In the One-Eyed Village, the Two-Eyed...
The elves were less a nation than a tribal people — clans gathered together to live as one.
Their lifespans far outstripped those of humans. A thousand years was nothing; to be considered truly long-lived, an elf had to push past three thousand. Set against a human average of fifty to seventy years, they were, for all their similar appearance, an entirely different species.
With so much life still ahead of them, they tended toward leisure, and put little urgency into the business of propagation. The result was that if you picked any two elves living in the Great Forest and traced their bloodlines far enough, you would almost always find a common ancestor. In a sense, they were all one big extended family.
That kinship left little room for class disputes — no one was especially noble, no one especially base. The prevailing view was simply that every elf was great and noble by nature.
There was, however, one exception. One bloodline that even elves could call truly exalted.
The royalty chosen by the World Tree.
Rooted in the myth that the World Tree itself had selected a representative for the elves, the royal line had been elevated as kings and queens of the Great Forest for over ten thousand years of elven history. Because the World Tree had ordained the bloodline, resistance was rare; the elves had lived more or less peacefully under their rule, without a single rebellion.
"And you're saying that the Third Princess — the first royal blood born in roughly five hundred years — is the one who drew this crest?"
"Yes—! *slurp* That's why Lio and I were ordered to scout human territories for a suitable place to settle! *smack* But this soup is seriously delicious! Meat and milk are so hard to come by in the forest — this is amazing!"
"Ah… I see. Let's finish the meal first, then continue."
"Yes—! *slurp* One more bowl, please!"
Freya interrupted Darian mid-intimidation — he had been leaning hard on Tene's presence — and suggested they at least offer their guests a proper meal. The trembling, terrified figure from moments before vanished without a trace; Shalle threw herself at the food with single-minded devotion, talking with her mouth full until Freya gently cut her off and told her to eat first.
"By the way, aren't elves supposed to eat only plants? That soup has milk and butter in it, doesn't it?"
Watching Shalle demolish her meal, Rosaria leaned over and murmured to Felix beside her. Tene, whose mere presence had sent both elves into repeated fits of panic, was currently waiting alone in another room, looking thoroughly dejected.
"There's a scene in the original where one of the protagonist's companions asks an elf the same thing. Apparently not. Their staple is forest fruit because they live in the woods, and every elf receives the forest's blessing — so as long as they're in the forest, they could survive on dew alone."
Felix answered with knowledge gleaned from reading Starlight of Dawn.
"Hmph. And where does a mere human pick up something like that? How curious that you know."
"Huh? You could hear us just now?"
"Do not underestimate elven hearing, human."
Lio, who had been watching Shalle stuff her cheeks with open disapproval, pricked his long ears and cut into the siblings' quiet conversation.
"We noble elves, unlike you humans, need never worry about food — not with the miracle the World Tree has granted us. There is no need to savagely destroy beautiful nature and forest, to raise livestock, or to despoil the land without restraint."
"Which is why the food tastes terrible. But how do humans make something this delicious? I wish we elves would learn a thing or two…"
"Shalle! Have you no elven pride?!"
While Tene had been present, Lio had spent most of his time face-down on the floor. The moment she left, he had puffed himself up with a smug sneer — only for Shalle, who had already scraped the last of her soup onto a piece of bread and polished it off with gusto, to fire right back. He exploded.
"Pride, schmide~ Someday I'm leaving the forest entirely. I'm going to adventure through the human world and eat every kind of food there is! That's why I volunteered for this mission!"
"…Tsk. I truly cannot stand it. Even if she is a princess, to force her will through sheer authority and shatter tradition like this… How did she even persuade the Council of Elders in the first place?"
"I know, right? I'm curious about that too. How did she win over those old fossils?"
"Even with a royal family, does the Council of Elders hold more power?"
"Yes. Even royalty can't simply override the opinions of those ancient elders."
Shalle, finished with her meal, was bantering with Lio when Freya smoothly joined the conversation and asked about the Council. The elders were not royalty, yet they wielded power no royal could ignore. They did not use that power for tyranny; rather, they preserved the traditions and culture handed down through the ages, serving as advisors and checks on whoever sat the throne. Living witnesses to the elven race itself — and thoroughly conservative.
And yet that same Council had authorized direct contact with the human world. Even Freya and her family found it hard to gauge just what kind of person this Third Princess truly was.
After finishing their meal and a light round of questioning, Freya showed the elves to a guest room, then gathered the family for a private discussion.
"The Third Princess… In the end, everything connects through her."
"What are you thinking?"
"I want to make contact, at least. The theory that some unrelated person simply possessed her and used the crest is persuasive enough on its own — but something about it keeps catching in my mind."
