He didn’t plan for it to go this badly, straight from the beginning.

He had sworn there would be a small traveler cottage for him to spend the night in, he had marked it on the map and gone along the route that would lead him to it, but he never ended up finding it.

Lightning strikes were flashing above him, the rain resembled a whip hitting his face and the mud had stained his brand new leather boots he had gotten just a few days ago. He held tightly to the reins of his black horse and tried to guide them both down a slippery slope, with much difficulty as the ground crumbled under him almost at every step. Donghae and his horse had just come down from a rock cliff where they had camped at, but with the harsh wind and rain coming down he had understood to retreat back to the woods.

When he reached the edge of the forest, around him appeared tall trees with thick trunks. He got onto the path he had been following before so he would not get lost. Immediately under the bushy leaves the rainstorm felt much less violent. It was only loudly dripping on him and he could safely continue a bit deeper.

After a fair twenty metres he found himself a spot behind a huge rock. The whole forest was old and very difficult to get through. Every stone had strong green moss on it and every branch had a lighter shade of beard moss hanging from it. Those signs meant that it was a healthy forest. It looked creepy to say at least, but Donghae knew there was nothing to be afraid of and that at daytime the forest looked completely different. There would be all sorts of insects flying around, there would be sunlight dancing on the green leaves and white flowers at his feet, and there would be joyful singing of the birds and perhaps even the rumored nightingale he had heard often about as a kid. Yes, he would greet a morning like that tomorrow, for sure. For now it was no more than a cold, wet nightmare.

When it rained everything living had gone hidden and the shadows appeared darker and stronger. The only organisms loving the weather were mushrooms, worms and beetles. He felt a bit scared to be there on his own, but he still had all of his supplies with him and he knew how to deal with the nature. He had also checked the moon’s cycle, and deduced that during this journey he would not have to worry about werewolves either who tended to hang around in the meadows and forests.

So, in conclusion Donghae told himself that had to be safe.

By a big rock he jumped off his horse’s back, tied the rein around a thick branch and took one of his warmest blankets that had been rolled up and attached to his backpack. Donghae had dressed up very heavily, and he had materials that would repel at least some of the water so he would not get too wet and cold during the next hours. He decided to sleep for a bit and hope for the rain to subside.

He gathered up a pile of leaves on the forest floor before he sat down next to one of the mossy rocks. He covered his upper body with the cloth and leaned his head on the surface, sighing and closing his eyes afterwards. He hadn’t yet decided whether he liked travelling alone like this or to work in a team.

Slowly he started drifting off and after a good fifteen minutes he was already asleep. He had had a rough day.

--

“Mom! Mom!” shouted a young teenage boy after he had just ran home from school.

“Mom, did you hear? The results came in!” The door was opened and closed quickly as the boy ran.

“Hmm? What is it, dear?”, asked the sweet lady with soft dark curls and an apron. She was cooking a meal out of fresh vegetables and pork by the fireplace. It smelled heavenly already.

“I got accepted to the academy!”, young Donghae told her as the first thing.

“What? Really!?” her face melted into a proud smile. “I’m so proud of you!” she said and congratulated her son. She could not believe it.

“Yeah! Where’s dad?” The enthusiastic boy asked and threw his backpack on the nearest chair.

“He’s outside stacking firewood. Ah, ask him to come inside for dinner as well!”

The boy immediately started shouting his dad as he ran outside and shared the news.

Donghae’s whole family had been very supportive of the idea to have their son attend the finest school in town. Donghwa, who had already moved away from home, had just started his career as a marine researcher at the bay, so they were all extremely excited about that too. That night they had a lovely dinner together. Donghae’s parents promised to let out the pigeons tonight so they would also get the news to Donghwa, who lived nearby the beach just outside town.

--

Faint noise could be heard in the distance.

A group of small, child like elves with pointy ears and gray strands of hair were making their way through the thick bushes and ferns. The rain had stopped but there were still big droplets everywhere. As the leaves moved some of the droplets got stuck in their clothes and some of them fell to the ground. A sleepy ladybug got scared of the sudden movement and so did a moth that dashed into the air to escape. The elves were about one metre tall each, all dressed up in dark green and brown, and they moved in a weird formation across the forest floor. They had fireflies in their lanterns.

