Chapter Three—Easton Sylvan

“Easton, go fetch the firewood your father gathered yesterday. And catch some fish for dinner tonight.” Arbelle, a beautiful woman now in her thirties, called from outside their wooden house to wake her son, Easton.

The one being awakened only let out a small groan. He turned his body the other way, covering his ears with a pillow before his older sister, Elara, kicked him in the back.

Easton immediately groaned in pain and muttered a curse under his breath. He glared at Elara, who was now sitting behind him while reading a book.

The young man then stepped outside. “Yes, Mom,” he answered, still half-asleep.

After cleaning himself up, Easton approached his mother, who was hanging laundry in the yard while yawning and stretching his body slightly.

“Is it just me, or does it feel a little quiet around here?” Easton said, helping his mother hang the wet clothes on the simple handmade wooden clothesline.

“I heard the people from the city came back,” Arbelle replied.

“What do they want this time? The village chief already turned them down.”

“I don't know, East. Maybe the old man changed his mind this time,” the woman said as she poured the used washing water onto her plants.

“What do you mean?”

“Never mind. Go and do your chores. Come home before it gets dark.”

Easton let out a quiet sigh. He knew that tone of his mother's voice. Whenever Arbelle started avoiding his questions, there was no point in pushing her any further.

He grabbed the woven basket hanging beside the house and slung it over his shoulder. Before leaving, Easton glanced toward their home. Through the open window, he could see Elara still sitting in the same place, buried in a book he was certain she had read countless times before.

“Don't read until you ruin your eyes,” Easton called out.

Elara did not even look up from her book.

“Don't come home if all you're bringing back is a fish smaller than my palm.”

Easton let out a mocking chuckle. “You've been annoying since the day you were a kid.”

“And you've been less intelligent than me since the day you were born.”

“Whatever.”

Easton walked away before their argument could turn into something longer. The morning air in Ardelle felt colder than usual, carrying the scent of wet soil and leaves that filled the paths between the villagers' homes.

★★★

As soon as he arrived in the forest, Easton was greeted by two white monkeys, Milo and Miro, whom he often played with whenever he came to gather firewood.

“Hey, Milo. Miro. You two look healthy.”

“East. Have you seen Ash today?” Miro, the more foolish and careless of the two, asked.

“Of course not. I just got here.”

Milo, his brother, immediately smacked Miro on the head.

“You idiot. If he just arrived, how could he have already seen Ash?”

Miro rubbed his head with a small grimace. “I was just asking.”

“A stupid question.”

The lighthearted interaction earned a small laugh from the young man.

“Guys, I have to get the firewood and catch some fish first. We'll play another time, okay?”

“No problem, East. Miro is stupid monkey anyway.”

“You're a monkey too!” Miro protested.

“I'm not as stupid as you.”

“You're annoying!”

Leaving the two bickering brothers behind, Easton continued toward the place where his father usually stored their family's supply of firewood.

The young man hummed softly to himself from time to time. He tied the pieces of wood together with the rope he had brought from home, then placed the bundle at the edge of the forest since he still had to continue toward the lake to catch some fish.

But as he walked deeper into the forest, Easton could not shake the uneasiness growing in his gut.

He was now on the farthest side of Ardenvale. People rarely passed through this part of the forest to reach Lake Arden. As far as Easton knew, this was the same area that had once been leased to the people from the city.

Easton was certain that what had happened here was their doing. It was obvious. The landslides and floods that frequently struck Ardelle had to be connected to the destruction of Ardenvale.

How could they not be?

Half of the leased land had been turned into a barren, treeless wasteland, with no effort made to replant anything. Along the way, Easton could see the carcasses of several deer that had been hunted simply for someone's amusement.

His heart ached at the sight.

Most of the villagers believed that the destruction of the forest, along with the disasters that had plagued Ardelle, was the result of Nereth's curse—a legend that had been passed down through generations.

Nereth.

The guardian of Ardenvale.

Since childhood, Easton had heard stories about him. They said that as long as humans protected the forest, Nereth would allow them to live alongside Ardenvale in peace. But once humans began taking more than they were supposed to, the guardian would become enraged and punish them with disasters.

Easton had never truly known whether he should believe it or not.

On one hand, he was certain that the destruction of Ardenvale was the fault of the people from the city. He had seen with his own eyes how they cut down trees, left the land barren, and hunted animals simply for pleasure. If landslides and floods came after all of that, wasn't it obvious where they had begun?

But on the other hand...

There were too many things he could not explain.

Ever since the forest began to deteriorate, disasters in Ardelle seemed to occur more frequently. The river that had once been filled with fish was slowly losing its life. Some of the animals they used to see had begun disappearing. Even the land that had always provided food for the villagers was becoming increasingly difficult to cultivate.

And the thing that troubled Easton the most was this—

Why did it continue even after some of the people from the city had stopped coming?

Was it simply the natural consequence of a damaged forest, one that would take years to recover?

Or...

Was Nereth truly angry?

Easton swallowed hard.

He hated admitting that possibility.

Because if Nereth really existed, then the people of Ardelle were not merely victims of the greed of outsiders. Perhaps they had also become part of the problem.

Maybe Nereth was not punishing them for destroying Ardenvale.

Maybe she was punishing them for allowing others to destroy it.

Yet there was something that still did not make sense.

If Nereth truly was the guardian of the forest, why had she allowed the people from the city to destroy Ardenvale in the first place?

Why hadn't she stopped them?

Or...

Perhaps everyone had misunderstood what was really happening all this time.

Easton exhaled slowly and shook his head. There were too many questions and far too few answers.

“Ridiculous,” he muttered under his breath.

He wanted to believe that everything had a reasonable explanation. That the disasters were simply the consequences of a damaged forest, not the curse of a creature that no one had ever truly seen.

But somewhere deep inside him, Easton still held a small doubt.

What if Nereth really did exist?

Too lost in his thoughts and anger, Easton did not realize that he had already reached the entrance to Lake Arden.

It was one of his favorite places—quiet and beautiful. He could spend hours there. He had even spent the night by the lake once.

“Ash!” Easton called when the wolf finally entered his line of sight.

But a split second later, his smile disappeared when he noticed an unfamiliar figure there.