Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail.
Chapter 35: The Strange Song In The Forest! Kūkiatsu & Kusabue, The Methodical Siblings! The Green Meadow's Five Groves Appear!
Sting and the other Sabertooth mages got off the train at the Ryokufū Station, feeling glad that the train ride was over, and Sting shared Rogue's issue of needing Risa to heal his motion sickness again. As Risa shot out a thin pink beam of energy from her mouth and aimed it at Sting's face to heal him like how she was going to heal Rogue, Lucy and Yukino calmly walked out of the train station with Haruna. Upon going out of the train station to officially be in the town, Lucy and Yukino mimicked Haruna's quick action of putting her hands over her mouth and nose.
They were all smelling the sweet scent of the perfume that rode the winds passing through Ryokufū Town, and Lucy noticed how several of the houses belonging to the townspeople had pitched roofs in different shades of green while those roofs had smaller roofs on top of them that were slanted towards the right. The roofs looked quite odd, but not as weird as how the houses made from different shades of green wood were all run-down. The houses were in disrepair, almost like the people of this town were quite poor.
Lucy and Yukino were stunned to see a woman with messy and long dark green hair immediately pull her young son back into one house that was on the right side of the street, preventing the short-haired boy who wore a face mask from going outside while mages were around, and she gave a scared look to Lucy. That made Lucy look very concerned, as she wasn't going to harm anyone, but the woman proceeded to look at her again. She started to look somewhat surprised, before seeming pleased at the sight of the girl who she believed was Kotomi, and Lucy got to see that woman silently mouth the antagonist's name while having relief in her eyes.
The feeling of comfort made the woman gently put her dark green face mask over her mouth and nose while she didn't want to get sick from how her son gently opened the front door, and she closed the door right before looking at Lucy through the nearby window with happiness in her eyes. Lucy proceeded to have a kind look in her eyes, letting the stranger believe that she was truly Kotomi Takeuchi, and she bowed her head politely. That prompted Haruna to grab Lucy's wrist in an aggressive manner, frowning as she thought that every passing second could lead to the group getting sick, and she couldn't waste any time.
"We need to get to my perfume shop right away, so let's stop spending time on trivial things." Haruna informed Lucy and Yukino with a stern facial expression, before leading them past the houses that bordered both sides of the street.
Lucy asked Haruna with a curious facial expression while quickly following her from behind, "Shouldn't we go to the research facility first, Haruna?"
That prompted Haruna to reply with a regretful look on her face, turning around slightly for Lucy to see the disappointment in her eyes, "If you wanted to go there from this part of Ryokufū Town, I'm sorry to say that just walking there would be impossible. You'd have to take a Sky Garden Cloud to get there."
"Sky Garden Cloud?" Risa asked with a confused look on her face while coming up to the group with Sting and Rogue joining her in putting their hands over their mouths and noses.
Haruna chose to point up at the sky with the index finger of her left hand, allowing the protagonists to look up at jade green clouds that floated on the sky's wind currents, seeing some people sit on top of them while being happy that they could temporarily avoid the perfume's scent reaching an extremely high altitude. Some of those people still wore their face masks, since they needed to use their Wind Magic to lower themselves down to the streets that had cobblestones in different shades of green forming the patterns of clouds.
Upon seeing one cloud start to land in front of the group for the winds to start blowing towards them, Haruna quickly ran through the town to guide the wizards to her perfume shop. She got to the perfume shop by going to her left at an intersection, before going straight up the street to make a right turn at the intersection that had been close to some trees that bordered the town. As Haruna ran to her shop that was made from forest green bricks with a pale green roof, she noticed that her shop still had the undamaged design involving five leaves being painted on the doorway to resemble flower petals with a green rose in the middle having scent lines cutely drawn near the rose.
Even though the shop's dark green and wooden doors were quickly opened by Haruna running fast enough to push them with enough strength for them to swing forward, she preferred to seem like she returned alone instead of running with the group that could be targeted. Lucy ran after Haruna with her friends by her side. As everyone ran to catch up with her, they glanced at how the perfume's scent made some of the townspeople cough in a sickly manner. The people who coughed even looked very sick while sneezing, their faces being quite pale with their eyes being red while they seemed to have trouble breathing. The people who could hardly breathe also looked feverish, blushing while they felt way too warm, and those fevers made them sick enough to groan from stomach pains or the wind making them feel symptoms of extreme dizziness or nausea. Risa looked stunned at the sickly people who felt waves of nausea rise up from their stomachs for them to fall over with saliva heavily leaving their mouths, but her eyes got to see how the people who died from that sickness were dead in the streets.
There were many deceased people on the street where Haruna ran her perfume shop, too. Risa gasped in a shocked manner from even seeing children being motionless on the streets, their pale faces displaying how the sickness was in their bodies while their pupil-less eyes displayed no signs of life. The sight of all the people who passed away from being so sick actually made Risa start to feel ill, causing her to hastily run into the perfume shop as a way of averting her eyes from the effects of how the research done by the researchers was definitely quite sickening.
"We've definitely... got to put an end to what those researchers are doing. Haruna, the best way to do that... is by showing us which path to take next and guiding us through there." Risa stated in a pained manner, gulping to keep those feelings of sickness suppressed for her to not feel so disgusted while she looked uncomfortable.
