The young man that was standing in front of us gave off a familiar feeling as if I seen him somewhere before but I couldn’t put my finger on it. He looked at Glad and Scarlett and then his gaze have fallen on me, I could feel something weird crawling inside my body as if hundreds of small ants were running around on it.

But before I could even react I could hear something *snap*, not sure where that sound came from or what it was but it sounded as if the sound came from my head even though I didn’t have a head, the weird feeling immediately disappeared after it.

Just as the weird feeling disappeared the man held his head with his left hand while having an unpleasant look on his face as if he got a sudden headache, I could even swear that a little of blood have dripped out of his nose.

Young Elf:”What a weird monster…” He murmured, but I only was able to understand one word from it a monster, he changed his gaze back to Glad.

Glad:”It’s a great honor meeting a high-elf.” He said as he gave a small bow his usual smile had a little bit of a surprise to it, Scarlett didn’t utter a single word and only nodded her head as a greeting.

Young elf:”We are the head of this village, we guess thee came for business, what is that thee desire?”

Glad:”We are members of the New Order, we have acquired weird rumors of the power decline of the Great Spirit.” Glad gaze changed to a serious and his smile vanished, he drew out the white stone that was presented to the guards before.

The young elf gave the white stone a fast look and murmured something to himself it was so quiet that I was sure that no one of us could hear it.

Young Elf:”We should talk inside, but before that can we ask what is that monster that is following thee.” His gaze fell on me once again and I could feel some hostility from it.

Glad:”Oh this is a really intelligent monster that we captured not far away from here, most likely one of the samplings of one of the followers.” Glad smile returned yet again.

Young elf:”That’s not a sapling of a follower that we can say for sure, we hope you understand that be bringing something like that to the village is little unsettling.” I could understand another word this time it was unsettling.

“Is this my new owner? Unsettling why I am so unsettling? Is it because I am a monster, and what followers are they talking about?” I started to understand that this rich young elf wasn’t so keen on me.

Glad:”Don’t worry as I said before this small monster is really intelligent and friendly as well.” This time another word popped up it was friendly but for whatever reason, the hostility of the young elf didn’t change.

“I will be protected here, no monster will get into the village and people here wouldn’t hurt me for no reason so I will be safe… but being a pet its a little.” After considering the positives and negatives of being a pet of an elf I came to a conclusion, it’s better to be safe and secured behind a think wall without freedom than being free while living each day on the edge of a knife.

“Friendly, I really need to show to him that I am friendly or he won’t accept me…” I started to pluck some berries from my body and handed them to him as I did in the past to Scarlett, I didn’t know if I would escape from this village in the future but I knew for sure that being sold to some rich youngster as a pet wouldn’t be so bad.

Glad:”See.” He released another smile as he said that.

But for my surprise not only did the gaze of the young elf didn’t softer his eyes showed, even more, caution than before.

Young Elf:”Fine, but if we see this little monster running in the village freely or it would try to dare to hurt someone in our village, not only would it be killed as well the New Order won’t be welcomed in this village anymore.” The young elf said with a threatening tone.

Glad:”Don’t worry I am giving my word that nothing bad will happen because of this little fellow, and he won’t be able to roam around freely at all because he is bounded with a monster binding rope.” He said with confidence.

The young elf pondered while looking at the rope and entered the house, we followed after him.

The house insides were in a circular shape, there was quite a lot of space. The first floor was spread open and had only a few rooms, the biggest room was the living room, the ceiling was at least four meters from the floor. In the middle of the room, there was a huge bloody red circular table that reminds of a roundtable of Arthur knights, for some reason its color gave me a really unpleasant feeling that I couldn’t shrug off no matter what I did.

The kidnapper duo sat around it while the young elf went to bring something from the kitchen. I looked around the living room with a dazzling look, it was my first being inside someone’s house. As I looked around I saw few paintings on the walls, many bookshelves full of books, and few flowers and plants scattered around the room.

After few minutes the young elf came back with a tea pot and a few cups, as he came back I sat on one of the chairs, he send a scary gaze at my direction seeing as something dirty sat on one of his chairs.

“Man he really dislikes me…” I though to get down from the chair but thinking it through it’s better to show how smart I am and give few points to myself.

Glad saw that the young elf was glaring at me but he didn’t do anything and only smiled like always. The young elf started to talk as he poured the tea into three cups.

Fortis:”We call ourself Fortis currently we are the head of the village and as you said before we are indeed a high-elf, may we know your names adventures of the New Order.” I didn’t notice before but surprisingly every word the young elf said, had some kind of magical power to it as if it was made to be pleasant to the ear.

“For some reason, it’s really easy to me to understand when someone says a name, it’s like I just know that it’s not a word in their language.” I now knew the rich youngster’s name.

Glad:”Nice to meet you Fortis my name is Glad and this is Scarlett, as said before we came from the Deres country as the members of the New Order for the concerns of the weakening of the elf race.” He said with a serious tone.

