"Good morning Llana!" The pony-tailed beauty from the mountain started her day once more greeting Llana the grump with a deep bow as soon as she arrived. And once again Llana simply ignored her, instead choosing to keep her head buried down in books while responding with an absent-minded "Un". The beauty looked like she had no problem with it, though, as she walked past her into the back garden to start tending to the plants for the day. 'Can't she at least say hi?' I thought as I continued to swing my stick downwards, accidentally pushing my body a bit too far forward and toppling down into the snow below.

"Mmmph. MMMMPFF." I started to shout aloud while frantically moving my arms in an attempt to find something solid to push myself off of. It wasn't long though before I was grabbed violently by the back of my tunic and pulled up savagely from behind.

"Distracted by the White-haired Beauty again, huh?" A mischievous voice asked from behind me.

"N-no. I'm just not used to practicing in this snow..." I responded, stuttering through my words as my vision moved towards the garden where she was working.

"Not used to the snow? Strange, I figure you'd get used to it after, I don't know, living on it for 16 years~." Arton replied incredulously to my perfectly reasonable excuse.

"No, this snow I said. The snow here is way more... weak. I don't get why Llana had us move our practice to back here anyways. I was completely fine training where goddesses would keep on falling from the sky." I responded with resolution.

"Hey, Reltin! Arton! Get back to training. We're already a couple weeks behind the other groups on training from your distractions the last fifty times we've done this." Tetsu shouted from a few feet behind us as he continued swinging his wooden pole in quick repetition without missing a beat.

"Yes sir! ~" Arton replied jokingly, his eyes moving to Llana who was writing down something at the windowsill of the cabin facing us.

"That training freak..." I mumbled aloud only loud enough for Arton to hear.

"You know what I think?" Arton asked.

"Huh?"

"About why we moved training areas." Arton spoke again. "I think Llana doesn't buy Princess Beauty's story about losing her memories or whatnot. And if that really is the case, why else would she lie than to hide something?"

"Hide something? Something... Like what?" I asked, urging him to continue.

"An invasion?" He answered in a speculative tone.

"Invasion!?" I yelped incredulously and swallowed a lump of saliva as I stared closer at the beauty's serene figure.

Arton hit my shoulder roughly after I yelped. "Hey, quiet down there Reltin." He said, indicating stealthily with his head towards Llana who I saw was now staring at me. She soon turned her attention back towards her book after I greeted her gaze with a nod and a smile.

"What do you mean invasion?" I asked in a more hushed tone, still unable to hide the anxiety in my voice as I imagined a swarm of armored soldiers on warhorses charging through the village.

"What if she's a scout? Like someone sent to infiltrate enemy lines, see what we're made of and all that." Arton replied.

I panicked inwardly at the prospect but soon reigned in my terror as I indulged in the sight of her gentle, blue eyes and soft, mesmerizing smile as she continued to happily pick the plants in the garden. Arton nudged me hard at the shoulder again. "Hey, don't get distracted by her beauty man. That's probably exactly what they want sending someone like her."

"Huh, how did you..." I looked back at Arton's piercing eyes in shock.

"You're drooling, creep." He said in a serious and disgusted tone, pointing at the drop running down to my chin. I hurriedly wiped it off with my shoulder as he continued speaking. "Maybe it's her that needs to be worried about being attacked instead of us..."

"No way, Elvi wouldn't do that kind of thing." I replied to him ignoring his last remark. "Plus, didn't Llana say that she saw the uhh... the thing in her head that proves that she's telling the truth?" I added on.

"What? The fog?" Arton asked. "Yeah." I answered to which Arton simply shrugged and turned to look at Llana once more. "Maybe there's something she knows that we don't." He said still eyeing her. As if on cue, Llana looked towards us and started to smile. I gasped in shock, there was no way she was just doing that randomly, she must've heard everything! What Arton said was tru-

- Wap - Suddenly a hand the weight of steel fell onto my shoulder and made its way up to the back of my collar before tightening around it and pulling me up, suspending me in the air. On my right, I saw Arton who hung in silence in the same situation. "I thought I told you two to get back to practice..." Tetsu growled from behind us as he held us in the air like two sacks of potatoes. Llana began to laugh as she looked at us and I realized too late what she had been smiling about before.

"Ugh...Let...ech...me...down!" I said, as I grunted while flailing around my arms and legs to make it as difficult for him to hold on to me as possible. "Yeah, we get it already. One-hundred and fifty swings, we'll do it now but we can't if you don't let us go." Arton added on, hanging by his collar in peace while crossing his arms as I continued to struggle in Tetsu's grip.

"One-Hundred and Fifty? Is that what I said? Huh, I'm not sure. I'm thinking now that I said Three Hundred." Tetsu mused as he tilted his head towards one side feigning ignorance. "What!? There's no way that's fair! I'm sorry I'll go back to it right now I swear just please go back to One-Hundred and Fifty." I pleaded while looking Arton's way, telling him with my eyes to do the same. "Yeah, please." He looked back at me before rolling his eyes and adding.

