The Fae Grove

(Perspective is Charon's)

I was pleased to know my enchanted clothes functioned like Elxa told me they would.

When I stopped by Elxa's shop last night, I had been greeted by Elxa holding a black morph-suit.

"Ta-da! My newest masterpiece! Does everything you requested, and a bit more!"

I took the morph-suit from Elxa's hands and stared at it.

".....I was expecting something at least a BIT fashionable."

"My dear, you won't have to worry about fashion ever again with this baby."

...

I ran through the list of enchantments Elxa had put into the suit through my head as I pushed on through the plants and fungi blocking my path.

Increased stealth, agility, waterproofing, self-repairing, fireproofing, and some bonus goodies like mana storage and self-cleaning.

However, the most useful functions Elxa had enchanted into the suit was morphing and invisibility.

As Elxa explained, to change the suit, all I had to do was have an image of what I wanted to wear, channel some mana into the fabric, and the morph-suit would change and split into the articles of clothes and colors I wanted to wear. I was limited to cool and dark colors, but I didn't mind that limitation at all. I could also funnel a bit more mana to activate the invisibility function.

Elxa had charged me a bit extra due to the morphing enchantment, but I wasn't upset with that. I essentially had just bought all my clothes I would ever need, so 200 extra gold coins was well worth it.

I was currently stealthed, searching the fae forest on my own. I left Wiz with Amily, knowing Wiz was capable of taking care of most enemies that we could possible encounter here. If Wiz did come across an enemy that caused him trouble, Wiz could signal me with a mental message. If things were truly dire, Wiz could forcefully teleport me to him by using some of my mana.

Amily would be fine.

I wanted to be done with this task as soon as possible. Although I had assured Amily I wouldn't mind helping her for a few weeks, the faster I could get my information the better. And if we were supposed to find a Fountain mentioned only in myth, Biggie would be my best bet of finding it.

Biggie was in the lead and had mind-linked with me, displaying all that he could sense into my head.

Through Biggie's heat vision, electro-reception, and mana sense, I could see countless bright figures of light darting around.

Many of the wildlife here avoided me, sensing both the density of my mana and the foul corruption of my curses before they could smell or hear me.

I wasn't trying to be too stealthy, as I was trying to lure something out. If this was called the fae forest, there should be.....

A few minutes later, I started noticing balls of mana floating in a large circumference around my location. The mana in the orbs were so bright I almost considered cutting off the link to Biggie's mana sense.

But with further observation, I could make out what looked like wings in each of the orbs.

Faeries. They had noticed me and assembled a large force.

The faeries were tightening the circumference of their patrol rapidly, and soon they would be at my location.

I decided to stand still and wait for them to get to me. I shot a quick mental order to Biggie, and he dove into my shadow and hid. I cut off sharing senses with Biggie, leaving a mental link only for messages in case I needed Biggie for some extra intimidation.

Eventually the first of the faeries came into view. They were petite, tiny creatures with translucent and glowing insect wings. Besides the wings, they were humanoid. They wore enchanted armor made of carved and polished bark, insect shells, bird feathers, silks, and beads. For weapons, they carried thin lances that reminded me of giant stingers and tiny staves. The females of the group had a breath-taking beauty, and the males were androgynous looking and could easily beat human females in a contest of beauty.

A male flew into the center of the ring the soldiers had formed, hovering right over my head. He looked around, searching for me. Then, in a loud, magically amplified voice, he spoke in a voice that was almost musical.

"Trespasser! Reveal yourself and answer our questions! Depending on your reason for being here, you may or may not be welcomed as a guest."

Oh, awfully polite and formal aren't they? I deactivated my suit's stealthing enchantment and spoke.

"Hello, I assume you're leading this group?"

Startled, the faery soldiers pointed their staves and lances at me. The leader, shocked, flew backwards a few feet before unsheathing a sword longer than he was and pointing it at me.

The leader quickly blinked, regained his composure, and sheathed his sword and cleared his throat. He made a gesture, and the lances and staves were put away.

"Ah, you startled us. We came to find the, no offense, repulsive source of magic wandering about our forest. I am Ter'stey, leader of the fae defenses. I must admit, you may be the first nu'mari to avoid our detection in my 400 years of service."

"I'm Charon. No offense taken, I agree that my mana does look and feel pretty gross. Is nu'mari the fae word for human or am I being slandered?"

"Good, seems you can handle honesty. And rest assured, you are correct that nu'mari means human in the fae tongue. No slander shall fall on you until you prove deserving. Now trespasser, why have you come here?"

"I was hired by someone to help them search for the Fountain of Knowledge. Would it be too much to ask you for the location?"

"We cannot disclose the location of our most precious treasure to anyone not of our people. However, you and your companion are more than welcome to visit our abode and join us for a feast."

.........................

The faeries had found Amily and had already brought her to their tree village by the time I had gotten there.

The fae village was more of a open grove, as the faeries lived in hollow trees and mushrooms. No walkways were present, as the fae seemed to prefer flying than walking. The only difference the grove had from the rest of the forest was that there was more space between the vegetation than the rest of the forest.

Once Amily saw me, she ran up to me and started yelling.

