In the Heart of the Forest: A Quest for Treasure
SMOL has mimicked a forest and setting before me; green, endless and so filled with the stories of robust and old. Vines and branches from trees extend above, leaving only small openings that allow indirect natural light into the forest, throughout the undergrowth area where the series is set. This citation describes a poor trail condition; rocks, which are mossy and ferns; temperature of the air is damp and it smells of soil, pine trees. This is my world now —my world of mystery and chance rich and ornate with hope — I might find what I want in the next step I take.
The journey I attempted was a result of a map that I found in the attic of my grandmother’s house, a map which was quite old then, and now has gained a yello to its color and twine to its texture. This song described an unused part of this specific forest, enclosing abstract signs and erasing crossed out words. The dream of making a fortune also zeal in me up, the exploring spirit that had long vanished from my breasts.
With the map in my hand as well as, with a certain resolve in my heart, I stepped into the forest with respect for the order of the antiquity. All these trees had stories and each chirp and rustling sound from the trees was like searching for a clue. Her trail went round and round, going through thickets and crossing over small streams as seen on the map. In particular, the only noise was coming from time to time, sharp trill of a bird, in the bushes, the noise of small paws of animals.
When I strayed in deeper, the trees began to open their arms and appear as if they were hugging me and whispering their secrets into my marrow. At first I started to look more closely at the terrain – there were piles of stones which I could not help suspecting were piles rather than just heaps of stones washed off by water, branches which have been carefully laid to form an arched entrance. These signs I felt were indications, messages left by those who once were here to give me a clue and a map to the treasure in these woods.
This turned to days when I intensified my efforts knowing that I won’t back down until I had achieved what I had set my heart on. The forest unfolded its mysteries to me; the secrets humming through the blades of the leaves. In this reasoning, I became privy to the complex language it spoke—the way sunlight filters through leaves; the way moss grows on trees—I was getting there.
However, it was not an easy and hitch-free voyage in the part of the candidates. I faced challenges that challenged my stand—crossing the sharp gulf which showed the path I needed to follow, a storm which made me to find a shelter from the trees which were as big as oaks. Every ordeal was a subtle message for me to understand that I was in a dangerous search but it also arianed me to discover myself.
It was during this period up to the present that has always been viewed as the ‘treasure’ remained hard to cat, a mirage that is ever so close yet so distant. Skeptic came across my thoughts occasionally to remind me that this was just fiction and the map was not laying out a trail, but true events and places. But every time I stammered, the forest seemed to give me positive signals—a flash of the sun to brighten up the cloudy sky, the catching sight of a few animals that looked to me as though they were signaling me to go ahead.
And then there were moments when I thought that I would never find it, and then – and that’s when I saw it – a meadow with the sun being golden, and the unapproachable ruins of the past were covered with wildflowers. The air was thick with anticipation and the human adulation that came with it as I neared, my heart racing as if to say so much more, all of it in welcome. This must be it, I was in search of, the goal and the reason I ventured deep into the woods, the treasure.
The wreckage hove into view as an abandoned temple complete with sun-wearied granite walls and depictions of various symbols. Below the altar, in the middle of the temple floor, there was a small stone chamber with a chest, encircled by bands of rusted iron and protected by an old lock. My hands shook nervously as I reached for the sides and placed my hands upon the cold steel of the door, a door which for over four hundred years had anticipated for a resounding knock.
Slowly, I inserted the key that I had from the very beginning of the game, which surprisingly, had the old-style design to match the lock. Creaking slightly, the lid of the chest licked back to reveal treasures I had never believed that I should find them – gold, gems as well as artifacts that perhaps belonged to an age I did not understand. It was as it simply had its own story to date: from where it was created to where it arrived.
As I was sitting there within it all, I began to understand the gravity of the discovery that I had made. The forest had in diverse ways impacted me; challenging me, changing me, and endowing me with things which cannot be measured in terms of money. It had taught me the value of patience and perseverance, the beauty of the world and the objects around me And in return I had learned what it was to fear the isolated and sinister, something that very few people were able to experience.
By the time I was poised to leave the forest with the treasure within me, a sense of gratitude filled me akin to the biblical story not a search for Wilderness had given me so much more than I had thought I could get actually diving into the wilderness and a portion of my soul was touched that I could not wipe out once again the trees embraced me.
And thus, I cast the last look back at the temple remnants, and the forest that I’ve grown so accustomed to, and started the trip which would lead me back to the world of men. The treasure I had discovered would transform my existence, but it is the process – the steps of discovery – the factors making me wonder whether there is anything out there worth searching for, the odds which I was overcoming and the realities which I was learning – that would create me.
Coming out of the forest into the light of the day, realistically clutching gold and jewels in my hands, I had myself and the other world as real treasures harvested from the mysteries of the forest which was a living symbol of the strength of the nature and the riches buried within its bosom for those who have the courage .