Something Spicy

Chapter 1

Author Note: Welcome to world of no return, BL.

Kevin clumsily tied his knife and canteen to his waist and left his cabin. He lived on the outskirts of the village which was useful when he needed to feed his starving stomach. Poisonous mushrooms, check. Grass, check. He would eat whatever is necessary to fill his stomach. He was too weak and had no training in weaponry. Nobody wanted a man who was too weak to lift logs and unable to pass the guild's testing for rank. A F- rank was a nobody. 

 Kevin walked out the door and made sure it was closed tightly cutting off any shafts of golden light from entering the once bright house. He double checked all the windows were sealed off and he limps away from the rotting shack with resolve his stomach twisting but he hesitantly stops. After standing still for a while, his stomach curdling with hunger he turns to look at his home again filled with happy memories  before heading towards the forest. Feeling almost like deja vu he shakes off the ominous feeling.

He entered the forest dragging his left leg slightly. Luckily, today was a good day and the leg was not hurting as much today but maybe it was from the anesthesia from the black spotted mushroom he ate a couple days ago.

He shivered in recollection of the hallucinations he had experienced. He hadn't always lived on his own. He had lived with his mother and older sister who died of pneumonia when he was fifteen. He had paresis in his left leg ever since he had fallen down a tree. He could still move it slightly by it often was painful especially when it had muscle spasms. After they had died the village ignored his existence. Luckily, the vegetable patch behind their house procured food well but not enough. When he couldn't scavenge food from the forest he begged in the nonexistent village square. Pigs and dogs ate what scrapes of food there was but occasionally the baker or errand girl would give him something. 

He felt himself tearing up thinking of his mom's smile and his sister's strong hands. His mother and sister occasionally joined the group of hunters in the forest while he helped tend to the garden and chickens. They were too poor to afford any pigs or cows. Two years after their deaths he began to find chickens and vegetables disappearing. Desperate, he would stay up all night but he couldn't do it every night and they started disappearing again. Finally, one day the plants were trampled to death not a bud to be seen which by then all the chickens were gone without a cluck. 

It was late evening and he had searched all day for something edible. The forest had been rather sparse from many of the villagers scrounging from hunger. The soldiers visited, often taking children above 12, strong men, and any "taxes" they could. The village of 325 had gone to 214 when the sickness hit and 131 after the soldiers came through at random intervals.  He shivered in his tattered shirt that was relatively clean. He scratched at bug bites littered everywhere on his body bloody as his mind muddled from exhaustion tried to think. He looked up, seeing only canopies of trees. The last dregs of sunlight that lit the dim forest were already disappearing; he was about to turn around when he spotted berries. Kevin lept up from his half crouch position and rushed to the berries, his hands trembling. He quickly stuffed berries into his mouth quietening the hunger pains. Thorns from the bushes cut his arms and face as he stuffed the berries in his mouth mechanically. If this was a couple years ago he would have been happy but this was no longer a new experience. A bunny hopped by, a deer pranced behind him, and birds sang above him. He tied a small remainder of berries in a piece of ragged cloth and began dragging his carcass the way he came.

He weakly bounced off something green falling to the ground and pain tingled in his hip. Huffin' and puffing with the assistance of an old oak lifted himself up and continued till there was no more light. He couldn't follow the stars because the canopy's were too thick and there was no chance he could climb a tree and look. He sat down and leaned against a tree hungry beyond words. Kevin closed his eyes huddling into a fetal position to stave off the chill.

A/N- Paresis is the partial or incomplete paralysis is when you still have some feeling in, and possibly control over, your paralyzed muscles.