Fortis:”Hmm, Glad the slayer of the bloody overlord we heard about thee and of course how couldn’t we hear about the red-handed thief Scarlett.” He passed a cup of tea to Glad and Scarlett.

Glad:”Your knowledge is vast.” He said with a humble smile on the other hand Scarlett face was little complicated it was filled with surprise.

Fortis:”Thanks for thy compliments but we would ask to stop with them, as for the problems of the elf race thee shouldn’t be bothered by them we can handle them by ourselves.” His tone didn’t change but for some reason, it sounded threatening and annoying.

Glad:”I understand that the Great Spirit will protect you from any harm but we are still really concerned about your situation, we don’t want something like the dark times to return for the elves.”

Fortis:”How dare thee remind us of those times, don’t forget that thy kingdom had a part in them as well!” Fortis slammed his hand on the table and said with a furious voice.

Glad:”We know that and we deeply ashamed for our past deeds, that why we don’t want them to return, we just want to be sure that all of you be safe. Hearing the reports of the decline of the followers and increase in monsters were already a huge concern for us but then we even heard that the Great Spirit is weakening.”

I looked at both of them little confused. “Why are they fighting about me, can’t they just settle on a price?”

Fortis:”Nonsense our Great Spirit is strong as ever, if thee continue to insult us further we would only be able to show you the door!”

Glad:”But, but…” Glad murmured in panic and had nothing to rebuke he could only stay quiet as he didn’t want to offend the other party, but thinking it through Glad didn’t back off and continue to argue with the young elf, this shit storm continued for half an hour till an awkward silence replaced its place, both of the parties couldn’t come to an agreement.

“I am that rare that they can’t come to a price, or does the youngster doesn’t think I am worth it?…” After more few awkward moments of silence, I looked at the untouched teacup of Glad and took it sneakily with one of my longer branches and held it in my hands, all what I wanted to do is to show off a little bit so I inserted few of my roots into it and tried consumed the tea.

*Skill discovered “Forced Absorption”*

“I am not a smart person… Why I didn’t do it before!” Just in a few seconds the teacup became empty, and I could feel a warm tea going through my roots sadly I couldn’t feel any kind of taste from the tea, I could only smell a very weak aroma that came from the tea cup.

“Inspect *Forced Absorption*.”

*Forced Absorption* – Let the user forcefully absorb into his body large quantities of food, water or minerals with great speed. The absorbed material will be immediately transformed to being part of the body, but if used too much the overall structure of the body will be damaged and collapse if not given enough time for the materials to integrate completely into the body.

“Useful skill, wait does it mean that this skill not only used for plants it’s used in animals and humans as well. Oh man, that will be really useful if I ran out of stamina I will be able just to force it down from food. *Self awareness*.” I wanted to check how much stamina did I have.

*Self Awareness Status*

-Visavil bush Lv3-

Experience: 37/60

Rarity: Uncommon

Health: 9/12

Mana: 31/40

Stamina: 2/9

“That explain why I started to feel bad, well I just need to replenish it again.”

All the three people looked at me little shocked because I went up from the chair and tried to get another cup of tea from young elf as I poked him with the cup. Fortis frowned as I did that but still picked up the teapot and poured some tea in it.

Fortis:”It’s really a funny little monster, where did you say you found it?” He said as I returned to my chair, and sat there enjoying the aroma from the tea while slowly absorbing it.

Glad:“Not so far away near one of the ponds.”

Fortis:“It’s really rare for untamed monsters to behave like this near people, is there a chance that it’s a tamed monster that lost its master?” I could feel some change in the gaze of the young elf, he still was cautious but the hostility that was present before was lessening a little bit.

Glad:”Maybe, but you sure it’s not a sapling of a follower? They are from the same family.”

Fortis:”We are one hundred percent sure, the sampling of the follower much larger in size and come from the family of large trees, on that way they can survive in the forest. On the other hand, this monster is some kind of a mutated Visavil bush that somehow got his hands on a strong life force, just a new monster that was born into our world nothing more nothing less.” The hostility in his voice got stronger and stronger as he said the sentence.

Fortis:”Well enough of that we shall continue our talk tomorrow, for now, we will make thee some food we can see that you are quite hungry, after the meal thee should go and rest. As for the creature, it’s best for him to sleep outside in the garden, tied down to a fence.”

Glad looked at me and back at Fortis and nodded his head, the only word I could understand from that sentence was rest so I guessed that they will leave me outside as a normal person would do and that what really have happened. Glad took me outside to a big garden that was behind the house of the weird young elf.

“I am little disappointed that I couldn’t meet the goddess in the village but if all goes good and I will be sold here, for a while this will be my home till my great escape, I should think of a way to scout the village but for now I will sleep…”

I deactivated my magic perception and returned to my small dark world, completely forgetting about the disgusting feeling that was still pulsing from the mark of the devil cat, as I was overwhelmed with the feeling of security after I entered the elf village.