Freya was, by nature, the sort who gathered information and evidence and approached every situation with logic and reason. That she was now citing something as unscientific and flimsy as a gut feeling only underscored how unusual this whole affair had become.
"So you want to go meet her in person?"
"That's the dilemma. From what those two said, the elves planned to hide their identities entirely and establish a foothold in the human world. If we show up having already seen through them, they'll either deny everything or dig in defensively."
"Exactly. One wrong move and we could spark a political conflict between humans and elves. Acting rashly could be disastrous."
"Ugh…! We finally have a clue that could solve the whole puzzle right in front of us…! Why is this so frustrating?!"
"Isn't there some way?"
But the person holding the key to every unanswered question was an elven princess, sitting at the very heart of the Great Forest. The whole family clutched their heads. It felt like finally finding a ring of keys that could open a locked door — only to discover there were so many keys that guessing the right one was impossible.
Then—
"Why don't we just take Tene with us? We're bringing a dragon. What are they gonna do about it?"
Rosaria mumbled around a mouthful of buttery cookie, snorting.
"Just roll up with a nuclear bomb and yell, 'Send out your boss!' They'll come out. Right?"
"I'd rather be treated as something noble and, you know, revered — not like some walking hazard!"
"Dream on. Didn't you see how those two elves reacted? If you just fly over the Great Forest in your original form, the whole place will foam at the mouth and pass out."
"Haaah…"
It had been a half-joking remark tossed out in frustration, partly to tease Tene, who sat gloomily chewing cookies at the side of the table.
"…Going in simple might not be such a bad idea."
"Ooh…? I like this. Just charging in is easier!"
"Hmm… Looking at how dragons are treated both in the original and here, it actually seems like a solid approach. Elves almost never invite humans into their settlements anyway, so if we don't do something like this, we have no other options."
"So how do we get there?"
"I've been studying light-element magic lately. It'll take some time, but if I can construct a proper magic circle, we can travel while staying hidden. Using Tene as the medium means mana consumption won't be an issue either… We make Tene invisible, climb on, and fly."
"Uh… guys?"
"That way we can conceal the dragon's identity and still make the trip quickly. Still, leaving the estate empty means we'll need to wrap up our current priorities first and free up some time. Looks like the next few days will be busy."
"Drawing a magic circle large enough for that body will require somewhere out of sight."
"Then we can use that forest where Tene was camping rough. Few people around — short-term, no risk of exposure."
"Hold on. Are we actually doing this?"
"But we're seriously just going to ride on that dragon head? Is that even safe?"
"At that altitude we'll be dealing with subzero temperatures, thin air, and low pressure, so I'll need to set up a barrier and stabilize the interior with a formula."
"It's not that hard, actually. Flight magic has been refined for ages — I can pull a few solid references and adapt them quickly enough."
"Really? Then there shouldn't be a problem."
"No, wait?! Hello?! Isn't this conversation moving a little too fast?!"
What had started as a casual joke was being taken dead seriously. Rosaria, who had been snickering, and Tene, who had been pouting and telling them not to, both went wide-eyed with pupil-trembling shock as the rest of the family barreled ahead with the plan, their mouths working soundlessly.
"No time to waste. We need to sweet-talk those two into guiding us right now. Come on, let's go!"
"Huh? W-wait…! What?!"
Darian shot to his feet, scooped Tene up so she dangled in midair, and strode straight out of the room. Suspended from his grip with her legs kicking uselessly, Tene wore a thoroughly blank expression, glancing back at Rosaria as if she still had no idea what was happening.
A short while later—
@>#!?#!~#!@!~!!?##!~!!!?#!~#!
AE!~FKWM!!FML!O!!!#!
Even though the guest room was a considerable distance away, a scream erupted with enough force to punch clean through the intervening space.
"Done. Whether it's the Great Forest or the Great Forest Bun, they said they'll take full responsibility and guide us there."
"Is this… is this really okay…?"
Darian returned with Tene still dangling from his hand, looking thoroughly pleased with himself as he flashed a thumbs-up.
"Excellent. In that case, I'll quickly hand over everything that needs handling while I'm gone to Gordon, Curmon, and my knight, Dame Fenril."
"Then I'll check over the spells we'll need and start drafting the formulas."
"I've got nothing left to do, so I'm going to go work out."
With that, the three of them wrapped up the discussion and hurried out to attend to their respective tasks.
"So, uh… you okay?"
"Noona… I did not need to know that elves walk like Dragoons when they're that terrified…"
"…."
"Noona. Your family. They're terrifying…"
"I'm scared too."
Left alone in the room, Tene shuffled over looking as if her soul had been vacuumed out of her body. Rosaria wore much the same hollow expression as she offered Tene a piece of cookie in consolation.
They say that in a village of one-eyed people, the two-eyed ones are the abnormal ones.