Chapter 30: CH 30

Chapter 30: Gee the Elf Clan Chief

“Uuu……?”

Selene groans softly as she opens her eyes. As she’s about to raise the upper half of her body, she feels a soft, fluffy sensation in her palms. That’s when it hit her that she was sleeping on a bed made of leaves.

Looking around as she rubs her sleepy eyes, she touches the nearby wall with her hand. From the sensation, this building seems to be made of wood, but the wall is way too bumpy for a wooden house, and the walls are also tilted at an angle. A few circles were cut through the wall to let sunlight in, but overall it seems to have been built halfheartedly.

“Here, where?”

I remember only up to when I decided to attack the elves, but after that, I remembered nothing at all. By the way, I wonder what happens to Butler.

『Princess! You’ve finally woken up!』

“Dowah!?”

Selene jumps up in surprise after suddenly being called in a loud voice. When she takes a close look, she notices a wooden box near the bed she slept in, inside the box is Butler, all tied up with ivy, with hay laid beneath him.

“Butler, you okay?”

『I’m okay, Princess, but as you can see, I’ve blundered, and you were captured. Please forgive me for my lack of competence!』

“It, okay.”

Selene shrugs her shoulders and tries to cheer Butler up. There is nothing that they could do in that situation. Rather, Butler had tried his best to change the outcome. If the one who was with her was Milano instead of Butler and he said something like “I’m sorry, I’ve blundered.” she’d have respond with “You big idioooot!” instead.

After taking Butler out of the wooden box, Selene tries to untangle the ivy binding him, but the ivy is just so sturdy that she couldn’t sever it with her strength alone. While she’s struggling with the ivy, the door carved out of the wooden wall opens.

“Ah, you’re awake?”

The one who opens the door is none other than the little elf girl Selene saw the other day, with sunlight shining through the door as a backdrop. She’s dressed in white and looks exactly like a little girl, as Selene would have guessed. Though short, she is slender, her figure is well-proportioned like a Japanese serow, and her voice is full of vitality and confidence.

“Elf?”

“Yup, I’m an elf, name’s Sana. Currently a big-shot. 15 years old. Favorite food are apples. And you?”

“Selene, human, eight.”

“Alright, I’ll call you Selene then. I’ve seen humans before, many, in fact. But one as young as you is my first. And that mouse-kun over there is your pet right? Sorry but we’ll have to tie him up for the time being.”

『I said I’m not mouse-kun, and not a pet too! I’m a proud butler in service of her majesty Princess Selene, Butler is my name!』

Butler stands up with his two hind feet that are not tied, skillfully climbs up onto Selene’s shoulder, and says while puffing his chest out proudly. But Sana only tilts her head in response.

『Nghhh, it seems like no one can understand me except for Princess Selene.』

Butler grinds his teeth in frustration. Butler and Selene doesn’t know of this because he has never spoken to another human before. Unaware about the their new discovery, Sana questions Selene once again.

“That mouse-kun, he’s pretty attached to you isn’t he? While you were sleeping, he had this reeeeally worried look on his face.”

“Butler, my butler.”

“So that mou…… Butler-kun, I noticed that he’s not just any ordinary mouse. What is he exactly?”

“Don’t know.”

『I’m afraid I don’t know much myself either. The only thing I know is that I’m in debt to Princess Selene.』

No one knows how or where Butler’s strength came from. Perhaps it’s a pure coincidence, and they couldn’t do anything about it. The moment when Sana is about to ask the second question, Selene’s stomach suddenly goes guuu, rumbling in hunger. Sana smiles bitterly and goes out the door for a moment, then returns with a wooden tray with something on it.

“Well, we can do the questioning later. You slept for an entire day, you know? I guess you’re starving at this point.”

Sana places the tray in front of Selene as she speaks. On the tray is a huge leaf used as a plate, and on top of that place are round slices of white meat that look like cooked ham, and on the side are some greens that look like stir-fry veggies.

“This, what?”

“Roasted Skink tail meat. It’s delicious.”

Selene wonders what this Skink thing is, but the moment the aroma from the roasted meat and veggies hit her nose, Selene’s reasoning goes away almost immediately. Selene who hasn’t eaten anything for a whole day is activating her goblin mode.

『It doesn’t seem to be poisonous.』

Butler checks the meat made of an unknown substance with his keen sense of smell, but it doesn’t smell like there’s poison in it. And at this point, Selene doesn’t even register Butler’s words in her head anymore. The moment Butler finishes speaking, she brings the meat into her mouth. Selene’s creed is that, when one is hungry, one can eat anything.

“Delish!”

