Dark Elf:Volume1

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Prologue

A legend. A true living legend stood before him.

The skinny boy named Klaus Knockburn had heard at the Court Magic Academy that the legendary dark elves could be found in this deep forest. Dark elves were featured in children’s picture books about as often as wicked witches, but this was his first time actually seeing one.

She looked to be around 15 or 16, but it was hard to judge the actual age of such a long-lived species. She was a little shorter than Klaus. Her silver hair fell to her hips and her skin was a healthy brown. Her eyes were large and ruby red. She had a small, beautiful face that drew the eye. Maybe that was thanks to the twitching of her ears that extended far to the side in a way human ears did not. Dark elves supposedly hunted and gathered herbs in the forest to survive, but her lithe and symmetrical figure was more reminiscent of a ballerina or gymnast. She was more lovely than a noble girl and more alluring than a bar dancer. And she also had a mystical feel that made you feel somewhat guilty when looking at her.

Klaus had forgotten to take notes. Even if he was still in training, that made him a failure of a fieldwork researcher. But he could not picture his rotten teacher’s mocking expression at the moment. He was too focused on something else.

Speaking of which, why could Klaus describe the dark elf’s appearance in such detail?

Because she was naked.

She had been bathing on the bank of a babbling brook.

An odd silence hung over them.

They were deep in the forest where the smell of vegetation was strong. The many conifer trees left just enough space for some mottled sunlight to filter through onto a river bank covered in smooth stones. But the river itself was shallow. The clear water only came up to the standing dark elf’s shins and sharp rocks could be seen jutting above the surface here and there.

The mottled sunlight and the clear water shined light across the scene.

A gold earring with a red gem glittered on the dark elf girl’s long right ear, so she clearly kept it on even when bathing. The entire world seemed to be shining. The long-eared girl stood in the water with her hands behind her head. She must have been gathering up her wet hair when she froze with beautiful eyes wide. The option of hiding must not have occurred to her. The clueless type, eh?

The boy had also frozen in place after walking through some vegetation covered in spiderweb-like strings, but he yelled out loud a few seconds later.

“Whaaaaaat!? That’s what girls look like down there!!!???”

“Bumov. Y-ykiw?”

She opened her mouth, but some weird sounds came out. Maybe that was the dark elf language.

The girl belatedly jumped and bent over to cover herself with her hands, but she did a poor job of it. Her defenses were woefully insufficient. Her surprise was winning out at the moment, so what she was covering up and what she should have been covering up didn’t match up at all. Klaus would have loved to warn her, but he couldn’t speak dark elf!! He settled on covering his face with one hand and pointing at the undefended locations with his other hand, but she showed no sign of catching on!!!!!!

…Wait…e-ehhh?”

He had been searching out the dark elves ever since he first saw them in a picture book as a child. Most of his childhood dreams had come and gone or evolved with time, but this one alone had remained firm. He had enrolled in the royal capital’s Court Magic Academy, he was learning magical biology in an elective taught by his rotten teacher, a known eccentric, and he had focused his learning on dark elves in particular.

And yet.

When he finally encountered one of those living legends, undoubtedly a historic moment, he found himself in a truly awkward position. If the academy back home asked him to explain what happened, would he have to tell it all in minute detail? He could easily imagine the (seemingly) young girl covering her brightly-blushing face with both hands. Really, the whole idea felt like a terrible violation of her privacy.

But there she was, right in front of him and close enough to reach out and touch one of those long ears!!

It was love at first sight. No one thing stood out to him. Her long silver hair, her smooth brown skin, her distinctive long ears, her gorgeous red eyes, the way she seemed so calm and composed yet grew innocently flustered instead of angry or tearful when someone saw her naked – every last bit of it was perfect!

…Thank the goddess I’ve never been popular.

Klaus was actually tearing up with emotion. Could it be that his lonely school life had been the goddess’s kindly making sure his first time would be even better than he had ever dared hope? He hoped so. If not, he might just impulsively strangle the goddess.

But wait. It was too soon to get excited. Now was not the time to be thinking with his dick. This was an important expedition for his magical biology research. He needed to take notes, write up a paper, and submit it. At this rate, he would look back at his notes and not know if “dark elf” meant this individual or the entire species. As a court scientist in training, Klaus knew he needed to be careful. It would be best to give her an individual name right away. One glance at the naked girl and he decided to call her Slender! What exactly he was looking at when that name came to mind is best left unsaid.

And after searching for this mystical species since he was little, he also knew all about their legends.

Didn’t they have a rule where a dark elf had to marry someone who secretly stole her weapons or armor…in other words, someone who saw her stripped bare?

It was a common enough cultural custom within magical biology. Stories of beautiful spirits having their clothing stolen while they bathed and then being asked to marry the thief could be found all over the world. There were also plenty of stories where a supernatural creature had to leave human civilization in tears after their true identity was discovered. Accidents that left nonhuman magical creatures defenseless were simply that important.

And dark elves placed a large focused on strength since they used hunting and gathering to survive. They especially valued the ability to hide your presence and take up a deadly attack position unnoticed. So the skills needed to silently approach close enough to steal their clothing and see them defenselessly naked was a show of strength.

Desiring a strong partner was a common value among nonhumans.

So this girl – Slender – would apparently ask Klaus to marry her.

“Y-yiuw.”

The girl’s cheeks were flushed with embarrassment, but her hands still weren’t covering the parts that really mattered. Did she not actually care if he saw that stuff? Or was she saying he alone was allowed to look? Whatever the case, Slender opened her lips in surprise.

But instead of screaming, she clearly tried to communicate with him.

“Ykiw ito bae gauqj wkoto? Uq hifw, ito bae amib???”

He once more observed the dark elf girl from head to toe. And he nodded.

…I bet she’s asking me to marry her.

He was certain of it. She did seem to be saying too much for that, but pessimism is a good way to live a dreary life. He could see it in her red eyes. The psychic waves were reaching him and how could those lie!?

This had all been an unfortunate accident, but what would happen to her if he refused her based on his own human rules? And what if he left the forest and walked right on back to town? Just think about it. She didn’t just want to marry him, she had to. If he ignored her here, she would be ostracized by her village for failing to follow their strict rules and this unresolved “engagement” would prevent her from ever finding love with anyone else.

…Then Slender would be all alone for the rest of her long life! For the nigh endless span of her elf life!! Left with only her own company to soothe her on those lonely nights! Actually, I kind of want to see that part, but I can’t doom her to a lifetime of it!!!!!!

That was a tragedy. A tragedy in his power to prevent.

…Yes, I need to do the responsible thing here.

Slender appeared to be using the local dark elf language and he had not yet checked to see if she was bilingual, so he used exaggerated gestures as he spoke. He spread his arms wide, spoke loudly, and enunciated each word as clearly as he could.

He slowly approached the girl and kneeled in the river with an audible splash.

Klaus Knockburn took her slim brown hand.

And he switched on his prince mode.

“I would be honored to take your hand in marriage and begin sharing a bed as soon as poss- gwah!!!???”

He was not permitted to finish his sentence.

A few more dark elves appeared behind him, seemingly out of nowhere, and treated him quite violently. He was pinned at their feet, his arms and head held down. He did not even have time for surprise. What level of expertise did it take to approach silently through shallow water?

Also, these ones were not naked. They wore white leather vests, blue tight skirts, and red jewels. They wore a quiver at the hip and held a long bow over the arm. They were stereotypical dark elf hunters. But Klaus knew he would get confused if he just called them all “dark elves”. Confusion was bad, so to help thoroughly research everything from their armpits to their pointy ears, he chose to name them.

…Okay, the one with the boobs too big for her clothing and the bare forehead will be Curvy and the relentless-looking one with the sharp eyes and the ponytail can be Leader.

Only after finding he could not use his arms did the boy realize he should have been taking notes. If he had to rely on his memories when writing his paper later on, he was bound to misremember some of the details. So during fieldwork, he was supposed to take notes of even the most insignificant-seeming things.

“Kob, Mouqi! Ykiw uv i kepiq gauqj uq koto!?”

“Ko…kivq’w dooq fitog hat? Uvq’w ko ihtiug ah wko gtijaq dejv!?”

With a short shriek, time seemed to speed back up for bathing Slender. She blushed and actually covered herself with her hands. It was kind of funny that she was freaking out now more than when Klaus, a boy, had been looking her in the eye.

Yeah, this makes sense, thought Klaus. That was a little too good to be true.

…Still, even if you’re capturing a blatant peeping tom, could you not pin me face down in the water? My whole face is submerged and I can only hold my breath for so long. Or is this the goddess’s kind way of letting me enjoy the same water those beautiful dark elf feet are soaking i-…gurgle, gurgle, gurgle…

He saw white. The view before his eyes grew so bright so quickly he could only perceive it as the color white. His blindfold had been removed. It took him a few seconds to realize he hadn’t been unconscious this whole time – his eyes had simply been covered.

“Hm? Ugh…”

His vision had returned, but his mind was having trouble processing what he saw.

He was standing up with his arms behind his back and his entire body was tied to a log. As soon as he realized that, he began to feel pain across his body like when you tied a string tight around your finger. But he was too preoccupied to grimace.

Coolheaded Leader, in her white leather hunter’s outfit, had a hand up to hide her lips while she whispered in the long ear of a priest-type in a loose silk outfit adorned with green jewels – he decided to call her Glasses for now.

“Wko kotdv ito toigb, Fiwkotuqo. Dew wkuv uv iq opotjoqfb, va wkuv yunn do hiutnb giqjotaev.”

“Yo kixo nuwwno fkaufo. Wkuv uv wko gtijaq dejv yo’to winmuqj idaew. Yuwkaew wkuv, ko yunn vetonb guo.”

A pile of dried plants lay at his feet. And all of the dark elf women and girls surrounding him were holding torches in the middle of the day. This did not seem to be a gathering of a specific group. The hunters with the white leather outfits and large bows were joined by the priests in thin, white silk and even a little girl in a sheer dress clinging to her mother’s hip.

The entire community had chosen this course of action. It felt more like a ritual than a crime.

“A-all this?”

He was about to be executed. Just like he occasionally saw in the royal capital.

“All this just for peeping on someone bathing!? Do you feel the need to fully cleanse even the smallest impurities you find!?”

Where was the girl from before – Slender!? Klaus moved his head around as best he could while tied to the log and found that girl standing within the crowd with a hand on her hip.

He strained at the rope and shouted over at her.

“Help me, Slender! If you tell them they’re overreacting, surely- ah!?”

He was dumbfounded. Did she just look away in a huff!?

…And come to think of it…

A fundamental question finally entered one corner of Klaus Knockburn’s mind.

The legends said a dark elf had to marry someone who stole all of her weapons and armor without her noticing.

Could it be that very human-friendly legend wasn’t even true!!!???

Chapter 1: Trial and Error, How It All Began

Part 1

That deep, deep forest was known as the Forest of No Return.

Once you wandered into that cursed forest, you were doomed to never leave again. Thanks to that, there were no hunters living in the small inn town at the forest’s entrance and all the meat served at the restaurant had to be transported from afar by wagons. It was all venison or beef preserved with salt. The way it was soaked in water to remove the preserving salt before it was cooked provided a unique flavor, but it would get old fast if it was all you had.

The redheaded boy named Klaus Knockburn’s plate also contained a round object no more than 5cm thick. It was the stem of a giant Witch Pumpkin, a type of magic derivative. Normal people did not eat those. In the fields outside the village, they were viewed as big, heavy weeds and wagon drivers hated them. However, certain conditions had to be met to use magic. In Klaus’s case, he only had to soften up the hard, nasty stem by cooking and seasoning it, but some people had to eat or drink things with extreme bitterness or even toxins that had to be removed first. Figuring out the trick to preparing it and asking a cook to make it more appetizing was one job of a magic user.

…If I use up all the stem inside me, I get really bad headaches and dizziness. That might sound like a big problem, but it’s really not much different than what happens if you don’t eat anything for an entire day. Once you’re used to eating them, you stop thinking about how much trouble it is to do so.

“It doesn’t make any sense, does it? All this delicious meat is delivered along a road built through the Forest of No Return.”

A beautiful (on the outside) court scientist with long, glossy black hair and bright skin was moving her knife and fork across the table from Klaus. Observing the items she had on the table was enough to know what kind of magic she used. She did not have any Witch Pumpkin stem.

Her name was Reika Kickpleats.

She wore a thick black cloak, a witch hat with floral decorations, intellectual glasses, and a tight black dress that showed off her plentiful curves like a smooth silk camisole. That rotten teacher was downing a glass of red wine in the middle of the day.

“Pwahh☆ If you’re gonna be an absolute disaster anyway, you might as well start day drinking!!”

“Y’know, you could at least try not being a disaster.”

Klaus’s comment was not appreciated. Reika snatched up the broom leaning against the wall nearby and smacked him over the head with it.

“Ow!?”

“Pipe down, my #1 student.”

Klaus heard a heavy metallic clanking from directly behind him. She must have wanted him to lower his head, but that grip was made of hard and heavy Naval Cedar, the same wood used to build the giant sailing ships used for intercontinental travel. She had hit him in the head, but he felt a little nauseous and couldn’t get his voice out.

A knight in heavy armor was walking by behind him, so Reika unnaturally leaned her upper body down onto the table to hide herself in the crowd.

“Oh, dear. I can’t let the knights see me here, so I might have to have you go buy me sandwiches from now on.”

“What did you do this time?” groaned the redheaded boy.

His rotten teacher winked behind her glasses while resting her upper body on the table (and thus softly squishing her large breasts against it).

“It’s all a big misunderstanding☆ As always, I’m working myself to the bone to make the world a better place.”

Then she quietly explained her reason for this trip to the Forest of No Return.

This was his last warning. And Klaus was not stupid enough to enter that deep forest without even knowing why first. He sighed when he saw how good a mood she was in despite her messy hair.

Once she was done explaining, he had just one thing to say.

“What a mess.”

“Don’t act like you couldn’t guess this was going to get messy☆ Were you worried about your kind, gentle, and beautiful teacher traveling all on her lonesome?”

“Of course not. I’m here because of the extremely rare reports of dark elves being spotted in the Forest of No Return.”

Dark elves were occasionally seen in virgin forests.

But he had to be cautious.

“A human only has one chance in their entire life to find a dark elf village. There are no second chances. So if I give up and leave the forest, I can never ever find their village.”

“Isn’t that just a legend? Do you have any statistics to back it up, my #1 student?”

“Shut up and listen. I’ve been visiting likely forests and wasted my chance in all of them. I never even caught a glimpse of a dark elf, much less their village! So if I screw up here, I’ll have to travel across the ocean and try to find an uncharted island or something!!”

“Sigh. You’re almost as thorough as me.”

“I have to be. My past brethren have pursued the dark elves for generations, but not one of them managed to reach those legendary villages. They all lost hope, graduated, returned home, and took over the family business…but I refuse!! Why do you think I chose this elective in magical biology that lets me study all the fantasy lifeforms that don’t fit into the general classifications? I’ll do whatever it takes to find a real dark elf and marry her!!!!!!”

“But that’s the Forest of No Return. They say you can never find your way out again if you take a single step off the stone-paved road. Besides, aren’t dark elves depicted as villains in children’s books?”

Witches were also stereotypical children’s book villains, but that long history of prejudice had finally come to an end and it was now an elite position that granted you free access to the royal court. So couldn’t the same happen for dark elves? Klaus pouted his lips. He would make sure it happened.

“Sigh. Since you chose my lessons for your elective, I really wish you would direct this passion toward the rest of your fieldwork. I’ve never seen someone so bad at investigating strata and water veins.”

“Um, how exactly do you expect me to focus on something that doesn’t have brown boobs and a healthy ass?”

Reika Kickpleats received a refill from a waitress in a miniskirt uniform that excessively accentuated her chest (given her age, it may have been her way of finding someone to marry). Reika swished the red liquid around in her gloved hand and narrowed her eyes.

“What is it about dark elves that motivates you like this, my silly student? Especially when you have a lonely witch getting a little tipsy right in front of you?”

“Heh heh heh. An unusually good question for you, my silly teacher. You see, dark elves have shiny silver hair and brown bodies that are as athletic as they are sexy. I also love how they wear unnecessarily revealing clothing and consider it perfectly normal. These aren’t the normal elves you can find just about anywhere. Those ones act all friendly like they’re coming on to you, but then they brag about how many hundreds of years old they are and insist they have no interest in romance with a human, but dark elves have none of those impenetrable defenses!! Yes, the keyword here is purity. I need a pure dark elf who’s super strong, still lives in tune with nature, and has the wisdom of age, but is also kind of clueless and defenseless!!!!!!”

“That is legitimately creepy.”

Part 2

Dead-eyed Klaus Knockburn awoke from his reverie.

“Ahh…”

He was screwed and withdrawing into his memories wasn’t going to change that.

Was this some kind of ritual? He was tied to a log while dark elf dancers danced around him in yellow-jeweled outfits sheerer than lace underwear. Every time they arched their back, lifted their leg high, and rhythmically moved their belly, their gold chains, bracelets, and other accessories jangled together. A sweet feminine scent wafted over from one short-haired young woman while beads of sweat flew from her hair and skin. But the show was hard to enjoy when it felt like they were preparing him to be cooked.

Was this their village, or not? Either way, they were deep inside the dark-elf-controlled Forest of No Return. This far away from human civilization, no one would come to his rescue if he shouted. His rotten teacher had entered the forest with him, but where had she gone? Had she been caught and roasted earlier, or had she abandoned him and fled when he passed out? Whatever the case, the legends had been wrong and it was looking like the actual reward for seeing a naked dark elf was death. But he had a feeling that rotten woman would have broken several other taboos.

Klaus Knockburn was all alone. The dark elves he had dreamed of meeting had tied him to a log pillar, piled up dried plants at his feet, and were surrounding him with torches at the ready. The dancer in thin lace that he had dubbed Short Hair and the hunter in white leather he had dubbed Leader both had their midriffs showing and they were not shy about showing off their cleavage and thighs either. Once he started paying attention, he found a lot of exposed skin. Those outfits were aggressively revealing.

He was in a crisis situation.

He was surrounded by the dark elves you were lucky to see even once in a lifetime, but they were about to cook him alive. So he wanted to believe this was the result of a misguided survival instinct.

…O-oh, no.

Whatever the reason, it still happened.

“Wait, wait, wait, why!? No, it really is getting hard!!

Due to a private male concern, he really wanted to inconspicuously lean forward, but he unfortunately had to remain standing tall since he was tied to the thick pillar behind him. And they were staring at him. Every last one of them, from the brown girl hiding behind what was likely her mother (Okay, I’ll call her Little Girl for now) to an alluring young woman (She can be Tear Mole). Was the little girl in the white dress, who wore her silver hair in a braid mixed with some artificial hair to mimic her mother, leaning forward to get a better look?

He could only pray all those serious-faced dark elves had not noticed his shame!

“…”

Then the bathing girl – his future wife Slender – turned her head aside with a hand still on her hip. But he was pretty sure the visible side of her face had grown a bit red. Her pursed lips were also moving, but he was too far away to hear what she was muttering to herself.

…She didn’t notice, did she?

She didn’t, right!? Right!? pleaded Klaus. Please, goddess!!

But he had no way of communicating while tied up like this, so he couldn’t even ask her. He had never known how distressing it was to be unable to communicate! He ground his teeth together. This was the most trouble he had been in since he dozed off in class that one time. It had only been for 5 minutes, but when he woke up, he found that thing was doing what it tended to do in the mornings. He had tried his best to hide it, but his rotten teacher had covered her mouth with a hand and laughed most elegantly. “Oh, dear. What have we here? That cute thing is really working hard to catch my eye, isn’t it? Was I perhaps a little too sexy today?”

…Noooooo!! I can’t let that happen agaiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiin!!

His entire body trembled as that nightmare came rushing back.

He was bound tight and had no chance of escaping. And even if he did slip free of the rope, he was fully surrounded by dark elves carrying torches and bows. Trying to escape in front of them would only get him pummeled into submission by the entire group.

He could use magic.

But if he used it poorly, it would only seal his fate.

Which would be the more painful death: having his vitals pierced by poison-tipped arrows, or having his skull smashed open by the dull machetes and axes used to create their firewood and torches? Either choice – or neither choice – would not be a pleasant death.

…Wait.

He was dripping with sweat and struggling to breath. He didn’t want them to laugh at him, but the complete lack of laughter led him to another realization.

…O-oh, no. Is this not just some cruel joke!?

It had excited him a little to think of this as a group of silver-haired, brown-skinned women ganging up on and tying him up, but was this actually very serious?

“Wait, wait! But reaching a dark elf village is one of my life goals!!”

Tension filled the air when he shouted in human language.

The dancers stiffened and briefly stopped their dance. The sudden pause sent beads of sweat flying from the ends of their silver hair. Even if they couldn’t understand him, they may have been able to sense his anger at this unreasonable situation.

A very ominous silence followed. His use of human language may have put them on guard, or maybe even riled them up.

On that note, was this even their village? He didn’t see any buildings around. It may have been a ceremonial ground or an execution ground.

If so, he hadn’t even reached his goal. He was figuratively sliding headfirst toward the incinerator.

He barely understood anything here, which pressed down on him like a thick wall.

…I…

His throat went dry. He felt death’s icy fingers on his back. He had no idea how this ritual worked, but if a single ember reached the pile of dried plants at his feet, even by mistake, he might be burned alive here. The possible discovery of his hard-on was no longer his primary concern.

…I need to make contact. I need to communicate!! I’ve wanted to meet dark elves for ages. They might be another species, but they look almost identical to us. Yeah, they have longer ears, but they have hearts and they have brains just like us. When they look this identical, they must be able to feel the same emotions we feel, so I know they’ll understand if I can just speak with them. Our wedding night isn’t over yet! Crap, now I’m really nervous. M-ma’am, I promise I will make your daughter happy! And you as well if you want to marry me too!!

Luckily, he did know a bit of the elf language. That wouldn’t be the same as the dark elf language, but they might be able to understand a fellow elf language…right? If there were any bilingual elves here, they were more likely to know dark elf and elf than dark elf and human!

If he screwed this up, he would be burned at the stake, so he licked his lips with a dry tongue.

…Um, “I wasn’t aware of your rules” would be…like this I think!!

He doubted anyone would mistake him for fluent, but he still managed to stumble through the elf words one at a time.

“Lhoipo plino jo. U sipk’q isino ab vaen nehop! U ilahacuwo ub u abbokzoz vae, pa yaehz vae lhoipo iq hoipq plino jv hubo?”

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

H-huh?

Time seemed to grind to a halt as a tense silence formed, so Klaus Knockburn smiled a little.

But not because he was amused. Quite the opposite.

He was pretty sure he had gotten it right. He might have had an accent, but he had spoken proper elf to them. Yet he felt more than just a chill. No one was smiling, not sharp-eyed Leader and not even Little Girl hiding behind her mother’s back. They made him feel like he had just snorted with laughter in the middle of a funeral where everyone else was sobbing. He had made some critical mistake here. He didn’t need to understand their language to sense that. He could no longer control his emotions. Maybe people reacted with laughter when all the assumptions of safety they had built up in their head were suddenly broken down.

He hesitantly turned toward his future wife Slender.

She was sighing with one hand on her hip and one hand on her forehead.

She looked exasperated or maybe resigned.

…Wait, wait, wait! Forget I said anything! Give me a do-over!!

Meanwhile, Tear Mole the dancer and Glasses the priest, who had pointy gold decorations (horns? wings?) on either side of her head, were whispering to each other.

“Kob, Fiwkotuqo. Uv ko i htuoqg ah wko onxov?”

“Uw yaeng voop va, Noqbi. Ykufk uv inn wko pato toivaq ykb yo qoog wa vixo kup.”

As an outsider and a human, he had no way of knowing how the legendary dark elves would react. He had hoped they would respond more positively to the language of their cousins the elves, but only after making the choice did a very bad feeling set in. He begged the goddess to tell him it wasn’t so.

But what if?

…What if the elves and dark elves are mortal enemies and we humans just aren’t aware of it?

“Dojuq!!!!!!”

Surprisingly, it was intellectual-looking Glasses who gave the arrogant command. The many torches were all raised at once and then thrown toward the boy’s feet, landing on the pile of dried plants there.

Part 3

Klaus’s vision was obscured by flames and smoke.

He did not even have time for fear. His eyes and nose throbbed with pain and, instead of heat, he felt pain like sharp needles were piercing every part of his body. The direct pain and suffering shattered the freedom of thought that people were meant to preserve above all else.

He couldn’t think. Human or dark elf, the burning fire would consume anything in its path.

“Agh! Cough, cough!!”

He coughed violently and twisted around, but he still could not free himself from the log. He could use magic, but he had erred in his timing. It was too late to use his magic in a panic now that the fire was already set. He should have tried it sooner despite the risk. Then he might have been able to escape, even if the odds were low. They might have killed him, but at least he would have chosen his fate. He could have avoided this worst of all possibilities where he did nothing, had no chance of survival and was simply executed.

…Am I going to die like this?

It was horribly unfair, but the pain from his burned nose and throat kept him from screaming. But why did they do this? That was still a mystery. Had it been that wrong to see Slender naked? Or had it been a mistake to use the elf language? Was he going to die without even knowing the reason why?

All of a sudden, Klaus realized he could think again. Perhaps he had grown numb to the direct pain. If so, was the real terror about to hit him? That seems backwards, he thought with a slight smile. He felt a step removed from his own predicament, like he was looking down on himself in an out-of-body experience.

That was when he noticed it. In fact, maybe that was why he noticed it.

Something felt off to him.

There was way too much of it. Of what? Of the smoke. The white smoke billowed out like cotton candy and fully obscured his vision, but there shouldn’t have been that much of it. He thought about what this could mean while the smoke irritated his tear ducts and sent tears streaming down his cheeks. Why was there so much smoke after they threw their torches on the dried plants? He couldn’t think of any reason for that to trigger an incomplete combustion. He should have been engulfed in a giant pillar of fire.

And…

“Ito bae amib?”

He heard a voice from a seemingly impossible location.

He couldn’t understand it, but the sound definitely came from within the fire.

“Wkob fiq’w voo ykiw’v kirroquqj koto, va u fiq jow bae aew ah koto.”

He couldn’t see past his nose with all the smoke, but he recognized that clear voice.

Is that…Slender?

…But why? If this is a punishment for peeping on her bathing, she wouldn’t come to rescue me.

He felt a tug forward. That shouldn’t have moved him while tied to the log, but he collapsed forward nevertheless. Before his knees could land in the dried plants, he felt someone supporting his weight. He could feel an intelligent mind behind the action.

He also felt a litheness not found in his male body. He could sense someone’s pulse through their touching chests.

…Huh? There’s an awful lot there for someone named Slender.

He must have been too heavy for her because he felt her stagger back a few steps. Whoever this was, they were no ghost. They had a real, physical body.

…She undid the rope.

But in the middle of a fire???

No, there may not have been as much fire as it seemed. That unnatural fact may have been the result of something the dark elves did for their ritual.

“Uh, ah.”

He had questions, but he did not have it in him to find any answers. The thick smoke kept Leader, Curvy, and the others dark elf hunters from seeing him, but it also filled his lungs.

He did not even sense himself passing out.

He was not even aware he was crossing that line as his consciousness slipped away.

Part 4

A heavy pain pounded in Klaus Knockburn’s head. But that very suffering was proof he still lived.

“Kh…”

He had come to, but he lacked the strength to jump to his feet. He couldn’t remember what was happening or where he was.

“Oww.”

He could tell he was lying on his back deep in the forest. He could see conifer trees too big to reach his arms around and large boulders. It was all covered in green moss, making them all look like one combined mass. It appeared to be daytime, but the light was dim thanks to the branches overhead. Some colorful objects lay at the base of a tree. Red Ghost Turnips and orange Witch Pumpkins measuring more than a meter across were growing there. Their skin was as thick as a shield, making them a poor choice for cooking.

After spending a good long time observing his surroundings, Klaus rolled onto his stomach. What felt like a low pile carpet had to be the green moss. His fingers trembled and the rest of him refused to move. Where was he? Why was he lying in the middle of the forest? More and more questions occurred to him, but they were all swept from his mind a moment later.

A long-eared individual was watching him. The silver-haired, brown-skinned dark elf was w-sitting on the ground and cautiously extending just her head forward to peer at him.

It was Slender.

He cried out in surprise.

She jumped and tried to scoot back while still seated. All she really accomplished was straining her white leather clothing and messing up her sitting position.

“Y-ykiw? Gaq’w htoim aew numo wkiw, kepiq. Bae vfitog po!!”

Without straightening back up, she reached out a frantic hand, but scooting back had placed her out of reach of the bow she had left on the ground. She looked like the calm and composed type, but he was quickly learning she was easily flustered. He could not even get up, yet she had nearly fallen over and even had tears in her eyes as she tried to find something to do. She was acting like she had just encountered a violent ruffian.

“What?”

Klaus worked to dredge up the memories inside his smoke-addled mind.

He had nearly been burned at the stake, but then this girl had untied him within all that smoke.

“Did you save me from-”

Her fingertips found the bow on the ground.

A tremor ran down his spine, but he could not even raise his hands to protect his face. He could not move, but the brown girl didn’t even hear him out before running off into the forest.

No one else remained with him.

“Umm.”

He waited a while and started feeling lonely just lying there.

“Um, what is happening to me? I feel all tingly. When will I be able to get up?”

No one answered him.

He only heard the cries of wild birds and the rustling of the forest’s trees.

Then it hit him.

He realized anew that he was alone.

Hopelessly alone.

…Um, wait. What if I can never move again? What do I do about water and food? What if some crawling bugs swarm me?

It was all too sudden. Once he focused on it, he felt a great pressure like the entire forest was collapsing in on him.

Would he pass out from hunger and then be eaten by an animal?

Would that green moss grow across his pale bones like it did the rocks and trees?

He screamed.

He shouted and yelled. He didn’t stop even when he realized the dark elves might be out searching for him. His voice was swallowed up by the deep forest. Tears fell from his eyes. He had never known being alone could be so terrifying. It affected him so much he grew irrationally angry at the dark elves for not showing up when they were supposed to be chasing after him.

…Dammit, where is that idiot of a teacher when you need her? We were supposed to be investigating the forest together, so surely she didn’t run away and l-l-l-leave me behind, right!? Ahhhh, ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!???

Wishing wasn’t going to help. His teacher was never going to come rescue him.

No one was coming. He had to survive on his own. He reached an understanding of his situation while still lying on the ground. The biggest problem for the puny boy was his lack of fire or a weapon.

…There was Leader, Tear Mole, and…how many others?

He used his fingernails to scrape letters into the moss. He listed out everything he had seen and heard.

…The hunters and priests wore different clothing. Are the dancers a third category? No, they’re probably part of the priests. Little Girl wore a dress instead, so maybe she’s still an apprentice and doesn’t have an official role yet?

He breathed a heavy sigh. The tingling remained, but he managed to grit his teeth and slowly turn his head on its side. He took an objective view of what he had recorded to help input the information into his mind.

“They had me at their mercy by the river, so why didn’t they kill me then and there? Is that river a holy place, or is there some significance in the use of fire? Boobs, thighs…oh, goddess, I want to put Slender’s entire long ear in my mouth and- ah!?”

Was he drifting over to a wish list of activities because he was out of information to consider? He didn’t remember most of what he had seen and heard. That may have been the smoke’s doing, but he was disappointed in his unreliable memory all the same. He could not remember what it was he couldn’t remember, but he was struck by a vague sense of forgetfulness. He especially regretted failing to observe the details of the burning ritual just because he was so worried about dying. He was a failure of a scientist and he couldn’t even complain if his rotten teacher made fun of him now.

“Y-ykiw? Gaq’w htoim aew numo wkiw, kepiq. Bae vfitog po!!”

For some reason, Slender’s words after rescuing him from the fire kept replaying in his mind. He didn’t understand what it meant, so it was like having a foreign song stuck in his head.

That memory was so vivid compared to the rest.

Analyzing the dark elf language with so little information would be difficult. It was like a code that a linguist had failed to crack after years of work. But there was definitely meaning hidden there. He could also learn about dark elf customs and culture by observing their clothing and mannerisms.

Customs and culture.

That might not sound like much, but this had all begun with seeing Slender naked.

If he had understood their culture, he could have avoided that landmine. And he could use that knowledge to his advantage. If this rule was important enough for them to take someone’s life without hesitation, then it had to influence the way they thought. For example, if there was some sacred ground or holy place they never visited, he could use it as a hiding spot.

…But first, I need to get up.

His strength was slowly but surely returning. He focused his mind on his right hand while lying on his stomach. He pressed his palm against the mossy ground and tried to place his body weight on it.

All of a sudden, he no longer felt the ground below it.

“Wahh!? Ahhhhhhhh!!”

His nose slammed into the ground, but the surprise was greater than the pain. He gritted his teeth and desperately suppressed the urge to roll around. He could now see that he was lying right next to the edge of a cliff. If he had slid just a bit more to the side, he would have fallen into that bottomless ravine.

His heart hammered in his chest.

He desperately wanted to run away from all this tension, but his body told him he didn’t have what it took. He had no map, no rope, no knife, and no water bottle. He wanted a bow and a lamp. He needed a tent and a sleeping bag.

…I need so many tools just to stay alive. Can I really survive if I delve blindly into the forest emptyhanded? Aren’t there some bare minimum of tools you need when camping?

He was alone now, but that was why he needed a solid plan. If he hoped to leave the forest, he needed to travel deeper inside. The only people in the forest with tools were the dark elves. They weren’t going to lend him some if he asked politely, of course. With the exception of Slender, they would probably burn him at the stake. So he needed to sneak in to their village and borrow a map and knife.

Running away was the natural instinct.

But.

He could only attempt to reach their village once in his life. Once he left the forest, he could never try it again.

“Maybe when I reach the village, I’ll look through a window and happen to see Slender engaged in some embarrassing hobby and that can lead to a secret life together.”

He felt like the deep green of the forest was going to crush him to death if he did not speak his fantasies out loud.

Also…

“Where am I?”

He was in the forest. Deep in the forest. The raw nature of the place rejected human life.

It had several different names, including the Dragon’s Forest and Grave Keeper Woods, but one was more well known than the others: the Forest of No Return.

He shook the obvious question out of his heavy head and finally took a look around. The solid boulders were covered in green moss, the thick conifers didn’t look like they would grow any fruit, and some bushes sat low to the ground. He couldn’t spot any kind of landmark, so he had no way of knowing where in the forest he was.

His body felt chilly.

The deep forest was damp and cut off from the sunlight, but would that really affect him this much? The simple cloak he had bought in the royal capital did nothing to keep out the chill. He had assumed his unusual difficulty of movement was due to inhaling so much smoke, but it may have also been all the body heat he had lost while he slept.

He was worried about his chances now. His cloak was not helping as much as the shopkeeper had claimed, but it was meant for someone traveling in a group with firewood, thick tents, and other camping equipment loaded onto a convoy of wagons traveling along a safe road.

And…

“What is this?”

His hand touched something as he pressed it against the mossy ground to support his weight. The glittering gold and small red jewel of a single earring had fallen there.

Had someone lost it? He initially thought of Tear Mole and Short Hair. Those dancers had been covered in jewelry, but he didn’t recall them wearing earrings like this. Elves’ long ears drew the eye, so he could clearly remember this even without any real notes.

“Their ears…”

His own voice reminded him of something.

It reminded him of running across Slender bathing in the nude.

“Oh, right. Slender was wearing one of these when she was bathing!”

There was so much he still didn’t know about Slender. She had not screamed when he saw her naked, but she had not tried to stop the others from setting up the burning ritual. But then she had rigged the dried plants to produce a smokescreen and somehow carried him all the way here.

He had so many questions.

This went beyond language. Some rules he did not understand were at play in the Forest of No Return and he could not even figure out what was happening to him until he figured out what they were. And as the only person here, he was the only one who could do that. He had to get his body and mind moving and risk his life to search out the answers.

“Yeah, I should probably return this to her while I’m at it,” he murmured while rolling the earring around in his hand.

He had business at the dark elf village regardless, so he could leave it for her somewhere while he was there. Even better, he could happen across her there and return it in person.

He was afraid of what might happen in the village, but he wanted to see her again.

…I mean, she was naked and bathing when I first saw her, so who knows what excitement awaits me the next time. Ohh, I can’t wait. What if she’s all sticky from being trapped in a giant spider web!? Or what if she takes a face full of moth scales that make her fall in love with me!?

The dark elves scared him to death, but Slender didn’t.

That was his conclusion. He didn’t need to overcomplicate things here. He had long dreamed of finding the dark elves, but now he knew she was the only one for him.

“Which means marriage is the only option.”

He only had one chance to find the village in this forest and he would forever lose that chance if he gave up and left. She was the only person in the world he cared about right now, so he wanted to propose to her before he left the Forest of No Return. I have to! And then I need to clear a path that connects us forever and ever!!

He gently rolled the jewelry around on his palm. It was made from gold and a red gem. That meant the Forest of No Return was developed enough to create something like this. They had language and they had tools. The only problem was how they were using those things to try and burn him alive. If he could borrow some tools from their village, he could leave the forest alive and clear a path toward marrying his wife-to-be.

He could also use the lost earring. It was metal after all. He collected a large branch lying nearby.

He was not hoping to use it as a handmade spear or fishing rod.

…I can write on it.

