Chapter 1

On a bright morning, a group of people are walking in the forest full of towering trees. All of them have one thing in common they were mycophiles before except Danny who is still into mushrooms. These groups of friends have known each other since childhood, they are Frida, Matt, Danny, and Danny's sister Rina.

Ever since they were children, they loved hunting mushrooms, even if it's a dense forest or they have to cross a deep river they will do it just to get mushrooms. Back then they almost spend their entire day doing it, particularly on weekends. They leave their house around seven o'clock in the morning and return home at seven o'clock in the evening. There are also times when they leave their house pretending to go to school but instead, they go straight to the forest and do their favorite hobby, until they don't go to school anymore because of their hobby. This causes their parents especially Fridas' mom to move to a city far enough to prevent her from seeing her friends which would eventually followed by Matt's parent as they moved to other countries leaving Danny and Rina to stay in town.

After many years, each of them had earned a college degree. Frida went on to work as a genetic engineer, Matt as a biologist, Rina as a nurse, and Danny, unexpectedly, became a mycologist after his parents failed to stop him from being obsessed with mushrooms. Finally after not seeing each other for so long the time has come to let them meet again as Frida's favorite auntie Jenna, her dad's cousin died, and not only that she was also the group's teacher in science during high school.

"Since Both Dad and elder brother Frank are not here till Wednesday and Mom I know you are busy with our business, I decided to attend the funeral of Auntie Jenna"

"No, I will not allow you to attend the funeral, I'm sure your friends will be there, especially that crazy Danny"

"Mom, you know Auntie Jenna is my godmother, plus she is very close to me and we have a lot of memories together"

"I know you are worried that I might go back to my old hobby but Mom look at me now Mom I'm no longer obsessed with mushrooms and besides friends have changed too including Danny" She added.

"No, I won't let you leave no matter how you beg," Frida's Mom said before heading to her room.

"But Mom"

Her Mom didn't say a single word instead slamming the door, leaving Frida standing and frowning. 

Back to the present Frida and her friends had spent over five hours walking and suddenly got tired, so they sat in a nearby stump.

"We've been walking for a while now and still haven't reached your cabin," Frida said.

"Yeah," Matt replied as he opened his bottled water and drank it.

"Danny, if you don't mind may I ask you a question"

"Sure what is it" Danny replied.

"How did you convince your parents to let you become a mycologist?"

Danny not expecting Frida to ask that kind of question suddenly became serious, then turned his head upward and said "Simple, whatever your heart says, follow it " before glancing at Frida and smiling.

"If I only knew that you would answer my question with some flowery answer, I should not have asked," She said surly.

"You're so sensitive, you haven't changed since then," Danny said smiling.

"We are curious we just want to know why Danny and besides we are your friends," Matt said with a dead serious face.

"I'll tell you all later as we reach the cabin" Danny suddenly started to run leaving his friends confused.

"Danny wait!" Frida said as she also started to run. 

Matt and Rina do the same.

"There is something odd with your brother Rina," Matt said.

"If only you knew how stubborn my elder brother is" Rina replied.

After a few minutes of running, Matt and Rina catch up with Frida, gasping as she sits in a tree's root.

"Where's Danny?" Matt asked.

Frida gestured to the wooden cabin in front of them, it was approximately a meter away from where they were currently, and it was also noticeable that the door was intentionally open by Danny."He was there a while ago" Frida said.

"Wait, aren't you running almost right next to each other when?" Confused Rina asked.

"He ran so fast that when I reached here, he was laughing by himself as he was holding a pot containing a strange-looking mushroom" Frida explained.

"I also noticed that elder brother is acting strange lately," Rina said frowning.

"I hope you are not offended by this Rina, but I think Danny is a drug addict," Matt said.

"I'm also thinking the same, you should take Danny for a drug test sometime" Frida added.

"I don't think so, my elder brother had taken multiple drug tests a couple of times just to prove he's not an addict" Rina replied.

"But why he's acting like that?" Matt asked.

"I'm not sure yet but maybe he's gone crazy from eating mushrooms" Rina replied.

"That's ridiculous, I don't think consuming mushrooms can turn you crazy," Matt said.

As the trio continued to talk, Danny suddenly went outside the cabin and noticed the trio "Oh, you're all here. Come on in, let's eat" he said.

The trio follows Danny inside the cabin. The cabin is like any other, with a living room with four chairs, and an oval table made from bamboo, the two-bedroom room is located on the left, and on the right are the dining room and the kitchen. The trio went into the dining room, where they saw a beacon, fried chicken, roasted beef, and a mysterious soup that seemingly contained an orange-colored spiral shell of a snail that had multiple eyes on it with the addition of okra, squash, and tofu. Curious Matt asked, "What type of dish is this?".