end of my chaotic adventure. The little yellow dot in front of me became bigger and bigger, somehow, I knew that it was the exit, or I just wanted to believe that it was the exit. Actually, it didn’t matter anymore, I just wanted to reach it. This yellow shining dot appeared to be as the greatest goal in my entire life. I forgot about everything and the only thing on my mind was,

‘One, two, three…

One, two, three…

I won’t stop… I’ll reach it…

One, two, three…

One, two, three…

I will survive…’

I started hearing how iron spear tips clanged onto the walls. Goblins were already so close… They see me, they thrive to kill me… But I won’t die as a miserable Stoyan who can’t escape his own village! Light in front of me grew stronger and bigger. My eyes were kept in darkness for too long for them to adapt quickly to such intense sunshine. I covered my eyes with left hand and thrusted forward with full force!

I can’t see anything, but I feel grass the underneath my feet… I feel the warm sunshine on my naked body…

‘Aaahhh!’

My foot slipped on the wet grass and I started falling downhill. I threw my knife away before hitting the ground, so I could avoid stabbing myself. I could see only green and brown shapes turning around in front of my eyes, then suddenly I hit something with my back. I lost my consciousness again.

After a few moments, when I finally opened my eyes, I realized that It was a huge oak in the root of the mountain that stopped my fall.

‘We don’t have such huge oaks in Cold Valley…’

Was my first thought after I sat on my knees, trying to clean myself from the dirt. I looked up and saw how sun was already passing the midday line above my head and going away from the mountain,

‘Sun is setting down…’ I whispered to myself.

Then, a wild thought struck my head,

‘I have never seen sun passing the horizon…’

It was always that Eastern Montserrat hid the sunset from us. Only sometimes we could see how red streaks of clouds showed up from behind of the mountain.

‘Senka always wanted to see where the sun goes after it hides behind the mountain…Senka…’

That was the moment when I realized what Senka truly meant for me back then… and what he did today in these evil tunnels.

‘He was like a real brother for me…’ I started thinking, while searching where did I threw my knife before the fall, ‘We shared the same passion, we were like hilt and the blade… but now I will never forgive him for what he did. Even if he was too afraid to die, we should have died together… It was our common dream to have an adventure… and now… now it is over…’

Finally, I found my knife, it was stuck in the ground not far away from the tunnel’s entrance. I straightened my back and raised my head towards the sky.

‘AAAHHH!’

Rage filled my body from head to toes. I started screaming as loud as possible. My shout echoed through the tunnel and came back as I would still be standing inside of the goblin’s cavern and trying to escape. They left me alone with a small pocket knife and underpants covered in mud. My eyes watered, but then I immediately looked down so no tears would fall from my cheeks. I always did like that, when my brothers bullied me and I didn’t want to show my mother that I cried. My view fell on the blade that I was holding in the right hand,

‘Nimrod…’ I whispered to myself fiercely, ‘Now it will be the time to assess how good I learned your lessons…’

I turned my head and looked around, a huge forest appeared in front of me. Somewhere far away a wild bird was chirping, a light south breeze was patting my bare skin. It was a warm and dry start of the summer.

‘Today is the day when I was truly born… I’m finally free…’ a slight grin appeared on my face, then swiftly it vanished, ‘…but first, I need to find some food and a shelter for the night, otherwise I will starve and freeze to the death during the night…’

I ran downhill and entered the forest. Luckily it was a deciduous forest and it was the exact time when everything was thriving with live here. Willows, oaks, aspens, poplars, and a thick moss under the feet, greeted me with a green smile on their leaves. Walking a little bit farther, I found a perfect spot for a bonfire beneath a gigantic oak, that was surrounded by huge rocks. I figured, that someone has already been here before and stayed for some time. There were places between the rocks where grass and moss has been trampled down and black circle in the middle of this lawn indicated that it was more than one person has been resting here.

‘It couldn’t be Senka and Wido… but then I wonder how they got so far away, that I couldn’t see them after escaping the mountain…’

Willow twigs were perfect for making rabbit traps, so I set a few of them around my camping site where I thought I could catch some prey. When I came back, started gathering branches and wooden bark to make a bonfire. It took me some time to start a fire, but months of training with Nimrod did not go to waste. I gathered leaves beneath the oak and made a decent bed for the first night in front of the fire.

It was already getting darker when I heard one of my traps going off. When I approached it, I saw that a proper meal was awaiting me tonight; a small rabbit was fluttering on the ground. I started disemboweling my prey right on the spot, throwing away its guts much farther than all of my traps were set up, because I didn’t want to attract predators to my sleeping place. Then I came back and skinned the animal, then took his hide to make a small bag and put the meat on small sticks around the bonfire. While rabbit was cooking, I placed its hide on the oak’s branch to dry up and started sharpening small willow twigs to make elastic strings. After an hour or so, I took the sticks with meat and started eating vigorously. I haven’t eaten for a whole day and after using so much stamina, these small pieces of meat appeared to be the best meal I ever had in my life. I was sitting on the ground with empty sticks in my hands, leaning my back on the oak and watching how the bonfire attracted forest insects. My eyelids were so heavy that they closed on their own and I didn’t realize how fast I fell asleep. I ran too much today…