Chapter 7 6: The Mystic Forest

"Elric!" Claude called out to his tied-up companion as he slowly crawled toward him.

Elric was struggling to free himself at first, but got slightly comfortable on the deep green grass as time passed by and decided to close his eyes a bit. Before he could drift away, though, Claude's head slammed into his feet.

"Elric, I'll try to untie you, alright?" Claude said. His hands were tied up behind his back, so he had to bite the rope open. "Untie me, and then we can go back on the path… Mystic forest, I don't like the name."

"Yeah, yeah, do that."

Claude squirmed a bit and then bit on the rope tying Elric's hands. He struggled a bit, but thanks to Elric's bony hands, it became easier to pull on the knot. As the red-haired boy did his best, Elric took the chance to look around the place.

Blades of green had grown tall all over the forest with stony, fine pecan soil. The roots of the many trees stretched deep within the ground and pushed it up in bumpy bits. Opposite the growing thicket of old trees, a thin, worn-out path of sand stretched all the way out of the forest. The path that they had just come in from and the carriage had left from had a rebellion of grass trying to take back its place from the tyranny of sand, a sign that the path had barely been used in recent years. For the ominous name that Claude had just taken, the forest seemed strangely normal.

"Ummf!"

The rope around Elric's hand loosened slightly.

It was then, that his eyes fell on the encroaching shroud of mist from the north.

"H-hey…There's a thick mist coming close…" Elric said.

Claude stopped pulling on the knot and turned his gaze up.

There, breaching through the bulwark of trees came flooding in the thick, dense mist. Everything that it grazed over was eaten away from sights, a mist so dense that Claude wondered if he would be able to see his own hands inside it.

"T-that's… mist? Fog…?"

"The lord of shadows!" Elric exclaimed. "It's the mystic forest because this is the place they offer sacrifices to the lord of shadows! Ahhh! We're done! It's over!"

"L-lord of shadows!? W-what the fuck is that!?" Panic colored Claude's face as the mist came closer and closer, it was just nigh of reaching them. "They never said anything like that in the classes!"

"Aww… There's no lord of shadows in this world?"

"You—AHH!!"

The two were swallowed up by the mist.

***

The flood of white slowly dispersed as the sight of the forest returned.

Elric raised his eyes to see the same tall and thick trees with their brown stumps standing proudly in a formation as if the mist had never broken through them. Left and right, the number of trees seemed to grow in all directions the deeper his gaze went. He looked down.

It was gone.

The path that they had been brought over on, was gone.

No signs of sands, no mauled blades of grass, no marks of the horse's footsteps, it wall gone.

"Ow-ow-ouch…"

A soft groan sounded from behind Elric.

"Did you have to pinch my ears like that?" Claude asked.

"The anti-shadow lord energy sealed in my left hand saved you."

"You know what? I am not even going to argue."

When Claude didn't play along with his games, Elric clicked his tongue and explained things normally. "I just thought we'd separate, then it'd be tied up you against the forest. And see, I was right. The path that we came from is gone. Or should I say, we were moved away? No idea"

Claude's eyes widened at Elric's words. He engaged his core and sat up with his hands behind his back to take a look around the forest. It was just as Elric had said.

"Mystic forest…" Claude muttered.

The Mystic Forest had swallowed them up.

Many questions streamed through Claude's mind, but he shook them all away. Most important right, it was to break free and find a way out. Sighing, Claude squirmed back to Elric and went to loosen the rope again, when he stopped in his tracks.

"Hey, Elric…"

"Yup?"

"Your hands are not tied up anymore."

"I know," Elric said with a nod while still lying on the ground, his hands in the same position behind his back. "It stopped touching me when you loosened it a bit, I guess the Shadow Lord took it."

Claude could feel veins pop up on his forehead. Things were already too confusing for the poor child, and this bastard was not helping at all. Taking in a deep breath, Claude asked, "Why aren't you getting up and untying me, Elric…"

"Eh… My muscles are sore… Just wait a bit, ok?"

After a few minutes passed, Elric finally sighed and moved his hands back to the front. His sedentary lifestyle of eating, sleeping, and looking pretty wasn't very kind to his muscles, or his personality. After struggling a lot to stand up, he walked behind Claude and started untying the ropes on his hands.

Finally untied, Claude stretched his hands and back. He looked around the place, touching the trees and the grass. He and Elric looked around in a circle through the woods and peeked around.

"As expected…"

"The Shadow Lord's labyrinth traps us,"

Fear was trickling up Claude's back, but he did his best to ignore it. Strong or not, just one month ago, he was merely a school student having fun with his friends.

He was so kind all the time. So helpful. He did his best to not make the people of the church antagonistic, and he was also always there for his friends.

And then?

This is what he got.

Claude clenched his teeth and turned to Elric.

"Hey," he said, his voice tinged with a poison he didn't know he had.

Perhaps sensing the darkness in Claude's mood, Elric stayed shut and stared back at Claude.

"Did you do it? Did you break that statue?"

Elric almost stuck his tongue out with an oops but held it in on time. He could feel sweat come flooding out again from his forehead.

But, Elric was different.

The Elric that he was this morning, wasn't the same as now.

This Elric had already settled on the narrative that it was completely the dog's fault. He was so hell-bent on blaming that dog that if he was put on a lie detector and asked if he broke the statue, the 'false' answer would be saying yes.

And so, Elric shook his head.

"I didn't break it."

Did he dispose of it? Yes. But that wasn't Claude's question.

Claude's eyes narrowed. "Then what were you doing outside the statue room, huh?"

"D-dog…"

"What?" Claude asked.

"Dog."

"You…" Claude leaned closer to Elric. "You were there because of a dog?"

Elric averted his gaze away from Claude. The gentle red-haired boy seemed truly pissed with his sharp brows furrowed together and his soft eyes and softer smile scrunched into a big frown. Elric gulped and nodded softly.

The two stood in place like that for a few seconds.

pαndα`noνɐ1--сoМ Then, a loud slapping sound reverberated through the air.

Elric nervously looked in the front again to see the boy with red hand-shaped marks stuck over his cheeks.

After slapping himself, Claude let out a deep sigh. As his swollen chest let out the air, his brows loosed and his eyes softened.

"Elric… I believe you."

The boy that no one trusted.

That boy decided to trust today.

His bright smile with his cheeks reddened from the slap looked like a blooming flower to Elric.

"So, what now?" Elric asked. He wasn't sure if Claude had more eye-opening events in line or if he could just go to sleep.

"Quite the forest, right?" Claude ignored the question and looked around.

The far-reaching branches of the tree and the leaves standing on their toes covered enough of the sky to form a canopy above. They could see things well for now, but the night wouldn't be as kind.

And the beings that dwell in such places.

Monsters could come up at any time.

"Elric," Claude said. "Let's find a way out, two of us."