They were all talking in a weird language until they saw something moving. All of them got scared when they suddenly came across a big black animal which neighed as she got scared of them. Donghae woke up to the fuss and sleepily tried to figure out what was going on. When he opened his eyes and rubbed them a few times, he saw the tiny people curiously looking at him and trying to inch closer. The staring between them lasted for a while.

When Donghae didn’t move, one of the elves got courageous enough to step closer and try to poke the horse’s leg.

“Hey,” said the man by the rock to get the elf’s attention. The horse didn’t like the small creature. When Donghae tried to sit up he noticed how freezingly cold he was. One of the little elves was just about to crouch down next to his stuff on the ground, but Donghae’s clumsy movement made the little creature flinch. Donghae yelped and tried to shoo the him away.

“Don’t touch that!”

His fingers were numb and his breath was erratic, but he was shivering since he had stayed cold for so long from all the rain and wind. How long had he slept?

The man looked around and tried to keep his posture while his cold frozen fingers desperately clung onto the hem of his blanket. The elves all retreated a few steps.

The man looked at them curiously. He knew about the forest’s weird dwellers but he had never seen them in person before. Donghae knew they were friendly, but that they could also be a big nuisance. They got curious over everything, as it already seemed. He coughed a few times to clear his throat.

“Hey,” he tried greeting them. He never got a response though. Only curious gazes and a few who who totally ignored him and showed an interest in his stuff.

“Ah..! That’s my stuff,” he stated and immediately tried walking up to the horse. One of the elves already had their hands on his blanket’s hem, so he needed to stop. Donghae had to shake the small hands off. But then he realized the little one had only gone for his water bottle, which was not where it was supposed to be.

“Hey!” Donghae tried shouting. “Give that back!” He did his best, but the elves were quicker. He heard them mimic his shouting.

“Okay. Please, give it back. Okay?”, he tried a kinder approach. When he got stares as an answer he suddenly lurched forwards and tried to catch one of them with his hands. The man found himself playing tag with all of them soon enough.

The chase took a while. As his throat was getting sore from all the nightly cold air, and his knees were starting to get bruised from falling down so many times, he let out a frustrated cry. He had lost and gotten his blanket back but he decided to give up on the bottle.

“Okay, fine, you win. Take the bottle,” he said at last and threw his hands in the air. He steadied his breath for a while before going back to his horse. He shooed a few of the elves away who were trying to grab stuff from the horse’s back, and then he opened the knot. He lead the horse with him further away from the rocky area and then just threw the wet blanket over the horse before he climbed on the saddle. He tried to ignore the small beings running after him. They weren’t making a lot of noise, which was weird, but sometimes they repeated a few words which probably were just their own names.

“Playtime is over! I lost and I’m leaving now,” he declared, then simply telling them bye bye and getting the same kind of words back.

As the brunet was sitting on his horse he remembered that when he was training with Heechul, the older man had told him about many encounters with these small beings. They had their own language, and they loved to repeat everything they heard, just like the birds of paradise in the far south-west corners of their known world. Donghae smiled to himself. He would’ve stayed longer if he just wasn’t so damn cold. He saw the little people following him.

“I’m leaving now, seriously. Bye bye,” he said again and waved his hand. He took a firm grip on the reins and softly touched the sides of the horse’s tummy. Slowly they started moving forwards, and Donghae could finally look ahead.

The elves thought hard about following him. One of them was still intrigued by the bottle he had stolen, and another one tried to make the others follow the big animal. The rest weren’t keen on the idea though, and soon all of them decided to scatter around and leave as well.

When Donghae was a good distance away he thought he was going to the right direction. After a while he wasn’t so sure anymore. It was still cold and the darkness didn’t help him the slightest. The man sighed as he was trying to get a view of the sky above the thick leaves. He figured it was early morning. The sun would come up eventually.

He continued a bit further just to see if he had perhaps originally come deeper into the forest than intended, but the trees seemed neverending. He couldn’t find the edge anymore. Had he gotten lost? Donghae decided that he needed to get to high ground and climb above the trees at some point. He would’ve gone back through the same route his horse had just walked on, but every direction in the dark looked the same to him.

After a good twenty minutes of pointless roaming around he came across a thin path. The sun was starting to rise now so he saw it more clearly. Donghae took his horse on the trail and picked a right turn that in his mind would lead to the direction where he had come from.