That prompted Haruna to ask her with an astounded facial expression, as she proceeded to go behind the shop's mint green counter, "Excuse me?! Why must I put my life at risk anymore, you bold mage? Must I not give myself some protection now from staying in the shop, instead of going back outside to reach any Sky Garden Clouds that may be in the Verdure Forest?"
Upon entering the shop with Sting and the others to hear Haruna's selfish-sounding questions, Lucy responded to her with an irritated look on her face, "I guess that you want us all to go through the forest, and we'll probably have to spend tons of time looking for the proper route while trying to not get lost."
"There may actually be a right path for us to take in the forest, Lucy. In fact, I think I hear it." Sting told her with a calm facial expression, before his blue eyes showed a very surprised look at the sound of someone singing.
Lucy gave Sting a curious look while wondering what he was referring to, but her ears perked up from starting to hear the same sound of a distant person singing. The sounds of someone singing a soft song like a soft ballad reached Lucy's ears, almost like whoever was singing had a way to amplify their voice to be loud enough for faraway people to faintly hear it, and everyone who was in the perfume shop could even hear the singing penetrate the walls and doors that didn't keep the shop from being a soundproof building.
Haruna sighed in a frustrated manner from hearing the sound of that singing, recognizing it to belong to a little girl, and Haruna deemed the matter to be insignificant in comparison to her prominent trouble. The prominence of that person's song involving several high notes in their slow ballad was enough for Sting to run outside of the perfume shop, the light dragon slayer looking quite curious about why a little girl would be singing a song that had strange-sounding lyrics like a song not being a town's official anthem, and he wondered if that person was in trouble.
Lucy started to also feel very curious about why a young girl would be singing out in the Verdure Forest, especially since she started to feel drawn to the sound of the song, and she followed Sting. As Lucy ran after Sting, Rogue and Yukino merely glanced at the unsold bottles of perfume that were in different shades of green. The perfume bottles may have been motionless on mint green shelves, but Rogue and Yukino ran out of the shop to go after their friends. Risa decided to run after them, only turning around for a moment to give the self-centered client a stern look that told her to check out the sound if she didn't want to be defenseless with no mages around to protect her, and the sight of the pink-haired girl leaving the shop that had dark green walls matching the tiled pale green floor made Haruna choose to run after her like a frustrated shopkeeper not wanting a customer to leave without having a persuasive conversation about staying around to at least buy one item.
Ten minutes later, in the forest...
Haruna followed Risa down the right side of the street where the perfume shop was located, and both girls quickly joined up with the other wizards who had gone into the forest. The Verdure Forest was quite a strange place, as Haruna and the other townspeople considered it to be a place that separated one half of the town from the other half, and there were five trees that stood around the grassy entrance to the forest. Everyone walked across the grass to get inside the forest, seeing the sunlight slightly be obscured by the trees, and Sting guided everyone to the sound of the singing girl.
He could hear her song being sung in a deeper part of the forest, prompting to run fast with everyone following him, and Sting quickly got to an area that served as a border between the forest's entrance and its deeper part. Going deeper into the forest required Sting and the other wizards to step on to the dark green grass with Haruna, leaving behind the pale green grass that pertained to the entrance section of the forest. With that section now behind them, Sting ran straight ahead before going to a path that was on the left. That particular path led Sting to an a dead end, but seeing a huge tree with a little girl singing in front of it made the light dragon slayer get closer to the situation.
He took some steps towards her while not minding the smaller grown trees surrounding the larger one, and the young girl wore a mint green dress with five dark green dots on it. The dots were in the formation of five dots on a dice block, and the dress matched her heeled boots that reached up to her ankles while the boots were in a plain shade of green. The green boots complimented her shamrock green hair that was tied back in a messy ponytail, and her eyes were in the shade of Kelly green. She continued to sing while moving her arms around in a slow manner, walking slowly and spinning like she was dancing.
The young girl continued to sing her ballad while Sting watched Lucy and Yukino stand on both sides of her for them to playfully mimic the movements of her dance. They proceeded to nicely smile at the young girl while enjoying the dance, prompting her to build up more magical power to where the shamrock green aura that started surrounding her body would allow her to sing for a longer period of time, and that boost in magical power also gave her more energy for dancing. Her decision to summon up magical power caused a nearby tree's leaves to start rustling loudly. They rustled for a few seconds, before a boy with messy and short light green hair in a spiky moptop hairstyle jumped down from the tree with mint green tornadoes of wind engulfing his fists. He looked stern while yelling, before being hasty enough to tackle Lucy down and start punching her in the head.
"This time, we'll be the ones taking you by surprise!" The boy exclaimed with a fierce look on his face, as he became quite persistent with his punches.
Sting responded to him in a calm manner, before walking over to him to pick up by the back of his green T-shirt, "We'll have to counter your little surprising sneak attack with a surprise of our own. We've never seen you before, unless you personally know Kotomi Takeuchi."
"She's the lady who...! Oh. I've never seen her before in my life, but everyone has heard good rumors about the intelligent and scheming Kotomi-san." The boy responded to Sting with a stern look on his face, before looking down at Lucy and being completely embarrassed at his mistake while his magic faded away from his hands.
Lucy comically replied with the feeling of pain in her voice, as she was on the ground and tightly holding her head with her hands, "Yeah, it's me. I'm Kotomi Takeuchi, and getting hit in the head doesn't logically seem to be how people greet each other in Ryokufū Town."
