The last time we were in here we got to the bottom of a large hill that went up above the treetops. I know where it is this time, forward towards the big green vine as soon as you enter the forest, and continue walking in that direction. She was running ahead of me, jumping over roots, plants, and anything else that was on the ground. She picked up a large stick and tried to use it as a cane, but it got caught between two rocks on the ground. Last time it took us a few hours to find it, but only a few minutes to get back. Well, it took me a few minutes to get back. At the speed I carry her that means it could be a good hour of walking like this.


    "Do you want us to be too late to actually climb the hill?"


    "Do you want to jump into my arms again?"


    "No! When you ran us back to the town I got dirt all over my face, I could taste the mud for a week!"


    "Even your running speed feels slow to me, I''d have to work harder than I want to just to stay at your speed."


    "Whatever, I''ll walk."


    And so we did. For the next few hours, we walked forward, but we found nothing. I couldn''t even tell if we were walking forward anymore. Was there some turn that we missed? Maybe we didn''t just run forward when we were getting out of here last time, maybe the big green vine wasn''t the way to go. Elle was getting tired. She would take a few steps and then get tired again. She wouldn''t last much longer.


    "Listen, I think getting dirt in your mouth is better than passing out."


    "Alright, fine. You have to promise me that you''ll watch where you step though."


    "I promise."


    "Pinky promise?"


    "What are you five?"


    She gave me puppy eyes while sticking her pinky finger out to me. It was either this or leaving her here, so I stretched out my pinky and joined it with hers. I picked her up into my arms once more, and we were off. However, just as I started to truly run, I found myself face-first in the grass. What? Did I even move at all? I couldn''t have. Had I gotten faster? No, if I''d moved that fast then Elle wouldn''t still be here, she''d be dust or something like it.


    Wait. Where was Elle? I could feel my arms still in front of me and they were holding something. I quickly brought my head back out of the grass and pulled the rest of my body with it. Elle was still in my arms, but she was covered in dirt. I laid her against the hill and started brushing dirt off her as fast as I could. Was she still breathing? How long was she in there for? Where did the giant hill come from?


    As I brushed the dirt off her face I could see that her eyes were open, and she spit a mouthful of dirt at me.


    "Elle! What the hell was that for?"


    "You promised you would watch where you were stepping! You pinky promised!"


    "I''m sorry, I- I didn''t see the hill. I don''t know how, it just was suddenly there in front of me."


    "You''re telling me. One moment I''m in your arms the next I''m in a pile of dirt!"


    "Whatever, we''ll talk about this later. We need to climb this hill before it gets dark again."


    We both looked up at the hill, it was incredibly steep. The dirt was soft though, I could stick my foot in it and push down and it would hold me up, it was kind of like stairs. This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.


    "Can you let me ride on your back up the hill?"


    "You really trust me to carry you after I just threw you into a pile of dirt?"


    "I knew you did it on purpose!"


    She backed away while frowning at me and I couldn''t help but laugh.


    "Never making a pinky promise with you again."


    "My fingers were crossed."


    "Celio!"


    "Come on, I need to run you back to the town when we''re done so we should at least climb the hill before that."


    Elle figured out that she could climb up the hill easily, and so we started our way up. Each time I would reach into the dirt with my hands it felt a bit different. As we got higher, the dirt got more soft, but I didn''t slip at all while climbing up and neither did Elle. We both climbed for what felt like another whole hour, but eventually we made it to the top.


    Wait, it was dark already?


    We just got above the trees and I was able to see the sky. I could see every single star that was out tonight. Tonight? How was it already night time? Were we walking around for longer than we thought? Were we climbing the hill for longer than we thought? I looked all around me and I couldn''t see the exit to the forest. I saw endless amounts of green trees that were all the same height.


    We were lost.


    How were we going to get back? What would we do? We can''t survive out here in the forest. Well, maybe I can, but I don''t think that Elle can. Well, I can protect Elle. But still! We shouldn''t be staying here for the rest of our lives. How could I not see anything other than trees? We were only walking, how did we get this far? How large was this forest? I knew that there was a big one in the middle of Melantia, but I didn''t think that Articulago had one as well. Was this a new discovery? If I made it back to the village, could I tell them about what I had seen here and become some sort of pioneer? How was I ever going to make it back anyway? Would I run as fast as I could without Elle, and hope that I made it out? If I made it out, I would have to come back in to get her, I shouldn''t just abandon her here. But if I don''t make it out of the forest, then I''m still going to be abandoning her. How would I even find my way back to this hill? The first time I found it by wandering and the second time I found it by just running for a second. What was the trick? What am I supposed to do?


    I looked over at Elle, she didn''t seem to care as much as I did. Why didn''t she care? She was just staring at the stars. Or was she staring at the moon? How can she just sit and stare at the stars or moon while we''re sitting on the top of a gigantic hill in the middle of a forest that apparently nobody knows about? How can she be calm when we could have ruined our lives by just going out for a walk? Should we have stayed in the orphanage and taken part in the rituals and prayers for the day? Was this Phrosus''s way of punishing us for not praying to him? Why did he care? I had praised him the day before, and Elle had to. Was he really that much of a jerk? He would choose to make two random kids in some worn-down village in the middle of a poor combination of countries that all hate each other get lost in woods that aren''t fully explored just because we didn''t pray to him at every opportunity? What kind of God is that? What kind of person is that? Elle was still looking at everything around her, but she must have been focused on one thing because she had been staring in the same direction for a while now.


    "Celio, look!"


    "Look at what?"


    "That random thing floating around!"


    I looked over at her, and I saw what she was talking about.


    In the middle of the starry night sky was a cube. Well, it wasn''t exactly a cube. The bottom of it looked like a mountain, sort of. It was like an upside-down cone. Like if you filled in a crater and then took out the filling. Something like that. The rest of the thing in the sky was a cube, It was like nothing I had ever seen before. There were windows all over it. One window, and then another window. Kind of like a house with more than one level, but all the windows were either right next to each other or right on top of each other. They were also all made of the clearest glass that I had ever seen. Was this some sort of fancy house? How did they get a fancy house to float in the sky? It was huge. The rest of the house was made out of this weird gray material. It looked smooth from far away, was it some sort of rock? That''s the only other thing that I knew about that would go in a house with that kind of color.


    I saw a dark figure come out of the house at the top of it. It was a man with a long coat who was standing on the edge of the house. The top of it must have been flat, I couldn''t see any sort of roof that houses usually had. Was he looking at us? The blue light of the moon made everything around me look blue, even the grass didn''t have its normal color. He was just standing there, on the edge of the tower. There was another window made of glass at the top, but it just sat there in front of him without any more of that gray stuff above it. I was trying to squint to see him better, but just as I stopped to blink I couldn''t see him anymore.


    "You''re not supposed to be here. Not yet, at least."