He needed to be careful because pure gold was soft, but he could carve letters into the side of the damp tree branch! It wasn’t as nice as the parchment found back in the royal capital, but this way he could avoid foolishly losing what experience he had gained. Falsely remembering a crucial fact scared him more than anything else.

Yes. The paper and ink pens he was used to were nowhere to be found here.

He checked his pockets, but it looked like all of his possessions aside from his clothing had been confiscated. He didn’t even have his cheap mountain climbing knife, his preserved dried meat, or his student ID. He was surrounded by a seemingly endless expanse of deep forest in all directions. He was beginning to suspect throwing him out here with only the clothes on his back had been a more indirect form of execution.

How would he find the necessities needed to survive and how would he avoid the dark elves who were likely searching for the escapee right this very moment? Leader and Curvy’s bows had not been for sports. Those were projectile weapons used to protect their forest village and to hunt the large animals needed to feed their people. They probably also had several varieties of poison arrow. One hit from those and a human like him was dead. As much as he wanted to research the dark elves, he was tired of having to risk his own neck to do so. Instead of taking each other’s lives, he would much rather work with them to create new life.

“First of all, I’m sick of being alone. This is driving me crazy. I hate it, hate it, hate it!! I swear I’ll find a way to meet and talk with my wife! I swear it! Ideally, she would let me borrow some tools from her village too. I can’t hope to leave the forest if I can’t survive on my own.”

He had to survive.

Otherwise he could never marry Slender.

What was the point of an emotional proposal that ended in their deaths like in the climax of a play? If he died before he got a chance to touch those long, twitching ears, he just knew he would regret it so much he came back as a ghost. So right now, even a small stone or tree branch could be priceless. He had no idea when he would find another metal product.

He was alone and helpless.

He felt horribly unprepared and doubted he could survive this on his own, so he started to imagine the dark forest was pressing in on him from all directions. It made him feel like a small child, but he was terrified of being alone.

“Dammit…”

He slowly gathered his strength and stood up, partially to see how much his body had recovered.

He was scared.

His rotten teacher was always doing crazy things, but this was the first time she had grown completely uncontrollable.

If he was going to venture toward the center of the forest in order to safely escape, the hunters’ bows were of course a threat, but those priests creeped him out too. Not much was known about dark elf magic. What if they could use some kind of invisible curse or secretly track him through astral projection? It might sound absurd, but wasn’t impossible. He couldn’t say anything for sure about them, which scared him.

Especially when the one thing he did know was that they tied humans to logs and set them on fire with torches.

His biggest fear was that the lovely dark elves would have no qualms about using some kind of devastating magic power against a human who looked so much like them.

The royal capital wasn’t exactly peaceful. When he was late to submit a research report and had to walk the dark streets late at night, there was always a chance he would be mugged. But this was different. Just like a traveler attacked by a wild bear, this violence existed outside the human rules he was familiar with. It wasn’t the same as a mugger who attacked while well aware it was wrong.

They might even think this violence was an act of good. The majority was being controlled and the group thought they were doing the right thing. No one cared that they were burning someone alive. This wasn’t a case of a mystery going unresolved – they didn’t even see anything needing to be solved.

And whatever the case, no one would ever know what happened to him if he died here.

Not a single person.

He shuddered and held himself. The ordinary branch he was using to take notes was still in his arms. He greatly regretted working to rationally analyze the fear he had sealed away inside himself.

…Anyway, I need to find Slender and then leave this forest.

He hated to leave a place full of so many dark elves, but his safety came first. He only had the one chance to search out their village, but as long as he made it there before leaving the forest, he was pretty sure he could come and go as he pleased. So once he knew its location, he could put off a more in-depth investigation until later.

That meant his top priority was his wife. He tucked the note-taking branch below his belt on the side of his hip.

Now, which way to the dark elf village?

To obtain a wife and leave the forest, he wanted some civilized tools like a bow and a map.

“Slender’s navel and thighs were bare. She wasn’t dressed for walking through bushes. The dark elves must use cleared paths – the animal trails.”

The boy began walking. With the green moss looked like a stormy ocean thanks to the boulders it covered. He walked through the tunnel of trees, the overhead rustling of leaves sounding like whispering voices. What was that cloth sack hanging from a branch by a rope? He hesitantly approached and checked inside to find soil. What could that mean? Was it related to some dark elf myth or religion? Maybe an old story about hanging a slain enemy’s severed head from a tree branch?

Just then, he spotted a narrow animal trail created by flattening the underbrush below foot.

He could no longer tell if he was acting based on educated guesses or pure fantasy, but he didn’t think he had let his guard down. There was no sign of pursuit nearby. He couldn’t afford to sprain his ankle out here, so he had been very careful to avoid the gnarled tree roots and the three round stones as he walked.

A dull metallic snap burst up from the ground at his feet.

“Eh?”

He felt no pain. The only things in his head were confusion and a complaint directed at some deity or another. He actually stared in amazement when he looked down.

Something had latched onto his right ankle.

The crude metal contraption was larger than a beast’s jaws.

It was a beartrap meant to capture large animals.

No, it was possible this one had been built to trap humans.

Part 5

Klaus fell over.

His leg was caught. The trap had lodged itself into the sides of his right shin just a bit above the ankle. The trap was made from a pair of jagged metal panels shaped like the letter D. It was about the size of a straw hat folded in two. He doubted he could extricate his leg just by moving it around.

He heard a jangling sound. The dark elf hunters’ beartrap was attached to a chain that was staked into the ground. The chain was less than a meter long.

“Ow…”

Once he started focusing on the word beartrap, the reality caught up to him. The pain was unusual, feeling more like pressure on the bone than the flesh and blood. It was far worse than having your fingertip crushed by a thick pair of pliers.

Pain exploded inside him, but experiencing a new form of violence for the first time was even worse.

His mind demanded he shout in a rage, like a small child stung by a bee for the first time. He gathered all of his willpower to avoid obeying the demand.

This was the end.

There were some problems people could not solve on their own. The sense of loneliness reared its ugly head once more.

“Ow, agh, bwah!? What…the hell!? It’s stabbing into me? Gwargh!!!!”

He curled up on his side, but that did nothing to relieve the pain. In fact, the pain only grew. It was like having a leg cramp but your body was too stiff to reach your big toe. He gathered what little strength he had left to face reality. He bent his leg and reached trembling hands toward the beartrap.

It was hard.

It was solid. It was a spring-loaded trap, but he had a hard time believing this part was made to move. It didn’t even budge, like it had been welded solid in this configuration. He considered slipping his fingers in the crack to pry it open, but he was afraid he would either cut his fingers on the jagged metal or get them caught in there with his leg.

Back when he picked up the earring, he had feared he would not find another metal product. He wanted to laugh at his past self for being so foolish.

He heard a slight sound.

It was a rustling of leaves he had not noticed before. Were the dark elf hunters approaching? No, that was not just a careless footstep. Someone had intentionally thrown a pebble to see how he reacted.

They already knew someone had been caught in the trap. And what if they realized he was unlikely to resist?

He shuddered.

He had a sudden flashback to all those torches surrounding him and the smoke irritating his eyes and nose so badly. But nothing he did helped remove the beartrap that was so solid he suspected it was locked like this.

He grabbed the thick chain and pulled. It was only held in place by the metal stake driven into the ground, but that wasn’t budging either. He guessed it was connected to a large stone or something buried underground.

“Ko pevw kixo vworrog aq uw. Vapoaqo ja rufm vapo kotdv hat kup.”

“B-bov, pi’ip! Yo fiq’w now wkuv ja numo nivw wupo. Yo qoog wa jow kup wa vihowb.”

He heard voices from beyond the bushes. Voices he recognized. It was weird how familiar they could be when he didn’t understand the language, but his mind figured it out from the pitch and intonation.

He was about to be killed.

He knew that, but he still nearly wept with joy. The loneliness was fading.

But he couldn’t just cry. He felt some kind of pressure slowly approaching.

Were they still checking on what they had caught? Or had they already deemed it safe and were moving in for the kill?

He felt so dizzy from fear he forgot all about the pain in his leg.

If the dark elves surrounded him with bows and machetes and he couldn’t even move, he really was done for. The fear of the fire and smoke crept back into his mind. He couldn’t stop the tears when faced with that. The smoke brought the tears and snot out all on its own.

“Gh…”

If he could not escape through normal means, then he would have to use the one trick he had up his sleeve: magic.

But he couldn’t use magic emptyhanded. His magic required a magic derivative.

He could produce the power itself within his body, but he couldn’t control it well without that.

He dragged his trapped leg to reach a nearby Witch Pumpkin measuring a meter across. But he could not break through its skin with his fingernails, his fists, or even a stone from the ground. Its skin was as think as a shield, so he could not even dig out the stem at the top.

The footsteps were closing in. His heart was hammering so hard he wanted to scream, but he resisted the urge and looked to the side. Another large object sat alongside the Witch Pumpkin. The red object was an equally-large Ghost Turnip. He was pretty sure that was a root vegetable, but it had lived so long it was sticking out of the ground.

The pumpkin was not the only magic derivative he could use.

Ghost Turnips worked as well. But he did not want to eat the entire meter-long vegetable. For one thing, he couldn’t. They were just as cruelly tough as the Witch Pumpkins.

But Ghost Turnips did not have stems.

Instead, they had strange blue flowers fluttering at the very top. Technically, it was the part below the flowers he needed, but he did not have time to make the distinction. He stretched the chain as far as it would go and ate it, flowers and all. His throat tried to reject it, but he forced it down.

The base of a vegetable’s stem came from the calyx that supported the flower from below.

He was all fueled up now, so he looked elsewhere.

…I’m ready, so I need a target! Something unscathed would hide me better!!

Klaus spoke through the bitter flavor lingering in his mouth.

“Of the three traits, I choose salt. Cucurbitaceae, annual, ornamental, monoecious, creeper. I have grasped thy nature like counting the corners of a polygon or star. The polygon emanates and the star gathers – together they symbolize the control of power. By knowing thee, I become one with thee.”

Still caught in the beartrap, he crouched down and drew a square in the leaves on the ground. He was afraid of digging into the dirt below, so he used a light touch. He used the accurate square to picture the four elements and stood within that imagined magic circle. The symbols were only meant to aid his understanding, so drawing out a more complicated magic circle would be meaningless if he didn’t understand what it meant. But if he did understand, then no complicated circle was necessary. He used the four elements to grasp the three traits and linked heaven to earth. The solid metal trap got in the way of the simple motions, but he got through it.

“Camouflize Decoration – now I am thee!!”

He could use magic.

And now had to be the right time!!

The white explosion produced steam, not smoke.

That symbolized the superhuman powers wielded by humans, but this was not a physical phenomenon. He had used magic. And once that illusionary steam cleared away, the skinny boy was no longer there.

Only a plump orange object.

It looked like a round stone more than a meter long, but it was actually a Witch Pumpkin. But it was too big to eat. It was an ornamental variety, so it was not meant to be made into potage and eaten. It had no face, arms, or legs and the lack of legs meant it had nothing to be caught in the beartrap.

With nothing in its jaws anymore, the beartrap violently snapped fully shut. The explosion of steam had also blown away the magic circle drawn in the leaves.

(Damn, I’m screwed if they figure out this is me.)

Camouflize was a camouflage magic.

It was the one and only magic Klaus Knockburn could use. He could not shoot fire from his hand and he could not fly, but he could still transform into any lifeform.

Camouflaging himself as a Witch Pumpkin that resembled a colorful rock had freed him from the trap, but he was not out of the woods yet. The dark elves were drawing close.

If they discovered his secret, they would cook him alive.

He could not trust any of them except for his wife-to-be. Not even Little Girl who had been hiding behind her mother’s back.

(I’m dead if they see me move! I don’t know how animals move well enough to trick a hunter, so I chose to camouflage myself as a Witch Pumpkin that doesn’t move in the first place. So I can’t afford to move now!!)

A ponytailed dark elf wearing bright white leather and armed with a large bow emerged from the bushes unexpectedly nearby. He recognized her as Leader. She had plenty of pure gold and red gems on her ordinary clothing, so were those things not considered as valuable among dark elves as among humans?

“Ok?”

She was alone and she looked down at the ground in confusion.

Witch Pumpkins did not have lungs or a heart, but his pulse was running wild in his mind.

Leader slowly bent over, placed a hand on her knee, and pulled an arrow from the quiver at her hip. After a moment of thought, she poked the metal arrowhead against the thing lying on the ground.

“Wko wtir yiv vrteqj? Ykiw gaov wkiw poiq?”

She was focused on the beartrap, not the colorful Witch Pumpkin or the magic circle.

She seemed to find it odd the trap was shut with nothing in it. That was understandable. If a wild animal had gotten its leg caught, it never could have pulled its leg out by force. Not many things would get caught in the trap yet find a way to remove it and escape.

However.

(Oh, wow!)

Klaus Knockburn’s focus was elsewhere.

The serious-looking dark elf had bent over to view the unnatural beartrap. Without noting the presence of the Witch Pumpkin nearby. That was supposed to be what he wanted, but there was a problem. She had bent over with her back to him. Now, close your eyes and imagine what that positioning would mean.

It was right there in front of his eyes.

The blue leather miniskirt was so close he could hear it creaking. Dark elves were supposed to be so rare you were lucky to catch a glimpse of one while deep in the woods, but this one’s round butt was hovering mere centimeters from his face. It filled up his entire field of view!

(Oh, wow, wow, wow!! Wait, no, I swear this wasn’t on purpose! But I can’t even apologize like this. She’d kill me!!)

From this close up, he noted some details he hadn’t before. About her bow, not her butt. It was a composite bow made from multiple woods and animal tendon. That thing could kill a bear even without poison. Frankly, it was nicer than the bows used by the royal capital’s mercenaries. He could not underestimate them just because they lived deep in the woods. They had used these tools for ages, so they had built up a lot of experience. They had developed the technology they needed. That was all the more reason he couldn’t let her find him. Which meant he couldn’t warn her about her butt.

“Mouqi!”

The giant Witch Pumpkin nearly jumped from the ground in surprise.

That call had not come from ponytailed Leader. Another dark elf – the one he called Curvy – had arrived, placed her hands on her hips, and called out to Leader. And…

“Bae’nn gipijo baet ittayv wkiw yib. Wtoiw wkop yuwk pato fito iqg gaq’w ivvepo uw’v viho levw dofievo uw’v rauvaqog.”

“V-vattb, Neodonn!!”

(Oh, Leader is bowing toward Curvy. Did she show up first because she’s only a scout? C-could she actually be really low level?)

It looked like Curvy was actually higher ranking.

Klaus seriously considered changing his name for Leader, but he felt like that would only confuse him when he was reviewing his memories or his notes later on. He decided it was best to stick with the original name he gave her.

And he had bigger things to worry about anyway.

“U mqay bae’to yattuog. Uw uv iq opotjoqfb ihwot inn. Dew wkiw uv ykoq hannayuqj wko heqgipoqwinv piwwotv pavw. Wko pavw giqjotaev papoqw uv ykoq bae navo baet witjow’v wtiun.”

“U toinnb ip vatt- mbik!?”

Leader lost her balance and fell onto her butt in a surprisingly cute way.

And she did so on top of the large round stone. No, on top of the giant orange Witch Pumpkin.

Her wonderfully sexy butt fell right onto Klaus.

(Bgweh!? Th-that’s my face! She’s got all sorts of wonderful stuff right there in my face!!)

This particular pumpkin had human senses and a human mind. He had to do this to survive, but guilt still filled his chest(?). And as bad as he felt – and he did feel bad – he couldn’t deny that he was enjoying this very much, goddess dammit!! He blamed all the rotten luck he’d been having lately. This bit of luck felt blindingly bright by comparison!!

It took all his willpower to avoid accidentally dispelling the camouflage.

He could not lose focus. He couldn’t!!

(Don’t let this tempt you! I-I-I-I-I already have a wife. Just think what would happen to Slender if I ditched her and left her all alone! Are you going to doom her to a life of comforting herself below the covers at night!? When dark elves live so very long!?)

(Unlike his first impression of her) Leader showed no caution whatsoever. She did not bother standing back up and simply rubbed her thighs together while using the large Witch Pumpkin as a bench. This brand new experience for Klaus Knockburn was going to last a while longer.

“I-idaew wkiw doitwtir.”

“U mqay ykiw bae poiq. Oxoq wko hatovw iqupinv noitq, va u gaedw iqb ah wkop yaeng jow fiejkw qayigibv. U inva gaedw wkob faeng ovfiro aq wkout ayq.”

He was passionate about his dark elf research, but he was extremely unsure if he should talk about this warmth, weight, and roundness in his paper. The principles of the public good and of personal privacy warred in his mind. He was also hesitant to let the world know he had gotten his first face full of ass before his first kiss. In what world was that the proper order of things!?

(A-anyway. I think I’m successfully hiding from them. If I stay still, they might just leave without ever noticing me.)

That was when he sensed some killer intent approaching him like ripples. No, Klaus did not have the skills of a martial artist or assassin. This was coming from his ordinary senses.

Something small was crawling along the green carpet of moss. A whole line of them. Each individual one was a small bug the size of a grain of risotto rice, but his throat(???) went dry when he realized what they were.

They were termites.

He had said Witch Pumpkins could not be used for food, but that only applied to humans. It didn’t apply to termites that could eat through the trunk of a tree. And his camouflage was perfect, so they hadn’t noticed he wasn’t really a pumpkin!

“Kuv vfoqw uv inva i rtadnop.”

“Bov. Ykb ga kepiqv ftoiwo wkavo vwtiqjo vfoqwv iqg vrtib wkop inn axot wkout vmuq iqg kiut? Uw pimov wkop va oivb wa wtifm uq wko hatovw.”

“Wko vyoow vfoqwv ito wko yatvw. U toinnb karo ko uvq’w iwwifmog db i yung doit at vapowkuqj.”

“Wko hatovw ftoiwetov yunn rtadidnb wtb wa ixaug kup. Karohennb ko fiq iw noivw ifseuto gtuqmuqj yiwot aq kuv ayq, dew ko yaq’w nivw naqj yuwkaew iqbwkuqj wa oiw. Yo qoog wa kettb.”

(How long are you going to chat!? And I can’t understand a word of it!)

Leader and Curvy were having some kind of serious discussion with the former seated on the Klaus pumpkin and the latter standing, but he really wished they would just leave. If he took the time to appreciate the weight of the defenseless dark elf’s soft butt, the termites would reach him. An entire swarm of termites were marching his way!! He could not underestimate them just because they were small bugs. Their mandibles could hollow out a house’s pillars, so they would eat right through the hard pumpkin and end his life. He would be torn apart by those puny bugs, eaten by them, and expelled all across the forest as droppings smaller than sesame seeds. He would know they were slowly chewing through him starting from one end, but he would be killed without even the chance to scream. And then his pitiful corpse would be scattered across the forest instead of buried.

(~ ~ ~!!!!!!)

His fear had passed the limit. The feeling may have been like having a bucket of ice water dumped over your head when you were afraid someone would dump hot water on you. He was hit by a completely different type of fear than he had expected, so it did double damage.

The giant Witch Pumpkin could not move. If he moved, the dark elves would notice.

Yet he still took action. He used the vine growing from the top of the pumpkin to poke at Leader’s round butt.

Her reaction was dramatic.

“Mbik!?”

She jumped to her feet, blushed bright, held her hands to her butt through the blue miniskirt, and hopped up and down. Curvy responded in an exasperated tone.

“Ykiw kirroqog?”

“P-pb deww – vapowkuqj levw waefkog pb deww!”

“Yuwfk Reprmuqv iqg Jkavw Wetqurv ito ftiynuqj yuwk dejv. Fkofm wa pimo veto bae yotoq’w duwwoq db iqbwkuqj xoqapaev. Wkiw’v inn wko wupo yo kixo.”

“Ejk…”

She made a fuss, but there was no real tension. She must have thought a bug had bitten her. Curvy chided Leader who tearfully muttered something under her breath and bent over.

She spread her legs to shoulder width, bent over, and looked down toward her own crotch.

But now was not the time to be impressed by the forest denizen’s flexibility.

(Ah, ahhh, ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!?)

This was not just a glimpse. Klaus got a good look at everything. And from a low angle. But there was no way he could have avoided it since pumpkins can’t move! The view he got this time made him even more hesitant to include these observations in his paper.

Even if it had been a split-second decision, he had chosen a poor location to poke her.

The tearful silver ponytail woman bent her finger into a hook and slightly adjusted the position of her thin and sweaty underwear.

Specifically, she pulled it to the side.

(Ahhh, ah, ah, gwaaahhhhhhh!! Slender, Slender, Slender, Slender!!)

Klaus repeated that name in his mind like a magic spell meant to ward off evil.

Except all he did was conjure up the memory of her very slender bathing scene.

That only made things worse. If he had hands, he would have smacked himself on the forehead. He was amazed he wasn’t struck by lightning.

“Ep…u gaq’w voo iqb deprv.”

“'Naam, wkoto ito wotpuwov axot wkoto. Faeng uw kixo dooq aqo ah wkop?”

Termites must have been a constant problem for dark elves. The red gems decorating Curvy’s white leather clothing shook as she reached into her impressive cleavage and pulled out some dried herbs tied together with a string. She took out her water bottle, poured some water onto the broom keychain thing, and then flicked water droplets on the row of termites. Klaus didn’t know what exactly it did, but those powerful pests immediately began writhing in pain. He was pretty sure he had heard that medicines had very different effects on humans and bugs. And the dark elves seemed to know this was what would happen.

The dark elves used poison arrows. They could also develop their own medicines. He could not look down on them just because they didn’t have a formalized magic school. It was possible they had humans beat in knowledge and not just strength.

“Iqbyib, ko uvq’w koto. Now’v fkofm onvoykoto.”

“Dew ykoto faeng ko kixo jaqo? Kuv vfoqw vwarv koto iqg wkoto ito qa haawrtuqwv. Uw uvq’w numo ko ftavvog i tuxot wa yivk iyib kuv vfoqw.”

“Ykiwoxot wtufm ko evog, ko fiq’w kixo jaqo hit.”

Presumably the rest of the termites would die when they reached that same point because the two women turned around and left. Leader would occasionally rub her butt like she could still feel something there.

(Man, that was incredible. Nature is full of new discoveries.)

Klaus sat there in a daze for a while, but the silence chilled him as much as the wind.

He did not dare move for a while even after they had disappeared past the bushes. He knew he was just being paranoid this time, but he was terrified. Yes, she had fallen on her butt. Yes, she had jumped up in a surprisingly cute way when he poked her. Yes, she had slid her underwear aside with her finger. He appreciated all of it, but unfortunately, none of it meant much of anything. It simply meant they hadn’t noticed him there.

What if they decided to turn back for some reason? What if he ran into them later? Once they noticed him, that gentle atmosphere was gone.

Several minutes passed and his sense of time grew so distorted he felt like he had entered another world altogether.

If he stayed silent any longer, he was certain it would break something inside him.

“Phew…”

He sighed and dispelled his camouflage magic. With the illusionary white steam that symbolized human power and civilization, the bench-sized Witch Pumpkin became a skinny boy once more.

He had lost them. He had learned he could fool the dark elves with his magic. He had also learned their butts were wonderfully soft. If he had to compare it to anything, it would be “super sweet custard”.

“Now it’s my turn. The hunter has become the hunted.”

That way, he might just find the elusive dark elf village.

He felt so lonely he grew overly dramatic when he spoke. If he didn’t use this small success to encourage himself, the loneliness would crush him.

“I now know they won’t notice me if I use my camouflage magic. You have some nerve making me fight for my life when you can’t even handle a naughty prank!!”

But something felt wrong. Klaus was not equipped with a sixth sense capable of detecting someone’s presence or killer intent. What felt wrong was the mottled sunlight. One of the shadows cast by a tree branch was abnormally swollen at one point.

He slowly looked up.

A brown girl was perched silently on one of the tree branches forming an arch overhead.

It was his future wife, Slender.

“Kyahhh!? D-did she hear all that!?”

He just about jumped out of his skin while feeling as embarrassed as if he had been overheard humming in the bath, but she remained at absolute zero. She made no move to drop down to the ground.

“No, you’ve got it all wrong! It was like a midnight high! I was so relieved to be alive that I lost control of myself! I don’t normally talk like that, I swear! Please don’t think I’m weird!!”

Speaking to her in human language was meaningless. Which also meant she wouldn’t have understood what he had said earlier either.

Also, she was crouching on the branch and he was looking up at her, so there was very little blocking her underwear from view. Her poor defenses revealed hers were made of red leather. Surprisingly sexy. But he could not just tremble in shock and joy. She looked angry. Her hood was pulled down over her face, but the rabbit-like ear decorations were standing up straight. Very cute.

Again, she wouldn’t have understood anything he had said. However…

…Oh, this is still bad. If she saw me dispel my magic, then she knows I was enjoying Leader’s nice ass!

Just as he had that realization, Slender grabbed the large composite bow she carried over her shoulder, reached for her quiver, and pulled out an arrow that was more perfect than he would have expected for a handmade product.

…I was looking for her. I dreamed of seeing her again.

“Wait…”

She silently pulled the bowstring taut. The icy girl silently exhaled. The sharp arrowhead was made of metal. It even had a barb. How in the world had they made something like that in this forest!?

It was time to flirt with his future wife.

“Wait, wait, wait!! Y-you’re just being shy, right? If you really attack me with that, you’ll lose the title of the only pacifist – or at least nonlethal – dark elf in the forest!! Help me! Someone please explain to my wife that this isn’t a healthy way to express her shyness!!”

If begging wasn’t going to help, then his only option was to run away while zigzagging unpredictably.

No matter how good an archer she was, she would have a hard time keeping a direct line of sight with so many trees in the way. He just had to pray she couldn’t control her arrows with magic. If she had a homing spell, he was well and truly screwed.

Hard leaves and branches scraped at his limbs and cheeks. He forgot all about recently being caught in a beartrap as he ran wildly through the forest, but he eventually noticed something. He came to a stop and looked back while trying to catch his breath. He only heard the rustling of the leaves in the breeze.

Slender was gone.

And…

“Sh-she never did launch an arrow, did she?”

Part 6

Once the relief hit him, so did something else.

A previous problem was back with a vengeance. He staggered and placed a hand on a large tree trunk, but that wasn’t enough to support him and he slid down to a sitting position. He grimaced and held his stomach.

…Damn. It wasn’t enough.

His camouflage magic required a magic derivative. That meant he needed to eat a Witch Pumpkin stem to activate it. But he had only bitten into a Ghost Turnip’s flowers as an imperfect substitute. And when he didn’t have enough of the derivative, his power would run wild inside him and his health would suffer. It felt a lot like dehydration.

…Come to think of it, I’m missing any memory of how I was carried to that clearing after they captured me or how Slender helped me escape that clearing. I’ve been assuming this all happened in one day, but what if slept through an entire night without realizing it?

Most magic came with risks and Camouflize was no exception.

This had never really felt like a threat before. When he had been safely researching in the royal capital, magic derivatives had been readily available. So much so that the mere sight of a pumpkin stem smoothie was enough to make him feel sick.

But things were different here.

“This…is bad.”

His voice was barely audible.

He had slipped down onto his side. He was stuck in that unnatural position.

He could use magic.

But it was far from all powerful.

He could barely move, but his breathing rang irritatingly loud in his ears. He didn’t lack strength – he couldn’t control it. His heart was racing and cold sweat poured down his brow.

…Is there a pumpkin stem nearby? Or any kind of magic derivative?

He could fuel up by eating a magic derivative made from several stems, but it wouldn’t last. He would use it up when he used his camouflage magic, but it would also gradually reduce over time. He would lose any magic derivative he ingested after about 24 hours, but if he wanted to always be ready to use his magic, he preferred to resupply at least twice a day to make sure it never dipped down to zero.

He preferred not to eat more stems than he had to since they weren’t exactly tasty, but if he really wanted to compress as much of the derivative into his body as possible, about five was probably the limit. Any more and it would actually destabilize the power inside him.

But all of that was moot when he was too weak to tear off a hard Witch Pumpkin’s stem.

Ghost Turnip flowers were an imperfect substitute, but he couldn’t even find any of them.

…Am I going to die like this? Not in a trap and not because they hunt me down, but because I used my magic at the wrong time?

Reality was cruel and no one was guaranteed a dramatic death. He hadn’t come anywhere close to infiltrating the dark elf village or escaping the forest. He could never marry his future wife like this. He had always taken a cynical view of the plays he had seen in the royal capital, but he finally understood what the playwrights and directors were thinking. People wanted some drama and emotion when they died, even if they weren’t consciously aware of the desire.

Suddenly, Klaus Knockburn sensed some eyes on him.

This was not the dark elves. These eyes were close enough to the ground that he was on their eye level while lying on his side. He no longer had the strength left to move his head. This thing had been in front of him from the beginning and he had only just now noticed it.

What was that creature tilting its head at him? It was a Palmtop Mouse with its round body and distinctive buck teeth. They were a popular choice at the royal capital’s pet shops. But just like with goldfish, this was his first time seeing one in the wild. Its small front legs held a piece of orange Witch Pumpkin it had found somewhere.

He sensed only fear and death from this forest, but the Palmtop Mouse didn’t seem worried as it walked over to be his friend.

No, it didn’t want to be his friend.

“…”

He realized the truth.

And he realized it too late.

He heard a gnawing sound. He could see his limp hand lying on the ground. His hand had to look huge to the Palmtop Mouse, but it held out its front legs like it was asking for a handshake and picked up one of his fingers.

That was when the gnawing started. He also saw an unnatural red color.

When dealing with markings and camouflage, it was imperative you did not place too much trust in your own eyes. It was a human thing to think of Palmtop Mice as cute. Even they were wild animals that had optimized themselves to avoid danger and acquire food.

Oh, he realized.

He didn’t need to subconsciously reject this thing as a candidate. Out in the wild, everyone searched for food. Even the tiny Palmtop Mouse had survived this long by obtaining food from weaker lifeforms. Of course Klaus would be targeted by other animals when he was on the verge of death. And there was nothing strange about him doing everything he could to survive either. Not one thing.

The Palmtop Mouse had tried to eat him first anyway.

So he would play by the same rules. If the rules said the strong could eat the weak, then he wouldn’t be accepting any complaints.

He clenched his fist with more force than he thought he had left. He felt something being crushed in his hand and heard the rodent’s shrill screech. He must have broken some of its bones. In the royal capital, this animal cruelty would have horrified him, but he did not bat an eye now that he was following the animal’s rules.

He carried it to his mouth.

Yes, if this thing was holding a piece of Witch Pumpkin, then it must have chewed through the thick skin and feasted on the skin and the innards. That meant it would have the contents of the stem inside its body.

Only the human body could break down a magic derivative.

Was it his rotten teacher who had said a pufferfish’s toxin was not created inside the pufferfish? The process was known as bioconcentration. As bugs ate Witch Pumpkins and Ghost Turnips and rodents ate those bugs, the magic derivative would be spread across a wide variety of lifeforms. Klaus only had to take that derivative for himself. Eating the stem directly was guaranteed to work and safer too, but an indirect source was better than nothing.

He may have been concentrating so much on the theory behind it to distract himself from the raw sensations he was experiencing.

He bit through something hard and forced it down his throat. It was awful. It tasted rusty and weirdly bitter. A brush-like mass of hair caught in his throat. He gagged over and over before he got it down his esophagus, but he managed it in the end. Tears spilled from his eyes as he forced himself to swallow with an audible gulp.

He had eaten it.

He smiled weakly afterwards.

Normally, you would skin it first. You would remove the organs and blood and preserve it for a while. When you did eat it, you would wash it well, season it, and cook it. In fact, most people didn’t eat mice even if they did have meat. Even crayfish and snails were more acceptable as gourmet dishes.

But he had eaten it all the same. The blood, organs, bones, and everything else were circulating through his body to give him the strength he needed to move. Only then did the revulsion hit him. He writhed around in disgust, scratching at his throat, but then he noticed the symptoms akin to dehydration were fading. The rodent had indeed contained the magic derivative.

That was why he had the excess strength and willpower needed to roll around on the ground.

“Damn you.”

There were no enemies in this forest. The dark elves and the forest animals were only doing what they always did to stay alive. Klaus was the only one struggling so hard in the unfamiliar forest.

Nevertheless, he had survived.

He felt like he had altered the fate of the world, but he was only curled up and trembling.

“Goddess damn you all. I will survive no matter what happens out here. I’ll survive and escape this forest…ugh, sob.”

He looked like a creepy clown with the popular pet animal’s blood around his mouth. And he cried, forgetting all about the fact that he was still being pursued by the dark elves who had tried to execute him.

No one could hear him.

His sobs simply vanished into the deep forest.

He was so very alone. The royal capital had been overflowing with products and services, but here he had to be self sufficient or he would die. The forest itself was a deadly monster threatening his life.

Part 7

Do whatever it takes to survive, Klaus told himself.

The first thing he did was collect a stick and the earring he could use to write on it.

The metal beartrap was tempting, but in his haste to escape Slender’s bow, he had lost track of where it was. Plus, he didn’t know how to remove the stake and chain attaching it to the ground.

…Don’t get greedy. I need to find a small stone, a thorny plant, or anything else I can use as a weapon.

He spotted a stone nearby. It was about right for holding in the hand. He could attach it to the end of a thick branch as a makeshift hammer, or he could throw it as a projectile. He doubted that would accomplish much against an actual hunting bow, but he needed something to feel less helpless or he couldn’t keep going.

“…?”

Once he picked it up, he noticed the stone was oddly smooth. All the corners had been rounded down, like it had come from a riverbed.

That was strange for something found on the damp dirt of the forest.

Didn’t I avoid some round stones before I triggered the beartrap? He ran his finger over the branch he used to take notes to confirm and then returned to where he had found the round stone. It formed the third corner of an equilateral triangle.

“There’s more to this,” he said, gulping and crouching down to take a closer look. He poked gently at the ground with his note-taking stick.

He found something solid in the grass. He carefully parted the grass and found two round rocks partially buried in the ground. Those had to be a hunting trap. If you unwittingly stepped between them, their position would shift and they would crush your foot down to the bone.

“These are a sign. A dark elf sign!!”

This told him more as well. The dark elves obviously wanted to avoid being caught in their own traps. They also had to avoid getting lost in the forest and they wanted to share information on unstable cliffs or caves. So they had a sign they used to warn their own of danger without human outsiders noticing.

There had to be more than just the three round stones. The dark elves managed this forest, so they would have signs for things other than warning about traps. They likely used other tools for those signs and they would all be designed so an amateur wouldn’t even notice them.

…I need to find the artificial things that don’t belong in nature.

It could be a pile of dried leaves brought in from elsewhere or red clay that didn’t match the dark soil on the ground. It could be small marks on the tree trunks or poisonous fruits that no animals touched. He just had to find anything that didn’t belong.

Once he could read their sighs, he could travel safely. He still had to be careful since he was more likely to encounter a dark elf in the areas they had marked as safe, but whether he wanted to use those safe areas or avoid them, knowing where they were was far better than wandering without anything to guide him. They might even have signs to mark the human road or the exit from the forest. Of course, those would be marked as dangerous by the dark elves who lived in the Forest of No Return.

Would he search out the animal paths leading to the dark elf village?

Or would he search out the stone-paved road used by humans?

Either way, he would have more options to choose from once he knew the safe route through the forest. Then he could be the one to launch an arrow at Slender – the arrow of love.

“Camouflize.”

He gulped. The forest seemed to stretch on forever and he was surrounded by the damp wilderness where the sunlight couldn’t reach. But he still felt the world open up before his eyes.

“If I’m going to camouflage myself, I need to observe that lifeform first. That way I know what they look like, how they live, and any idiosyncrasies of their behavior. But that’s what I always do, so there’s nothing to worry about. I won’t be risking my life right away. I just have to continue observing them like I always do.”

There were no beautiful dark elves around at the moment. He was alone and had only one path forward, but he could sense their presence in the forest around him. He could not afford to overlook it. He had to find the small signs hidden there and use them to walk freely through this deep forest of death and terror.

Part 8

Three round stones arranged in an equilateral triangle warned of a trap.

Two sticks arranged like a lowercase “y” warned of an easy-to-miss animal path. He had been forced to try both options to check (and nearly died when some thick bushes got in the way), but the longer stick indicated the correct path.

An empty bird’s nest woven from a thorny plant…he wasn’t confident on this one, but he guessed that indicated an animal’s hunting ground. That guess was based on the fur and droppings he had found there.

The bright ribbons tied around tree branches at eye level were decoys meant to distract crafty humans, so he had to watch out for those. There was a good chance of a trap nearby.

While writing all this on the side of a handy stick, Klaus was forced to frown.

…Should I have devised a way to indicate direction first?

He looked up at the sun shining through the branches. He had heard plenty of rumors related to the rings in a tree stump or the side of a tree with moss growing on it, but how did those methods actually work? He needed to know the direction before he could draw a map.

This “conversation” with the dark elves continued. That was only his personal interpretation to help fight the loneliness and they might not be happy if they heard him put it that way, but he had to absorb as much information as he could.

He could not expect everything right away, so he gave up on the direction and focused on the figuring out the signs.

“Does this indicate a patch of herbs?” groaned Klaus.

He found another new sign. He had no idea where they had gotten it, but a crab shell smaller than his palm had been half-buried in the ground. The sign here was the scent, not the color or shape.

