Once, there was a village in the Kingdom of Gothenburg. In that village lay a family. But the family was not the ordinary family you would see. It had something special. They couldn’t tell anyone their secret. It was too valuable to be given away. It was a story that lead generations and generations ago.

The story begun in a land where kings were the only royalty in the family. The king of this land was the richest king there ever was.The king had found a mountain full of gold. Every day, miners excavated gold from the mountain for the king. From that mountain there was 100 camels. Each camel had 100 pounds of gold. That was how the king became so rich. The King’s son had one rule. To not go into the Forbidden Forest of doom. The forest had much in it that the king couldn’t afford for the son to be in it. The son was always a good boy. But as he grew older and older, he started to not follow the king’s rules.

One day, the boy decided he wanted to figure out why the forest was forbidden. He went in and it was like he went into another realm. He looked back- nothing was there to guide him back. What is this place?, he thought. He saw things that looked unfamiliar to him. He saw what we call skyscrapers and towers in the sky. He saw cars and now modern day technology. He saw that this was the future and he wanted to leave. He went back to the area he came from to see something that was not his kingdom. It was a lion’s cave. But he didn’t know that it was a lion. Lion’s were not made at the time of the kingdom.

But he knew that it was dangerous because it’s fearsome claws and it furious roar told him that.

He ran back and he got back to the kingdom where the king sat waiting for him. His face was both angry but he was also nervous. The king sat with the militia and told them to leave while he would talk to the son.

He told him to never again enter the forbidden forest ever again. He decided to give him more than one rule. He told the son to never leave the castle without an escort of any kind.

He just said “Ok” and left back to the castle.

But he had ideas swirling around his head.

He wanted to see the world in the future, he wanted to see the mysterious creatures that attacked him. He didn’t want to sit in a room that was full gold all day long with nothing to do. He wanted a challenge. And the forest was the only thing to give him a challenge.

So the next following days, he waited for his guards to take a break.

When they finally did, he went into the forest again.

This time it lead to a mine. It was the mine that the king owned.

He knew it was the mine because of the line of camels moving with loads of gold on them. He had been to the mines before, but he couldn’t put his hand on when he did.

He left to another location- this time it was a place full of animals. It was different. No humans were around. He was an odd person there. That was when he saw the mysterious creature again. He knew it was the same creature. The creature seemed to know he was the one who got into the cave. They attacked each other, but the lion fell into a hole that appeared in the ground. Then more and more holes appeared in the ground. And that was when he figured out that the king wanted him back again. He went back to the kingdom and he saw this time the alchemist was there giving the ritual of devastation. That was when he saw that the forest had been turned to dust.

The king scolded the boy and they had an agreement to not leave the castle.

Obviously, the boy decided to leave the castle again. But it was after many things occurred. The first thing that happened was the food. The food changed. The food was made so the boy would fall asleep if exposed to the outdoor world. The second was the animals in the castle. The boy loved animals and played with them after seeing the lion. The animals were taken away because they were a toy to the boy. The third was the room. His room had more gold than ever now. All this made him want to leave the castle.

When he got the chance, it was a rainy night in the kingdom. Rain rarely happened, but he knew that it was his only chance to escape. He left the kingdom and continued to the nearby countries. He saw many animals along the way, many new people. He traveled afar and he was known as many people “the wandering traveler”. One thing he was not aware of was the time. The sun was rising, but he did not know the way to the kingdom. He wandered back to what he thought was the kingdom, but he ended up getting lost. He went to many places that he thought he had been to. He tried getting back over and over again but he felt like he was just running around in circles.

One day after another, he scavenged for food. He looked around and he saw someone who was looking at him. That person was a wise old man who said to always look forward and never look at your past. Then the wise old man took him to his house and told him that this was his new home. The boy grew up to become the old man’s son and he forgot about the king. That was how the first orphan came to be.