Editing Failing Witch:Volume2 Episode2 (section)

===Part 6===

Melehe Superlative gave her an icy look.

“There is no way you saw an elf alive in the modern day. Even their fossils are rare.”

“But, but I saw her with my own eyes!!”

“You were alone and all you did was see it? No more? You didn’t capture it and you didn’t get a silver halide photo?”

“Uhh…”

“That’s what I thought. It’s possible you did see something that looks a lot like an elf, but remember – this is the campsite where the last alleged elf sighting happened. Some tourists with too much time on their hands probably dressed up as one for a photo shoot.”

“Urrrrgh!!”

Argued into a corner, Viocia tearfully glared over at Yagoro, but he only covered his face with his hands. With a sketchy story like that, what kind of help could he give her?

“Eep. Anyway, Viocia, is that all the firewood you got? W-we need to cook our own food, so we need to be ready soon.”

“You just brushed it off with an ‘anyway’, which tells me you don’t believe me either, Dorothea. But I swear I really did see a legendary elf!!”

Viocia protested, but she joined Dorothea in preparing the campfire spot. Her empty stomach may have gotten the better of her.

They had eaten lunch during a break before entering the Dazzling Forest, but dinner was a different story.

“You must only start a fire in specific, prepared locations. You could start a wildfire otherwise.”

An old man who appeared to be an instructor at another prep school cautioned all the students in a wizened voice.

Instead of instant food made with witch recipes, they would be cooking over an actual fire.

Dorothea usually cooked for herself, so she wanted to adjust this makeshift stove to her liking.

“Will this work? Eep.”

“Don’t worry too much about stacking the rocks just right. You can fill any gaps in with sand, don’tcha think?”

This was all a learning experience, but Yagoro helped with the initial heavy lifting. After gathering stones from the riverside and arranging them in three sides of a square, they placed a metal grill on top. Then they only had to arrange dried plants and twigs below and ignite them.

Striking the flint and metal together reminded Yagoro of the metal matches he had been issues in the Force. Not that he had ever had a chance to use them.

“Ohh, it’s burning, it’s burning!” exclaimed Viocia.

“We’re not here for the campfire. The point is to cook some dinner. Cough.”

“Sausages! And thick bacon!!” said Viocia as she snatched up more and more food for her own plate. “Munch, munch. Melehe, do you like the healthier chicken?”

“I want my internal environment to lean toward the wind element. As for you, pork is the fire element, so you should use sweet basil or cumin. Star anise is a water element herb!”

Her mother seemed to be a vegetarian, but Melehe didn’t appear to take it that far.

“Dorothea, you’re only eating the vegetables? You’re so grown up.”

“<span style="font-size:75%">”Ugh. I-I would really rather fill up on meat too.</span>”

Maybe it was to stick to the water element, but Dorothea was munching on grilled apples flavored with chamomile. No one had asked her to, but she would occasionally add more wood to the fire or blow into the fire to adjust the heat level. The big sister’s efforts were going unrewarded, but at least she appeared to enjoy looking after the fire.

“Oh, can’t forget this. Heh heh☆”

“Hm? Viocia, eep, why are you filling up a new plate with meat?”

“Okay, I need to write a note. ‘To the elf: eat this if you’re hungry.’ ”

“Are you still fixated on that? That mysterious species went extinct ages ago. And even if they were still around, who knows if they would even understand our language.”

Viocia ignored Melehe’s exasperated comment and placed the plate and parchment note on a stone a short distance from the campsite.

In addition to the meat and vegetables, they had long, narrow loaves of bread. Were they baguettes? The bread was fairly hard, but thick pieces could be sliced off and grilled, or the whole loaf could be slit lengthwise so meat could be placed inside a lot like with a hot dog.

Yagoro was a little saddened by the bread because he saw white rice as the perfect companion for meat.