Editing Dark Elf:Volume1 Chapter4 (section)

===Part 1===

“Wait.”

The first to express confusion in the dark forest night was Elzane Livzy, the knight with massive twin ringlets that nearly reached her ankles.

“A dragon, wiping out the humans? Boy, what are you talking about?”

Perhaps the issue was on such a large scale that ordinary people couldn’t wrap their heads around it.

But what other scale was appropriate for a conspiracy caused by the one and only hope elf who had become a living legend?

Wouldn’t anything she was plotting need to involve the destruction of a whole kingdom or the entire world?

Rosehera herself continued smiling. She looked like a blonde girl of around 12, but like with a true conspiracy, revealing the truth did nothing to stop her. She made no attempt to hide her arrogance.

“Are you for real?” said the superior being. “Stop acting like this is some kind of accomplishment, you ''beygukc uzuaq''.”

She had some other language mixed in with her human sentence. She also sighed and held out her small hand. But her palm was directed toward the confused knight, not Klaus Knockburn.

There was no light or sound.

“Gah!?”

“Elzane!!”

The skinny boy shouted in concern, but he did not dare approach. He could only watch as powerful Elzane collapsed to the ground. Her unnatural lemon yellow hair trailed after her like a comet’s tail. Once she hit the ground, she stopped moving altogether. She had reined supreme even in this forest by rejecting all the natural colors around her, but now even her face was covered in dirt.

The hope elf’s piercing-covered ears shook as she twirled her raised pointer finger.

“She hadn’t caught on to what you were saying yet, but once she did, I just know she would have taken your side. ''So I took back the power I had lent her.'' You can’t blame me for that one, can you, human?”

“''By boosting that girl’s strength with her magic, the difficulty of controlling the power inside her gradually grew until her body could not manage it on her own. But she failed to notice because the hope elf was expanding her power.''”

Slender explained while glaring at Rosehera.

This appeared to be some kind of side effect. And one Rosehera had neglected to mention. She had kept quiet so she could immediately knock Elzane out by turning off that valve. It didn’t look like there had been any camaraderie between those two. At least not from duplicitous Rosehera anyway.

“''She is in an extreme state of deficiency. The standard result of someone using magic too powerful for them. She appeared to be controlling the power inside her using those combs, but it wasn’t anywhere near enough. The hope elf knew that but didn’t say anything so she would have some insurance.''”

“My target is the dark elves. I am more than willing to let a human like you go free.”

“Thanks, but no. Besides, the world is doomed when Brashgain is resurrected regardless.”

“You don’t know that. The humans might band together while I’m wiping out the dark elves, deciding ''they don’t want to meet the same fate.'' Think about it. I don’t know if you humans are capable of it anymore, but you did destroy Brashgain once already.”

“My answer is the same either way,” spat Klaus. “I will never give you Slender or the rest of the dark elves.”

“And your reason for this foolishness?”

“It would be pretty sad if her side of the chapel didn’t have any guests during our wedding.”

He meant it as a simple joke, but Rosehera’s eyebrow twitched slightly in response. One of her blue eyes changed shape. She was the only hope elf in existence. She could wield unbelievably powerful magic and she had claimed the power that single-handedly repelled the dark elves was only a fraction of her power. But he had found something there. His words had hit home.

“Very well. Then just try it.”

She had no obvious staff or sword.

He heard the sound of something solid scraping together. Rosehera had pulled a scroll from the side string of her underwear and tossed it into the air. It unfurled on its own and hovered over her shoulders and back like a heavenly raiment. It did not even have anything drawn on it. Instead, the blank scroll had evenly-spaced holes with colored pencils stuck inside. Together, they looked like a train track’s rails and ties. There were likely 72 colors in all. He hadn’t actually taken the time to count them, but that was the number of important colors in the field of magic. And he could not let his guard down just because this was not a bladed or blunt weapon. Think of it like a rope ladder. Just rolling it up like a scroll was not enough for all those pencils to fit in such a small space. It may have used some kind of magic there. For example, a conversion a spell that made the 3D into 2D, allowing the many pencils to be stored in the paper when it was rolled up as a scroll.

Hadn’t she drawn out giant magic circles when she was preparing to burn down the entire forest? In her hands, art supplies were weapons of mass destruction capable of devastating entire armies and fortresses.

When her small fingers pulled out a light blue pencil and twirled it around, light surged from the sharp, unused tip. Klaus could tell electricity capable of slicing through metal was being compressed into a single point.

Rosehera smiled with that deadly weapon in hand.

“How long will those invisible and indescribable bonds last under the threat of death?”

“Tch!! Slender, you need to get away from-”

“Kee hee hee. You had the nerve to talk down to me, the one and only hope elf, so do show me a bond that cannot be broken even in death, student.”

The world around him was scorched white.