Stellar Echo: Heart of the Myst

"Finally, I have a good machete, although it would be better if it were made of steel. But well, you have to adapt to the circumstances," the boy said as he started to stroke the back of the machete. It was undoubtedly the best-shaped and most polished tool, making it look beautiful and shiny, besides being deadly sharp. "I really missed having one of these..."

As he spoke those words, the boy gazed at the machete with nostalgia, almost lost in the past. After all, it was a tool filled with memories and emotions, not to mention it was probably the tool he had used the most in his first life.

The old man who took him in during his first life lived on a farm where he grew various crops depending on the season or his interests, including some types of flowers and even raising animals. The first tool he taught the boy to use was the machete; after all, it is the ultimate weapon in the field. It serves for weeding, cutting branches, making fences, herding animals—it's useful for everything.

"Although it's strange to hold a machete without the scars on my hands from when I was little, hahaha. I remember the old man took me out to weed the field because 'I couldn't spend my whole life sewing with Grandma like a sissy’, and I almost cut off two fingers with the machete, hahaha. It was really funny seeing the old man running around the farm yelling apologies while Grandma chased him with a stick..."

After getting lost in his memories with a nostalgic smile, the boy shook his head and ran to his bamboo hut, where he pulled out a pair of rabbit skins he had saved especially to make sheaths for his machetes. He measured them, cut, scraped the leather, and then carefully sewed them using the bone needle he had prepared some time ago.

With the sheaths finished, the boy used the remaining leather to make a belt, where he placed the machete sheaths. After inspecting it and feeling satisfied, he took off his pants to make belt loops using leftover pieces of leather.

Once everything was completed, he put his pants back on and adjusted them with the belt, placing the machete sheaths on the left side of his waist. The sheaths looked well-made, with neat and perfectly straight stitches, and several decorative marks made with chisels. The sheaths also had two horizontal straps on each one, which, apart from being decorative, were quite useful as they could be used to tie smaller tools to them.

"Wow, my dear old lady really taught me well how to make clothes and work leather. I really look great..."

After leaving the hut, the boy commented cheerfully as he admired his new look. But the more he looked at the design of the two machete sheaths on his belt, the more melancholy filled his heart, bringing a flood of memories. He could only look up at the sky with sadness.

"Really, what has hurt me the most in both my lives was losing you, grandparents. I hope you had the chance to live again like I did and are eternally happy. Don’t worry about me; your teachings and sacrifices were more than enough for me to live a good life, and they even became invaluable in my second life.

Thank you so much for everything and sorry for being able to give you so little. But one thing is for sure, you are the only ones I will love no matter how much time passes or how many lives I live. You were undoubtedly the best parents I could have had and the greatest stroke of luck I ever had.”

Lost in an infinity of memories belonging to his first life—the only truly happy ones in his two lives—the boy continued to stare at the vastness of the sea. But after a while, he slapped his face, washed it with water, and began to gather all his tools scattered around after he ran to make the machete sheaths.

By the time he finished tidying up, night had fallen. So, the boy roasted a good piece of ‘mini chicken’ meat, as he had decided to call the small bird he hunted, and then returned to his hut, where he slept on a mat on the floor until the next day.

...

By sunrise, the boy was already practicing his martial arts movements on the beach, allowing the energy balls, or simply ‘nature’s energy’ as he had decided to call them, to circulate through his body in harmony with his ‘chi’, following the strange ‘flow’ he had learned from ‘nature’s energy’ some time ago.

Practicing these exercises every morning had become a daily routine. It all started because he wanted to verify something. Initially, one of his biggest concerns was catching a disease. After all, he didn’t have any medicine, and although he had some knowledge of how to make them, being the only person around, getting sick would leave him out of commission. Without the ability to store food for long periods, it would be akin to a death sentence.