The boy proceeded to help Lucy stand up, before apologetically bowing his head to show that he was sincerely sorry. Lucy simply smiled as a way of accepting his apology, and she gently rubbed her head while the young girl hadn't stopped singing. She was soon silenced by the boy who looked like he could be her older brother, as he put one hand on her lips to make her be quiet, and the young girl watched him sigh in an annoyed manner. He seemed miffed at her singing, almost like the fact that it attracted people was a tendency that brought displeasing results.
He glanced at all of the people who showed up here, noticing that not one of them seemed to be a certain person who he intended to attack, and even Haruna's presence didn't make him feel like there was a sign of the particular lady being around right now. Since there wasn't any danger at this moment, he proceeded to walk behind a tree and pull out a light green picnic blanket that appeared to have been neatly folded up. He decided to unfold the blanket right in front of the tree, revealing it to be in the shape of a square, and two smaller cloths had been inside the picnic blanket.
The boy picked up the plain green cloth to unfurl it, revealing a brown wooden picnic basket, and he opened up the basket to start taking out the food. The young girl walked over to him and smiled, before attempting to help him by nearly putting her hand in the picnic basket. However, he aggressively slapped her hand away and proceeded to glare at her in a stern way. The mere sight of her being near him made the teenage boy walk over to the light green cloth that seemed to be concealing some food, and he quickly picked it up. He wasted no time with handing the food to her, but seeing her start to open it up only made him slowly clench his fists while he gave her a frustrated look.
"Don't eat your lunch with us, Kusabue! Go eat it over there! You know that I don't want anything to do with you, and I despise you!" The boy told her with the frustrated look remaining on his face, before he aggressively pointed at the tree for her to go towards it.
That prompted Kusabue to respond with a sad look on her face, before walking away with the feeling of disappointment in her eyes, "Oh... Sorry, Kūkiatsu. I'll remember that from now on."
After Kusabue walked away from the group, Kūkiatsu told Haruna and the Sabertooth mages in a kinder tone while smiling nicely at Lucy, "Sorry for making you all have to hear that, and I'm sorry for assuming Kotomi was a mage. I'm Kūkiatsu Hanasōgen, and she's just Kusabue Hanasōgen. It would be nice to know your names, especially since you're friends with someone as supposedly smart as Kotomi-san. I've heard that she's so smart to where she's probably the most intelligent person to come from the nearby town, so she was probably just caught off guard by a surprise attack from a mage. If Kotomi hasn't already told this to you tourists, mages are people who can wield magic such as Wind Magic while even creating spells."
Kūkiatsu's explanation of mages made Risa nicely smile while thinking about the situation, "Kūkiatsu had the assumption that Lucy was a mage, but I wonder how he'd react to finding out that he was correct. Although, I guess we'll all have to deal with Kotomi being perceived as a good person by this town's residents."
Risa replied to Kūkiatsu with a kind smile on her face, playing along with this town's perception of Kotomi while she sat down alongside her friends and Haruna, "My name is Risa Ryusei, and it's definitely nice to meet one of Kotomi's admirers."
"My name is Rogue Cheney, and it's a pleasure that we ran into some healthy-looking people." Rogue added in a calm manner, as he calmly smiled.
Yukino told Kūkiatsu with a nice smile on her face, "I'm Yukino Aguria, and it's great to meet you."
"I'm Sting Eucliffe, and I'm the strongest person in Fiore. In fact, there isn't a single person who can withstand my punches." Sting stated to Kūkiatsu with a confident facial expression, his left fist strike his right hand.
"Now that you've met these people, I find it appropriate for me to now introduce myself. I'm Haruna Senzai, and I own the perfume shop where sweet-scented fragrances exist without making people sick. Of course, I've only had older citizens and grownups like Kotomi enter my store. That's just probably why I've never had the opportunity to speak to you or Kusabue until today, Kūkiatsu." Haruna explained to the young boy with a somewhat relaxed facial expression, trying to take her mind off of her own issues concerning the researchers.
With the introductions over, Kūkiatsu took all of the food out of the bag. There were rice balls with different times of fish in them, as well as some plants that weren't seaweed. His foods mainly consisted of vegetable dishes, such as having a bowl of hot ramen noodles with vegetables in the bowl instead of meat, and there were even three sandwiches that had healthy vegetables in them. In addition to those healthy foods, Kūkiatsu poured seven cups of green tea into cups that were literally in a dark green color while the pitcher was in a juniper shade of green.
As Kūkiatsu was pouring tea out of the pitcher, Risa looked over at the sight of Kusabue having her back towards the group. Kusabue calmly ate one of the sandwiches that had been wrapped in the cloth for her, but the fact that she was eating all by herself made Risa view her to be quite lonely during these moments of lunchtime. She gently picked up a sandwich, before walking over to the young girl, and Risa proceeded to sit down next to her. Kusabue simply smiled a bit from seeing Risa be next to her on the grass, showing that she liked having a friend around.
The fact that Risa was making her smile caused Risa to softly giggle, but she soon glanced back at Kūkiatsu. He claimed that Kusabue was someone who he despised, even though they were siblings, and that made Risa feel curious. She was definitely very curious about why Kūkiatsu had been hiding in a tree with his Wind Magic prepared for attacking someone, and the act of him waiting for someone while Kusabue stayed out in the open as bait was something they frequently did to possibly attract someone. Today wasn't their first day of carrying out that plan, and Risa would try to get more info on Kusabue's feelings about the plan while everyone else could get Kūkiatsu's views about the plan.
