The morning wrapped Theo's small village in a deceptive calm, as if nature itself conspired to hide the secrets waiting within its embrace. The wind whispered through the trees, and the sun sent its golden rays through the light mist.
Theo stood in the dusty training ground, facing his friend Rayn, the air between them charged with tension and muffled laughter.
"Hahaha, Theo, you can't take me down now!" Rayn said with a chuckle, his eyes gleaming with confidence.
He stood in a defensive stance, trying to block Theo's attempts to unbalance him. But Theo, with a faint smile hiding cunning, suddenly vanished like a shadow, leaving Rayn looking around in confusion.
Rayn felt a light tap on his shoulder, so he quickly turned, jumping back cautiously, but he wasn't fast enough. A powerful punch landed on the back of his head, sending him sprawling to the ground, unconscious.
Theo stood over him, panting slightly, but satisfied with his performance. "You still need a lot of training, Rayn," he muttered, wiping sweat from his forehead.
It wasn't noon yet, but the training ended early.
Lately, Rayn had become bolder, demanding stronger and faster confrontations, and at the same time, his abilities had significantly developed. Theo had no choice but to end the training earlier than usual, especially since Rayn's strength began to approach his own, making the confrontations more intense and dangerous, and also the real reason for ending the training quickly was his annoying questions.
Theo was thirteen and a half years old, and a full year had passed since that night he snuck into his aunt Celia's room and read a mysterious book about the Berserkers.
That book, with its worn pages and carefully engraved letters, opened a world of questions for Theo. From that moment, his curiosity became restless, pushing him to search for hidden truths in the history of his small, isolated village, and about the vast world that lay beyond its borders.
Theo hadn't returned to his aunt's room since that day. He didn't know if it was a feeling of guilt, or fear of discovering more secrets, or perhaps worry about facing something he couldn't understand.
Whenever he passed her room door, he would glance at it quickly, then continue on his way. Elena, his mother, believed he was looking at the door with longing for his aunt, and she wasn't entirely wrong. Theo missed Celia.
Meanwhile, Theo continued to search for any trace of Kyle, the coach who had suddenly disappeared.
He snuck into Kyle's house several times, hoping to find answers. But one time, he almost lost his life. He had approached one of the doors inside the house when a flying sword passed over his head, grazing his hair by inches.
He narrowly dodged the sword, but quickly faced a barrage of sharp knives that flew at him from all directions.
Theo tried to block them, but their number was overwhelming, and they weren't ordinary knives.
They pierced his arms, leaving deep wounds, and some hit his body, making him bleed profusely.
He thought it was over, but he was surprised by smoke bombs falling around him, completely blinding his vision. At that moment, he felt other bodies moving towards him from all directions, and they were other knives, more numerous and sharper. He had no choice but to flee, so he rushed out of the house, leaving behind a mess of blood and traps.
Theo exited Kyle's house barely able to walk. His injuries were very serious, six stab wounds in his arms, a knife close to his heart but not deeply penetrating, and a large cut on his right thigh, in addition to stabs above and below his left knee. He sat leaning against a wall outside the house, trying to heal himself with his weak magic.
But, being still in the first ring of magic, he couldn't do much. He was about to give up and sit still when Rayn appeared.
Rayn was watching from a distance, and he probably knew that Theo would try to break into Kyle's house at some point. He helped him with treatment, but Theo, when he realized that Rayn had deliberately not warned him about the traps, did not hesitate once he had partially recovered, he attacked Rayn and inflicted serious injuries on him as punishment.
They were just two thirteen-year-old children, but they weren't like other children. They had trained under Kyle for years, and they were accustomed to serious injuries and bleeding. Their training, especially Theo's, was harsher than usual, having started before he turned ten.
After dropping Rayn off at his house, as if delivering a package, Theo began walking through the village streets.
He loved walking in the morning, especially after early training sessions. He felt the morning breeze caress his face, as he thought about the days he spent with Kyle, and about the secrets he was still searching for. After a while, he headed towards the nearby forest, where he used to spend the rest of his day.
