" Curses, I can't believe that I'm seriously lost, at least it's almost dawn again." Complained a frustrated Zane who was nothing short of being completely exhausted upon entering his third day in the forest. The climate was also starting to get to him, from the hot and humid days to the eerily cold, quiet nights with only the sounds of nature and scarce illumination of the moon to guide him. He was able to mange even if he was dressed lightly in black pants and shirt, with a white scarf tied around his neck, topped with a hooded cloak. They were designed specifically for messengers or travelers who crossed long distances, and was equipped with a belt with cases to carry small equipment. Zane also kept other primary equipment such as a bag strapped onto his back, containing provisions like spare clothes, food, water, and arrows for the bow on his back. Lastly, for protection he was armed with a short sword and the aforementioned bow.
While he gingerly made his way through the forest Zane considered stopping to rest, after all he was all but certain that he managed to lose his pursuers. Ultimately though, he considered it unwise, being all too familiar with pursuers willing to travel through ridiculous lengths and environments for his head. Plus, he also had to be mindful of the forest organisms that would be more than willing to make breakfast out of him. The forest he was in particularly was notorious for having abnormally large animals, and after a few close encounters with grizzly bears and jaguars, the slightest rustle of a bush or crunch of a tree branch was enough to make him flinch.
Aside from being killed by an animals, starvation or dehydration as a cause of death was becoming an increasing possibility with his reserves of food and water running low.
" Come on Zane, keep it together." He groggily moaned to himself, the original pursuit for him begun at the evening of the two days ago, he struggled to shake off the warriors following him, until he saw the entry to the forest, where they finally abandoned their chase. Unfortunately at that point there was no turning back and he had no time to assess where he was, being so focused on escape and went in without a second thought. Even for normal standards this forest was exceedingly extensive, and coupled with the darkness of night when it eventually occurred, he was practically running around like a headless chicken.
Gradually the sun reared out allowing for a much clearer perspective of his immediate surroundings, that didn't make him any less lost though. " I never thought I'd grow to hate the color green so much." Zane huffed, his strides becoming more vapid with every passing moment. The past few days without rest taking it's toll in abundance, and Zane was lucky to even be going through the motions, rather than collapse on the spot.
When he thought he couldn't have any less luster in his movement, his vigor came back in a flash as he heard several crunches of grass coming from the distance. " Crap." Zane lowly said, he wasted no time moving behind the nearest tree to hide, he knew something or maybe even someone was up ahead.
Zane waited out a moment and surely enough the sound of foot on grass became louder and louder, unexpectedly though as the noise grew closer he even started to hear voices.
" Just my luck, maybe I should just ru-" Zane poked his head out from behind the tree considering to make a getaway only to quickly return back to original posture. What he saw that startled him so much, was three women coming in his direction, and he prayed that they didn't see him just now. The real surprise of the matter was the stature of all three of them, never in his 19 years has he seen women as massive as he witnessed a second ago.
To make matters worse, they were all dressed in a form fitting black body suit, with pieces of light armor covering their shoulders, arms, and gauntlets on their legs.
" They must be soldiers or knights of some sort." Zane thought to himself, he still heard them approaching closer than before and it would prove to dangerous to make the slightest move right now. From what he made out, two of the soldiers were standing in the forefront, a good 8 foot 5 inches tall by his estimation, one with short shoulder length brown hair, the other with dirty blonde hair in a pony tail.
The soldier who stood out the most though, was the one he saw behind them, she stood a good head and shoulders above the other ones, 10 feet by his guess and her armor was more distinct looking and accented by a dark blue cape behind her, Zane could tell that she must be of a higher ranking than the other too. From her armor to demeanor on her prideful yet stoic face. The sense of duty she possessed was apparent in the her sharp hazel eyes, and not a hair out of place on her straightened long brown hair, that was tucked behind her cape to keep from interfering in field work. Their sheer enormity was staggering to Zane who only stood a modest 5'7, and on a good day probably wouldn't be much taller than the navel of the tallest women.
" There doesn't seem to be anyone here either." One of the soldiers said, lazily scanning her eyes through the landscape in search of anything out of the ordinary, or that shouldn't be there.
" Yeah, come on already General Slave Driver, no one would know if we stopped patrol here and go back to the capital." Complained her partner, and not even bothering to be on lookout.
" Cease your complaining, and keep going, there could be someone right under our noses trespassing in the forbidden Xaria Forest as we speak. We have several more acres to cover, now continue." Zane knew immediately that he heard the alpha speak, the force and bellow in her voice was powerful enough to make him want to yield right now, and she wasn't even speaking to him. As powerful as her words were, she still managed to sound commanding, and not demanding, definitely not one to be trifled with.
Zane was worried immensely now that he heard this forest referred to as "forbidden" and he heard the word trespassing too. " Shit, I would have to be near Xaria." He cursed in the lowest of voices knowing he was breaking some sort of law, and now he was aware whose territory he was in.
Every motion they took at this point made Zane more wary and as much as he would hope they'd leave, all they have to do now is look around the tree to the side of them and notice his presence. There was also no knowing what they'd do upon capturing him, and there was no way he could win a fight under circumstances where he's fatigued, out-powered, out-numbered, and out-sized.
