After the amazing meal, Riuluk felt melancholy again. What a pity not to have had a chance to divide such a meal with his old friend. He started to reminisce about those days when they only celebrated after completing their quests. That big table full of meat, apples and fat sauces in the castle city of Dramantherkt. Ahaaa..those were the times!

  It was almost night, the dawn was at its end. Riuluk found a place to sleep, next to the shore, close to the forest. There were 2 trees at a considerable distance apart to tie the balloon between them to make a hammock. He tied it higher than normal, considering the possibility of wolves or creatures trying to eat him while asleep. It was kind of useless, actually, because there were creatures and animals taller than that, but even if he knew that, it was the only illusion that was keeping him from being afraid and losing a night of sleep.

  The night was long, and sounds were coming from the forest. Calls from animals, leaves rustling. The wind was not helping determine whether it was a creature or just moving through the trees. Riuluk closed his eyes, thinking about the beautiful meal he had. Suddenly, he fell asleep like a pig in his protected stable.

  The next morning, it wasn't the sun waking up our dwarf, but the fish jumping on the waterfall ramps of the river.

  “Squash!”

  “Squash..squash!.”

  “Oooooh..good Lord!” said Riuluk with a sleeping voice.

  “Such a nice way to wake me up! Aha!” he smiled,

  “Well, considering I'm still alive and I have no bites on myself, I have to admit it was a good idea to tie the hammock so high... ohoh, I'm such a genius!”

  Actually, it wasn't because of that, and if our old friend had heard him, he would have immediately made fun of him, probably saying: “Aha.. no, it wasn't because of high, there are bigger chances that it was your smell! Ohohoh..”

  But unfortunately, he was not there, and Riuluk was able to tell everything he wanted to believe for himself.

  He was hungry again. He looked at the river; those tasty salmon were jumping from ramp to ramp...

  He untied the hammock and took the balloon next to the river.

  “Aha! Are you ready, my dear, nicely fat fishes to enter this stomach?” said Riuluk with an even bigger smile.

  He looked around and noticed, next to a tree in the forest, a big red mushroom with blue shades. He turned his look to the salmon as if he never seen the mushroom.

  “Ha..I should be tired, I think I saw an Idrilich mushroom..ahah!” he said to himself.

  He was about to try to catch some fish when he had a moment of frost. His whole body blocked, his eyes turned big, and his mouth remained half open. Not a hair of his beard was moving. He turned his view to the tree, half wet in the river, with his hands grabbing the balloon as a net. There was a moment of silence. He stood there, without a move, with the water moving like every day, the salmon jumping as if nothing had happened. Riuluk began moving slowly toward the shore. He left the balloon at his feet, then...ran to the tree.

  He couldn't believe it. He put himself on his knees in front of him, less than 1 foot from an Idrilich mushroom. All red with blue shades like lightning.

  “Oh my good Lord..” said Riuluk, whispering, hands open on his knees.

  “A mushroom like this costs not less than a thousand gold coins at Duerth Merkath market..I'm rich, I'm rich!!!! I knew you had a plan sending me here, Kloud, I knew it!!”

  “Aaaahahahahahah..ahahahahahah!” laughed Riuluk with the happiest feeling he ever felt.

  He put his hands at the base of the mushroom and gently pulled it off with a quick move. He couldn't help but contemplate such beauty in his hands. He never had a chance in his life to see so close such beauty. The blue shades were shining towards the sun like a moon.

  It would have been such a funny moment seen from the outside. A fat dwarf, with a dark red beard, sitting on the ground with his legs open, his belly sticking out in all his greatness, in his hands a mushroom and the look in his face as if he was staring at the most beloved woman that even existed.

  He suddenly closed his mouth and looked around himself to see if anybody was there to steal from him such beauty. He stood up slowly with a serious face. He then looked behind the tree, in the forest...he couldn't believe his eyes...a whole dark forest full of magical mushrooms of all types.

  He stood for a moment, frozen, inside him an emotion of fire trying to break free from that frozen body. Riuluk started walking slowly through the forest, looking around, afraid of the sheer amount of beauty and richness. He then took another mushroom, a yellow type with green tears on it, an Atiarch, he took after a blue one with red geometries on it, an Otiseuoth...and then an Utar, an Eisper, an Uriur, an Aetar and an Iespar...he didn't know what to do, he couldn't stop taking them, in front of him he had the rarest mushrooms ever known. He could have bought the entire cities of dwarves with them...and maybe also of men.

  He ran back to where he left the balloon. He put the mushrooms inside it and carried the balloon with him in the forest. He continued walking through the forest, collecting mushrooms. But he didn't catch all of them, only the ones he felt talking to him. The most beautiful, the rarest he knew...

  He was astonished. He continued through the dark forest. He was in such a trance that he didn't notice he was walking through paths that were going all around the forest, made of stones like city streets, but strangely enough, different.

  It was like a garden, with paths leading to mushroom zones to cultivate them. But who was cultivating them? And why? No one in the world had the ability to cultivate a magical mushroom. Who was there? Who? Or maybe there was a spirit, the spirit of the forest, walking through this garden and making mushrooms. But why would a spirit care to make mushrooms? What for? Maybe a hobby?

  Riuluk swallowed from fear. He realised it wasn't luck; he started walking scared, looking around. His mind was blocked, but his body was feeling our same questions...he was afraid, maybe it was a ghost...a ghost of a dead king of elves living there waiting for the chance to enter the body of an interested dwarf attracted by magical mushrooms.

  What to say? What to do? He even forgot which way he had gone into the forest. He continued, afraid and amused by such a beauty, through the forest, till suddenly he didn't even notice he arrived at the centre of it...where all paths led together in a central half circular square. On the other side, a hill with big green trees, like in the rest of the forest, covering most of the light from the sky. Some windows and a huge door in the hill. Riuluk didn't notice it, he arrived inside the square walking backwards from the path..still astonished looking at the trees around him. The air was the freshest air he felt, purer than the air up in the highest sky. There was no sun coming inside it, only a thin light covered by shadows all around. The most perfect environment for growing mushrooms.

  Riuluk froze. He wanted to scream, but he was so afraid that the only thing that came out of his voice was a stretched breath, like a kid trying to talk after being caught doing something wrong. Something was touching his left shoulder. Something heavy. Something huge. He couldn't move at all; he looked at what was emerging from his shoulder only by moving his eyes very slowly. A big piece of wood.

  He then finally found the courage to move. He turned with the big stick of wood on his shoulder. His mouth opened, his fear at the highest possible felt by a dwarf. He let the balloon go from his hands to the ground, and it opened full of mushrooms. He didn't know what to say. In front of him, a huge creature, similar to a troll, was full of stones and earth. He looked grey and blue under that light, a very dangerous and angry face, big ears, big arms, big legs...big belly, and an enormous piece of wood as a rod on his right hand, made of roots.

  “Anything else to steal??!!” said the creature firmly.