Upon the Magic Roads

An old farmer gathers his three sons and reveals a trampled wheat field, setting up a test to discover who destroyed it. He orders them to guard the field at night to find the culprit. The youngest son, Ivan the Fool, is sent to stand watch and uncover the truth.

John chats with the hedgehog he once saved and spots the outline of a mare in a mist. He throws a rope toward her, and the mare drags him across the fields into a swamp. After they fall in, John pulls the drowning mare out with a waterwheel and, moved by her plea, lets her go free with a vow she will stop trampling their fields.

The next morning in the stable, two horses appear alongside a small Humpbacked Magic Foal. The Foal explains he was sent by the mare to help and support John. John accepts the magical helper, hoping for advantage in future tasks.

John leads the gifted horses to the bazaar to earn money, but the King spots them and claims them as his own property for the royal stables. John tricks the system with the Foal’s help and whips the horses back, earning the King’s attention and the position of the most important royal groom.

Over time, people increasingly love John, but the King’s envy grows. At the Sleeping Bag’s instigation, the King devises a plan to rid himself of John by sending him on a dangerous mission to retrieve the Firebird, hoping it will lead to his downfall.

John and the Foal set off to find the Firebird, collecting dream-nuts along the way. They locate the bird’s shelter and pour out the nuts, causing the Firebird to fall asleep. John binds the bird in chains but learns it can only get hot when it is free.

On their return, the executioners seize John for supposedly disobeying orders. He claims he captured the Firebird but released it. Despite bringing back a feather, no one believes him until the Firebird appears, canceling the execution and saving John from the block.

The King, embittered by John’s rise, sends him to retrieve the Tsar-maiden from an Ice country perched on a high rock. John and the Foal reach the icy destination, where the maiden awakes, refuses to marry because there are no true heroes left, and leaps into the abyss.

To win the maiden’s hand, John must recover her grandmother’s ring from the ocean. They travel the Magical Roads, consulting the Sun, Moon, and Wind, and learn a whale is chained for swallowing ships. John makes the whale sneeze, freeing ships at sea and earning the grandmother’s ring via a crab.

John returns with the ring and asks the Tsar-maiden to marry him, but the King arrests him for attempted kidnapping while the Foal is shot by the guards. The Tsar-maiden’s ring provides some leverage as the situation escalates toward a wedding that is never straightforward.

The Tsar-maiden’s grandmother’s recipe triggers a test of rejuvenation through three cauldrons. The plan is to throw symbolic items into each cauldron: the ring first, the Firebird’s feather second, and the flower that grows at the end of the world third. The Sleeping Bag guides John and Foal through these dangerous trials.

The ring and feather pass harmlessly; the Foal retrieves the life-and-death flower despite a wounded wing and warns that plucking it implies danger for the one who uses it. John survives the first two cauldrons, but the King leaps into the first cauldron, and a bubble carries him away to the sky. The flower’s true meaning is revealed as a test rather than a curse.

With the King gone, John becomes a ruler alongside the Tsar-maiden. They prepare to marry, bringing a new era of peace and prosperity to the realm. The couple’s partnership marks the end of the King’s tyranny and the beginning of a hopeful future.