But after coming out of that strange trance he entered while ‘training’ and reorganizing his survival needs, he thought more carefully about that trance and came to a conclusion. He must have spent several days in the trance, without food, water, and exposed to the elements the whole time, yet strangely, he didn't even catch a cold, let alone anything more serious. This led him to a theory: ‘practicing these movements makes me immune to diseases and somehow meets my basic needs like eating, sleeping, and hydrating.’

Although he was aware of the risk of falling into a trance again, the potential benefits of proving his theory were far greater. After all, he didn't die; instead, he became a sort of superman. If he was right, ‘surviving’ would be infinitely easier, not to mention his chances of leaving the island and returning to civilization would increase exponentially.

Having concluded that he needed to test his theory, and after securing all his belongings so they wouldn’t disappear if he entered a trance, the boy performed the movements again one morning as the first rays of sun emerged, leading to some rather curious conclusions.

First, he didn't enter a trance, even though he tried to replicate all the conditions of that moment, but in the end, it didn’t happen. It seemed to be a one-time occurrence. Secondly, unfortunately, he concluded that the trance was the reason he didn’t need to eat and all the rest, as a couple of hours after starting, he began to feel the lack of breakfast.

But, although his theory was wrong, he still gained some benefits from his experiment. Firstly, although he couldn’t eliminate his need to eat, the training did mitigate it significantly, as he found that while he felt hungry, it was mild and quite manageable, the same being true for his need to hydrate.

Moreover, what really motivated him to continue practicing the exercises was that he noticed a slight increase in his strength and the amount of ‘chi’. Additionally, he felt that not only did the ‘chi’ flow through his body more smoothly, but it was also now at least three times faster than when he first tried, something that surprised him a bit.

But the last benefit of the exercises, which he valued almost as much as the increase in strength, was that they somehow calmed his mind. Although this effect was rather subtle, after practicing for several days, he felt more ‘refreshed’ and focused.

When he finished his practice, the boy ate some preserved dried rabbit meat, drank some water, and headed into the forest with only his machetes and a few thick ropes. His tools were now quite sharp, and it could be dangerous to carry them without proper sheaths. Even though he was supposedly quite durable now, it was better to be safe than sorry without antibiotics.

Once in the forest, the boy found a strategic spot and set up several traps using the trees and ropes he had brought, ensuring they were designed to catch the deer without injuring it. Damaging the hide would defeat the purpose of hunting it in the first place. Once he finished setting up the traps, he ensured they would activate correctly and were in strategic positions to catch the deer before going out in search of his prey.

A few hours later, the boy found a deer, although he could tell it wasn’t the same one he encountered the first time, as it was slightly larger, which didn’t make much difference. After all, they were monstrous compared to his size—half a meter more or less didn’t change much of his situation.

Without taking his eyes off the deer, the boy took one of his machetes in his right hand and carefully circled the deer, staying alert and avoiding making any sound that might alarm it, then positioning himself where he could, with luck, drive it into his traps.

After reviewing the plan in his head one last time, the boy didn’t hesitate any longer and leaped, trying to appear larger while making loud noises with his machete to scare it. But to his surprise, the deer didn’t get scared. Instead, it simply stared at him while several branches around it shot out at high speed in his direction.

“Shit!”

When the boy noticed the branches, the world around him seemed to slow down for a moment, allowing him to analyze his surroundings and situation. Then, he executed light and ethereal movements from his daily practice, enabling him to dodge most of the branches while cutting through the ones he couldn’t avoid with his machete, hardened with ‘chi’.

One strange thing he noticed about his machete was that the ‘chi’ flowed through it very quickly and smoothly, almost without resistance, entirely different from how it moved through his stone tools. He could hardly differentiate where the machete ended and his arm began, almost as if they were one.

(Shit, I should have practiced with the new tools, what a mistake…)

Due to the situation, the boy couldn’t focus too much on that sensation, as the branches not only continued to attack him but also increased in number. This forced him to draw his second machete, cutting the branches with both hands while dodging with his ethereal movements.