The Escape

Green Forest Village was directly adjacent to a massive forest that spanned numerous mountain ranges. As far as the eye can see, trees peppered the background for miles around. In a small corner of the village a house on a small piece of land was ablaze as a withered man walked straight ahead toward a vast expanse of tightly packed trees.

Damien knew that he had to make his escape both quickly and quietly. Truth be told he had absolutely no knowledge of the world beyond his small piece of land. He had never been able to run very far before being dragged back and Damien didn't kill his father with the intent of obediently turning himself in to his fellow villagers, he wanted freedom, the freedom to make his own choices and the freedom to escape his terrible fate. To Damien, an escape plan was paramount, perhaps even more important than the act itself. Although he had very little knowledge of the outside world, he knew that The Great Forest was both a treasure and a curse to Green Forest Village. His father often took out his anger on hum when he was frustrated and there were times when the curses he threw out let a little info slip. He knew that although the forest was dangerous, the Beasts that dwell within practically had bodies worth their weight in gold and his father often rambled on about not being able to acquire any of the most high quality meats they had to offer at a lower cost. Once, he even saw one of the village guards delivery a half mangled corpse of what looked like a huge black snake. Even half destroyed he didn't miss the wide smile that hung on his fathers lips.

Damien strongly believed this forest was the perfect place to erase his tracks. He was trapped between two unknowns, what would happen if the villagers discovered he murdered his father, or the vast forest before him with its terrifying population of fierce beasts. Long ago, he had already made his decision. The one thing Damien did know, was the viciousness of the human heart. Given the choice, Damien would much rather be granted the mercy of a quick death by beasts than risk being confined fir a second time. He had seen enough of how cruel humans can be under his father and chose the lesser of two evils. Even so, Damien held a small hope of survival, he knew how low the odds he'd actually make it in the forest were but he still forged ahead. He wanted to touch it, his last hope of true freedom. Despite it all, he survived, he killed that man, and now he must walk through the gates of hell to truly succeed. Without hesitation and with one step after the other he disappeared amongst the trees shrouded in pitch black darkness.

——

The sun was now creeping over the edge of the sky, spilling out into the world. Surrounding a small pile of grey ash on a field, multiple people with a kind of leather armor stood huddled. One man, a head taller then the rest, and a long scar across his nose spoke with a loud thundering voice.

"What happened here? Speak!"

At this moment, one of the surrounding guards said quickly, "I'm not sure sir. When I woke this morning, I noticed the smoke and hurried over. By then it was already too late, the house was ash."

"And what of Dominic? Did he make it? What about the dog he keeps in the cellar?"

"No sir. We found his body after the initial search, dead. As for the boy, the cellar door was unlocked and there's no sign of him."

With a sigh the lead man muttered, "What a dumb ass. Search for the boy, bring him to me if you can. If you can't after a day, forget it. Best not to pour resources into searching for a dead body"

The surrounding men all shouted in unison, "Yes sir!"

The crowd of men quickly dispersed and the only person still standing atop the ashes was the tall man with the scar. "Too bad. That boy had such a sweet taste to him. I loved the look in his eyes, especially recently. Shame, what a shame. Now I have to find a new stress reliever."

Soon he walked off with perverted grin, leaving the pile of ash and burnt wood to decay and disperse with the wind.

——

After escaping into the forest, Damien did nothing but try to put as much distance as he could between himself and the Green Forest Village border as possible. He knew that the village guards would more than likely quickly catch his tail. Although they likely wouldn't search very long, he considered this period to be his first big obstacle. His body was simply too flimsy, the amount of distance he could cover was a far cry to how much a fully trained guard could and there was simply no solution to this. The one who brought that giant snake to his father was a guard, Damien had no doubt that a single whip of that tail was all it would need to kill him and that snake was mangled beyond belief. Truthfully, there were a couple options before him. He could hide, though Damien had very little experience with stealth, with a bit of luck he could stall for long enough until they stopped searching. He could keep running, he did have a head start after all, perhaps it was enough to out run them, though his body was taking an increasingly larger toll as he navigated the rough tree-filled terrain. He could fight, although the least likely option to succeed, there were benefits to this, he could set some simple traps and catch them off guard, if he was able to kill them, their armor and weapons would be his, boosting his chances in surviving the forest himself. Damien weighed his options as he continued forward with heavy breathes. He had already been speeding through the forest for hours now. His feet stung and bled with each step he took and his was steadily reaching his limit. Of course with willpower only exhaustion wasn't something to worry about but if he truly pushed himself far past what his body was capable of doing, he was essentially guaranteed to die regardless of whether the guards found him or not.

