From the chests, an ancient suit of black steel armor. With that and some spare materials so that I can replace my sword, always breaking those when I travel. I tell you, I wasn't far from home before I was lost. The good kind of lost, the lost that you can be proud of.
Through a thicket, over a marsh, and a glacier was climbing down out of the mountains. I took samples as I passed, saplings, flowers, stone in a few kinds, ores and minerals. Crossed the entire glacier before landing on the other side, not as easy as it sounds as there where strange flying things in the blizzards, snowballs thrown out at me, and a howling core inside, my sword bit something and with a scream it scattered.
A small patch of pine forest and an overgrown beach had drawn my eye, gave me a chance to collect some cactus. I was getting many kinds of plants and I would have to have a garden for themselves. So much of the world is untamed and wild, dangerous and sharp. It's going to be hard to find a place to live. Everywhere is strange, and swarms of the undead come at me out of the darkness, caves and deep forests spilling them out at me. I've already broken one sword.
A frosted forest, and I think I heard wolves. Surely enough to eat out here, I've seen pigs and cows plenty enough for me to try to tame some and bait them home, wherever home ends up being. Perhaps I would even like to tame myself some dogs. The jungle I landed had itself a few ocelots, I suspect there could be come conflicts between the two if I got both, but I'd be tempted just the same.
I almost fell down that hole, it's wet all the way to the bottom I've been told. Yes, told. I'll tell you about that soon. You see those low bushes? Quite a few saplings, but only one log. A deep purple wood that's rather attractive. Perhaps part of the attraction is from how hard it would be to make a building of it. Now let me tell you that the monsters where getting worse and worse as I fought through these hills and forests. Where I'd been doing well against the zombies, and the skeletons let themselves be baited around a tree, but it was those green monsters, creeping up behind me that did the most damage to me. That was the most dangerous.
Most dangerous, because soon I was trying to protect this village. The locals where sieged by the monsters, waves after waves of them, day and night. I've shown you a picture of what it looked like after because before there was no time to stop. A large village, aparist and blacksmith had moved in, swelling the numbers, but none had the secrets of making golems so the town was unprotected. The locals stayed inside, hiding, the forest had overgrown the town. This only brought the monsters on closer. So they gave me work. I cleared the trees. I lit the paths, and I built a fence. It wouldn't stop arrows but it would keep out the worst of the monsters. They would be safe again. Maybe someday I'll be able to return and perhaps they will expand a little. It wouldn't take much more to attract one that knows the secrets of golems. They told me many secrets, and I'll have to write them down once I am safe. Here I will only make a short note, the magic has left this world.
There is beauty, and wonder, but the magic of lands my family has known in the past, is just that, the past. There are rumors, there are stories, but the days of magic are past. Technology is taking the place where magic used to be, but the growth is slow in these distant villages. I thanked them and moved on. Near to the town was these huge cliffs of hardened clay, mottled mesa views. I've lived in the hills before, in cliffs for the views. Always loved a view. Still I wasn't going to settle where the only growth is a distant forest.
Beyond the cliffs is a paradise, not for me but for horses. Not forests, but vast open fields, prairies and herds. Horse after horse, all on the run for they did not want to be near me. Wild as anything. And into the wilds I did continue. Across into the badlands, and then into desert and dunes.
I saw in the distance, a huge dune and rememebered the story of my grandfather, he found shelter in a dune like that, but to hear him it was smaller. This dune was almost as large as the pryamid that he built. If he'd moved into that he'd hardly have had the need to expand out of it. From the top of it I saw that swamp, with gnarled trees, and beyond the sea. For all that I was traveling I didn't want to cross the sea. Nor did I want to go more then 1km from the place the world began. I'd hit the sea and turned, not once, but twice now...
It was time to come back.
On the way, I saw...
Those are mountains, and they call to me. There is a whisper.
Home.
(thank you e_dm_b for the like, was worried I'd lost my touch)