This area was clearly being maintained. Garden may have been a better word than patch. There was a small clearing in the forest, allowing the sun to shine through. Lots of small, bright fruits similar to berries were growing there. Since they were not Witch Pumpkins or Ghost Turnips, they did not contain the magic derivative he needed for his camouflage magic. But he did have his ordinary hunger and thirst to deal with. What if he gathered these up and ate them? He gulped since he was currently more bothered by thirst than hunger, but he quickly shook his head. Something felt wrong. He took another careful look around.

…These fruits are growing at hip height, so why hasn’t a single one been gnawed on?

He had nearly been eaten by termites and a Palmtop Mouse just from lying on the ground.

He recalled the dark elves’ poison arrows and the herbal insecticide Curvy had used against the termites. The forest might look calm, but it was actually teeming with life. This garden was unnaturally clean, which scared him. It would be best to avoid eating anything he didn’t recognize.

…Or if I have extra, I can place whatever food I’ve found on the ground and watch to see if any other animals eat it.

He recalled the collection an eccentric collector in the royal capital had opened to the public in their mansion’s garden. The eucalyptus eaten by koalas was poisonous and hyenas preferred to eat rotten meat. Animals were different enough that seeing one eating a food was no guarantee, but it had to be better than nothing.

And…

“?”

Klaus crouched down low. He had heard something he had heard countless times in the royal capital and the maintained human roads: horse hooves. But that made no sense. Whatever picture books and fairy tales might say, wild horses did not live in the forest. Horses were cowardly herbivores, so they preferred the open fields where they could see clearly and use their speed to escape. They would avoid the hilly forests where visibility was poor. And the dark elves did not use them. How could they when they would never come across any? So what was this?

After some more thought, he gasped. If no horses should be here, there was only one answer. A human was riding the horse and guiding it with reins. The human road had to be nearby!

He suddenly realized that his standards of what was natural and unnatural and what was comforting or concerning had shifted from those of humans to those of the wild animals. He just about laughed out loud. He had no idea what day it was since he had passed out twice, but he doubted it had been more than one full day. If he had gone longer than that without anything to eat or drink, he would have died before coming to again. He had let the forest reshape his thoughts an awful lot for such a short time.

He stuck his note-taking stick in his belt so he wouldn’t drop it and placed the earring in his pocket.

“H-hey. Heyyy!”

He waved his hands and walked from the garden and through the bushes. He had not spoken to anyone in a while, so his voice was scratchy. At some point, he had grown so accustomed to being alone that he had begun to forget how to talk to other people.

But he still forced his way through the bushes.

And he collapsed on the other side.

The ground felt unusually hard. This was not the exposed dirt or the grass. It was somewhat uneven thanks to the roots lifting it up, but this was the stone pavement of a human road. That was enough to loosen his tear ducts. He very nearly kissed the pavement in his joy at discovering human civilization again.

“Help!”

“Ahh!?”

Someone shouted and tugged on the horse’s reins. With an upset whinny, the two muscular front legs of a warhorse wandered through the air.

Klaus had not looked in a mirror, but he could guess he looked horrific.

The thought occurred to him through his exhaustion and thirst, but it was too late to make himself presentable now.

The person riding the horse was…a surprise. The blond boy in lightweight armor designed for mountain travel had a baby face. He may have been younger than Klaus was. He probably wasn’t an actual knight.

“Wh-wh-wh-wh-who are you!? I nearly ran you over!!”

“Court Ma…Academy…Klaus Kno…burn…studying magical biology and came to this forest with Court Scientist Reika Kickpleats.”

His voice drifted in and out, but the knight(?) boy’s expression stiffened. He calmed his horse and descended from the saddle.

“You are from the Professor Kickpleats’s research team!? The jurisdiction differs, but I am in charge of defending the Hardjuicer Research Team. I am the honorable Sir Rainbook…’s page.”

…He’s heard of Professor Kickpleats, huh? I don’t even want to know what kind of dishonorable stories are out there about that rotten freak of a teacher. Come to think of it, don’t researchers normally request professional guards? If that freak wasn’t so cheap, maybe none of this would have happened to me.

But he couldn’t complain too much about that missing teacher. The dark elves had taken his student ID, so he had her reputation to thank here.

He had to report accurately on what had happened.

“Reika and I got separated and I don’t know where she is. I just managed to escape from a dark elf village. I was nearly executed in some strange ritual and they’re still trying to hunt me down.”

“Sounds like you had a rough time of it. You can join us, so don’t worry. We have plenty of resources.”

That offer seemed to drive a small thorn into Klaus’s heart.

He only had one chance with each forest. If he left the forest now, he would never be able to find the dark elf village. That meant he could never meet Slender again.

He was honestly impressed he still had it in him to be more worried about that than his life.

“I have no way of knowing if you are telling the truth or not, but one look at you is enough to know you are worn out enough for it to be true. People cannot harm themselves to that extent even if it will lend credence to a lie. For now, you can have something hot to eat and get some rest. Um…”

“It’s Klaus. Klaus Knockburn. And you?”

“The honorable Sir Rainbook’s-”

“Not that. Your name.”

Did he add “the honorable” every single time? It gave Klaus some secondhand embarrassment, but he never had understood how noble society worked.

“My apologies. My name is Loinbelt. I am still a page studying under the honorable Sir Rainbook, so I have no family name to give. I am simply Loinbelt.”

The horse’s saddle was decorated with what looked like a noble coat of arms, but Klaus didn’t know how to interpret it. He had never heard of Loinbelt or this Sir Rainbook (which might be rude for a commoner like him). But since the boy had accepted him without demanding to see his student ID, it would be unfair to ask any further questions. Loinbelt urged him to ride the horse since he was clearly exhausted, but Klaus declined. He had ridden horse-drawn wagons, but never a horse itself. If he tried it now, while half dead, he was pretty sure he would be thrown right off.

The babyface knight’s page, who had either a rapier or short sword at his hip, stayed off the horse and walked alongside Klaus. While pulling the swift horse’s reins along with him.

“Are you sure about this? I mean, I’m glad you’re helping me, but you must have been sent out as a messenger or something to be out on the road alone, right?”

“Ta ha ha. I’m ashamed to admit I failed to put out the campfire correctly. I was told not to return until I had buried and put out all the embers. Fortunately, that allowed me to come across you in your time of need.”

He seemed very sincere for his young age. None of the haughtiness Klaus associated with nobles and knights.

“Also, you mentioned a few other names.”

“You mean the honorable Sir Rainbook!?”

“No, um, I was more interested in the Hardjuicer Research Team you said you were guarding.”

Klaus had no intention of leaving the forest, but there was something he had to do.

Meanwhile, the young warrior was clearly disappointed. Had he wanted to talk about the knight he served? (The Sir Family Name form of address suggested a high-ranking noble.) The blond boy was pouting his lips a little.

“Yes. He is an authority on dark elves and magical biology in general. Hmm, I think he said he was going bug-catching in the forest himself because he failed to receive the cooperation of a bio-collector in the capital.”

…That tracks.

Klaus Knockburn breathed a heavy sigh in his thoughts. The capital’s school was a big place. He had never met the old man, but if the rumors were true, then he was even more of a freak than Court Scientist Reika Kickpleats. It was unclear why noble knights were working for a commoner scientist, but since he never got in trouble for his eccentric behavior, he had to be fairly skilled (or have some blackmail material on someone in the capital’s leadership). So he might be just as good, or even better than, that rotten teacher.

As they approached the camp, Klaus saw a small clearing in the forest. Several large tents had been set up there. And it was all very noisy.

Boys and girls with similar lightweight armor and warhorses called over to Loinbelt. Did the still-unseen Sir Rainbook have more than one page?

“Hey, why are you taking a leisurely walk!? We’re already about to head out!!”

“Did something happen?”

“Our mission is to collect samples. The shy dark elves have finally shown themselves and Professor Dissection is a little too excited about it. As in, he’s literally got a boner. It’s creepy!!”

The eccentric’s nickname had apparently spread beyond the school.

Klaus Knockburn grimaced.

He felt a thorn in his heart.

All he wanted to do was get to know Slender better. By which he meant marry her.

He still didn’t know why the dark elves were hunting him and trying to burn him at the stake. Could Slender be their princess and he had interrupted some kind of purification ritual? That made it all sound kind of adorable. It pushed away the fear and hatred. And if she really was a princess, then she was might be too perfect.

Of course, he knew that his silly fantasies didn’t change the fact that they were trying to kill him.

Still.

Imagining what they would look like on the dissection table had been a mistake. He clenched his back teeth, dug his boots into the dirt, and could not help but open his mouth. If they were going to answer for their crimes, it had to be in a way he could accept. For example, having all those beautiful women gather around him and let him rest in their lap for about a week. Then he could probably forgive them with a smile. No, he definitely could.

He was the victim and he didn’t want them dissected. He hadn’t asked for this intervention. This was between him and his future wife.

“Excuse me. By Court Scientist Hardjuicer, do you mean Kyle Hardjuicer?”

“Huh? Who’s this filthy kid?”

“Please let me see him. I’m from the academy too. Just a student, though.”

They must have been in a hurry because they appeared to be leaving without folding up the large tents. Klaus found a man in his sixties inside one of the tents. Even this deep in the forest, he wore the kind of white coat only seen in the capital’s labs. He wore an outdoor cape over the shoulders of the filthy coat.

“You?” They had never met, but the eccentric managed to guess his identity while looking up from the parchment document he was reading with a monocle. “Oh, are you Reika’s #1 student? Not one for first impressions, are you? You reek of sweat and filth. Blood too. Is that part of your fieldwork?”

“You know who I am?”

It was just like “Professor Dissection” to be reminded of outdoor research by the smell of blood. But Klaus had half expected to be kicked out immediately, so this was a surprise.

He could not read Kyle’s expression. He could see it. The man was looking straight at him, but he sensed as little emotion as he would staring into the eye of a fish he had just caught.

“You are the one and only student who chose to take your elective lessons from Reika of all people. Word of something like that gets around. I wish my own students had that kind of perseverance.”

Why didn’t that sound like a compliment? His only value was in his proximity to his rotten teacher and his only positive trait was his perseverance instead of his intelligence or memory. He could easily imagine his teacher excitedly telling the other teachers she had found a lively masochist to torment.

“I heard you traveled to the forest yourself because you could not get a collector’s permission.”

“Indeed.”

“Are you really going to do this?”

“Indeed. Why even bring it up?” Professor Dissection failed to notice Klaus’s tone of disapproval. His wrinkled finger toyed with the edge of the parchment document in front of him. “I came here for Brashgain’s bones and byproducts, but I am willing to shift focus if something in greater demand falls into my lap. I am ashamed to admit it to a student, but an eccentric like me needs to produce results on a regular basis to remind people why they keep me around. Little is known about how dark elves live for how well-known they are. They are like living fossils. They would be perfect to convince my patrons of my worth.”

“Sorry if I’m being dumb, but you would do that even to a dark elf?”

“Why wouldn’t I? They seem like the perfect candidate to me.”

“But they can speak of love just like humans can.”

“We can’t know that until we actually dissect them.”

The eccentric’s eccentricities reared their ugly head.

He was saying this about all of the dark elves, even Klaus’s future wife, Slender.

“The best way to determine if an animal is an herbivore or a carnivore is to check the length and contents of its intestines. If you see it for yourself, you can know for sure.”

Only because they had longer ears, were a different species, and had an unfamiliar language and culture.

“A dark elf cannot contain so much power inside such a skinny body. That means they must have something that amplifies the magic they use, but where exactly in their body is it located? It couldn’t be in their stomach, so my guess is either the chest or the butt, but what do you think? Not that our guesses matter when we will know for sure once I slice one open for myself.”

“I would expect this kind of talk during the Age of Navel Conquest when our people set sail and drew up a map of the world, but we’ve grown since then. The capital has even invited an elf priestess as a guest in the royal court. You can’t seriously think like this, can you!?”

“Oh, how I wish I could do it to her as well, but my requests keep getting rejected for some unfathomable reason. And just as I was losing heart, a new dark elf sighting comes in. Perfect timing, if you ask me.”

…He’s even worse than I thought.

Magical biology was only a separate field because humans had decided these were “fantasy” creatures. They were still living beings just like humans. Professor Dissection wasn’t interested in Klaus. If he simply held his tongue, the man was no threat to him. On the other hand, the dark elves had tried to burn him alive as part of some horrific ritual. Yet he found himself taking the dark elves’ side here.

They were still better than this man.

You could tell an herbivore from a carnivore simply by observing them from afar for two or three days. Anyone could find the answer if they checked the footprints and chewed remains of plants they left behind. But he didn’t do that. And not because he wanted to avoid doing so much work. He never even considered any option but this one. It was the only thing he trusted.

Kyle Hardjuicer reached for his belt and grabbed a pocket watch that looked terribly out of place in the forest.

“It is time.”

“Please wait! I’m not done!!”

“We can continue once I get back. Oh, and I do not doubt you are who you say you are. In fact, I welcome you. I will freely share my results with you. I would very much like to hear some fresh stories from the Kickpleats lab, so how about we continue our chat while you watch me work tonight?”

Klaus had not had goose bumps like this even when he thought he was going to be a meal for termites or a Palmtop Mouse.

This human was something else entirely. He realized now that humans were the most frightening creature of all. This man did not hate the dark elves, nor did he want their gold or gems. He was going to slice open someone’s body out of habit and custom.

Of course, struggling here was not going to solve anything. Klaus could not shoot fire or lightning from his hand. His only magic was camouflage. He was alone with the frail old man now, but there were dozens of real knights, expert warriors, waiting outside the tent.

He knew he stood no chance.

So he squeezed his eyes shut, clenched his teeth, and felt a weight in his gut as he got out a groaning voice.

“Professor.”

“Yes?”

“I freely admit my teacher is as much of a rotten freak as the rumors say. She is the absolute worst from the moment she wakes up in the morning to the moment she goes to sleep at night. I may be the only person left who can stand being around that undisciplined court scientist.”

He thought of Slender who had opted to speak with him over screaming when he had seen her bathing. He thought of the girl who had reached out a helping hand when he was being burned at the stake for some kind of rule he didn’t understand.

Was he supposed to abandon her now?

Was he supposed to hold his tongue while she was placed on the vivisection table, had her gut cut open, and her organs removed one by one? Just because her ears were longer, she spoke another language, and she belonged to another species?

Klaus Knockburn opened his eyes wide and touched the handle of a ceramic pot. He tightly grabbed that blunt object heavy with its liquid contents.

“But not even I can stand you.”

“…”

“Professor, there’s no love in what you do.”

Part 9

It ended exactly how he had expected.

The heavy ceramic pot was shattered on the floor and Klaus was sprawled out on the ground, unable to move.

His hands were tied behind his back and his face pressed against the floor with the old man looking down at him and casually waving a hand.

“No, no. Kill him here and Reika will have my head when she finds out.”

Kyle Hardjuicer was unscathed and surrounded by knights wielding the daggers meant to finish off an injured opponent.

And that included Loinbelt, the baby-faced page who had helped the redhead boy earlier.

“It’s a real shame. Not that I was hoping to make you my elective student at this point. You are already spoken for. My only real option is to write a dissection book that can convey the accurate information to far more people. And to acquire the necessary details, I must first take a look inside those creatures.”

Professor Dissection exited the tent with the knights, leaving Klaus alone.

“Dammit.”

Klaus squirmed and awkwardly untied the ropes binding his wrists behind him.

He had nearly been burned at the stake when the dark elves tied him up, so rope escape methods had already been on his mind. Admittedly, he had only come up with the extremely simple method of getting his sleeves caught in the rope meant to bind his wrists. The trick to escaping ropes was to create a gap. Once he pulled his sleeves out from the rope, he had some wiggle room between his wrists and the rope.

Since they weren’t weapons, his stick and earring were left out on the table. That collection of his experiences was almost as valuable to him as his life. Only his wife was more valuable than his life.

However, when he tried to get up, he wobbled and fell flat on the ground again.

He had escaped the rope, but he was still weak.

This was the hunger and thirst brought on by extreme physical exhaustion. He had obtained some magic derivative from the Palmtop Mouse, but his ordinary stamina was still an issue. And it wasn’t like he could chase after them and stop them by force. Through some kind of trickery, that old man had managed to get the knights on his side even though he was a commoner and an eccentric. Those military experts would work together to swiftly suppress a skinny guy like him well before he could cause Kyle any harm.

…I could use my camouflage power to turn into a large animal…no, that wouldn’t work. Changing form wouldn’t bring back my strength and there must be plenty of preserved food here since they left all their supplies behind…oh, but an animal can’t defeat spears and bows and those are powerful military weapons, not just hunting ones.

“So…”

He felt hunger, thirst, pain, and suffering. He could not win this just by indirectly taking the magic derivative built up in a Palmtop Mouse through bioconcentration. No one would blame him if he just passed out here on the floor. That was the ordinary reaction for a living being.

But.

Even so.

“Do you think I’m going to give up on my wife just because I can’t win?”

He clenched his teeth and forced himself up from the ground again.

He walked unsteadily out of the tent.

He heard the neighing and hoofbeats of warhorses, which sounded so out of place deep in the forest.

A few of them had twisted their ankles on the rocks, Witch Pumpkins, or tree roots and a few more had been caught in beartraps or other traps, but that was not enough to defeat trained knights.

The dark elves, the rulers of this forest, were on the run.

Even though they had caused Klaus so much fear.

“Iqb xaneqwootv, jiwkot itaeqg!! Yo yunn ifw iv i guxotvuaq! Yo yunn gtiy wkop iyib db rtowoqguqj wa hnoo!!”

“Uw riuqv po, dew wkob iwwifmog ev hutvw iqg yo fiqqaw now wkop nafiwo wko xunnijo. Fapo yuwk po uh bae ito rtoritog wa gutwb baet kiqgv!!”

Leader and Curvy, the hunters who had used their silence as a weapon, were now raising their voices. Perhaps that was a sign of how worked up they were, but straying from their usual ways made it sound to Klaus like they were losing.

He seriously doubted their village was in this area.

They would never place their secret village right alongside the human road. Had they been on their way to that garden, or just on a walk? Whatever the case, they must have been unlucky enough to run across the human expedition.

“…”

Klaus kept his eyes peeled for the trap signs as he took up position on a small hill.

A thought occurred to him. He could not let Professor Dissection get away with this. He would save the dark elves from that bastard who felt the need to cut open everything he came across. But when you got down to it, how was Klaus any different? His methods were different, but he still wasn’t on the dark elves’ side. He didn’t know their language or their customs. Anything he did would only be the self-righteous actions of a human outsider.

Just then…

“Qyik!? Ykiw, ykiw uv wko poiquqj ah wkuv!?”

“Uw’v inn tujkw. Fapo wkuv yib.”

Any kind of activity stood out this deep in the forest, yet someone had chosen to do more than necessary. And it caused quite a reaction. A dark elf calmly pulled on a small hand. She had long, silver hair and brown skin and she looked to be 15 or 16. She wore a white-bleached vest and a blue tight skirt, so she had to be one of the hunters.

And an earring glittered on just one of her ears.

This was Slender. The attacks were concentrated on her of all people.

The one speaking loudly and being pulled along by her appeared to be Little Girl who had been hiding behind her mother’s back in the clearing. What had happened to her mother? Klaus frowned as he watched that small girl in a dress tripping and falling in the mud over and over and as she sobbed and was forced to run away. Slender could not abandon her, so she would rub the sobbing child on the back and get her running again. The boy gritted his teeth when he saw it. He knew the emotion throbbing in his chest.

…Go to hell.

He felt burning fury. He felt the same unbearable anger he would have felt if he saw a human child surrounded and brought to tears by a group of fully grown adults.

…I’m going to marry Slender. Nothing can change that now. But what about the wedding? I can’t have the bride’s side of the guests be entirely empty because of some old geezer’s twisted ideas about science.

He had felt definite fear and confusion when he was nearly burned alive by the dark elves, caught by the beartrap, nearly fell off the cliff, and nearly eaten by termites, but this was the first time he felt his heart burning with such obvious rage.

As a scientist in training, he chose a solid stance against this kind of unreasonable and abominable treatment.

“That’s enough,” he muttered under his breath.

The situation was only going to get worse. The rules he had always lived by did not apply here in the Forest of No Return. He was unarmed and alone while Kyle’s knights and the dark elf village clashed. If he assisted Professor Dissection, the dark elves would be his only enemy, but the dark elves would not take his side even if he assisted them. If he did that, he would have both sides as his enemy. If he let his emotions take over and made a rash decision, he was unlikely to return alive.

But.

He squeezed the earring in his hand.

…What did Slender do when they were burning me at the stake? Do you think she considered who would take her side and how she would benefit when she chose to save me?

If a dark elf could make that kind of decision, then surely a human could too.

“I don’t care if I’m just being self-righteous,” he said more strongly.

He was through wracking his brains to find some kind of excuse for his actions.

He didn’t know the dark elves’ language or customs, but he might be able to dry Little Girl’s tears while she searched for her mother and he might be able to prevent Slender from being dissected after refusing to let go of that small hand.

The dark elves scared him.

But he wanted to invite them to his wedding with his lovely bride.

If he wanted Slender to fall for him, that was the kind of human he had to be!!

“I won’t let this self-righteousness go to waste.”

Part 10

Klaus slid down the slope.

He charged onto the life-size game board while keeping the locations of the dark elf girl and the warhorses in his head so as not to lose track of them.

First, he reviewed the battle conditions. He had chosen to save Slender. He would do so no matter what. But that good will was one-way and he doubted the dark elves would reciprocate. If he stood in the knights’ way, Slender might even shoot him in the back with an arrow.

…I still don’t know why she disobeyed her village to save me, so I can’t let my guard down. I can’t speak with her, so she might think the human she saved on a whim returned the favor by calling a bunch of his friends to attack.

He could not expect her thanks.

But he had not chosen to save her to demand anything in return.

And…

…I would have a hard time fighting directly against the knights. They’re combat experts. Even more so than martial artists. An amateur can’t accomplish anything by challenging them.

The only card in his deck was the Camouflize magic.

He could also tell he was woozy. He had a bad headache similar to a dehydration symptom. That meant he had very little magic derivative left after charging out here without grabbing any supplies.

…I can only use my magic once. And even if it does work, I’ll have zero stem left in me, so I’ll pass out.

“That means my goal can’t be defeating the knights. No one could do that. I need to sow enough confusion for the dark elves to escape!!”

He could not rely on the idea that he could defeat a whole group of humans by camouflaging himself as a large magical creature like a dragon or griffin. These knights could slay one of those and move on. That was what it meant to be experts in the field of combat. It was wrong to assume they could be defeated as long as you were clever enough. He would die as soon as he tried to challenge them in their field of expertise.

The dark elf girl was not going to last long while helping sobbing Little Girl escape.

Professor Dissection’s objective was to take her alive and dissect her. That was why Loinbelt (who Klaus hoped was questioning his actions here) and the others were going easy on her as they pursued her, but there were no guarantees. If one of those 500kg warhorses reached her, she would be crushed. She would be killed just like the traffic accidents between a runaway horse and a pedestrian that he had occasionally seen in the royal capital.

…I’ll show you a surprise before you can lay a finger on my wife. I swear it.

What would he transform into?

When and where would he use it?

“Of the three traits, I choose mercury. Mammal, perissodactyl, equid, kingdom, gone feral after domestication, an animal with no original. I have grasped thy nature like counting the corners of a polygon or star. The polygon emanates and the star gathers – together they symbolize the control of power. By knowing thee, I become one with thee.”

He recited the incantation while he ran. He worked to understand what it was he wished to become.

He couldn’t reach a full understanding. That would be as endless a task as painting the grains of sand on the beach or the stars in the sky by adding each individual dot to the canvas. So he selected a few aspects of the whole and filled in the gaps with his imagination to guide him. As long as he got that right, he could create a very realistic scene, like an oil painting that intentionally omitted information.

With that set, he only had to raise his voice.

He drew a square magic circle on the ground and stepped inside. So he could grasp the three traits through the four elements and connect heaven to earth.

He had magic and now was the time to use it. Once he knew that, he had to act immediately!!

“Camouflize Decoration – now I am thee!!”

With an almost comical-looking blast of steam, Klaus Knockburn gained an entirely different body. But the distortion to his vision was not because the position of his eyes had changed.

(Cough, cough. Ugh, I’m so dizzy! I really am going to pass out like this!!)

He clenched his teeth, but he grinned on the inside. Of course he did. This was 100 times better than letting that girl die. Once he knew where he stood, all his hesitation vanished. He couldn’t understand her language and he couldn’t ask her how she felt, but he felt confident she would do the same in his position.

Now that he was on Slender’s side and viewing the world from her viewpoint, the world seemed to open up around him.

He had an entirely different body now, so he could appear in front of the dark elf and the knights without them knowing it was him.

“Wha-!?”

If they collided, it would mean a legit traffic accident, so he had known Page Loinbelt would immediately pull on the reins and stop his horse. Just like on the road earlier.

From up close, he noticed doubt and guilt on Loinbelt’s face. There was even a touch of relief when he was forced to unexpectedly stop. Geez, what an honest knight.

(Yeah, you would never agree with this, would you? You instinctively risked falling off your horse to protect a stranger. If that’s the kind of knight you hope to be, then you must hate being ordered to work as a group to chase after someone much weaker than you and take them prisoner, right!?)

There were times when you had to obey even if you didn’t want to.

Klaus himself had briefly hesitated because trying to directly stop Professor Dissection would only get him killed by the knights. So he wasn’t going to blame Loinbelt. He had no right.

(So I’ll stop you. If you’re silly sense of knightly duty prevents you from disobeying an order, then I’ll stop you instead! That’s my way of repaying you for saving me!!)

Now, what exactly had Klaus Knockburn Camouflized into?

And why had Loinbelt felt the need to pull on the reins while riding atop a 500kg warhorse?

Because Klaus was a mare.

And not just any mare. He was one any male horse would find irresistibly attractive.

“Kh…stop, swift and honorable Vainbux! I said stop!”

Loinbelt tried his best to stop the horse, but it was too late.

Klaus could not create a camouflaged form out of nothing, so he had based it on the warhorses he could see. They were all powerful males, but the observations for his camouflage magic only determined the species, such as horse or cattle. If he were camouflaging himself as a dalmatian, for example, he could adjust everything other than the species to his liking: coat, markings, sex, age, etc.

He would choose one of three traits to focus on when casting his magic. Salt meant leaving everything the same as the original, sulfur meant prioritizing the male side, and mercury meant prioritizing the female side.

(Hm, will this do the trick?)

He did not know how horses behaved and anyone who did may have thought this horse was acting very strangely indeed, but shaking his butt in front of the many warhorses had a dramatic effect. The knights lost all control like they were now riding racehorses injected full of banned drugs.

And Klaus made sure to continue his observations as a scientist.

(Whew, impressive. That one certainly lives up to the “hung like a horse” saying. Warhorses are normally castrated for better control, but maybe the idea is to sell them off as studs after they retire. Are the regulations looser with a second-class horse given to a page?)

Loinbelt did fairly well, but his Vainbux (who the baby-faced page insisted on praising as much as his knight) was not the only warhorse here.

Klaus heard more and more whinnies which were even more frightening than the sounds of a steam engine. Some knights were tossed about, some clung on for dear life, and others were thrown clear. It was a complete disaster. With the front row of horses out of control, the shock and panic spread as a chain reaction.

Alchemists had developed a form of explosive powder. that would make a loud noise when ignited, so it was sometimes thrown out onto the battlefield to confuse the trained warhorses.

(I’ve got them!!)

He felt like he was out fishing and he felt the imaginary tug of a solid bite. He had no actual numbers or signs to go by, but he knew he could allow Slender and Little Girl to escape now.

However.

(Wait. Distracting them is all well and good, but what do I do now?)

He hadn’t thought this through.

A chill ran down his spine(?).

He hesitantly looked back to find the muscular machos of the horse world breathing heavily and leering at his mare ass. He rapidly grew embarrassed by his own actions here. But try as he might, he could not shake their attention. The horse language was an even greater mystery than the dark elf language, but the looks in their beady eyes could not have been clearer.

How kind of you to offer, you charming young lady.

I hope you’re ready to be shared by all of us until dawn☆

(Ah, ahhhhhhh, ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!?)

Taking a quick look back at the dark elf girl before thoughtlessly charging into the nearby bushes may have been a mistake. The many warhorses rushed after their prey, despite being herbivores who normally peacefully ate the grass.

“Bae?”

He thought he heard Slender’s voice while she sat flat on the ground with her arms around Little Girl’s shoulders from behind.

Come to think of it, hadn’t she seen his camouflage magic back when he was being crushed below Leader’s ass as a Witch Pumpkin?

Part 11

The dizziness had grown far worse and he couldn’t control his perspiration. He really thought he was going to die this time.

He had been down to his last stem, so he was never going to last long after using Camouflize.

“Whoa!?”

He frantically uncamouflaged in a blast of white steam and rolled behind a mossy rock. The thundering hooves of the heavyweight warhorses raced past. He came dangerously close to losing his virginity out in the open woods before he could lose it on his wedding night. The horses would have gathered around him and spent all night making sure he was very well acquainted with those monstrous things hanging between their legs.

“I-I never could have called my rotten teacher a pervert again if that happened.”

He sat on the ground and tried to wipe the sweat from his brow, but he found he couldn’t raise his arm.

His was down to zero Witch Pumpkin stems. With the magic derivative deficiency set in, he really was approaching death. He had the severe headache of a dehydration symptom as well as powerful nausea. He could no longer accomplish something so simple. He clenched his teeth, but the dizziness would not go away. He had finally hit his limit. Even he could tell the unpleasantly warm sweat on his brow was rapidly cooling.

…They…got away, right?

His thoughts turned to the girl who looked around 15 or 16. But a dark elf’s age did not necessarily match their appearance, so she may have been a 3000-year-old granny for all he knew.

He rested his back against the large rock and worked his woozy head. None of this was worth it if she had been captured by Professor Dissection. He wanted her to be happy. She didn’t owe him anything for saving her, but he still wanted her to take care of herself after he risked his life to repay her. After all, he doubted he was going to live long enough to see her again.

…Oh, I forgot to return her earring.

With that thought on his mind, he started to shut his eyes in resignation.

But then it happened.

He saw something transparent.

He saw an unbelievable destructive gash.

An unseen mass of great power tore away the leaves of the trees and pierced the air as it followed the course of a flying arrow.

That was Archdragon Magic. Specifically, Charge of the Wyvern.

He could tell it wasn’t aimed at him, but his seated body was still lifted from the ground and thrown several meters. He slammed into a green mossy object that may have been a pillar or a rock.

“Kah!?”

The fearsome destruction reaped lives while traveling with enough confidence to carefully avoid felling any of the trees. Charge of the Wyvern was not the only magic used here. Wings of the Lindwurm sent in a great mass of air that was concentrated down to a single point before exploding in every direction. Levelling of the Drake increased an invisible pressure until it was powerful enough to flatten the target and the mossy terrain around them. Rolling of the Wyrm easily smashed large boulders.

Which side was doing this?

During his time in the Court Magic Academy, Klaus had never heard of a human managing to reproduce Archdragon Magic based on the scraps of information found in the old texts sleeping within the forbidden section of the royal library.

“Eek, eek!”

So the answer was simple. Especially when he heard a voice begging for its life echoing from deeper in the deadly forest.

The wrinkled old voice spoke the human language.

Which meant it was not a dark elf.

“What did I do to deserve this!? Eek, we must reveal the secrets of all forms of life. To create a freer world!! And dissection is necessary to reveal those secrets!! I have done nothing wrong!!”

The owner of the voice was obliterated, reduced to no more than some splattered remains.

His eyes had been as unreadable as a fish’s.

That researcher had been self-centered to the end, so all he left behind was a pathetic plea for his life. It didn’t seem like his words reached anyone. His life was snuffed out with the disturbing sound of something sticky being thrown against the wall. That was the end for a lonely old man who had managed to cling to success for so long despite his eccentric nature.

Yes, the dark elves could think, talk, and take action just like humans.

So of course they could use magic just like humans. In fact, no human knew much about the dark elves’ lifestyle, religious views, or technological level. There was just as little information on the magic they used. So why underestimate them? Wasn’t it possible their magic was even more advanced!?

…Archdragon Magic.

Klaus’s survival instincts told him to continue his observations even on the verge of death. He would not survive through fight or flight if he lacked information. So his instincts were telling him to gather that information to give him whatever chance he could get.

…I doubt they can just use magic like that for no reason. There must be more to this – some kind of core that supports the Archdragon Magic no one else can use!!

His memories seemed to flicker in and out. He did not remember much immediately before or after seeing Slender bathing, or when they had taken him to their village. For example, he knew he had happened across that mountain stream, but he couldn’t remember why he had been walking in that area. Could there be other gaps in his memory? He must have been injured badly enough that he didn’t even notice the gaps until the memories returned to him.

But one of the drawers in his mind suddenly opened.

He had been thrown several meters through the air and slammed into a mossy object that could have been a pillar or a rock. But now he was confident it was neither.

This forest was also known as the Dragon’s Forest.

He had seen giant, pointy white fangs all around when he had stumbled across naked Slender.

And Professor Dissection had originally been here to research Brashgain’s bones.

In other words…

“The dragon was over 10km long and could cover an entire city with his wings spread. 500 years ago, back when the knights still had some righteousness left, the humans managed to band together to slay that great predator.”

Reika Kickpleats’s words replayed in his mind.

This was when she had explained why she was only bringing her tight-lipped #1 student into the forest with her.

“The dark elves are working to resurrect Brashgain. In order to bring flesh back to the great skeleton stretching across the entire forest and to return him to his former glory, they have set up a massive magic circle to absorb power from the land itself. He is a true monster, so recovery magic really can resurrect him from that state. And we humans are so much weaker nowadays, so we won’t last long if this succeeds. We have to put a stop to this but we also must prevent any other humans from seeing it. We face utter destruction, but if enough people panic, we might be brought down without the dragon needing to do a thing.”

He only had one chance to find the dark elf village.

If he gave up and left the forest, he could never attempt it again.

So the boy slowly looked up at the mossy object he was leaning against.

That enormous crescent moon curve was…a rib.

One look through the gaps in the trees and streams was enough to tell that 10km dragon corpse really did cover the entire length of the forest.

His teacher was gone and the knights had just been wiped out. With this distraction dealt with, the dark elves would soon be back to their original work. Deep in the woods where no one could reach them, they would carry out the ceremony necessary to resurrect Brashgain and bring doom to the world.

Why would they do that? One look at Professor Dissection was answer enough. He was a rather extreme example, but he was like a concentrated version of how humans tended to treat magical lifeforms.

Humans saw them as creatures of fantasy. Humans refused to give them equal rights. They could so clearly think and behave just like humans, but humans dodged the burden and responsibility of treating them as equals by labeling them as inferior. But the downtrodden were not going to just sit there and take the abuse forever.

The dark elves had already developed a solid motive for their actions.

Only the humans acted like everything was fine.

“…”

Klaus Knockburn, currently slumped over and unable to move, had made a choice earlier. He had chosen his future wife. He had decided to rescue Slender who was in trouble after refusing to abandon a crying child.

And this was where it had gotten him.

Had he really done the right thing?

In a flash of motion, Klaus grabbed the glossy black beetle starting to crawl on him.

He stuffed it into his mouth and forced it down his throat.

It was likely a forest decomposer that cleaned the forest of insect and animal corpses. You might find something similar if you checked in the garbage can behind a royal capital restaurant.

But he still ate it.

He broke a taboo to live. Was that its legs or antennae that caught in his throat? He didn’t even want to know the source of that bitterness when he bit into its squishy belly. He ignored all that and got it down. He was not enjoying a nice meal for its flavor and texture. When living by the rules of the wild, you couldn’t complain when someone ate you. He had to steel himself to live by those same rules if he hoped to survive out here.

“Ewww. Dammit, why do I have to eat Witch Pumpkin stems of all things?”

But he no longer felt like he had an invisible ring of metal tightened around his forehead. This species of beetle must eat Witch Pumpkins or Ghost Turnips as well, so it acted as an indirect supply.

He could not die yet.

He could not escape to the human village just outside the forest.

In the Forest of No Return, a single step from the road was supposed to leave you stranded, never to escape. All of his assumptions about the human road had just been overturned. The dark elves did not fear the humans. They may have been overlooking the human wagons coming and going, but not anymore. If he tried to stagger his way to safety along the road, he would almost certainly run into an ambush and be blown away by Archdragon Magic along with the stone-paved road itself.

He could not afford to lose his life like that.

If he died, he could not stop the dragon resurrection. Nor could he find Slender again and ask her what was going on.

“Goddess dammit.”

He was moving slower than a snail, but he still got up. No voice answered his curse. The eerie silence of death had once more taken over the deep, damp forest ruled by the dark elves.

He had to do whatever it took to prevent the dark elves from resurrecting Brashgain, the 10km city-sized dragon that viewed humans as his prey. Rotten freak though she was, Reika Kickpleats was a genius, so if she said that would mean the end of humanity, he had to assume those modern knights (She said we’re weaker nowadays, didn’t she?) wouldn’t be enough. This one thing would mean the destruction of every human country and organization out there. That thing would be a living ultimate weapon.

“Who can I rely on?”

He toyed with the earring in his pocket, confirming its presence there.

Slender. In hindsight, it was such a silly name, but changing it now would only confuse his memories and notes. So he carved into his note-taking stick that Slender was his one and only option.

