Session 01 A Half-Elf and a Crusader Wake Up in a Forest

When the boy awoke next, he felt the shining sun upon his face. Its piercing rays stung his skin like a sunburn. He reached over to cover himself with his blanket, but only grasped a handful of grass. “Grass?!” he thought, opening his eyes to a blinding bombardment upon his retina. “AHH!” he moaned, sitting up and rubbing his eyes. He looked and saw he was not alone. Before him stood a tall man clad in armor from head to toe with a thick red cross on his chest, not a speck of skin could be seen. “Who are you?” The boy asked, pointing a finger at the man, who tilted his head in response.

“What are you talking about?” the man asks, lifting his helmet and revealing a face he knew almost as well as his own. The man was tanned, though not dark enough to disguise

“Dad?” the boy asked, his face contorting in confusion. “What are we doing here? Why are you dressed like that?”

“Me? Have you seen yourself?” For the first time, the boy looked down and saw that his clothes had changed. What had been his well-fitted jeans and t-shirt had become a loose-fitting tunic, knee-high boots, and a cloak.

“What? How did? Why?” the boy stammered on his words and spun, pulling down his hood to try and get a better look at his clothing.

“Dear Lord, what did you do to your ears?” his father asks.

“What about my ear-” The words stop as the boy touches his ears. Finding them to stick out against his head and narrow to a fine point, as opposed to the round, feeling ones that had stuck close to his head.

“First year in college and you mutilate your ears like that,” his father asked, grabbing his son’s ears. “I mean, sure, I got a tattoo at your age, but this? This is just ridiculous.”

“Let go!” the boy yells, pushing his father’s hand away and stepping back. As he does, he feels something bang against his side. He looks and sees two swords sheathed and strapped to his left and a small ax strapped to his right.``Wha- how di-? This doesn't make any-! Why did-” The boy stops when he spots his father’s face showing more disappointment than shock. “Dad, are you not freaked out by this?” he asks.

“Son, look at me. Take a deep breath.” He follows his father's instructions and stops stammering.

“Now, watch my breathing, in and out nice and slowly.” He follows his father's instructions and breathes with him. Slowly, he stops hearing his heart pound in his ears. The rapid thumping is replaced with the calm serenity of birds in the air.

“Calmer now?” his father asks after the fifth breath.

“Yeah,” he responded.

“Good, now listen to me, we’re in the forest with no idea where we are, no contact with the outside world, and no idea how to get back. Now tell me, what good is panicking going to do? Hmm?” His words were calm and precise; more than that, they were correct. “Nothing that’s what, panicking will get us nowhere, in fact, it’ll make things worse because you won’t be thinking clearly, understand?” The boy nods in response. “Good, now I need three rocks and a stick.”

“Three rocks? Why do you need three rocks?”

“And a stick, gonna try an old trick I learned in the Army. Ahh, look here’s one,” he says, bending down to pick up a rock. “Two more to go.”

“Dad, I don't understand.”

“Neither do I, but that’s never stopped me before,” he responds a bit too quickly. The boy found his father’s words both calming and confusing, but looked to the ground nonetheless, scouring for stones. Once they’ve collected the requested stones and stick the father smiles.

“Perfect, now watch as I figure out where we are,” his father says. The boy watches as his father jams the stick into the ground and places a rock at the top of the shadow. “Dad, how is a stick and three rocks gonna help us?”

"You'll see,” he says, rising to his feet and walking away.
“Where are you going?”

“Behind a tree.”

“Then why did w-”

“Can you wait to question the process until you’ve seen more than the first step?” his father asks, cutting him off. He follows behind with a sigh and stands behind a tree. “OK, can you please start explaining now?” he asks.

“No, not yet. I know it’s really strange, but if I tell you now, it might not work, so I need you to trust me, can you do that?”

“Yeah, sure, how strange could it be?”