"Starting now." Tetsu commanded authoritatively, as he dropped us both back onto the snow and walked back to Rafal who still swung his stick as if a fisherman handling a sea monster. Tetsu walked behind him to straighten his posture and fix his grip on the stick.

"It's an older brother's job to be doing stuff like that, why's it gotta be me taking orders and him leading the group? Elder Souan must have been tricked by that guy somehow." I spoke out in unhidden jealousy as I watched him help Rafal perfect his form and corrected my own form from his tips as he gave them to him. "Damn him, why does he have to be so good at this." I added, annoyed at his competence. "Heh." Arton simply smiled from beside me as he continued to swing his own stick...

__________________________________________________________________________________

"Good morning, Llana!" I said, smiling and bowing for the third morning in a row since I started to work at this cabin. "Unn, yeah." She responded haphazardly as she continued to write down whatever it was that was so important in that journal of hers. Her actions seemed obvious enough, simply coming off as uncaring, but her right eye told a different story. It opened ever so slightly as she looked up stealthily to inspect my head yet again as I changed from my house shoes into the work boots in the corner of my room. Llana quickly buried her gaze back into her journal as I turned around once more to walk into the back garden. It had been a whole two week since the mess of a day that I first arrived here.

Although I had managed to convince both Llana and The Village Chief of my 'amnesia' situation enough for them to not throw me out with a little help from Usra and the evanescent 'fog' that Llana saw in my head. Evidently, at least Llana still reserved her doubts for me. Taking multiple glances at my head whenever possible. A week in I figured she'd at least cast away her suspicions enough to only do so once or twice a day, but with how often I've caught her staring holes into me It must have been happening at least twenty times an hour.

As for my living situation, Usra was kind enough to allow me to stay with her and her family while The Village Chief had a few men from the village working on constructing a new cabin for me nearby Llana's deep in the woods. As it happens to be, Tetsu, who I had earlier referred to as a 'giant' is actually not one. Although it was hard for me to believe he was just a teenager barely 15 years old. The thought of that giant growing any taller gave me goosebumps, but boys stop growing at 16 right? So surely there wasn't much farther for him to go.

Although suspicious at first, as soon Llana had confirmed that I did indeed have something akin to what you would see from amnesia in my head, The Village Chief immediately changed his attitude. He slathered me with promises and incentives to rope me into joining their tribe as a second healer, giving me housing as well as a job as Llana's assistant. I figured Llana would be completely against the idea, but she had surprisingly little to say about it. I figured at first that she had finally accepted my innocence but soon found myself terrified at the proposition that it would be much easier to monitor me or... take action were I to do anything she didn't quite appreciate.

Based on how much effort the Village Chief put into roping me into his tribe I figure being a healer was quite the rarity in this world, and considering Llana was the only other one in this village, either resources were much scarcer here or my assumption was correct. In which case the deal of a simple cabin in the woods along with enough pay to barely afford the bitter food that they sold here might have been a wild scam I've fallen for. In any case I don't plan on going anywhere outside the village anytime soon. Just thinking about that blue monstrosity I saw at the top of the mountain loses me sleep at night.

"Invasion!?" From the field in front of me, one of the boys that were training shouted and I looked up to see him quickly pull his eyes off of me. 'That's... Reltin?' I thought as I looked at the two boys that were talking to each other in a now much quieter tone. 'I guess they're still suspicious of me as well' I thought. It only made sense, a complete stranger in such luxurious clothing just falling from the sky? Even the idea was too ludicrous to say out loud. I continued to pick only the plants that looked similar to those in the drawings of 'ripe' versions that Llana had sketched down on a book she had given to me. As well as picking the ripe fruits, I also was tasked with tending and maintaining all the rest of the plants that grew in the entire garden. Which wasn't as far from capital punishment as you'd think. These magical fantasy plants had a terrible temperament and the slightest mistake in any of their care would result in the plant turning out completely unusable as they'd either turn to powder at their ungrounding, spontaneously explode if they were given too much or too little water ruining the other plants around them, and various other dangerously exaggerated methods of death that brought down anything and everything around them.

Also in the journal Llana had provided me with was the specific maintenance requirements of each plant, all kinds of plants like 'Iodamias', 'Fearin', 'Nightmare Korlans' etc. had made their home in this garden. A few certain plants required the products of others to help them grow most optimally, leading me to many interview sessions with the big boss herself. But as far as questions went I had plenty of opportunity and reason to ask them as Llana was always sitting at the same windowsill writing in the same windowsill while I was always blessed with the status of 'amnesia' giving me plenty rhyme and reason to ask anything I had questions about. Although at first Llana would give me a look that said 'You're really acting like you don't even know stuff this basic?' during our 'sessions', once she repeatedly found herself having to heal me of all degrees of cuts and bruises from the countless mistakes I had made in the field, I could sense her suspicion fading and she began to answer my questions in earnest detail.

As for why I couldn't just use my newfound 'prime healing' power on myself instead of having to have Llana do it every time, the options simply never showed up again. I couldn't tell whether if it was just a one-time thing or if it had some sort of cooldown or something so I came to Llana asking about why I wasn't able to use my healing on anything anymore she gave me a very vague and confusing answer.