" I can't afford to take chances now." Zane thought, if he started running with a head start now perhaps he could lose him, but he certainly wouldn't stand a chance if they discovered him first. Having made his decision, Zane put on the hood to his cloak to conceal his identity and threw caution to the wind as he turned tail to make a dash run for it. " Someone's there!?" Responded one of the soldiers, jumping in surprise at Zane's sudden sprint.
" An infiltrator! Pursue him immediately!" Ordered the General, and the two soldiers complied instantly and began the chase, despite this the General followed as well, running at probably double the speed as her underlings who are no slowpokes given their size.
Zane fortunately was able to cover a decent amount of ground in the few seconds of leeway he had, and was somewhat able to maintain the distance of him and the first two soldiers after him. The one really giving him a run for his gold was the General who was hot on his trail and rapidly closing the distance.
Granted she was far taller than her colleagues Zane was still astounded just how much faster she was than them. " Shit.", he knew he had to do something quickly or else she would need but a few more seconds to catch him.
Thinking fast, Zane began to cut every corner and every turn possible, at every tree or bush to prevent it from being a linear chase where he had no chance at escape. As clever an idea it was, these acts only afforded him the absolute minimum of extra time, and was barely managing to keep ahead of her just enough to avoid being within an arm's grab. He managed to ditch the other two soldiers entirely, but the General was giving him all sorts of difficulty.
Ordinarily keeping the pace he was running at would be a lot more maintainable, but with his fatigue being as high as it is, his movement began to slow ever so slightly as his legs failed him. Like a shark smelling blood the General swiped her hand out in an attempt to grab him, only being short by a mere centimeter, and grabbed the cloak straight from off his body with the swiftness of the wind.
This clearly rattled Zane and took a look behind him and it was painfully apparent that the tides of the chase has completely turned, with his eyes showing panic and desperation, and his adversary unshakable confidence that the end was near. What was really telling though was the smirk that was on her tight lipped face, it almost gave him the impression that she was toying with him and that she could catch him sooner if she wanted to.
" Getting tired little one?" She condescendingly asked, knowing full well that the question needed no answer, all she really wanted was a total and definitive conquering over her foe where their maximum effort wouldn't prevent them from falling miserably before her.
Zane tried to take no heed to her words, but there was no hiding his weakness now. The impending doom of knowing this was a near futile struggle didn't even make it feel like a chase anymore and more so a pitiful game of cat and mouse. It's obvious who the mouse is, yet it'd be insulting to compare the General to a cat, with such imposing size, strength, and not even utilizing her full capability on her far smaller and weaker prey, comparing her to a lioness or tigress is more accurate.
Keeping on the lookout for any opportunity to lose her, Zane had to avoid letting his nerves get to him even under the insane amount of pressure, and he may have found his chance. " Excellent." He thought, coming ahead, was a large concentration of trees, with an excess of vines and branches drooping and obstructing the path on every angle.
This is one of the few areas where his smaller size in this forest will play to his advantage and allow for much easier mobility through the obstacles, which cannot be said for his much bigger adversary.
Going full throttle ahead, Zane swiftly lunged passed the first series of vines, he had to be particularly cautious to duck, bob, and weave through every last one or risk getting tangled. Still he knew for sure he had one upped the General here.
" Not good enough." Zane heard an unimpressed voice from behind him say.
" Fucking hell, now what? " He thought looking behind him, Zane's eyes widened at the sight he was seeing, the General reaching onto her back unveiled the largest sword he's ever seen. His awestruck didn't last long though as he had to duck to the ground while she took a huge swing and cut down the vines in her path, the wind force produced from it enough to even leave slash marks on the tree's bark.
" That's flat out absurd." Zane thought aloud, referring to the sheer asinine amount of strength this woman possessed. The metal of her blade shined brilliantly, and stood as proudly as it's wielder at a whopping 3 meters tall, it was also quite wide and thick. Near the bottom of the blade was an emblem with a symbol, probably her military's insignia. Even if a normal sized human wielded a sword proportionally sized sword to that, there's only a handful of people who could swing it as effortlessly as she did, with one hand no less!
What he initially thought would be an advantage was becoming his steepest challenge yet, it was bad enough he had to be mindful of every last stray vine that could possibly get in his way, but now he had to multitask dodging every swing of the General's sword who was simply cutting down all obstacles in her path, without losing a step, one wrong move on his part would leave him as little more than a stain of blood on her blade.
As valiantly as he struggled, the inevitable inopportune moment and Zane overlooked a vine near the ground, causing him to lose his footing and his right ankle was successfully trapped. To make matters worse, his fall was broken by another vine above that trapped his right arm as well.
Precious seconds were going down the drain as Zane desperately attempted to free himself, he tried to grab his sword, but with only his left hand at his disposable it was too difficult a task for him to reach over to his opposite right side where his sword was equipped.
Zane was so busy struggling he didn't even notice that the General was already right in front of him and seemed amused watching him only manage to pitifully tie himself up further. After a few moment Zane ended up looking like a very poorly wrapped mummy, and he finally gave up his futile efforts, proceeding to heave heavily. The only thing that kept him going throughout the entire run was adrenaline, and now that its worn off, he didn't even possess the strength to move a muscle anymore.
He didn't even want to look, but he did so anyway, in shifting his eyes over to the General whose face beamed in non-verbal gloating in her total victory and simply said. " Infiltrator detained."