"Were did you go?! I hired you to protect me and you waltz away on your own, leaving me with your bird?! I can't believe you! The nerve!!"

I was unmoved by her outburst, but I decided I should still apologize.

"Oh, yeah, sorry. Thought we could find the Fountain faster if we split up."

Amily looked at me angrily before she sighed in resignation.

"Well, that's true, but I hired you because I can't defend myself well. I'm a support, not a combatant. I guess I'm okay though, all's well that ends well...."

Amily looked away from me, and continued to mutter as she shoved nuts and berries in her mouth.

Seeing Amily like that amused me slightly, and I patted her head like I would a kitten. She flinched at the contact, slapped my hand, and began muttering about how she wasn't a kid.

Then, a melodious voice like that of string instruments and songbirds spoke.

"Welcome nu'mari, humans. I hope you are enjoying the food. We apologize if the portions are rather small. We don't typically gather food for races larger than us."

The voice had come from a female faery, an elegant figure, one that was far superior to the rest. She wore a dress of pale green silks and vibrant flower petals. The other faeries were bowing before her, and Amily and I decided to follow their example. We then introduced ourselves.

"Welcome Amily, Charon. I am Cat'duah, Matriarch of the Glowing Fae Forest, one of the last five Fae kingdoms. We don't get visitors to the forest that peak our interest that often, so we are glad to have such unique company."

As the faery queen spoke, she looked at me warily.

"And you, Charon, seem dangerous. Though I knew you may be powerful, I realize it may have been a mistake to bring you here."

I lowered my head and spoke.

"I will not be a danger as long as you do not present a reason for me to be one."

Cat'duah smirked.

"Rather honest, aren't you boy? Well, if harm did befall my kingdom, it would only negatively affect you humans."

Amily tilted her head.

"What do you mean?"

"If we cease to be, the corruption by the God of Chaos will be able to spread more rapidly past our forest. You would seen an influx of cursed creatures and Night-walkers would begin to migrate to your lands. Vampires, Werewolves,intelligent undead, and the like. Our existence here keeps the lands east of us peaceful. If you exit the forest and travel further west, you will see the humans are far more militarized, the daily death toll far greater."

Amily nodded her head slowly.

"I always thought it was weirdly peaceful in this part of the continent. I assumed it was due to the protection of the Wild Gods and Witch Goddesses...."

Cat'duah shrugged.

"Believe what you wish. But for the greater good, it would be best for Charon to be our friend rather than foe."

I get it. I posed a threat, and I radiated a malevolent aura due to my curses. Made sense the faeries would try to threaten/convince me into avoiding conflict with them.

"Well, I don't know about friend, but you certainly have not presented a reason to be foe."

"Good! Well enough with the heavy talk, please continue feasting!"

..............

By the end of the feasting, the faeries had somehow convinced Amily to give up on her search for the Fountain of Knowledge. Although they didn't explicitly say that the Fountain didn't exist, they heavily implied that the Fountain was not worth the search.

Amily, swayed by the faeries' beauty, grace, and kindness, found herself search for alternatives to her problem.

I, however, remained suspicious of the faeries.

The next night, the faeries offered to escort us out of the forest safely after they had showed us around the forest and adorned us with gifts.

"You go ahead Amily, I'll catch up to you. I want to continue asking some questions."

"U-uhm, okay. See you soon Charon!"

Amily left with a faery escort, leaving me alone with the faeries of the village.

I exchanged pleasantries and chatted with Cat'duah for a while, making sure Amily had exited the forest and her faery escort had left her. Biggie was hiding in Amily's shadow, and he reported back to me when all the conditions were met.

Once I had received the mental message, I fell silent. Cat'duah silently drank some tea from an acorn cup.

Minutes passed, Wiz was circling above us, looking down at the scene with his three eyes.

I finally broke the silence.

"The Fountain is here, isn't it? Right next to me."

Cat'duah raised an eyebrow while staring into her cup. Several faery soldiers started to hover closer to me, their hands on their weapons.

"Oh, and what will you do now? I feel as though we had become rather close in such a short period of time."

"Yeah, me too. And I'm not sure what to do right now, so I'll ask a few questions. Is it true that you are preventing corruption and Night-walkers from spreading further east?"

"Yes."

".....do you know anything about how I can meet the God of Chaos, or anything about the High Inquisition?"

"No. I have no desire to meet with such a haughty, disgusting being. And we faeries tend to stay removed from the affairs outside of our kind or of our forests."

I stood up, and sighed.

"Well, I really do like you Queen, getting to learn about your people, your ways, and you have been fun. You've shown us incredible kindness, too. I would hate to ruin that."

Cat'duah smiled a genuine smile, filled with a kindness one shows to a close friend.

"Thank you for understanding us, Charon. We are in your debt."

"That being said...."

A splatter of blood hit the ground, several vivisected faery soldier bodies fell from the air around me.

Cat'duah gasped and flew backwards, staring at me with disbelief and shock. The faery soldiers covered her path, getting between me and her.

My heart was cold. The pain caused by the curse of my weapon, [Death's Key], coursed through me. My anger and hate pulsed in my veins.

Through my gritted teeth, I seethed and spat out my words.

"...I hate that God-Thing more than I care about you or this world."