Chapter 83 - Fairies and 'Companions'
Elenoa tilted her head at the nostalgic sensation of hunger, yet magical power circulated through her body as always. Assuming there was no particular problem, she flew south with peace of mind.
The reason she headed south was because her destination lay in that direction.
In the past, she might have literally flown to the authority on fairy research who loved her excessively and contributed to creating new problems by asking, "Hey, hey, I feel like I'm hungry. What could this mean?" But now, she could not turn back for something this trivial.
Fairies do not feel cold.
As far as the eye could see, the season was close to winter.
Most of the mountains visible from the Demon Lord's Castle had their peaks decorated white due to their high altitude, but the mountains in the human world were low, and their vibrant autumn leaves were still visible.
It was still the middle of the night when she spotted a human settlement.
It had taken about three hours from the Demon Lord's Castle. Elenoa prided herself on her top speed being comparable to a jet airplane in her previous life. Since it took this long even using her maximum speed, she honestly thought, The Demon Realm is vast, isn't it?
In any civilization, people first build towns near water sources. Since the large river she had spotted along the way also seemed to flow south, she followed its course and found the settlement.
It was a small village enclosed by wooden fences about twice the height of a person, compactly contained within. If one ran with all their might, it would take ten minutes to go from one end to the other.
Houses made of earthen walls and wood stood in neat rows. There were no lights. They were probably sleeping because it was night, but it was quiet regardless. There were signs of people, and the scent of food, yet.
"—I told you, another night flight—"
Suddenly hearing a man's voice, she approached cautiously. She jumped between the shadows of trees until she reached a position where their conversation could be clearly heard.
Two guards at the village fence were talking sleepily, without any light.
"Well, you can't blame them for not wanting to stay in a place like this."
"Even so, where can they go now, dragging along a father with bad legs and back? They'll probably be killed before reaching another town. You can't properly gather tools or weapons in a place like this."
"True. Well, staying here might lead to the same result anyway. I wonder which is better: sitting and waiting for death, or clinging to a slight possibility."
"Which is it, I wonder? I hate getting tired."
It seemed to be idle chatter about the decreasing village population.
"It's the Dark Age, after all. Unless someone kills the Demon Lord, we're just going to keep dying."
"Demon Lord Louis, I wish he'd disappear soon."
The guards laughed secretly, hiya hiya hiya. But their smiles vanished quickly, and one muttered,
"…I wonder how long this will continue."
Elenoa flew away from there.
She entered the village.
Small as she was, Elenoa moved smoothly through the night darkness without being noticed.
It's less developed than I thought.
Two hundred years had passed since the era of the Royal Capital Grenole. Something should have changed by now, even if just a little. Even if this wasn't a particularly large settlement, the buildings were far too shabby.
Rather, has it regressed…?
It was nowhere near the twelve-story glass buildings of the past.
The 'Dark Age' for humans—could this be what it meant? Was the existence of Demon Lord Louis hindering human prosperity?
So what?
Humans were the ones who attacked us first.
Elenoa furrowed her brows and continued observing the settlement.
She heard a baby crying. She went around to the back of that house.
If she strained her ears, she could hear the voices inside clearly.
A couple, presumably the parents, were desperately trying to soothe a baby who was crying instinctively through the night—ungya ungya hongya—without regard for adult circumstances. Their voices sounded exhausted.
'Are you hungry? There, there, be a good child, good child, good child.'
'I even changed the diaper, so what could be wrong…'
Hongya, hongya, hongya,
'Please… please, let's go to sleep, okay?'
Hongya, hongya, hongya,
'The monsters will find us.'
'If they find us, we'll be killed.'
Hongya, hongya, hongya.
＊
Elenoa left the village and headed further south.
As she moved away from the Demon Realm, the scale of the settlements she saw grew larger, from villages to towns, and from towns to cities. While heading toward her destination little by little, she observed the humans.
Even the large cities were at a civilization level no different from Grenole.
However, only the large training grounds stood out strangely. Many humans were sweating and striving hard in their training. There were humans crying in the shadows. There was a lady looking up at the sky with eyes swollen from crying. She seemed to have lost her husband to monsters.
Surprisingly, she also found something that looked like a firearm. Bows were hardly visible, and they were training to aim at targets with guns. But there weren't many of them; swords still seemed to be the mainstream.
She also saw mages and knights, or perhaps swordsmen, conducting joint exercises.
"Don't think you can challenge the Demon Lord with just that!" "Stand up quickly." "Are you trying to die in vain?" "The Demon Lord isn't so foolish that your shitty, shoddy sword will reach him." "You're avenging your younger sister, right?" "If we don't win this battle…" "We'll get married after it's over." "Children will be born." "For the sake of future generations!" "No matter how powerful the opponent is…" "The true strength of humanity…" "Our power…" "I have nothing left to lose." "We have companions here." "Let's believe." "We must believe." "Someday we will be saved." "For a better future."
There were many voices, many tears, and strong eyes glaring toward the Demon Realm.
—.
—….
On the night of the tenth day.
She saw a land covered in rubble and ruins. It was a place devastated to the point where one might ask if it had suffered carpet bombing, invaded by sturdy trees and vines. Thinking that someone should tend to it since it was so flat, she landed there, and—
"…Ah."
