Adventure (2)
When the troll brought its club down for the first time, Ariel raised an arm and blocked. It hadn't been intentional. She had been absorbed in watching the fairy, and when the club came in she simply threw an arm up on reflex.
A heavy boom shook the air, and the wind blasted outward around them. The troll's club had probably struck with considerable force. It did nothing to Ariel. She felt it meet her arm, and that was all—no pain, no wound, no damage whatsoever. Given the number on her Defense, the result was only reasonable.
Her Defense was infinite. Getting hurt by a club a troll had swung would have defied all reason.
"Kuwok?"
"Huh?"
The troll and the fairy both made thoroughly vacant noises. Ariel, who ought to have been reduced to paste, was standing there perfectly intact, and the sight left them rattled.
The troll hoisted its club again, and the fairy shouted at her once more to run.
Ariel lifted her gaze and watched the club come down. The force behind it was dreadful, but it still wouldn't harm her. Nothing the troll did could. Even so, she decided to move. Defense was proven. Now it was time to confirm her attack.
An instant before the club could connect, Ariel vanished, leaving only an afterimage—a speed approaching that of sound. Agility was infinite as well, so she could move at whatever speed she pleased.
The club crashed down into the space she had left.
BOOM!
It must have put more strength into the swing this time. The roar was louder than before, and the ground caved in.
"Keh-keh-keh."
The troll's shoulders shook as it laughed, certain that this time the little elf had been mashed into a bloody pulp. Had its intelligence been even slightly higher, it might have realized the club had caught nothing at all, and found that strange. But a troll was a monster of very low intelligence. Drooling at the thought of tasting the little elf was about all it could manage.
It waved a hand and swept the dust aside, and the spot where the club had landed lay bare. Nothing was there. Only a sunken dent in the earth.
"Kuwok?"
The troll was even more bewildered than before. Last time, odd as it was that she was unhurt, the little elf had at least still been standing in place. This time she had vanished without a trace. To a dim-witted troll, it was nothing short of magic.
It rolled its huge eyes this way and that, searching for the little elf, and soon found her. Somehow she was already up in a tree, looking down at the troll with the same blank face as when they had first met.
The troll grew angry. It wanted to eat the little elf this very instant, and the fact that things refused to go its way was infuriating.
Vicious Roar
KRAAAAAH!
Bellowing its specialty, the troll charged the little elf.
Even watching it come, she didn't flinch. She simply waited for it to close in, drew her arm back, and drove her fist forward.
To the troll, that fist looked tiny. Being hit by something so small wouldn't even tickle—and a troll's hide was tough even among monsters. Ordinary weapons couldn't so much as scratch it. The troll found the gesture not merely laughable, but almost cute.
That was its last thought.
With a meaty smack, the troll's head ceased to exist.
A red rain fell through the fresh green forest. Soft chunks, and things like bone, were mixed into the downpour. It was what happened when a troll's head disappeared. The liquid pouring down was blood. The soft chunks were brain.
Standing in the red rain, Ariel thought back over the moment just past. After dodging the descending club, she had climbed a nearby tree, waited for the troll to come close, and thrown a punch. She hadn't adjusted her strength. She had simply thrown a reasonably ordinary punch. The force, however, was beyond imagination. The instant her fist connected, the troll's head burst like a watermelon. Headless, it collapsed in a heap and did not move again.
Ariel was certain. Her attack power was definitely infinite as well.
She had confirmed what she needed to confirm. It was time to set out on the adventure again.
"W-wait! Just a moment!"
She was about to walk on when a voice came from behind. It was the fairy from earlier.
"You're just going to leave, miss? We're both folk of the same forest. Practically relatives, you know. Please get me out of here!"
The fairy was desperate. If Ariel left like this, there was no telling what would become of him. Trapped in a magic cage with no way out, he would most likely rot away in friendly company beside the troll's corpse.
"I'm begging you, miss!"
At first he had called her an elf brat, and casually at that. Looking at her now, she was an overwhelmingly powerful miss. Bursting a troll's head with a single punch—he had never seen such a thing. He had never even heard of it.
Trolls were harder to kill than ogres, because of the regeneration peculiar to their kind. Ordinary wounds closed in no time, so the best way to take one down was to kill it in a single blow. But was that an easy thing? Countless people had aimed for a troll's head only to be caught and turned into a meal, or been struck by a swinging club and died on the spot with their bodies bent at grotesque angles. Ariel had dodged the club at a speed the eye couldn't follow, then dropped the troll in one blow with a lightly thrown fist. Promoting her from brat to miss was only natural.
