Tthor was carefully placed on a large, flat rock that lay under the shelter of leafy trees, whose tall, gnarled, veined trunks formed a kind of protective wall around him.

   The dog seemed to observe, for several seconds, the boy's unconscious face. Then he sniffed his calf, right at the gashes that the branches of the bush had caused, going through first his pants and then his own pale skin. The cuts didn't seem to have any depth. The dog continued sniffing other parts of the young boy's body, until the sound of a branch breaking, a few meters away, put him on alert. He moved his ears, pricking them up to hear more. He turned his eyes to the side and let out a menacing growl.

   Yellowish fangs flashed through the branches of a nearby bush. Several more pairs of fangs appeared from behind.

   The black dog took a few steps back, deliberately seeking to soak its paws in the pool of blood that Tthor had left on the path, looked askance at the child who was still asleep, and ran at full speed down a narrow path that descended into the valley. A complete pack of wild wolves emerged from the thicket and began a chase race against the dog that seemed to run faster; Well, the wolves, compared to him, looked hungry, mangy and seemed to drag remains of chains hanging from their necks and legs, which made them even slower.

   A cold and somewhat violent breeze hit Tthor in the face, just at the moment when a heartbreaking howl came from the same direction where the pack had gone. The young man moved a little but did not open his eyes.

   Suddenly, the breeze turned into dense smoke and turned blood red that enveloped the boy until it completely covered him, just as a pair of straggling wolves appeared along the path. They sniffed the air, the fresh blood of Thor on the way. And without wasting time or noticing the fainted young man, they began the race, following the trails of the dog and the pack.

   A few seconds later, the dense smoke that covered Tthor rose in a spiral and disappeared, as if absorbed, passing through the mirror that protruded from the young man's open backpack, lying a few centimeters from his body. And just as the cool breeze that was now blowing again on Thor's face, shuffling footsteps were heard approaching, somewhat clumsy.

   An injured body fell next to the boy and trembling hands began to shake him.

   "Tthor!!! Wake up! Please, Tthor!"

   But the boy didn't seem to react.

   "Please!!!" the voice cried. "Don't let him be dead!!! May he not be dead!!!"

   Tthor gave a soft groan and half opened his eyes.

   "You're alive!!!" Said his voice and brought a canteen filled with fresh water to his lips.

   Tthor took a few gulps and felt his mouth and throat clear. He opened his eyes a little wider and saw who was helping him.

   "Lee- Won!" He pronounced coughing. " I came to... rescue you..."

   The young dark-haired man smiled through his tears and whispered:

   "Yes, I can see it."

   Lee-Won didn't know whether to worry more about the cuts on Tthor's face, the gash on his calf that was still bleeding a lot, or the fact that the boy was still coughing almost compulsively.

   "Drink a little more water," he suggested.

   Tthor took several long drinks before fully recovering. With quite some effort he sat down on the stone on which he had been lying. And when he set his feet on the frozen ground, he noticed the cut in his pants.

   "What happened to you?"

   " It was... with a bush," Tthor remembered, while he checked his leg- And then...

   "And then what…?"

   "I'm not sure…"

   Lee-Won looked around and pointed to a plant with fleshy leaves and small, blue fruits.

   Tthor nodded without hesitation.

   "Don't worry," Lee-Won assured him, cleaning the wound with the sleeve of his shirt and pressing a little to try to stop the bleeding, which happened almost immediately. "They're not too poisonous."

   "Oh! How good!" said Tthor, a little mocking, but smiling.

   " I meant that, with the slight cut you have, not too much poison passed into your blood system, plus the purple ones," - the boy explained, pointing to a further bush. Are the deadly ones.

   "And you? Are you okay?" Tthor wanted to know, scrutinizing him from head to toe.

   "I'm fine," Lee-Won answered, sitting up, trying to hide a grimace of pain.

   Tthor noticed and asked:

   "What's the matter? What hurts you?"

   " Nothing!"

