The Legend of the North

Chapter 12

Announcement

Thank you for reading "The Legend of the North". This book is fully published on Amazon (under the same name), it would be very helpful if you buy the book to support me.

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He began to read it with difficulty due to the dim light, perhaps it was already night, Ezer completely lost track of time in the storm. The book began with brief stories of hunters and some of their most famous hunting parties in which they participated, earning merit, glory, honor, money and women... it put too much emphasis on women.

"Whoever wrote this was nothing more than an amateur with free time and too much pride, it is even likely that everything that is written actually happened, it is hard to believe." Ezer wasn't an expert on books, but at least he knew how to tell a good one from a bad one.

He is a little disappointed that he doesn't have good reading material, Ezer continues to flip through until he reaches the middle of the book and finds himself with a different kind of paper and handwriting. The paper was also worn, but they had enough quality to keep their shape and the ink on it, the calligraphy was also very different from the previous one being clear and smooth.

The first page was titled as " What a hunter must know to understand nature ". Excited, Ezer was about to read when he notices the look on Lia's face.

"Are you interested in what is written?" He points to the book with a small movement of his hand.

Lia nods closing her eyes and pricking up her ears, paying attention to the reading aloud. Ezer begins to read, happy that someone else is interested in the same thing as him, so many years of reading books in the library alone, or rarely accompanied by his younger sister, resulted in him beginning to believe that he was different and that no one more shared their ideas. He returns his thoughts to the book and begins to read it.

"In the past, people depended exclusively on hunters for meat since, surprisingly enough, animal husbandry was not common. Men who, when cities were no bigger than the towns we have today, went deep into the forests in search of food, land or resources for their families. This book contains all my experiences, as well as that of my ancestors, everything necessary to make you know the origins of my art, unlike the imperfect and greedy money hunters of today." Ezer stops and looks at the book as if he had found gold, the author had great knowledge, he could recognize it just by reading the first words. The way in which the author expressed himself, although also a little arrogant, showed wisdom.

"This is the real book, and not that invented rubbish that was added at the beginning by a complete ignorant." Without realizing it, he ironically uses almost the same words as the one who had written the dedication at the beginning.

Ezer begins to absorb all the knowledge written in the book, animals and their characteristics, habitats, weak points and how to kill them; plants, how to identify and find them. All knowledge that would be vital and would save his life more than once.

Itself

With sharp black rocks rose one of the earliest, and smallest, mountains on the border. The eastern sun illuminated a young man climbing these rocks, slowly but steadily.

"Aahhgg... this is costing more than I thought!" He was nearly ten meters off the ground, his muscles beginning to complain and his fingers reddened from friction and cold.

Lia was sitting on her two hind legs watching him with amused eyes and expectant to what might happen to him again.

"From here I can tell that you're having fun waiting for me to fall, right?" Ezer find a good point of support on which he shouldn't exert too much force, he used it to rest.

"It's not going to happen like the first time... or the second... The third time was because the rocks were wet!"

Lia rolls her eyes as if to say "And the fourth, why is it going to be?" Although Ezer obviously can't see it from a distance.

The reason why he tried to climb it several times was not for fun, it was because of the need to survive. Three days ago, he was injured by one of the tusks of a boar in the shoulder and that wound turned black along with all the veins around it.

Poison was slowly spreading through his body. It did not weaken him or cause pain, he managed to recognize the type of poison thanks to the book he read several times in these two months.

In winter, the boars must strive for food and one of these is the roots of a small thorny bush. When they unearthing them with their tusks, they release a toxin that adheres to the tusks and teeth, they are not toxic to wild boars, but to humans.

The poison has a very slow action, but if it is not treated in a week, it will weaken you until one is bedridden. Fortunately, the book not only recognizes the poison, but also a cure for it.

A dull yellow flower that grows on the slopes of mountains, it withstands the winter and once it blooms, it stays that way for years until it dies. However, it is quite scarce and its growth is very slow.

Ezer finally reaches the ledge the flower is on, there is enough room to sit down and rest. As he catches his breath, he gazes at the landscape spread out before him. Hills were beginning to give way to mountains and forests to rocks.

"Spring is coming, the cold and the dark days are moving away... I think that in a few days I will be fourteen years old. What will mother and sister be doing?" A moment of peace like this is perfect for thinking and remembering.

He looks down and almost not make out Lia's white fur against the snow, but it's there, he knows it is. She was always by his side and never left him, helping him countless times and saving him from the boar, as well as dozens of times.

"I'm not going to keep you waiting any longer." Plucking the flower from its stem, Ezer begins to descend the same way he came. Although when climbing it is easier to go up than to go down.

When the sun is at its highest point, Ezer manages to reach the ground and starts preparing the antidote without wasting any more time.

—"Immerse the petals in warm, non-boiling water for half an hour, then crush them and apply to the wound." He recites the procedures making sure he didn't forget anything as he applies the crushed flower to his wound.

"You have to heat them in water to remove a little of the toxin inside and it's not harmful. How ironic, using toxins to treat toxins." Little annotations were added in the margins of the pages of the book, it has the same handwriting so it was surely the author who placed them deliberately.

"Now that I'm not in any danger, I canfocus on my training again." He takes his bow and arrows, created byhimself, to start practicing. At first he used the ones he had found in thequiver, but constant use broke them and he preferred to reserve them foremergencies, now he only had twelve iron-tipped arrows left.