"Historia!"

It was her morning ritual. Wake up early in the morning, make breakfast, and do her daily chores. Those chores often lasted all day, leaving her exhausted and sore by sunset. Unfortunately, that was the reality of being a young adult. That's what her sister always said, at least. The little family of three lived in the countryside; far away from what Historia's sister calls The Land of the Failed. From what she told her, their mother brought them to the farm when they were infants. She raised the girls until they were capable of doing hard work, and ever since they've been in charge of keeping the farm alive.

Just as Historia rubbed the sleep from her blue eyes, her older sister burst into the bedroom and hopped on the bed, only to shake her back and forth. "Historia! How many times do I have to wake you up?"

"I was already awake, Frieda." Historia covered her face with the bed sheets.

"Liar!" Frieda giggled and yanked the sheet away. She continued to shake her little sister to keep her from falling asleep again. "Come on, Historia. We have a lot of work to do today. Winter is coming, after all."

"Do we ever not have work to do?" Historia asked sarcastically as she sat up. Frieda shook her head with a smile on her face. Historia sighed, but couldn't be irritated, so she grinned. Although doing chores were tedious, her sister always made it fun for the both of them.

Frieda was like her exemplar. Ever since she was a child, Historia had looked up to her and learned most of the skills needed to be a responsible adult. Frieda taught her how to cook, clean, take care of the animals on their farm and even taught her how to read and write. It was a shame to say that Freida was, essentially, a motherly figure throughout her childhood. But it wasn't as if their mother neglected them.

Their mother just… stopped trying.

Just as they finished preparing breakfast with whatever food they had, Frieda told Historia to call their mother over, and she walked over to their mother's bedroom. She carefully opened the door. "Mother?" she called. The woman who created her stood by the window, daydreaming. Historia called her again, but she didn't react at all. The teen went closer to her mother and tapped her shoulder, and her head jerked to Historia's direction. "Breakfast is ready," Historia said, nervous. Her mother just stared at her and didn't say a word. She was worried about her mother. Each day, the woman withdrew herself from her kids more and more. Whenever Historia tried to talk to her or ask her what was wrong, her mother would either stare with a stoic expression or demand the girl to go away. Frieda, on the other hand, had a way with words; whenever she talked to their mother, the woman broke into tears. Perhaps she was depressed due to something that happened in her past. Or maybe she was ill in the head. Historia did not know. And she probably never will.

Once Historia managed to get her mom out of the room, the family of three began to eat the food together like a real family would. It was a plain breakfast: barley bread and porridge. Historia used to hate eating porridge because of the taste. But Frieda used to tell her to always be grateful of what she had, because resources always run out. Eventually, they finished eating in silence and cleaned up after themselves. Their mother slowly walked back into her room, still without saying a word to her daughters. Historia wondered what was on her mind. "It's time to go outside," Frieda caught her sister's attention, after putting things away.

Historia blinked. "Oh, right…"

"Don't worry about mom," Frieda patted her head. "She'll be fine."

"Are you not concerned for her?"

"I am." Frieda walked with her sibling to the front door and opened it. "But sometimes… you just have to live with it."

It was a beautiful autumn morning. The sky was a bright blue with cumulus clouds spread about. The trees were a mixture of orange and red. The grassland they lived in was vast and seemingly endless. Over in the distance was a long fence that prevented the animals from running into the forest. It took Frieda three years to build the fence. Historia always wondered what was beyond the forest; she wanted to know what the Land of the Failed was, but Frieda made her sister promise to never go past the fence. Because if Historia ever broke the promise, Frieda wouldn't be very nice about it.

They started their errands by first watering and fertilizing the crops. This took a while, considering that they stretched for miles. The siblings took whatever was done growing and put it into a basket. They brought the crops and rinsed the dirt off with well-water to make them safe to eat. Soon, they did their laundry; Frieda always had them ready. Together they filled up buckets of well-water and scrubbed their dresses and sheets all by hand. They often got off track by splashing water on each other as a way of making it fun.