She saw a familiar building. Amidst the traces of such destruction, a single house stood in a perfect state, nothing short of alien.
House of Stylus.
Which meant this area was, or rather had been, the Royal Capital Grenole.
She could only vaguely remember where the roads had been, or the location of the fishmonger she used to frequent.
She stood dumbfounded for a while. Glancing down at her feet, she saw a streetlight, twisted and snapped like a screw, lying on the ground. She wondered how it had ended up in such a shape. Elenoa knew that this had originally stood straight and firm, illuminating people's lives.
She decided to rest at the House of Stylus for the day.
When she had come here before, she had been led astray by a strange woman's voice and had been too busy chasing her own memories. But now was different. She had decided to learn more about the wider world. —So, she thought, this would be a good time for them to lend a hand.
"Hey."
In the living room of the House of Stylus, where time seemed to have stopped, Elenoa raised her voice. Into the unknown space,
"Is anyone there?"
Silence.
"Won't you show me something, like before?"
There was no answer. She asked several more times, but the mysterious woman's voice did not respond.
Elenoa could not tell if she was being mocked, or if she was being watched over with the assurance that she would be fine now.
The next morning, Elenoa woke up on the bed Louis had used. She stretched lightly and prepared to depart again—just as she was about to,
"…Somehow… huh?"
She noticed. To conserve magical power, she should have been in fairy size when she slept. But somehow, she had become human-sized.
She tried to return to fairy size, but she would not shrink.
"…Eh…?"
This was strange. Not being able to control her size was something that had never happened before. In the beginning, there were times when she would forcibly shrink when Louis's magical power ran out, but under the current circumstances, this was an impossible situation.
Her hunger was also growing stronger.
Frowning at the obvious anomaly, Elenoa departed.
Her destination from Grenole was surprisingly close.
When leaving the Demon Realm, Elenoa had said this.
'I will return to my parents' home for now.'
Parents' home. That meant the place where Elenoa, the fairy, was born.
The place where she had lived until the young boy Louis had attacked.
Players did not know where each capture target had prepared their respective clocks. They might have been handmade, bought at the market, some treasure from somewhere, or perhaps picked up.
The same applied to the Fairy's Moon Clock. It was never even mentioned where Eren, and thus Elenoa, had procured it.
She only remembered its shape. It was like a portable sundial with multiple overlapping rings. A masterpiece that was practically useless, as it could not measure time accurately except on nights of the full moon.
Indeed, if a fairy were to prepare a clock, it might be something obtainable in a place connected to fairies.
—The dwelling of fairies, the place most deeply connected to Elenoa.
Since she had considered her 'parents' home' as the first candidate, Elenoa visited that land for the first time in over two hundred years.
In a deep forest, a thirty-minute flight southeast from Grenole.
There was a giant tree that had taken root there since a thousand years ago. Numerous trunks intertwined and bundled together, stretching high into the sky as if it were a single tree. Countless branches and leaves caught the strong sunlight, casting dappled light onto the earth where it stood.
Even a single root protruding from the ground in waves was too thick to be encircled by both arms.
Centered around this tree, a fairy dwelling had formed.
This was Elenoa's birthplace. This unnamed place was, however, a reservoir of high-quality magical power.
Even now, more than a hundred fairies lived in this tree, watching Elenoa's situation. Although none of the fairies she had spent time with over two hundred years ago remained, whether they were new faces or not, if they were fairies, they were all companions.
'Companion?' 'Welcome back?'
'Companion.'
'Good work.'
She lightly greeted her unique companions with "Hello," and first circled the tree.
She spun around and around, looking up, peering into the hollows of the tree, and searched thoroughly.
No matter how much she strained her ears or focused her eyes,
"…It's not here."
The Fairy's Moon Clock was nowhere to be found.
Not here?
Then where?
She had other ideas, but—
Considering the return trip to the Demon Realm, she had no time to spare. Just as she spread her wings to hurry, the fairies swarmed around her, saying no, no, and stopped her.
'Don't go.'
'Dangerous.'
'Companion.'
"I'm happy you're worried, but sorry, I'm in a bit of a hurry."
Even as Elenoa spoke, the fairies insisted no, no, appealing to her about something.
'Companion.'
'Dangerous.'
Wondering if something was wrong, she noticed.
A fairy's finger pointed at Elenoa.
At her abdomen. And then,
'Companion.'
Huh? she thought.
Then Elenoa recalled her hunger and the issue of her body size being uncontrollable. Looking at her kin who were clamoring 'companion, companion,' she pointed at her flat stomach and asked,
"Is there a companion in here?"
'Companion.'
'There is a companion.'
'Small.'
She understood. "Heh," a pathetic sound escaped her. The wings she had spread wide moved separately to the right and left, reflecting their owner's confusion.
Her breath skipped a beat, her heartbeat became strangely fast, and although there should have been only one word floating in her chest, only "Um," came out. Her voice caught, and as she wondered what to do, why, could it be, various doubts and astonishments flashed through her mind,
and when the storm of all those thoughts subsided.
Only the pure fact remained there.
Elenoa said one word,
"Child?"
Pure fairies do not undergo physical growth, so while there is a classification of newcomers and veterans, there is no concept of children.
Therefore, 'companion'.