Gaia's Leaf

Truen was roused by an overly excited Zero.

"Come on Truen, wake up! Quickly!"

Still slightly disoriented from the time difference, the elf groaned. Zero straddled the elf with his tiny legs and shook the elf with his tiny hands.

"Come on! Hurry!"

Half-dragged by Zero and half fuelled by curiosity, Truen allowed his ward to place his hand on the treasure. It was warm to the touch as per usual. The elf didn't understand what made the boy so excited but didn't question it. Zero could be strange at times.

Then, he felt movement beneath his hand. It was a small vibration that made a low sound from inside the egg. Truen was immediately wide awake. It was unmistakable, the creature in the egg was close to hatching.

He turned to look at Zero who smiled widely in response.

"It's moving!"

Truen nodded. He didn't quite know how to explain to Zero that this wasn't a normal treasure. Conflicted, Truen decided to postpone the talk till later. They freshened up and set off to find the small house Zero spotted during their flight. Mii was kind enough to mark out the house's coordinates and update Truen's map. At the same time, the Isis sent him the list of shortlisted candidates. Truen sent Isis a short reply and left the lamp with Zero.

This time, Zero wanted to walk instead of teleporting. For some irrational reason, the brunet was convinced that teleporting would hurt the treasure in his lamp. Truen didn't know how to explain that the room in his lamp was created in a different space and movement would not affect it. Hence, he allowed the boy to do as he pleased.

Noon approached quickly and Truen told Zero to gather some dry sticks for the fire while he caught some fishes from the river. The boy scuttled off quickly and Truen reminded him not to stray too far. His sense of hearing as an elf was powerful but even it had limits. Not thinking much as Zero scampered around for wood, Truen concentrated on catching river fish.

A yell from Zero nearly made Truen shit in his pants. He jumped out of the river, forgetting about lunch and ran over at breakneck speed.

When Zero came into view, the first thing Truen did was scan for enemies before fussing over the boy, checking for injuries.

"Truen calm down! I'm fine."

The elf frowned. Seeing that he couldn't convince his guardian with words, Zero showed the elf the leaf he'd found instead.

At first, Truen didn't understand why Zero would show him a leaf after yelling so suddenly. Then it clicked.

"You found it!"

Zero beamed. "Yes I did! Who knew that the leaf would be hiding in such a place? I was looking for sticks when I found it!"

Happy for Zero and forgetting about his earlier concerns, Truen told Zero to pose with the leaf before snapping a picture. He sent that picture to Zero on his request. The boy decided to send that picture to Gaia after lunch and kept it away in the sling bag.

Speaking of lunch, Truen hurried back to the river. Zero laughed at the elf's expression and happily went back to collecting sticks.