What is the most hateful sound? Chalk screeching on a blackboard? The sounds you first hear after waking up? It´s close, very close, but there is a clear winner, at least when I was concerned. The sounds water made were always terrifying to hear. This held especially true for larger bodies of water like oceans or rivers. It was a hateful river I used as a landmark for further navigation.

As soon as I heard the sounds, I slowed down to not accidentally run into the water and I was right to do so. The gravel beneath my feet was slippery due to the wetness and I nearly fell down as I turned sharp to the left, running further upstream. The gap in the canopy, created by the river also let me view the landscape for the first time.

Hilly was an understatement. Massive mountains were right in front of me, exactly as predicted. Smiling that I at least found the way, although it wasn’t hard at all, I continued to run upstream, the sword still in my hand. The sounds the water made never left my ear, warning me always that I was just one step away from certain death. Half the night, I ran along the river shore, only drinking a bit of animal blood to replenish my energy.

The mountains came closer and closer with each passing minute until I reached a seemingly unclimbable stone wall right in front of me. Water was falling down freely to my right side, creating a thundering noise as it splashed onto the water. It was a waterfall, nearly a hundred metres tall, with no way in sight of climbing this thing. I needed to get up there within the next few hours, otherwise, my already small time frame would be truly over. For a few minutes, I ran along the wall until it turned into a steep, but climbable slope.

Biting onto my sword, I began to climb the mountain. I never climbed before and only knew the theories such as the need for a few security measures, but I instantly threw these out of the window. The first few metres were rather easy, but then the stone turned quite smooth, forcing me to create places I could grip on myself. More than once, I bashed the sword against the surprisingly brittle stone, a merciful development, but also a quite dangerous one.

It didn’t take long for me to lose grip due to an incredibly brittle stone and nearly fell down. I only hung on one hand for a few seconds as I also lost my footing on the wall due to the surprise. With the drawn sword in my mouth, I regained my footing relatively quickly though and was quite relieved, until I realized it was probably all for nought.

“Watcha doin there?” I looked behind me as I only heard the sounds of a bird before and had to realize that it wasn’t a bird at all. A red-haired woman with white birds wings as arms flapped exactly these a few metres away from me, staring at me full of curiosity. A harpy out of all intelligent species … not like I didn’t expect them to be here.

“Enjoying the view. What about you?” I asked, trying to be as friendly as possible after I struck the sword in the wall.

“I couldn’t sleep, so I was flying around and tried to figure out what these beavers are up to.” She said and made me smile involuntarily.

“Hey, can you bring me to them? I´m kind of stuck here at the moment and need to solve some issues with them.” I proclaimed and waited for her response while a particularly strong gust of wind hit me and I nearly lost grip on the wall again. Just by looking downwards once, I could most definitely say that I would die if I failed right now. I overestimated my abilities in climbing a mountain, but it wasn’t like I had another choice.

“Sure, I guess. Grab onto my legs.” I grabbed my sword again as she flew very close to the wall and enabled me to grab onto her birdy legs. Her bird feed wrapped around my arms as well, making sure I wouldn’t fall down because I lost strength in my arms, not that this would ever happen to me. The harpy flapped her wings and seemingly flew without trouble for the extra weight. Judging by her wingspan and our combined weight, this should be completely impossible, and yet she ascended quite fast.

The view was breathtaking. The nearly endless forest was truly a sight to behold from higher up as it painted the ground in an endless green, only interrupted by an occasional blue. A few birds flew around here and there, all lower than us obviously. As I turned my head around towards the mountains, I already saw the peaks, covered in snow if I looked upwards. But I also saw a huge wooden construction on a scale humans would never achieve. At one point, the waterfall I noticed earlier spewed through an opening in it and created the river I saw earlier. As we ascended further, I saw that the scale of this thing was needed, although it already gave me headaches.

It was a massive mountain range, but the shape made it particularly interesting for a certain species. It was circular and formed a large basin in the middle. This would be the perfect place for wild animals or farmlands, but neither was the case. Instead, there was fish. A massive amount of it.