Chapter 17 unexpected encounter

"Eeepp!!" Is the sound I heard from the bush when I asked, "Who's there?"

As I notice it, it tries to run away, but with the rustling of the bush, I can roughly tell where it is.

Instinctively, I pull an arrow from my quiver and have my bow at a low ready.

As if sensing my intent, "WAIT! WAIT! DON'T ATTACK! PLEASE DON'T ATTACK!"

"Alright. Come out, and I won't attack."

"You promise?"

Seriously, you operate on promises? "Ok, yes, I promise."

"Ok, you promised! Ok! I'm coming out now!"

When the little voice emerges from the bushes, I see a small, slender girl about the size of my palm, fly out with wings that flutter not unlike that of a bee.

Her hands are held up to shoulder height, showing me that she doesn't have anything in her hands.

On her face, I can see the slightest bit of fear and a lot of nervousness on her face.

She gets no further than a few centimeters from the bush before stopping. From this distance I can make out that she has short light yellow hair and she's wearing what looks like a... bikini made of leaves?

It just looks like a leaf top with no shoulder straps and a leaf skirt that's just Barely with in school regulations.

As I now see that she's unarmed and shaking, I decide to slowly put my bow down and put my arrow back in the quiver.

At this moment, she starts shaking even more. Her lips are quivering. I think she's trying to say something, but I can't quite make it out.

C'mon. I put the bow away. That should make you feel more at ease.

Then suddenly she screams and puts her hands in front of her, firing a concentrated blast of wind at me.

In my disbelief and disappointment, I stood there and took an entire 1 damage from that attack as she started to fly away.

Sighhh... I rub my eyes.

I could use my magic on her... right now... it would be sooo easy.

I let out another sigh, before running after her.

In an instant, I caught up to her and grabbed her by her feet. Lifting her up to eye level, I just stare at her, through here eyes, directly into her soul as she tries to hold up her skirt.

Or that was what it felt like.

I am a reasonable man. I won't hold a grudge over that. So I calmed down.

Now that I can get a closer look at her, I can see she has a clip in her hair that looks like a twig keeping the front of her hair from falling. The back of her hair is tied into a small bun with a little bit flaring up at the end.

Or down in this case. She is upside down right now.

She has deep blue eyes, which are currently getting ready to tear up and possibly cry.

I can also see tiny freckles on her face, along with an open twitching mouth that signifies to me that she may start to cry at any moment now.

At this point she starts panicking. At first only making random sounds and then, screams… again… fire a shot of wind at me, again… This time directly at my face, at point blank.

I take 1 more damage and now my hair is all messy.

"Sigh... you've been following me for sometime now. What do you want?"

She continues to make random noises and shaking uncontrollably, looking like she's right there, on the brink of tears. "A..a.aaa...a.a.a.. I'M SORRY!! I won't do it again...! Papapa.. Please… don't hurt me!"

I let go of her feet and she orients herself upright again. "Who are you, and why were you following me?"

Her gaze is low while she answers. Her arms kept close to her body. "I'm... I'm a fairy of the forest... my name is Piccy."

"Um hm. And why were you following me, Piccy?"

"Ummm... well... you see...uh...."

"Um... hmm..?"

"Uh... back there... when you were helping miss elf back there... I.. I could smell something really good.. and...*grrr...*. Hup." Her stomach growls.

Even with that small body, her growl is superior to my own. I feel defeated.

But I think I know to situation now. "So you were hungry?" I reach into my bag and pull out another Wolf berry.

"Hoh!" Her eyes lights up and she starts to come closer. Sniffs the berry, with her hands clasped together in anticipation.

Then she starts reaching her hands towards the berry... and I pull it away. "Hoh! Haaa...!"

I fold my arms with the berry in hand and give her the Look, with my eye brows raised. She flashes me a smile and then pulls back a little. Again, keeping her gaze low.

What? She stalks me, and then attacks me, twice if I might add. And then expects me to give her food? Unbelievable.

As if realizing the situation she flashes me a few glances before giving me puppy dog eyes.

Huh. You really think that's gonna work on me?

I roll my eyes, "Uuuhhh… fine… here." And I hand her the berry.I am the bigger man after all.

Literally.

And I think I get her situation. So I just handed her the berry. It's not like it'll cost me that much anyway. I still have plenty more.

"Ha haaa...!!" she excitedly grabs the berry with both hands and it's weight pulls her down a little.

"Heeavyyy..." she floats it to the ground and starts eating. Looks like she is really enjoying it.

She may look small and harmless, but she is level 10 with 65Hp and 40/44Mp. If the target of that wind blast wasn't me, it might have caused some serious damage.

"So... fairy of the forest. What brings you out here, all alone and hungry?"

"Hmmm.." she gulps down the cheek full of berry. "Ummm... well, you see... eh he he. It's a verrry long story, he he..."

"Um hm?" I look at her inquisitively. With my arms folded.

"Eh he he... hoooo..." She really doesn't want to tell me the story huh?

But after realize she had no choice she gave up the pointless resistance and started speaking.

"This morning I saw some cute fluffy white bunnies outside the village and I wanted to play with them. We ran around all over the forest and had lots of fun, but before I knew it, I was in a place I didn't recognize. I tried to find my way back, but after a few hours of searching, I got hungry and collapsed. That's when I smelled something really good, so I flew towards it. When I got there I saw miss elf eating the berry." And the rest is what followed.

So after I separated with Silvia and Malakai, she followed me in hopes of getting a berry…

Uh huh. So she's just an idiot. A fairy of the forest who doesn't know her way around the forest.

But still, she was able to follow me for that long without me noticing. Even if I wasn't actively searching for her, that's still pretty impressive.

Back to the conversation, "Wow… what a long story… It was so long I think it's getting dark now." I say that sarcastically of course. The story didn't even take 3minutes.

"Well, I wish you luck in finding your way back to your village. I'll be off now. See ya." I wave her goodbye and start making my way back to town.