That girl was quickly becoming a special member of the dark elf species. She looked to be 15 or 16 and she was likely one of their bow-wielding hunters.

Was she an enemy or an ally? Should he really have rescued her?

Klaus slapped his hands against his cheeks.

…Don’t hesitate, don’t second-guess yourself, and don’t overturn your assumptions for subjective reasons. Whatever her reasons might be, she still rescued me!

Reality could be cruel and Slender might be part of a village plotting to destroy the world. If he was wrong, he would be ruining his one chance of preventing the dragon’s resurrection. And then the world was doomed.

But he did not change his mind.

He could trust his future wife. And if he trusted her, then he could continue onward with confidence in his step.

If he trusted her, he needed to work toward being the kind of guy she would fall for.

“Time to win this lonely war and find all the answers.”

The only card in his deck was Camouflize.

He didn’t even know where he would find any food to eat, but he had to find a way survive in this dark elf forest.

If he won, it would all work itself out.

Chapter 2: Right and Left, Nothing but Crises

Part 1

So smooth. So soft.

“Ik ki ki! Vefk iq adoguoqw ftoiweto bae ito!!”

Little Girl, the dark elf in the sheer white dress, was riding Klaus Knockburn, bouncing up and down in delight. The pure gold flower decoration in her hair and the green gem around her neck seemed awfully dangerous on such a small child. Not to mention her short skirt. Now that was dangerous!

Then again, he was currently using his camouflage magic to transform into a male deer.

(Th-this isn’t right. How did this even happen!?)

The sun had fully set.

Since the camouflage magic was the only card in his deck, Klaus needed to be prepared to use it. That meant acquiring the magic derivative found in Ghost Turnips and Witch Pumpkins, but that was easier said than done. First of all, the Witch Pumpkin was not an option. Their skin and stems were thick as a shield and a metal knife was not enough to break through. And while he had forcibly eaten part of a Ghost Turnip’s flowers before, not all of them had flowers growing from them. He had no idea where to find one like that in this vast forest and he lacked the physical or mental fortitude to walk through the bushes and search for something that might not even be there.

That meant he needed an indirect supply, such as an animal that normally ate Ghost Turnips or Witch Pumpkins.

But that was also easier said than done. He actually had a chance there, but he did not know how to catch a living animal or fish out in the wild. He would occasionally spot shapes through the gaps in the trees or the surface of a river, but they ran away before he could eat them. And the teasing glimpses only made it more painful.

He was going to die at this rate.

He had less than a full stem left. Once it reached 0, he would suffer from symptoms similar to dehydration.

So he went for a high risk, high return last resort. He could not seem to capture them for whatever reason, but he could catch glimpses of them. And if he could observe them, this was always an option.

He could turn into an animal using Camouflize.

And if he camouflaged himself as a calm herbivore, he could lure in a carnivore.

He wanted an animal with Witch Pumpkin or Ghost Turnip inside it. A carnivore might not seem like the best option there, but they would be eating the herbivores. That meant they were very likely to have indirectly ingested what he wanted.

He could not survive by running randomly around the forest.

He had to focus on the ecosystem. What effect would the hard, unmoving Witch Pumpkins and Ghost Turnips have on the forest as a whole? Focus on that and he had a chance.

Of course, this meant he was forcibly camouflaging himself while already low on stem. If he screwed this up and failed to catch anything, he would definitely suffer from the dehydration-like symptoms. It was a risky gamble.

He was prepared to fight for his life. Pushed to the limit, he concluded that fighting an animal was far better than just rolling over waiting for death.

But now he was trembling in deer form.

(Little Girl? Why did I have to run across her now!?)

What about her mother? It was dark now, so shouldn’t she be back at their village? Several questions spun through his mind, but at least she didn’t look injured.

And in an unexpected move, Little Girl walked 5cm in front of him and hesitantly placed something like meatballs on the mossy ground.

He scarfed it down.

Maybe they were for pets and maybe they were for livestock, but they were meatballs without a hint of saltiness. They may have been deadly bait normally placed on the ground to draw out prey, but he didn’t care. Two golf ball-sized hunks of meat were not enough to fill his belly, but it had been so long since he had proper food cooked(???) by someone. He nearly burst into tears despite being a deer.

(Yes, yessss!! The headache is going away. I’m recovering. This is meat. Cooked meat. And it has the magic derivative. Cooking is the bessssst!)

The meatballs gave him two stems’ worth. Had the meat come from an animal that ate Ghost Turnips or Witch Pumpkins, or had the vegetable or stem been ground up and included in the meatballs? Only now did he start to question the entire idea of a deer eating meat, but Little Girl didn’t seem to question it.

“Bov, wkoto’v i jaag dab. Bae pevw kixo dooq hipuvkog, bae raat wkuqj.”

He felt something soft on the top of his head.

Smiling Little Girl had placed her small hand on his head and patted him. She may have placed the meatballs on the ground just to get him to lower his head enough for that. It had been soooo long since he had experienced such kindness. I’m really gonna cry, dammit.

That much was fine. He was even willing to call it a success.

But what good were a puny human’s predictions out in the wilderness?

“Kp. Bae irroit vwtaqj oqaejk wa verratw pb youjkw. Aqnb aqo yib wa huqg aew!”

(Gwah!?)

She hopped right onto his back. With no thought to the whole skirt situation. He felt her weight and the touch of a small butt with nothing but underwear between it and his back. He nearly spat the meatballs from his deer mouth, but she didn’t seem to care. The oddly cheerful and very soft skirt girl was still talking.

“Ik ki ki! U kig wkaejkw katvo-tuguqj yiv i rivwupo hat wko kepiqv aew aq wkout aroq rniuqv, dew u qoxot mqoy kay wtaednovapo katvov faeng do. Wkoto uv inyibv pato wa noitq oxoq iw pb ijo. Ja, ja!!”

Her smile was too innocent. He was only human, so he had repeatedly attempted to get back at his rotten teacher by transforming into a beetle or butterfly and sneak in while she was bathing or changing, but she had spotted him every single time and beaten him half to death with a slipper. Thanks to that, he had written off his camouflage magic as fairly useless, but how wrong he had been. Were the dark elves just too pure to suspect a thing!? His deer form trembled. Unlike with that black-hearted and rotten teacher, he just felt bad with this girl.

In fact…

(Ow, ow, ow!? M-my hips. A deer just isn’t strong enough. If she was going to ride me, I should have gone with a horse! Then I could jokingly say she rode me cowgirl style!!)

Just like with salt and fat, people sought out inappropriate laughter when they were worn out. And this deer was honestly relieved while innocent Little Girl tightened her legs around him and enjoyed the rodeo ride. He was glad her smile was back. He still had to stop the resurrection of the legendary Brashgain from the 10km remains, but it felt wrong to blame such a small girl just because she was a dark elf too.

Even if he might have to fight against her mother.

Worse, her mother might have already lost her life to Professor Dissection and the knights’ barbaric attack.

How long could he realistically remain on this girl’s side?

(…)

He was glad his deer face could not form detailed expressions.

And then…

“Ykiw ito bae gauqj wkoto?”

A dreadfully low voice reached his ears.

He hesitantly looked back to find a second dark elf. It was Slender in the white-bleached leather vest and blue tight skirt of a hunter. My wife, did you sense my mental call and come running!? No, now was not the time for rejoicing.

She had a terrifyingly icy look in her eyes and she had her large bow at the ready.

(Oh.)

He reviewed his situation here. Little Girl was wholly ignorant, but Slender had seen him dispel his camouflage magic before. And a hunter might be able to tell his behavior apart from an actual deer. So what would this look like to her? Wouldn’t he look like a gentleman of the highest caliber who spotted a young girl in the middle of the woods and opted to trick her into climbing onto his back in a small dress so he could enjoy having her spread her legs and rub her smooth softness against him through her underwear?

“Akk!? Ykiw kiv bae inn doqw aew ah vkiro, jutn? Yoto bae karuqj wa tugo kup waa?”

(Wait, Little Girl! Don’t start bouncing up and down even harder when your friend shows up!! Ahh, i-it’s not what it looks like, Slender. I was on the verge of dying from magic derivative deficiency, so this was my only option! Oh, goddess, she’s so warm!!)

“Kprk!!”

Slender shouted something and then he heard something sharply whizzing through the air.

Then he heard a loud slapping sound.

Pain exploded in his butt like someone had rubbed mustard paste into a wound. Hallucinated lights really did dance before his eyes. It took him a few seconds to realize what had happened to him.

(A-agh. D-did she remove the bowstring and whip me with it!? But wait! Didn’t that bow have something like a fang on the end!?)

“Ykb!? Pevw bae!? Inyibv pimo wkuqjv va iymyitg!?”

When he did not immediately let Little Girl down, his future wife kept shouting at and whipping him.

Slender proved to him she had the makings of a dominatrix, but Little Girl was still on his back. If he ran off now, he would be a very tasty kidnapper. He couldn’t do that. He had eaten a bug to survive, but he couldn’t do that!! Little Girl was working her small hips atop him for some very high-level rodeoing, but the male deer had to put up with the pain and crouch down to let her down. But Little Girl pouted her lips to complain. She lowered her center of gravity and started pressing her far-too-defenseless crotch against him even more.

“Ykiw’v wkuv, wirruqj aew intoigb? Dew u yiv huqguqj wkuv vratw wa do seuwo oqwotwiuquqj. Vwib vwtaqj! Wko heq kiv aqnb levw dojeq!!”

(Stop tilting your tiny head and get off of me!! Before I learn to like being whipped by my wife!!)

Little Girl was rocking her tiny body back and forth to enjoy herself some more and showing no sign of getting down on her own, so the trembling deer had to crawl out from below her. He somehow managed to escape the fearsome tunnel created by her two legs and rubbing crotch. No deer in the history of the world had ever moved like that, but he couldn’t worry about that right now. He had to escape before the pain in his whipped ass became something other than pain and he found he could no longer get off without his hunter of a wife whipping him in the great outdoors. If he was going to develop a fetish like that, he didn’t want Little Girl to be watching.

And now it’s time to get out of here!!

“Jow navw, bae geppb!! Ga bae ga wkuv yuwk iqbaqo yka juxov bae wko fkiqfo? Ykb gaq’w bae ja fkivo ihwot i gao’v ivv, bae rotxotw!?”

He was pretty sure Slender directed some strong words his way as he left.

And he was even more sure she had not been complimenting him for his hard work.

Part 2

It was difficult to think while suffering from pain, hunger, or thirst. Just like your body’s reflexes took priority over logical thinking when touching a hot kettle. Only the detectives in stage plays could get by on last-second flashes of insight. The logic would only catch up to you after it was too late.

Klaus the Deer ran through the forest while looking for traps until it grew dark. Only after coming to a stop and looking back did he realize something important.

(She used her bow like a whip, but she never did launch an arrow at me.)

Nor did she use any Archdragon Magic.

He pondered that for a bit, but there was no point in staying a deer. He might be able to trick the other dark elves searching for him, but he also didn’t want to be hunted down as tonight’s dinner.

He dispelled Camouflize with the usual white steam.

He had two Witch Pumpkin stems’ worth left. But that only applied to the bioconcentrated magic derivative, so he was still hungry. Since he had eaten some, his stomach was begging for food even more intensely than if it were entirely empty. But Little Girl would be more heavily guarded now and he doubted that would work on the other dark elves. Slender had noticed something was off about his deer form, so the others might as well.

And with anyone other than Slender, they would shoot him with a hunting arrow or even blast him with Archdragon Magic.

…That’s too risky a gamble.

He could not expect to subsist off of food given to him by others. His only option was to secure some magic derivative, acquire food, and search out the dark elf village on his own.

This was no longer as simple as borrowing some tools to bring his future wife back home with him.

The dark elves were attempting to resurrect the 10km dragon Brashgain.

He had to stop that, but he had too little to work with. Food, a place to sleep, and other survival concerns were an issue, but his lack of information was even more of a problem. He lacked a map of the Forest of No Return and he didn’t know where the dark elf village was. How the dragon would be resurrected from his bones, what kind of magical materials were needed, the details of the ceremony, and the amount of time remaining were all unknown. That rotten teacher hadn’t explained anything for him. But he would rather she stayed dead than return from the depths of hell to explain it all for him now.

…I need help.

His thoughts turned in the natural direction.

Little Girl was so innocent she would probably help him if he asked, but he couldn’t share any secrets with her for the same reason. There was too great a risk of her telling the adult dark elves any secrets he told her. And without giving any thought to the consequences. Then he was dead for sure.

That just left Slender.

She was old enough to know what she was doing, but she had still chosen to save a human like Klaus. If she was willing to save one human boy, surely she would want to stop the destruction of the entire species. He also wanted to prove to her that he had not been preying on a little girl deep in the woods. He had to shatter that idea before it could set in too deeply!!

He could not speak her language. He did not know her culture, customs, rules, or taboos.

He still didn’t know why they had tried to burn him alive for seeing her bathing. Did the dark elves just value purity that highly, or had that bath been part of the ceremony to resurrect Brashgain? Could she be a dark elf princess needed for the ceremony so no one was to interrupt her while she purified herself? Oh, no. These fantasies are getting me a little too excited. And all those furious dark elves seem a lot cuter when I think of them as shrine maidens or maids trying to protect their one and only princess.

…I have nothing to support that idea, though. There’s too much I still don’t know about the dark elf world.

But…

“All I really have to do is win my future wife’s heart, right? And who needs a flask of aphrodisiac to do that?”

Part 3

He needed to perform some research and then act on that research.

He stuck his note-taking stick below his belt and finally started walking. He was afraid of missing the signs for traps and forks in the path when it was this dark out, but it was less of an issue than he had thought. He had always needed a light back in the royal capital, but once his eyes adjusted, he could make out the outlines of everything with just the starlight.

…But I can’t get started without knowing where Slender is.

Given how they had last parted, he doubted they would get any closer if he approached her now. His pessimistic side was shouting questions at him. How long would he have to wait before she cooled her head? And even if she did, how could he be so sure his proposal would be accepted? He was short on time. This forest was notoriously easy to get lost in, so he would never find her if he started searching at random. He needed to go back on the offensive while he had still seen her recently. Unless he wanted to break down in tears later on.

He wanted to see her as soon as possible specifically because she was angry. The longer she was left with that misunderstanding, the harder it would be to convince her of the truth.

…I love you, Slender, but not because I’m into younger girls. Please understand that nuance, my wife!!

So he ended up searching for his own footsteps in the forest.

“Dammit, is this them? No, I’m not looking for boot prints. I was Camouflized as a deer at the time. Ugh, and I’m hungry too. So these hoofprints are what I’m looking for. Man, I really shouldn’t have started thinking about meat.”

This felt as useless as gathering back up his own spit, but it was necessary. If he could find his trail, he could follow it back the way he came and return to where Slender and Little Girl were.

He walked slowly and carefully through the dark forest, surrounded by chirping bugs. After a while, he recognized his surroundings. This was near where Little Girl had attacked him earlier. But the place was already deserted, so she and Slender must have gone elsewhere.

Still, he would have overlooked the location altogether if he hadn’t been observing his surroundings so carefully. The hunter girl had even collected the remnants of the meatballs from the ground.

…Does that mean I’ll have a hard time tracking Slender by her footprints?

No, it was too soon to give up hope. He changed what he was focused on and viewed the grass and ground once more.

“There we go.”

Slender was a fully-trained hunter, but he did see a few smaller footprints. Those had to be Little Girl’s. Slender intentionally covered her tracks, but that girl still left a trail.

…Little Girl again? I’m basically stalking her now, aren’t I?

That was concerning, but he was in no position to worry about it now. Surely his future wife would understand. He still wasn’t sure why Little Girl was out this late, but he wanted to believe Slender would be looking after her – and thus he could find her by following Little Girl’s tracks.

That was when he heard a dry cracking sound through the chirping of the bugs. He never would have noticed it in the noisy royal capital, so he was amazed at how much his time out in the wild had changed him.

He ducked down, gulped, and narrowed his eyes to peer into the darkness.

“Kooob, jutnnn!”

He heard an elongated voice. He did not know what it was saying, but it sounded quite young. He also recognized it as Little Girl’s voice. He was getting even worse if he could recognize her by her voice now.

And she did not seem to have noticed him.

She seemed less accustomed to moving through the forest than Klaus. It made him anxious just to watch her. He was looking for Slender and didn’t really need to observe Little Girl so closely, but she was the only one leaving any hints for him at the moment.

…And if I follow her, I might be able to find Slender.

The dark elves had been out and about during the day, so they were not nocturnal. They may have worked on shifts. But that still left Little Girl’s presence here a mystery. Why was she out during the night shift? Did dark elf culture not include the concept of a bedtime for children?

Klaus watched his footing and avoided breathing through his mouth even on this difficult route. He mimicked the path she took and eventually heard another voice.

Bingo.

Another dark elf spoke from beyond some low bushes. He could not see her yet, but it was the kind of gentle female voice they never seemed to use with a human like him.

…Bingo, but I don’t think that’s Slender. Am I in trouble if it’s another dark elf?

He was briefly afraid, but…

“Pitb, u ip toigb.”

“Ak, ito bae? Yonn gaqo, Punoqi. Qay, kay idaew yo inn diwko wajowkot.”

Klaus was surprised to find how relieved he was.

The voice from beyond the bushes was the dark elf who had appeared to be Little Girl’s mother back at the burning site. She must have escaped Professor Dissection and the knights. Slender must have been helping Little Girl escape because those two had gotten separated in the confusion.

…So she wasn’t playing with a deer in the forest to distract herself from the pain.

He reflected on that fact.

He had to be careful not to make any noise, so he couldn’t say any of it out loud.

…She can still enjoy herself. That’s one thing I managed to protect. It may have been one of the dumbest ideas I’ve ever had, but I was the one who drove off the knights with my camouflage magic.

If they spotted him, they would take him right back to be burned at the stake. And they had wiped out the knights with their Archdragon Magic, so he was being awfully carefree with them this close. But he was glad he still had enough of a heart left to be warmed by this scene of a mother and daughter reunited.

Of course, this was all his own self-righteousness speaking and they would still attack him if they found him. He had seen more than enough of the dark elves’ Archdragon Magic. He had deserved it, but Professor Dissection had been obliterated by that magic along with the terrain around him. The fates of Page Loinbelt and Sir Rainbook were still unknown, but death did not discriminate. Klaus would be just as dead as anyone if he let his guard down.

And with all of that in mind, Klaus Knockburn slowly approached the bushes without straightening back up. He couldn’t do anything without information, not even survive.

…I need to get closer.

He was afraid, but he had to do it. He prayed to the goddess. He still hadn’t seen Slender. She was more reasonable than the other dark elves (not that he could understand anything she said), so he had to find her and get her help if he was going to find any way to stop Brashgain’s resurrection.

He was pretty sure it took him a full three minutes to approach just one meter. Then again, his internal clock had completely broken a while back, so who knows really. Bushes made for an uneven wall, so he was afraid he would be spotted through one of the gaps. But he managed to get close. Please let Slender be there too, he prayed while taking up position directly behind the low bushes. He could not stick his head above them, so he would have to look between the thin branches of the hip-height bushes. And he gulped.

…What if they’re looking back at me from the other side and our eyes meet at close range?

He shook his head to dispel that horrifying idea. He couldn’t chicken out now. If he gave up his search for Slender, he had no path forward.

He held his breath and leaned his face in close.

His next clue had to be found between those branches.

What he saw first was lots of brown skin.

Little Girl was cheerfully raising her arms while half-naked Mother removed her clo-

“!?”

Klaus jumped and reflexively looked away from the mother and daughter.

But he found more brown skin there.

…Kyahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!? Sl-Sl-Sl-Slender!!

He thought his heart was going to stop.

Why?

Why was he seeing so much brown skin in the great outdoors with no walls or doors to hide them!? She had her hands on her white leather vest and she was opening it wide right out in the open!!

“Wkiqmv hat ijtoouqj wa jeitg pb pawkot iqg po numo wkuv, Fkitnawwo.”

“Gaq’w yattb idaew uw. U kig wa rtorito hat pb qujkw keqw iqbyib.”

Mother seemed to be smiling and speaking to Slender from the direction he was intentionally not looking. He had to fight the instinct to look in the direction of her voice when he heard it. As a cool beauty, Slender replied while coldly not looking in the woman’s direction, but one of her long ears was twitching. She was apparently using it to join in the conversation.

And at the same time…

“Ikk, wkuv uv qufo.”

…Ah!!

Even more of Slender’s brown skin was shining in the moonlight. She had finally removed both the white vest and the inner garment covering her chest. Slender though she was, she did have some curves there. Wait, were you using the vest’s strap to push them up, my wife? But even if they were small, they were more valuable than diamonds of the same size. Their jiggliness was revealed before his eyes. They were definitely small, but they weren’t nonexistent.

…So what happens now!? I thought a dark elf had to marry any guy who took away her clothing and equipment and thus left her defenseless (and naked). But now I’ve seen all three of them naked.

Klaus started to sweat profusely.

The human mind had a tendency to work overtime at the least useful times. In other words, it tended to spin its wheels.

…Does that mean, um, polygamy? Is that a thing in their culture? And the two I’m trying not to look at seem to be mother and daughter, so am I actually going to end up married to Slender + a dark elf mother and child!? This is…this is getting out of hand!!

What if Slender and Little Girl were sisters? His life experiences were nowhere near enough to prepare him for this. How was he supposed to handle a family structure that convoluted?

…No!! Th-the other two aren’t naked. I have seen more of the mama’s skin than I’m comfortable with, but she’s not naked. So I’m still safe! I’m dedicated to Slender! I don’t need anyone else!!

Also, hadn’t the previous time suggested the actual reward for seeing a dark elf naked was being burned alive? A shadow fell over his face. That would be a problem. Are they going to burn me to death thrice to cover all of three of them!?

If so, he was not in for a good time. He didn’t want to think about what would happen if he carelessly shook the bush’s leaves. If he was spotted here, it would shatter his future wife’s love for him. But he doubted he could escape unnoticed if he tried to run away now, so he had to stay here and survive.

Still, this situation only introduced more questions. The dancers he had seen before hadn’t been naked, but their revealing outfits had suggested the dark elves viewed bare skin as sacred. So was this some kind of religious ritual? But that idea died when he heard some splashing water.

…Water? Wait…

Come to think of it, wasn’t the smell of vegetation awfully strong here? And everything was damp. They were next to a river. His adorable future wife had removed her clothing on the rocky riverbank and folded it up at her feet.

…And I doubt she’s skin diving for fish.

His continued observations showed the water only came up to Slender’s knees.

Which meant…

“She’s bathing?”

“?”

Slender looked up with her distinctive long ears twitching, so he clapped his hands over his mouth. It took all his willpower to avoid taking a reflexive step back. His heart rang loud in his ears. He had screwed up, but making an audible footstep would only make it worse. He would only confirm her suspicions.

He could find a better time to send his future wife a love letter or present.

…How did she notice me!? What did I do wrong!?

He held his breath and remained entirely motionless while battling his own doubts. Slender stared toward the bush for a while with no clothing covering her soft skin. She even crouched down to keep her bow within reach. The look on her face was deadly serious, but that pose meant he could see everything!!

Then some more skin moved into view. It was gentle Mother with her droopy ears. He hoped like hell she was a sensible person and he discovered she had plastered some white leaves over the wet brown skin of her very large breasts. That appeared to be the dark elf version of a bathing suit. That meant she was covered up, but only in the most technical of senses.

Little Girl also had the white leaves plastered to her much flatter body as well as some kind of vine around her hips, but she was crawling through the shallow stream like a dog and tilting her head, which made her bathing suit was just as inadequate.

“Uv vapowkuqj wko piwwot, jutn?”

“Uw’v qawkuqj.”

Finally, Slender ever so slowly pulled her hand away from the bow lying on the riverbank. She still seemed curious about the bushes, but Little Girl pulled on her hand to guide her into the river with Mother.

…So she wasn’t certain? If she was, I bet she would have been bow-whipping this bush.

Klaus relaxed his stiff back a little. Even that scared him so much he thought it was taking years off his lifespan. Mother was washing Little Girl’s back with some soap bubbles while the daughter kicked her feet excitedly, but he was more focused on Slender who was sitting on a large rock by the water and wrapping a vine around her hand.

Yes, there were bubbles. Those white leaves appeared to be from a type of soapbark, so they produced white bubbles when rubbed. Slender rubbed one against the vine around her hand and then washed her upper arm. To wash her own back, she undid the loop, held it in both hands, and rubbed it up and down.

…I see. That’s clever.

Klaus was impressed. Impressed by their technology and culture, not by the way the white bubbles slowly dripped down her curves when she poured water over herself from a leaf rolled into the shape of a cup!! And there were plenty more perfectly legitimate observations to be made!!

…Jutn. Twice now, Little Girl seemed to refer to Slender that way.

He was also curious about the beginnings of their sentences. Words indicating people, such as “you”, were more likely to appear there.

If he had time, it might be useful to analyze the dark elf language bit by bit. Even if he couldn’t learn to speak it fluently, it would mean a lot to pick up a word here and there.

Or so it seemed, but was that really correct? He was gradually losing confidence. Oh…oh, wow! Slender is doing calisthenics while she bathes. She has to be really flexible to do the splits and then bend backwards like that. Ooh, and look at her chest jiggling. …No, no, stop. Don’t let your future wife’s devilish body distract you!! You need to stay focused…but so jiggly…

Once he did manage to focus, a shadow fell over his face.

…H-how can I ever escape from these bushes and then get to know Slender better!? I-I don’t see how I can escape being cooked more thoroughly than a pizza!!

The dark elves had a custom of bathing. The forest appeared to have a disinfecting plant they could use as soap. And they had vines and light stones to scrub their bodies with.

…Is that all? That’s not much research to go off of. Hmm, if she only uses natural materials, maybe I could gift her a bath product from the royal capital. No, I can’t. First, I don’t have anything from the city. And second, gifting a girl a bath product would just come off as creepy. If I want to get to know her better, it has to be something inoffensive, so stop thinking about her in the nude. Dammit, and now I’m really craving pizza. I wonder if a dark elf would have ever had one cooked in a proper pizza oven.

But then Klaus noticed something.

He continued to observe Slender while she thoroughly washed herself in the clear stream.

Unlike Little Girl and Mother, she had been carrying a bow with her. Since she had stripped down to bathe, she must not have been there as a bodyguard. But she had been invited out here by that mother and child under the assumption that she would need her bow. That meant she had the bow with her for a reason. Or at least, the bow’s presence would not get in the way of whatever they were doing.

He was getting sidetracked, but it was possible none of his direct observations here were going to get him any closer to Slender.

…Could it be?

Part 4

He had barely escaped with his life.

He had not been in a magic shootout and he had not dodged an explosion by diving and rolling along the ground. He had simply left the bushes as silently as possible and walked back the way he had come through the dark forest. But he was still afraid of encountering a dark elf. Any of them other than Slender would get him burned at the stake, so the forest stroll seemed to take years off of his life.

But there was still hope in his face.

“It’s the smell.”

As long as he knew where his future wife went during her daily routine, he could meet her again. Hopefully.

“The smell of my hair and clothes! The forest animals are avoiding me because they can smell the artificial scents on me!!”

He recalled that naked body shining in the moonlight. Slender had been washing herself so carefully because she had to fool the animals’ noses.

She could wash her scent off.

Finding a river was easy enough. Instead of investigating the flora or the terrain, he only had to walk downstream of where Slender and the others were. As long as he didn’t encounter them along the way, that is. He relied on the information he had gained from the experts. He had to wash everything anyway, so he kept his clothes on and let himself fall into the river.

He thought his heart had stopped.

“Bwah!! Cold…cold!?”

He hopped back up in a hurry and crawled out of the river before he died. He was trembling as much as a newborn fawn while he gave the river a look of utter disbelief.

…But the dark elves were smiling so happily. Was it this cold when I first ran into Slender too? I’d go numb after just a few minutes in water this frigid!

Were dark elves just that much tougher than humans? He felt irrationally angry about it, but then something else occurred to him. If the forest animals could avoid him by detecting the faint artificial scents on him, then why had Slender been unsure if he was there even when she was so suspicious of those bushes?

“Wait. You’re kidding, right?”

He didn’t know if he was correct. Hell, he didn’t even know if he could detect the scent after spending so long living in the city. But he still made a guess.

…Could there be a hot spring there? Did they dig into the riverbank to guide the hot water into the cold river to create an area of water that’s just right?

He glanced through the text carved into his stick and something else came back to him. He hadn’t observed the other two closely enough, but he did not remember seeing any goose bumps on his future wife’s smooth skin. And if there was a faint sulfur scent there, it would explain how the hunter had overlooked his presence behind the bushes.

Anyway.

What would he do now? The dark elves had a specific part of the river set aside for bathing and the hot water would only be found there. And they knew where all such points were.

He would have to make do with the nightmarishly cold river.

Otherwise he would starve to death without encountering any of the forest animals.

And if he could capture some food, he would have more options for using Camouflize in the forest. He could even give some food to Slender as a gift.

This was not the royal capital. He had learned the hard way how wondrous food and other supplies could look in this deep forest. Every skewer of meat and every piece of parchment had to be handmade. The two small meatballs he had eaten and the prospect of more food to come only made him hungrier.

“Dammit.”

He shivered as he glanced back over at the dark river.

He took a step toward it. How would he ever obtain a gift for her if he didn’t work for it himself?

“Goddess dammit! This is a test of my love, isn’t it!? Well, just you wait, my future wife!!”

Part 5

Klaus had no mirror, so he had no idea what color his lips were.

“…”

He also lacked the energy to scream. He was soaked with icy water from head to toe and all his human warmth had been sapped away. His joints were as stiff as an unoiled doll, but he had done what needed doing. Just to be safe, he took some dirt and animal fur from the ground and sprinkled it over his head.

The effect was dramatic.

He saw some small lights and initially assumed they were fireflies, but they were not. A pair of yellow lights hovered in the darkness. They were the eyes of a nocturnal animal reflecting the moonlight.

“Eek!”

This caught him by surprise. It was so much closer than he had expected. He gulped, turned away from the mystery animal – it could have been a boar or a lion for all he knew – and walked deeper into the forest. It was only about 10 meters away.

…I’m living in the same world as them. If I learn to be silent, I can get within reach.

Now he was searching for signs other than the dark elf ones. It was a difficult task in the dark, but he found some pawprints and some stiff fur caught on the bark of a tree. He tried to leave as little trace as possible, but walking through the deep forest without stepping on any leaves or grass was simply not possible. The best he could do was take his time placing his weight on them and be careful not to make any noise. He traveled through the dark forest connecting the dots between each animal sign he found.

…There one is.

It was hard to tell in the darkness, but he thought it was a deer.

He would be lying if he said he wasn’t interested in filling his belly with meat. Steak, cutlets, a roast – anything would do at this point. And this was an herbivore. That meant it would have eaten Ghost Turnips and Witch Pumpkin stems and still have the magic derivative in its body. There was a good chance he would indirectly get some of that for himself.

…Is this the one I observed before getting some meatballs from Little Girl?

He was less than 10 meters away. Wild animals gave off more pressure than he had imagined when there was no fence separating them from him. He knew intellectually that deer were docile herbivores. This wasn’t an 800kg moose, so he didn’t have to worry about being kicked to death by back legs as powerful as a horse’s. This had to be better than trying to fight a bear or a tiger. He hoped.

…But can I do this? Like really do it?

He wondered that while ducking behind a large Witch Pumpkin. He did not have the hunting bows or spears the dark elves had. Not to mention their Archdragon Magic. Thrown out into the forest without any kind of weapon, a human was weaker than a wild dog. What would actually happen if it they ended up in a close-quarters fight? Any animal larger than a dog was terrifying in that context.

Still crouched, he unclasped his wet cloak. He collected an orange-sized stone from the ground and wrapped it in the cloak. He tied off the round part like he was making a simple ghost doll and he grabbed the ghost’s skirt(?).

He now had a makeshift morning star. The hefty weight in his hands reminded him that this was not like what happened with the Palmtop Mouse or the beetle. This time, he would be attacking a defenseless deer. And this was the kind of animal that could put a smile on Little Girl’s face. He had to shake those thoughts out of his head.

He had to think of this as an opportunity.

He could not survive with a passive attitude. He could not gain meat or fur if he did not make the attempt. Slender would never want to get to know or work with someone who couldn’t even protect himself.

The thought of killing the dark elves disgusted him, so could he really kill this deer and fill his stomach with it?

A self-deprecating smile formed on his lips. Would he never get to know them better if he still wasn’t sure where to draw that line? He slinked over toward the dark shape in the woods. He moved slowly and silently.

The deer raised its head.

But he was already within 3m of it, so he took a large step and raised his blunt weapon just a step away from it.

“Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!”

Part 6

He felt the first blow land. Hard.

One of its antlers broke off and a warm liquid spurted from the animal’s head, but that was not enough to kill it. The struggling deer shook its head wildly. It was nothing more than luck that kept Klaus’s windpipe from being torn open. If the other antler hadn’t caught on a low bush, it would have scored a clean hit.

Then he swung down his blunt weapon again. He was fully focused. He couldn’t believe his weary body had this much strength left in it.

“Pant, pant!!”

How many times had he hit it now? He swung one last blow down on the animal that was now too weak to stand on its own. He waited until its convulsing legs came to a stop. He had won. But he was afraid it might suddenly get back up again.

That must have been a painful death. A real hunter would have been horrified by his handiwork.

“Yeah…this isn’t going to make a good gift for a girl.”

Klaus covered his face with his hands after looking down at the smashed head.

He was primarily after Slender, but he decided he should consider what Little Girl would think as well. He recalled how delighted she had been when she innocently climbed on top of him with a smile. He could never let her see a deer looking like this.

…But what if you couldn’t tell anymore? Like if I made jerky out of it? Oh, but there are no factories in the forest, so the dark elves must make everything themselves. Would homecooked food even seem special to them?

His admirable thoughts were interrupted by the growling of his stomach. Maybe because he was thinking about food.

It was finally time to get cooking. No one could blame him for eating a little of it himself. Eating some meat would stave off the hunger for tonight. And if he indirectly ingested some magic derivative, he would have more uses of his camouflage magic stocked up. This was no longer a passive fight of running away, hiding, and surviving. His next step was going on the offensive.

If he had the time, he also wanted to meet with and get to know his future wife better.

With any luck she might even tell him where their village was.

She had seen through his camouflage using her hunter knowledge, but if she told him what exactly had been wrong, he could fix it. That would give him the means of sneaking into their strictly-guarded ceremony. He could not let the dark elves resurrect the 10km dragon that would bring doom to humanity. He was scared, but with his rotten teacher and the knights gone, he was the only one left. They could never have their wedding unless he resolved all of these many concerns.

Just one person’s help would make so much difference, so his first job was to reach a point where he could calmly think things through. He needed a flexible mind to figure out how to set his future wife’s heart aflutter.

The deer was collapsed on its side with a broken antler and a smashed head.

“Time to eat,” said Klaus. “I can get to work after I’ve had some food.”

But he couldn’t just chow down on this freshly-killed meat. Setting aside all issues related to the magic derivative, he would gag and retch it back up.

…So I need to cook it. U-ughh. The work never ends.

He briefly recalled the scene of his future wife bathing. He could easily cook the meat by throwing it into the nearly-boiling water at the source of the hot spring. But he might not be able to find it anymore and the odds were good the dark elves kept an eye on those bathing spots.

He would have to start a fire on his own.

Camouflize was his only magic, so he could not shoot fire from his hand.

So he considered the simplest method he knew of: hold a stick between his hands like he was praying and spin it enough to start a fire with the friction. But that wouldn’t work. He could imagine the tragic result easily enough before even trying it. That was an expert technique. He might be able to do it through brute force if he Camouflized into a large bear or something, but he did not see any big animals around. Not that he wanted to see one. Which meant…

“I’m glad I killed it,” he said, rubbing his hand along the unmoving deer’s belly.

He was checking its rough fur. He rubbed his hand back and forth a few times to be sure, like he was cleaning a window with a rag.

Bluish-white light flashed in the darkness.

“Static electricity.”

Most people saw it as a nuisance that only caused a bit of pain when touching a doorknob or a sweater in the winter, but some at the royal capital’s school were trying to bottle it up and use it. They claimed they would remake the magical world into an electrical world if they succeeded, but he couldn’t tell how serious they were about it.

Anyway.

“This I can do. I don’t need any special tools or skills to start a fire!”

He took a look around and gathered up some dried leaves and cotton-like plants in the moonlight. The static electricity itself was small, but he could create as much as he wanted by rubbing the deer’s fur. As long as he could get a small fire started…

“H-huh?”

It didn’t work how he had hoped. The static was there and it was contacting the leaves and cotton. Fluffy and dry things had a greater surface area and thus burned more intensely, so he had thought something like cotton would be best. None of that was wrong. His information was correct, but he still did not receive the results he had expected. The fire would not start.

…Of course it won’t. I’ve never heard of someone bursting into flames because they were having fun making their hair stand on end.

Fallen leaves and cotton were not good enough fuel. But he doubted he could find tallow or a flammable gas this deep in the forest. He could get tallow by rendering the deer’s fat, but that would require a fire.

…Is there anything else that burns – that burns more? Hold on, wait. I’ve seen something like that already…

He thought, took a look at his note-taking stick, and then looked up.

He had completely forgotten.

