Chapter 7: Elfia

[World One Arc]

Jack found himself standing in the middle of a forest clearing, brandishing a heavy iron sword in his hands with a flimsy stance that could be easily broken by a gust of wind.

He was lost. What was he doing all alone in the woods?

The sound of grass rustling behind him warned Jack that he wasn't alone. He hastily restructured his stance, although it wasn't much as he was unused to the weight of the iron sword. He could only catch glimpses of a yellow blur that was adeptly going for his blind spots. It was a dangerous foe. As soon as he sensed the blur going for the kill, Jack decided to wing it and swung the sword to the blur's direction, hoping that it would at least graze it and slow its movements. All was in vain as he swung it too wide to allowed the blur to slip pass his already poor defense.

"Ha! Nice try, pup!"

It was a woman's voice. Before Jack could turn around and see his assailant, a heavy blow struck the back of his head, immediately knocking him out. Once again, he was engulfed by the abyss.

"Ughh... what the hell was that?"

Jack woke up with a massive headache and a large bump behind his head. He somehow ended up in a soft bed inside a wooden room, with not a single modern necessity in sight. It was like going back in time to the period where humans didn't have any electricity. He was probably in some rural backwater village.

But that was the least of his concerns. He was still confused with everything. What — or who — was that yellow blur? Why was he suddenly attacked in the middle of nowhere? In the first place, what was he even doing in the middle of nowhere?

Jack took a deep breath and calmed himself. Being thrown in situations he didn't understand was one of the amnesiac's forte. And experience (and his teacher) taught him that the next best move was to "take a step back."

The last thing he remembered was entering a huge machine, and an unending darkness. Then... everything finally came back to him. What he was doing. And what he was supposed to do.

[Save the World]

He gave out a sigh of relief, happy that he actually had memories now, unlike the last time three years ago. He wasn't alone. He remembered Marianne, Iris and the rest of the team, and it almost brought tears to his cheeks.

"Wait. Then, if my memories serves me right, then this is..."

A different world. But it didn't feel that different, even with the lack of technology around. Maybe because he wasn't familiar with the original world himself? Jack shook his head. He remembered the reason he was here. He had to save the world, then find that cursed Sara Aislin. And to save the world, he had to find the Marker Point.

Jack was so engrossed in his thoughts that he didn't notice someone enter the room.

"Ah, you're awake. Here, I brought you some ice," said a soft voice that suddenly came out of nowhere.

A otherworldly beauty in a simple green dress stood before him, holding a wooden bowl filled with ice. The girl had fair skin and soft golden hair that reached her thighs. Although her face didn't convey much of an emotion, those emerald green eyes themselves gave a sense of mystery. But her most eye-catching feature was definitely her ears, longer than an average human's. She was a creature he only saw in his teacher's many fantasy games: a freaking elf.

"E—elf?"

"... I'll warn Ranee not to hit your head too hard. But you should really reconsider, Jack. You're never going to hit her with your skills."

Jack didn't understand what she was going on about, so he tilted his head in confusion. The mysterious elf somehow took it as a proper response.

"I get it. I'll be in the kitchen if you need me."

After placing the bowl of ice on a nearby table, the elf promptly left the room and once again left him to his own devices. He sat there in the bed frozen, unable to comprehend what he just saw. An elf. A genuine pointy-eared elf, live in the flesh. It was then that the realization of being in another world finally struck him.

"What the hell, I seriously thought that Marianne was joking about all this dimension-slipping sciency stuff... "

Jack swung himself out of the bed and decided to tour the whole place, until he caught sight of a silver card just beside the bowl of melting ice. He immediately remembered the message he received just before entering Marianne's weird machine.

"That's right, I got a message from Sara Aislin! Damnit, I almost forgot!"

He swiped the card off the table and pressed it for an answer.

"Hey! You're... Harmonica, right? Do you know where Sara Aislin is right now? You gave me a message from her, remember? What do you know about Sara Aislin?"

[It was just a prank. emoticon(wink);]

"Just a prank? What the hell?! No, it wasn't just a prank. You know something about her. Now spill it all out!"

[Service Unavailable. Please try again later. Beep.]

"Dammit!"

Jack tried shaking the card for a different answer, but to no avail. He now understood the horrors Marianne had to face dealing with the borderline-broken doll called Harmonica. No amount of stomping, scratching or bending would change the words plastered on the blasted card.

He stopped his mad assault as soon as he noticed the elf head peeking from behind the door, looking at him with pity-filled eyes.

"Is a visit to the village elder necessary?" she asked with concern.

"N—No thanks," Jack answered.

"Ranee should really start holding back. I'm... going back to the kitchen."

Once again, Jack was left in awkward silence.

Jack decided it was time to leave the room and explore the brave new world, but not without some food first. Luckily for him, the house was smaller than expected, so he easily found what seemed to be a mix of a kitchen and a dining room.

Jack peaked inside and was greeted by a pair of emerald eyes looking directly at him. The elf was stirring some weird alien soup in a pot over some magical burning leaves that didn't seem to burn itself up. It truly was a fantasy world. Although there was no point in hiding as he has already been discovered, Jack refused to come out of his hiding spot. "You can't trust those pesky elves," his teacher once said (to a game). Besides, he should have that trusty(?) Marker Card to tell him more about her.

"What's her name?" Jack whispered to the card.

[Ask her, socially inept individual]

"A—aren't you supposed to be helping me?"

[I am helping you to grow into a functional member of the community, which you are not]

"Just... tell me her name. I don't even care about who or what she is anymore, just tell me her name!"

