![xI0OI0c.png](https://i.imgur.com/xI0OI0c.png)
Title of the Picture: Secret Santa and his loyal Puppy following the steps of a Spirit Tree.
Before reading the story, play the song:
Story:
It was a foggy night in September. Santa Claus struggled to find any sleep, his mind was rambling about whether is he able to participate to the tradition, what the mortals recognize as "Christmas". The pandemic left a scar, and it refused to heal. Santa was thinking about giving up.
"How?", "Why?", "Alone?" - these were the words that were haunting him.
He was in a situation where he did not know, whether his health will withstand another year of travelling all over the world, causing depressive thoughts, because he didn't find any purpose in it any more, making people happy every year himself.
Why does nobody make Santa happy? These were the last thoughts before his good night's rest.
The night was restless. He saw nightmares of how an 11-foot creature, called Ashihama, is about to take over the world with cruelty and evilness. "He must be an NBA player." Santa thought whilst in sleep. But suddenly he realized that creature bringing suffering and sadness to the world, was immortal.
He went on to seek guidance within deep Taverly dungeon. Throughout the way there, he met many creatures, including dragons, dwarves, demons, spiders.
But the Santa was persistent, he had a goal in sight.
After hours of wandering around the dungeon, fighting for survival, he made it to a dark place.
"Why am I here?" he thought. He started looking around, without seeing much.
"HELLO!" a DEEP VOICE filled the tunnel.
Santa, without having an extra pair of underwear, almost did an oopsie, but managed to keep his composure.
"Who is it?" he asked.
"They call me the Key Master." a deep voice responded.
Santa, realizing his bag had no clue scroll in it, was confused.
"I can help you regain the strength and joy." Key Master said.
Santa listened to those words, and started thinking.
"Could you actually?" he asked.
"Yes, behind this gate is a creature with 3 heads, his main hobby is to put souls into a jar."
It started to confuse Santa a little bit too much, so he decided to ask upfrontly:
"And how can this creature help me?!"
"See, sometimes in life, you have to accept all the help that's been offered. You have tried to make people happy alone for years, without realizing that people aside you always wanted to help you out. You have two options, take the creature with you and let him save you from Ashihama ruining the Christmas, or keep on trying alone, which at your age, seems impossible to do."
Santa, without much thinking, accepted the offer, brought the creature alongside him and went back home.
When he got home, LOTS OF THINGS were changed. The usual desk he was sitting behind, was there no more. Instead there was a TREE IN MIDDLE OF THE ROOM.
"What in the world?!" Santa had no clue what to say, or how to react. A TREE IN THE HOUSE? IT IS NOT A CHRISTMAS TREE?
Tree started talking and said: "Hi, my name is Spirit Tree."
"A TALKING TREE?!" Santa Claus immediately started thinking about all the machine learning clients that have asked for a talking tree.
"Yes, I do talk. I do help." Tree responded.
Santa had enough, drank a bottle of rum and fell asleep.
Next moment, he woke up and realized that it was all a bad dream, but a helpful one. Keep in mind, that every single time that anyone wants to help you, they want to reduce the weight and burden you may go through every single day. They help you because they care about you.
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Take care!