Selene gulps down the unknown meat without any hesitation. Selene isn’t good at troublesome stuff like checking for poison and whatnot, after all.

Sana smiles with fluffy feelings in her heart as she watches Selene eat without hesitation. It’s not surprising, given that anyone who feeds a cute little wild animal will smile after seeing its cuteness. That’s how Sana feels.

“Hey, if you eat that fast, you’re going to choke. Here, drink this.”

Sana walks to a small barrel in the corner of the room, pours the grape-colored liquid from the barrel into a wooden bowl, and gives it to Selene. Seeing the deep purple liquid, Selene blooms with joy.

“Alcohol!?”

“How can it be alcohol? If kids drink alcohol, they’re going to be dead drunk. This is just juice. You can drink as much as you want.”

Sana gives Selene some juice for kids with her age in consideration, but the young girl in front of her seems to be incredibly disappointed, so she tilts her head once again in confusion.

“Stomach, full.”

『You have my gratitude.』

Selene proceeds to fill her stomach with all the food in front of her, and of course Butler gets his share as well. The two are now full. And now that her appetite is satisfied, there’s only one thing left for Selene to do.

“Good nightー”

Selene bows her head to Sana and goes back down onto the bed made of leaves she slept in earlier. The smell of hay bedding is pretty calming, and it also feels good to sleep on.

“Hold on a second!”

Sana hurriedly grab Selene by the scruff of her neck. Selene looks up at Sana, puzzled.

“Youuuuu! Did you just forget that you’re a prisoner!? Why the heck do you decide to sleep like it’s nothing!?”

“Oh, right!”

Since Sana is so cute and the food is great, Selene has completely forgotten that she has been captured. Selene’s stupid response almost made Sana fall over comically like a character in a Looney Tunes cartoon, but she managed to stand straight.

The other day, one of the guys said that he was deceived by her outward appearance. Perhaps she’s just pretending to be stupid. If so, that’s Hollywood-level acting.

And now that she thinks about it, when she saw Selene happily eating the food without hesitation, she realized she had completely let her guard down. If Selene had thrown the tied mouse at her at that point, she could have killed Sana.

‘Maybe I’m being overly cautious, but I should tighten my guard more……’

It’s very possible that the young human girl in front of her is pretending to be powerless. Steeling her resolve, the elf warrior Sana tries her best to look like she’s not on guard.

“And now I’ll bring you to Gee. Please don’t do anything weird in front of him, alright?”

“Gee? Who?”

“Our chief. And well as the head of villages in the surrounding. If you’re obedient, he probably won’t kill you. He’s an idiot, sure, but he’s not the guy who unreasonably uses violence. Still an idiot though.”

Sana moves the food tray to the corner of the room and takes Selene’s hand in hers. It seems like she’s going to bring her to the chief right now. And of course, Butler, who is still tied up, goes with Selene as well, riding on her shoulder.

『Princess, we have no choice but to comply.』

Butler whispers into her ear, and Selene nods silently. If they escape here, they’re still in the middle of the White Forest nonetheless, so they had no other choices.

“Fuehー!”

“What? Never seen one?”

“Un.”

After they exit the room, Selene is taken aback by the sight unfolded before her. The room that she thought was halfheartedly built was actually a huge hollow in the giant tree. Several giant trees with circumferences of several tens of meters are everywhere, trees so gigantic that they’d be designated as natural monuments on Earth. And in the trees are hollows that the elves seem to be living in as their homes. They’re natural wooden houses, so to speak.

“From our point of view, you two are an even rarer sight.”

Said Sana, leading the group, while Selene looks around her curiously. Selene noticed that there are elves who are peeking at her, some from behind the white bushes, some from the tree branches, their expressions seem half curious and half afraid.

Every single one of them wears a white outfit just like Sana, perhaps it’s their clan outfit. And maybe they also serve the purpose of blending in with the white forest for camouflage.

『How rude of them to stare at us like this. Princess, please pay them no mind.』

“Un.”

Butler couldn’t care less about himself, but seeing his beloved Princess Selene being treated like an item on display puts him in a bad mood. Selene, on ther other hand, doesn’t seem too concerned about the elves’ glances.

Selene’s past self, after all, shamelessly participated in hero shows for children that were held on the department stores’ rooftops as a spectator. Compared to the intense stares from the dads and mums of the children, the elves’ glances are nothing at all.

‘What courage. Seems like I have to learn from her.’ (Butler)

But of course, Butler has no way to know that. From his point of view, all he could see is that Princess Selene is behaving in a calm and dignified manner despite the gazes of the elves. Butler pulls himself together and focus. After all, appearing intimidated would reveal his weaknesses to the elves. 

