I leaned my head back against the tree branch, tugging my hood lower to keep my face in shadow. It was definitely spring, considering the pink blooms surrounding my chosen spot for lunch—it kind of reminded me of an oversized plum tree, though its description said it produced 'star tear fruits.' Considering it was overlooking a river near a bridge, I was wondering if Gaellia had a version of Vega and Altair's story floating around.
The Garden of Naiads really was a nice little grotto that Jonas suggested all those weeks ago before I had to fight a wind drake and accidentally flattened half a town. The apprentice mapmaker managed to survive with his master, having run into the brunet about two weeks ago. We had met eyes and he either did not realize it was me that exploded the drake or was keeping mum about it.
Either way, I appreciated Jonas's discretion since I had no one come up to me to demand me to fix all the buildings I broke.
Removing the crumbs from my fingers, I took an apple out of my Inventory and started slicing the fruit with wind magic. It was a highly technical use of mana for such a utilitarian use but the application was excellent fine-control practice.
Splashing water was heard.
Turning my head slightly, I saw the water nymphs who had been frolicking gathered under the branch I lounged on. Sitting up, I looked down at the giggling magical beings that looked like naked young women with long hair that ranged from black to a green-blue shade, their skin paler than my own.
The hulder, one of the races involved in the creation of Crown City.
"Cousin, will you not share with us?" one of them giggled, speaking in a more underwater-orientated magical dialect. The accent translated itself to be very bubbly and erratic, much like the element.
Sitting up while taking care to not let either of my legs dangle off the branch—they were questionably safe but I'd rather not give them the opportunity to challenge the impression—I levitated a slice of apple cut into a purple bunny.
"You like apples?" I asked in elvish since speaking a magical language of any kind killed my throat.
"Yes. The star tears of this tree are very good. You should try some when they bear fruit in a few weeks."
I simply hummed as I directed the sliced apples to the crowd of hulder. Taking more apples out, since I ended up buying a bushel of them when I ate the ones I bought into the city with me, I started being designated apple-peeler.
A part of me envied how these hulder can boldly let their milk-white skin glisten from the high noon sun hitting their damp skin. I would be sunburnt within the hour. (And yeah, they were nice eye candy I was going to treat with respect.)
This was a nice break after going through a large section of the Library. One thing for certain—other than my more finely-tuned control over mana, my being Level 98 definitely increased my reading speeds. I also seemed to have sleeping as being an optional activity.
It really felt like the changes were mostly mental. Sure, I could move quicker and hit harder, but that was active manipulation of internal mana to achieve it. I'm pretty sure I'm still fairly squishy.
"Don't you want to swim with us, Cousin?"
I smiled and laughed awkwardly, standing on the branch. "Haha… no thanks, I got to go now, enjoy your snack!"
Exiting the out of way grotto, I started heading back to the Library, stretching my arms as I walked—
—I quickly flickered onto a roof.
After a moment, I carefully peeked at the group that startled me and resisted the urge to laugh a little nervously. Yup, I would recognize Captain Grine anywhere.
[Nori, why don't we check on the emergency conference?]
"Ugh," I rolled my eyes. 'For the last time, no,' I replied to a question 37 has asked me multiple times ever since that meeting began.
I decided to take to the rooftops from now on instead of walking the streets where I might run into the Aure City contingent.
Well, Captain Grine still made me very nervous, but her relaxed stance and facial expressions did reassure me that the fallout from everything seemed to turn out well enough.
"I need to go or Professor Hannigan will skin my hide!"
I moved aside as Squirrel Guy rushed out of the building before walking up to a rather exasperated looking Elin that was, for once, without a book in hand. A man was next to the librarian and he said parting words to her which she returned before walking off himself.
"What's up?"
"Tillian was just throwing far-fetched theories of who the Hero of Pearltower might be."
"'Hero?'" I parroted before the name of the town registered and I suddenly became a bit nervous.
That was the name of the town I was in before arriving in Crown City, having only found out after looking at a map.
"Pearltower was a garrison town south-west of here. Captain Reinhardt, a rather famous knight in Westria, went out with the troops to subjugate a wind drake that was picking off farmers near the area. From the surviving soldiers, Captain Reinhardt was apparently eaten whole which cause the troops to panic.
"They led the wind drake back to Pearltower and the town would have been a goner if not for a passing magician killing the wind drake and saving everyone. So now everyone is looking for the Hero that defeated the wind drake since Heroes tend to be fairly rare."
For fuck's sake.
[The citizens seem grateful?]
I ignored the AI and turned my head away and faked a cough. "Ah, yeah," I said while unable to maintain eye contact with Elin, "they're probably rare because they get themselves killed by their heroics."
"True."