THE AMULET

Prologue

Our fellow carpenter however made up his mind to enter the dark forest to get what he needs. He can't afford to purchase redwood and he can't wait for new trees to grow either. Besides he never believed in all those gossips and folktales and it made him feel like the most sensible person in the village. A flex he was mostly proud of.
He was the type of person to complete a task that many have failed to just to be the center of everyone's attention.

The brightness of the surrounding started slowly fading away as he walked through the densely grown plants that reached upto his neck. He made a way for himself by parting the bushes with his bare hands and breaking the twigs that were crisscrossed ahead of his path. After much struggle the man finally reached the place he had been looking for. A long line of redwood trees appeared right infront of him and the man sighed with relief. He grabbed his axe and started chopping down the easily accessible trees that were closest to him and not surrounded by wines and thorns.

After many hours of physically straining work the said man decided to take a break. He sat himself down on a nearby rock that was covered with fresh moss and breathed heavily.
The clouds started darkening in the already gloomy forest. The carpenter assumed that it might be close to sun down and so he started collecting the chunks of wood, piled them up and tied it together. He harshly dropped the heavy bundles of wood in his wheelbarrow as if it weighted nothing.
And now for the most difficult task of all, wheeling his way back out of the dark forest with all those twigs and bushes in his way.
Even the thought of it made him groan with frustration.
A sudden idea of going around the hellish crops rather than going through it crossed his mind and after much consideration he decided to give it a shot.
He turned around and walked forward till he reached the last redwood tree. The area that was ahead of him was clearly paved for some reason. It was almost as if someone had intentionally gotten rid of the plants that had burdened the path.
However he shrugged it off and continued to walk forward.
The forest became eerily silent as the man kept walking deeper into the woods. The shapes of the trees started getting weirder and the smell of rotten flesh or more accurately the smell of something dead was becoming unbearable by the second.
He hated to admit it but he could feel a shiver run down his spine.
The man was looking everywhere around him but the ground. Suddenly he bumped onto something and looked down to see what it was and that's when all color in his face drained out.

A basket full of chopped hands, human hands with dried blood stains was neatly laid down right besides his legs.