Inside the magic cage, the fairy even went through the motions of a formal bow, but Ariel's reaction was utterly flat. She had meant to let him out anyway, even without all that. It wasn't difficult.
Ariel took hold of the cage door. In that instant she felt something like resistance.
"Miss, there's a spell on this door. Are you a mage, by any chance?"
Ariel nodded. Her class, at any rate, was mage.
"Perfect!"
The fairy clapped.
"Then first you'll have to dispel the magic. That's the only way the door will open! Humans, honestly—what possesses them to make something like this..."
Ariel simply pulled on the door. She was a mage, but she didn't know how to dispel magic. Force was the only option.
Crack. Crrrack!
The spell on the cage shattered, and the door tore free.
"Eh...?"
The fairy blinked, startled. There had been no sign of Ariel dispelling anything. She had ripped it open by force. Not even the troll had managed that.
"So force... was possible."
Scratching his head, the fairy slipped out of the magic cage. Then he shot upward and began circling Ariel in tight loops. In his own mind he was flying with elegant grace, showing off his beauty. To Ariel's eyes he just looked like a gnat.
"Anyway, up close you're really beautiful, miss. You're small now, but when you grow up I bet you'll be a stunning beauty."
The fairy hovered in her face and kept talking.
"I'm Lou! May I know your name, miss?"
"Ariel."
"Miss Ariel! A pleasure to meet you! Killing that troll just now was incredible! That brute hung me from his belt for days, and he was so rude! He even dragged me along when he went to relieve himself, so—"
Fairies were chatty by nature, but this one was chatty to an extreme. Ariel let Lou's words wash past her and started walking. She still had an adventure to get back to.
Then Lou caught the collar of her clothes.
"Miss! You can't mean to just go like this? That troll's corpse is worth quite a lot! Not as much as a fairy, but it should fetch a decent price. Leaving it to rot like that would be such a waste!"
Ariel stopped and glanced at the corpse. That thing was worth a decent amount?
"Mm... but moving a hulk like that on your own would be too much after all, miss. If you could at least take a little of the blood..."
While Lou muttered, Ariel trudged over to the troll's corpse and casually reached out a hand. Unable to make sense of what she was doing, Lou tilted his head.
"Miss? What are you—"
In the next instant, the corpse vanished without a trace.
"Whoa!"
Lou's eyes went wide as saucers.
"H-how did that happen?"
All Ariel had done was put the corpse into her Inventory, but to Lou it was beyond comprehension. Then again, if it was magic, perhaps it was possible. A fairy's only ability was scattering powder, so he didn't know much—but magic ought to be capable of any number of outrageous things.
Not long ago, that was something the human mage who had captured Lou had said. At the time it had sounded like nonsense, but now it seemed about right. Not that it had done the man much good. Less than an hour after he said it, the troll ate him.
"Miss, where are you headed now?"
Lou asked, wings fluttering.
"Do you have a purpose, by any chance?"
Ariel answered, staring off into the empty distance.
"Adventure."
At that single short word, Lou's body began to sparkle. Adventure! What a thrilling word! Adventure was Lou's purpose too. The fairy village was peaceful, but dull, and unable to bear the dullness he had run away—to adventure across the world. Wandering alone, though, was dangerous for a fairy. He had been admiring flowers in the forest when a human mage caught him almost at once. It happened a single day after he had boldly fled the village.
"Miss! Please take me with you!"
Lou went through another bow in midair.
"I may not look it, but I'm quite useful! You know, don't you? Fairy Powder has all kinds of abilities! If you get hurt, I can heal you. I can let you fly. I can even put you into a comfortable sleep! So please, let me join your adventure!"
Ariel looked at Lou with a blank face. On the outside she seemed entirely unmoved, but inside she was rather interested. Of course, a fairy's Healing Powder and Sleep Powder would be of little use to her. Infinite Defense meant she had no reason to get hurt, and she slept just fine besides. Flight Powder, though, interested her. She had wanted to fly through the sky at least once.
"Flight Powder."
Ariel held out a hand to Lou. She meant for him to give her the powder.
A delighted smile spread across Lou's lips.