Louise Flyer: The Price of Pride - Part 3

The sunlight was majestically invading the place. The birds' singing and the red trees gave a sense of inner peace. It was a little cold because winter was coming, but it wasn't bothering enough. Near the edges of a lake, under a big tree that cast shade everywhere, there were two children.

"Ugh... Isn't it a little hot?"

"And you still think you have the right to complain?"

They were called Louise and Finn. They weren't friends or anything, they just knew each other more than one of them would like. They were close to each other. Louise had her hand extended over the boy's head, pouring almost boiling water with her bare hands.

"You're covered in mud, and your mere presence is annoying enough. I just want to solve one thing. So just stand still!"

"I-I'm sorry..."

"What an irritating person."

"Ah..."

After the "bath," Finn stood up a little dazed. He quickly looked around as if he were searching for something. Finding it, he stretched a little, making a "Huf." Louise looked at him suspiciously, but she didn't pay much attention. And then, after finishing stretching, the boy tried to take off his wet clothes to hang them on a branch he had just found - where the sunlight was shining the most - to dry them, but...

"W-What do you think you're doing?!!"

Louise covered her eyes while shouting so loudly that it scared the birds around, causing them to fly away.

"It's just that... I might catch a cold if I don't take off my wet clothes."

"There's absolutely no need to do that!"

"Hm?"

"Warm winds. Air Ignis!"

Still with one hand in front of her eyes, Louise quickly conjured what she wanted. In seconds, a blast of warm wind ran through the boy's body. He was initially surprised. It wasn't a bad feeling, he could feel his clothes drying along with his body... But.

The wind had become so strong that it lifted Finn's body up quickly. Finn was about two meters high when Louise finally opened her eyes.

"Hey! Calm down!" he shouted.

"Oops..." Louise said when he fell heavily to the ground. If it weren't for the grass, he would have been hurt. Louise seemed indifferent to the situation and Finn wasn't sure if she even noticed what had happened.

"That was a little cruel," Finn said.

"Hmph! You're the one who irritated me, as always!" Louise crossed her arms and lifted her nose up haughtily, refusing to admit her mistake.

But for some reason, Finn didn't get angry. Instead, he smiled brightly.

"What a scary smile," Louise said. "Come on, get up."

A little while later, Louise and Finn were sitting under an unnecessarily large tree, which provided shade over the entire area. After the incident with Finn's "bath," Louise hurried them to eat. She hadn't eaten lunch yet and was very hungry. All the confusion before didn't change that fact.

The cool breeze was refreshing, the perfect weather for a picnic. In the basket that Finn had fervently protected, there were slices of cake of various types: carrot, apple, potato, honey, and chocolate. Louise couldn't resist and ate her lunch.

"Hmm. For someone who chases after girls, you're actually useful sometimes, aren't you?" Louise said as she chewed her food and sipped her tea.

"Thanks, I made them myself, and... I already told you, it wasn't like that!" Finn said.

When Finn was being pelted with stones by girls his age, they commented that he had followed them there. There were still many confusions in this story, including the part where he suddenly appeared with a basket of food for Louise. In any other situation, Louise wouldn't care about the means, only the end result, which was her enjoying those wonderful cakes. But this time, she was a little intrigued.

"When I came back from school, I ran into Mr. Vska. He asked me if I saw you and was worried that you hadn't eaten anything yet. So I went home and made these lunches... but when I went to the library to look for you, my mom said you had left some time ago. The first place I thought you would be was here," Finn explained.

Yes. He already knew this place. In fact, it was Finn who introduced Louise to this spot. She once said she wanted to stay in a place without anyone around and cool in the summer, because the library rooms were always stuffy at that time of year, and she always wore heavy clothes, which didn't help at all. That's when he said, 'I know a place like that!' and brought her here. It was a bit far, but it was worth it.

"And then, as I was coming here, I ran into them. And... I overheard some of their conversation, unintentionally."

The expression on his face changed slightly. As if he had done something he shouldn't have, he lowered his head, regretful, and stopped speaking for a moment.

"But suddenly, he looked determined and continued.

"They were planning to pass through the barrier, so I tried to stop them."

