After opening the door, Asterion found a little girl standing 4 ft 5 in tall, around 12 years old, with a ponytail and rosy cheeks, looking quite cute.
Her face had a look of astonishment, which she quickly hid after seeing his ragged state. She introduced herself quickly. "Hello, my name is L-Layla, and Grandpa told me to give you this stew." The girl stammered.
She seemed nervous in front of him for some reason as she placed the steaming hot bowl of stew on the wooden table.
Asterion nodded his head at her as he watched her nervousness. He realized that she was the granddaughter of the chief of the village.
After keeping down the bowl of stew, she glanced at me, and with a slightly hesitant look on her face, said, "Grandpa told me to tell you to rest early, as you will have to work from tomorrow and earn your meals by doing work."
"I will, and sorry for the trouble to deliver the food." He said with a little apologetic look in his eyes.
"It's no problem." She said and quickly ran outside the house without even glancing back.
After eating his portion of food, he slept on the wooden bed as his mind quickly drifted to sleep.
A week had passed in the blink of an eye.
He had started working daily by chopping down thin trees or helping in some tasks given by the chief to earn food and housing for himself.
None of the villagers seemed to get close with him but still conversed in light talk, maybe because of the fact that he was an outsider.
While passing through the village market, he nodded at the woodworkers with a light smile on his face, as they were one of the few who conversed with him.
It was through them that he learned that there were also other types of species in this world, but they didn't know any of them, as they were simple villagers.
He also learned from the talks of the chief that merchants come to the village once every two months to trade lots of goods for wood. Hence the reason why the villagers were staying in the forest.
It was a means of survival for them. This forest was their lifeline. In the cities, they won't be able to find work like this and will have to resort to cleaning houses of nobles or doing construction work.
The only way one could go to those cities from his forest was a black bridge in the north direction. The name sounded a little sketchy to Asterion, so he inquired about it.
He quickly found out that the reason it was called Black Bridge was because of the dark miasma that was present just around 5 meters below the bridge.
The words 'dark miasma' sent chills down his spine. It sounded so ominous; he knew he had to remain cautious and try to avoid going there if he wanted to keep his life.
But it also made him a little curious, as now he was sure that he was in a world that is not one of the 13 known worlds people get sent to for Void Link.
After finishing his work today, he went to the nearby river where people come to collect water and sat down near a rock.
After a week, he still hadn't found any hint or detail regarding who he was supposed to save them from.
Or did he simply have to survive with them by living for a certain amount of time with them?
But that would be too easy of a task.
Asterion knew that there was no such thing as a free lunch in this world and everything requires a price.
His thoughts were in disarray as he thought about his mother and how she might be without him right now.
He clenched his fists as he thought, "No matter how dangerous it is, I will return back as quickly as I can." So he made up his mind to move deeper into the forest tomorrow to find any hint of the danger that the village was in right now.
He made his way back with some of the villagers to the village from the river in the evening. Rays of light shone upon the village, giving a peaceful feeling.
As the last rays of sunlight faded through the horizon, everyone went to rest, but no one knew the catastrophe coming for them tomorrow.
Tomorrow in the morning, Asterion woke up like any other day as he made his way to the bathroom and took a dump; clearly, the lack of fresh water, which made him use leaves just like the villagers for cleaning himself, was too problematic.
They also weren't allowed to do it near the river, as it would leave their scent and could maybe attract a lot of beasts at a single time.
After finishing his business, he was now fully awake. He ate his morning meal, which was a pair of bread and sweet mushroom stew.
Completing his breakfast, he went out of his house and started moving towards the entrance of the village to start another day of wood chopping.
He also found many of his companions who work with him, and one of them was Kael. He was around 5 ft 8 inches tall with almost no body fat, he was also not too muscular, but his muscles were quite defined.
They started talking with each other about today's work and how many trees they had to cut and plant as a man suddenly came running from the outside to the inside of the village.
He looked quite disheveled, and seeing his face, many recognized him, as he was one of the hunters of the village who hunts in the early morning and afternoon.
Many people rushed toward him after seeing his panic-stricken face, but before they could ask him what had happened, he started shouting, "Run, run for your lives. There is a horde of beasts running from the south straight towards us. Run if you want to save your life."
After saying this, he once again started running, but this time, it was towards his house to start packing up things. Many villagers didn't believe his words but were also somewhat afraid of the possibility.
They started murmuring among themselves about what to do as they quickly saw the chief also coming towards them with a frown on his face, and beside him was his granddaughter Layla, who had a pale face.
Clearly, they had also heard about the reason for the commotion, and just as he was about to ask for the reason, once again someone came running back into the village, but this time there were 3 people, and they were also the hunters of the village.
After confirming with them that the news was indeed true, the chief fell into quiet contemplation as to what to do, but he knew that the whole village had no chance to survive if they stayed here, so he quickly made his decision and announced, "Pack your things and quickly start heading towards the north; after crossing the black bridge, we can simply break it and save our lives."
Many people nodded at his words, but everyone also knew that taking all the villagers, which included the old and the women, would take a lot of time, which they didn't have.
But they also couldn't do anything except grit their teeth and move as fast as they could. Kale also ran towards his home and came back with his father and mother as all of them started heading towards the north.
It was now that Asterion realized what he and the villagers were supposed to survive against. But why did the beast horde suddenly come towards them for no reason?
But it wasn't the time to waste on this useless thoughts because the way the situation currently as, he was sure many of the villagers would die as the bridge was far away and the beasts were already a lot near as the hunters had said.
He needed to do something, so he quickly started running towards the bridge with the others as his mind started thinking of the best actions to take in this scenario.
He quickly thought of something and changed his direction towards the river. Many villagers who were running with him saw him, but they themselves didn't have time to chat with a man who was trying to commit suicide.
Clearly, they thought that he was going to commit suicide, as instead of going towards the bridge, he had suddenly changed his course towards the east, where the river was.
As soon as Asterion reached the river, he took off all of his clothes and belongings that he was running with on his back and separated the items and the clothes.
He quickly took off his upper robe, dipped it into the river, and tied it around his mouth. Then he started a small fire with the stones near the banks of the river and started burning all his clothes.
As the clothes caught fire, he threw each of them on different trees while running from the east towards the west, which caused a forest fire in a line separating the villagers and the horde of beasts, and a lot of smoke also gathered due to it, but Asterion, who was covering his nose with the wet cloth, was able to breathe due to the wet cloth.
The fire started spreading through the trees in a matter of minutes, but would it be enough to stop the horde of beasts who were currently moving towards it?