Five minutes later...
Kūkiatsu had a somewhat wary look on his face while eating a rice ball, wanting to make sure that the lady who he was waiting for wouldn't try to surprise him, but his thoughts were interrupted by Lucy loudly sipping some of the green tea in her cup. She proceeded to put the cup down, before getting up to start heading back towards the beginning of this path, and Lucy's eyes looked to the left and right for a few seconds. She wanted to see if there was anyone hiding in any of the other trees, wanting to make sure that the group wasn't being spied on while they were curious about Kūkiatsu's actions.
The sound of someone suddenly towards her from behind made Lucy quickly turn around, and she got to see Kūkiatsu maintain his wary facial expression. He started to also look stern, wondering if Lucy just saw the person who he and Kusabue had been hoping to attract, but seeing Lucy shake her head in an apologetic manner while looking disappointed only made Kūkiatsu let out an annoyed sigh. He wanted there to be a glimmer of hope for his plan to work, especially since he had been sensing a familiar type of magical power in the past few months.
He had definitely sensed the magical power that a certain mage wielded, even sensing the level of power to be a strong one while that mage was probably using their magic to restore the plants. Kūkiatsu had never gotten to see that person restore the plants, due to him and Kusabue having the unfortunate luck of being in Ryokufū Town or being in a different part of the woods that made them be quite distant from that mage to where they couldn't be reached in a quick amount of time. Even if that mage was also looking for them, both sides had never experienced a second encounter with each other.
The fact that there was no progression in this stakeout caused Kūkiatsu to look like he wanted to give up, and the loud sound of him sighing in a sad manner made Kusabue turn around to look at him. She watched him disappointingly glance down at the grass, before he glanced at the entrance to this part of the forest, and Kusabue had a concerned look in her eyes. She could see that Kūkiatsu was upset at how that particular mage seemed like they wouldn't show up, even if the siblings stayed out in the forest until the late hours of nighttime, and Kusabue slowly closed her eyes while she felt like there was only one logical solution to ease her brother's pain.
"On the mint green winds of the tower, the hero is who they see. The wielders of wind and plants clash over their differences, feeling the pain of the strife before the hero silences them both. The heavens come down, and earth comes up with both of them concealing truths that the other lacks. Reaching out with her hands, the hero slams her palms into the winds and the plants. The wind and the nature's aroma must come together to create a beautiful thing, dulling the pain and exemplifying the power of the ring. The wind and the plants, they must be the best of friends. The friends must flow together like a smart haiku, going slowly with five-seven-five for harmony to start to extend." Kusabue sang in a slow manner while dancing around, purposely building up a shamrock green aura of magical power in her mouth as she smiled.
Lucy asked Kūkiatsu with a puzzled facial expression while putting a hand on his shoulder, "Does Kusabue repeatedly sing that song throughout the day? Kūkiatsu, is she trying to attract a friend for a surprise attack or something?"
"She's been singing that same song and doing that same dance for the past five months, no matter if it's nighttime or if the weather is bad! Kotomi-san, she's hoping to lure out a researcher who's doubling as a mage. Kusabue sings with an infusion of Sound Magic in her voice, and unleashing more magical power can extend the range of her voice to attract people from the town or further away. Of course, that means she can attract unpleasant people sometimes. Still, it's all done for revenge purposes." Kūkiatsu thoroughly explained to Lucy with a serious and annoyed facial expression, thinking about how this plan still hadn't worked.
Lucy asked aloud in a calm manner, after blinking her eyes, "Revenge purposes?"
Kūkiatsu nodded with confirmation to assure Lucy that this experimental method was for that purpose, since he observed it being successful several times in the past. He soon surprised Lucy by pulling out a small notebook from the right pocket of his basil green khaki pants, and the notebook was dark green. He opened the notebook to show Lucy a list of names pertaining to the people who he and Kusabue encountered, having even organized them with names and days recorded while the different hours of time were also recorded, but there was something very odd.
He pointed to the researcher's name, but Lucy only saw a question mark written in that section. She assumed that the lady didn't give her name to the young children as a way to keep herself from being reported to the Magic Council for attacking them, since it seemed like no guild was ever even informed by the Magic Council about how some children were attacked in forest near a town where the scent of a sweet-smelling perfume was making people sick. Lucy looked up from the notebook to face Kūkiatsu, who didn't seem to be feeling sick at all.
She wondered if he had been using his Wind Magic to somehow repel the perfume that had its scent all over the town while the aroma could obviously get into the forest, but even repelling the perfume couldn't prevent the issue of the siblings possibly needing food or water while they were out in the forest. Eating plants may have been a wise thing to do, if they were always careful about which plants they could heavily consume. However, the fact that Kūkiatsu chose to finish eating a rice ball made Lucy feel curious about how he could store food inside a picnic basket or a cloth without the sickness-inducing perfume getting on anything.
"If you're also wondering if that researcher may be sick from the town's scent, I can tell you right now that you'd be wrong. Some researchers either use Wind Magic to make themselves constantly breathe purified air from their spells, or they have to heal themselves with medicines made from plants. Of course, Kotomi-san, you know that researchers have to heal themselves in the Meadow Research Lab." Kūkiatsu explained further, hoping that Lucy wasn't going to unexpectedly ask any stupid questions.