"Firstly, that rose colored healing of yours is not like anything else I've ever seen and, trust me kid, I've seen a lot. As far as I can tell, you've simply run out of mana. That technique you used must have been pretty costly. In all the times I've seen that kid since you used your healing on him, he's been healthy as an Ox. No symptoms from the stillbirth, no illnesses since, not a scratch on him. For healing that potent, I wouldn't be surprised if it'd taken years off your life let alone all your mana." Llana spoke, sitting sideways in her chair as she continued to write in her journal, the bright moon glistening in the sky behind her. At her last few sentences, I went pale.

Her head shifted upward to look at me before she added: "Relax girl, it was only an exaggeration. From how unperturbed you were after the fact; I'd say it's simply an issue of you not knowing how to control it rather than anything else. Amnesia and all." Unlike what I would've expected a week or two prior, she said it now without any tinge of sarcasm.

"So I just have to learn how to control it..." I clenched my hand in excitement at the prospect of being able to control real magic. "But... if I do, will my eyes get like that too?" I asked, reigning in my enthusiasm.

"Huh?" Llana asked back, seemingly puzzled by my question.

"Your eyes." I said, pointing towards my own and squinting fiercely, mocking her.

"Hahaha." Llana began to laugh as I did so before recovering after a few seconds. "No, Elvi. There's no reason for you to worry about that." She started. "This... is a very special case." Her voice returned to its former coldness as she said that last bit and I nodded in response, not wanting to test her in any way now that I had finally gotten on her half-decent side.

- Tak Tak- A sudden knocking came from the backside door that lead out to the garden. As the front door was boarded up with planks as a temporary measure until the winter ended, the backside door was the only way that anyone could find their way inside the cabin now. I hurriedly got up from the ground beside Llana and walked over to open the door, allowing in the four boys that often trained in the field beside Llana's cabin. In two weeks I had only a bit more than a rough grasp on the type of people they were. Firstly was Tetsu, the giant that stood at least two heads above the other boys. He was a bit of a training enthusiast, highly disciplined sort of kid that was strict on everybody around him including himself. From what I'd heard from Llana he would wake up at dawn every morning to go running around the village as well as practice his swordsmanship before anyone else had even woken up. He had slightly long wavy hair that stuck to his head like it was glued on regardless of what physics had to say about the situation.

"Llana. Elvi." Tetsu simply looked towards each of us and bowed as he ducked his towering frame into the cabin door. Also, It'd make sense I explain this whole 'Elvi' thing, right? Well, although I was dangerously close to spilling my real name, 'Levi', to Llana when she had first asked before I remembered I was in a female's body, I quickly covered it up using the 'amnesia' to my advantage, acting as if I was still confused on what my name really could be. "Le-Leev... Elv-elv...ee...Elvi!" In doing so I both saved my ass but also sealed my fate to forever remain as 'Elvi' In the eyes of everyone who now knew me in the village. 'If worst comes to worst, I can just run away and leave it all behind.' I thought to myself. The world was large, after all. Or at least I assumed so, given how little I knew about it.

"Yo." A boy with long dirty-blonde hair walked in next, greeting us both nonchalantly. This one's name was Arton, and I liked him considerably less than the giant in front of him. Particularly his thin eyes that were very similar to Llana's. They held very thinly veiled suspicion toward me and though I'd smile toward him whenever I saw him, I always regretted doing so when he met me with his own faked smile that creeped the hell out of me and would of anyone else who saw it. I didn't know how invasive thin and suspicious eyes could feel until I was a targeted by it from a regular-sized young man rather than the fun-sized Llana.

"Y-yo." "H-hello." The next two to walk in were Reltin and Rafal respectively. Brothers that were a refreshing sight to see as neither of them were either monstrously large nor scarily intimidating. I unconsciously smiled even wider while greeting the two of them and the first looked down as his face flushed red much to my confusion while the second's smile only deepened upon meeting my own. As the boys walked in, they shook down their snow-covered clothes at the entrance at Llana's aggressive request that came out as more of a threat to them and their families than a proper request would.

As the boys shuffled inside, they all walked to the corner of the room as if hiding away. And Llana exchanged a quick glance with them before turning off the lamp and leaving the night sky as the only light source for us in the room. "Huh? What's going on?" I asked but was met only with a quick "Shhhh" from Llana. As if on cue, the village chief and the monopoly man who I later found out went by the name of Edgar walked out to the path in front of the cabin by the way post that lied a couple feet in front of it. Behind Edgar was an extensively decorated carriage that, much to my dismay, had a tarp covering most of the intricate design seen on the front. The two seemed to exchange a few words before Edgar entered the carriage and the Village Chief saw him off with a wave before he ended up taking off. After a few seconds, the Village Chief looked over to the cabin in silence. In the complete darkness, his gaze seemed especially horrifying for some odd reason as it seemed to be looking right at me. My heart shook in the silence as if it could see a darkness behind his eyes. After a few more seconds, the Village Chief, too, took his leave, walking back towards the village.