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Selene weaves through the giant trees with Sana pulling her hands, until she notices a single tree that stands out among the rest, visibly larger. Its roots, which sprout from the ground, resemble rock formations. Sana climbs the roots casually, but for Selene, this is more like rock climbing.

After a hard time climbing the root wall, Selene sees a door in the tree, the same type of door as other houses. It seems like this is the entrance to Gee’s house.

“Heyaー! Gee, I’m here with the girl I talked aboutー!”

Said Sana in a loud voice as she knocks on the door vigorously. She knocks on the door so hard that it sounds like it’s going to break at any moment, showing not a single shred of respect to the Chief.

“You’re damn annoying! At least show some respect!”

Not long after, the door is busted open violently, and appearing from inside the house is a short young man. He’s probably Gee, the chief that Sana mentioned. Selene thought the chief was going to be like a grandpa or grandma, but surprisingly, Gee is pretty young.

He’s even slimmer than Milano, and his skin is as white as the forest. His eyes are slanted, as if to contrast that. He’s a very handsome young man with a bad boy look on him, but for some reason he’s wearing a beaten-up iron pot on his head, which destroys all the good things about him. He certainly looks like an idiot.

“So she’s the rumored human shorty, huh……”

“Gee, -san.”

“What, shorty?”

“Head, that, what?”

“Hnn? This?”

Gee looks at Selene intently, as if sizing her up, but Selene is too curious about that pot on his head not to ask. She thought he’s going to be mad at her, but for some reason Gee looks pretty happy instead, smiling as he knocks on the beaten-up pot.

“This is the ‘kraun’ thing. Human big shots wear metal on their heads, right? How’s it? Don’t you think it’s pretty cool?”

“Well……”

The stage is set for Selene to shoot the joke back, but she finds it too troubling, so she gives a vague answer instead. Gee doesn’t continue the topic of 『crown』any further and invites Selene inside. 

His house looks very much like the room Selene slept in, a basic hollow in the tree, but his house is special as it is decorated with feathers, masks, and, for some reason, iron spoons. These decorations are a clear sign that he’s the chief of this area.

Gee seats Selene on a Japanese-style cushion made out of stacked leaves while he himself sits across from her, cross-legged. Selene’s sitting on the wall side and Gee on the entrace side. Sana’s standing next to the entrace, as if blocking it. Seems like she’s doing that to prevent any chances of them escaping.

“Let’s see, your name is Selene, right. And you’re not an ardvencharar?”

“Ardvencharar?”

『I think they’re talking about adventurers, Princess.』

Selene finally understands when Butler told her so. And of course she’s not an adventurer so she denies it by shaking her head left and right. Rather, she doesn’t even know it herself what adventurers are. Gee judges that Selene isn’t an adventurer from her puzzling expression.

“I’ll trust you that you’re not an adventurer. But still, the humans from your country, Ba-, Bandoll? Are causing us troubles. You can’t just waltz into our territory and steal stuff from the White Forest. Surely you aren’t one of those guys……. Well from the look on your face, guess not.”

“Bandoll?”

『He probably means Valbell, Princess. I’ve heard that there are lots of adventurers in that country.』

Adventurers are, literally, people who venture into danger. Unlike in Helifalte, discrimination based on status still exists in Valbell. For example, even if you had great magic abilities and whatnot, but if you’re a commonner then you’ll never get a high position in a job, and moving to Helifalte where things are better is very difficult as well. It’ll be like sending salt to the enemy after all. 1

And among the people of Valbell with abilities that were treated poorly, many enter the White Forest, which is abundant in resources with magical properties, in the hopes of becoming wealthy quickly. They invest their fortune to buy magic-resistant equipment, just like the dress Selene’s wearing, steel their resolve, and plunge into the forest, only to end up unsuccessful.

Butler had heard of these people before, but only as rumors. There aren’t many adventurers in both Aquila and Helifalte after all, so he doesn’t pay the rumor much attention.

“Balbell, not, me country.”

“Oh, so that Balbell…… no, so there are other human countries other than that one?”

“Un.”

“Then what’s your country?”

“Helifaalthe”

“Helihallte, huh. Is it close to the White Forest?”

“Far, distance, about a week.”

Gee tilts his head, puzzled, at Selene’s answer. Isn’t that pretty far from the White Forest? How can a kid and a mouse travel such a long distance? He couldn’t come up with anything.

“You, what you just said is pure absurdity. Why would you come here from such a faraway place? Even ardvencharars don’t come this deep into the forest.”

“Dragon, bring here.”

“Dragon? You said a dragon deliberately bring you here?”

