Tessia Eralith
I was riding on Hoofy's back. My faithful steed was immensely happy to be able to carry me through the Elshire Forest again with no pain or difficulty thanks to Corvis's invention.
Servo-Leg, right? Corvis truly always came up with the strangest of names, but I couldn't deny its brilliance. Hoofy moved with a lightness he hadn't possessed in weeks, his gait smooth and effortless, as if the leg he had lost had never been gone at all.
I leaned forward, pressing my cheek against his warm neck, and felt his contentment through his whole body. It was a small miracle, a gift from my brother that I would never stop being grateful for.
We were riding eastward, the Woods Wide Web guiding me as the Forest—Gaia, I had learned she was named—called me once more.
This time, luckily, it wasn't for some kind of emergency like in Azellio. The Forest seemed to be wanting to show me something, yes—or at least, that was how I interpreted the Woods Wide Web's message.
The sensation was different from the desperate pull of Azellio. It was gentler, more curious, like a mother leading her child by the hand to a secret she had been keeping for years.
"Princess," a voice called me. I sighed and turned just to see Lance Aya mounting her own Elenoi Highcolt, Frisian—a beautiful steed black as ebony with a mane that contrasted his skin perfectly. "Where are we going?"
The Lance had been assigned to babysit me to avoid me getting into trouble like in Azellio. Mom and Dad had decided so, and they had done the same with Corvis, assigning Lance Alea to him instead.
I understood their concern, but it still felt suffocating. Aya was always watching, always assessing, her presence a shadow I couldn't shake.
"I don't know," I replied, my voice carrying a note of frustration. "I am following the Forest."
"Following the Forest, Princess?" Aya asked back, her tone perfectly formal—the Grephin lady was always formal on the outside—but I heard the veiled tease beneath.
She was a woman of illusions, my instructor, impossible to read by anyone—even Mom and Dad—but me.
Why? Despite the Grephins being called ghosts—from that her codename as Lance Phantasm, as Dad had explained to me and Corvis—she remained an elf, she remained a daughter of the Forest.
The Woods Wide Web helped me have a better understanding of Aya; a fitting power for the Princess of Elenoir was this strange Beast Will bestowed upon me by the Forest.
"Yes, Ms. Grephin," I replied, keeping my voice steady. "I am following the Forest. Now, I am trying to concentrate here. I would like it if you remained silent."
"As you wish, Princess," Aya replied, her tone even, but I could feel her amusement like a ripple in still water.
I raised one hand and grazed a leaf from a low branch.
The Woods Wide Web immediately fed me information as we exchanged mana—my power nourishing her, her power nourishing me; the sensation was intimate, a conversation between my soul and the soul of the Forest.
Still east, I realized as we continued our path. Always east, toward the edge of the civilized world.
The eastern section of the Elshire Forest was the least inhabited part of the Kingdom of Elenoir.
The three main cities and most of the population of my family's nation lived west, closer to the Grand Mountains than to the sea east of Dicathen.
The reason for this was probably because Azellio was in the Grand Mountains, and Azellio was our birthplace. The east had been left wild, untamed, a place where the Forest reigned supreme and the touch of elven hands was rare.
This left the east of the Elshire Forest wilder than the rest, and being close to the Beast Glades only accentuated this wilderness. The trees here were older, their trunks thicker, their branches reaching higher.
The undergrowth was dense, tangled, and the air was thick with the scent of damp earth and ancient leaves. It was beautiful in a way that made my heart ache, a reminder of how much of my home I had never truly seen.
Then, through the thick trees and the bushes, we spotted a large clearing.
"That's it," I said, dismounting from Hoofy. My boots sank into the soft grass, and I felt the Forest's approval ripple through me. Aya followed suit, dismounting her steed and arriving by my side in the blink of an eye.
"A clearing?" Aya asked, again her tone didn't let anything be interpreted, but I still felt the deep teasing of her voice. She was humoring me, I realized. Treating this like a child's game.
"Yes, this is the place," I replied as I walked into the clearing. It was an old place, this clearing. Tall grass swayed in the breeze, and berry bushes dotted the edges, their fruit heavy and ripe.
Small dens of harmless mana beasts were scattered around, their occupants long gone or sleeping. It was a place that had been left alone for centuries.
Whatever its original use had been, it had stopped being that countless years ago.
Aya looked around herself, trying to understand why I had brought us here, but she saw nothing. I wouldn't have seen anything either if it wasn't for the Woods Wide Web that made me unconsciously know what to do.
