Free. That is what I was. It took me one year but I managed to free myself. No matter how much the earth wanted me to stay at the forest, I wanted to leave. I love the place to death but I can not stay here forever. The first thing I did was run. At least that is what I had hoped I did. Considering the fact that I wasn't moving for a year, it was hard to move. The moment I set my body into motion, I collapsed. This was going to be hard. I decided to cheat the system because I didn't have time. I closed my eyes and focused really hard on healing my muscles. I felt the warmth through my body as the healing began. This felt good.
"What are you doing?" I heard a voice behind me. I turned around and saw it was a little boy. I opened my mouth and tried to say a word but nothing came out. I started to panic. My voice it was gone for good. I needed to heal my vocal chords. I ignored the boy and went on with my healing. Only problem was my ability disappeared. Oh, no. Was he here already? I thought I slowed him down.
"You thought you could escape. I told you many times it is not time for you to leave. You have a lot to learn." This, ladies and gentlemen is the forest guardian. He was using telepathy to communicate with me. I tried standing up hoping I had healed the muscles in my legs only to fall on my butt. I heard snickering all around. Those backstabbing creatures. I would get them for this.
"Go away, old geezer. I need to leave. Didn't the fairies give you my message?" Yes, I know. I used fairies to slow down a very powerful person. This powerful person would be able to disintegrate me in 2 seconds. And what do I use? FAIRIES. Not so smart. But usually he absorbs all my powers so even if I wanted to use my magic nothing would happen. So I made a contract with the fairies and it didn't end so well. As you can tell they were bought over in a few minutes. Never trust fairies, EVER.
"As you can tell, it wasn't so hard dealing with them. Now lets go back to where you were."
"Oh, how I wish I could. But as you can tell my legs don't work." I said dramatically. "Are you willing to offer me a piggy back ride?" I batted my eyelashes to him and gave him my puppy dog face.
"Okay, I have no idea what is going on, but this is weird. Are you guys having a staring competition? If so, I want in." I watched the boy grin to us as he talked. I completely forgot that the boy existed. Then it hit me. I know how to buy some time to get out of here. "You know I was the best at my school at the staring competition. Nobody has eve....." The boy kept boasting on and on. Well I will let him have his fun for now.
"I need your help, Aspen. Since it is clear you don't want to carry me how about you heal my muscles. That way, I can walk back instead." I told him without giving a hint of my real intentions.
He looked at me very suspiciously and then he snorted. "Yeah, right. So then you can actually run away. I don't think so."
"I can't run away even if I wanted to. You have that stupid protective shield on don't you?"
"Yeah, but that doesn't mean you won't find away to get out."
"I don't have that kind of level of magic. It's too high and anyway I don't like putting in effort. Too much hard work." He looked at me suspiciously and finally gave in. I felt the same warmth I did a few minutes ago. When the healing was done I tested out my legs. I could finally run. I can go to where I want to be. Finally, time to put the plan to action.
"Thanks Aspen. I really appreciate it." I gave him the best heart warming smile I could. I looked at the boy again and he was still talking. Somehow he ended up talking about how giraffes fight. "So what are we going to do about this kid? It doesn't seem like he wants to leave."
"He will leave, eventually. We just have to disappear without him."
"Okay." Aspen waited for me to go first but somehow or another I convinced him to go first. Time for some action. I grabbed the boy and shoved him towards Aspen. Yep, that was my great escape. Take a harmless kid and push him. I ran the opposite direction and I didn't look back.
I finally reached the edge of the forest. If I remember correctly, the way to destroy the protective shield was either for the person who put it up to break it or break one of its bases. The base usually had a symbol or a letter carved into it. Looking at the floor of the forest (that's where they are found), I sighed. To find a base here would be tough. There were leaves, grass, twigs and rocks everywhere. Where would the base be? I thought about it and the solution was to ram through the protective shield. If I do that I would have to act fast. I did it and it sent a signal to Aspen saying where exactly I was. I was in deep shit if I didn't hurry up. I am just glad Aspen is really slow. I found where it was as the ripple effect took place and the base absorbed the disruption I caused. Now to break the base I would need a lot of energy. And it hit me. THE FAIRIES. I called out on them and one popped up. I grabbed it and threw it to the base. It cracked the lettering but it did not break it. Oh My God. He is almost here. I quickly healed the fairy and apologized to it. They can be pretty vengeful and if you get on their bad side, it isn't pretty. Anyway, I took anything I found and threw at the stupid letter. At some point I had picked up pebbles and leaves and even threw those. Because you know, a leaf can harm somebody very seriously. I was very angry and desperate so I punched it and it finally broke. It wasn't the only thing that broke. Let's just say, that there was this terrible crack noise and pain.
I saw the crack in the barrier. I heard Aspen marching towards me, so I put my fingers in the crack and tore the barrier open. The touch of the barrier left burn mark on my palms, but at this point I didn't even care about the pain. I walked through the space I created and waved goodbye to Aspen. The shield was stitching itself up as I saw Aspen coming closer and closer. I looked one last time at the forest and started walking towards this village I spotted up ahead. One good thing about Aspen being the guardian is that he can never leave the forest.
