The magic labyrinth

The first light of day came directly into Peter's eyes, he still felt a little sleepy, but he did what he always did: he shook and shook his body so that the moving energy would get him out of bed. He grabbed his work clothes and set out to help his father with the chores at the coffee plantation.

Things were not going well; since the last harvest the coffee had taken on a more acidic taste than usual, people were complaining about the strange taste, they refused to buy it and the family income was decreasing every day. Peter's father did not know what to do. If he cut down the bushes it would be years before he would have new crops.

After breakfast Peter began his work, it was a cloud cover day, cold and wet. His father instructed him to go to the blacksmith, two kilometers away, to fetch the new tools and to put them neatly back in the toolshed.

The boy set off cheerfully on his errand; if there was one thing Peter liked to do, it was to run errands far from home. As he walked along, he distracted himself by picking small green coffee beans from the numerous bushes that adorned the area.

The blacksmith took longer than usual, it was only in the early afternoon when he delivered the tools. As it was still early Peter decided to return by a different route....

He had gone a long way when, at the top of a hill, he saw a small house with a flash of light in one of the windows. He could not resist and went to look. As he climbed the hill he smelled a pleasant sweet fruit smell, similar to the raspberry chewing gum he liked so much. With each step that brought him closer to the house the smell increased....

When Peter arrived he noticed that the door was open, the smell of raspberry gum was spreading everywhere, He walked here and there and suddenly he saw a dark and long staircase, fortunately on one side of the wall there was a lamppost . Peter turned it on and started down. At the bottom was a gleaming wooden door on which was pasted a sign with a strange inscription: If you go through it all your problems will be solved, but you may not know how to get back...

That inscription increased Peter's curiosity, he hesitated, he was afraid, but in the end something in his heart told him that he had to dare, that everything would be all right...

Peter opened the door and a large luminous space opened before him. A narrow path led into a complex gumball Labyrinth . He hesitated again, he knew that it was easy to get lost in a labyrinth like that, that he might never be able to get out of there...

Suddenly he remembered the coffee beans he kept in his pocket. One by one he marked them with his thumbnail. One stripe meant right, two left. This was Peter's way of making sure that he could find his way through the maze...

He began to walk, and at each change of direction he took a small bean and embedded it in the gum wall. He walked for a long time until he reached the center of the maze where a small box of very shiny metal rested. Peter picked it up and inside was a coffee bean the size of a walnut. That surprised him, he never imagined that there could be such a large bean. Without much thought he put the bean in his pocket.

The bean embedded in the wall of chewing gum showed him which way to turn. Soon he was at the top of the stairs again, climbed up, left the house and resumed his walk.

That night he said nothing to his father about the adventure he had been on. He fell asleep staring at the giant coffee bean.

The next morning Peter did what he did every day. He went to the shed, took the new tools and began to help his father. When he was near a bush, the seed fell out of his pocket and as he lifted it, he lightly brushed against one of the leaves. As if by magic, the bush became more alive, it regained a great greenness and the bean on the branches grew bigger and took on a bright color.

Peter and his father were amazed. Between the two of them, they brushed the giant seed against every bush on the farm. They had the same result in all of them, they all became beautiful and lush.

The new harvest was a revelation. The taste of the coffee was outstanding. Everyone wanted to taste it. Sales increased as never before...

The sentence on the sign had been fulfilled: All your problems will be solved. Peter had made it through the difficult test of the gumball Labyrinth.

Thank you for your time.

I used the following words: Cloud cover, gumball Labyrinth, Blacksmith, Toolshed, lamppost.

All pictures are my property.

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)