   "What happened to your shoulder?"

   Lee-Won looked at him surprised.

   "How do you know I have something on my shoulder?"

   Tthor smiled.

   " It's not that I noticed because you have one shoulder lower than the other or because you haven't stopped touching your shoulder at all times or because you have a face that..."

  "Yes, yes, okay."

   Lee-Won collapsed next to Tthor, giving a big sigh.

   "Let's see, give me your hand... We're going to put it back in its place...," Tthor told him as he placed his foot on Lee-Won's shoulder, exerting slight pressure and pulling his body back, holding tightly to the hand. young man's hand

   Lee-Won looked at him seriously but didn't say anything.

   "Mrs. Nogg has had to adjust her shoulder to me on a couple of occasions."

  Lee-Won gaped at him and wanted to know more. But Tthor prepared himself and said:

   "I'll count to three...," and immediately Murk's face and the scene of the Kraken appeared in his mind.

   With a slight smile he began to tell:

   "At one…!

   Lee-Won closed his eyes and frowned, waiting for the pain that would soon come.

   "At two …!"

   And immediately, the dark-haired young man let out a strangled cry.

   "What? "Don't you know how to count to three?!" He said to Tthor, releasing his hand and wiping the perspiration from his face.

   Tthor laughed amused.

  "Now... we hold your arm this way..." he explained, putting his own jacket around Lee-Won's arm and holding it, with a strong knot, around Lee-Won's neck. "How are you?" He asked her, then, in a loud voice. low.

   Lee-Won smiled at him.I

   "It almost doesn't hurt anymore. Thank you, Tthor," he responded, visibly relieved.

   " You are welcome. It is a simple technique if you learn it well."

   "I mean...you came for me."

   Tthor smiled at him, as he slung his backpack on his back.

   " You would have done the same... Now, the conversation is very nice," Lee - Won smiled. "But it seems to me that we should seek refuge. A big storm is coming," said Tthor, scanning the sky.

   "How do you know? I can't see more than half a meter ahead. Because, furthermore, there are no stars to illuminate and the moon is covered".

   "For that very reason. The clouds have covered everything and the south wind has started. It will be a cold night," Tthor predicted, helping Lee-Won to sit up.

   He put on the backpack he was carrying across his back, clung to the canteen and, with his good arm, held onto Tthor's shoulder.

   "Where can we go? Mount Ri is not an option," Tthor said, calculating that it could take them at least half a day of walking to reach the base of the eastern face. "How did I get so far away?"

  " I Don't know. I was surprised to find you here, so far from the Ri…"

   "And what were you doing here?" Tthor asked him as they advanced towards a group of young fir trees.

   "The shortest path is impassable. And the other path is too dangerous, so I thought it was best to approach the Ri, through the ruins..."

   "The ruins?"

   "Yes, the ruins..." he repeated again and pointed around him. "Well, now it's dark and you can't see them. But around here there are stone structures left by the Vanir. It was the place of their settlement, before leaving Meaghdose for good. They preferred wild and isolated life. They couldn't bear to share anything with the Asís."

   Tthor looked around the place and, just there, he realized that they were surrounded by circular buildings, spread over a wide area, almost all of them semi-collapsed, without roofs and without windows.

   But about two hundred meters away, Tthor estimated, stood a fairly well-preserved structure. It was made up of a single circular wall that almost closed in front, flanked by a narrow entrance and a roof of branches interwoven with mud that rose conically above the structure.

   An icy wind, which seemed to rise suddenly, precipitated Tthor's decision. And they began, leaning on each other's arms, the distance that separated them from the shelter. They entered just as a surprisingly heavy, cold rain began to fall in torrents. The wind became increasingly violent and caused a rather peculiar sound when it crossed the top of the trees and hit the stone wall of the hut with unusual force.

   Tthor helped Lee-Won sit on the imprisoned ground, to the side of a small circle of stones that was right in the center of the structure. Half a dozen gnarled, dry logs were neatly arranged within the circle. In a corner were a couple of smaller logs and some rusty containers.

