After the fight with the golem, Rina Wenswood found herself regaining consciousness to a beautiful night sky with dangling stars, still numb on her muscles and ached on those bruises the stone creature left.
“Uh- urg… My head…”
She was greeted with a warm light emitting right in front and crackling noises of dry wood as she laid near a small bonfire, the elf also noticed some bandages were there around her arms and legs. With one final rub on her eyes, Rina finally saw… A giant werewolf growling in front of her, with its teeth showing, it drooled, having all claws out in a defensive pose.
“Shit!” Rina crawled back a few steps, reaching around for her bow, but it was not here, rather she saw it was on the opposite side of the bonfire, alongside a magical staff that looked like Pearl’s.
“Come!”
The Elf raised her hand towards her staff and used wind magic to drag it across to her, only to be noticed and stopped by the werewolf which stomped on it. Rina clenched her teeth before switching to a different plan right away.
“Elves’ Vision: Wind Dance!” She channeled her wind abilities and created four small spinning tornadoes around her limbs, quickly getting up to standing. Though Rina always took pride in being the tallest in the Freedom Group, right now had to tilt her head high at the thing.
“Awooo!”
“No! Dynol, don’t hurt her!”
The werewolf howled and walked up to Rina, that was when a figure came out of the woods nearby and tackled it down, dropping their stack of drywood while doing so. Well, they did try to tackle it, but it was simply too strong physically and it turned into a hug from behind. But it was effective, having the creature lowering itself.
“Oh… Calm down, be nice, don’t hurt her, please?” The person spoke again, patting the giant thing on its back, having to reach their arm up a lot. That was when Rina on the opposite side was frowning as she squinted.
“Ydych chi'n elf? (You are an elf?)” Rina asked as backed off from the two and retracted her bow. In front of her was a weird sight; a young woman with long, slightly tangled white hair and sharp pointed ears like Rina was calming the giant creature down.
She couldn’t be any younger than Rina herself, with a bright pure smile and a few gentle pats on its back, the stranger finally got the werewolf to sit down before going towards Rina and greeted her formally with a headbow.
“Oh… I’m sorry Dynol scared you, Hello! And um… I don’t speak Elvish, sorry, but I am an elf if you are wondering!” The woman answered, which got Rina confused and slightly frowned at.
“You helped me?” Rina asked, slowly but surely letting her guard down.
“Oh… Yes! That’s what I am supposed to do, no?” The Elf smiled at her, her voice was light and only now Rina noticed a strange book with a cross on it strapped to her belt.
“You can’t sense what I am?” Rina asked a strange question again, which left the young woman completely baffled. She scratched her face for a little bit before awkwardly shook her head.
“I… Don’t, I’m sorry. Mom told me I should help anyone in need no matter who they are. Oh! Where are my manners? My name is Alasta, and he is Dynol, my companion.” The elf pointed towards the werewolf and introduced themselves.
Rina let out a huge sigh, feeling a slight relief knowing that this woman couldn’t possibly want to hurt her. She finally went and sat down across from the both of them.
“My name is Rina Wenswood, thank you for saving me.” She answered while holding onto her retracted bow, “You are not grown up with Elves, aren’t you?” She added, looking at Alasta who sat down next to the werewolf named Dynol.
“Oh… I didn’t save you, I just found you laying near a dangerous spot and Dynol carried you here!” She shook her head and answered. “No, I’m not. But I hope you don’t mind! I lived with my Mom, Brothers and Sisters, a human-filled town. How did you know?”
Despite Rina thinking that the girl would be embarrassed and what not, she was taken aback by Alasta’s casual and friendly smile while helping Dynol to put more dry wood in the bonfire.
“You not knowing the race tongue, your accent gives it away, and most importantly, the elves can sense another’s presence. I can see that you are an Elf.” Rina answered, finally letting go of her bow and sighed “And the elves won’t help me.”
"Oh… That's just wrong, we should try and help everyone we can. But, I don't get it, why won't elves help Rina?"
"...” Before answering, Rina squinted at the woman in front, “They’ll know that I’m not pure-blooded.”
“Oh…” Alasta noticed Rina’s voice was a bit lowered, signaling a tint of sorrow, she decided not to press on and thought a bit before asking. "You didn't have dinner, right? I am going to make some rice porridge, do you like to join us?"
“Hah…” Rina slightly tilted her head and nodded, “Why not. Thank you, Alasta.”
“Oh that’s fantastic! Let me get it going, you can rest while that’s going on.”
Alasta turned around to get a big pot and carefully set it on the fireplace, before she got out big pouches of water and rice from her bag and started making a simple rice dish with literally two ingredients, for every rice there’s double the amount of water added, Alasta estimated.
Rina didn’t rest but rather went over and helped, also introducing herself with Dynol, shaking its giant furry hand and exchanging apologies for the misconceptions from before. Of course elves do not understand werewolves, but the two can interpret from facial expression, body language and what not.
“Oh… Um, I’m not a tamer, no.” Alasta answered a question Rina asked, while breaking some carrots apart with her hands and dropping it into the pot, “A nice friend got him to trust and came with me! Dynol was a demihuman before, but he’s like this now.”
“... I see” Rina casually observed Alasta’s expression when the elf casually answered everything with such a bright and cheerful smile, she could not help herself but went over to sit next to Alasta to slightly pinch her cheek and make a comment, “You are cute, you know that?”
“Ao- ouch ouch, nooo, it’s only skin there, it hurts-” Alasta whimpered, with little to no fat on her cheek she held onto Rina’s hand and frantically asked her to remove it, which Rina did let go soon. “Sisters did tell me that, but I don’t understand, ouch….”
