Finally, the forest had ended, and she could see the outline of a city beyond the trees.

After years of isolation in the solitary path, after years of hiding, she was finally back. There was a big tree at the edge of the cliff. It could serve as a good vantage point, if she could climb it, she would have a good view of the outer part of the city.

Luckily, climbing such a tree was like child’s play to her.

She put down her travelling bag, and gave the tree a look. First thing when climbing a tree this big was to confirm whether it was safe to climb or not. The roots weren’t rotting, that was a good sign, no mushrooms or fungus growing at the base either.

She gave the trunk a good look, there were some splits and cracks but nothing too big. And finally, she checked it from a distance to see whether it was leaning to one side or not. It was common sense to check if a tree was about to fall.

Everything checked, the tree was safe to climb.

It seemed to be a maple tree, fairly easy to deal with, she had a lot of experience climbing those since childhood. She looked for a low hanging branch and grabbed it, next was a sturdy looking branch, and then another. In a few moments, she was at the peak of the tree.

She could see the city in all its former glory, covered in a blanket of smoky clouds. Just after the small cliff she was currently at, was a motor road. It was leading to the city, she would have to walk a lot to reach the entrance of the city.

She descended the same way she came up, and jumped down when it was safe.

She took out the journal out of her bag and jotted down a few things.

“I climbed a maple tree today, it has been a while. To my surprise, it required some effort, maybe I need to work on my climbing skills. That aside, Alzeria is not as I expected, it was said in the guide that it was a city teeming with wonders. I hoped that some of that was still left, unfortunately, the city is eroding. A closer look is required for confirmation, travelling will take a few hours”.

She closed the journal and placed it back.

The guide she had mentioned was just an old guidebook that was laying around in their house, when she lived with mother. It mentioned information about all cities, how to travel, which spots to check and the shortest way to get there. It was basically a tourist’s guide, but she considered it something far more credible than that. Most of the information she had about the outside world and the cities came from that book, she adored that book.

It was time to move on, she picked up her bag and inspected the edge off the cliff.

It was steep but could be traversed. The slope was made of moist dirt and gravel. The only way to descend from this kind of surface was to slide down, if you tried to walk down, you’d fall and end up rolling down either ways. She thought that there was no one stupid enough to hurriedly walk down a wet slope. But perhaps, there was someone like that in the world, there is never a shortage of idiots after all, she concluded in her mind and nodded.

She prepared herself and slid down the steep cliff with no problems at all.

She had landed in overgrown vegetation at the side of the road, she got up and dusted off any dirt she had on her bottom. She checked her bag to see if had been torn during the fall.

It seemed to be safe from any major damage. Relived, she made her way towards the main motor road. She gawked at the asphalt road for a few moments and then bent down and touched it.

The roads were as same as she remembered. Leveled and smooth, unlike the paths of forests.

She started to walk happily on the road. It was quite an experience for her. There were abandoned motor cars along the road she walked. She took out her journal as she strolled and started to write.

“The roads are easy to walk on, they haven’t changed. I didn’t hate the solitary path, but this is definitely better. It seems as if I have been missing out a great comfort. I have decided, I will never use the forest path again, until it is an absolute necessity. On a side note, there are a lot of abandoned motor cars here, I wasn’t expecting to see this much. However, I should have expected this from the jewel of the south. Even though it lays in shambles, it manages to display some of its former glory”.

She stopped writing when she saw a small building of some sort in the distance. It was strange for a building to be at the entrance of a city, seemed to be a private business. The rain that had been absent for all day had started to pick up, it was a matter of minutes before it started to drizzle.

Thinking about shelter, she went near the building to take a better look. It really was an odd building, it stood alone on the side of motor road. She inspected the door of the building, the doorframe had a broken glass panel, which was nothing out of the ordinary. However, something irked her about this door, it seemed almost unnatural or wrong. She chalked it up to her paranoia and walked in.

As soon as she walked in, she froze in her steps. The practice of countless days kicked in due to her instincts. Her hands reached her back, took the bow off her shoulders and readied her arrow, all in a few moments.

On the thick layer of dust on the floor of the building, there were recent footprints.