“Good, now what we’re gonna do is sing the Star Spangled Banner.” The boy looks at his father’s face. Desperate to see him crack a smile, indicating he’s joking, but it never comes. “The Star Spangled Banner?”

“Yes.”

“The U.S. national anthem”

“That’s the one.”

“The song they sing at the ball games?”

“One of them.”

“The one that goes ‘Oh say can you see’?”

“By the dawn early light, yes, keep going.” The boy watches as his father continues singing, but he doesn't follow along, no matter how much his father taps and shakes, he never follows along. After singing through and even holding the last note for what seemed like an hour, his father stops and falls silent. “You didn’t sing.”

“No, because it’s ridiculous, we suddenly appear in the woods and you expect me to sing a song for no reason.”

“I’ll have you know there are actually two reasons,” his father says, holding up a closed hand. “1. It's a good measure of time. And 2, it makes me feel better”.

“If it was just to do that, then why’d we come behind this tree?”

“Oh no, that's for a different reason, wait here a moment,” his father says, walking back to the stick. He looks down and places a second stone just next to the first before coming back. “Now we sing another one, I’m thinking the Japanese National Anthem.”

“Why a Christmas carol?”

“Well, that one always calms me down.”

“Why do you need to calm down?”

“I don’t know, couldn’t be that I’m just a tad distracted by finding myself in a strange forest, in strange clothes, with a strange sword, with my son who’s ears have been mutilated so he looks more like an elf ready for the ren-fest, and I’m just a bit better at hiding it than you.” His father’s raised eyebrow could’ve held up the sky as he stared at his son. Then, as quickly as it came, the tension melted away. “Nah, couldn’t be that, that’d be ridiculous, I just wanna do pointless stuff cause nothing matters.” The boy looks at his father, trying to think of a response, but nothing comes to his mind. He relents and sings Kimi Ga Yo with his father, still unsure of how it’s supposed to help them know where they are. Once they finish, they go back, and the father places the third stone on the ground and smiles in satisfaction. Why is the father so satisfied by the three stones in a slightly curved line that the boy could never guess, but he doesn't have to wait long for an answer?

“Alright, son, do you know what this tells me?”

“No idea.”

“This tells me two vital pieces of information. Number 1. This isn’t a dream.”

“Huh?” the boy asks, tilting his head in confusion. “Isn’t that a given?”

“I mean that was always in question,” His father snickers. “I’m suddenly wearing armor in the woods with you. That sounds like a dream to me.”

“OK, but how does this tell you it’s not a dream?” The boy asks.

“Have you ever been in a dream and you know you're dreaming?” His father asks, answering his son’s question with another question.

“Yeah.”

“Have you ever looked at a clock while doing that?”

“...No,” the boy answers, starting to wonder where this line of questions is going.

“Well, the next time you do look at a clock, take note of the time and then look away for a second or two. When you look back at the clock, it’ll tell you a completely different time. It sounds crazy, but I’ve done it before, so I know it works.”

“Okay…” the boy asks, still not understanding. “So, how is that relevant?”

“Look at the rocks, notice how they’re in a mostly straight line?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, if this were a dream, then I’d expect the rocks to be in any given direction without rhyme or reason, meaning that this either isn’t a dream or one that doesn't follow conventional dream logic. So I don’t think I’ll be flying over to my mansion made of rice to watch Star Wars with Kid Rock any time soon.”

“What?” The boy asks, taking a step back and shaking his head, desperately trying to follow his father’s line of gibberish. “Why would that happen?”
“I have strange dreams sometimes, usually when I take melatonin, but that’s besides the point. The second thing it tells me is our cardinal directions.”

“Okay, now how the hell does it do that?” The boy demands.

“Think, son, which direction does the sun move through the sky?”

“East to west, everyone knows that.”

“Right, now here’s something you may not have thought about. What directions do shadows move?” The boy took a moment to think about it. He’d never stopped to think about it.