Lucy asked Kūkiatsu with a nice smile on her face, as she decided to keep playing along with the notion that she was Kotomi, "Since I haven't been to this town in presumably a really long time, where is the Verdant Meadow Lab? Is it the research lab that's in Ryokufū Town?"
"No, Kotomi-san. That particular lab gets its name from being near the meadow, and some researchers use the underground path as a safe place for them to rest. You'll see how it's viewed as a safe place, if you end up finding the lab's entrance. It's not on this path, but all researchers can secretly get there." Kūkiatsu told Lucy with a nice smile on his face, before pulling out a mint green plastic card from the right pocket of his pants.
The mint green plastic card was actually Kūkiatsu's badge for working in the research facility, as it had a picture of him smiling while his name was listed on the badge, and he had been a worker at the research laboratory. Although, it seemed like he was no longer employed there while his badge was only a reminder of how he was out of a job. Kūkiatsu had informed everyone that he was a mage, but not all mages were part of guilds or working for royalty. Some of them chose to work in research fields, since they thought that getting harmed by other wizards was highly unlikely to happen.
However, Kūkiatsu found out firsthand that other researchers weren't exactly good individuals. He started thinking back to how the town's scientists with light green hair once had the unethical idea of using perfumes that were presumably from Haruna's shop as their groundwork for developing new perfumes or thoroughly analyzing scents to see which specific plants were used in the creation processes of perfumes or hybrid plants that could be used to create new hybrids of scents or plants. Even though their actions were sleazy, Kūkiatsu felt like he could stay quiet about it because of how they weren't hurting anyone when he was working there.
That immediately changed when Kūkiatsu recalled how there was a fateful incident that negatively affected him and Kusabue, but he felt like it would've been avoided if Kusabue wasn't the cause of the problem. Kūkiatsu had never forgotten how he once encountered a certain researcher who harassed his younger sister, as well as their parents, and he firmly blamed Kusabue for singing in the forest before their parents wanted her to come home. Even if she chose to sing her song out of pure happiness when she found something important in the forest, Kūkiatsu angrily clenched his fists while thinking about what had happened.
Kukiatsu's Flashback, five months earlier...
Kūkiatsu wandered deep into the forest with Kusabue for the purpose of finding some medicinal herbs, going down some of the paths that weren't commonly used by people who didn't need to collect certain herbs, and venturing quite deep into the forest allowed the two siblings to soon arrive at an area with a circle of trees that had dark green leaves. Most of the leaves were pointing down at a juniper green rock that was covered in plain green moss, The mossy rock had a dark green ring situated on top of it, the ring glimmered in a light green color when a small bit of sunlight shined down on it from above the trees.
The fact that the sunlight came down on the ring to make it shine in pretty shades of green caused Kusabue to smile happily, and she walked towards the mossy rock. The mossy rock had a smaller stone situated next to it, prompting Kusabue to immediately climb on to it. Once she was on that stone, Kusabue inhaled some air before focusing the energy of the air into her mouth. She built up magical power, making a shamrock green aura engulf her body, and she exhaled the air while Kusabue's Sound Magic made her lips create a beautiful whistling sound like she had blown air on a leaf to create some loud notes of music that flowed together.
The Sound Magic came with a side effect, since looking down at the ground and exhaling air caused Kusabue to create some shamrock green blasts of energy that were small. The intensity of the blasts and the sound waves ended up propelling Kusabue high into the air, which caused Kūkiatsu to look very concerned for his younger sister, but Kusabue soon grabbed some leaves that had been blown off of the trees by the winds of the blasts. The feeling of the heavy winds caused Kusabue to gently blow on the leaves, creating some music that was somewhat quiet, and that affected her Sound Magic in an interesting way.
Kusabue began to float down to the ground while continuing to play her music, and her notes seemed to be part of an upbeat melody. That upbeat feeling from her music caused Kusabue to start jumping on the air, but she only jumped downward to hop on the air's straight path that led down to the mossy rock. When she got to the top of the rock, Kusabue chose to gently pick up the ring and she smiled in a cheerful manner. She giggled cheerfully while proceeding to look at Kūkiatsu, who looked quite surprised at how it seemed like his younger sister had been practicing frequently with her magic like she was trying to be a first-class mage, and Kusabue watched Kūkiatsu quickly shake his head to refocus his mind back on getting the medicinal herbs.
"Since you found that pretty ring, let's go home now. Kusabue, they want you to be home early and I have to do some research on several different plants." Kūkiatsu explained to her with a calm facial expression, as he began picking up herbs that were on the ground to put them in a green wooden basket that was in his left hand.
Kusabue replied to her older brother with an excited look on her face, feeling like she needed to celebrate with a happy-sounding song, "On the mint green winds of the tower, the hero is who they see. The wielders of wind and plants clash over their differences, feeling the pain of the strife before the hero silences them both. The heavens come down, and earth comes up with both of them concealing truths that the other lacks. Reaching out with her hands, the hero slams her palms into the winds and the plants. The wind and the nature's aroma must come together to create a beautiful thing, dulling the pain and exemplifying the power of the ring. The wind and the plants, they must be the best of friends. The friends must flow together like a smart haiku, going slowly with five-seven-five for harmony to start to extend."