This was a similar place to the Colour Timberland, only that no pack of mana beasts had started to live here. It was a sleeping giant, waiting to be awakened.
"Aya, you want to see something you would never expect?" I asked the Lance, turning a full 180 degrees toward her.
"I have seen many things in my career, Princess," Aya evenly replied. "I am not easily impressionable."
I smirked as I withdrew my wand-sword, jerking my arm backward without leaving eye contact with the Lance.
"Perfect," I said challengingly, then I sank the point of my wand-sword into the clearing's soil and, pouring mana into the ground, I uttered the command:
"Sprout!"
The soil shook. Aya tensed, preparing herself to move. I felt a sudden fear as I saw the Lance withdrawing her rapier, which I didn't even know she was carrying.
She has always taught you to keep your weapons hidden, Tessia. Of course she has one! I screamed inwardly as the Elderwood Guardian slumbering below this clearing started to awaken.
"A-Aya, it's not dangerous!" I shouted as the giant of vines and thorns emerged from the ground like a giant seed sprouting to life in a flourish of nature.
The Grephin woman stared at the S-Class mana beast that rose to its full height at the center of the clearing, assessing its surroundings after who knew how long of a deep, deep slumber.
"They're a friend, Aya!" I told the Lance. "You know the stories about the Elderwood Guardians teaching elves about the forest? I think they are true."
The Elderwood Guardian behind my back remained still as I heard his wooden head creaking downward to look at me and Aya.
It was different from the one in the Colour Timberland. This one had many flowers decorating its long arms and legs, the branches making them adorned with colorful blossoms: pink, orange, purple, and red.
It was a living wooden tapestry of the Forest's bounty.
"It doesn't seem hostile," Aya said, but while her outward appearance suggested she was calm and still, I knew she was ready to cut the—my—Elderwood Guardian in half if it even dared to make a wrong step.
And I certainly didn't want Aya to kill one of the Forest's guardians. I didn't know how they were born, but making an S-Class mana beast must have been pretty damn expensive even for Gaia.
The Lance and Elderwood Guardian stared at each other in a stalemate while I finally turned to look at the mana beast properly. Its wooden face was ancient, its eyes deep pools of moss and shadow. And yet, there was a gentleness in its gaze, a patience that spoke of millennia of watching, waiting, nurturing.
"Hey, do you have something for me?" I asked the Elderwood Guardian. The last one had given me the Beast Will of the Forest and its Acquire Phase: the Woods Wide Web.
Maybe this one would let me have the Integrate Phase, the second stage of a Beast Will, as Grandpa had taught me.
"You can speak with it?" Aya asked, her voice carrying a note of genuine curiosity.
"No, but they can understand me," I said, catching the attention of the Elderwood Guardian by gesturing wildly with my arms. "So? Do you have something for me?" I asked, raising my voice to let me be heard clearly by the flowered giant. "Your... colleague gave me the Woods Wide Web!"
The Elderwood Guardian slowly moved one arm to their chin, the movement being slow and powerful. It was thinking, I realized. Considering my request. Weighing my worthiness.
"The stories about Elderwood Guardians are mainly Sornèvaine folklore," Aya started. "To think they are truly intelligent creatures."
"I think they see us Arbèvaines as too independent from the Forest," I explained my theory to Aya. "They still help us in extreme cases, but they see us as independent from them."
"Have you told His Majesty about this?" Aya asked, and I made an embarrassed expression.
"Ehm... no," I said. "I only told Corvis. I didn't want Dad or Mom to worry. You won't tell Dad this, right?"
"I have to, Princess," Aya replied calmly.
"But! Alea never tells my parents when Corvis misbehaves!" I whined.
"Alea is a professional. She does her job her way," Aya said. "But I too, however, have my own ways to do my job, and it includes reporting everything to the King."
"Unfair..." I murmured, but I knew she was right. Aya was a Lance. Her duty was to the Crown, not to me.
Then, after what seemed like hours, the Elderwood Guardian finally decided to give me the Insight it shared.
The S-Class mana beast lowered one of its gnarled fingers and touched my forehead, pouring its mana inside my mind.
My Beast Will reacted to it, and, like a plant receiving high-quality fertilizer, I felt nourished with high-quality Insight about the secrets of my Beast Will and Gaia.
Understanding washed over my mind like pouring rain.
"I need to go to the Hallowed Hollow, Aya," I declared. "I have discovered the secrets of the Watchful Trees."