[Name: Bloom Larisa]

[Age: 203]

[Occupation: Village Herbalist]

[Lorine Capacity: 300]

[Special Abilities:]

[Divine Healing: Increase a body's healing rate exponentially]

[Magic Dispenser: Transfer Lorine to other bodies]

Jack was surprised by the amount of detail given by the normally uncooperative card. Finally, Harmonica was starting to find some usel. It was a big help to have a pocket encyclopedia about everything around him, especially in an unknown world filled with surprises like this one.

He finally went inside the kitchen, but not without Bloom giving him strange looks. She did witness him do a crazy skit with that card, so she made a point to herself to scold Ranee for hitting him in the head too hard.

But Jack was unfazed by her stare, thinking he held the upper hand in terms of information. Nothing could stop him now. He took a seat in the nearby table and waited for her. As his teacher once said, "Those who wins the information wars win all the wars."

Bloom took a small sip of her mushroom soup, and once she found it satisfactory, poured some in wooden bowls. She set them on the table and took her own seat, but not without looking at Jack with the same pity-filled eyes. Jack didn't back down and gave her his own stare, treating her like an enemy he had to face. He would indeed defeat her without fail, but not without having a taste of the soup that gave off a mouth-watering aroma.

The moment a small drop of soup hit Jack's taste buds, fireworks and mushroomy goodness began bursting inside his mouth, trumpets played around him and the slow realization of just how shitty every food he has eaten before hit him.

"This is delicious! This is the best thing I've eaten in my life!"

"But you eat that every day."

"... Oh."

Bloom gave Jack a suspicious glare.

"You're acting weird today. Are you sure you're okay?"

"Yep. Don't worry about me, Bloom."

"Bloom? Who's Bloom?"

"You?"

"I'm not Bloom, I'm Flor."

"... Are you 203 years old?"

"... I'm sixteen."

"Are you the village herbalist?"

"I'm the village's Great Magician."

"Lorine capacity ranging around 300?"

"What's Lorine?"

"Special abilities include Divine Healing and Magic Dispenser?"

"What are you talking about?"

Silence filled the distance between them. Jack didn't waste any time in taking out the silver card and giving everything he had to break it in two.

"WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU?"

[It was just a prank. emoticon(wink);]

"AAHHHHHHH!!"

It was an all-out brawl between man and card. Jack didn't hold anything back, while the card simply let everything flow through it, which pissed him off and made him redouble his efforts into bringing destruction to the little devil. It didn't matter to him that the card was his only way of locating the Marker Point, or its real body was actually worlds away from him.

Flor couldn't take the bizzare scene any longer.

"Let the light of my soul burn through the darkness, [Hestelvim]!"

Her chant stop Jack's mad assault dead in its track. The moment he made eye contact with her mesmerizing green eyes, a strange shock struck him and rendered his whole body numb. There was something hypnotic in her eyes that made his mind drunk and unable to think straight. It felt impossible to break eye contact with the elf.

"Sorry, but I just have to make sure. Why are you acting like this?" Flor asked, making sure to add strength to her voice. Every word out of her felt like lightning striking his very essence.

Something deep within compelled Jack to speak the truth and nothing but the truth. It was that magical chant fault, he realized. But what was he supposed to answer? That he was from another world? That he took over some poor chap's body? That he was only here to save the world? There was really just one suitable answer in the end.

"I... lost my memories," Jack answered.

It wasn't a lie. If it wasn't for this stupid amnesia, he wouldn't even be looking for Sara Aislin, and he wouldn't have been wrapped up with Marianne's plans and Harmonica's bullshit.

Those words convinced Flor. It was impossible for someone to lie while being under that spell, after all. "I see, so my suspicions were right. Ranee did hit you too hard."

She finally released her spell. Jack dropped to the wooden floor like jelly, all his energy drained away. It felt like he aged considerably. That was true magic, one that gripped you at your very soul. This world was truly dangerous with crazy weapons like that.

"Well, there is a silver lining. With this, the insane idea of leaving the forest should've been knocked out of you as well."

"Eh? Leaving the forest? Why, you can't leave this forest?"

"You might have forgotten, but this is the Sacred Forest, a blessed sanctuary protected by the Goddess of Blessings. Humans predate the outside land and hunt on our kind, you see. Nobody has left the forest for years."

That was... interesting. There were too many things that Jack didn't know about. And in Marianne's own wise words, "Along with adaptability, general knowledge of the world is what determines life and death." Worse, he couldn't even trust the "encyclopedia" he was given to push through that problem. The job now required his own information-gathering skills. But if could handle crazed superpowered humans fighting him at every corner, he should be able to handle this.

Jack nodded his head. "Yep, I can do this. And Flor, was it?"

"Yes, that's my name."

"I have to leave this forest. I don't care how, but I have to."

"But why? You don't have any reason to leave this forest now, do you?" Flor wasn't too pleased with his declaration. But that didn't stop him.

"I just want to," Jack answered. He didn't think spilling the beans to her was a good idea. Maybe when he knew her better, but not now.

"... I see. Not even losing your memories will stop you, of course."

Jack didn't understand why Flor looked so pitiful, but he knew it had something to do about him leaving. In the first place, he didn't know his original relationship with the mystical elf. Family? Friend? Lover? Whatever it was, it felt like he owed her an apology.

"... Sorry about this."

"H—huh?" Flor was flabbergasted, not expecting the sudden apology.

"However, nothing's stopping me from leaving."

"... I see."

Something changed about Flor's way of looking at him. What once was looks of pity became apparent curiosity. And for the very first time since they met, her normally blank expression turned into a soft smile.

"But Jack, like I said. You'll never hit Ranee once with your poor sword skills."