After that incident, I received a few handfuls of apologies through the closed door, then I heard the dwarfs practically running away, likely fearing some sort of retribution. Yeah, like I am going to run after them in my sweaty undies to beat them up. Fat chance!

I sighed… Walked over to the door and locked it from the inside. Something that I evidently forgot to do before falling asleep. It was at least halfway because of my lack of attention that led to this situation. The other half being the thick headed dwarfs tendency to open a door right after knocking on it.

Seriously, what is the purpose of knocking if you don’t wait to be let inside either way? Might as well come in… Stupid, thick headed idiots…

Still… I need to change… it’s quite a pain to only have one pair of spare underwear… I will have to wash this one again. How dull.

I took off the dirty underwear while walking over to my personal washbasins, one larger for the clothes and a smaller for cleaning myself. I requested them from the commander a few days ago, since I didn’t know who else to ask.

Anyway, he had it delivered to me right away, and since then I was getting familiar with the process of handwashing my own clothes.

I quickly realized something crucial. Washing machines are awfully underrated devices. Seriously… If you don’t believe me, just go ahead and attempt to wash your dirty clothes with nothing but your hands and some used horse brush.

All that in ice cold water, just to make it interesting. Thank god I only had to wash my stuff and nobody else’s. I would likely pull out my hair from the sheer frustration.

While I was focused on the monotonous cleaning procedure, my thoughts began to run wild.

It was impossible to not notice that the dwarf’s standoffish behavior had begun to change since the commander announced that I would play a crucial role in the capturing of a new outpost.

With the change in attitude, however much appreciated, there was a fresh trouble, one that was completely unfamiliar to me.

I felt extremely uncomfortable as I recalled recent attempts at conversations, unprecedented praises to my looks or straight up pick up lines that were thrown in my direction haphazardly. Well… at least I think those were supposed to be pick up lines? In their own dwarfish glory…

I am starting to understand the deeper reasons for the age long conflicts between the dwarfs and elves in this region.

Telling someone in the face as a complete stranger that you have a nice heart shaped ass is not exactly what elves would consider flattery… At least I believe so…

Yes… in short, I was being hit on by a bunch of dwarfs… And in most cases very badly… Being the sole female in a cave with a few hundred veteran warriors would likely cause your average woman to feel pressured.

Luckily, the dwarfs, aside from their eccentric behaviour, were genuinely honorable people. Thereafter, I didn’t have to feel that way around them. Even Regmir, who hates my guts, gave me a hand in need, even if he complained all the way and now I supposedly owe him a favour or whatever.

On the other hand… if I had run into a bunch of goblins before meeting with Emrum… Ugh… I don’t really want to think about that outcome. It would only serve as further nightmare material. Which I don’t really need at this point.

The only reason I wasn’t constantly hit on even before this was me being considered too young and an elf. While being this mysterious witch who appeared out of nowhere.

I suspect that the real reason was only the last one, though.

Fear can only postpone things so much it seems… The dwarfs are quickly realizing, no doubt thanks to Emrum and Tymur’s secret efforts, that beyond having access to powerful magic, I am nothing more than another person.

My expression became strained as I recalled Skod’s recent attempt to match me up with his son…

Which wouldn’t be half as annoying if his reasoning wasn’t so obvious… The idiot just wants my ability to make gold secured in his family… How can someone be so tactless and pebble minded? Worst of all, I let my guard down and actually agreed to it without understanding what he truly meant.

“Sigh~!” — I hope he forgets about it before we get back to the Dwarven Kingdoms.

This is so embarrassing…

But it couldn’t be helped! I lived for so long being a man that I keep forgetting that I am not anymore. I have to literally force myself to constantly be aware of that, and it just slips my mind occasionally. It is too different, the way people look at me and treat me…

Well, not just different… but also awkward.

The sneaky stares I get occasionally… the whispers behind my back… The conversations I am left out… probably for the better.

I even heard one guy boasting about that he supposedly slapped my ass while I was standing a few meters away. He clearly knew that I was in hearing distance and still went through saying it. What an actual jerk!

Let me tell you… it didn’t happen. But… well… I guess that’s nothing compared to the one who walked up to me and praised my arse while smiling into my face, like it was the most natural thing ever…

I looked down at my naked body while continuing to wash off the sweat and dirt from my skin with a wet rag.

