Dancing Flames of Zypath

Chapter II -All Road Leads To One

After trekking for straight 3 days, Umier finally decides to make camp. "My beautiful stallion here must be tired." The horse softly neighs and bends her neck to welcome his soft brushes. The drained man spent his remaining strength to seek firewood nearby before making a safe return to the camp and setting up his 'futile or trash,' as his family loves to refer to it but which he actually finds to be quite practical. His skin will undoubtedly tremble in the chilly night air, but this tent has been keeping him warm since his third voyage.

"I'm sorry, beautiful." He turns to face his horse, who is quietly nibbling some green grass next to him. "—But my tent here has only one person capacity, and you are not a person either." He laughed, breaking the calm of the cold, dark night, and ended it with a deafening sigh. "We must rest now, we still have a long day tomorrow."

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"Oh pity me! forgot to bring blankets, never thought the cold could seep through my tent!" Umier complained early in the morning. He never thought it would be so cold, he clearly remembers closing his tent that night so why does it feel like it was snowing inside?

"Maybe my tent has a hole?" he searched up his tent while fixing it before throwing it in his bag. "There's no hole—that's strange." he looked around, his horse was completely fine and still was eating grass at some distance. Then a couple of senses hit him square in the head. The warmth of the weather made him feel as though noon had already arrived. "It's still dawn," he uttered in silence. Knowing something strange was going on, he quickly killed the fire and caught up on his horse. "Lass, somethings not right here, we must get going."

They take off. Umier started sweating as he was unable to figure out what was happening at that moment. Although the sun wasn't yet up and it was completely early morning, he felt as though the heat was suddenly creeping in on him. "Marma, just what is happening?"

A few hours later Umier forcibly stopped his horse after seeing a large rock wall in front of him that was covered in extremely long and thick hanging vines that almost gave the impression that there was something beneath it- but a rock. When he turned to face the road, he saw that it actually led to the rock. "A dead end?" He whispered, he reached for some vines hanging on the wall and inspected them while flipping through his book of plants, which contains an array of names, origins, and other details about various and different species. It was a book given to him by his mother it was very dear to him.

The old man couldn't find what kind of vine it was, it wasn't in his book but he still kept reading. His attention was immediately taken aback by his horse's soft neigh, she was eating grass again, but something made it seem off. The grass was greener, like a very bright green that almost looked like it was glowing. He squinted his eyes and looked back again, "It's not a dream then..." And just as he was about to depart, he recognized an old illustration in the book. Beneath the hanging vines, he places it. "Epilipta Marcissa, a growing vine that reaches up to a hundred meters in length and is rarely found hanging on some enormous boulders."

His eyes were widely veiled as he asked, "This is it—place of origin, —Z-zypath?!" His hands abruptly turn to the following page just as he was about to continue on.

When he read, "Gragette Feroe, a very bright green grass that only thrives on the lands of Zypath—," the book slipped from his hands and as he went to pick it up, he discovered that it had ended up on a certain page called "Ancient Plants." He gazed at the enormous stone wall in front of him, the large hanging vines, and the road he believed to be at a dead end.

"I-oh my Malma—w-we're in the ancient lands of Zypath!" his face suddenly turned pale and his body was frail. His eyes were fixated on the giant wall of stone before him. Turned out it wasn't just any wall or rock, it was a humongous boulder covered in earth and vines that from one viewpoint appeared to be a mountain. "This is a dead land."



He looks around. "No one is here, it's just awfully dreary that this such place is abandoned. It will always remain a legend."

"I bet someone had found this land already and wasn't able to understand why this was a dead end. And they probably haven't had this book that I have here." He called his horse and was about to set off when it was terrified and suddenly fled away, "H-hey!Marma!" he screamed and chased her off the road but he couldn't catch up because she was galloping so fast. His heart was racing as he looked back at the giant boulder, Marma was looking and probably got scared by something behind his back. But when he looked, no one was there.

"Oh heavens! how do I do this?" he went back up again to look for someone suspicious. He held tight to his axe and sharpened his visions. "You are intruding." Then he felt the chill of a voice behind him. The creature unleashes a surge of power and dominance, which he can sense. When he slowly turned around, an ancient Zypathi appeared before his eyes.

He was taken off guard at that same moment and got knocked out.