Editing Dark Elf:Volume1 Chapter2 (section)

===Part 14===

Klaus Knockburn felt the thin thread of his conscience nearly burning out in his mind.

What was right and what was wrong? The horseback knight and the hope elf may have been right. Klaus and Loinbelt had both nearly been killed when the dark elves ganged up on them, so striking back with twice the force may have been justified. It was the right thing to do. This may have been what it meant to see someone shining with an inner light.

But.

“Levazastar Linked Magic Circle,” whispered the long-eared girl in a green priestess’s outfit, whose blonde hair billowed below a small crown. “Cast out the primitive image of adding fuel to a fire. What matters is the wind and the humidity. We remove moisture from the forest’s air and then send in plentiful wind. An unnatural magical tailwind can move very swiftly indeed. The dark elves will never be able to escape it on foot.”

“We sent another unit to seal off the road’s entrance and exit, but smoke damage to the village will be unavoidable.”

The blonde girl who looked no older than 12 hopped off of her horse, leaned over to pick up a stick, and began scraping it against the ground with both hands. It was a major job covering a few dozen meters, but her actions were just like those of a small child doodling on the ground.

But an overhead view would have shown she was drawing a large and intricate magic circle. Klaus could only draw out an accurate square at his feet, so this was far beyond his abilities. It may have been even more than his rotten teacher could accomplish. At the same time, this meant she was planning to do something that not even the hope elf could control without such an intricate circle.

Meanwhile, Klaus noticed movement from a bright yellowish-green reminiscent of the electric sign experiments that the average person was not even aware of. Elzane was shaking her massive twin ringlets while pulling a comb from her arm armor and speaking.

“Madam Hope Elf. Will that really be enough for such a large task?”

“Once, a group wished to carve out a remote portion of a large kingdom and declare independence for themselves. Although behind the scenes, a powerful nation across the sea just wanted a naval port protected by the new borders so they could safely scatter magical sea mines.”

“…”

“This is how I solved that little problem for the kingdom. I transformed their impenetrable Shark Ocean Fortress into a giant oven and kept the blaze burning for three days and three nights. The king’s aide, who had hired me, apparently gave up when attempting to count the bodies.”

Rosehera planted her tall shoes on the ground and stuck out her little butt while she faced the ground and prepared two magic circles. The circles would link the wind with humidity and prepare the entire forest the way she wanted.

She was creating a highly flammable environment where a single spark of static would start a forest fire. This hope elf was superior to the ordinary elves who already had powerful magic and nearly endless lives, so her actions would surpass theirs as well. There was zero chance of Rosehera screwing up her magic.

The dark elves of the forest would be wiped out by Klaus’s “side”.

Could he really let this happen? That question had been growing and growing in the boy’s mind for a while now. The dark elves were strangers to him. In fact, they had even tried to cruelly kill him. But no matter how self-righteous he had been, he had still seen how they lived their lives. He had seen Little Girl deriving comfort from Mother and he had seen Leader being rebuked by Curvy.

And he had seen Slender rescue him.

Maybe those smiles would never be directed at him.

But was that any reason to be okay with those smiles being permanently erased?

Maybe they wouldn’t smile his way, maybe they wouldn’t give him anything, and maybe Slender would never be his wife.

Those thoughts saddened him, but he would never place his own likes and dislikes above other people’s lives.

Everyone was looking at this all wrong. The dark elves had attacked “Professor Dissection” Kyle Hardjuicer. If someone barged into your home and said they wanted to capture and dissect your family, anyone would resist to the best of their ability. But the next thing he knew, everyone was talking about retaliating in the name of the noble Sir Rainbook. How could they judge the dark elves for what happened? The dark elves didn’t even understand human language, so they wouldn’t even know who Sir Rainbook was. They couldn’t possibly have maliciously targeted him. And hadn’t Loinbelt said he only died because he moved into harm’s way to protect the boy?

What even was this?

Klaus Knockburn asked himself which side he wanted to take here. Were the dark elves really fascinating enough to throw away his life now that he was finally safe again?

What about his future wife?

What did he think about Slender?

Yes, she had rescued him from being burned at the stake, but more recently she had also tried to kill him as soon as he attempted to communicate. That made it flat, even, 50/50. He could no longer say she alone understood him, so would he really risk his own life to protect the dark elves now?

And if so, why?

“Oh. Damn, so that’s why.”

“Hm? What is it, boy?”

Elzane Livzy, the horseback knight who did not bother hiding her bright hair, gave him a confused look that actually made her look younger for once. He ignored her. Instead, he turned toward the hope elf whose large, pierced ears were twitching up and down while she drew out her magic circles with the long stick held in both hands.

“Excuse me, St. Rosehera.”

“Ho ho. I know I said I would not complaint, but that title is more embarrassing than I expected.”

She kept the stick moving and gave a casual glance back his way. This magic was something she could do ''while focused on something else''. Yet it would burn all of the dark elves to death in the very forest where they lived in peace.

“So what did you want?”

“Just for future reference, this…Levazastar thing? How long does the magic circle take to complete?”

“Hm. Not long.”

“So you can just create as many of them as you want?”

“No, not even I can do that. It looks simple, but the details are quite tricky. A common factor between all forms of expert craftsmanship.”

“Really?”

“The tools at hand are another issue. Drawing out the linked circles is simple enough, but a normal compass is not enough to determine their exact location. That requires an astrological sextant. Acquiring one of those through a special route at the royal capital was no easy task, let me tell you.”

“I see.”

“Still, the initial linework is more or less complete now.”

He thought his heart had stopped.

But Rosehera narrowed her blue eyes and wiped sweat from her brow as she clarified.

“This is a large geoglyph. I must view the stars and make precise corrections to the details, so we must wait until around dawn.”

“Ha ha. I see, I see.”