“The torches. The dark elves were using torches when they tried to burn me alive!”

Part 7

Traditional torches burned pine resin instead of tallow. A long-lasting light could be produced by taking a stick or piece of wood filled with plenty of flammable pine resin, covering it with dried grass or stems, and tying it all together with a thin string. Klaus was pretty sure he had seen candles made by wrapping dried leaves around pine resin shaped into a stick.

He did not have to search long to find a sticky fluid on the hard tree bark that was not ordinary sap. He tentatively concluded that he wanted the sticky stuff that the bugs stayed away from.

…Damn. I could take all of this with me if I had an empty bottle.

There was no use worrying over it. He scraped the heavy stuff away with the large, hard leaf he took from a bush and scooped it up. The unique and powerful smell suggested he needed to be careful how he handled it. He definitely didn’t want to get any on his clothing. He would never be able to shake pursuit then.

He returned to where he had left the dead deer. Luckily, no animals had stolen his prize in the meantime. He scraped its belly fur again to create static electricity and held the pine resin close.

“Whoa!!”

He shouted more from the blinding light than from the heat. It was a small flame, no larger than a candle, but it was too much for his eyes after growing accustomed to the dark night. The surprise hit him first, soon followed by fear of the dark elves noticing, but he was not about to give up the fire he had worked so hard to acquire.

The danger never arrived. No dark elves showed themselves and the forest remained quiet.

He couldn’t help but laugh.

“Heh heh. Ah ha ha ha ha ha ha!!”

This time, he could finally escape the hunger. And once he had plenty of magic derivative, he could use as much camouflage magic as he liked. This forest was ruled by the dark elves who would capture and roast anyone they found here, but he had outdone them. He had proven they weren’t the only ones who could survive here.

At long last, some hot food would be his.

Thanks to the cold dip in the river earlier, that thought was enough to bring tears to his eyes.

But then something occurred to him.

He had no knife.

How was he supposed to get the fresh meat out of the dead deer covered in thick skin?

“…”

He stared blankly for the few seconds it took him to realize – no, to accept – that he had gotten the order wrong.

He had no knife. Nor could he get one. He grabbed at the unmoving deer’s solid fur with his empty hand and tugged, but its skin showed no sign of tearing. It felt as sturdy as pulling on the carpet.

He had fire, so could he burn away the troublesome skin? He thought about it, but could not imagine it ever working. It would not catch fire that easily and the whole thing would just get burnt if it did.

Then what could he do? Had he hit a dead end after so much work?

How many different processes were needed to create a metal blade strong enough to skin a dead animal? Could he not expect any real food until he had done that? And could he not obtain a single stem’s worth of magic derivative? Even though he had the fire needed to cook the meat and the dead animal too!?

His head tilted backwards in despair.

The starry sky above seemed to be pressing down on him. He connected those countless dots to create a grand constellation in his head. It was the goddess. And the goddess had a message for him: Nope. Incorrect☆ Return to square one and try again from the beginning, okay?

“Are…”

He set his burning pine resin on the ground.

He took a deep breath and reached a conclusion in his mind.

“Are you kidding me, you stupid deerrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr○☆△□♂♀!!!???”

He pulled the morning star rock out of his cloak and gripped it in his hand.

Skin the animal? Prepare it with a knife? Who was he, Mr. Fancy-Pants? He took aim at the deer’s belly over and over. The head was already smashed up by repeated blows, so he could do the same to another part of its body. The skin split open and the fat and muscles were crushed until they spilled out. He smeared the minced chunks onto a nearby stick and held that into the fire. Once the pink had turned grayish, just like the stir-fried mincemeat in a royal capital kitchen, he stuffed the end of the stick in his mouth.

“Urp!?”

…Ew.

It only tasted like blood. He had to stick out his tongue and remove the rough fur stuck to it. If you were served this in the royal capital, it wouldn’t even qualify as an amusing punishment for losing a bet – it would seem a lot more like severe abuse. He could not recommend this to animal-loving Little Girl or even to Slender.

But he could still eat it. As long as he had something that wouldn’t give him food poisoning, he had to eat it. He repeatedly crushed the deer corpse, smeared the mincemeat onto the stick, and cooked it. He could eat it. He forced back the tears to swallow it. And he repeated the process.

“Wait, no! This is my note-taking stick!”

He panicked when he realized his mistake, but the tears on his cheeks were not from pain.

Even this awful food gave him sustenance.

He was hit by a sudden drowsiness, just like when he had finished a nice big meal. The taste of meat and the fresh magic derivatives were overwhelming him. And all he really had was fur, skin, and crushed meat smeared on the end of a stick. He realized his values had declined drastically from when he had lived in the royal capital being tormented by his rotten teacher and that knight girl. It scared him. He hated to admit it, but these tears did not come from fear or sorrow.

He was definitely going about this all wrong. He knew that all too well. You were supposed to skin the animal, cut its gut open, remove the organs, and remove the blood. Before cooking it, you were meant to wash it, season it with salt and pepper, cover up the smell with spices, chop it into more conveniently sized pieces, melt some butter in the hot frying pan, and then slowly lower the meat inside. Oh, and you couldn’t forget to remove the moisture first since the oil would be sent flying.

“But…so what?” he slowly spat out.

He could feel all of his blood vessels expanding. Something was being circulated around his body – maybe the physical nutrients and maybe the magic derivative. It was going to take a while before he actually digested the food, but he had still regained enough strength to complain.

“Survival isn’t about looking all cool and clever. Ugh…yeah, that’s right. I killed this thing and ate it. I smashed it to pieces and it looks pretty damn ugly, but that’s how these things work. You’re always killing something, chewing it to pieces, and swallowing it whenever you fill your stomach. Ugh, bleh.”

He could not keep eating like this forever. As he continued swinging the heavy stone down on the deer, he started to taste a strange bitterness in the meat. He checked and found the grass and leaves on its fur was getting smashed in with everything else. He couldn’t keep doing this. It smelled too much like medicine for comfort. It might even be poisonous.

If he could properly prepare the meat, he could make jerky that would last several days. If he could smoke it, he might have even made it into a present for Slender. Instead, it had provided just the one meal and only one Witch Pumpkin stem’s worth of magic derivative. The rest would go to waste. He normally would have felt dizzy from that kind of loss.

But he instead felt like he had outsmarted some unseen foe.

He felt like crying, raging, and puking, but not even he knew why.

Klaus Knockburn had avoided death for tonight. He had acquired food and survived. None of it had anything to do with Slender. He had been wandering and struggling all alone, but he had succeeded in the end.

Part 8

It was morning. For a day not ruled by the clock, morning began with the sunrise.

“Gh.”

Sleeping out here was nothing like his home in the royal capital. His joints were aching after spending the night on the mossy ground with only his cloak around him.

…Oh, my muscles!

Moving a single finger made him grimace, but he still grabbed the stick lying next to him. He marked the beginning of a new day using the earring’s pin. He prayed he wouldn’t have to figure out how to mark the passage of months.

He had left himself defenselessly unconscious out in the wild and survived. He hadn’t even been tied up and taken away by the dark elves who could move silently through the darkness. Why was that?

“This worked better than I thought.”

The skinny boy glanced over at the three round stones he had placed a short distance away.

That was the dark elf sign for a nearby trap.

Once he knew that sign, he could use it to avoid traps and to trick the dark elves.

He checked to see if the real trap he had collected along with the stones had caught anything, but he hadn’t expected it to be that easy. He had only borrowed a few poison arrows sticking up at the bottom of a pitfall and set them up in the bushes around him, but they had failed to accomplish anything. Was there a trick to setting them up? Leaving an unmarked trap was a risk to him as well, so he collected the poison arrows, counted them to make sure, and then tossed them down the original pitfall.

…That trap they always use in plays is pretty funny, but how do you even make one of those? You know, the rope that yanks you up by the ankle when you step in it. With one of those, I could have some fun with- ahem, perform some research on an upside-down miniskirt dark elf.

He pondered that again in the mottled morning sunlight, but he couldn’t imagine the details of how that thing worked.

So what to do now?

He needed to get food and water while he could still move, but he would never make any progress if that was all he ever did. His primary goal was getting to know Slender better. If he could stop the resurrection of Brashgain and save humanity while he was at it, so much the better. If he had Slender on his side, she might even introduce him to the local cuisine. And if he stopped the dragon’s resurrection, he could leave the forest with his wife and return to the royal capital. Then he could princess carry that brown girl into the chapel and marry her without a care in the world. Ah ha ha! The future is bright!!

A rustling sound dragged Klaus Knockburn’s thoughts back to reality.

He slowly crouched down. When caught by surprise, it was better to hide your presence than to noisily run around and shout. He was amazed to find he had picked up that weird bit of forest etiquette.

…So who is this!? I doubt my hunter of a wife would be making all this noise!!

While he was panicking on the inside, something burst from the bushes. It was a red-eyed rabbit.

But why? That question made him gasp. Changes did not happen for no reason. Aphids would gather on the plants and ants would gather to feast on the sweet juices produced by the aphids. The distribution of life was highly organized, like a collection of gears. If that organization was falling apart, like water overflowing from the bath, then there was trouble afoot.

In other words…

…Someone’s here. I don’t know who, but there’s a hunter nearby!

This was the infamous Forest of No Return, so it would not be a human. That meant a dark elf hunter. He did his best to be as silent as possible while he slowly turned his head toward the direction the rabbit had fled from. Fortunately, he was downwind of them. They might have noticed his scent if he was upwind.

If this was anyone other than Slender, he needed to run.

If they were armed and resentfully trying to resurrect Brashgain, there was no room for conversation. If he did hope to reach an understanding, he would need Slender to act as an intermediary. His future wife came first. He could not forget that.

But when he silently peeked out from behind a thick tree trunk, he relaxed.

“Oh, it’s only Slender. Damn, all that anxiety for nothing.”

“?”

He doubted she could have heard him, but her long ears twitched and she casually looked back his way. To hide, he slowly pulled back behind the tree. After observing the animals, he had concluded that moving too quickly would only make noises that gave you away.

…We sure do run across each other a lot in such a large forest. My wife, could it be that your body desires me?

Was this area where she usually hunted? He was curious, but that was not the main issue.

Slender was about 20m away, so what now? He was safer than he would be at their village, but she was still armed with a powerful composite bow and Archdragon Magic. He did not speak her language and her customs were unknown. Even if she was on his side for now, she might eventually get fed up with his mistakes and try to kill him.

What did he need if he was going to risk his life to interact with her?

…When in doubt, start with observations.

Slender detected the smallest signs to hunt down wild animals, so trying to follow her around undetected seemed like a bad idea, but he could not put together a plan without first gathering information. When she moved to the side, he snuck from behind the tree to some bushes.

This was far better than pursuing a deer or an eccentric old geezer.

His future wife really was beautiful. If he had to chase after anything, her ass in that tight skirt was a good choice.

Part 9

Based on Klaus’s observations, Slender was not trying to hunt down a wild animal. She was not ducking low or trying to hide her presence. She stood tall and let her lithe fingers toy restlessly with the curve of her bow while she walked through the forest. He couldn’t believe how cute she was.

He initially thought maybe she was on patrol, but that didn’t fit her actions either. She would come to a stop where three stones were lined up, bend over, hold her long silver hair back with her hand, and check at her feet. Sometimes she would even remove a trap or unlock and retrieve a beartrap along with its thick chain and then place them elsewhere.

…Is she on trap maintenance duty?

He wondered about her actions while curled up behind a large Witch Pumpkin. That might sound boring, but it was an important job. Magical landmines could be found spread across the battlefield, but the location of those traps was crucial to the arrangement of an army’s defensive line. If she was allowed to do this on her own, she had to be fairly high up in the hunter ranks.

Klaus put up with the muscle pain while he learned something else from his observations.

He crouched down a short distance away and noted the faint footprints she had left on the ground.

“Hm, footprints, huh?”

The dark elf hunters generally erased their tracks as they moved, but he had noticed they also intentionally left footprints that were too far apart to connect by a straight line.

“Patquqj, Fkitnawwo. Bae’to er iv oitnb iv oxot, u voo.”

“Va ito bae. Gug wko qujkw vkuhw levw oqg?”

Leader, another hunter, arrived from another animal trail and greeted Slender. He checked their footprints and found they had different boot prints. And not just because their boots were handmade.

…They’re intentionally altering the design with swappable soles. Are they split between a few different teams to form shifts? And each team has distinct footprints to tell them apart?

They probably split it up so, for example, Footprint A would handle Area 1 and Footprint B would handle Area 2 on that day. That way they could tell if even another dark elf was outside of her designated area.

…But if I learn their shift schedule, trailing Slender should be pretty easy. And it would be even easier if I could acquire boots with the same sole as hers.

He realized just how purposeful everything the dark elves did was. The composite bows and distinct boot soles were good examples, but so was the white leather they wore. He had initially been surprised to see them wearing something so conspicuous, but it was probably meant to make sure they never mistook a dark elf for an animal while deep in the woods. The red, yellow, and green gems they wore probably indicated social status and occupation. Even the rabbit-ears hood may have been similar to how a butterfly’s eye patterns could confuse a bird trying to eat it. That form of defense could be unique to dark elves whose ears stuck out so far they risked hitting them on something when only shaking their head.

That thought reminded Klaus of the treasure he held in his hand. He had been holding onto it as a rare metal product he could use as a writing implement, but it was actually Slender’s earring. Some girls wore earrings to help with their balance, but he had only seen small piercings on the other dark elves. Slender was the only one with something so large.

It was the one thing with no purpose he could see.

And if it served no purpose, it had to be a personal interest or hobby.

Klaus used the earring to write an important note on his stick.

“Is Slender surprisingly fashionable?”

Part 10

Slender’s interests had been obvious from the beginning.

She tried to stay cool and collected, but he had glimpsed the way to her heart from time to time.

But Klaus could not create some intricate piece of jewelry even if he did find some gold or gems in the forest. Fortunately, he didn’t need to aim for a perfect score right away. Do that and you would be crushed by the yawning skill gap between the experts and an amateur.

…There have to be plenty of handy materials around here. Like a hard nut or a shell in a mountain stream.

How he would go about gathering the materials and processing them into an accessory was an important question, but he wanted to know something else first. This was a dangerous move, but he wanted to get it done before he left Slender.

He only had to crouch behind cover, draw a perfect square in the green moss so it wouldn’t leave a permanent mark, and quietly recite the incantation within that magic circle. His example was right there through the trees.

“Of the three traits, I choose salt. Magic lifeform, mammal, primate, elf, dark elf, rulers of the forest who prefer the darkness. I have grasped thy nature like counting the corners of a polygon or star. The polygon emanates and the star gathers – together they symbolize the control of power. By knowing thee, I become one with thee.”

This time, he would be using the original unchanged.

Dark elves were a lifeform too, so this was entirely possible.

“Camouflize Decoration – now I am thee!!”

Illusionary white steam spread out and Klaus looked down at his body.

Long, silver hair tickled the skin of his shoulders and back. The skin reflecting the mottled sunlight was a healthy brown. Its color had never been so clear to him. Which made sense since this was an entire dark elf girl’s body with no clothing to cover it. Even the hair only covered the back and the nape.

He had wanted to try this out when he had some Witch Pumpkin stem to spare. No matter how much he built up on the inside, it would be digested away after a full day, so he might as well use it for something.

Now that he had gone through with it, he nodded in understanding.

(I don’t reproduce any kind of clothing or possessions when I camouflage as other lifeforms either, so I should have expected this.)

“Oops, my stick was camouflaged along with me.”

His voice had transformed to a girl’s one as well. He touched his throat and found no Adam’s apple. He had set down the soft gold earring to avoid crushing it when he sat down, but he could not take notes with just it.

Yes, he wanted to know Slender’s size. If he was going to, for example, make her a ring, he needed to measure her finger first. And needing to speak with her in order to prepare the very surprise gift meant to bring them together was nonsensical. So he had decided it was faster to camouflage himself as her and take the necessary measurements that way.

(These are pretty nice, though.)

He tried hopping up and down and two things his male body lacked jiggled softly. And she dares call herself Slender? Wait, no, I guess she doesn’t. The sound of his hands touching his skin was weirdly alluring, but now was not the time to act like a horny idiot. I won’t deny I am one, but I must resist!! The dark elf he had named Leader had turned out to be a low-level hunter, but the name he had given his future wife was dead on. He had had his suspicions when he saw her bathing, but this confirmed it. She really did use her vest’s strap to make them look bigger. He could focus on this later. Right now, he needed to be cautious. C’mon, now’s not the time for this. I mean it, me. N-nwohhh!

“Ahem.”

He had burned the image into his eyes, so now it was time to take a deep breath, refocus his mind, and try to be a scientist (in training) once more. First of all, he had learned he ended up naked if he camouflaged himself as a dark elf. That created a new task. The hunters wore white-bleached leather and the priests wore thin silk. Procuring clothing like that in the forest would be no easy task. His plan of transforming into a dark elf and sneaking into their village was looking a lot less realistic.

(Then could I camouflage myself as a fly or mosquito and sneak in that way? No, that’s a bad idea. Don’t forget how those termites almost ate me when I was a Witch Pumpkin. The rules of the wilderness apply out here. A harmless bug or a small animal might go unnoticed by the dark elves, but there are tons of predators out there. Besides, what if a dark elf spots me and pulls out a fly swatter?)

Getting to know Slender and gaining her cooperation was still the best plan. Why sneak into the dressing room as a mouse and spy on her boobs from a corner, when you could get her permission and actually touch them? He had gained a lot to think about, but it would be best not to change plans without thinking it through first.

He heard a flapping sound at his ear.

“?”

Thinking it was a big moth or something, he reflexively swung his hand past his head, but then he felt some pain in his ear. He hesitantly touched it and felt it. The ear was long and a little hard. It didn’t have an earlobe like a human ear did. He wasn’t sure how to best describe it, but he could freely move them. He could even move each one separately.

He had some difficulty without a mirror, but he managed to attach the earring to that long ear.

Then he moved the ear.

…It’s kind of heavy. It feels like it would get in the way, but maybe she just really likes how it looks.

He could not tell the differences and advantages the long ear had compared to a human ear.

Camouflize only camouflaged him. It made him look like something else, but it did not actually transform him into it. That was why he had retained his five senses while in Witch Pumpkin form and how he had been able to look back over his shoulder while in mare form. There were exceptions, such as crushing an enemy with an extreme size difference, but camouflaging himself as something for offensive purpose was generally useless. He could not breathe fire just because he camouflaged himself as a dragon. So he could only make guesses here.

(Maybe it’s like a cat’s ears. They turn their ears in the direction they want to focus to gather sounds from primarily that direction. And they can use the auditory differences between ears to judge distances in 3D space, such as the distance to their prey. Maybe they can even focus on the sound of the wind or of magic, but I can’t say for sure.)

At any rate, the task at hand was taking Slender’s sizes.

In order to measure each part in turn, he ran his hands across his body like he was washing himself in the bath. He measured the fingers, the wrists, the ankles, the ears, the neck, and…where else could she wear an accessory? He measured every option he could think of and recorded the numbers on the ground with his bare heel. He could not use Camouflize repeatedly since that would use up his magic derivative, so he considered even taking her height, weight, and other basic measurements while he was at it. Wouldn’t it be a waste otherwise?

In dark elf form, he approached a thick tree trunk and tore off a stringy plant that measured several meters long. Was it a parasitic plant like mistletoe or dodder? He wrapped the pinky-thick plant around his bare chest. It lacked the marks of a tailor’s measuring tape, but he could accurately record the length by making a mark in it with his fingernail. This had seemed like a good idea at first, but it ended up prickling his skin a lot. Especially at the tips that were a shade lighter than strawberry milk.

“Hmm, not even 80cm. The actual numbers give a different impression than the visual.”

(Sigh. If I keep this up, I’ll be as bad as Professor Dissection.)

And.

He heard several small objects clattering to the ground.

“?”

Four-legged animals could not hold anything since they used all four legs to walk, so they could not drop something like that. Then what was this? Who had just dropped something?

In (naked) brown girl form, Klaus looked over curiously and found the answer past the bushes.

A girl with long, silver hair, brown skin, and an identical face was staring, wide-eyed.

That one was the real Slender.

“Ik…”

She had a look of utter disbelief in her eyes.

Following her gaze, he looked down somewhat. Yes, she was less focused on the “identical face” part than she was on the body. In other words, the chest and the part further down than the navel which were entirely bare in the mottled sunlight.

And her measurements were written plainly on the ground at his feet.

She did not speak his language, but she might be able to read the numbers.

“Ikkkk. Ikkkkkkkk.”

(Uh, oh. I screwed this up real bad.)

She had already seen his camouflage magic, so she would know exactly what she was looking at when she saw someone identical to herself. She would not suspect some other magical lifeform like the royal capital’s Doppelganger or that eastern nation’s Tomokazuki.

“Ykiw wko konn ito bae gauqj!? Wkiw’v, ep, pb dagb! Iw noivw faxot uw er!! Tujkw wkuv uqvwiqw!!”

Slender blushed, pointed vigorously at him, and shouted something with tears in her eyes. She had dropped the arrows from her quiver, but she didn’t seem to notice.

But what was this?

She was shouting an awful lot, but she never used any of that brutal Archdragon Magic that so easily defeated the knights.

“Huqo, bae yuq. U gaq’w mqay ykiw muqg ah pijuf bae’to evuqj, dew u yaq’w munn bae hat qay. Uh u munnog bae naamuqj numo wkiw, u yaeng qoxot nuxo uw gayq aqfo wko awkotv haeqg wko dagb. Va levw jow aew ah pb dagb hat qay. Rnoivo.”

“…?”

(Why isn’t she attacking? Does this mean…I really can make contact with her?)

He had no idea what she was saying, but if she was talking, she had to be trying to communicate. She was giving him a chance, so could he make use of this? He didn’t know what fidgeting Slender was thinking here, but she might be able to convey his thoughts to the dark elves like a translator.

He wanted them to stop resurrecting Brashgain.

They might attack him for knowing their secret, but it was worth trying.

When he had seen Little Girl running through the forest in tears, he had felt a squeezing in his chest.

When he had seen her reunited with Mother, he had breathed an honest sigh of relief.

They were enemies now and they were trying to hunt him down, but he wanted to avoid having to fight the dark elves if at all possible. Not just with Slender and Little Girl, but with all of them. Maybe that made him naïve, but he could never treat them the same way he did that deer he beat to death the night before.

If any of the dark elves got hurt, it would sadden Slender and Little Girl. He could not be friends with Little Girl and fight against Mother.

This was a first step toward communication, so Klaus Knockburn placed a hand on the center of his chest (while still a naked girl) to show he had no intention of fighting. He could not decode the dark elf language and what little elf he knew had failed last time, so he had no choice but to use human language.

“You-”

He was cut off by a strange explosion.

The world spun around him.

He had no idea what this meant. No one else had intervened, but this was real Archdragon Magic. The mass of air that erupted directly in front of him had come from Slender.

“Ykiw yiv wkiw!?”

“Bae haan. Juxo ev i vujqin dohato evuqj pijuf. I nuwwno yitquqj yaeng kixo dooq qufo!”

Was that Leader and Curvy? In his upside-down vision, he saw some other dark elves rushed over to join Slender. The world continued to spin around him a few times and he felt a squeezing in his stomach when he realized he still hadn’t hit the ground.

How far had he been thrown?

…Oh, come to think of it, Slender seems to say “bae” a lot. Especially when she’s looking at me. Could that mean “you”?

He retreated into his thoughts during his extended airtime, but soon enough, he crashed into the ground like a catapult stone, tearing into the soft soil and bouncing a few times. Did those snapping sounds come from the short bushes he was crushing below him? He could not even consider bracing for impact. He happened to weave between some thick trees, rolled right past a giant Witch Pumpkin that had to be hard as rock, and eventually came to a stop.

(It’s no use.)

White steam burst out and the naked girl was a clothed boy once more. But the pain was still there. He could not move and he passed out while half-buried in some thick bushes.

…I have no idea what she’s thinking. Maybe I was wrong to ever assume she thinks the same as humans do. Why would you do that, Slender?

Part 11

Things were not going well. He had no clock, but the morning color was gone from the sky. It looked more like daytime shifting into evening.

“How am I still alive?”

Klaus Knockburn groaned after confirming he still had the earring and the stick below his belt. He would have loved to get up and find he was still a naked girl, but the magic had long since worn off.

After all, he had been hit by the same Archdragon Magic that had defeated fully-equipped knights. He had rolled a long way. It was a miracle he had not split his head open on a tree or rock. Had the dark elves failed to check on the body because he had ended up inside some thick bushes?

Whatever the case, that had not made for a comfortable bed and his entire body was aching, but he didn’t seem to have any broken bones.

“Ow…”

He wanted to get moving if he could still walk. He groaned as he extracted himself from the bushes and he noticed something wavering in front of him.

It was a white flower. A tiny white flower. He briefly froze when he saw it. He doubted it was edible or useful in luring out animals. But it seemed to shine bright. He did not consider picking it. He instead admired its beauty like someone cupping their hands around a small fire for warmth.

That tiny wave of emotion reminded him that he had to remain calm.

And even if it had ended in spectacular failure, he had just used his camouflage magic. He had eaten two meatballs and some deer meat the day before, but that would all be digested by tonight. The deficiency symptoms were fast approaching. If he could not acquire some food, he would be right back to when the hunger was dulling his mind. And he wouldn’t be able to use his one and only weapon: Camouflize.

He needed some kind of edible food with the magical derivative and it had to be something he could catch. This was not the royal capital market where meat, seafood, and even rare foreign fruits were available for purchase. Those conditions were devastating so deep in the forest. But he had an idea. He had already acquired fire using static electricity and pine resin.

“I could really use a container,” he commented while getting to work.

He was not after a land animal or a fish. He didn’t know how to store an animal long term after he killed it and fashioning a fishing rod was well past his skill level. The rod, the line, and the hook all sounded like a challenge. But he also doubted he could find any sizable fruit in this conifer forest. The enormous Witch Pumpkins were out of the question. Those were not an edible species, so he couldn’t get through the thick skin.

So there were two things he wanted. He used his note-taking stick to refresh his memory while he walked around picking small plants from the ground. These were the herbs Curvy had used to repel the termites. It had looked like they were normally dried and then soaked in water to rehydrate them before use.

The other thing was up in a tree. The round object was larger than Klaus’s own head and hanging from a tree branch, but it was not a fruit or mistletoe.

“A beehive.”

Although it was round, it didn’t seem to be a hornet’s nest. Maybe they had built this around a damaged hive.

He had heard honey’s flavor depended on the kind of flowers it was produced from, so if the bees had been collecting Ghost Turnip or Witch Pumpkin nectar, the honey would contain the magic derivative.

Larvae were also supposed to be edible. A proper lady from the royal capital might scream and push them away with her fork, but Klaus had already broken through the “eating bugs” barrier.

Bee larvae could not escape on their own and they were an excellent source of nutrients.

A hive that big would have enough honey for several days and it would even indirectly give him the magic derivative if the nectar had come from Ghost Turnip flowers. And unlike an animal full of blood and guts, it wouldn’t rot as soon as he worked so hard to kill it. He doubted he would need any specialized knowledge to preserve it.

“And maybe I could use beeswax as an adhesive for the accessory. Nuts, stones, shells – there are plenty of materials out here. I just have to trust that my future wife isn’t so picky that only a big hunk of diamond will do.”

He couldn’t afford to miss this opportunity, but all the worker bees were a problem. There were no doctors or even first-aid kits out in the forest, so an attack from a swarm of bees could be fatal.

The bees could even drive off a deadly bear attacking the hive in search of honey, but Klaus actually used his head. He rubbed some pine resin on a bundle of herbs tied together with a plant stem and then he rubbed his cloak to set the resin ablaze with static electricity. In an underhand throw, he tossed the result directly below the beehive.

The chemical-smelling smoke had a dramatic effect.

The bees swarmed around like a dark storm, but they could not find an enemy needing defeating. Meanwhile, the smoke filled the round hive and large bees fell from its surface. The fat queen bee eventually crawled out from the hive, but the smoke was too much for her and she fell to the ground instead of flying away.

Her kingdom was doomed. The queenless workers began to wander and they ended up scattering with no one in charge.

“Now to finish it off.”

Klaus cautiously waited a while longer and then threw a small stone at the hive. It didn’t look like any bees remained inside. After approaching the tree, he picked up a long stick and poked the hive until it broke loose.

The whole thing dropped to the ground.

It was made of surprisingly sturdy stuff because it didn’t break open after falling from above Klaus’s head.

“Sigh.”

He had it, but what now? His plan had been to get Slender’s help in stopping the dragon’s resurrection, but was that a lost cause now that she had launched Archdragon Magic straight at him?

He had assumed it would be safe to contact his future wife, but he had little to actually back that up. And in that case, he was rapidly running out of options.

“What do I do now? What good is this stuff really? Munch. Maybe I should switch my focus from Slender to Little Girl. Oh, this is good. No, she’s too young for me. It would be wrong. Lick, lick. And my heart already belongs to Slender anyway. Agh, how can this honey taste so good!?”

The unflavored meatballs from Little Girl had been decent, but honey tasted the same whether it was natural or farmed. It meant a lot to be eating something that tasted the same as it did at the royal capital’s markets.

He continued muttering to himself with a blank look in his eyes until something smelled off to him. Literally. He could smell something burning. Speaking of, what had he done with the herbs he had used to smoke out the beehive? The ones he had covered in flammable pine resin and lit with static electricity? When he found no answer to that question, he froze. Uh, oh.

Trembling, Klaus Knockburn slowly looked over his shoulder.

Red flames were spreading at the base of the tree.

“Ah.”

He dropped the large ball-shaped beehive and stood up in a panic.

Was this forest cursed so every plan you had was doomed to fail!?

“Ahhhhh!? Wait, wait, wait, no! This can’t be happening!!”

He tried to extinguish it by covering it with dirt, but he had to wave his removed cloak with all his might to deal with the embers that escaped that. If this didn’t work, he was completely out of ideas. There was a river nearby, but he had no bucket.

The dark elves used powerful Archdragon Magic, which allowed them to wield every form of devastation, but he had oddly never seen them use fire. This was why. Why would they choose to use magic that would start a forest fire if they weren’t careful? Oh, and that might be why they used a clearing to try and burn me at the stake. Did I really need this revelation now?

“Out! Go out!! I’m sorry! I never should have thought I was hot shit for figuring out how to use pine resin!!”

He was nearly in tears toward the end while stomping his boots on the stubborn embers. After confirming it was entirely out, he was too afraid to leave and kept dumping more dirt on top.

He had somehow gotten the fire out.

However…

“Wh-what do I do about this?”

He could only tremble and stare. He had avoided disaster, but the underbrush was scorched and dark soil covered everything after he dug it up with his bare hands. Anyone could tell a person had done this. And that revelation would put the dark elves on alert. But he had no way of hiding it.

“…”

His thoughts ground to a halt. He grabbed the ball-like beehive and curled up on the ground.

“I can think after I eat this.”

Part 12

Man, now that was a feast.

Klaus had filled his stomach with honey so richly sweet it left his tongue tingling, but no new ideas occurred to him. If anything, he was feeling sleepy after satisfying his body’s needs.

“For now, I just need to get out of here. Immediately!”

The sun was already setting. In case the dark elves would search the entire area around the remains of the fire, he needed to find somewhere far from here to sleep.

He could tell he had only gotten one Witch Pumpkin stem’s worth of magic derivative from the honey, but it meant a lot to have gotten it in the evening. That meant he could last the night even after what he had gained the night before ran out.

He would have to figure out what to do about Slender later. Whether he was asleep, awake, eating, or starting fires, he kept thinking about her, but at the moment, he needed to find a safe place to sleep and somewhere he could think without any interruptions. If he screwed this up, he might find he had no way of avoiding a dead end later on. However…

“Kh.”

He noticed something while searching for someplace to sleep. He slowly crouched down to hide behind some bushes. He knew moving too quickly would make noise and draw attention to himself.

He had noticed a sound, which was unusual for the dark elves. The priest he called Glasses stepped on some underbrush while walking nearby. She did not look worried. She was smiling and chatting with Curvy who appeared to be on patrol.

“Konna. Aew lajjuqj?”

“Uw’v i kiduw. Oxoq uq opotjoqfuov, uw dawkotv po ykoq u gaq’w ga uw.”

The way Glasses let out a heated breath and wiped the sweat from her neck and cheeks with a cloth was weirdly sexy.

As scary as they could be, they still had times when they smiled together like this. Glasses eventually waved goodbye to Curvy and left along a different animal trail.

…Maybe she was just out jogging. Do unaging dark elves worry about staying fit and dieting? Well, even the young will get clogged arteries if all they do is eat fatty foods.

This was hardly a surprise since they were not like the monsters in plays that essentially appeared out of nowhere. The dark elves lived in this forest. They would have daily routines. When he watched more closely, he spotted more of the dark elves than just their signs. For example, he saw Mother and Little Girl out picking small berry-like fruits.

…But wait. Did that little girl in a sheer dress just tap her fist against her lower back when she stood back up? I could practically hear her saying “oh, my back” from the motion alone. Does that mean she’s actually an old lady? Could Mother be the younger one? Does she not wear the clothes of a hunter or a priest not because she’s already retired, not because she’s still in training? I-I still don’t know anything about dark elves, do I!? Do they start to shrink back down after they reach a certain age!?

“Bae’to va hnozudno, Qunwibi.”

“U faengq’w renn ahh wkuv aewhuw awkotyuvo.”

Short Hair began to hold herself and fidget bashfully when the others apparently complimented her revealing dancer outfit. The gold decorations and yellow gems jangled every time she moved. Dancers appeared to have a superior position in their society – something others wished they could be. So were they like the elites of the priests?

Klaus had been right to wash off his artificial scents in the river. He was still a good distance away, but he could actually see this defenseless side of them now.

And when he held his breath and observed them from afar, their expressions were no different from the humans in the royal capital. Some looked sleepy and some were smiling, but they were all enjoying their day.

He hoped those smiles could be directed toward humans someday.

But the truth was they were attempting to resurrect a 10km dragon.

And he may have been asking too much of them after what Professor Dissection had attempted to do to them.

“…”

He came to a stop and wondered if everything he was doing out here was a waste of time. He didn’t understand Slender now that she had attacked him out of the blue, he had no chance with the other dark elves, and Little Girl was an old lady. What could he change through understanding them? Humans could never thrive in the Forest of No Return, no matter how hard they tried. Wasn’t he just waiting for his inevitable death out here? He could see so many girls with silver hair and brown skin, but they were so far removed from the concept of a wife. He felt like he was doomed to be single until the day he died.

While worrying in the deep forest, he looked weakly up into the glimpses of the night sky overhead.

He saw a dark shape there: smoke.

“!?”

He spun around and looked in the direction of the fire he thought he had extinguished, but he immediately realized that was a completely different direction. This was not his fire reigniting.

…Then where is that smoke coming from?

He thought maybe the dark elves were cooking something, but the smoke looked awfully toxic for that. Yes, this smoke was intentionally colored in a way not seen in nature.

The word “intentionally” led him to the answer and he spoke the possibility that came to mind.

“Smoke signals?”

Part 13

Smoke signals were hard to miss. They were a signal, so that was by design.

The boy hesitantly approached, but not because he was afraid of whoever was making the signals. He had heard a quiet sound along the way. They could silence their footsteps through how they walked, but there was no fully silencing the rubbing of their white leather clothing. They were there. And if an outsider like him had noticed the smoke signals, those rulers of the forest would have seen it as well.

The entire forest was on edge. The dark elves had used torches before, but they may have been particular about fire management. With good cause given how close to disaster Klaus had come earlier.

And he had never seen the dark elves sending messages using smoke signals.

This had to be a human. Whether it was his rotten teacher or a surviving knight, he wasn’t the only one out here.

…But giving away your position like that is suicide.

Were they that confident? Based on what? The knights guarding Professor Dissection had gotten their asses kicked and his teacher had run off, leaving her student behind, so the power of the dark elves’ Archdragon Magic was inarguable. Something didn’t fit. And in his experience, these small hunches rarely led to the pleasant sort of surprise. Especially ever since he had entered the Forest of No Return!

He hurried toward the smoke signals…and he was surprised to find he could do so while making sure the dark elves didn’t notice him. He had gotten used to this. All he had done was wash off his artificial scents, overwritten those with animal fur and such, and learned to be careful about making noises and leaving footprints, but those little things added up.

And eventually…

“?”

He quietly crouched down. He could see some footprints, but they different from any of the team-specific dark elf footprints he had seen. These were more complex and ornamental. The design gave no thought to silence or grip, nor did it hold any hidden meaning.

…Was this person wearing armor?

The fancy footprints were deep and heavy compared to the nimble dark elves. He initially thought it must have been a large man, but the foot size was about the same as his own. Thus, he concluded they were wearing heavy armor.

Something flashed in the corner of his vision.

The glint seen through the trees was sunlight reflecting off of metal. That seemed downright careless. A dark elf hunter or archer would probably scoff because even Klaus could tell someone was there. He heard metal rubbing together past the trees. The dark elf hunters considered the best defense to be hiding silently behind bushes so you were never discovered, so they preferred not to wear heavy armor that could easily get leaves or branches caught in the joints.

In that case…

“Loinbelt?”

“What!? You?”

“Loinbelt, were those smoke signals you?”