Selene silently nods. She was abducted by the dragon for reasons only God knows, then mistaken by the elves, and now she’s here. It’d be great if she could explain all this to them, but unfortunately, with Selene’s vocabulary, the best she could explain is that the dragon brought her here.

“She’s telling the truth. We just went to investigate yesterday, didn’t we?”

Sana who has been in silence the whole time speaks up to supplement Selene’s claim.

“Oh, about the dragon being nearby? I’ve heard of that from a report.”

“Yes, and the two patrolmen found her near that area. Later, I went there to double-check it, and sure enough, I discovered the dragon footprints, couldn’t be mistaken for anything else.” 

When it comes to the White Forest, the elves are the experts. If there are footprints on the ground, they can immediately tell which animal they belong to. Actually, given the size of the footprints near where Selene was discovered, there’s no need to speculate on which animal they belong to. After all, only one creature on the planet could have left such a large footprint.

“A dragon and a human…… It’s really hard to believe.” (Gee)

“What? Are you implying that our investigations were wrong?” (Sana)

“I didn’t mean it like that, but you know, a frickin’ dragon? A dragon and a human kid? What is its aim?”

“Well, I don’t know……”

It’s only natural for Gee to question it. Though the elves do not believe in any specific god, they do believe that gods and spirits inhabit nature and life itself. And because dragons are the most powerful creatures in this world, they are revered and feared by the elves.

And said dragon deliberately brings a human child all the way here to the White Forest. Such a thing has never happened before. The report also said that the mouse accompanying her is also a special creature.

It’s probably that this girl has some hidden special power of some sort. For example, she may claim that the dragon brought her here, but in reality, she has the ability to control dragons and came here for unknown reasons to meet the elves alone. Anything Gee can come up with is just ridiculous. He shakes his head to shake off these stupid thoughts.

“That aside, what do we do next…… You said your name is Selene, right.”

“Un.”

“Originally, if you were an ardvencharar then we’d have to strip you of any possessions on you, but it seems like you’re not one of them. We’ll take you out of the White Forest. You’re on your own after that.”

“Two weeks? Reason, what?”

“We have some business to do near the land of humans at that time, so we’re just going to drop you there.”

Selene was unaware, but the materials and food required for the elves’ daily lives are gathered from the forest in addition to cultivating them. If they gather resources only in one area, it’s going to be depleted, so they would change their gathering area at intervals.

And it just happens that the gathering area two weeks later is the one nearest to the land of humans. Walk a little bit further from there, and she’ll be out of the White Forest. For the elves, the area outside the Forest is uncharted, and that’s where their range of operation ends.

They also have the option of getting rid of Selene and Butler right here, but with the dragon being involved, they better not act rashly. Gee’s decision can put their entire clan in danger, since his decision as the chief means the decision of all villages.

Immediately after Gee comes to a conclusion, there’s a loud knock on the door, louder than when Sana knocked on it, and then a young elf man rushes right in. He’s so quick that Sana couldn’t stop him in time; the expression on his face is that of panic.

“Gee-sama! Pardon my intrusion!”

“Don’t just come in whenever you want! Right nowe we’re having an important meeting!”

“There’s an emergency, sir! The dragon has appeared again!”

“You kidding me? Wasn’t it here just yesterday?”

Gee’s expression turns grave as he stands up. It’s extremely rare for a dragon that travels across the continent to land in the White Forest. That’s why yesterday, Gee dispatched a guard unit that consists of Sana, who is second only to Gee in terms of power. Such an extremely rare situation has occurred again today, making it two days in a row.

“And where did it appear?”

“Same place as yesterday, sir. It has been walking around in the area, seemingly looking for something. So far, it hasn’t done any notable damage.”

“Fumu……”

Rubbing his chin, Gee stops and ponders for a moment, then turns to look at the sitting Selene.

“Alright. Me and Sana, and that shorty…… Selene, all of us will go there.”

“Eh!? You’re coming too, Gee-sama?”

Gee is the leader of the elves after all. When something happened, he won’t go there in person in most cases. But now he’s telling the messenger that he’s going to there personally along with this human child. His words surprised both the messenger elf and Sana.

“There’s no doubt that this shorty is somehow related to the dragon, and we don’t know the reason behind it. That’s why, rather than sitting here thinking all day, let’s just bring this shorty to the dragon directly.”

“Hold on! You’re planning to feed a kid to the dragon!?” (Sana)

“She said it herself that the dragon brought her here. If that’s true then there’s no danger. If what she said was a lie, she would be the only one to die. How is it, pretty good plan, yeah?”

Sana is about to say something, but she stops just before the words come out.

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