“Sigh…” — I kind of understand where they are coming from…

This girl, ugh… well, me… She-me, am… this is so stupid… Sigh… to be forthcoming, I am below average in the chest department… It doesn’t really bother me, it’s kind of a relief even. Since there are fewer things to get used to, and it’s not like I am completely flat either.

I feel little difference from the time I was around fifty and got into this serious eating habit, well minus the beer belly, of course. At the time, I successfully cultivated those famous men's tits, as some people tended to call them. Except I didn’t wear a bra back then, for obvious reasons. Haha!

What? You know how it is… there were way too many delicious things to eat… or drink! As I used to say, if you were never fat, you never truly lived, my friend.

Anyway, my lack of tits is probably the main reason they believe me to be underaged… Aside from my lack of knowledge and tendency to blabber too much.

You see, those are probably genetics and at least partially elven characteristics. On closer inspection, there is no way this body belongs to a child. I am definitely a grown elf. There is no doubt about it.

My main reason… well… this is really awkward to even say it in my mind, but… Jokes on me… I got a real heart-shaped butt. That dude was correct about that…

My left eye twitched from the effort to acknowledge such a statement… As a reward, I sneaked a peek at my…

I looked down in a sudden streak of shame… Just what am I doing… am I seriously this pitiful? Drooling over myself… how embarrassing. I guess it shows that I was a straight man my whole life. I didn’t mind gay people, not that I had anything to do with them in my everyday life.

Seriously, I don’t get the entire basis of the argument. The whole world was going nuts and people were arguing about who can marry who? The fuck do I care… Do whatever you want until you abide by general law.

That said… I strongly believed in the natural order and biological parental roles of a standard family.

I still do, in fact. Women should play the roles of women while men should commit to their own part. That was how we developed, and even if such roles hold little difference anymore, especially in modern society… eh?

Wait… I am not exactly in the modern world anymore… On top of that, what does this make me…with that mindset at hand? Should… should I commit to the role of a woman now? I mean… I am a woman as much as the next girl. I have checked it a few times… I mean… cough… Since I believe myself to be a straight ma-… cough… a straight girl, that is… Do I have to like men now?

I raised my hand to my temples, massaging them slowly.

Yeah… I am not sure if it works that way… I should probably observe my body's reactions from now on… Ugh? Now that I think about it… I felt strangely warm when I was carried by Emrum earlier… I believed it to be from the embarrassment, but what if it wasn’t?

“Nah… no…” — That couldn’t be. It’s not like I am gay now…

On the other hand, I am a girl… so that reaction would be perfectly normal?

“Nah, no… nope, don’t think too much into it…” — But what if he feels the same? What am I going to do then?

“No… I am thinking too much into this… I saved his life, he saved mine… twice… that’s it…” — That sounded like the most typical romance trope in any movie, doesn’t it?

“NOAOAAH!!!” — I throw up my arms.

“This is ridiculous. What am I thinking?” — I grasped my head, trying to contain those frustrating thoughts.

Still… his reaction when he saw me in my undies… No… that doesn’t mean anything I would react the same walking on a half-naked girl… And this world is like the middle ages… people probably have a much lower stimulus-threshold.

“… Anyway… lets… lets calm down! Ehehe… I am getting hot from all this excitement…”

“Seriously, why am I feeling this hot suddenly?”

I was freezing up just now… As my thoughts focused on the logical side of the strange phenomenon, the sense of warmth quickly slipped away and I was left feeling the coldness once again. With a sense of lingering, incomprehensible listlessness.

The sensation was completely different, yet still familiar enough to ring a few bells in my mind.

Then my eyes grow wider with new comprehension.

“Wait, was this?… Was I horny just now?“

It’s embarrassing, but I don’t even know what it feels in this body to be aroused. I wouldn’t even know if that was the case… Maybe… s-s-should I… try to figure that out?

My fingers thoughtlessly slid upwards along my glistening, watery thigh. One of my cold fingers accidentally hit something sensitive between my legs, and I was jerked out of my thoughts with a yelp.

“maAH!” — A shiver run across my body as I pulled back my hand.