He had somehow managed to make contact before the dark elves. Klaus’s words contained a shade of accusation and the page moved his face into view. He looked awful. There was no sign of the Loinbelt who had kept an honest expression on his adorable baby face. He had bags under his eyes, his hair was an unkempt mess, and his lightweight armor had dried mud caked onto it.

He must have faced his own trials in the forest, just like Klaus had survived by eating a bug. And Loinbelt was still here because he had chosen to survive.

But why had Loinbelt sent those smoke signals if he had struggled to the point of obtaining his own fire?

Idealism was meaningless in the forest of the dark elves. The rapier and knife at his hip would accomplish nothing. Surely he had learned and accepted that lesson if he was still standing now. Loinbelt looked adrift in a purposeless life when Klaus grabbed his shoulders, stared straight into the page’s eyes, and spoke slowly to him.

“What do you think you’re doing? You need to get away from here! A large group of armed dark elves are on their way! You’ll be surrounded!”

“…He’s gone,” said Loinbelt, staring into the distance. His eyes were not focused on Klaus’s face. “The honorable Sir Rainbook fought proudly to the end and lost his life in the line of duty. I was too terrified to move, so he shoved me aside and was crushed into a red paste!!”

“…”

“So I will kill them. I must have my revenge. No matter what it takes. Yes, I know I’m only dreaming. Their Archdragon Magic is too powerful and my armor might as well be made of paper. They have me beat in both quantity and quality, so I need to fix that. I need to gather more and better forces so we can overwhelm them.”

Klaus had never actually met Sir Rainbook, but he felt certain the knight had not protected Loinbelt so the boy’s soul would be bound by revenge like this. But the words of an outsider would never reach Loinbelt.

“So you sent out smoke signals to call in reinforcements?”

So he started with what he did know for sure.

Something about this was clearly wrong.

“They’ll never arrive in time! Do you have any idea how far we are from the capital? They can’t even see your smoke signals from there.”

“Oh, I called for reinforcements immediately after the devastating attack. By carrier pigeon.”

Now things were making more sense. In a bad way. And this one was even worse than when Professor Dissection got involved.

Loinbelt explained quite clearly.

“This is to call the reinforcements to me. They should have already arrived in the forest. I called for the elite knights who are second to none at cleaning up once disaster strikes: Last Resort Unit.”

An explosive boom rumbled across the deep forest. But not from just one direction. The projectiles and fearsome explosions of the dark elves’ Archdragon Magic were met by a different form of deadly attack from the other side.

Lightning. In other words, electricity. A niche lab in the royal capital was experimenting in making electricity visible inside a device known as a neon tube and Klaus himself had made use of static electricity to ignite pine resin, but this was on another level entirely. This lightning was manually bent and twisted like a sugar sculpture. A different culture entirely was tearing away pieces of the dark forest.

“Vanguard, not so far forward! Feel free to leave the brunt of the burden on me!!”

“Ito bae mugguqj po!? Yo’to douqj revkog difm!?”

“Silence, monster. You seem to have entertained yourself with our dog hunters, but now I will ensure you can never speak again.”

The people speaking the human language were not begging for their lives this time. There was an exchange of words from both sides. A female voice dripping with hostility overpowered even the dark elves, leaving them unsure about their next move.

This was Last Resort Unit.

But the difference in power between human and dark elf was supposed to be insurmountable. The humans shouldn’t have been able to outdo the dark elves in the field of magic no matter how elite a force they sent in. And yet…

“What is-?”

Klaus was cut off by several dark shapes rushing out from the bushes nearby. He didn’t even have time to cry out as his mouth was covered and he was knocked to the ground along with Loinbelt.

“Lady Elzane! We have secured Loinbelt!!”

“Plus one unknown – unarmed and human. Shall we rescue this boy as well!?”

They had not been brought down to be restrained. It was for their own safety. And Klaus grimaced when he heard “Lady Elzane”. That was unfortunately a name he recognized. And not in a good way.

A warhorse was ridden by a female knight using just one arm to easily lift a giant lance known as a chauve-souris. It was a flashy weapon named after a bat, but its practical design caught the enemy weapon on its side blades while slaying that enemy with the center blade. Her armor was much more ornate than Loinbelt’s. She only wore a highly aggressive style of chainmail on her upper body to prioritize the mobility of her arms and torso. Conversely, her legs were covered with enormous pieces of metal armor to attach her solidly to her saddle. The spur and spike on the armor’s heel and sole may have been used to give accurate instructions to the horse.

Overall, it gave her the same silhouette as a hakama-wearing martial artist from the isolationist nation far, far to the east when they removed their upper clothing and tied it around their waist. The armor itself did not appear to have any mobility-enhancing symbols or magic circles included in its design. That sort of thing had instead been placed in the metal armor surrounding the horse’s neck and torso. The horse had been boosted so thoroughly it would have damaged a human’s muscles and tendons.

She had beautiful sky blue eyes and hair worn in massive ringlets that fell nearly to her ankles. Also, that hair was an impossibly bright lemon yellow. It was clearly different from an ordinary blonde. It was more fluorescent or metallic. It reminded Klaus of the neon tube experiments he had seen at the royal capital school.

Non-medical hair dyes were obviously a luxury afforded only to the upper classes. And even then, most of the nobility had to resort to mineral dyes that damaged the scalp. Only a select few could use purely plant-based dyes.

She was a horseback warrior through and through.

Giving her long hair so much body and splitting it to either side was likely a fashion meant to accommodate her riding.

Fashion.

That word felt like it came from another world entirely. She was not actually using perfume, but the sweet scent from her nape and chest still tickled his nose. After nearly starving due to the faint scents on his hair and clothing, that sounded like suicide to him, but she could get away with it as long as she could bring plentiful resources along with her and had the strength to fight off the dark elves who detected her presence. That extraordinary knight held a position that allowed her to do all that just to remain fashionable.

She was combing her hair atop her warhorse. Did that involve the legend claiming that a witch’s power came from her hair? That may have been a personal rule of hers, much like his need for the magic derivative.

She broke the comb in two, tossed it aside, and brushed a giant croissant of hair off her shoulder.

“Hm? Why if it isn’t the Knockburn boy. I would recognize that adorable face anywhere.”

“I am not your childhood friend. And need I remind you for the zillionth time that I’m older than you?”

She would occasionally arrive at the school as an outsider to ask his rotten teacher for advice. That teacher had given her some lessons on leading a combat group based on how bees, wolves, and lions formed their respective groups. Her name was Elzane Livzy. She was a year his junior, yet this was how she treated him. She was simply too accustomed to looking down at everyone around her. The fact that she did not look down on them meant she was still a little cute, though.

…But the difference in status is so great I have to be all formal with her even though she’s younger.

Also, after she had repeatedly fallen victim to and been brought to tears by his rotten teacher’s eccentricities, she had eventually started to view Klaus as something like a mascot. Whenever she asked for advice in a closed room and received relentless flirting in the darkness in exchange, the straightforward and sensible boy waiting outside had felt like a breath of fresh air to her. So when she felt especially victimized by the rotten teacher (in other words, every single time), she would hold him in her arms like a big teddy bear, rub his head, smell his hair, and otherwise soothe herself before leaving the lab. She was younger and a stranger, yet she had taken up the “older girl next door” position in his life. Damn and she thinks she can get away with anything because her fancy diet has made her tits so big. In a school life where age and school year were everything, he found this incredibly frustrating. (Especially because he found him powerless to fight back.)

She smiled a little while carrying a lance twice her height and with the tight chainmail accentuating the size of her boobs like fishnet stockings or a boneless ham’s netting.

“Out adventuring, were you? I admire the spirit, boy, but from the look of you, I imagine you were yet again having a rough time. Where is Reika?”

“…Missing.”

“I see. Then we must slaughter every last one of them.”

Wait a second.

He had no idea when the terrible knight constantly visiting their lab had ended up leading the elite Last Resort Unit and it confused him that her lightning was so effective against the dark elves. As far as he could see, Elzane was the only one using magic while she waved her giant lance on horseback. A single human was overpowering and pushing back the dark elves. This clearly contradicted the rules he had gathered on his note-taking stick. How could this violation of the rules be permitted?

He lacked the information to reach an answer on his own, so he needed more observations. The answer revealed itself as another warhorse emerged from between the trees. A lithe blonde girl of about 12 rode the white horse.

No, that wasn’t just a girl.

She wore the transparently-thin green outfit of a priest and her ears were long and pointed.

“The hope elf? The visiting priestess!?”

“Address me as Rosehera, young one. And I would not complain if you added ‘St.’ to that.”

She looked like a child, but she spoke like an elderly woman. She even held a hand up to hide the elegant smile on her lips.

Unlike the dark elves, this hope elf could speak human language. There was an independent elf language, but Rosehera used the human tongue (while making it clear this was a favor she was mercifully granting them).

The dark elves all looked young no matter their actual age, that knight had an unbelievable chest despite being younger than him, and now this small hope elf spoke like an old lady. Were Klaus and Loinbelt the only ones in the forest who looked their age? Was there not a single ordinary girl here!?

“The dark elves are no more than a distant branch of the elf family, so their power cannot defeat one such as I who has a mastery of the elven arts. Archdragon Magic? No more than magic that takes the dragon name in order to conquer dragons. Ha ha. A mere parlor trick. They started by thinking of the unconquerable Brashgain and then lowered the mental hurdle by setting their sights on dragons one or even two levels below him. Then again, even that is superior to trying to make sense of those error-ridden texts you have so foolishly preserved in your royal capital’s library.”

“…”

“I have lent that girl my power, so each of her attacks packs a punch those dark elves will never see coming.”

…She’s on an entirely different level.

Rosehera was the only hope elf in the entire royal capital with its school full of eccentrics. In fact, there was no community of hope elves like the dark elves and their village.

Only the most powerful and intelligent of elves became known as a separate species known as hope elves. Categorizing someone as extraordinary as Rosehera in the same species as other elves would have caused too much confusion in academic society, so they had instead created a new category. She was just that powerful.

She was not just the only hope elf in the royal capital. She was the only one in the entire world.

If she were to fall to a deadly blade, the loss would be incalculable. Yet she had been taken from the safe capital to fight in this deep forest? Just how badly did the humans want to settle this problem?

Loinbelt kneeled next to Elzane’s horse. He bowed with his knee in the mud and his head down low where she could kick him to death if he upset her. That may have been some form of etiquette.

“The honorable Sir Rainbook fought nobly to the very end.”

“I see.”

“Please lend me your blade of vengeance, as a final kindness to one too inexperienced to fulfill this duty himself.”

“I humbly accept your request,” replied Elzane, pulling a new comb from her armor.

The dark elves had killed a noble. That may not have mattered much in the rules that governed the forest. Klaus himself believed those humans had only themselves to blame for assisting Professor Dissection. But humans had to follow their own rules. They could not allow a noble to be insulted. So to erase the shame of his defeat, they had pulled out all the stops and sent in an elite unit and the hope elf.

The knight glanced over at the hope elf.

“What would be our most effective option? I can always crush them one at a time with this borrowed magic, but we do not know how many dark elves are out there. We don’t want them to mask their numbers by hiding or playing dead in the vast forest.”

“I might be the supreme member of the elf family, but I am very familiar with this puny subspecies’ weaknesses. Leave this to me.”

The blue-eyed hope elf, who was practically a legend herself, raised her small index finger.

And she continued with a smile.

“You need only set the forest ablaze and burn the entire place to the ground. Dark elves live in the forest, so they know not how to survive outside of it. Then you can massacre every last one of them.”

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.

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.

Chapter 3: Day and Night, Never Stop Learning

Part 1

Deadly parasites.

“Wait, um, hold on.”

Klaus Knockburn forgot all about taking notes on his stick. He just blurted out some words while the forest evening turned to night. He only realized he had used the human language when Slender slowly tilted her head atop him.

He had to shift each letter ahead by two, with consonants and vowels separate.

He focused on converting everything into dark elf and tried again.

“Wait! Parasites? You mean inside me? And what about Brashgain’s resurrection!?”

“I don’t know anything about that. But you passed through the sticky, stringy plants directly pierced by the especially dangerous bones and fangs. Since you had not used the preventative pollen, it was only natural to assume you had been infected with the dragon bugs.”

“What about Brashgain!?”

“Sh.” Slender’s long ears moved and she looked to the side while still sitting on top of him.

“Someone is approaching. But it isn’t just human footprints. I hear metal as well.”

“Is it Elzane’s group? Only the knights would bring horses with horseshoes this deep in a forest so full of tree roots!”

“I don’t want them after me again. Come with me.”

She finally got off of him, the warmth and weight of her crotch vanishing. Only once it was gone did he realize a girl in a tight skirt had spread her legs to straddle him. He so desperately wished he had been given the chance to appreciate it.

“I won’t cry. As long as I live, there’s still a chance of it happening again!!”

“Use our language. And come this way.”

He had expected them to run in some direction found on a compass, but the forest was still full of surprises. Slender crouched down and grabbed a string handle hidden below the grass. She pulled it up and an 80cm square opened in the ground.

“Eh? What!?”

“Use dark elf.”

She had warned him twice now, but he really wished she would be more forgiving of these reflexive statements. She climbed down first and beckoned him in. It was a good thing he wasn’t claustrophobic. He excitedly climbed in with her and she shut the mysterious cover above them. They were now in total darkness, but she pulled out something. It was a glass-shielded lamp the size of an eyedrop bottle. It didn’t look like she had just lit it.

“You were hiding a lit flame…in your cleavage? Th-that sounds dangerous.”

“We are allowed to collect fire after a lightning strike, but we are not allowed to light it ourselves. A-and what does my cleavage have to do with this!?”

That sounded like a weird custom to Klaus. Were fire, water, wind, and earth considered to be works of nature they were forbidden from creating themselves, but fires lit by lightning strikes had been created by nature and were thus acceptable? He had heard that there was a nearly million year gap between primitive people starting to use fire and figuring out how to start fires themselves.

“So you don’t start fires? That explains why I didn’t see any after all my observations. Oh, that also explains why you went to the effort of leaving your village and mixing a hot spring’s water with the river water to bathe.”

“Observations?”

“Um, never mind that!!”

He laughed off the glare she gave him. These reactions were part of what made direct communication so much different from before. It felt like pouring love into his icy wife.

“But this is great too. No, it’s the best!! I feel so fulfilled I swear I’m going to end up pregnant!!”

“?”

He took a look around. They were in a very long horizontal tunnel that appeared to have been dug out of the dirt. It wasn’t very tall, so he would bump his head if he didn’t stay crouched. Slender kept a cautious eye upwards, presumably because of the knights walking around up on the surface. She gestured him forward and she took the lead since she had the only light. Klaus Knockburn had finally received official authorization to chase after the brown girl’s round ass. That tight leather skirt was the most attractive thing he had ever seen.

“But what is this place?” he asked her.

He could see one of her long ears turn toward him while she continued on ahead in a crouch. He had seen this before. It showed she was mildly interested, as opposed to fully ignoring him. Now that he could understand her and had better context for understanding her little idiosyncrasies, he found her cuter than ever.

The tunnel branched off here and there, but it didn’t look like someone had dug this out with a shovel. If so, surely the dark elves would have made it tall enough for them to stand up inside. The materials were odd as well. The walls, floor, and ceiling were all coated with some kind of translucent film instead of just dirt. The film was more than a centimeter thick and it was made of a strange substance that wasn’t quite glass or crystal.

Slender replied while bending over and placing her round butt right in front of his face.

“I doubt the humans know about this place. Because not even the other dark elves know it exists.”

“Eh?”

“Otherwise I couldn’t have snuck you out of the clearing through here.”

This place apparently connected to the clearing where they had tried to burn him. But that only raised further questions. If the other dark elves didn’t know about it, had Slender dug it all by herself? That seemed like a lot of unnecessary work even if she did use magic. And why would she do that anyway? The dark elves appeared to use metal for their arrowheads and jewelry, so had she wanted a monopoly on the mineral resources in this area?

…Oh, right. Jewelry. I forgot to give that back.

Klaus recalled the earring that had initially created a connection between them. It was a crucial writing implement for him now, but she was right here with him. He couldn’t just hold onto it forever.

“Um. You dropped this when you rescued me before, didn’t-”

He trailed off when she turned back toward him. He thought she was responding to him, but then he saw she was holding something in her hand.

…A white snake? No, a bug!? But it’s huge!

“Creepy-crawly.”

“Yikes!?”

Bugs were not supposed to grow more than 30cm long. He had never been more grossed out.

“These things dig holes all through the ground. And their slime hardens on the walls and ceiling, keeping the tunnels from collapsing. The tunnels can be useful in an emergency, but I would prefer not to remain in the dragon bugs’ home for long. So stay quiet and keep moving.”

“Th-these things were…inside me?”

“It’s a possibility.”

The translucent film that wasn’t quite glass or wax was apparently something secreted by these bugs after it hardened. Did that mean they could be found all throughout the forest? He shuddered at this unseen side of the dark elf forest. Was this what Professor Dissection had wanted from that collector?

“Wait. If that fire ceremony was actually meant to drive these things out of me…”

“…”

“Why did you interrupt and let me escape? No, wait…if the ceremony was never competed, what about the bugs inside me!?”

Slender had chosen to use a flame in this cramped indoor(?) space, not because she was unfamiliar with oxygen deprivation, but because the pale bugs avoided lights. He imagined himself trapped down here with those things in complete darkness. A terrifying thought to say the least.

Eventually, their subterranean expedition came to an end.

“This is the place.”

“?”

Slender stopped partway through the tunnel, but he doubted she could be using a map down here. Was there some kind of mark only she recognized? Still crouched down, she pressed her empty hand against the ceiling, which slowly opened. It was another square trapdoor. That must have led them to the deep, damp forest, but the bright light outside dazzled Klaus’s eyes. And that was with the sun nearly set.

“Good…the coast is clear. Hurry on up. If the dragon bugs do get inside you, they really will need to be smoked out of you with herbs.”

“What do you mean?”

“The dragon bugs really are a dangerous parasite. More will continue to be born as long as Brashgain’s bones remain. Humans are not naturally immune, so whenever you enter the forest, we must drive you back out. A wagon passing through on your road is fine, but you can never live here permanently.”

I can’t believe it, thought Klaus. There was nothing special about the Forest of No Return itself. It was only the result of the constant threats from the dark elves trying to keep vulnerable people away.

After viewing the surface (and failing to notice how far up her thigh her skirt had risen), Slender sighed.

“But the ceremony to drive out the dragon bugs with smoke is a drastic measure. It is guaranteed to drive them out, but there is a significant risk of the patient not surviving and dying a painful death. Do you really want to undergo a procedure like that?”

“…”

“An untreated dragon bug infection is deadly, so the elders thought they were doing the right thing. They treat everyone who even might be infected just in case, but I could tell you were the type who would die from what was likely an unnecessary treatment. So I rescued you.”

She climbed out of the hole first, giving him a good view of the underwear below her short skirt. Everything else was made of a tough leather, but these were white and lacy. He was surprised they had the means of making something like that, but then he recalled the delicate, see-through outfits of the dancers like Short Hair.

He really did need to see these things for himself. You couldn’t make assumptions, even about underwear. And the hint of brown skin showing through the thin fabric hit his brain with devastating power. Three cheers for fieldwork!

“Hell yes. I have a new life goal. My peeping days are over. I want her to let me remove those from her.”

“What, more human language? Just hurry up.”

She looked puzzled but was not aware what he was talking about. She powerfully pulled him from the hole, closed the trapdoor, and then hid the small lamp back in her flat chest. It must have used a double layer of glass for insulation.

They had covered a lot of ground in the tunnel, but they were still inside the forest.

How big was the forest in all? He had seen a map when helping his rotten teacher pack back in the royal capital, but the Forest of No Return was managed by the dark elves who threatened and drove out any humans they found. He doubted any humans had ever left the stone-paved road and trekked their way deep inside to take an accurate survey. If the map was only a general estimate based on external observations, it could vastly differ from the reality.

“You said you wanted to know about Brashgain, right?”

Yes. What was the truth there?

“Then come with me. You might not believe me if I told you on my own.”

“Wh-where are we going?”

Slender winked as she answered him.

The idea that the dark elves were an exclusionary species may have been inaccurate.

“Our village.”

Part 2

The sun fully set while they were walking.

The dark elves apparently did not rely on firelight even when it was this dark out. Their hunting skills and pride would play a role there, but it mostly came from a fear of using fire carelessly.

Insects chirped and the starry sky hung overhead.

How much longer would this cycle last? Rosehera, the only hope elf in the world, would have finished the basic structure of her Levazastar Linked Magic Circle and would be beginning on the precise adjustments for this particular situation. She had said she would finish by dawn, but the exact limit was a mystery.

And it was all to stop Brashgain’s resurrection.

It was all to protect the humans, another species altogether.

“What a disaster.”

A largescale forest fire would soon engulf the forest.

When he explained the situation, Slender placed a hand on her cheek. That left her armpit wide open. A dazzling sight.

“I can’t believe an elf would wield fire like that.”

“Eh? Is it that unusual?”

“It is. But this means we are even more pressed for time than I thought. Not even hiding in those tunnels would save us. We need to warn everyone in the village and prepare to fight that hope elf.”

“But…”

“Don’t say it.”

Slender cut him off.

Rosehera and Elzane Livzy, who was borrowing Rosehera’s power, were the top fighters sent by the royal capital. They were a devastating pair. The dark elves had already been easily repelled by them. And that was when Elzane was only guarding the area they would use to prepare the magic circles.

Slender pointed out ahead.

“There. That is our village.”

Klaus nearly dropped his stick at how casual she was about it.

“You’re kidding, right? That’s the elusive village you only have one chance to find?”

“Use our language.”

Slender was super cute when she pouted her lips like that.

“I didn’t expect something so normal. I was imagining some kind of secret place hidden by a magical barrier.”

“No one wants to live in a village that takes so much effort to move in and out of. Besides, not many humans are weird enough to willingly enter the forest.”

So she thought he was weird, did she? He sighed.

“Well, I won’t deny I’m horny for dark elves.”

“Bfff!?”

“Huh? Did I convert that wrong? It’s a two-letter shift, right?”

“Y-you had it right,” replied a blushing Slender in a vanishingly quiet voice.

At any rate, he could see a campfire. He did not see any walls or fences, but a gate made from wooden pillars had been constructed at one point near the village. Two sentry dark elves stood at it.

“Hm. The one on the right will be Braid and the one on the left will be Freckles.”

“What are you muttering about?”

He named them out of habit, earning him a glare from Slender. Oh, right. Now that I know their language, I can just ask them their names. But if I change their names in the middle of my notes, I’ll get confused about who is who. What do I do!? He started trembling, but the two sentries were even more shocked.

“Wh-who is that!? A human?”

“And isn’t he the one who escaped in the middle of the extermination ceremony!? Get him away from me!”

“I’ll cry, goddess dammit!! And you, the freckled one, I’ll hug you and rub my cheek all over you if you don’t take that back!!!”

When Klaus snapped back at them, the two sentries jumped in fright and held each other in their arms. Their soft brown cheeks were pressed together. Their halberds, a combination of a spear and an axe, might as well not have been there.

The dark elf critic gave his opinion on the matter.

“Yeah, a dark elf should really use a bow. Would a thick tome be the next best thing? No, maybe a whip. Eh heh heh.”

“U-umm, so what is this supremely creepy gentleman doing here?”

“Rosena, Patricia, he might spy on you in the nude and dive between your legs every chance he gets, but he isn’t a threat. As you can see, he can speak our language.”

Was her explanation helping him or not? After Slender winked and vouched for him, the other two pulled back their halberds.

His dreams were collapsing around him. It all felt so ordinary. Was there not a single deadly trial he had to pass to gain entrance?

“This is the secret village? Ahh, what a disappointment.”

“Why would we create a village where we threaten to kill everyone who comes along? C’mon, we need to hurry.”

Klaus passed through the ineffective gate and entered the village with Slender.

He doubted there was any magic or a mystical barrier at play, but as soon as he was inside, everything felt strange to him. It was the sounds and the voices. The place was full of life. There were also campfires lit all over the place. They may intentionally have been producing so much light and sound to scare animals away.

The inside of the village felt like another world altogether. He was finally in contact with civilization again.

He saw several log cabins and a few groups were sitting around campfires in between those cabins. There was no light inside the cabin windows, so dark elves must not have used fire indoors, except maybe small candles and lamps. He recalled that they bathed in the rivers and springs outside their village. That meant they wouldn’t have any household baths.

The log cabins did not appear to use nails.

In fact…

“Oh, I get it. They’re made to be dismantled and carried away. The village is so hard to find because it’s constantly being moved around the vast forest!!”

“Yes, and?”

“C’mon, you’re supposed to react with extreme shock!!”

“???”

He was going to have a hard time sharing his excitement with someone who lived here. This meant recording the village’s location on his stick would be meaningless. Instead, he wanted to know how they decided where to go.

He detected the delicious scent of cooking meat. He discovered the dark elves really did use salt. And they also used herbs. He saw salad, stew, grain bread, and what looked like a risotto. It was distributed in ceramic containers. This was what you could do once you had mastered life in the forest. Klaus, a beginner who was forced to eat bugs and barely-cooked mincemeat, was way out of his league. He couldn’t imagine how many steps were involved in accomplishing all this.

The barrels he saw here and there appeared to contain iron sand, which was probably used to create metal products.

“Wow, who is that? He has earlobes!”

“Is he a human? Ohhh, I’ve never touched one before.”

The little dark elves approached him with no caution whatsoever. They wore the same white leather outfits as the others. The skimpy outfits looked so wrong on those small bodies. And they didn’t seem to be old ladies like Little Girl was. The adults…kept their distance, but they seemed to trust him since Slender was with him. They did not appear to be readying poison arrows to attack him.

One of the children massaged his earlobe when he crouched down for her to reach.

“I bet it was a pain getting here.”

“?”

The path here had taken him through a hellish world of survival and mistakes he would much rather forget, but that was not what the little dark elves were getting after.

“She likes to guide people through the forest. Because she loves explaining stuff. So you must be exhausted after she talked your ear off the entire way.”

“Eh?”

Klaus was legitimately surprised by this.

The children didn’t seem to be joking because more of them joined in.

“She’s always saying how stressful it is to sit silently behind the bushes with her bow at the ready.”

“And that after work she goes and screams behind the waterfall to let off some steam.”

Unable to stop the children from revealing her secrets, Slender grew flustered, her hands and her long ears shaking wildly.

“N-no, don’t get the wrong idea! I only like to provide people with some basic information so I didn’t have to help them every time they stumble along the way! It’s all meant to help me in the long run, not because I feel lonely when I don’t talk with anyone for a while.”

“I see. You do like explaining things, don’t you?”

“Shut up. It’s none of your business!!”

When he thought back, he realized Slender had not been alone all that often. Hadn’t she generally been with other dark elves?

“Was she contacting the others because she felt lonely?”

“I can’t understand your human language, so use ours,” said Slender, pulling up her rabbit ears hood as if threatening him.

She seemed like an entirely different person now that he could understand her.

For that matter, the dark elves weren’t exclusionary at all. Klaus had found nothing but surprises since he learned to understand them. Is this what Professor Dissection had wanted to slice open with a scalpel and what Elzane was trying to burn alive because they “had no other choice”? Something had gone horribly wrong in this world.

Among the children, he saw one holding a large paper book and he saw drawings on the ground, presumably made with a rock or stick. They may have had their own fairy tales and children’s stories.

Two of the dark elf children broke a fallen stick in two. But instead of throwing it on the fire, they shared the two pieces. Hooded Slender narrowed her eyes as she explained.

“That is a legend from a children’s story.”

“?”

Did the matching jagged edges act as a password or something?

When he started watching the dancers performing near a campfire, Short Hair blew him a kiss. No screaming and calling him a pervert here.

…Come to think of it, isn’t this my first time seeing them outside of that weird ritual or spying on them from the bushes?

Does that mean I’m an official part of their audience now? And does that mean I can watch as much as I want!? Where’s my stick – I need to take notes. I need to get some very close observations of the dark elf lifestyle. This will be one of the greatest research reports in the history of humankind!!

“Hmph.”

“Gah, ow!? What!? Did you just kick me in the shin!?”

“I can’t understand human language.”

Slender puffed out her cheeks and looked the other way, but one of her long ears was twitching and turning his way. She was looking away, but she was still listening in.

And…

“You were awfully flexible when you were bathing, so were you perhaps interested in being a priest dancer instead of an ace hunt- gwah!?”

“S-s-s-s-stop making assumptions!! My reputation depends on it!!”

“A clenched fist this time…?”

“And what was that about me bathing?”

Where would she hit him next if he didn’t learn to keep his mouth shut? He still had a lot of training to go before he could gladly accept a fisting from his wife, so he frantically shook his head and dropped that line of discussion.

…Ugh, I so want to see her dancing in one of those skimpy outfits.

“Yeah, you’re right. Dark elves look best wielding a bow!!”

“Y-you really think so?”

“You’re the wild type, not a graceful dancer! Ah ha ha. A dancer with this flat a body? Not happening!!”

“…”

For some reason, she stomped on his foot, making him lose his balance and fall right into one of the dancer’s arms. Beads of sweat flew from Short Hair’s lithe, heated body. She did elegantly hold a hand to her mouth and let loose a shriek, but in a playful way.

…But.

After that ordeal, Klaus noticed something odd. He saw several canoes or boats seemingly made by hollowing out logs or Witch Pumpkins, but the carving looked rough, imprecise, and poorly done. Plus, he saw no oars to use with the simple boats, so how could they operate them? There were no fishing rods or nets either. The dark elves must not have developed much of a fishing culture.

“U-um.”

“Yes?”

“Do you dark elves not know how to swim?”

“Do I need to punch you again?”

That suggestion upset her. Language was tricky. Being understood was not always a good thing. But it was true a species that couldn’t swim wouldn’t approach the rivers.

“Yeah, that makes sense. They do love bathing enough to do it more than once a day.”

“Why do those human words sound so indecent?”

…Do they view the water as something that cleanses and washes away scents, not something you get stuff out of?

“Eh heh heh. Yes, washing that beautiful skin clean.”

“What are you fantasizing about? I don’t like a single thing about how you’re acting here. Hey, answer me!!”

Klaus was grinning and staring into space, so Slender grabbed his shoulders and shook him hard.

They were surrounded by a peaceful scene.

Dark elves gathered around the fire to eat dinner and laugh together. Children held out bowls and plates to ask the woman in charge of cooking for seconds. Quite a few scantily clad women were dancing and jangling their yellow gems in time with drums and flute music. A parent and child were leaning together while the mother pointed up into the starry sky, perhaps to teach her daughter about the constellations. They used different tools, but he had seen these exact smiles in the royal capital’s restaurants and public squares.

It all felt wrong to him. Weren’t these the people trying to resurrect Brashgain?

He had expected a strained atmosphere from their resentment of humans or for no one to be allowed out at night. And if they did hate humans, why would they accept him in just because Slender said it was okay?

“It’s like I told you.” Slender peered over at his face with her hands on her hips and her cheeks a bit puffed out. “We don’t know anything about trying to resurrect Brashgain.”

Ropes were tied to a tree’s thick branches and cloth sacks the size of heads dangled down. He had seen these disturbing pieces of art before, but now he saw the children were laughing while smacking them with sticks. It appeared to be some kind of game, but he couldn’t work out the rules.

Slender kept one hand on her hip and gave him a puzzled look with ears twitching.

“Why are you covering your face like that?”

“It’s nothing. Just don’t look at me for a bit.”

…Goddess, I just want to die. Don’t remind me that I thought those were part of some kind of cult ritual.

But as civilized as the village was, it did lack one thing: the lighting of fires. They knew how to use fire, but they never seemed to light one themselves, by friction or flint. All of their campfires and torches were started from other fires they already had.

They probably had a fire preserved in a sacred altar, deep in a cave, or in the elder’s house. If that ever went out, their civilization would screech to a halt. It felt terribly fragile to Klaus.

“Anyway, we need to see the elder,” said Slender. “It would be fastest to speak with her first. She might have some old text I’m unaware of.”

“Um, is the elder like the oldest woman here or something? Who is it? Please tell me I’m not going to find Little Girl seated atop a throne in the back of the village.”

“Who is Little Girl?”

She showed him to the village’s largest house located a short distance from the others. It was large enough to be called a mansion. Since their village was mobile, a bigger building took more effort to move. Whoever lived here had to be powerful.

They must not have needed an appointment because they marched right on in and found the big boss waiting in the back of the mansion.

The elder wore white silk, green gems, and…

“Glasses!?”

That makes sense, thought Klaus entering assessment mode. Glasses is more mature than Slender. By which I mean she has bigger boobs. Like, wow those are big. And she’s wearing that loose-fitting sheer silk instead of the white leather, so she must be a priest. Mature, intellectual, and a priest? Leaders are generally whoever can supply a steady source of food or the leader of an ancient religion, but it looks like the dark elves went with the latter.

Meanwhile, Glasses looked at him like he was a creep and held her arms protectively around herself with her long ears twitching. Unfortunately for her, that only caused her to lift her boobs from below.

“Why did you bring this rude human to me? What kind of person calls someone Glasses just because she wears them?”

“That’s just how he does things. I fell victim to it myself. W-while I was bathing…”

“Yes. And I seem to recall his extermination ceremony was never completed since a certain someone took him away.”

“Oh? I am not accepting accusations from someone who ties people up and starts smoking them to death without bothering to explain it to them or to test if the treatment is even necessary.”

What’s this? thought Klaus, noticing something here.

Strange sparks were crackling between those two. He could have sworn he saw it.

Slender and Glasses pressed their foreheads together as they continued their exchange.

“I always did think you needed to be taught some respect for your superiors. You could also stand to stop acting so brusque when we all know you’re the fragile bunny type that needs someone to talk to or you die of loneliness.”

“Oh, I have plenty of respect for you. Even if you do eat the deer and boars we worked so hard to catch without putting in any work yourself.”

They could not afford to get into a fight now. Rosehera could set the forest ablaze at any moment.

Klaus lay down on the floor.

Drastic times called for drastic measures.

“Now, now, my lovely ladies. If this is going to take long, why not take a seat right here? Yes, one of you on my face and the other on my hips! It’s the perfect position for three people who need to learn how to become very good friends!!!!!!”

“Why in the world did you bring this scumbag into our village!?”

“?”

Glasses shouted tearfully at Slender who didn’t know what he meant and only looked confused.

Slender loved explaining things, but that particular position was too high level for her and she gave up trying to figure it out. Glasses, realizing her outburst proved she did understand, blushed bright, puffed her cheeks out to the limit, and clenched both fists so hard they shook.

Klaus realized something from all this.

…It looks like their official leader isn’t necessarily the most powerful person here.

Glasses glared down at him.

“What? What did you just realize? Out with it, human.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t dream of realizing any great dark elf secrets, Lady Glasses.”

“Adding ‘lady’ to it doesn’t make the name any better!! D-do not forget that I am the village elder! I am the most important person here!”

When she opened her eyes wide and raised her arms (with enough force to make her breasts jiggle up and down), the dark elves waiting outside the mansion silently responded. A composite bow made from multiple woods and animal tendons launched an arrow with greater force than the average mercenary and grazed Klaus’s nose.

It also shattered a window from the outside and pierced an expensive-looking liquor bottle on a shelf on the opposite wall.

Glasses froze with her arms still in the air and began trembling.

“Ah, ahhh, ahhhhh…”

“(Scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch.)”

“S-stop that, human! What are you writing on that stick!? Don’t you dare leave any record of what just happened!!”

The lovable elder grabbed at him to stop him and Slender winked.

“This is what happens when you guard your mansion with hunters because we’re more effective. You might as well be putting up a sign saying the priests can’t do anything on their own.”

“Um? What can she do?” asked Klaus.

“I specialize in recovery magic.” Glasses kept her cheeks puffed out while she crossed her arms, unintentionally lifting her large breasts. “But with the long dark elf lifespan, our bodies never really show their age. I’ve had time to master my magic to the point that I can heal just about anything, but it’s almost never needed.”

“Yes, and you’re there whenever someone’s in trouble. You don’t need to be useful on an everyday basis, so make sure you do your job when it is needed.”

…So the hunters support their everyday lives and the priests are for emergencies.

If that was her role, Klaus couldn’t bring himself to laugh at Glasses. She was there when she was needed, but the dark elves lived such peaceful lives. Just like with a doctor or a soldier, it was best when she wasn’t needed.

“What is that look of pity for, human?”

“Oh, I was just impressed that someone as incredible as you really exists. You’re so different from our shitty human king who’s obsessed with his own glory and won’t stop counting how many statues he has in the city.”

“Well, excuse me for having no glory or statues. Hmph!!”

Glasses looked sulkily away. But just as he thought she looked kind of cute, someone stomped on his foot.

“…”

Slender was sulking even more with her arms crossed. She was even more cute.

Failing to realize his praise had been genuine, Glasses clicked her tongue.

“So what do you want? You wouldn’t have visited me if it wasn’t a big deal.”

“It’s about Brashgain,” began Klaus Knockburn. “But I’m not talking about the parasites you call the dragon bugs. My teacher, rotten though she may be, told me the dark elves are plotting to destroy the world by resurrecting Brashgain from his bones. And the humans – plus Hope Elf Rosehera – are responding to that accusation.”

“But I’ve never heard anything about resurrecting Brashgain,” said Slender to the dark elf elder. “Are you hiding something from us hunters again? If so, you need to tell us sooner rather than later.”

