"Stay on the path, Astrea!" The Duke shouted, his voice nearly drowned out by the thunder of the hooves. "Don’t move from this trail!"

It was a warning he needed Julian to heed right away. But it all happened so fast, and the others had encroached on their space, making it hard for Julian to navigate anything.

Julian wanted to follow, he really did, but the surge of riders cut him off, their horses forcing his horse to retreat into a narrower, overgrown thicket.

He couldn’t let them run him over. Lucius was with him, and that could cost them their lives. So he chose safety first,

By the time the noise died down, the main trail was gone, shrouded in mists and suddenly having a thick density of trees that made it hard to tell where was where.

Julian gripped the reins tight, knowing he had to follow the trial. He couldn’t lose the Duke. And so, he went straight on the path he was sure was the right path. But... was it?

The mist was a living thing, thick and suffocating as it swallowed the path ahead. Julian squinted, his eyes darting between the dark trees and the distant trail behind them. He was sure... he was so sure, so...

How did I lose him? The thought hammered at the back of his mind. One moment he was sure he was following the Duke’s trail, but the next, he was in the middle of nowhere.

The silence of the woods felt heavier now, broken only by the uneasy huffing of his horse and the creaking of some brave insects.

Julian felt Lucius trembling against his chest. He tightened his arm around the boy, his heart sinking. He was supposed to be the adult here, but he was just as scared.

"System, don’t I have a map for these plains?" Julian whispered, and the purple window opened up before him, showing him a map of the continent, and then zoomed in to the map of the Imperial palace, as well as these weeping woods.

But unfortunately, all maps for the Imperial Palace and the Capital were locked.

The system was useless, once again, not giving him enough help that would guarantee his safety.

Right now, he was just like any other man without any ’system’ to guide them, lost in a forest that wanted him dead.

"It’s alright, Lucius," he said, stroking the boy’s head as he gripped the reins with one hand. "We’ll find your father soon, so don’t be scared."

He looked up, more trees, more mist, and more vines. He couldn’t even see anything properly. At this rate, they could be in serious trouble.

And as his bad luck would have it, something startled the horse, and it shrieked loudly.

There was a snake, a thick, long snake, right in front of the horse. The horse neighed violently, pushing his front hooves up into the air and tilting the balance of the two on top of it.

With only one hand on the reins, Julian had no real balance and couldn’t keep himself on the horse as it pushed back. They were heading for the floor, so he gripped Lucius tight to shield him.

But then, in that split second, Julian saw the mouth of a hidden pit opening like a hungry throat. His brain fired with a cold, desperate clarity. If he fell with Lucius, they would both be trapped. Or worse, he might crush the boy.

With a final, agonizing heave, he shoved the child toward a patch of soft moss at the edge.

"Get away!" He yelled and then, gravity took him.

Julian hit the bottom of the pit with a sickening, wet thud. A jagged wooden stake, planted there for large game, drove straight through his right thigh.

He didn’t scream at first. The shock had numbed his nerves for the first few seconds. But then, the pain came in all at once.

It hurts. It hurts too much. He bit his lip heavily.

He wanted to scream, to cry out. But he just sat there, gasping, as the world turned into a blur of brown dirt and white-hot pain.

Above him, the sound of his horse’s hooves faded into the distance. The coward had bolted.

"Lucius..." Julian croaked, his voice trembling. "Lucius, are you there? Are you hurt?"

Silence followed, and for a heartbeat, Julian’s soul went cold. What happened up there? Did he faint? Did he get hurt? Did he...? Then, a small head popped over the rim.

Lucius’s face was a mess of mud and fresh tear-tracks, his wide blue eyes searching the darkness of the hole. He opened his mouth to call out to his teacher, but no words came out.

He couldn’t see anything, like he was blind for the first few seconds as he looked into the deeper darkness of the pit.

"Lucius," Julian called, helping the boy to trace his position, and then, he finally saw the inside of the pit, and he went pale.

He saw the stake that had gone through his teacher’s thigh, and how it looked like Julian had dislocated his shoulder.

"I’m fine," Julian lied, his fingers digging into the dirt as blood began to pool beneath him, soaking the dirt underneath him. "I’m just stuck. Stay there, Lucius. Don’t move. Someone will come soon."

He did not know what more danger could be up there, but he didn’t wish for Lucius to run off and find the danger itself.

But the boy’s expression shifted. A fierce, silent determination took hold of his teary face. Before Julian could tell what he was thinking about, the boy vanished from the edge.

Julian went pale in that instant. Where was he going?

"Lucius!" He shouted, but the little boy did not come back. He was going to get help, and Julian realized it too late. "No! Lucius, come back!" He kept shouting, but the effort only sent a wave of agony through his leg.

He slumped back, his head thumping against the dirt wall. Please be okay. If anything happens to that child, I’ll never forgive myself.

He was so consumed by fear for the boy that he barely felt the movement near his ankle. Then, a sharp, needle-like sting pierced his skin. He hissed, jerking his foot away. He looked down into the shadows. That silver shimmering snake that had frightened the horse hadn’t stayed above; it had fallen into the trap with him, and it was agitated.

Reflexively, Julian picked up the rock his hand felt in that moment and bashed the snake’s head as hard as he could, killing it in an instant. 𝕗𝚛𝚎𝚎𝐰𝗲𝗯𝗻𝚘𝚟𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝕞

He breathed hard, his heart racing in fear and shock.

And then it came. A cold, burning fire began to crawl up his veins from his ankle upwards. Poison.

That snake was poisonous.