“Eat more vegetables and meat. You’re skinny.” Rina said looking at Alasta’s pot of dinner, a completely white pot with just rice, water and little carrot bits, simply plain and empty.
“Oh… I don’t like eating much, it hurts my stomach.” Alasta chuckled before noticing the pot was almost ready as she took off the lid.
“Look!” Alasta pointed, her eyes lit up bright at the sight of steam that was trapped in the pot released and flew all over the place high up in the air. “It’s so cool, right?”
“Yes it is.” Rina answered. “Thank you again for helping me, it was a pleasure meeting you.”
The three of them; Rina Wenswood, Alasta and Dynol sat around a fireplace and shared a nice meal. It was just plain rice and water yet for every bite Alasta took it was like the best thing in the world as her face was written in bold “satisfixation” and “happiness” with the blandest thing. Rina did not complain though and found herself at ease and could trust this girl as she also did enjoy the meal with great laughter, meanwhile Dynol the werewolf sat right there all confused because now he had to deal with trying to understand two elves instead of one like he used to, not that he needed to understand them, but they kept asking him questions knowing full well he didn’t speak neither human or elvish tongue.
After the meal, Rina used some of her wind magic to help get rid of the fireplace, which caught Alasta by surprise. The girl was all fascinated; pointing her finger towards the intangible wind and looking at Rina.
“That was so cool!” Alasta exclaimed, “Can you do it again?”
“Hum? This you mean?” Rina asked before twirling her hand in a circular motion in the air. The next thing Alasta noticed was a strong gust of cold wind blew through her from down under, sending white strands of her hair upwards and Alasta herself levitating, the girl was terrified at first and spun around wildly with hands on her eyes, before letting loose and finally letting Rina control her.
“Oh! Woah… Hahaha! This is so amazing! Dynol, hold my hand!” Alasta reached her hand out to the werewolf, who stared at her all confused before reaching its hand out and grabbed onto the owner’s hand, who used him like an anchor and spun around him.
‘I should not drain my mana after all that.’ Rina thought, chuckling, ‘But this is nice to see.’
Rina soon had Alasta descend and landed safely, the elf was still in awe at her wind magic, before realizing something and unstrap a thick leather book from her belt.
“Oh, I can do something too! Let me show you this.” Alasta said, kneeling down with the book opened to reveal… A book with completely blank pages, stretching from the cover to the end—no words, no picture, not even a dot of ink.
Rina observed with great confusion and curiosity as the cute elf clasped her hands and started praying like a religious human being. As she prayed, a stream of mana in bright green appeared from within the book, circulating it as the pages were being flipped back and forth violently.
“Is that… Holy magic?” Rina whispered, in amazement she widened her eyes and noticed as the visible mana turned towards her and started finding its way onto her wounds and bruises, easing them all up with a warm tender feeling of touch, it also went for the small burn mark on Rina’s neck but couldn’t really change that, before disappearing completely.
“It’s so cool, right! I never knew I could do magic.”
“...” Rina paused for a bit, moving her shoulders a bit and chuckled, before stroking Alasta on her hair. “Yes, that was very cool. I’ve never heard of an elf using holy healing, you are very special, Alasta.”
“Oh! Holy healing, is that what this is? Mom told me to bring it on my adventure. She really did think everything through!” Alasta smiled brightly with her eyes almost closing.
Starlights had already filled the sky when the three done chatting, got on their backs and rested through the night. Constellation stretched forwards infinity and beyond, Dynol served as a warm coat for the elves as Rina and Alasta laid their head on his thick fur, not the first time this happened and the werewolf can not be fazed at this point. Through the quiet night, Rina did not fall asleep that easily, still on guard herself in the middle of nowhere, she enjoyed the sound of crickets on the grass, scent of tranquility emitting from the nearby plants and wildflowers. Yet her mind could not find itself at peace, knowing she’s now on an unending run, knowing her team was still waiting for her, and so Rina finally rested her eyes, making sure Dynol and Alasta went to sleep themselves, and making sure there was no threat in the area.
Later in the morning, Rina Wenswood woke up with a strange weight on her body, as if something or someone was pressing on it. Rina soon got very frustrated and sat up to notice: a very big wizard hat, upon removing it, revealed a young woman with short brown hair hugging a small reptile-like green creature and the both were sleeping right next to Rina very peacefully.
“Mei, Esmeralda.” She said, tapping on the two’s heads and noticing Alasta with Dynol was not up yet. “When did you two get here?”
“yawn… Morning Rina.” Mei sat up with her legs crossed, still hugging tight onto the sleeping dragon like a teddy bear. “Well… We went searching for you. But didn’t want to wake you and your girlfriend up, so Pearl got back to scout for Marc and told me to guard you.”
“Guard?” Rina squinted, only now noticing Mei’s hair being shorter, and she was wearing her old waitress uniform that she initially gave to Esmeralda. “That didn’t go as he thought, it seems.”
“Ehe.” Mei chuckled in embarrassment. “I was tired.”
“Um… Rina, you’re awake?” Alasta got up right after that, upon opening her eyes and seeing Mei, the elf was pleasantly surprised and moved backwards to Dynol, before stuttering for a bit, “Oh… Hello, my name is Alasta.”
“Hello.” Mei used Esmeralda’s hand while the kid was still sleeping to wave at Alasta. “My name is Mei Magmal.”
Thanks for the chapter! And "Happy New Year" too Author-sama!