Finally the forest was slowly becoming more alive. The different coloured flowers that hid during the nights slowly opened their bright colored buds. Purples and blues were first, and as the early birds started singing a sly gray fox woke up from its sleep and ran away when it smelled the intruder. It didn’t take long before Donghae saw his first deer. For a moment he thought about taking out a bow and sending an arrow through the animal’s neck, but then two fawns appeared with their adorable spotted furs and immediately Donghae decided against it. He wouldn’t be able to eat all of it anyway, and he wasn’t really starving or low on supplies. He just had to get out of the forest. He locked eyes with the mother deer for a moment and peacefully led his horse onwards.

Now he finally understood why they called it the lost woods back at school and why their parents never really let them play there.

--

“Donghae, you know that this is serious business, right?” asked Heechul as they were packing his stuff. A few strands of hair were falling on the man’s face so he gently swiped them to the back of his ear.

“I know. But I don’t want to stay stuck in this town for the rest of my life,” answered the brunet as he was bringing a few extra pairs of socks with him.

The long haired man sighed. “You won’t be needing that,” he said and took the garments away from him. Donghae frowned.

“But what if they get wet?”

“Firstly, you wait for the rain to stop and make a fire, idiot,” Heechul scolded him. He had met this teenager some weeks ago and now they were heading out for their very first trip to the far east. “Secondly, where we’re going there won’t be any rain, for god’s sake.”

Donghae let out a small giggle. Half of it was done on purpose just to annoy his new mentor, but half of it was also him being totally honest. “I’m here to learn so I can’t possibly know all of this!” he said and next started thinking about whether he would need a frying pan.

“Don’t even think about it!” said Heechul immediately. He was following the younger’s gaze. “That weighs a ton, so don’t!”

Donghae laughed again. “How about this?” he asked his eyes twinkling as he found a purple book with golden pages. The title was written in a language he did not yet fully understand, but he knew the letters meant that it was a book of spells. It was just a small guide book that would fit into anyone’s pocket. He had learned a few of the simplest spells by accident already, and his aim was to know all.

“Don’t play stupid. The witches are in the south.”

“Alright, alright,” said Donghae.

He still packed the book though. It became his habit after that.

--

Eventually the man grew tired of the endless wandering. Bit by bit he was also starting feel a bit frightened, because he had heard rumors of the forest that everyone who got lost there would turn into a nameless, faceless being who wore clothes made out of hay and grass, and played a flute or a whistle on a treestump. They said that the lost people talked with the language of the birds and different animals. Sometimes they even ended up living with them. Donghae got shivers as he saw a fallen tree trunk and thought how a figure would dance on top of it, and how eyes beaming yellow would stare at him for so long that he himself would start looking like that.

He decided no, and tried to look around for a tree he could climb up. He soon chose a dark spruce and jumped down from the horse’s back. He tied a tight knot to one of the branches of another fallen tree and also abandoned a few of his heavy load, like his belt, backpack and cape. He took a firm grab of the first branch and started climbing upwards. After a few meters he checked the area for any elves who might’ve tried to steal all his stuff, and then continued when he saw nothing but a pair of gray squirrels running around a nearby tree.

The spruce was a very high one. The whole forest was actually filled with trees that stood at least a good twenty or thirty metres tall. Luckily it was an easy task and soon he found himself high enough to be able to look around again.

At the top he was greeted by the morning. The view of the endless mist and green around him made him figure he had indeed gone to the wrong direction. The man sighed, steadied his breath and thought about what to do next. He looked down, feeling a small fright from it and then looked back at the beautiful sunrise scenery. The mist was actually covering his view of the few small southern mountains. He couldn’t see the fields or the path that lead to the town either. He didn’t see any seagulls flying to the sea’s direction, nor could he even make out the edges of the clouds clearly.

For the sake of it he spent a while up there. He knew to trust his horse to make a sound if anyone should bother her.

--

Suddenly Donghae saw something. A trail of different kind of mist. With a closer look it seemed to be a trail of smoke. At first it was very faint, but eventually even the smell carried out to Donghae’s nostrils. That meant fire, and that meant someone was most likely passing by or living there. Perhaps a campfire, a tent, or even a cottage!

Quickly he started making his way down from the tree, hands still shaking and excitement building up. After a few scary slips of his foot he made it down to his horse. He jumped on her back as soon as he got his stuff back on himself.

Abruptly there was no path for him to follow anymore. The undergrowth of the forest seemed to thicken and the ground turned into very ugly mixture of mud and lichen that would create a small suction to anything that stepped on it.

Donghae let out a g