After hanging the laundry to dry in the wind, it was time to do one of Historia's personal favorite errands: checking up on the animals. Frieda stood up and tied her black hair into a pony tail. "Alright, sis," she smiled. "I'll deal with the horses and chickens. I need you to get milk from the cows and count the goats."

Historia frowned. "Wait a minute. We had a deal."

Her sister chuckled. She knew how much Historia loved their horses. Sometimes Frieda would catch her riding one of them in the field. "Fine. You care for the horses and count the goats to make sure they didn't run off again. I'll deal with the rest. Alright?"

"Got it." Historia nodded and tied her blonde hair up into a pony tail as well. She ran off to the rotting stable where they kept all six of their horses. One by one she took them out and brushed their hair, fed them and let them drink out of the water trough. One of the horses were pregnant, so she took extra care of of it.

Eventually, Historia got to the goats. They were all sprawled out in the field, peacefully eating grass without a care in the world. The family of three didn't have many goats; there were only twenty of them, and it was tough to make them mate with each other. Around the goats' necks were leather collars with numbers taped on them to make the counting process easier. And so Historia went. Each goat she counted seemed healthy and lively.

Except… one was missing.

"Damn it," she thought. She had to tell Frieda. It wasn't a big deal though, because she'd know what to do. When Historia caught up to her, she told her about the missing goat.

"Really? It's been a while since they've done that." Frieda said.

"What should I do?"

"Well… I'll try to call for it, like I usually do. But if it doesn't come back, then it probably jumped over the fence and got lost."

More time went by, and the sun began to set. They never found the missing goat. Instead, they finished up the rest of their errands and Freida prepared dinner at the house. While she did, Historia stood outside and collected firewood for the fireplace. She usually tried to stay outside as much as possible. The world around her was beautiful and worth exploring. She believed it was a shame that she'll never be able to explore beyond the woods, because she wanted to see others like them. She had no idea what men looked like, except for in the books Frieda gave her. Historia had always hoped that something out of the ordinary would happen to them. She walked over to the fence and stared into the forest, taking in the fall colors.

It wasn't until she heard twigs snapping in the distance. Although, she didn't think of it at first. But the sound became frequent and repetitive. Suddenly, a piercing, animal-like shriek came from the woods and startled her. She dropped all the wood from my hands. Maybe it was the missing goat, she thought. Maybe it was hurt. She couldn't just leave. She had to save it. Before leaving, she remembered the promise she made to her sister. But she wouldn't be breaking it if Frieda didn't know what she was doing, right?

Historia carefully went over the fence and walked into the woods. She made sure that she was on the path. The sounds of twigs snapping got louder and louder. Then, she saw something- or someone-and hid behind a tree. When she peeked her head out to see what was there, her heart nearly stopped.

It was the missing goat… being eaten alive by what looked like a human. This human had the goat's blood all over them and wore only torn pants. And it didn't look like a female to her. "H-hey," Historia called out. The human turned his head to look at her. His face was covered with blood and dirt, yet his eyes were a striking golden and his hair was a mess of brown. He was young, probably around Historia's age. "You killed my goat! You monster!" she teared up, but remained collected. The human unhurriedly picked himself up, and grabbed the dagger he used to kill the goat with. She was scared, yet amazed. "You're a boy…"

The male suddenly ran up to Historia and grabbed her neck. He didn't squeeze it, though; instead, he took a good look at her and smelled her hair. It was as if he'd never seen another human before. But she didn't trust him. Historia immediately pushed him away and ran back to the path. She didn't look back. She was so afraid for her life that she cried on the way home.

Luckily, she made it to the house just before dinner was ready and met her sister with an embrace and cried in her arms. "Are you alright? What happened out there, Historia? Tell me!"

Historia didn't tell her sister of what she saw out there. She feared that Frieda would hate hate for breaking the promise. So, she just kept crying.

Were all men like that boy? Did they all act like savages?

Was that the reason Freida told Historia to never go beyond the fence?