14/04/2025
Foam from the hinterland (Buih dari Pedalaman)
From Novel: Treading the Barito Foam (Meniti Buih Barito)
By Kaspul Darmawi
Letika Prio Publishing, 2019
Kayan ran back towards the camp while shouting…”Oiiii… run…! Spread out…!” Kayan kept running back. Ignoring his surroundings, Kayan kept running back towards the camp, “Run…! Spread out…! Find cover…! The wild boar is raging from the South.” Kayan kept shouting warnings.
Kayan had arrived near the center of the camp. How shocked Kayan was when he saw Apul being chased by a raging wild boar. Kayan hid behind a large tree. Kayan clenched his palms and shook his hands to encourage Apul to keep running to avoid the wild boar. Kayan’s heart seemed to stop when he saw Apul fall because Apul’s leg was caught in a tree root. In one jump, the wild boar would have charged Apul.
Right when the shadow of the wild boar was close to Apul’s body, without thinking, Kayan took the wooden Mandau that had been on his left waist. With lightning speed, he pressed the locking k**b at the base of the Mandau’s handle. It turned out that the Mandau was genuine, a silver light reflected from the Mandau. Apparently the Mandau was designed with two layers of sheath so that if someone else took the Mandau out of its sheath, only the first sheath would come out so that it looked like a toy wooden Mandau, but if it was pulled by pressing the k**b at the base of the Mandau, the real Mandau would come out of its sheath.
Like lightning speed, Kayan also raised and rotated both of his hands to control his Mandau. The very high speed made the Mandau spin in the air with dazzling light, and at the speed of light the Mandau flew into the air like lightning that moved very quickly away from its owner according to the direction of Kayan's shaking hands and hit a wild boar right before the boar charged Apul. The big wild boar was sprawled behind Apul's body. His thunderous voice shook the earth, causing thick dust smoke. Only the sound of coughing was heard after the thunderous sound.