In the forest, Theo hunted goblins, those small creatures that inhabit the depths. He would kill about thirty of them each time, going deeper into the forest to maintain his monster hunting skills. But recently, he discovered something new, a mysterious cave filled with traps.
The cave was a dark place, reeking of dampness and danger. Every time he entered, he faced deadly magical traps. On one occasion, a low-level fire orb hit him, burning his upper clothes and leaving painful burns on his chest.
Another time, he was trapped inside a water sphere, and almost drowned if it weren't for a foolish goblin that attacked him and unintentionally saved him.
And on the third time, he woke up hanging on a wall, surrounded by hundreds of small goblins who tried to tear him apart. He used the "Flame of Destruction" spell to kill dozens of them, but he emerged with severe injuries.
Now, in his twentieth attempt, he was facing wind magic. The wind blades were almost invisible, but he could barely see their waves, which helped him dodge them. But the blades were fast and numerous, and sometimes, they would touch him, leaving deep wounds that wouldn't heal easily. Half an hour passed as he dodged, trying to preserve his life. Finally, the magic stopped, so he sat leaning against a wall, panting heavily, his heart pounding violently and his body already drenched in blood.
'Damn it, I shouldn't have gone while not fully healed,' Theo cursed both his stupidity and the foolish Rayn who didn't warn him about the traps in Kyle's house.
As he was healing his wounds with his weak magic, he noticed another door at the end of the cave. It was tempting, but he didn't dare approach in his current state.
He decided to return to the village, where he found his mother Elena sitting in front of the house, singing softly. When she saw him, she stopped singing, and her face darkened.
"If you don't stop this soon, I'll prevent you from going out and I'll sit with you all day!" she said sharply. "How do you come back with all these injuries, for God's sake?"
Theo fell silent, trying to move his injured arm in vain, 'Damn these injuries' he thought, looking at his mother with eyes full of guilt.
Because he wasn't ready to stop, not yet.
In the following days, Theo continued to return to the cave, driven by restless curiosity and a determination to uncover its secrets.
He knew that the cave was not just a place full of traps, but a place that could take his young life.
Each time, he brought backup plans, trying to improve his skills in dodging traps and facing magic.
On one occasion, he encountered a new trap; the cave floor began to shake, and cracks appeared under his feet. He had no time to think, so he jumped to the cave wall, clinging to a rocky ledge. But the ground continued to collapse, and from the cracks, black shadowy figures began to emerge.
They were strange beings, faceless, carrying glowing swords. They moved towards Theo with terrifying speed, as if they knew his movements beforehand.
"What the hell is this?" Theo muttered as he dodged a sword strike that almost cut off his arm.
He used a simple spell to create a magical shield, but it shattered easily under the blows of the shadows.
He had to think fast. He noticed that the shadows moved synchronously, as if connected to something. He focused his gaze in the darkness, and noticed thin magical threads extending from the shadows to the center of the cave.
'So that's the secret,' he thought for a moment, instead of facing the shadows directly, he ran towards the center, ignoring the blows that hit his shoulder and leg.
There, he found a glowing gem floating in the air, emitting a low hum. Without hesitation, he raised his sword and struck the gem, shattering it into pieces. At that moment, the shadows disappeared, and the ground stopped shaking.
Theo sat on the ground, panting, his wounds bleeding profusely. But he felt a small victory.
He knew there was more waiting for him, but he felt victorious this time in particular because it was the first time he found something specific to the cave, unlike the rest of the traps which had no source.
That night, when Theo returned home, he found Elena waiting for him in the living room. She was holding a cup of tea, but her eyes were full of worry. Theo sat in the chair opposite her, trying to hide his injuries under his cloak.
"Theo, we need to talk," Elena said calmly, but firmly. "You can't go on like this. Every day you come back with new wounds, and I... I can't bear to see you like this."
"Mom, I'm fine," Theo replied, but he couldn't look into her eyes. He knew she was worried, but he couldn't stop.
"Fine?" Elena repeated sarcastically. "Look at yourself! Your arm can barely move, and your face is as pale as the dead. You're not fine, Theo. You're destroying yourself."