Kusabue continued to happily sing with joy in her voice, before inhaling more air to cheerfully tell Kūkiatsu in a singsong voice while spinning around, "I'm so happy! Happy, happy, happy! I got the cute ring, and my big brother watched me get it! I got the pretty green ring, and it's so very beautiful! Treasure for me, Kūkiatsu! My pretty treasure is for me! La la la la la!"
"If you love your treasure so much, then go keep it in a safe place!" Kūkiatsu responded to her in a slightly irritated manner, moving his right hand to create some Wind Magic.
Kūkiatsu created a powerful gust of Wind Magic that blew Kusabue quite high into the air, before making the winds be redirected for them to carry Kusabue down to the grass. When she softly landed on the grass, Kūkiatsu looked down at his little sister's dark green T-shirt and the plain green skirt that matched her juniper green shoes. She seemed to be okay, not having any bruises from those blasts or having any grass stains on her clothes. Since Kusabue seemed to be okay, Kūkiatsu watched her get up and try to put the ring on her finger. The ring was too big, though, and Kusabue felt like she'd have to ask her parents to help her make the ring perfectly fit on her finger.
After she hurriedly ran out of the forest, Kusabue went home. Kūkiatsu stopped by the house to just drop off the herbs, before going back into the forest to start conducting research on some seemingly dangerous plants. They were on the right side of the town's large forest, which extended for a long distance to form a dense border that separated both sides of the town, and Kūkiatsu wasted no time with running over there. He quickly ran down some paths that were prominent to the townspeople, before turning to the right at a branching path, but the moment he arrived at some shrubs that had mint green tulips on them was the same moment where two people seemed to be coming towards him.
He immediately hid behind a tree while looking startled, not assuming that other people would be here, and he decided to just spy on them. One of those individuals was a girl who had wavy and long pale green hair that reached the middle of her back while it went well with her orange eyes, and she wore an emerald green lab coat that matched her pale green T-shirt. The shirt went well with her miniskirt, which was in a dark green color. The miniskirt complimented her pale green high heels, and the girl who wore it seemed like she must've been a new researcher. She wasn't the only researcher who Kūkiatsu noticed, though. The other researcher was a woman with forest green hair that fell to her hips, and she wore a forest green lab coat that complimented her neon green blouse. The blouse went well with her fern green khaki pants, and that researcher also wore dress shoes that were in the shade of honeydew green. The shoes matched her square-shaped glasses that were in the color of matcha green tea, and Kūkiatsu watched the researcher push up her glasses as she walked alongside her partner.
"Harui, are you sure that you heard the singing coming from this general direction? How come we haven't seen anyone yet?" The woman calmly asked the researcher who looked one or two years younger than her, before frowning from feeling a slight bit of doubt.
Harui responded with a look of assurance on her face, as confidence was in her eyes, "Yaeko, I'm sure that I heard a girl singing on the other side of the forest. She was singing about finding the ring, and it shouldn't be difficult to detect where her magical power has been used."
"You're a researcher, but you think with absolute simplicity. Following her trail to where the magic came from is a good idea, but sensing her general proximity is a much wiser idea for finding that ring. If you don't know that, Harui, you really are the newest and dumbest researcher in the institution." Yaeko explained to her fellow researcher with a smug smile on her face, feeling like she always had all the answers to problems.
Kūkiatsu thought to himself with a panicked look on his face, as his eyes were filled with shock and curiosity, "Are they talking about the ring that Kusabue found on the mossy rock? That jewelry is valuable? If Yaeko is right, then...! Oh, no!"
Kūkiatsu wasted no time with quietly going back to the entrance of the forest, trying to get there as fast as possible, but he soon sensed someone use a high amount of Wind Magic. He could feel a massive breeze behind, almost like the researchers chose to run at high speeds, and the fact they didn't use any powerful spells meant that they didn't sense Kūkiatsu's presence. Still, he felt like his safety was now a lesser matter in comparison to Kusabue being safe. He ran all the way back to the entrance of the forest, and he felt like time was not on his side.
He made a mint green aura of Wind Magic surround his feet, watching it engulf the light green sneakers that matched his Kelly green jeans, and the aura also surrounded his hands that tugged on his fern green dress shirt. His hands soon let go of his shirt, as he felt less panicked, and Kūkiatsu began running much faster to get back home. He soon made it back to the town of Ryokufū, running past the perfume shop to reach an intersection, and Kūkiatsu headed straight down to reach the street where his house was located.
He ran to the left, and Kūkiatsu noticed how the front door of his house was open while black skid marks were on the ground to lead him into the house. He ran into the house at a decent pace, not running at the speed of someone driving a car that dangerously skidded to leave sizzling burn marks on the ground, and Kūkiatsu let the aura fade away from his body while the sight of what he saw left him looking quite shocked. The living room had furniture that was broken, as well as smashed tables, and a woman with somewhat long light green hair was wounded on the floor while a man with short and messy hair was heavily injured. He was under a bookcase, and he seemed to be losing consciousness while the woman could barely stand. At least she was pulled up off the ground by her hair like how Kusabue was, though. Kūkiatsu watched his younger sister get harmed by the woman who had wavy light green hair, and the sight of her partner comfortably sitting in a green chair made his facial expression of shock fade away for a look of anger to take its place.
"What the hell's going on here?! Yaeko, what the hell did you do to my parents and why is your assistant hurting Kusabue?" Kūkiatsu asked with anger in her voice, looking stern as he ran to be by his mom's side.