Klaus Knockburn nodded several times while slowly walking along the edge of the magic circles. He viewed the massive amount of material this expert was letting him see. They had to weave between the trees, but the magic circles covered several dozen meters. Together, they rivaled the size of a sports arena back in the capital. Once he had put enough distance between him and Elzane’s group, the skinny boy casually hid himself behind the forest’s trees.

He looked back twice, blatantly checking to see if anyone was following him, and then he broke into a sprint to get away from the knight camp.

…''I couldn’t tell what Slender was thinking. First she saved me and then she tried to kill me, so why was her behavior so inconsistent? The answer is so obvious.

“Pant, gasp!”

…''Now that I’m in her position, it all makes sense. She had to put on an act because the others were watching! It never did make sense that I took a direct blast of Archdragon Magic and survived. When I was camouflaged as her, Leader and the others were nearby! So that was the only way she could think of to save me!!

The preparations were approaching completion like the hands of a clock.

So if nothing was done, the vast Forest of No Return would be engulfed in flames. Leaving Rosehera and Elzane now was tantamount to suicide.

But he had still run off.

He couldn’t stop them. Hope Elf Rosehera and Last Resort Unit Commander Elzane Livzy were simply too powerful. Before even attempting to fight, he could tell his camouflage magic would not help here.

His feelings were a mess. It was possible this had nothing to do with humans or dark elves to him. He may have simply wanted to run away from seeing anyone dying. They could call him a chicken or a coward if they wanted. He tried to shout that there was nothing wrong with that.

“Ahhhhhhhhhh!! Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!”

But when he opened his mouth, no actual words emerged.

He knew he was making a terrible mistake. The dark elves would be using silence to their advantage while they took up the optimal positions to attack, so there was no way they wouldn’t hear him making so much noise.

Something dropped down from a branch overhead.

It was heavy, but also soft and warm. This was not his first time being flattened on the ground in this forest. But now it was a dark elf hunter instead of an elite human knight.

The person pinning him down had long hair, brown skin, and ruby-red eyes. She wore a white leather vest and a blue tight skirt. Her most notable features were the bow much too large for her size and the earring on only one ear.

This was Slender.

Now of all times, her gentle warmth stabbed straight into his brain.

“''Ykb gug bae teq iyib?''”

He was sobbing like a child when she pushed her face in close and asked some kind of question. She seemed to be accusing him from only 5cm away. As if trying to push him back to rejoin his own kind.

“''Wkiw uv ykoto bae fipo htap, va ykb yaeng bae towetq wa wko hatovw qay?''”

Klaus felt his voice catch in his throat.

Then he slowly shook his head and worked his trembling lips.

In order to speak her words in another language.

“Why did you…run away?”

“''…?''”

Speaking to her in human language was meaningless, but she still gave him a puzzled look. This was strange. It fit a little too well.

Klaus Knockburn loudly clicked his tongue below her and threw out everything he had learned so far. Learning what “jutn” meant or that “bae” meant “you” wasn’t want mattered. He didn’t need to decode each individual word and write up a dictionary. The rules were much simpler than that.

“''It’s just shifted ahead by two letters! With consonants and vowels separate!'' Dammit, why did it take me so long to figure that out!?”

A language like that could not have developed naturally. They may have intentionally altered the language themselves.

He wanted to laugh out loud at the thought of the linguists around the world who wasted years trying to study it as a natural language. Had it been so ridiculously simple that the possibility never even occurred to them? Maybe the dark elves had used their long years of experience to learn how to intentionally slip inside human blind spots like that.

[[Image:Dark_Elf_v01_bw4.png|thumb]]

He could easily guess why they had forbidden themselves from using the same language as humans.

They feared the humans. They didn’t want to be deceived again.

So they had sealed off all communication.

Klaus Knockburn awkwardly worked his way through the words, converting each one in his head.

“''U eqgotvwiqg baet niqjeijo.''” (I understand your language.)

“''Ykiw!?''” (What!?)

This time, Slender’s eyes opened wide and she held a hand to her mouth.

Now that he could convert it in his head, he could tell what she was saying. So he shouted in dark elf.

“''Now that I understand you, you can’t deny it!! I can hear your screams, see your fear, and sense everything you’re thinking and feeling! So tell me – what is it you want to do here? Tell me in your own words!! What do the dark elves hope to accomplish by resurrecting Brashgain!?''”

He waited.

He waited until he some terrifying words reached his ears.

“''What…are you talking about?''”

“…”

She tilted her head in genuine confusion. It was cute, but that was what made it so frightening. The feeling spreading from his fingers to the rest of his body was different from the fear he had felt when nearly burned at the stake or when facing Professor Dissection.

Communication was not always a good thing.

Communication could also be used to deceive or feign ignorance.

Was she the type who could lie about love with a smile on her face?

No, this was different.

“''I’ve never heard anything about resurrecting Brashgain.''”

“''But then…''” Klaus sniffled and raised his voice to a desperate shout. Almost like he was lashing out at the girl in front of him. “''Then what was all that? I was nearly burned at the stake in that clearing. You dark elves keep chasing after me and no one would take my side. So tell me the truth!! That all has to do with some kind resurrection ceremony, doesn’t it? I feel bad about stumbling across you while you were bathing, but punishing that with death is an obvious overreaction! And you expect me to believe you’re not some priestess who holds the key to the ceremony and there’s some rule saying no one can gaze upon you while you purify yourself beforehand!?''”

Slender shook her head.

He sensed some kind of misunderstanding. And even a minor one could lead to disaster if ignored.

She slowly explained the reason for it in as few words as possible to ensure he understood her.

“''Goignb ritivuwov.''”

Deadly parasites.

After converting it in his head, Klaus Knockburn bit his lip.

The world went dark before his eyes.

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