“Don’t feel bad, I never thought about it either till I was learning land nav for the Army. Since the sun moves from east to west, shadows move from west to east. That’s why we use the rocks,” he says, pointing to the first rock. “The first rock will be at the westernmost point, and the third at the easternmost point. It isn’t perfect due to the curvature and tilt of the Earth, but it’ll give us a rough idea. Now that we know where east and west are,” he says, pulling up the stick and drawing a line between the first and third stones. “We also know north and south. Isn’t that something?”

“Ohh, ok I understand,” the boy says, as if he's finally putting the last piece in a puzzle. “So, which way do we go?”

“That’s getting to the third thing it tells me.”

“I thought you said it only told you two things?” The boy asks, raising an eyebrow.

“It did, but I just thought of this while we’ve been talking,” the father says, standing to his feet. “The compass actually isn’t as useful to us as I first thought.”

“What do you mean? Now we’ll know which direction to head to?”

“No, we’ll know which direction we’re heading,” his father corrects.

“Isn’t that the same thing?”

“Tell me, son, what direction should we go in to get home? Or at least to reach a bus stop?”

“Well, we’d need to head…” The boy began, stopping when he realized what his father meant. With the compass, “We’ll know the directions, but what good is it if you don't know where you are or which direction you need to head?” He thought.

“Yeah, that same lightbulb went off for me, too.”

“So then what do we do?” The boy asks. His father paces for a moment before standing next to the stick and facing north.

“Give me a number between one and eight,” he says.

“Six,” the boy says without thinking. The father then stretches out his hand and points east.
“We’re going that way.”

“What?”

“We’re gonna head east.”

“Why east?”

“Because six was east.”

“You’re basing the direction we’re heading on what number I said?”

“Yes, exactly.”

“That doesn't seem like a good idea.”

“If you have a better one, then I’m all ears,” his father says, crossing his arms. The boy thinks for a moment but sighs when he comes up with nothing.

“Fine,” the boy says, defeated.

“Good, now before we head out, let’s take an inventory of our items. Take a look in your pouches and backpack, see what’s in there. Maybe you have your phone in there somewhere.”

“My phone,” he thought. “How did I not think about it?” he reaches into his pockets, but his pants don't have pockets. He begins feeling around his waist and finds, along with the swords, that he also has two pouches. He shakes them, and one sloshes like it’s full of liquid, and the other jingles like coins. More interested in the coins, he reaches in and pulls one out. The silver shines even in the canopy shade. “Is this anything?” he asks, handing the coin to his father. The father holds it up to the sun and looks at it.

“I’ve seen a lot of coins in my life, but nothing like this,” he says, handing it back to his son. “Find anything else?” he asks.

“Just this pouch,” he says, grasping the sloshing pouch.

“That looks like a waterskin of some kind. Open it and smell it before you drink any. The last thing we need is dysentery.” The son does as instructed, and indeed, the liquid is odorless, much less so than the leather pouch. He cups his hand and pours some of the clear water into it.” Yeah, this is water,” he thinks before drinking from his hand and tasting the leather.
“Check your bag,” his father says, “might be something useful in there,” he says as he reaches into his. The boy’s surprised he hadn't noticed the backpack before, but given how much he’d been panicking, he reasoned it wasn’t that strange. He is astonished to see two small axes tied to the sides. “Why do I have so many weapons?” He wonders as he moves them aside and clicks open the bag. The bag is like one he’d seen in camping ads, but more… primitive. He takes off the bedroll on top and begins digging through it. “Alright, let’s see what we have”. He reaches in and pulls out a stick with cloth at the top. “What the hell is this?” He thinks before placing it aside. Next, he pulls out a box with wood, a piece of metal, and a shiny rock. “The hell is this?” He reaches in again and finds a small sack. He opens it and pulls out a small piece of dried meat. “Jerky?” He thinks before tasting it. He instantly pulls his face back and spits. “Salty” is all he can think.

“Find anything?” his father asks.

“Just some stick and jerky,” he responds.