Kūkiatsu's mother responded weakly with her eyes closed, as she felt heavily injured, "Kūkiatsu, contact someone... from the Magic Council... or go to a nearby guild."
"Don't bother wasting a guild's time on this, you imbecile! We're only looking for the ring, which we know your daughter has in her possession. She just won't tell us where she hid the ring." Yaeko explained to Kūkiatsu with a smirk of self-interest on her face, before stomping on his mother's back with her foot.
Kusabue exclaimed in a frustrated manner to the girl who was pulling her hair, tears in her eyes from the pain as she had quickly been bruised up and bloodied during the attack, "I keep telling you that I don't have it! I ran home to show it off, but it's not here! You didn't listen to me when I said I dropped it, you witch!"
That remark prompted Harui to slap Kusabue in the face, causing the young girl to let out a very loud cry with Sound Magic infused into it, and aiming her voice in Harui's direction only made an average-sized shamrock green blast occur around them both. It freed Kusabue from Harui's grip, though, and the older female fell to the floor after being sent flying back against a wall. She slowly got up to see Kusabue panting heavily, stunned that such a young child had the talent for using something as rare as Sound Magic, and recalling how a beneficial ring was said to be green like that Sound Magic made Harui frown sternly from not wanting Kusabue to possibly amplify her magic with it.
One way to stop her would be by trying to nullify that Sound Magic, and Harui pulled out a white beaker from the right pocket of her lab coat. She made a dark green aura engulf her right hand that held the beaker, causing the seed in it to quickly start growing, and the green flower that grew in the beaker opened up like a blooming bud to show Kūkiatsu's family its green petals. In the middle of the petals, the flower fired several sharp-looking thorns. Several of the thorns pierced through Kusabue's clothing to stab her skin, causing her to be more wounded while screaming in pain, but her sound waves would soon encounter their weakness.
Haru's flower began to absorb the sound waves, taking in the shamrock green aura of energy, and the flower simply spat out a small bubble. The air bubble immediately popped, causing Harui to sense her plant's reflective attack to not work because of how her opponent's magic was quite weak for her plant to not shoot out a high-level spell, Yaeko merely sighed in an annoyed manner while putting one hand over her face, as she recalled how that particular spell couldn't gain much of a boost from a weak attack, and Yaeko proceeded to walk out of the house. That prompted Harui to walk out of the house, but Kūkiatsu made a mint green aura engulf his hands again. He proceeded to make his hand slap the air near Harui, causing her to be carried upward by the winds, and he watched her fall down to the ground before quickly running away to catch up with Yaeko.
It didn't take long for Yaeko to pick up something that had been on the town's nearest street, the object nearly concealed by being on bricks of the same color, and seeing the glimmering ring made Yaeko pick it up to smirk deviously about it. She could now look in the direction of the sealed area of the research lab, and Yaeko's thoughts could shift towards studying the ring for creating better research observations or just fabricating research. As Yaeko walked away with the feeling of victory in her fern green eyes, her thoughts were entirely focused on the ring. That couldn't be said for Harui, who turned around to glare at the two young kids who both narrowed their eyes at her to send the message of how this feud between their groups wasn't going to be over anytime soon.
Back in the current time...
Kusabue was definitely not going to let that feud end without herself and her brother being victorious against the researchers who had given them so much trouble over that legendary ring, and she had also been thinking about that day. Recalling how her family got hurt by those wizards made Kusabue feel like she needed to become much stronger, which prompted her to train very hard every single day with her magic while Kūkiatsu also trained quite hard with his spells, but training out in the forests or woods near other towns wasn't something that they could do for the rest of their lives.
Kusabue narrowed her eyes at the grass in a stern manner while feeling like she and Kūkiatsu would eventually meet up with those researchers again, and having to fight them would probably be dangerous. It would be the second actual time where Kusabue had to fight for her life, as well as fighting to earn her older brother's respect. She recalled seeing him be angry at the researchers, but he had been more angry at her for finding the ring in the first place. Kusabue had wanted to redeem herself for making such a bad decision, but she soon sighed in a sad manner from thinking that the day where her brother could be happy would never come.
His feelings of anger and unhappiness made Kusabue wonder how hard she'd have to work for herself and Kūkiatsu to get their revenge, since she chose to not go one day without singing. If she didn't sing, then the researchers would probably never show up. Kusabue started to have determination in her eyes from how she didn't want them to think that they could keep living happy lives after what they had done to her family, and she quickly stood up. Kusabue walked away from Risa, who got to see the young girl make a shamrock green aura engulf her hands while she walked towards a tree, and Risa watched Kusabue happily hum some notes at a purposely loud frequency while repeatedly slamming her magic-infused hands against the brown tree with a strong amount of power.
Kusabue's high amount of powerful magic was prominent enough for someone to create Plant Magic in their hands as a way of activating a spell for preparation, and she widened her eyes in a stunned manner from sensing the general location of that magic. Kusabue recognized who that level of magic belonged to, prompting her to make a shamrock green aura engulf her feet. Kusabue ran away from this part of the forest at very high speeds, wanting to confront the people who hurt her family, but her high speed instantly got the attention of Kūkiatsu and the other wizards who disliked evil mages. As everyone felt the heavy breeze of Kusabue's running speed pass by them, Kūkiatsu could only look immensely alarmed.