   "If we had something to light these logs with," Tthor said quietly, feeling the cold on his thin arms.

   "Are there logs? Excellent! Because I can't see them...," said Lee- Won rummaging through his backpack with one hand.

   He felt inside for a couple of seconds and pulled out a large box of matches. He passed them, with a smile, to Tthor who suddenly blushed, silently reproaching himself for not having thought of that when he started his adventure. But because of the darkness, Lee-Won didn't notice anything.

   Tthor lit the logs, successfully on the first try. And the light and heat of the fire enveloped them both in a few seconds. Lee-Won took a few sips from his canteen and passed it to Tthor, who rejected it with a slight smile.

   "Where are we exactly?" Tthor wanted to know, sitting next to Lee-Won.

   " I already told you, the ruins of the Vanir camp..."

   "It is fortunate that we have found this structure intact," Tthor said, feeling the sound of water on the roof. "How long has this been abandoned? You shouldn't have to do much..."

   "No..., not much, just about a hundred years," Lee-Won said. " I don't know much about history, really, I only know that when the last Great War was declared, more or less a century ago, the Asís defeated the Vanir and the latter who lived here ended up leaving permanently. It is fortunate that the Asís have won, even if it cost them almost the extinction of their race."

   Tthor had heard that story before. But he always heard the same version, always told even in the same words. It sounded more like a lesson learned by heart than a true story.

   The young people remained silent, each one immersed in his own thoughts. Tthor watched the logs crackle, while he bit his lip absently, with his arms crossed, surrounding his bent legs. Lee-Won looked at Tthor intently, with a slight smile on his young, dark face.

   Suddenly, nearby howls brought them both out of their thoughts.

   "Fenrir wolves..." said Lee-Won.

   Tthor's skin crawled and his breathing hitched.

   "Don't worry! They won't come near us. They don't like fire."

   Tthor nodded nervously.

   "At least, they are not baldanders..."

  The young man looked at Lee-Won apprehensively and questioned him with his eyes.

   " They are statues that come to life, during some nights and under certain astronomical conditions."

   " You know a lot...," Tthor told him smiling.

   " I was born here and know a lot about the history of Meaghdose and its surroundings."

   "And... What is your story? I don't know anything about you."

   Lee-Won paled a little and blinked nervously several times.

   Some nearby helmets that, apparently, were receding, imposed a few moments of tense silence within the circular structure. But the silence did not last long because an intense wind brought, to the ears of the young people, new peculiar sounds: first, a series of hammer blows on what seemed like a metallic surface, spaced but strong; then, a distant male voice, which seemed, at first to recite something, and then to become a song, carried by a sweet voice and with a tone that seemed to envelop the two young people, enchanting them.

   "Remnants of history...," said Lee-Won, minutes later, when everything became silent again. "It is said that the souls of other times wander here and continue doing what they did in life..."

   Tthor leaned out of the narrow door, stood half his body outside and, crouching, looked around for several seconds.

   The darkness was total; The rain was a heavy, cold curtain that had already bogged down the earth. But Tthor was able to see every detail from several meters away. And, despite the rain and the swirling wind, he could see, in the distance, a white horse with his rider walking away until they disappeared behind some trees. Farther away, a bonfire seemed to burn, defying the rain, surrounded by a group of people, dressed in furs, with long hair, drinking from clay bowls, chatting and laughing. Towards the other side, some children ran around, playing with each other, disappearing, turning into wisps of white vapor, when they reached a circular structure in ruins.

   "It will be a long night...," said Tthor as he returned to the fire.

   Lee-Won looked at him pale. He was visibly shaking and breathing with some difficulty. Tthor approached him and hugged him, instinctively, with the same effusiveness with which he had done it that same morning at the shooting range. He rested the boy's head on his chest and watched the flames, while the wolves howled again and the night closed on them with threatening claws.