Glasses slowly raised both hands and stuck out her tongue like a child.

She was aware her mansion’s hunter guards were not going to listen to her here.

“You think we’re messing with Brashgain’s bones?”

Klaus felt some relief setting in. Slender was a reasonable person after all. All the dark elves had been eating and smiling together. Even Glasses, their elder, was a playful person. The village was a pleasant place. It was overflowing with kindness. The contrast to the harsh and unpleasantly unpredictable forest was plain as day.

But it slipped his mind that this village was itself a part of that unpredictable Forest of No Return.

Glasses smiled thinly and gave her answer with both hands still raised.

“Of course we are. We would be fools not to.”

Part 3

Klaus Knockburn did not understand.

His mind had gone entirely blank and this throat felt clogged up. What had that woman just said?

And time had not frozen along with his mind.

“Catherine!!!!!!”

With the sound of scorching friction, Slender pulled the bow from her arm, raised it, and nocked an arrow she pulled from the quiver at her hip.

That was a composite bow and she could boost its power with Archdragon Magic.

The dark elf elder kept her smile while staring down that weapon.

“Calm down.”

“What have the priests been doing in this forest? And without informing the hunters!?”

Klaus thought he was going to faint when he heard it.

Yes. Why hadn’t he considered this possibility? He had noticed the split between hunter and priest dark elves. He had noticed it before he even understood their language. And if there was a division in their village, this was possible.

The hunters and priests could have different plans for their village.

And that would mean an assurance of safety from a hunter like Slender was not enough. Glasses, leader of the priests, might do something else entirely.

For example, she might be resurrecting Brashgain from his bones.

Hadn’t Glasses said her recovery magic could “heal just about anything”!?

The grinning elder moved the fingers of her raised hands, but these were not just finger exercises. She seemed to be making fun of them.

“If you suspect me that much, then go ahead and kill me with that bow. But then no one will be able to stop Brashgain. No one at all.”

“Is that a threat?” growled Slender.

“Just listen.” Glasses sounded like she was trying to talk sense into a stubborn child. “Calm down and I will explain everything. I have nothing to be ashamed of in this matter.”

The tension seemed to have grown to the point that it was its own individual presence in the mansion.

And the unstable equilibrium was not broken by the hunter or the priest.

“Kah…ah…”

Klaus wobbled on his feet, unable to breathe through all that tension. He staggered to the side and Slender relaxed her bowstring so she could support him.

He was soaked with an unpleasant sweat. He hadn’t felt this bad even when he as wandering the dark forest in search of some magic derivative. His rotten teacher was awful in just about every regard, but she was only ever joking. No matter how bad it got, she made sure he would survive to do it all again next time.

…But Glasses is different. She tears everything down so there is no next time. I finally found the dark elves I’ve searched for all my life and now they’ve betrayed me. I’ve never been in so much pain.

“What…but…why?”

“I’m not going to bother converting your human language.” The elder lowered her raised hands and shrugged. “I freely admit we are casting magic on the massive dragon bones found across the entire forest. And not to suppress the creation of dragon bugs. We are interfering with the dragon’s own resurrection.”

“How could you!?” snapped Slender while supporting the weak boy.

“Wait, he said to stop her. He managed to get the words out through his blue lips. “What do you mean ‘interfere with’? You say that like the dragon’s resurrection is separate from what you’re doing.”

“You’re sharp.” Glasses winked and raised a finger. “Simply put, Brashgain will be resurrected sooner or later. His bones forcibly draw energy from the ground and trigger something much like recovery magic. His bones were made to do that from the beginning. All our magical interference can do is influence the ‘sooner or later’ part.”

“And you’re accelerating that process?”

“In a manner of speaking.”

He felt dizzy all over again. What did this mean? Brashgain would resurrect on his own in ten thousand years’ time, but the priests were making it happen in a years’ time instead? Was a year from now and ten thousand years from now not all that different with the near-endless lifespan of a dark elf?

He shook his head and chose to trust Slender. From what he had seen of her, their long lifespan did not leave them detached from the flow of time.

“The polygon and the star.”

“?”

Klaus’s thoughts were pulled a step back from the precipice of despair. The elder had just mentioned two symbols used in his Camouflize magic. Even though they both had eight points, an octagon and an octagram had entirely different meanings. (An octagram’s shape could change depending on how the points were connected, but that can be omitted here.) Generally, a polygon represented the emanation of power and a star represented the gathering of power. But why would she be bringing that up here?

The dark elf elder laughed as she gave the final answer.

“My priests have been accelerating the flow of power to the point that it cannot gather in a single point and the river of energy ruptures, allowing it to scatter everywhere. Simply put, we are preventing the resurrection process from ever making any progress.”

Klaus Knockburn truly could not find any words this time.

“Y-you mean…?” After what felt like an eternity, he managed to ask a question with a tremor in his voice. “The dark elves aren’t trying to resurrect Brashgain?”

“What, disappointed the elder wasn’t a secret villain?”

“N-not at all!”

He frantically denied it and Glasses covered her laughing mouth with a hand.

“The dragon corpse absorbs a massive amount of energy from the ground, so an emanating polygon on its own wouldn’t be enough. The emanation would be too weak and the power would gather back together again. Like it was being drawn into a funnel. So we needed to accelerate it to ensure it had the necessary force behind it. Even if that meant adding a star.” The dark elf elder’s long ears moved gently up and down at that point. “And it might not be entirely wrong to call me a villain.”

She smiled in a way that told him it was best not to say anything here. And she made no attempt to flee.

“We are accelerating the dragon’s power and letting the resurrection process run in vain, but what happens to all that energy after it breaks free? It does harm the world in a different form. Usually as natural disasters like earthquakes and tornadoes.”

“…”

“That’s better than the destruction of the world, right? But it does cause damage. If someone had a loved one’s life taken by one of those disaster, then I probably would look like someone worth killing even if it meant bringing the entire world down with me.”

Klaus felt it wasn’t his place to decide whether or not it had been necessary. He was not the one taking lives or the one having a precious life taken. If he was, he knew his emotions would keep him from reaching a logical conclusion.

“But wait.” Another problem occurred to him. A much greater problem. “Rosehera and Elzane are trying to end this by burning down the entire Forest of No Return! By dawn at the latest! If that happens…!!”

“Yes, it would be a problem. One that puts the entire world at risk.”

The human operation to prevent Brashgain’s resurrection would instead ensure he was resurrected. It was irony of the worst kind. The elder knew all of that, but she still had a question for him.

“So what do you expect us to do with this information?”

“What do you mean?”

“We dealt with that dissection-obsessed freak and his knights, but did that solve the problem? Things only got worse. As you well know after seeing that hope elf’s magic circles. We did nothing wrong. We never threw a glove at you and demanded a duel. All we did was refuse to play by your rules.”

“Oh, hell!! shouted Klaus, forgetting to convert it into dark elf.

Elzane’s group was not evil. But he could not tell them the truth about Brashgain. Hadn’t his rotten teacher said that letting people know about their impending doom would only cause a panic? What if a new cult wanted to use it to destroy the world? What if an army attempted to control the extent of the damage so it would destroy just their enemies? He couldn’t even guess what that chaos would bring. In all likelihood, the current system would collapse and something worse than he could imagine would happen. But even a faulty plan could end up triggering the world’s destruction, so he could not explain all this to the angry people.

And if he couldn’t explain it, the conflict between dark elves and humans would never end. The humans would continue resenting the dark elves. What could he do to end that downward spiral? He squeezed his eye shut in thought. This was going to be a painful decision. He couldn’t get any help from the true allies he had finally found.

“Okay.”

But he said it anyway.

After reaching this point, he wanted to say it.

“I’ll do this on my own. If the dark elves don’t harm Rosehera or Elzane, then the nobles’ grudge will be redirected toward me! That will free Slender and all the rest of you!!!!!!”

The dark elf elder stared blankly at him. Earning that look from crafty Glasses made him glad he had said it. Except he was focusing on the wrong thing here.

A moment later, he heard an icy voice from the girl supporting him.

“Slender? Is that supposed to mean me?”

“Uh, oh.”

“What about me inspired that name!? Can you answer me that!?”

Slender grabbed his collar and shook him while blushing. That may have been something of a complex for her.

Meanwhile, the more mature Glasses held her sides in laughter.

“Pff. Ah ha ha!! I see, I see. So she’s Slender, is she?”

“Don’t think you’ve won this!!”

“All I’m saying is I don’t have to use a vest strap to make my chest look bigger.”

“You had to say it, didn’t you!? We could have gotten through this without specifying my chest!!”

“Anyway.” The dark elf elder pushed up her glasses and wiped the tears from her eyes. “He calls me Glasses and you Slender. I bet he has names for the others too, but this means he doesn’t know any of our real names, doesn’t it?”

“Oh.”

“And it didn’t matter to him that he didn’t even know our names. When he saw someone in need, he decided to risk his life to help them. …You are an awfully kind human.”

She called him a kind “human”, not just a kind “person”.

She was marking him as a member of another species.

That may have been an important distinction for her.

“I now accept you as one of us. From now on, we will invite you into our village whenever you enter this forest.” She stood in front of Klaus Knockburn and lowered her head as a sign of respect. “But at the moment, there is little we can do to help aside from trust you. I, Catherine Apple, am in awe of your courage. The fate of the dark elves and of the entire world are in your hands. Please do everything in your power to save us all, our kind hero.”

Part 4

A cheerful energy permeated the simple village that night.

That was what Slender of the hunters and Glasses of the priests had wanted to protect no matter what. Klaus Knockburn burned the scene into his eyes.

From here on, he was acting on behalf of more than just himself.

Everyone’s lives and futures rested on his shoulders.

…I’m honored.

With that thought, he walked away from the light. The dark elves had excellent archery skills and Archdragon Magic, plus they worked as a group, not as individuals. He would have loved to have them fighting alongside him, but he shook free of that temptation.

He loved dark elves.

So he didn’t want to get them involved. This was a human problem, so it was up to a human to solve it.

“That should about do it.”

He let out a soft breath.

He had made something out of a stick skinnier than a match. The dark elves said they were used to make bird nests and decorative wreaths. He couldn’t use anything as fancy as a rock, so he rounded out the edges of a broken shell on the edge of a boulder and fixed it in place with beeswax.

He had made a ring. It was more about breaking free of his regrets than a necessary part of his plan.

He hadn’t wanted to leave without finishing his plan to make an accessory to win his future wife’s heart. But now it was done, so he had to focus on the upcoming battle.

This would be a clash of ugly human deeds.

“Wait up.”

But as soon as he left the village, someone called out to him.

For some reason, the person he most wanted to protect was approaching him. The forest was not done betraying his expectations, so Slender was chasing after him!

“Wh-what are you doing here, Slender!? The plan doesn’t work if they see you with me!!”

“Slender, huh?”

He coughed, but what else could he do when he didn’t have another name for that girl staring at him with a hand on her hip? And changing names in the middle of his notes would only cause him more trouble down the line. He had stuck with Leader and Little Girl’s inaccurate names, so Slender would just have to accept hers too!!

“Are you sure you can reach your destination walking through the forest alone at night? You do remember where these Rosehera and Elzane people are, don’t you?”

“…”

He was not at all confident. It was entirely possible he would get lost and wander around half in tears until he ran out of time.

Slender winked and pressed a hand against her chest.

“See, you need me with you. I can guide you to the site of your duel.”

“Th-thanks.”

“But if any stray shots come my way, I might just reach for my bow on reflex. I can’t be blamed for responding in self-defense, can I?”

“You’re going to ruin the plan, Slender!”

They continued their discussion while walking through the forest together.

It was a little too dark out to call it a date and he feared that was a large carnivore he heard moving around nearby, but it was still vastly superior to when he had been out there alone. They felt so much closer than when he had been hiding in the bushes trying to guess what she was doing from her few remaining footprints.

“Here.” She pulled something from the cleavage formed by her white vest. “When was the last time you ate any real food? We can’t have you collapsing before the battle even begins.”

He greatly appreciated it.

After all, their food was all handmade, which made this the lovely Slender’s home cooking! I love it! Marry me!! He just about hugged her, but…

“What?”

He muttered to himself in his own tongue without thinking when he saw the small bottle. It contained a collection of fruits – peach, apple, grape, and more – chopped up, dried, and covered in a white powder.

He was surprised to find they had fruits like this in the conifer forest, but that wasn’t the primary issue.

…What kind of choice is this? This is just as awkward as when your smiling grandma recommends you a subpar snack.

Klaus had bitten into a small rodent and a black beetle for sustenance, but he was turned off by this in a different way.

This was from his future wife.

It was her home cooking.

The white powder indicated the super-sweet love behind it. He could not reject it, but he also didn’t quite feel like accepting it. Noticing the awkward look on his face, Slender’s eyes angled upwards in displeasure.

“What, are you saying you won’t eat it?”

“No, ah ha ha. I will, uh, gladly eat it.”

He was so unconfident in his acting abilities he used the human language she couldn’t understand, so she ended up grabbing at him. She must have been proud of it and hated to have it rejected because she opened the lid and stuffed the contents into his mouth.

“Eat it!! See, it’s good now that you’ve tried it! Admit it’s good!”

“Mghghghgh!?”

Choking on dried fruit sounded the same in any language.

Dried fruit still reminded him of an unwanted gift from grandma, but he was surprised to find it was somewhat warm. Which made sense given it had been stored in her cleavage. With the white leather vest pulled tight, she actually did form a cleavage, even if she was less than 80cm. He didn’t think dried fruit worked as a cardiotonic, but he heard his heart pounding in his ears after eating it.

Then there was the sugar. How had she gotten that? The sugarcane didn’t grow this far north, so had they boiled down the inedible Witch Pumpkin? Klaus had felt like he knew his way around the place now, but the dark elf forest was still full of mysteries.

And no matter how much of a granny flavor it had, food was food. It may have been an emergency supply for when she failed to catch anything or accidentally got lost in the forest because the small bottle of dried fruit really packed a punch. The already sugary fruit was soaked in more sugar and the dried fruits may have soaked up the moisture and expanded in his stomach. He felt a lot fuller than he had expected.

“Did you use honey in addition to the Witch Pumpkin?”

“Oh? I’m glad to see you know how to appreciate forest food.”

That was fortunate. If Ghost Turnips or Witch Pumpkins had gone into making the honey, he could indirectly acquire the magic derivative from it.

…I have five uses of Camouflize now. That’s the first time I’ve been fully charged since entering the forest.

Now he could fight using trickery. He still had no idea what he could do against an elite knight equipped with iron and silver and against legendary hope elf, but he could figure something out with his options open like this.

“Hey.” Satisfied that the bottle was empty, Slender spoke to him again. “Did you really stick around to help even though you didn’t even know my name?”

“Um, well.”

He wasn’t sure what to say since agreeing felt like officially branding himself her stalker.

But he was curious about something himself.

“What about you?”

“What do you mean?'”

“Why did you save me from the fire? I’ll be kind of sad if you say you would have nobly saved anyone in that situation…”

“Did the drug make you forget?”

“What drug!?”

That was a scary thing to hear from a dark elf hunter who knew all about mixing poisons and drugs for her arrows. Then again, he had noticed some unnatural gaps in his memory before and after he was initially captured and taken to the clearing and before and after she rescued him from the fire.

“Quiz time.” Slender flicked her long ear – the one wearing her single remaining earring. “When you first ran across me bathing, which ear was I wearing this on?”

“…?”

“You were too busy staring at my naked body to notice, weren’t you, you pervert?”

He didn’t dare tell her how right she was.

And another question came to mind.

“Which ear? You weren’t wearing both of them then?”

“The other earring’s clasp is broken, so it has a habit of falling off.” She laughed and continued on. “So you found it on the ground and walked through those sticky plants, not knowing what they were, to return it to me. That is why you ran across me bathing.”

The rest of that story was far from romantic.

He had been sent running all over the forest because of parasites, knights, and a giant dragon, ultimately finding himself here. He didn’t want to count how many times he had nearly died due to remarkable and very boring reasons alike.

He held a hand to his forehead and sighed, but she seemed to see things differently.

“That doesn’t sound like much, does it?”

She had such a kind look in her eyes.

This seemed like it should have been a disappointment to him, but…

“But it meant a lot to me. The pair of earrings is a gift meant to draw destined lovers together. Admittedly, it’s more of a superstition or jinx than it is a serious ritual, but when you appeared with the ring in hand, it was just like a scene from the picture book my mother used to read me. I had given up on those superstitions long ago, but you made me believe again.”

“…”

Come to think of it, hadn’t he seen the village kids breaking a stick in two and sharing the pieces?

But in the end, that’s all it really was. There was nothing special there and they weren’t the reincarnations of lovers from a past life. They hadn’t known each other’s names, but when they saw the other suffering, they hadn’t been able to sit idly by and let it continue.

They were both people who had continued to pursue their childhood dreams even as their belief in them waned.

They both smiled at about the same time.

That similarity may have been what drew them toward each other from the very beginning.

Both before and after they could understand each other’s words.

“There’s so much we can discuss once this is over,” she said.

“Sure,” he replied.

“There’s a lot I can tell you and there’s a lot I want to hear from you.”

“Sure.”

“So…”

Something had changed.

This wasn’t the chirping insects or the nocturnal animals. They sensed a messier and more oppressive presence out there.

It was the humans.

No other lifeform was more openly indifferent to the other life around it. Slender looked out ahead and spoke with a firm, determined voice.

“Do not let them win. I will never forgive you if you don’t return from this.”

Crack

Booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooom!!!!!!

A bolt of lighting really did crash down from the heavens and split a thick conifer tree down the center.

Maybe it was the harm to one of the forest’s trees and maybe it was the ignition of fire in the forest, but the look in Slender’s eyes sharpened.

The dark elves would silently hide in the forest and take up positions before the enemy ever knew they were there, but the knights would make their presence known as they surrounded the battlefield and then charged in for a direct attack.

Had that lightning been fearsome divine punishment or the symbol of humanity’s new toy?

The two halves of the split tree collapsed in opposite directions, revealing someone on the other side. She only wore lightweight chainmail on her upper body for ease of arm movement, but she wore thick armor on her legs, creating a very odd silhouette. Her massive double ringlets spread out to the sides and fell to her ankles. She used a single arm to easily wield a complex lance known as a chauve-souris, named for the side blades that resembled bat wings.

Her sky blue eyes carried a powerful will and her lemon yellow hair had the artificial color of the neon tube experiments held at the royal capital’s school. The unnatural color of her hair seemed to defy the power of nature all around her.

Klaus knew her name.

“Elzane Livzy.”

“So we meet again, boy.”

Had she left her horse behind to prioritize mobility over speed? He could tell she intended to tail his every move so he could never escape. Last Resort Unit’s commander reached a hand out to the pitiful runaway while prepared to kill him at any moment.

She used her other hand to toy with her hair because that was how she controlled her magic.

“Hope Elf Rosehera had hoped to complete her magic circles earlier than expected, but I had her stop until we could find you. Now hurry this way. We can burn away the forest and the dragon bones within once you are safely away. The other knights have already left.”

She approached him and gave him a chance. But he had to refuse. And then she would take his life with her overwhelming power. She might as well have thrown the white glove in his face to declare a duel. That was how a knight forced people to obey.

Klaus just about spat at her feet, but then he remembered this was still part of the dark elf forest. He could not spit on the ground while slender was watching.

He used his words instead.

“What if I said I’m not going back?”

“That’s too bad. …I like you, boy, and I mean it. So I really wish I could find some way to avoid killing you.”

Of course, Elzane wouldn’t have cared if all the dark elves had worked together to oppose her. She would have wielded her devastating magic and repelled them all on her own. So a human like Klaus would have to be insane to try and fight her. The dark elves had taught him how to survive, so he wasn’t going to get dragged into a fight with this knight. His best option was to borrow the dark elf tactics of remaining hidden until he had a winning position and launching a swift attack from there.

…What can I use to do that? I have plenty of knowledge built up on my note-taking stick, but that’s all on the Forest of No Return and the dark elves. That won’t tell me what to do against a human. So my only option is Camouflize. What can I camouflage myself as to get the upper hand here?

There was another crucial factor here.

“Where is Hope Elf Rosehera?”

“Looking for me?”

Thick-soled shoes crushed the underbrush as another blonde girl made a casual appearance. She looked to be around 12 and she wore the loose green garb of a priestess as well as a small crown. She was the one and only hope elf in the world and she spoke with some amusement in her voice but also with a slight pouting of her lips.

“I see you aren’t calling me a saint anymore. You wound me, student.”

The hope elf’s magic was central to Elzane’s tactics. He had no idea how it worked, but Rosehera could apparently “lend” her power to others. That meant any magic cast by Elzane Livzy was given the power of a hope elf. Didn’t that mean the knight wouldn’t be as much of a threat if he could take out Rosehera first?

The knight in the bottom-heavy armor clearly knew that because she looked surprised by Rosehera’s appearance.

“Stay back, Madam Hope Elf. You are not needed here.”

“Oh, don’t mind me. Now, student, you aren’t thinking of defeating me first, are you?”

“Kh.”

“Ah ha ha!! Adorable. Simply adorable. I only lent Elzane a fraction of my power, while I have control of it all, and you think I will be the first to fall?”

…I had a feeling it wouldn’t be that easy.

That monster had been born an elf, but her magical power had been so great she no longer counted as an ordinary elf. She was a higher being who had required the creation of the hope elf species just to explain her existence. He couldn’t hope to break through an opening left by the knight and rush at the hope elf. If that was enough to defeat her, she would still only be known as an elf.

“This is a discussion between knights. Innocent boy, please leave us.”

Elzane moved her heavy lance.

Its tip shifted from Klaus to the girl next to him. What did the distance between them even matter with that lightning magic of hers? She had Slender in her sights.

“And, dark elf, whatever your reasons, you took the life of the honorable Sir Rainbook. You must pay for your crime. Your rules might deem it barbaric, but a life can only be paid for with a life.”

They didn’t have time for these overly dramatic customs.

Klaus clenched his teeth. If the dark elves were slaughtered to satisfy the knights, nothing would remain to stop Brashgain’s resurrection and then the entire world would be destroyed. The knights might be willing to admit to their mistake and accept death, but that wasn’t fair to everyone else who had to die along with them. Elzane had arrived from outside the forest, so she had no way of knowing that the fundamental issue regarding Brashgain had gotten twisted around, but if he said so, it would lead to another problem.

Why had his rotten teacher Reika Kickpleats entered the forest with only her tightlipped #1 student with her?

In order to avoid triggering a panic about Brashgain’s resurrection and the end of the world.

He hated this predicament, but he noticed something odd while going over the conditions in his head.

Yes…

“Wait…why?”

“Boy?”

Elzane gave him a puzzled look, but he wasn’t looking at her. His focus was on the smaller girl with distinctively long ears.

“I get how humans could be confused about the whole Brashgain thing.”

“Oh?” she said, sounding surprised.

She viewed the trembling boy like he was an amusing spectacle.

“We don’t know anything about Archdragon Magic, so we have no way of predicting what it can or can’t do. But Rosehera, you scoffed when you first saw the dark elves’ magic, didn’t you? You called it a mere parlor trick. So you must understand how their magic works. Then you should have realized the truth when you saw the dragon bones scattered around the forest. You would have known the stars drawn on the ground were to accelerate and scatter the energy, not to resurrect Brashgain. You would know that the dark elves have been working to prevent his resurrection, so you would know destroying them would instead lead to his resurrection.”

What if Rosehera had known all that, but feigned ignorance and continued to assist the human knights?

Klaus didn’t know how much of it she had planned. Maybe the deaths of Professor Dissection and Sir Rainbook had been a stroke of good luck for her, or maybe she had sent Sir Rainbook to guard Professor Dissection to set up exactly that situation.

The knights’ presence there had seemed strange from the beginning.

Klaus had to think this through once more. Maybe that eccentric had managed to learn some compromising information on important people to keep his position, but Kyle Hardjuicer’s actions had not been the kind of thing an honorable knight would ordinarily condone. And a noble did not normally accept a short, mercenary-style job away from the royal capital like that. Klaus had never met Sir Rainbook and didn’t know what kind of man he had been, but the average noble would never agree to that unless convinced to do so by some political pressure from above.

Yes. For example, if the one and only hope elf had bowed down and asked him.

“You were never working with the humans to solve this problem.”

So what if she had set this all up, received word of Phase 1’s success from Loinbelt’s carrier pigeon, and grinned behind everyone’s backs?

“Hey, Elzane, when you and your knights were hurrying to prepare for this mission, did that duplicitous elf happen to say she wanted to tag along and settle the score herself because she was the one to introduce Sir Rainbook to this job?”

He was only guessing, but the knight girl’s gasp was all the answer he needed. That meant Rosehera had prepared herself a tear-jerking excuse to join the battle without anyone asking too many questions. And she had been ready to make the suggestion whenever the distant clash might occur.

That settled it.

He knew the blue-eyed hope elf’s true objective now.

“She wanted to wipe out the dark elves so Brashgain could be fully resurrected. All so she could wipe out the very humans who she had tricked into helping her resurrect the dragon!!”

Chapter 4: Far and Away, Display Your True Power

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.

Part 2

He ran and ran. His eyes and ears had barely recovered. Only the fear he felt told him he was still alive. If Slender hadn’t pulled hard on his hand back then, he would have been vaporized on the spot. He held his future wife’s wrist and ran through the forest night.

This was no longer a battle between people over the human formalities surrounding nobles.

First and foremost, they had to survive. They had to escape their opponent’s view, hide in some blind spot or another, and take up a safe attack position. In the best case, they could win this unscathed. They were up against someone wielding what very well may have been the strongest magic in existence. There was no point in challenging that hope elf to a direct battle.

But Slender was focused on something else while they ran.

“Oh, no. Now the hope elf might start calling me Slender too…”

Silence was always an option. Just because he could speak her language now did not mean saying something was always the right answer.

That aside, Klaus had never imagined the day would come he would be leading a dark elf by the hand like this. If they ran in a straight line, a projectile attack would hit them. Not that a straight line was ever an option in a forest full of bushes, tree roots, boulders, Witch Pumpkins, cliffs, and other obstacles.

The two of them hid behind a nearby tree.

“When did you learn to do that?”

They had a large object to hide them while maintaining several escape routes. Slender, a professional hunter, actually looked impressed, but now was not the time to be reveling in the praise of an expert. …And in truth, he didn’t want to explain he had learned it while spying on her, Little Girl, and Mother bathing. He was well and truly screwed if she sighed and abandoned him here.

Something was coming.

A clear change came over the woods. The bugs and small animals noticed something with their finely-tuned senses and rapidly left the area. It was like the harbinger of a great disaster.

When Klaus peered out into the woods, he saw a crown swaying side to side while a small figure approached. There really was no fooling her. Rosehera was moving straight toward the tree he and Slender were hiding behind. Her scroll was still floating above her shoulders and back and her little fingers wandered indecisively between the colored pencils contained within it.

“No need to hold back on my account, student.”

“…”

“Afraid attacking me two-against-one wouldn’t be fair? Or are you reluctant to run such a small body through with a blade? Yes, yes. If that’s it, don’t let it bother you. That human knight was too unstable to be useful thanks to her righteousness and emotions and such, so allow me to even the playing field.”

“What?”

Next to him, Slender seemed unsure if she should draw her bowstring or not.

“She has something there. Is that…a sword?”

Rosehera had more than just the colored pencils. Did that weapon boost her magic? At this point, he wasn’t even going to bother asking where it had come from. The scroll of colored pencils had already defied logic in that regard.

“T. E. O. D.”

She paused briefly between each letter.

Klaus thought it was some kind of incantation, but her next words proved that wrong.

“The End of Dragons. This is the magic sword which once supplied the finishing blow against Brashgain. It flies all on its own to slay its target, so once I release it from its scabbard…well, you could call this a two-on-two battle, couldn’t you?”

His throat felt as dry as the desert.

It made sense for that to exist, he supposed. It had to have been out there somewhere. Was it 500 years ago that colossal dragon had died? Whatever it was, Brashgain’s bones were now littered across this forest, so the weapon that had slain him had to be somewhere in the world, right? But did it have to appear here and now? What kind of irony was this!? It did explain how her magic could defeat the dark elves’ Archdragon Magic, though.

…It’s always something, isn’t it!?

“Slender, get down!!”

He could have sworn the scraping sound he heard was taking years off his life.

The sword had been released from its scabbard.

Klaus immediately grabbed the silver head next to him and forced it down, which proved to have been the right decision. A moment later, a tree trunk too thick to reach his arms around and a massive Witch Pumpkin were both sliced through diagonally. The horizontal slash passed directly above their ducking heads. If they had remained upright, it would have sliced right through their torsos.

Three triangular sails of light burst from the guard and several blue flames, similar to the burners seen in the royal capital school’s labs, erupted from both flat sides of the blade. Those things allowed it to ride the wind, float, fly, and soar.

After failing to hit its target, the twisted magic sword spread its glowing sails and shot upwards at nearly a right angle. It tore through the leafy canopy blocking the night sky and accurately retargeted them from above. How was this fair? If it could fly any which way through the sky above and scan the ground below, then hiding behind trees and boulders wouldn’t accomplish much. Klaus and Slender ran full speed through the forest, the hard branches and underbrush scratching at their arms and legs, but the weapon flying through the wide-open sky was much faster.

This meant they could neither run nor hide. If they couldn’t play hide-and-seek, then the dark elf tactic of hiding your presence and making a critical strike from behind cover no longer functioned.

…This is insane!! How are that thing’s artificial eyes so good!?

They had already been on the verge of death with only the explosive magic cast by Rosehera and her scroll of colored pencils, so it was obvious what would happen if the magic sword forced them out from behind cover.

They would either be vaporized by the hope elf’s magic or bisected by the magic sword. Klaus could no longer think of any options that didn’t end with their deaths. Was there really a way to defeat this monster?

“Dammit!!”

The sword locked onto them, folded up its glowing sails, and adjusted the flames shooting from the sides of its blade to drop straight down. Klaus grabbed Slender’s hand and took off running to avoid the attack from the sky. It was like a small meteor strike. More than slice with the blade’s edge, it impacted with the ground, scattering small stones and a shockwave in every direction. An invisible wall slammed into his back and he stumbled. The air was forced from his lungs, but he managed to avoid falling. He also never let go of Slender’s hand.

…Think.

He clenched his teeth while running through the forest with all his might.

He could continue thinking as long as he remained alive. Even if he was up against artificial eyes and a devastating magical cannon.

…I’ve already challenged her to a fight, so there’s no backing out now! And it isn’t just my life on the line. All the dark elves’ lives and Slender’s fate are hanging in the balance.

“Over there!!”

The girl pulled hard on his hand, directing him toward a massive structure with the base covered in green moss. He didn’t know what part it was, but it was a piece of Brashgain’s remains.

The sword skimmed just off the ground instead of soaring into the sky. Klaus felt a squeezing at his heart when he heard a disturbing clang from right behind him…but the pain and fear was proof that he was still alive.

They had survived the magic sword’s attack?

But Rosehera was sneering at them from a short distance away.

“Ha ha. That won’t shield you for long! The T.E.O.D. I have released from its scabbard was created to kill that thing. Even if humans have long since forgotten how to create things like it!!”

“Dammit!!”

There really was no safe zone. They could not use the dark elf fighting style of moving silently through the forest, finding a safe hiding spot, and firing an arrow from there. They could not keep up with the hope elf’s magic that swept away the darkness with overwhelming firepower and felled all obstacles standing in the way.

Whether they were for control, amplification, or cooling, Rosehera would occasionally pull a gemlike berry from her pocket and eat it. But they could not get close enough to prevent her from resupplying her magic that way. Carelessly approaching was far too dangerous with that devastating magic and legendary blade after them.

“Kh.”

Maybe he couldn’t end the battle with it, but if they were going to change anything about this hopeless battlefield, the key had to be Klaus Knockburn’s Camouflize magic. There was a chance Rosehera had heard about it from Elzane, but he would still be able to use it to catch her off guard.

But what exactly could he do with it? He had five uses stocked up, but what would he try it with? What lifeforms were there in this forest that could overpower that hope elf!?

…Should I go with direct strength? Or maybe something venomous?

He listed a few possibilities in his head, but none of them sounded promising. That hope elf was a living legend and the T.E.O.D. watching them from the sky on her wordless command was the very magic sword that had slain Brashgain. Nothing sounded realistic. What would one of the usual “strongest animal” options, like a bear or a lion, accomplish here? He was starting to feel like he needed something on a legendary level to even stand a chance.

However.

“Oh.”

The redhead boy realized a fundamental fact. He didn’t know if it would work since he had never tried it, but he reviewed each of the conditions required for Camouflize to work. And he concluded it should work based on that definition.

Of course, things that theoretically should have worked had betrayed him plenty of times in the past.

Reality didn’t always go your way. Trying a new idea on the fly tended to end badly.

But he did not back away. He refused to throw out this hope because it might just work.

“Let’s go, Slender. Come with me.”

“What?”

“I need to confirm at least five things.”

The dark elf girl looked confused by his explanation.

“I’m going to use my magic to get a legend to fight for us!!”

Part 3

Whatever he hoped to do, he had to survive long enough to do it, so running away was their standard play. Klaus and Slender shared the routes they thought were best, pulling on each other’s hand and just barely avoiding the hope elf’s magic and the magic sword searching for them from the sky. They did not hesitate to travel down animal paths and through bushes. Maybe the combination of the boy’s and Slender’s ideas made them harder to predict because he sensed Rosehera’s aim veer away from them on a few occasions.

He knew all too well that they couldn’t keep this up forever.

The question was whether or not they could achieve their goal before death caught up to them and tapped on their shoulder.

“Where to next!?”

“Over there!! Hurry!!”

An explosion of light erupted so brightly it looked more like the sun than a lightning strike, but it was farther away than before. No matter how much powerful magic the hope elf had in her colored pencils, she was still very short even with her thick-soled shoes. Her steps were short and she was walking slower than them. To make up for it, the magic sword spread its glowing sails and moved out ahead of them to cut off their escape route more often. If they charged ahead without thinking, the blade would slice them in two, but if they came to a stop, the magic light would vaporize them. They had to keep multiple escape routes in mind at all times or the enemy would catch up to them.

“We aren’t approaching the village, are we?”

“Why your human language all of a sudden? Are you saying something dirty again? Anyway, come this way. We should see the next attack soon!”

Slender made a mistaken accusation and pulled on his hand to get him running in a different direction. The drop off nearby was growing taller. They may have been close to a waterfall. They couldn’t afford to slow down, but they also couldn’t afford to slip off in their haste.

He heard the rustling of someone stepping on the underbrush behind them. No one who knew the first thing about living in the forest would make so much noise.

“Hello again.”

It was the strongest elf, who only looked like a 12-year-old girl. The nearby drop off and the unsteady footing must have slowed them down enough for Rosehera to catch up.

She moved her small hand from a short distance away and a red colored pencil gave a roar. The magic circle she drew on a nearby rock resembled a complex spiral. No, it was a stereotypical piece of trick art, like a staircase with no top. Impossible shapes could be represented through art and passing power through them would endlessly amplify that power.

The power grew.

After crossing a certain threshold, it was released into the 3D world.

“Is this over already? I was hoping to enjoy myself some more.”

“Slender!!”

They couldn’t afford to be careful with their footing. After a flash of white light, the bedrock crumbled and a large chunk was torn out of the waterfall itself. Klaus held Slender’s shoulders in his hands and jumped from the solid slope. He used himself as a cushion to protect her. Or he tried to, but the white explosion sent them soaring much farther through the air than he had expected.

The sense of falling squeezed at his gut.

The most he could do was clench his teeth to make sure he didn’t bite his tongue.

He landed back-first on the ground with the dark elf girl in his arms. He had hit a patch of soft soil, but that barely mattered. He felt the impact in his organs and he had trouble breathing.

“Gahh!”

He heard a dull cracking sound and felt a pain unlike what he was used to from cuts and contusions. A brand new form of pain exploded inside him.

…Did I break a bone? But which one?

He couldn’t even imagine. He couldn’t even scream as he simply coughed while sprawled out on the ground.

“Gah!! Gh, cough, agh!!?”

“You idiot. What are you doing!?”

Slender grabbed his trembling hands in her own. The disconcerting sound had come from his back, but he could still move his arms. So had it been a rib, not his spine or shoulder blades?

He couldn’t speak.

His mouth flapped wordlessly while he felt something flashing in the back of his mind. The fear of death and agonizing pain opened up what had been locked away in his brain.

The beginning of all this appeared the back of his mind.

His rotten teacher had suggested the dark elves were dangerous. She had said they were taking revenge on humanity by resurrecting Brashgain.

But he could not bring himself to give up on his life-long dream of meeting the dark elves.

He had picked up an earring and wondered if that would help him get to know its owner.

He had chased after her through the sticky plants and that had marked the beginning of it all.

He had not lost the memories after all. Now that they were back, he found they were nothing special.

There was nothing especially romantic there and no crucial information either. It was just an ordinary event.

His back hurt and his lungs weren’t working right, but he still reached over and stopped Slender who was muttering under her breath, pulling a few small bottles of medicine from her chest, and producing firefly-like pale blue particles of light from her palm. He did not know how dark elf magic worked, but the pale light suggested this was recovery magic. However, magically speeding up the healing of his broken rib before it was set would only make things worse. He would have to break it again just to fix it.

Yes.

He could not rest yet. He could not tap out of the fight.