“What’s that on your back?” he asks. The son reaches and feels a smooth leather cylinder attached to his belt. It’d been on his back so he hadn’t felt it before.

“Hold still,” his father says, grasping the case and opening it.”If I had to bet, I’d say this is a map case.”

“That’d be useful, could tell us how to get out of here.”

“We could only be so lucky,” his father says, unrolling the paper. “And we are! Come and look at this,” he turns around and looks at the map in his father’s hands. The parchment is aged and the pictures crude, but it’s a map nonetheless.

“But a map of where?” The boy wonders. The map itself was torn on the edges, and the illustrations were faded. All they could correctly identify was a landmass taking up the right side of the sheet, along with a few islands to the left. An arrow pointed where they could only assume to be north, but aside from that, it was an enigma.

“Any idea?” he asks his father, who strokes his beard and points to the northernmost island off the coast.

“What does this look like to you?”

“An island?” the boy says, unsure.

“Not the island, the text,” his father corrects.

“What text? I don’t see any.”
“You’re looking at it upside down,” he says, turning the map to face his son. Now correctly oriented, he could make out the text.

“Now what do you see?” he asks, pointing to text just below the northernmost island. The boy looks and is astonished.

“Hokkaidō ?” he says, surprised.

“Good, you see it too, thought I was going crazier than I already am.”

“But that doesn't make any sense. If that’s Hokkaidō, then why do Honshu and the rest look like that? And why does it have land to the west?” He fires off questions as quickly as they pop into his mind, but his father doesn't have any answers.

“The way I see it, there are a few possibilities. A. This map isn’t correct, and we should disregard it. B. This is a different Hokkaidō, don’t ask me what other island is named Hokkaidō. I've never heard of it. Or C., this is a new land that just so happens to share the same name and apparently uses the Japanese script. Don’t ask me how that’s possible. I have no idea. The only thing I can say is that this map looks… Familiar.”

“Familiar?” The boy asks, looking from the map to his father.

“I can’t explain it,” his father says, shaking his head. “But I feel like I’ve seen it somewhere, not all that surprising, I’ve seen a lot of maps in my time.”

“So what do we do?” the boy asks. His father takes a moment and thinks before wrapping up the map.

“As of right now, this map doesn’t change anything. We’ll still head east for now. If we’re somewhere on this map, then we’re either on one of the islands or the mainland, so heading east should bring us to the coast, or something else, make sense?” he asks his boy.

“Yeah, that makes sense,” he replies.

“Good, now hand me one of those axes and pack up while I explain how we’re gonna keep in a mostly straight line,” he says, placing the map back in the cylinder. The boy hands his father one of the axes he’d had in his backpack, and the two return to their bags and repack their belongings as the father explains.

“OK, here’s what we’re gonna do. I'll look out and direct you to a tree. Once you’re there, I’ll mark a tree where we started, and come to you, then we’ll just keep doing that.”

“Why mark the trees?” He asks

“Two reasons. One, it’ll help us keep our heading straight. Two, if we somehow do get turned around, we’ll know it when we see the marks. And three, which I just thought of while talking, is that if someone else comes here, they’ll see our marks and maybe come looking for us.”

“What people?”

“Well, let’s say that map is referring to the Hokkaidō we know, and we’re somewhere approximating Japan. There are a few national parks, but none of them are that big, at least not compared to American parks, especially the ones out west. Why I remember a story I heard about a group that-”

“Dad!” the boy says, cutting off his father. “Can you save the long-winded story for later?”

“Yeah, sure, fine,” his father says, disappointed. “ Point is, it stands to reason that if we’re in a park of some kind, there’ll be park rangers somewhere wondering who’s marking the trees. They’ll follow and find us.

“Won’t they be upset at us marking the trees?” he asks.

“Maybe, but if I have to choose between not being found and being found and gripped at, I’ll take the grip,” he says, using the ax to chop a mark onto a tree. “Are you ready to go?”

“Yeah,” the boy says, swinging his bag onto his back.