Theo didn't reply, and even when he planned to, he quickly shut his mouth, trying not to say anything foolish that would make the situation escalate further, and perhaps deny him from going out for a period.
Theo wasn't weak and he had already tried to create clones of himself, but his mother always discovered him; he didn't know how she recognized the clones, but he immediately stopped and told her he was just trying to kill a few ordinary orcs.
Theo tried to hide the cave matter again by saying, "I'm looking for clues about the Berserkers, Mom."
Elena said, placing the cup on the table. "Berserkers? Theo, those are old stories, legends. Why do you think they're real?"
"Because I read my aunt's book," Theo finally admitted, his voice low. "I saw what was written in it, I couldn't even turn the second page of the book, not because I was afraid, but because I was too weak to turn it."
Theo's hope was to cover the cave matter with one of his secrets, and he had succeeded indeed.
Elena froze for a moment, then said: "Celia's book? Theo, why didn't you tell me?"
"I didn't know how to tell you, but I really stopped entering the room since that day," he replied, looking at the ground.
Elena sighed, trying to ease the tension that filled the air, she patted Theo saying "Theo, I forgive you for entering your aunt's room without telling me, but please don't come back with other injuries."
Theo didn't reply and looked at the ground with guilt filling his heart until he heard.
"Okay, now I'll consider that your agreement to stay home for a month," Elena said as she hugged Theo, who was in pain from the injuries, but he didn't even wince as he was surprised.
'Wh-what? A month?' Theo thought before he finally gave in.
'Well, it's not like I can defeat her.'
The month passed quickly, and Theo soon recovered, given that he was no longer an ordinary person. He couldn't even set foot outside the house; he was even prevented from sitting in his own yard.
His mother always stopped him before he took his first step outside, and Theo was terrified by that thought.
In the days following the end of the month, Theo began to prepare better to face the cave. He trained in some simple defensive dark magic spells, and made a light shield of reinforced leather to protect himself.
He also began to study the traps he had faced, trying to understand their patterns. He noticed that the traps changed each time, but they followed a certain sequence.
In his twenty-fifth attempt, he entered the cave with more confidence.
This time, he faced a corridor filled with spears shooting from the walls. He used the shield spell he had trained, a sphere of darkness suddenly appeared surrounding him in a circle, and Theo sat in its center, which helped him block some of the spears, but he was injured again, and he also noticed that this time the trap was very weak compared to the last time.
But he noticed that the spears were aimed to force him to move in a certain direction.
Instead of resisting, he decided to follow the sequence, and soon found himself in front of a new room.
The room was wide, lit by a faint light emanating from crystals in the ceiling. In the center, a stone statue of a man in armor stood, holding a long sword. Theo approached cautiously, but felt movement behind him. He turned to find the statue moving, its eyes glowing with red light.
Theo quickly fled before the cave started playing with him again and sat in a safe place in the forest and tried to heal himself slowly.
When Theo returned to the village, he found Rayn waiting for him in the training ground. Rayn had recovered from his injuries, but he looked different, more serious.
"Theo, I heard you were forbidden from going out for a month, hahaha," Rayn said, chuckling at the same time, then pulled out his sword. "Shall we begin?"
"Rayn," Theo called out in a normal voice, which drew Rayn's attention.
"Will you come with me somewhere?" Theo said, and Rayn lowered his sword.
"Where?" Rayn asked with curiosity on his face.
Theo explained to him about the cave he found while hunting and about all the traps he faced in the cave, even that statue, he explained to him all the injuries he suffered, and about the times he almost died, and also about his twentieth attempt while he stood up and hit Rayn.
"I agree," Rayn replied while being hit by Theo, which made Theo stop for a moment.
"Are you sure? Even I almost died several times."
"Of course, who am I to refuse such an opportunity? And also, don't forget that I refuse to let you be alone in this matter," then Rayn paused and took a breath as he prepared for something and continued, "Consider it my compensation for not warning you before, Theo," then Theo showered him again with violent blows.
But even though Theo looked a little angry, he actually felt some relief before guilt overwhelmed him again and he thought.
'Sorry, Mom.'