"My god, you startled me!" she said.
"Sorry, it's just… in the last 3 minutes, there's too much for me to handle."
"Oh… like what?"
"Being in a cage, seeing a fantasy woman, being blinded for a bit, seeing magic… a lot for me to handle."
It was true. I just couldn't understand what happened in the last few minutes.
"Oh, this is not magic. It's just one of my blessing skills. Translated to our language it's something like: Earth let the hard become soft let metal be paper. Or something like that. It's just a blessing I got when I reached the RANGER rank."
"Ranger? What's that? And wait, a blessing like from praying to god?"
"No not from praying to god. We get the blessings from the guild. And Ranger is a rank you can get at the guild."
Guild… Am I in a fantasy world? Isn't this a dream? But first the most important question right now!
"So who are you anyway?"
"I am Pandora, short Pan. Pandora Mourait."
"And what race are you? I mean you do have pointy ears."
"Ah, these?" She showed her ears. "I am half. Half human and half-elf."
Elf? Did I hear right?
"Did you say elf right now?"
"Yeah? And by the way… what is your name?"
"Samantha Reese, short Sam", I answered despite being still in shock.
"So next important question… Where is this?"
"You don't know where this is? Then why are you here?"
This naivety… it's adorable. She should instead ask why I was in a cage, not that I can answer…
"I was here when I woke up. And as you maybe remember I said I can't see anything and didn't know if there were any other persons here… So no I don't know where this is."
"Right, I totally forgot. Well… we are in the Idite Forest right now. And this cave is about halfway to the middle of the forest. I can bring you out of here if you want."
"If you can… of course. Thank you."
She got me out of the cage and suddenly I noticed a big problem. Normally I'm only for about an hour in this dream – I should call it a world – and then I wake up… But what if I don't wake up this time or if I wake up after months.
I panicked. Pan noticed my behavior and took me in her arms. She was a bit shorter than me. It had to look funny. But it helped I calmed down. I wonder if this is one of her blessings too?
"Pan?"
"Yeah?"
"I will come with you. Can you take me to a city?"
"Of course I will. But before that, we need to do something about your appearance. You won't get access like this." She had to chuckle.
"What?" I was perplexed. What's wrong with my appearance? I looked down and immediately understood. I only wore rags. Not even shoes. I asked myself again and again, how I didn't notice something.
"Yeah ok I understand what you mean. But where do we get some clothing if we can't get into a city?"
"I have some." She said and I saw a white shine and suddenly there were clothes in her hands.
"They could be a bit short but we'll make it possible." She grinned and I just nodded.
After a while, we finally had something that remotely fit. It was a red shirt or blouse and brown shorts. For shoes, I had to go with some leather boots. She had nothing else.
"Really thank you very much. I wouldn't know what to do if you weren't there."
"You would have found someway anyhow. So don't be too thankful. If fate wills it anything can happen.
And so our adventure began. (Will I ever see my mother again?)