The night forest is filled with magic.
Luke was accumulating mana with great enthusiasm while feeling the night breeze.
It costs money at home, but at least the mana from nature is free.
Since Luke had to restrain himself at home, he planned to collect it in the forest.
“Isn’t it cold? You don’t have to stay outside, you know?”
“It’s still fine. Thank you.”
Yerna sighed inwardly as she handed Luke a paper cup filled with cocoa while he sat in front of the lodging.
She had already forgiven him.
The child didn’t do it on purpose, and he was reflecting on his actions adequately.
How could she not forgive him?
Moreover, she had heard that mana is needed to stabilize the circle.
She never imagined it would be that expensive.
‘I’m grateful for the information, but… ugh, 3 million gil is a bit hard to swallow…’
No matter if the expenditure was due to mana leakage or Luke’s overspending, it was Yerna who had to pay the money.
Since she obviously didn’t have 3 million gil to pay all at once, she decided to go for a 12-month installment plan.
Even then, it’s inevitable that it feels burdensome.
After all, it meant 3 million gil in cash was flying away.
Having a circle means that one’s body becomes a cane itself.
This means that it needs to be charged with mana like a cane.
However, Luke was an exceptionally mana-sensitive child.
Thus, the amount of mana needed to maintain that circle was immense.
‘From now on, I absolutely can’t collect it at home…’
Yerna thought that having a child would incur various costs, but the mana fees were truly unexpected.
At this rate, it would definitely be impossible to leave him in a facility.
There were no facilities that would spend this much mana on a single orphan every month.
‘From now on, should I bring him to the forest more often to feed him mana…?’
Yerna thought that this was currently the best option.
While pondering these thoughts, Luke said as if to himself, “Ah. It’s a firefly.”
A green light floating in the air.
It could be considered quite beautiful.
However, the first emotion that came to Yerna was puzzlement.
“How strange, fireflies in winter.”
“Right? It’s a curious thing.”
Luke nodded in agreement.
Fireflies were insects usually seen in late spring or summer.
“But they say that fireflies that appear unexpectedly have been the ‘messengers’ of spirits since ancient times.”
“Hmm, really?”
Yerna, who was curious about which fairy tale that came from, played along, while Luke extended his hand and continued.
“Or do you not know? Elves were originally friends with various spirits, weren’t they?”
If it were the elves of the era Luke lived in 5,000 years ago, they were the species with a high affinity for spirits among the intelligent races and were the closest to them.
Thus, Luke’s expression was confused at Yerna’s apparent ignorance of this fact, and Yerna hastily replied.
“Y-Yeah! Haha, I just… I forgot about that.”
The elves’ closeness to spirits is a common theme in fairy tales.
It was clear that Luke, who loved fairy tales, thought that as an elf, she should be quite familiar with spirits.
In today’s world, spirits had also hidden away from the world.
Such fairy-tale events as spirits retrieving a knight’s sword that fell into the water no longer occurred.
Previously, Yerna had thought she had shattered Luke’s childlike innocence, and this time she promised herself not to make the same mistake.
No matter how much she said that the spirits had become hidden even from elves in this era.
Luke nodded in response to Yerna’s words.
“Well, I might have just forgotten for a moment. Indeed, elves probably don’t require messengers. They can just speak directly.”
Right.
Messengers are used only when there are spatial constraints or when one has low mana affinity and cannot see directly. Elves likely wouldn’t need messengers that much.
So it made sense that an elf might not know about fireflies.
Having come to that conclusion, Luke asked Yerna.
“Then do you have any spirits you’ve built a friendship with?”
Yerna barely concealed her surprise at Luke’s question and spoke as if it were an excuse.
“Umm, haha. But I haven’t really contacted my spirit friend lately, so I don’t know…!”
“Contact…? Hmm, is that so…?”
Are spirits entities that require something like human contact?
That shouldn’t be the case…
It felt strange, but since Luke didn’t have an affinity for spirits either, he had no idea how conversation with spirits proceeded.
Luke thought that Yerna, an elf who was supposed to have spirit friends, would at least know more about them than he did, and he turned his gaze back to the dancing green light in front of him.
At that moment, Yerna remembered how Luke had tried to catch a laser light earlier and wondered if he was going to try to catch the firefly as well, so she advised him.
“Luke, if you try to catch a firefly with your hands, it will smell bad.”
