Encounter with a bird

Waking up with groggy eyes, our protagonist took a moment to register where he is.

As if confirming that everything he witnessed that previous day was not a dream, he blinked.

And with that, he widened his eyes, panicked and jumped up with all his strength, resulting in him hitting his head on his improvised shelter, making it collapse upon him, much to a small bird's amusement in the far-off tree, confirming that following this clown was the right choice.

"Ouch! What bad luck!"

He said, pulling himself out of the now destroyed shelter and went on:

"I first wake up in the middle of nowhere in god knows where!

He waved his hands around.

"By some crazy hunch, I find this weird piece of work that looks like an apple tree. " He said while pointing in a wide gesture towards the said tree.

"Not that I find that problematic, it did help me with my hunger and thirst." He said in an inaudible mutter.

Raising his voice again he said: "Then the night comes and by some weird chance, seeing these two, " He looked at the tree with the double bark accompanied by the baby tree.

"I get the bright idea to set up this nasty excuse of a shelter!" He kicked the twigs and wooden debris.

"And what were those shadow creatures-" He suddenly froze like a statue, widening his eyes in panic, he looked around for any trace of those ominous monsters he saw last night.

As if making fun of him, the birds sang happily, the sun shone brightly between the leaf bedding and the whole forest looked ordinary, albeit with a lack of animals, other than the birds themselves.

"What is this weird place I found myself in!?"

Hearing the whole outburst, the little red bird on the tree had a glint of amusement and contemplation in its eyes.

'This human doesn't know how he got in the middle of the forest of shadows?'

It stopped for a moment: 'Maybe he's lying?'

'No, it cant be. Why would he lie about such a thing when he thinks nobody is nearby?'

Then the glint in its eyes brightened: 'Someone brought him here? Did someone scheme against him?'

Scanning his pajamas and footwear it thought yet again, 'Even though his attire is odd, it certainly looks like something a human noble would wear.'

'But what is his identity? One would need to be an Archmage with an affinity in space, not to mention using something like [Greater Teleportation] is impossible to conceal.'

Deciding it was best to ask the person himself, it saw that he was approaching the sage tree with hasty steps.

On our protagonist's side, he was having that little outburst of his when he suddenly felt a pain in his stomach.

Remembering those juicy red-golden apples, he started salivating a bit.

With a gulp, he started hastily walking towards the apple tree, he climbed a bit to grab one of the bigger apples, under the weird looks the little red bird gave him until it saw that he was grabbing an apple from the Sage tree.

He grabbed an apple, took a big bite and when he was swallowing, the little bird shouted in its girlish voice: "Wait, don't!", Almost making him choke on his own tongue.

Nevertheless, he had already gulped down his bite, much to the bird's terror and the man's dismay.

The delicate bird then shouted with a resigned voice: "You moron! you took a bite out of a seed of wisdom from the Sage tree! Even the few Legend-ranked Mages don't dare to do that! you're going to explode!"

Our protagonist looked towards the direction of the voice and all he saw was a small crimson bird, like a fine, delicate sculpture, it had glassy orange beady eyes that looked like gems.

Overall, it was so cute that he wanted to squash it with a hug.

While being amazed at how cute that delicate bird was, that very same girlish voice came again, this time with even more anger: "What are you looking at you idiot! You're going to explode soon and all you do is look?!"

Startled, he answered: "You're the one that's talking?" He said, pointing towards the bird.

With the same anger, it answered: "Who else you buffoon? Never heard of a |magical beast| before? Or is your eyes as useless as your brain?"

Not sitting to register the term the little bird used, he replied after climbing down while pointing towards the bird: "What a big mouth for a little thing like you! After coming to this weird place with nothing but my pajamas and cellphone, next thing you know, I get dissed by a talking bird not even the size of my fist! that's it!"

And so he threw the rest of the apple at the bird, making it stumble, freeze and then fume at the imprudence of the stupid human, she a glorious vermilion bird lowered herself to talk to this weakling and he dares to throw things at it?

It flew up high in the air with a gentle flap and stared at the weakling in disdain, while he was going to explode, it won't let such imprudence go easily by so she decided for a small punishment.

Judging from his pitiful mana signature and Out of respect for the sage tree, it wouldn't use any high tier magic.

As appropriate, it decided that a barrage of weak flame arrows will be enough punishment for this clown, while such magic was below it, it was just the right thing.

Flapping its delicate wings lightly, a basket-sized bright red magic circle came to life, it had three layers to it, the centermost sporting a pentagram with the outer two circles having mystical glyphs on them.

Out of the circle came a barrage of red arrows

woven with flames, wherever the arrows passed, a fiery trail would be left in their wake accompanied by a whistling sound.

When he saw the bird flying up high, all he felt was emptiness at not being able to vent his anger at the stupid thing, but when he saw the circle resulting from its flap, matrixes appeared in his eyes, the world went in slow motion and be could see the process that took place in the forming of the circle.

Small wisps of mana were traded from the bird's wing like it was in some kind of deal with something unknown and so the centermost layer of the circle was formed, sporting a pentagram.

Onto the first outer layer, as if communicating with the traded mana, the glyphs formed in some mystical language which for some weird reason, he understood the meaning of, and it said:

'Come forth o' fire, form arrows of flames'

Then came the second layer, unlike the first layer, it didn't have any fancy words, just instructions for the direction of the arrows.

When the spell materialized, he could see how the energy was siphoned from the circle into forming the arrow barrage.

Broken out of his reverie, he was still seeing everything in slow motion, but he didn't have the time to marvel at how his thoughts can keep up or how that's even possible at all.

The only thing in his mind was how the arrows were coming at his direction, feeling scared of the consequence from the arrows coming in touch with his body, he tried moving.

But, like he was surrounded by thick mud, his body wouldn't respond like he wanted to. seeing that the arrows were closing in, he took a dive forward, barely avoiding the arrows with one of them scraping by his pajama, leaving behind a black burn mark.

Seeing that he avoided the arrow barrage, the little bird hmphed and said:" At least for having a pitiful amount of magical power he can dodge, I'll give him that."

Coming closer to him, it said: "That will teach you to be impudent to the great me, weakling!"

Seeing how arrogant the bird acted, his expression contorted in anger, the matrixes in his eyes started spinning, he called for his magic, spreading out his open palm towards the bird, he drew upon his mana pool and copied the process the bird previously used, Surprisingly, the magic circle popped in existence almost immediately.

Fiery arrows not dissimilar to the ones the bird cast materialized and went towards its direction in great speed

When the bird saw his actions, it got startled greatly so it spread its wings, the result was a fiery forcefield appearing, making the arrows disappear upon contact.

The bird thought: "What great casting time! his understanding of the spell and fire affinity must be great.'

Diminishing its force field slowly, it mused: 'He's quite skilled for a beginner-level mage weakling, trying an Apprentice-level spell like that must have used his mana pool though.'

As if answering the bird, a thud was heard, looking over, it saw that he had fainted.

In the air, it stood there, waiting for him to explode from consuming the wisdom seed after using his own mana, but it was surprising when seemingly, he just laid there, unconscious.

It cautiously flew close to him, just in the off chance that he would indeed explode, not that it would hurt it, it just didn't want to get dirty, that's all.

'That's weird' It thought 'There's a good reason even Legend-ranked mages think things through before consuming a seed of wisdom, there no way for this brat to survive with his beginner-level mana pool and he certainly doesn't look like a Legend-ranked.'

Landing close to his unconscious form, it reaffirmed that this brat will be entertaining so it waited for him to wake up, watching over him.

Thanks for reading!