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3- Soft movements

"With this money, I will be able to have better bait and some food for the week," Sherek thinks.

After that, Sherek starts to notice that he is thirsty and hungry. He hopes to soon earn enough money to eat and have more peace of mind in the coming days. Out of nowhere, a man dressed entirely in black emerges from the forest, fleeing from something. He passes close to the path where Sherek is, causing his horse to get scared and lose control, running towards the woods and flipping the cart over the cliff. Sherek jumps off the horse and manages to escape the accident unharmed. He starts chasing after the horse but loses sight of it in the thick forest. Now, with his lost horse and destroyed cart, far away from the roads, Sherek becomes somewhat worried. Luckily, he was carrying his revolver, bullets, and axe with him in case a dangerous animal appeared. Now he has no choice but to start searching for another trail. After a few minutes, he sees an open space, somewhat clean, on a hilltop and heads towards it to get a broader view of the area, but the dense trees make it impossible. He walks quite a bit, and after a few hours, he decides to chop some wood to make a fire in case it gets dark. He looks up at the sky and realizes that noon has already passed; it is around three in the afternoon. Hunger and thirst attack Sherek, and in the distance, he sees a cluster of purple and yellow flowers, sixty meters away, another cluster of white and light blue flowers, and finally, forty meters away, a cluster of red and orange flowers, all in good condition. "Someone has been planting flowers all over the forest, how strange. I will gather a red one," he says. After another two hours of walking, he sees a house with smaller trees around it, giving him a good view of his surroundings. Just thirty meters away from the house, he hears a raspy and angry shout accompanied by a shotgun blast, and he understands, "Get off my property, boy!" An elderly man of about sixty-five years old, with gray hair and a mustache, Sherek raises his hands in a gesture of peace and explains to the old man, "I need help, my friend. I am lost and very hungry. I lost my horse and all my belongings in an accident. I just need some help and maybe directions to get to Teresville." "I don't know if I can trust you, kid, but come closer, let's see what we can do for you," the old man comments. Once inside the house, he is greeted by a very kind old woman to whom he tells his situation while accepting a warm cup of coffee. She offers him two nights of lodging if he helps her husband catch the thief who stole from their garden. "If you want to get to Teresville and get some money or provisions, you must be careful because that town has changed a lot since the curse," the old woman says. "What curse?" Sherek asks, intrigued.

—Did you not know? Four years ago, some hikers from Ambelón and Osland came and brought with them some magical flowers, and they planted them in the forests. —the old woman comments—

—Oh! I think I've seen them. —Sherek responds—

—At first, nobody noticed the power of the flowers, but they realized that an old woman from the town of Stela picked one from each of the ones they planted, and it is said that she used them for witchcraft and invocations. There is also a story of a lumberjack who picked some flowers to help his unconscious son, and it is said that they helped him for a few years, but then he destroyed them all. They turned wild and killed the entire poor family. Also, a sweet twelve-year-old girl was playing in the forest with her friends and took some flowers, but on the way home, a stampede of animals ended up taking the lives of all of them. These flowers are both loved and hated by many of the people here. We avoid them as they can cause problems.

Surprised, Sherek asks, "Do you know which ones are good?"

"Only people from the East appreciate them greatly. They may know them better," the old woman says.

"Don't get near them, kid. They will corrupt you like all the crazies in the cities who kill each other for those things," the old man adds.

"I can get you very good wood with this axe in exchange for some food for a few weeks," Sherek tells them.

"I wouldn't let someone who appears out of nowhere screaming in the middle of the forest stay in my house for so long, but you can earn some of my trust. First, you must help me find, catch, or kill the thief who often lurks in our orchard at dawn and damages our crops. It's been a real nightmare, and we've been dealing with this problem for months. We could use a hand with this culprit," the old man comments.

"It will be a pleasure to help, but do you have any clues about this miscreant, or if there is more than one?" Sherek asks.

The old man gives him a shotgun, a flashlight, and says, "Just wait for the damn guy to be near my tomatoes and take care of him once and for all."

At dusk, Sherek approaches the orchard and checks for hiding places where the alleged thief won't detect him. He finds some sacks and arranges them in rows outside the orchard, so they can hide him. It begins to get dark, but the whole night is calm. In the middle of the night, after a while of keeping watch, he realizes that there is a barely visible white flower among some tomatoes.

"Could one of the old folks have lied to me?" Sherek wonders.

Several hours pass, and he feels that he can no longer bear the sleep, so he goes to bed with that doubt in his head. He goes to sleep in the room assigned to him by the old folks, but as he closes the door, he hears something behind the house, like several people running. He quickly goes out with the prepared weapon and sees something that scares him – a puddle of blood along with several destroyed flowers. He doesn't recognize the color of these flowers as they could be white stained with blood or red. Sherek quickly looks for a bucket to throw water on them and disperse the blood. He throws the flowers into the forest, but as he approaches the densest trees farther away from the house, he sees a man in the distance. He wore a hood and a black coat; this man turns to Sherek, greets him, and slowly walks away, disappearing among the trees. This situation makes Sherek a little fearful, but he quickly heads to the house of the old folks, and in a feeble attempt to wake them up, he decides it's best to go to sleep. With some fear, he manages to fall asleep.

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