Fireflies have an organ called ‘citrin’ that emits a strong foul odor when threatened.
Yerna, who had lived in the forest as a child, had a vividly recollected memory of having been caught off guard by it.
Of course, Luke knew this fact too.
Fireflies existed even 5,000 years ago.
“I know well. I’m not trying to catch it forcefully, so don’t worry.”
“Really?”
Luke extended his finger like he was inviting a butterfly to land.
Unlike the laser, which he had never seen before, fireflies were creatures that had been around for 5,000 years.
Thus, there was no sense of curiosity or an uncontrollable desire to catch them.
However, there was a different instinct stimulating Luke compared to that of a cat.
‘Is this also an instinct…?’
Yet it was entirely different from the chaotic instinct of a cat; this was an instinct related to mana manipulation.
How to move mana, the clarity with which it appeared in his mind, was truly surprising.
However, it wasn’t his body moving on its own; it was merely that a mana arrangement came to mind.
So this time, curiosity outweighed the fear associated with instinct.
What would happen if he operated mana according to this arrangement?
‘Theoretically, it doesn’t seem to be a particularly dangerous arrangement… Maybe I should give it a try.’
Using the knowledge he possessed, Luke roughly calculated the potential outcome, and since it wasn’t exactly an aggressive mana arrangement, he felt curious enough to try it and see what would happen.
Soon, as Luke instinctively arranged mana at the tip of his finger and released it, a firefly flew in front of him, flaunting its tail light, and lightly landed on Luke’s finger.
Seeing that, Yerna seemed slightly surprised and said, “A firefly flew onto a person’s finger. Must be a brave little one.”
“That might be true.”
Was it a mana arrangement that attracted fireflies?
Luke thought that it could be a way to summon spirits, which left him a bit disappointed, yet there was nothing he could do about it.
Still, the sight of the light extinguishing at the end of its tail while resting on his fingertip was quite refreshing and beautiful, so Luke quietly stared at it close up.
‘Come to think of it, I’ve never seen a living firefly this closely before.’
Fireflies had a connection to spirits but were not closely related to magic, so Luke had never had the opportunity to look at them like this.
The only memories he had were of glancing at preserved insects.
But now, he had a sudden thought that it was quite marvelous that there was a magical arrangement glowing at the end of an insect’s tail.
And Yerna thought that this scene resembled a moment from a fairy tale.
She gently patted Luke’s head and said, “It’s beautiful, Ru.”
“Ah, right, it’s quite a beautiful light.”
‘Oh, what I meant was that you are beautiful,’ Yerna thought, and she unintentionally spoke those words out loud.
“No, what I mean is, our Ru is really beautiful.”
That was Yerna’s hope that Luke wouldn’t feel guilty about this incident and would regain his confidence like before.
However, Luke, without time to contemplate Yerna’s feelings, felt quite burdened and even goosebumps at the fact that the adjective “beautiful” was attached to him.
He was mortified, more than was appropriate for his age.
“W-What are you saying? Please, don’t ever say such things again!”
As Luke shouted in embarrassment, the sudden noise startled the firefly, causing it to flutter away.
Emitting a foul odor from its citrin.
“Ugh…”
Due to that, Luke’s finger was now filled with an extreme stench, and he grimaced. When Yerna, who had been momentarily startled by Luke’s shout, hurriedly glanced at Luke’s expression, it appeared as if he had heard something he definitely shouldn’t have.
And seeing that horrified expression, Yerna began to think that maybe that wasn’t something to dislike so much.
Perhaps, it was because he was unsatisfied with his appearance.
A cute appearance could only be valued as just a commodity for a slave after all.
Maybe that’s why he didn’t like his appearance.
“Ah, sorry… If it’s that unpleasant, I won’t say it again.”
“Uh… If you could do that, I would really appreciate it.”
Luke, having said that, moved his fingertip away from his nose, relaxing his expression.
He wondered if it was necessary to have such a dark expression just for saying he shouldn’t call him beautiful, but perhaps it was a good thing.
Trying to forget the terrible smell, Luke brought the now-cold cocoa to his mouth.
But Yerna thought that she wanted to treat Luke kindly enough that he could wash away this trauma.
It’s too sad for such a cute child to live with the trauma of being called beautiful.
She hoped that Luke would realize later that he truly is cute.
And so, both of them harbored completely different thoughts as yet another day passed.
