Chapter 10—An Army

"Humans loved to walk. They saw no reason to fly. But, Caelen was the odd one in the society. He was a dreamer and all his life, he tried to find a way to fly."

A bright moon glowed above their heads. Everyone was settled around the fire, listening to Carlotta's clear but tiny voice. It was her turn to give him his wish. He only wanted to know why they feared him so much.

"He found a way to fly but it only gave him a few seconds. Caelen had fallen—fallen from the sky!" Some of them began to cry but the human couldn't understand why. "He fell down in our pond, just like you did. And he wreaked havoc in this village. He was mad, you see. He wasn't able to prove himself victorious and so he poured his anger on our houses. Burnt everything down. Ate some of us. It was horrible."

Delic couldn't see the raging fires on the trees or hear their own screams of fear but the leprechauns remembered the past so vividly.

"And he left after all was fallen into ashes. He went home and became a laughingstock."

"Karma, I'd say!" Druch, an old wrinkled-face leprechaun, interrupted with a wave of his wooden staff.

"So, is this why you're afraid of me?"

"You're Caelen reincarnated!" Druch stood up and wobbled all the way to the blond man. He poked his staff against his legs and dirtied his white shoes.

"Look, I don't even want wishes and it was an accident! What do you want, old man? What do you all want?" His voice shook with controlled anger.

After a lengthy silence, the old Druch finally said, "We want... revenge."

"He was one of the greatly affected ones, you see, Delic." Carlotta empathically stated. "He lost his wife, brother and kids. I lost my brother and father. Everyone lost someone dear to them." Sympathetically, he nodded. "We just want to prove that we, though little, should be treated fair. None of us dies except for old age but he, Caelen... what he did... it was just..." She broke into tears.

Every single leprechaun around, young or old, exhibited a red nose and a tearstained face. It still hurt. The past wasn't something easy to forget.

"I'll help you," Delic finally said with conviction.

"Liar!" Druch spat and he received a blow from the thigh with his staff.

"I'm serious!" His voice made everyone look up at him. "I'm going to save my friend. But I don't know where he is. Can anyone help me with that first?"

"Just wish for it!" Carlotta beamed.

And so he did. And found out that the kidnappers took Hibiya in the Land of the Impossible and kept him locked up in a golden castle.

"Do you want to help me save him?"

"Why should we do that?" The staff was raised overhead but Delic stopped Druch's momentum.

"I need an army to stall the guards as I take him away. I know I can't do it alone. I'm going to need some back up and I think you folks can help me. You can do anything you want with the enemies. Then, you can prove your worth. You can show them that you're not just little unimportant runts. In that way, the world will know it and you have played an important role for me."

"Hmm, quite a two-birds-in-one-stone deal," the female leprechaun remarked.

"I'll call you. Just wait for my signal to enter. Trust me." He hoped he didn't sound too desperate.

"Deal."

Delic gave his index for Carlotta to shake and the deal was sealed.


Really hope that I'm not messing things up. }OTL Its hard to write, okay! And I'm kind of following the "Anything for You" pattern. If you don't know the song, please listen to it! Again, it's "Anything For You" by Ludo.