'The chief obstacle in my escape still remains the forest itself, I need to increase my odds of survival and facing the guards is far too risky. Another factor is time, they're much more familiar with the terrain than I am and I don't have the luxury of carefully setting traps that may or may not work. My body is also slowly reaching a limit, I can't risk becoming incapacitated within a forest like this. Hiding it is.'

At this thought, he quickly put the plan into action. He needed somewhere to hide and in a forest like this, hiding spots were abundant. His only issue was that he had no knowledge of the means the guards were using to track him. Quite honestly he had very little knowledge in general and most of what he was doing now was improvised thanks to his innate cleverness. He wasn't stupid though, he knew that the main problem was that his escape was a bit clumsy. He left clear signs while moving through the forest and he needed a way to disguise his movements so that even if they reached his current location they'd have nothing to track anymore. This was the problem, he had very little supplies on hand, and aside from a small bag of food, a canteen, and a 6" nail there was nothing else. Damien's mind grew sharper as he felt the breathe of death down his neck. In the corner of his eye he noticed a long branch that'd snapped off a nearby tree.

'That's it, I've never been a threat to anyone, much less those guards. I don't think they'd take tracking me down all too seriously either.'

He approached the branch and picked it up, it was about 4 ft. long and there were large green leaves attached to its end. As he held the branch he plunge the the leafy end into the ground behind him and walked forward. As he moved, the ground behind him was unchanged, there were no traces of his previous movements. At this sight, even he couldn't help but let out a slight grin. Without any hesitation, Damien in a completely different direction, doing his best to eliminate all his traces and he steadily walked forward, further decreasing his speed.

After another hour, he stopped. In front of him was a large area of brush and at a glance he noticed the thorns poking out from each of the branches. He walked forward once again and moved through to the center of the brush, without each step, stabs of pain engulfed his entire body. The thorns plunged themselves into him and left streams of blood that flowed out of each wound. An excruciated pain remained on his body even as he moved forward. No doubt, the thorns were poisonous. The more he moved the more wounds appeared on his body and the more excruciating the pain. Even with the poison flooding his system, Damien's face remained unchanged, nor were his movements hampered in the slightest, if it meant truly escaping his previous status he could calmly watch as his body was wasted away into nothingness. His hopeless future hurt far worse than any physical blow could inflict. As he reached the middle of the thorny brush, he began to crawl, crouching and lying fetal within the area of green his wounds still searing in pain. He planned to stay here until tomorrow morning, this was his best guess at how long they'd try and search for him. If he was wrong, all he could blame was his bad luck and he'd stab the nail into his own throat at the first sign of capture.

——

After some time, a group of 4 men in leather-like armor appeared within a patch of forest. They were chatting and laughing as they scanned their surroundings. The man in the leads was looking at the ground following a series of footprints marked in the dirt. After a moment the man looked up and spoke, "The tracks are gone. Seems he figured a way to erase his tracks. Clever for a dog."

Another man spoke up immediately, he was short and stubby, and a pendant hung from his neck that read 'squad leader,' "No matter. Fan out, he couldn't have gotten far."

As the 3 guards each headed in different directions, the short man took a seat on a log and took out his canteen. 'This is stupid, although it was fun to play with that little bastard, what a waste of time. If he decided to head deeper into the forest, he's as good as dead anyways. No point searching for a corpse. Even a full squad of guardsmen could perish within its depths. Still, orders are orders, let's search the outskirts for a bit. Hopefully, I can drag that mutt back, Captain might even share him with me.'

With a step he walked off into another direction and lazily began to search his surroundings. Farther up was a patch of green bushes that covered a small area of forest.