Louise, after calmly drinking her tea, just sighed. She was not upset, it was not as if it was her problem. However, she had a question. No one would want to leave the barrier. There were only magical beasts ready to kill anyone who appeared. Leaving was basically suicide. And, as if he was reading her mind, Finn answered:

"Their father is a military soldier," Finn continued, "and apparently they heard that someone was living outside the barrier, with the monsters. They're from my class, so I heard them spreading this rumor to everyone... but... no one ended up believing them and they were called liars by everyone in school. That's why I think they wanted to leave. To make sure they're right."

"Arf..." she sighed. "So they're really idiots."

Yes. They were just children trying to prove something impossible. Probably their parents told them this as a joke or something. It didn't make sense for someone to live outside the barrier, unprotected. Only a very crazy person would try something like that. For a moment, her uncle's words came to mind, "There's no one who would go through there."

"So they think the magical beasts disappeared or something?"

"It's not quite that. Recently, they found out that they hibernate during the winter. So they wanted to take advantage of the moment to look for this supposed person who lives there."

Louise had read some books about it. Apparently, the number of Fallen Spirits decreased during the winter. From what little is known, magical beasts attacked anything that contained mana to survive, and these spirits were like food to them. Basically, they fed on mana, which they would hardly find in winter.

That also means that magical attacks had little to no effectiveness against them

Despite this knowledge, it would be imprudent to wander into the forest unprepared. No one knew exactly what the Fallen Spirits were. Some theories suggested they were the souls of the departed, but it was likely just a legend.

As they finished discussing the topic, Finn seemed to have something else he wanted to say. Louise raised an eyebrow at him, silently urging him to speak.

"Um... it's just really impressive what you can do," Finn finally said.

Louise smirked. "Hm? Be more specific, I'm impressive in everything I do."

"You can abbreviate incantations, right? How do you do that?"

"They haven't taught you that yet?" Louise asked in surprise.

"I think that's a bit more advanced," Finn admitted.

Since she was young, Louise had been a prodigy in magic. She had even left school early, feeling that she was wasting her time there. Instead, she immersed herself in books, eager to learn more and more. Shortening incantations was a complicated technique that few people in Forthen could do. Louise found that normal incantations took too long to cast, so she searched ferociously for a way to speed up the process. There was no tutorial to be found in a book, so she had to learn through a combination of training and acquired knowledge.

"Every spell has keywords that trigger the desired element," Louise began to explain. "You know that, right?"

Finn nodded. "Yes! There are four... no, six in total. Ignis, aqua, caeli, terra, lux, and umbra. Right?"

"In theory, each of those words should trigger the element you want to conjure," Louise confirmed.

Aqua = Water manipulation magic.

Ignis = Fire manipulation.

Caeli = Wind manipulation.

Terra = Earth manipulation.

Lux = Light manipulation.

Umbra = Shadow manipulation

But it wasn't quite like that.

"Exactly. But there's a way to use two of them at the same time." Louise said.

"W-what? Wait... thinking back, you just said 'air no ignis,' didn't you?"

"Exactly. The 'no' serves as a way to combine the two things."

"How did you discover that?"

"I think it was when I went to Forthen Castle a while back for a meeting my family was called to, or something like that. There I met someone, with long dark hair, who was casting something like that. I think she noticed me... but didn't seem to mind."

Louise, at that time, thought that person was Elise Forthen - who would now be the current queen of the kingdom - but in fact, right after leaving the courtyard where she met her, she bumped into her again as soon as she left. In other words, the person she saw couldn't be Elise Forthen. So, who was it? Everyone from the Forthen family, the royal family of the kingdom, were publicly known, and yet she never knew who that person was.

"Well," Louise continued, "anyway, after I saw that person shortening the spells and using 'no' when she wanted to use two at once, I kept trying until I got the hang of it. And, besides..."

For the first time, Finn saw Louise really excited. Usually, she was indifferent when she spoke. But now, talking about what she liked, she was smiling gracefully. It was charming. Finn wasn't that interested in this subject - although he was really impressed with what he just heard - but he couldn't stop admiring her as she spoke with so much enthusiasm, so he kept asking about anything just so Louise wouldn't stop talking. And so, that afternoon passed quickly.