My face turned a deep crimson red. The sound I just released kept ringing in my ears.

I stepped closer to my personal washing basin and, in a panic, pushed my head under the cold water. I was already postponing that hair washing too long, and the situation was getting out of control.

While keeping my head under the sobering embrace of the ice cold water. I kept rocking my head in denial. Trying to shake the sinful thoughts out of my mind… I wasn’t sure what was going on with me, but I refuse to think that I was always this wacky in the head.

I pulled my head out of the water and took a few deep breaths. Feeling relieved, noticing that my arousal was successfully pushed back.

“Seriously… that was scary… I almost couldn’t stop…“

So yes… I am pretty sure that Lord Axis actually created an adult body for me. He had no reason for not doing so, since he even mentioned not having time to wait for me to grow up, in case I was reincarnated.

My first thought was probably spot on about the unusual lack of fat proportions while having a considerable amount of lean muscles being elven characteristics.

If I didn’t blabber about my age on Earth to Emrum, I likely wouldn’t be treated as a child… His sense of having or not having curves is some sort of cultural difference based on dwarven maidens having the general shape of a log, no doubt.

Or him simply wanting to annoy the hell out of me.

Aside from that, why do I think my body is actually mature? Well… my hips and chest are well developed.

I have hair where I should have… Let’s just silently cross out that hairless elf dream... done. Elves are still mammals, after all. Aside from that, there are no signs of pimples on my body. Taking the rest of my body as a base, it clearly means that I long passed puberty.

My body is well proportioned. It doesn’t feel awkward, like it had recently gone through some growth spurt either. There is absolutely no baby fat on my cheeks, as that fool claimed.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t see my reflection quite well since there were no high-quality mirrors inside the base. I used some sort of polished metal plate as a mirror to get the first look at my unfamiliar face, and it wasn’t really that clear. Still better than the water surface, though.

I got the general shape of my face, which was surprisingly sharp and thin, giving off a sick-looking aura combined with my extremely pale skin tone. All in all, I was surprisingly witchy looking.

But well, ending up considered a child in retrospect wasn’t a bad thing. It allows me a childlike freedom to learn the ways of this new world. Giving me valuable leeway to make mistakes without real consequences.

I watered my long black hair once again in the basin, then squeezed some of the extra out before repeating the procedure a few more times. It’s not like I had a bottle of shampoo at hand.

Sadly, but not surprisingly, there were no proper baths here. And since the water was cold and when I say cold, I mean it... I wasn’t half as mad to attempt to take a bath in a tub like some crazy ass dwarfs did.

I was pretty sure that I would catch some serious cold afterwards, and that was the last thing I needed right now.

I finally got to wash my hair… I didn’t wash it since coming here, and that was a week ago.

It was stuck together from the sweat and grime. The feeling of dirtiness was quite… horrible. Not even mentioning the itchiness and irritation. I couldn’t help but scratch it at times, making it even worse.

The thought of having to wash my long hair in cold water… well, it bothered me. I hated the idea of it. Since coming to this world, I have been much more sensitive to the cold… At first I ignored it, thinking that I was imagining the whole thing. Then seeing some dwarfs actually having a cold plunge in a tub a few days ago, while I was shivering while walking by in my coat and all. Let’s just say I reconsidered.

I believe that it is partly an elf thing, because of the lesser amount of body fat stored compared to humans and dwarfs. The other is because of my new gender. It was a known fact that women tended to be more sensitive to cold back on Earth. I didn’t see why it couldn’t be the same here as well.

Unfortunately, as I already mentioned, it was not allowed for the soldiers, that included me, to waste coal on heating up bathing water. For one, dwarfs were quite accustomed to the cold since living underground and all. Two, the coal was transported one time in a month from the kingdom with the caravan that supplied this expedition with every type of consumable.

The caravan could only bring a fixed amount of necessities, and coal apparently wasn’t the top priority here. It was only used for cooking. Aside from the use of coal is heavily restricted in the deep roads. Turns out smoke is much more bothersome and potentially life threatening if blindly released in a deep and complex underground tunnel system than on the surface.

I decided that the next spell I am going to learn is a fire spell that could potentially be used to heat up water.

Well… I better get over this hair washing stuff quickly before I actually catch a cold.