In the end, he was an outsider in the forest and a source of disaster, yet this kind girl was pale in the face as she worried for him. He wanted to protect her.

There was nothing particularly romantic here and he was not fighting out of duty or obligation.

He couldn’t help himself. No matter how small it might seem, he had picked up an accessory and thought she might miss it if it was permanently lost out in the forest. He hadn’t known her name, she was another species entirely, and he didn’t know how much she even cared about the earring. For all he knew, she might have never even noticed it was missing.

But he still couldn’t help but return it.

And if that girl’s life was in danger now, he couldn’t just lie there and die!!

“Ahh, agh, ah!!”

He grimaced, got his body moving, and forced himself onto his feet. He had grown up in a safe city, so he had no idea how dangerous it was to move around with a broken rib. He briefly wondered if the broken bone would pierce one of his organs, but this was more important than that.

He bit a lip that tasted of blood.

He bore with the pain, trusting he had been right to try and protect Slender here.

He wasn’t even thinking about the destruction of the world anymore.

He didn’t care how powerful the legendary hope elf and magic sword were.

He would do whatever it took to ensure that dark elf girl returned alive. He didn’t need some romantic story. He wasn’t going to find one lost in the recesses of his mind, but what did that matter? He was the one who wanted to save her and he knew that was the right thing to do, so he would stand by that decision!!

“Let’s go, Slender. We can still win this. There’s still a chance.”

She only sobbed in response.

“It’ll be okay.”

He rubbed her head.

Now that he knew her language, he knew what to say to his future wife.

“I will make you happy. No matter what it takes.”

What did the pain matter? Why should he care about Brashgain or the T.E.O.D. that slayed him? Maybe Hope Elf Rosehera was acting on some centuries’ old grudge, but that meant nothing to a short-lived human like Klaus.

Was his love at first sight more powerful than anything else in the world?

If he couldn’t answer yes without a second thought, he wouldn’t have fallen in love in the first place.

He resumed walking with an unnatural gait. With Slender supporting him from the side. The only thing on his mind was drying her tears as soon as possible.

The hard grass blades and bush branches sliced at his skin like blades. He started to suspect the tree roots and partially buried rocks were conspiring to twist his ankle. He squeezed out every last ounce of stamina he had. The strange pain and heat in his back made sure to protest every move he made.

The seemingly endless forest would eventually end.

Slender would not want to leave the forest and they were both dead once they lost the cover of the trees.

“How much longer?”

“Just one more. Cough, we still have a chance!!”

…Almost there. We’re so close.

Just then, he heard sharp whistling overhead. The T.E.O.D. was dropping from the sky with a blue light trailing behind it.

It was only a rib, but the broken bone had still slowed him down. And that delay had allowed the magic sword to target them. Slender suddenly pushed him away. He lost the support of her shoulder and collapsed face-first onto the grassy ground. Pain exploded inside him.

He kind of hoped she was making a run for it to save herself.

But instead, he heard a straining sound of her turning around, drawing her bow, and aiming toward the night sky through the gaps in the branches.

“Wko gtijaq’v rayot uv i naiwkvapo wkuqj, dew uw fiq do kitqovvog wa jtoiw ohhofw. Koto u faqwtan iqg iup wkiw rayot. Wkuv uv wko powkag mqayq iv Itfkgtijaq Pijuf.”

She spoke under her breath and Klaus could tell something was gathering in her arrowhead according to some kind of rules.

“Leave my hand and fly forth, Jaws of Nidhogg!!”

Her bow rebelled against the heavens above. The dragon-slaying sword and the dark elf arrow collided and exploded in the sky. The power built up inside T.E.O.D. was unleashed in every direction, rustling the leaves of the forest around them.

But.

A sharp sound pierced through that blast.

T.E.O.D. sliced through the dark elf’s Archdragon Magic to continue along its course. Even after losing its light, the sword that had delivered the finishing blow to Brashgain dropped like a lightning bolt.

It sliced apart the raised bow.

And it stabbed right through the girl’s body.

“………………………………………………………………………………………………………”

Klaus Knockburn could no longer breathe.

He refused to believe what he was seeing.

The sword had collided with the arrow on the way down. That must have scattered most of the power built up within it because it had lacked the explosive force needed to form a crater where it landed. But the sword stabbed in to the hilt was still a horrifying sight.

And of all things, Slender held the hilt and guard in her hands. But not to pull it out of herself. Quite the opposite, she was keeping it trapped in her body to protect the boy lying nearby. She couldn’t even remain standing, but she gathered the last of her strength in her bloody hands.

“Stop!!”

The pain in his ribs no longer mattered. He grabbed at the grass to stand up, shouted at the top of his lungs, and ran toward the small body lying on her side with the sword through her gut.

“That’s enough! I didn’t want this!! Sob. How am I supposed to enjoy life – ahh – if I’m the only one that survives!?”

When he clung to her, a small smile formed on her lips. She may not have been able to see anymore due to the blood loss.

She only spoke two words.

“Thank…goodness.”

And her head slumped down. Klaus had gone to the trouble of learning her language, but nothing left his mouth now.

I will marry you.

He would take Slender as his wife, no matter what barriers stood in his way.

And as his wife, she could place all the burden on him. He would do the housework and he would earn a living so she could just live a peaceful life. And seeing her living her best life like that would be all the happiness he needed.

Except now…

“Don’t smile.”

He had no idea how many centuries or even millennia this young-looking dark elf had lived, but how had she not learned something so simple after so much time!?

He wasn’t even sure which language he was speaking anymore.

He clenched his teeth and couldn’t keep the tears from flowing as she shouted down at her.

“I want you to be more selfish. Sob, I don’t want you to sacrifice yourself. I want you to be happy, to smile, and to live a full life. What kind of guy could smile after seeing his wife slice her gut open!? Are you insane!? Dying a stupid death over a silly obsession is supposed to be my job!!”

He yelled so loud he thought he would tear open his own throat.

Because he feared it wouldn’t reach her otherwise.

“So don’t smile like this is a good thing!! I refuse to accept this! Please, say you don’t want to die! Ask me to stop the bleeding!! That’s what people are supposed to do! Let me be proud I could give you what you wanted and you can be happy I used all my strength for you! Not…not this!!!!!! Ahhhh!!”

“My, my.”

He heard the scraping of a scroll containing 72 colored pencils.

And a voice.

“Are you ready to give up now?”

He worked to catch his breath while checking behind him. They were near the edge of the forest, but the end of the trees didn’t lead to an open plain. It led to a precipice that seemed to continue on down into hell. There was no escape.

Rosehera sneered with the scroll floating behind her and the small crown swaying on her head.

He heard a wet splash.

He hadn’t noticed it with his vision flashing in and out, but the hope elf had casually stepped inside a forest stream. It was only ankle deep and something like a sharp white stone jutted out from the water and the nearby greenery. It was a dragon fang.

This was the place.

Oh, so we made it all the way back to the stream where I first met her, Klaus realized.

In his bleary vision, he could tell Rosehera remained unscathed. Her skin maintained its childlike softness. A stark contrast to Klaus and his numerous scrapes and his broken rib, or Slender and her gut pierced by the dragon-slaying blade.

The redhead boy could not even hold his shoulders even and all emotion vanished from his mind.

You’re ****.

A strange tingling filled him as he mouthed two words at Rosehera.

“I am impressed you managed to run nearly 10km. That’s almost all the way across the forest.”

“Thanks, I guess…”

“Now, who should I decapitate first? Or you can emotionally jump from the cliff in each other’s arms if you like.”

“Come to think of it, I forget to ask something.”

His face was soaked with sweat, but he managed to spit out the words. He felt no emotion, only a blank nothingness. He couldn’t take his time trying to negotiate. He had to treat his wife’s wounds as soon as possible.

So he chose to enrage that experienced monster with a single statement.

He wiped the tears form his eyes with a thumb and attacked her with his words.

“Why do you want to destroy us humans so badly? Do you spend every night reliving memories too painful and humiliating to share?”

“Are you offering to go first? I can cleanly vaporize everything below your head and let you watch me dismember that dark elf right up until your head remembers to die and ceases to breathe. In your final moments, you can enjoy seeing the agony and terror on her face as she cries out in vain for your help.”

“Yeah, you wish you could do that.”

His extreme exhaustion and the internal pain of the broken bone didn’t matter right now. Klaus Knockburn spread his arms while using his pale lips to speak.

“Of the three traits, I choose salt. Magic lifeform, reptile, squamata, varanidae, cold blooded. I have grasped thy nature like counting the corners of a polygon or star. The polygon emanates and the star gathers – together they symbolize the control of power. By knowing thee, I become one with thee.”

The hope elf’s blue eyes narrowed asymmetrically, her face twisting in confusion.

The look on her face said she was not interested in a battle to determine the strongest life form in the forest. She was a living legend, so sending a lion or tiger after her was meaningless. Plus, Klaus’s magic only camouflaged his appearance; it did not actually turn him into the life form. Mimicking a dragon’s appearance would not let him breathe fire and camouflaging himself as an angel would not let him fly. Unless it was something large enough to crush his opponent with its sheer size, his camouflage magic had no offensive use. His effort here was doomed to fail, so Rosehera could not figure out why he sounded so confident.

Lucky for him, it took her a moment to figure out what he was after. It even gave him a chance to crouch down and run his finger along the mossy ground with Slender still in his arms. Making all the necessary preparations in front of a powerful enemy was the most difficult part. He used the four elements to grasp the three traits and linked heaven to earth. And he smiled while battered and beaten.

Fangs were littered across this area, which meant another white monstrosity had to be pushing through the forest vegetation. He directed his gaze toward that colossal skull and he unleashed the final incantation.

Yes, he had his eyes on Brashgain’s body.

“Camouflize Decoration – now I am thee!!”

Part 4

“Ah.”

Hope Elf Rosehera finally reacted, but she had waited too long. The boy’s camouflaging had already begun inside the square magic circle.

It had to be possible.

Even if only the bones remained, that thing had once been a lifeform that cracked the ground beneath his feet, caught the wind with his wings, and opened his jaws wide to roar.

This was why Klaus had continued to run away. Why he had run the full 10km from one end of the forest to the other with that girl by his side.

It had to be possible.

He did not have a living sample, but the camouflage magic only needed the basics of the target lifeform. The rest could be filled in with his imagination. So he only needed the power of his mind, like he was reconstructing the original muscles and facial features from a fossil.

That was why he had needed to observe each of the colossal dragon’s bones lying across the forest.

It had to be possible.

His Camouflize worked with any lifeform, so even if Brashgain was a legend, he could become that great dragon and make the ground tremble beneath him as long as he observed the bones, made some calculations, and pictured the end result in his mind!!!!!!

In that moment, the skinny boy’s mind was transported elsewhere. He came into contact with something unseen.

Salt, sulfur, and mercury. From those three traits indicating the shape of the lifeform, he had chosen salt, which prioritized the original form. That was partially because he had his doubts that Brashgain belonged to a species that formed communities of male and female members. He had a feeling that the dragon had become a singular being due to being too abnormal, just like Rosehera.

His camouflage magic only disguised his appearance. It did not remake his mind at the same time, so he did not gain the life form’s memories or thoughts. But he still received a message.

He felt a throbbing.

Unbearable pain spread from a point in his stomach to the rest of his body. He concluded the only way he could have inherited this pain from the original was if it came from a disease. And even while afflicted by a deadly disease, the dragon had been too powerful to ever actually die. He hadn’t even been able to tear out the diseased part of his body. All he could do was beg for someone to kill him.

That may have been why it happened.

He had needed to search out someone capable of bringing him death. He had unleashed great violence upon the humans, trusting that they held that power. In his final moments, when he had been run through by the human blade after an all-out war, the dragon had felt relief. The dark elves were working to prevent the dragon’s resurrection, but that was a blessing for the dragon. He had finally found peace in death, so he would never want to be brought back to a life of agony.

(I’m sorry, Brashgain.)

Klaus understood that pain now. It really was enough to for even a great dragon to weep and wish for death. That very pain and suffering wore at Klaus’s mind the entire time he borrowed the dragon’s power. He had no idea if a human could come down with this disease as well, but he knew he couldn’t bear it. Which made sense when it had been too much for the strongest of dragons.

But he took it anyway.

He accepted this condition. Why wouldn’t there be a cost to borrowing such a great power?

And.

…This is probably just a self-righteous assumption on my part, but I bet that lonely dragon wanted someone he could share his pain and fear with.

Now that I’ve experienced your pain, I will tell everyone your story.

So please.

(Lend me your power. So I can protect someone I love from her own unbearable pain!!!!!!)

And.

That being opened its “eyes”.

“Hi, Rosehera. I can’t seem to pronounce human words with a dragon’s throat and tongue, but I trust that a hope elf fluent in human, elf, and dark elf will be able to understand me. Yes, you’re probably cursing your own intellect right about now.”

“Ah, ahh.”

She was in a daze. That unbelievably powerful hope elf stared up at him in confusion and shook her head to forcibly get her mind working again.

It was a very childish action. The crown on her head looked silly now.

“N-no. No!! T.E.O.D. was created to kill you. And a skin-deep mimicry is no threat to-!!”

She stopped talking when she realized she did not have the sword with her.

In fact…

“You said T.E.O.D. was the sword that delivered the finishing blow to Brashgain. I’m sure that’s true, but what about everything leading up to the finishing blow? The humans at the time would have been on the verge of utter destruction, so wouldn’t every state and every human joined forces to oppose him? It wasn’t just T.E.O.D. There were innumerable great warriors there. That sword alone isn’t enough to destroy the entire dragon. Besides, your sword was already deflected by one of this guy’s bones earlier.”

Rosehera froze while she was reaching down to pull the sword out of the brown girl’s gut.

Klaus Knockburn had only disguised his appearance. He could not open his mouth and breathe fire or spread his wings and fly.

But.

He now had a 10km body and his opponent looked like a 12-year-old girl. A difference like that was enough to create a devastating attack. He could rely on brute force and simply crush her.

“You never did apply the final touches to your fire magic circles, did you? Then I have nothing to fear from you.”

Slender was curled up on her side.

She used her arms and body to cover up the hilt of T.E.O.D. sticking out of her gut. That way she could ensure the boy’s victory and prevent any harm from coming to him.

He loved her so much he thought he was going to die, but it wasn’t time for that. Right now, he needed to display cruelty.

He gave a final, irreversible ultimatum.

No, he announced an execution.

“Hey, little legend, how many of your precious hope elf spells do you have left? Not that it matters. If you don’t kill me with the very first one, I’ll squash you flat. Just like a wee little bug.”

The wind roared.

With a body that size, muscle movement was enough to produce a disastrous gale.

“Ka, ka, ka, ka…”

In that final moment, the hope elf looked up with wavering blue eyes and said something.

She had tears in her eyes and her shoulders shook in a strange half-laughter.

The words she spoke were not human or dark elf.

“Qdo qdukc ixaeq duj up, jv okojv, do guhhoz pajoako lnoyuaep qa jo pa ronv hakc ica.”

Part 5

The colossal dragon vanished like it had been an illusion all along. All that remained was a boy ignoring the pain from his broken rib as he ran toward the dark elf lying collapsed on her side.

“Slender!!”

Her movements remained sluggish even as he shouted and ran over to her. T.E.O.D. must have stopped moving after Rosehera’s defeat because she had removed her bloody hands from the hilt. Her hands now lay limply on the ground.

He didn’t need to be a doctor to know something crucial was spilling out along with her blood. Camouflize only changed his outer appearance, so it was powerless to help her. Not even with the power of a dragon large enough to destroy the world.

“Is it…over?”

That was all she said.

Klaus was too scared to say anything. When he nodded in response, she looked satisfied and started to close her eyes.

He wanted to keep her here. He wanted something – anything – that would give her reason to stay here in the realm of the living.

Only one thing came to mind.

“Marry me.”

The words spilled from his mouth. He had struggled so much in the forest, but now that it was time, they came so easily. He pulled something from his pocket: a simple ring made from a thin stick and a rounded-down shell piece.

The dark elf girl exhibited some surprise.

His face crumpled up as he cried. He spoke through the tears and snot.

“Please, please… Ugh, I can’t live in a world without you. I’ll do anything. I don’t care if I never leave this forest again. So…”

Slender gently raised her hand.

She was responding. What about his request had tugged at her heartstrings? The smile on her face was more like someone calming a small child after a nightmare than it was someone accepting a marriage proposal.

Klaus bit his lip and moved his trembling fingers, bringing the ring closer.

It touched her left ring finger.

But then her lithe hand dropped down.

It hit the ground and ceased to move.

Klaus Knockburn felt something burn out in his mind and he looked up into the sky and wailed.

With that, his fieldwork had ended.

Epilogue

Klaus Knockburn was greeted by a bow at a perfect 90-degree angle.

He had somehow managed to escape the Forest of No Return with his life and return to the royal capital. He found the familiar stone buildings and well-maintained roads. He heard the transit carriages and high heels clacking against the stone pavement. He was home. He could draw as much water as he could drink from the well pumps and he could order an extra-large meal at the restaurants as long as he forked over a bit of cash. His ordinary life was back.

And he found someone profusely apologizing out on the public street in front of a church. The armored knight named Elzane Livzy had her head bowed lower than his hips. Her massive twin ringlets were touching the ground. …He wanted her to stop. He just wanted normalcy back. His body couldn’t physically handle anything more at this point.

“I am so, so sorry!!”

“…”

…Everyone seeing this is going to assume some dumb commoner kid tried to confess to a noblewoman and she’s kindly giving her rejection in as polite a way as she can.

Worry, surprise, curiosity – the passersby all gave them subtly different looks. The royal capital contained people from countless regions and of every race and occupation imaginable. The group dressed in black mourning clothes was probably here for a funeral, but he also saw a lot of people who were more of a mystery, like someone in a clown costume, someone wearing a mask, someone with a large straw hat covering their face, and a middle-aged man with springs in the soles of his shoes. But the thoroughly-trained girl paid them no heed.

The armored knight raised her voice instead of her head.

“I unwittingly assisted the villain and threatened the life of an innocent boy – one of the very people I have dedicated my life to protect. I was careless – far too careless!! I swear to you I will make it up to you. Ask anything of me, boy!! Ask for my hand in marriage and it is yours!!”

Klaus stood as still as a statue, wondering if he was the only one feeling left behind by the flow of time. Breathing in and out made his broken rib throb with pain, but that wasn’t what mattered at the moment.

“Um, if you’ll do anything for me, then can you start by raising your head? Look, they’re holding a funeral right over there.”

“You…truly are a kindhearted person. I am moved from the bottom of my heart. I doff my cap to you. Now, there is no time to waste!! Let us be wed immediately!!!!!!”

Nothing he said was going to dissuade her from dragging him into the chapel to demand a wedding in the middle of that funeral. And Klaus had something else he needed to do now that he was back in the royal capital.

When he took off walking, the knight followed in a way that showed she was accustomed to serving people. Did that come from her service to the king? He was glad to see not even she was oblivious enough to walk around town with that enormous lance. She only had a small (and unnecessarily ornate) pillow sword at her hip for self-defense, but he knew she could do a lot with just that. She too kept her guard up during a simple stroll, but in a different way from the dark elves.

“Where are you headed, boy?”

“To school.”

Elzane’s shoulders and bright yellow croissants shook. As did her boobs accentuated by the chainmail like fishnet stockings or a boneless ham’s netting. She must not have had many pleasant memories about that place. Even though she was the one who always went to his rotten teacher for advice.

A silent and thoughtful mood set in over the two of them, perhaps due to the funeral they had seen underway. But time did not stop for them.

Klaus’s school was a magical education institute established by the state to increase the kingdom’s technological level. It was held in such high esteem that a portion of the vast royal court had been provided as a school building.

The boy flashed his student ID to the guard at the station and was allowed in. The school was known for its eccentrics, including Professor Dissection and his rotten teacher. There, no one would bat an eye at seeing a fortuneteller with a crystal ball in one hand or a mage girl in a white dress and a large straw hat covering her face.

“Oh, excuse me. Go on ahead.”

“You know, this is part of the royal palace. Spies and assassins are always a concern, so I really wish you would quit cutting in line like that. Especially when none of you ever seem to wear your uniforms which act as a secondary student ID.”

Once through the gate, Elzane’s expression changed. They could discuss things here that they didn’t want anyone to overhear while out on the open streets.

“Your kindness is frankly astounding,” whispered the knight walking alongside him.

“In what way?”

“The way you captured Rosehera alive instead of killing her. …I can’t believe you forgave her.”

He answered her stiff voice with a stiff voice of his own.

“Revenge wasn’t what she actually wanted. That’s all there is to it.”

Elzane no longer formally addressed her as “Lady Rosehera” or “Hope Elf Rosehera”, suggesting she now viewed her as a magical criminal who nearly destroyed the world. Klaus shrugged.

“Also, she is technically still a guest in our kingdom. If I killed her on the spot and didn’t even give her a chance for a fair trial, I would have made myself an international terrorist.”

That was what had happened with Sir Rainbook. The dark elves had done the right thing according to their rules, but that had earned them the ire of the human nobles.

He had needed to account for that.

Elzane sighed with exasperation in her sky blue eyes.

“It is true our Last Resort Unit just barely escaped this intact because you handed Rosehera over to us. But you didn’t need to leave that crown on her head, you know?”

“I went easy on her to protect the dark elves, not because I sympathized with her.”

He wanted to make that very clear. He could have easily killed her using Brashgain’s colossal form. Even if he was only mimicking that appearance, he had been a 10km dragon against what looked like a girl of 12. Really, he wanted some recognition of the skill that went into leaving her intact after that.

“Rosehera was behind it all. The humans and dark elves were only being manipulated by her. If we slide her into the villain position like that and then have her stand trial, the nobles lose any justification for attacking the dark elves, right?”

“Tacticians shouldn’t be so thoroughly adorable. I so want to marry you. But not everyone will accept that.”

“You mean that page named Loinbelt?”

That babyface boy had gone missing. Even after learning of the hope elf’s conspiracy and learning the world had come close to destruction, he had chosen to focus on taking revenge for Sir Rainbook.

It was elective time, which meant the halls were full of people moving around. The knight stood aside to let some students passed.

“To be honest, if he’s still inside the forest, he’s probably starving to death. No matter how he rations his supplies, he will be gradually running out.”

“And if he escaped the forest alive?”

“Then he would be licking his wounds and sharpening his fangs. But even then, the fact that he’s ‘disappeared’ means he hasn’t returned home. The knights function as a group. Unlike the heroic knights who fight all on their own in the famous stories, your power comes from being an organized group. And that holds true for your military and political power. Looking at the pure specs, an individual human’s magic is no match for a dark elf’s magic. It can be easy to miss after seeing that hope elf and magic sword, but they’re pretty powerful. Both as individuals and as a group.”

Who did Loinbelt see as his enemy now? And was he doing the right thing? It was a painful question for Klaus since the boy had saved his life once.

But chasing after him now would be meaningless. He doubted he would ever see him again. And while viewing the rows of doors operated by the school bell, he decided that might just be in both their best interests.

“Boy, why did Rosehera do what she did?”

“Isn’t it your job to question her about that while waiting for her to recover? I left her with you because I trusted your skill in that matter, so don’t come crying to me before you even get started.”

He had to avoid any preconceptions, but he felt a few pieces to that puzzle had been sprinkled throughout.

Why had Rosehera secretly possessed the legendary T.E.O.D.? Why had she insisted on using Brashgain as her method of destroying humanity? He sensed an obsession there.

Had humans treated her badly in the past? He had said that to provoke her during their battle, but it didn’t seem to fit. Her anger had remained under her control, suggesting he had missed the mark. But something else had shaken her much more: when he and Slender had chosen to work together after he revealed Rosehera to be the real villain. When he had said he wouldn’t abandon the dark elves, she had become fixated on something unnecessary to her plan.

She had demanded he show her “a bond that cannot be broken even in death”.

“Maybe she had her heart broken in the distant past.”

“That sounds romantic and all, but I would hate to think the world was nearly destroyed over that. I also don’t want to think about someone so small having such an ugly love story in her past.”

Klaus and Elzane walked to his elective lab. The small room full of documents was deserted.

However…

“I knew it,” groaned the skinny boy when he looked toward the window.

The warrior girl hesitated and ultimately did not have the guts to place a hand on the trembling boy’s shoulder.

“I knew that rotten teacher was still alive!!”

Hearing him shout, a girl with a large straw hat pulled over her face peeked in from the lab entrance. A message was written out on the window in alluring lipstick.

“You did well to escape that forest alive, my #1 student, but you have much room for improvement. That forest belongs to the dark elves, so even if you were battling that hope elf, you should have risked your human life to ensure none of it was destroyed or consumed. I have docked you several points for that.

“Do you know why Hope Elf Rosehera was fighting?

“Do you know the real name of the girl you decided to call Slender?

“The answers were right there all along. Simple observations and an understanding of their words and actions would have led you there.

“If you cannot answer those question, then I can’t give you a passing grade for this fieldwork.

“-Magical Biology Court Scientist Reika Kickpleats

“P.S. I left a gift from the dark elves on the desk: assorted dried fruits. They are preserved, but don’t wait to eat them. Leave any and it’s punishment time for you☆”

“Heh.”

Klaus hung his head and tried his best to suppress his body’s trembling.

What was this? He had come so close to dying, fought for his wife, saved the world from destruction, broken his rib, and come back alive, but she was going to fail him!? That meant he would have to write an extra report to make up for it. He was already dead tired and now he had to silently complete some totally unfair homework assignment like some kind of cruel joke!? And all while she ignored the fact that she had been dead wrong when she so confidently stated the dark elves were trying to resurrect Brashgain!?

…Also, was she watching me that whole time? And from pretty close up if she’s referencing the granny’s dried fruit. There’s no stopping a genius when they’re that skilled. She hasn’t even learned my camouflage magic, so how in the world was she following us around and observing us the entire time?

Yes. Yes, he could just see it.

In the near future, in this very lab, he would be stuck there dealing with some hellish assignment to avoid being held back, but then she would situate her butt on his desk, cross her long legs, and smile down at him with a look of utter confidence. And then she would say something like, “Let’s see, what can I have you do to avoid failing the year?”

His patience had already been pushed to the limit and now it was pushed even further.

“Nwoooooooooooooooooooooooooooohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!???”

His injured rib didn’t even matter. He kicked the leg of his desk, slammed his fist into the side of the bookcase, gathered up the documents, divided them by subject matter, dusted the desk with a duster, and wiped it clean with a rag. He had started off lashing out in anger, but the next thing he knew he was tidying up all the documents piled up on the lab’s desks and floor. He even made sure the window looked good as new even though that lipstick message was a lot harder to clean up than it would have been to write. He had always had a knack for converting his anger into housework.

Elzane Livzy looked like she had fallen in love while crossing her arms in front of her chainmail-covered chest.

“Boy, I insist we get married this instant!! I have so many rooms at home I want you to clean!!”

“Pant! Pant!!”

Klaus’s shoulders rose and fell while he wiped sweat from his brow.

Now that he had calmed down, he worked his mind like a researcher and arrived at another conclusion.

…A gift. The window message said the dried fruit was a gift. That means that rotten teacher was interacting with the dark elves. Is her goal to fully decode their language? No, does she want to compile her own dictionary, become the only person in the world who can contact them, and act as an intermediary for trade? So did she intentionally cause trouble in the forest to rattle that peaceful village and make them feel the need to work with humans? Which would mean she made them think her own student might have parasites and that they would try to help me by smoking them out!? And her very first trade good is that dried fruit. That! Goddess-Awful! Rotten! Teacherrrrr!!

There was so much he wanted to say.

But there was one thing he had to say first.

“Ugh, cough. Pant, pant. I am not marrying you.”

“Ehh!?”

“Why would that come as a surprise? Try to remember you’re younger than me.”

“And what is wrong with that? I don’t know the details, but I believe this kingdom’s Specialized Aristocracy Law says the minimum marriage age is either 12 or 13, and that includes shared inheritance rights over both parties’ assets.”

“Why haven’t any of your butlers or aides told you you’re crazy!? They might think they’re being kind, but this is how nobles end up so damn messed up!!”

Also, why did they have special marriage laws for the aristocracy? He wanted to scream. Did nobles start thinking about marriage at a younger age? Was that why that big-boobed knight (who was actually younger than him) wouldn’t shut up about marriage? It felt like the opposite of the dark elves who were actually old ladies but were young in mind and body.

Klaus Knockburn fidgeted with his left hand. He wore a simple handmade ring on its ring finger. He still had no intention of removing it. That may have been a statement of sorts.

“Please stop joking about marriage. Especially in front of her.”

And.

He removed the straw hat from the person standing next to him.

From the mystery girl in a white dress who was sticking just her head into the lab.

“My wife might not understand our language, but she can still pick up on the nuance.”

“Wait, whaaaat!? Why is that dark elf still alive and what is she doing outside of the forest!?”

After all, she had been run through by a legendary magic sword. She had intentionally let it stab her to protect Klaus and then held it inside her body when it tried to leave. That should have been a fatal wound.

But Glasses of the priests was their elder because of her true value that only showed itself during emergencies.

Yes, he could never stop observing. The dark elves had been defeated by Elzane and Rosehera once, but had he seen even one of them wrapped in bandages or otherwise showing signs of injury when he visited their village? No, he had not. That was thanks to Glasses’s true power.

The recovery version of Archdragon Magic was also extraordinarily powerful. He had stopped her bleeding with his cloak and belt and then he had carried her back to the village.

And…

He had worked at convincing Slender to listen to him. He had begged and pleaded while she squirmed awkwardly (but never ran way). It had taken him days of trying every idea he could come up with. Little Girl, who was actually an old lady, and Glasses, who always wanted to be of some help, had even slapped him on the shoulder to cheer him up. Either he had looked pretty pathetic or they were eager to see how that love story would end. To know which, he would need to continue observing the dark elves.

He could not disregard her now that she had saved his life. He would normally only have one chance in his life to try for that village, but he could come and go as he pleased now that he had passed that trial. That just left his human life to worry about.

“Oh, goddess dammit.”

His rotten teacher really was a genius. She could sniff things out better than most. She would have known exactly what he was up to the entire time he was out there.

“That’s the reaction I wanted to get from that rotten teacher,” spat out Klaus with a tongue click.

The church bell rang. Sir Rainbook’s funeral would be ending soon.

Klaus’s attempted surprise had failed, but that rotten teacher had still made herself scarce so she didn’t have to deal with all three of them at once. That self-centered garbage never budged on anything, so now she was likelly running around dealing with some plans unrelated to him. He would count that as a win for now.

“Ugh, I’m still not used to this.”

He heard some of that unique (and artificially constructed) dark elf language.

There was no scar on her stomach, but she still rubbed it on occasion.

Slender seemed overwhelmed by the stone roads, stone buildings, and all the people. She would put the large straw hat back on every chance she could to hide her splendidly long ears. It may have been a replacement for her bunny-ears hood.

The truth was, very few human states officially recognized civil rights for magical lifeforms. They were even depicted as villains in children’s stories a lot of the time. But on an individual level, few of the people would go out of their way to harm her. She still had to be on the lookout for crazed animal abusers or slave traders hoping to capture her, but the humans also had to watch out for those abnormal criminals.

Her nerves were understandable when an extreme exception like Professor Dissection had been one of her first experiences with humans, but she didn’t really need to be so afraid. She could live here just fine if she was just as cautious as an ordinary person was of being caught up in a crime.

…She can live here.

The reality of the situation was catching up to him. He had to find a place for Slender to live. Wait, or do I? he asked. The more seriously he considered it, the further he strayed from his original plan of “Welp, you’ve no choice but to come live with me!! Yes, no choice at all!!”

Incidentally, he had yet to return her earring.

Even though they had exchanged rings.

Every time he tried to, she would shake her head and refuse it. It may have been some kind of magic charm to her. Hadn’t she said the pair of accessories would draw destined lovers together?

“Damn, and here I thought you got to marry a dark elf if you saw her naked and stripped of all her equipment.”

“You thought what?”

So much for that legend. Another casualty at the hands of communication.

“What do I do now?”

A few of the people walking on the main road looked back at them when they spoke the unfamiliar dark elf language. From the dark elf’s perspective, she was surrounded by unintelligible humans, so she may have been nervous.

She could still sense the questioning tone of their voices, though. While she looked cool and composed, she reached out hand grabbed his clothes with her brown fingertips. Cute. She furrowed her brow worriedly Super cute!!

“We can learn each other’s languages bit by bit. I’ll translate for you until then. That rotten woman is technically a teacher and there’s no way I can’t pull it off after she taught me.”

“?”

She tilted her head.

Is she trying to kill me with cuteness? Does she radiate beams that make you fall in love with her!?

“Slender, is there anything you’re interested in seeing? Or someplace you want to go? The other dark elves told you to go see the outside world and learn about our culture, right? Then you need to get started.”

“Yes.”

The dark elf girl placed her index finger on Klaus’s lips.

This rattled his brain.

Thank the goddess I survived to see this day!!!!!!

He was willing to give up his dark elf research and focus all his time on being the world’s leading expert in Slender research.

Then she breathed in and out.

And she spoke with a wink.

Their next adventure was sure to be even more exciting than running around the forest and battling the hope elf.

“First, I want to see your home.”

Afterword

This is Kamachi Kazuma.

This one was a magical battle against nature with the added bonus of dark elves! The MC can use magic, but he is far from all powerful. With this magic, you have to figure out how exactly you can use it to give yourself greater freedom. And you have to decide if you’re willing to reduce your own lifespan and mobility to use it. I also went back to my roots and simply thought about what kind of power would be neat to have.

The focus of this story is the MC meeting Slender.

So you’ve finally found what you had spent all your life searching for, but then they attack you and try to burn you at the stake. What would you do in that situation? You could run away, or you could fight. It’s your choice. Klaus is the kind of MC who can’t bring himself to slaughter them even after learning he has to stop the resurrection of the ultimate dragon. He instead works toward mutual understanding while continuing to pursue the girl of his dreams. He really is a dyed-in-the-wool dark elf lover, isn’t he? He can’t make too much fun of Professor Dissection or his rotten teacher.

As an alternate world fantasy, you’re free to do what you want. You can go anywhere in any direction, but making sure you’re sufficiently prepared to enjoy that freedom is no easy task. You’re even free to go somewhere that gets you killed! I hope I managed to show that freedom comes with a price. To function as a novel, I had to show the characters acquiring hints and drawing conclusion on their own (and those conclusions weren’t necessarily accurate, for Klaus or for the dark elves), so even a simple walk through the woods ended up full of foreshadowing. Conversely, I made the dark elf village and the human knights be a threat to the MC – in that they obstruct his freedom. Once you can no longer keep moving through the vast forest, it’s checkmate and game over. Now, which do you find more appealing: dangerous freedom or restrictive safety?

He didn’t know her language or her name, so what could he do to get to know the dark elf girl better? As a student who specializes in fieldwork, he naturally gravitated toward watching her like a wild animal. It would seem different sorts of eccentrics have trouble getting along. The MC harshly criticized Professor Dissection for only believing what he had seen for himself, but he was twisted in his won way for never questioning his fieldwork observations. People can’t detect their own odor, after all.

He could have taken his Camouflize magic in a pretty scummy direction (such as turning into a puppy and having the dark elf pick him up so he could lick all over her face), but you saw what it can do in a serious context. I hope you enjoyed that trick that made use of the entire stage. If you can turn into any lifeform, the only two options are a cute girl or the strongest creature, right!? Also, note that his magic is a double-edged sword that can also destroy him if he uses it wrong. This contrasts the dark elf Archdragon Magic that consistently provides the same result. Also, distracting an enemy’s horse by transforming into a mare comes right out of Norse Mythology. If you’re interested, just do a search on Loki☆ I’m sure you’ll end up wondering how a god failed to predict how that plan would end if it succeeded.

I used a special language again, but this one was a lot simpler than the one in Blood Sign. You should be able to figure out the elf language as well if you use Klaus’s line in Chapter 1 and how the dark elf conversion works. I recommend reading the book a second time now that you can decode those two languages. What were the dark elves and the hope elf thinking when Klaus was working so hard to observe them? Maybe you can enjoy it like having a second sound track. Klaus-kun was going to a lot of wasted effort out there☆

…N-now, I did carefully check over everything, but I may have made the occasional mistake. If you find one, just assume that dark elf has a unique accent.

I went back and forth on whether I should have the rotten teacher actually show up in the epilogue, but I decided she would seem more mysterious and dangerous if she only left a note. I made sure all of the main characters went to some wasted effort at some point or another but got a happy ending anyway. In her case, I did something that made her seem even more impressive while also being fundamentally wrong about something. Someone on her level takes wasted effort to a whole new level. I didn’t spend any time describing life in the city since this book is supposed to be about the awkward interactions between a human boy and a dark elf girl, but I think this helps you imagine what Klaus goes through in his ordinary school life.

I give my thanks to my illustrator Mahaya-san and to my editors Miki-san, Anan-san, Nakajima-san, and Hamamura-san. I imagine it was hard to show the unique environment of the forest while also showing how cute the dark elves are. Thank you so much!

I also give my thanks to the readers. How did you like these unusual magic battles where supplies are the key factor? I hope you can look at the setting like a puzzle and figure out how you would use that magic to survive the fantasy forest.

I will end this here.

Maybe I should have left everyone’s real names unknown, instead of just the dark elves.

-Kamachi Kazuma

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