The Tale of Raskaya: reincarnated into an unknown world

5. Growing up and standing on your own feet

The little boy Raskaya continued to live with the forest fairies for the next two years.

At the tender age of four and a half years he decided that he wanted to live on his own, though a few things that happened in between need to be mentioned as well.

The first memorable thing that happened is that when the little boy gained enough awareness to understand the difference between the male and female gender at the age of three, he became permanently unhappy.
This was because his soul was that of a woman who in her prior life, as the only thing she detested more than being a woman, hated the idea of being a man.

So because of this he will now be called she in remembrance to her prior life!

...

or not.
Actually she didn't exactly remember much more than her resentment towards the male and female gender, but it will stay as she.

So as Raskaya was unhappy on her own she grew more and more irritated by being called a he from the forest fairies. Don't get her wrong, she didn't become gloomy at the age of three nor did she hate the fairies, they were her family, especially uncle Siourua. There were many reasons why she decided to leave. She learned very fast everything the fairies taught her and at a certain point it just became boring. The forest fairies were very peaceful. That on it's own was not a problem but they didn't interact with any other people or folks either so there was simply nothing going on. There wasn't even a school!

Because of this little Raskaya decided at the age of four and a half that after already having learned the most basic things needed to survive on her own, it was time for her to leave her family and home and promptly headed out of the forest fairy territory after giving her goodbyes.

The most important things Raskaya learned before leaving were reading and writing the neighbouring kingdom's language, edible and poisonous plants (to not be accidentally eaten) and simple remedies for common injuries and diseases. Not to be forgotten also self defense and hunting against wild forest animals, washing and sewing clothes, and most interestingly some little magic tricks!

With this knowledge the little boy set out on his journey to find a new home.

He traveled for a long time in the direction of the neighbouring kingdom. Even though Raskaya did not leave the forest one time during the journey, because it was just so big, he actually managed to get to the border after a week. This part of the border was in the middle of the forest so there were no soldiers or checkpoints to watch it and the only indicator for a change of territory was that there was a clean line beyond of which were different trees in a very obvious different colour.
Before they were brown with green leaves while they now changed to white tree trunks with red leaves for at least a day. Afterwards there were dark, almost black, trees with purple leaves, which changed to light brown with dark blue leaves and after another three days it changed to ordinary trees with green leaves again. This part looked, from the plants at least, exactly like the territory of the forest fairies. One could almost think that the boy only walked in a giant circle, but since the border was only crossed once, it was obviously not the case.

Raskaya decided that she liked this part of the forest and to settle down there. Raskaya set down the things he brought with him and went to explore the area.

There was a small stream close by, water source ok! There were many animals but at first sight no dangerous ones. After spending until sunset exploring the boy eventually returned to his belongings and decided to look for a place to sleep.
Not far away Raskaya found a little cave. This cave was so small that the end was soon (after no more than maybe six meters) reached and it was obvious that no animals lived inside. He set up camp an slept there for the night.

The next day Raskaya first build a door into the cave entrance so that no animals could just enter, wrote a sign and hung it at the entrance with here lives Raskaya on it, in case humans passed by, and hammered the inside of the cave into an angular shape, to give it more of a feeling of a house. At some point he went to get food and afterwards continued with the work. He still hammered a few small windows without glass into the rock and holes for air circulation.

Finally finished with work he directly dropped to sleep and did not get up until the next day.

Since Raskaya decided to live there she did not go to the end of the forest to look for other people. Although one of her reasons to leave the forest fairies was that it was too boring and there were no interactions with humans, that did not mean that she had any desire to meet some.
This was because now that she lived on her own she had to do everything herself. Hunt, gather plants to eat, cook, wash and repair her clothes, and many other things.

There simply wasn't enough time of each day left to get bored.

Everytime she was done with eating and whatever she was doing she went to explore the piece of the forest surrounding her 'territory'.
A relatively short time after moving into her little cave, she had now even furnished a bed and closet, a chair and a desk, she found something while strolling a bit further from her base than usual.

It was a wooden house in the forest.

She thought that maybe it could have been a shed for passing hunters, if they had to stay out overnight, but came to the conclusion that it was not. The reason being that first, you couldn't enter the house without a key. If a passing hunter was supposed to spend his night there, he would have to be able to enter without needing a key, right? But the door was locked so that couldn't be. The second point was that Raskaya thought the interior looked too nice. It looked cozy and comfortable like the home of a family.

Because she was curious, Raskaya came by every now and then to look if anyone lived in there.

After half a year Raskaya was sure that no one lived inside the house. It had been months already and the house was empty the whole time. If the owner was only away on a trip he would have surely returned already by now. But that never happened so it seemed that simply no one lived there on a regular basis.

But to the little boy's surprise one day when he was out hunting, coincidentally near the wooden house, another little boy came suddenly out of the bushes in front of him.

Light green eyes of a colour reminding him of fresh grass looked into his eyes and frozen he looked back into the face staring at him.
The foreign boy had light hair of a colour of honey and wood brown and light skin and looked curiously at Raskaya.

He suddenly began to smile and turning towards the house he shouted:

"Mom! I found a girl in the forest!"

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Wordcount: 1260
Date of release: 20.10.2021