"Oh, no! Kusabue must've detected the presence of the mage who we've been looking for, but she's so reckless! Running off to fight the enemy by herself is so damn stupid! That crazy girl's going to get herself badly hurt again!" Kūkiatsu exclaimed to the group with a panicked facial expression, the intense feeling of worry in his eyes while he ran after her.
Lucy responded to him with a stern look on her face, as she proceeded to run after him with her teammates, "If we catch up to her very quickly, then we can hopefully take down that researcher before they kill Kusabue!"
"The researcher who these kids have been trying to find... That person may be part of the Green Meadow's Five Groves. None of you better even have the slightest thought about getting careless." Haruna explained to the Sabertooth mages in a strict tone of voice, looking concerned as they all ran to the other side of the forest.
Risa responded to Haruna in a snarky tone, seeming annoyed by her words, "If these guys are causing so much trouble, then you won't even see us acting careless!"
Risa hoped that Kusabue would be okay, and she could sense the young girl's magical energy on a path that was to the right. She watched Lucy also sense that with her Psychic Magic, as the green-haired girl led her group down that path, and Lucy even led the team down a steep slope that made them soon be standing on fern green grass. This forest was quite interesting, as the different shades of green grass represented how this forest was quite dense with the woods winding because of their various paths, and the group soon came to a clearing that had trees with fern green leaves.
There was a path of fern green grass going deeper into the forest, but the path was currently blocked off by the group of five mages who were all facing Kusabue. She turned around to look surprised at the group of people who followed her to this area, not thinking that they would also sense some magic, but Kusabue quickly turned back around to glare at the five researchers. Lucy noticed that the researcher with forest green hair had a green ring on her right hand, which made Lucy be quite shocked, and she immediately built up some magical power.
That prompted Sting and Rogue to build up some magical power, followed by Risa, and Yukino was about to pull out one of her golden keys. As Yukino got ready to summon a Celestial Spirit, Kūkiatsu and Kusabue both looked quite stunned that the group of people who they had been talking to were all actually mages. Kūkiatsu genuinely couldn't tell the difference between a civilian and a mage, as he never looked at any newspapers that would've possibly made him see the distinct guild mark of Sabertooth, and he simply gave Lucy a surprised look.
"Magic?! That means you guys are all...!" Kūkiatsu asked Lucy in a very shocked tone, as he started to focus on the pink aura around her hands.
Harui asked Lucy in a stern tone, her eyes showing curiosity right before she recognized Sting, "Who the hell are you people? Wait, aren't you the guy who enjoys destroying plants?"
"We're wizards from the Sabertooth guild, and we're here to stop your disgusting research that's making people sick from perfume! None of Haruna's perfumes are responsible for it, since you're at fault. Also, you've got something that we want." Lucy explained to Harui in a calm manner, before aggressively narrowing her eyes at Yaeko.
Ayane responded for her subordinate with an annoyed look on her face, disliking Lucy's attitude, "Those are some bold words to hear, especially from a user of Psychic Magic who isn't exactly the smartest one or the leader. We know your leader is Sting Eucliffe, but the ring is ours for research. If you want it so badly, then just try to take it from us. We're the Green Meadow's Five Groves, and we're the strongest mages and the best researchers in Ryokufū Town!"
That response only made Risa loudly scoff in a doubtful manner, as she viewed the situation as how they were all still near Ryokufū Town while no battles had commenced to determine the strongest mages. Still, the strongest mages didn't just involve wizards having high-level spells or brute strength. Risa made a bubblegum pink aura engulf her hands, and she activated the Stellar Psi spell while her hands were aimed at Yaeko. Risa attempted to pull that woman forward, thinking that a sudden attack would allow her to punch Yaeko for the purpose of distracting her to get that ring.
However, Risa's plan to get the ring was intercepted by Harui firing several sharp-edged leaves from her hands. Those leaves looked different than the ones Lucy ran from in Tokiwa Town, seeing them to be pale green with a dark green aura surrounding them, and this spell known as Verdant Cutting Leaf made those leaves be in a circle like a large blade. Yukino quickly summoned Libra to intercept it with Gravity Magic, making the spell go down to the ground for several pale green blasts to occur, and Yaeko exhaled wind to push herself backwards with a high amount of force while making the mint green aura of Wind Magic surround her body.
She landed near her fellow researchers, before they all looked at the blasts of light together to see how Harui's power got deflected. Yaeko sighed in a rude manner at how her partner's spells were overcome by a mage who didn't even look strong, and that blunder on Harui's part was enough to make Yaeko feel like she could take a chance on an interesting idea. She started to smile in an arrogant manner about how Harui could probably decimate all of those wizards by herself, or just experience the possibility of dying.
Yaeko told Harui in a calm tone while using her middle finger to push up her glasses, "Harui Kiiroi, we're going on ahead to the research lab. You can play around with those kids and the guild wizards, but just don't take all day to finish them off."
Sting responded sternly, as he ran towards Yaeko with a fierce facial expression, "That's plan's going have to be changed, and you're scummy to abandon your comrade like that."
Before he could punch Yaeko, Sting soon felt some green vines wrap around his arms. He was immediately slammed down to the ground, and the vines were from Harui's spell known as Destructive Vine. She retracted the vines into her palms, before sending them out to aggressively slam themselves down on the ground. The vines created dark green blasts of energy that had enough force to send the large group of mages flying into the air, but Libra had stepped back to avoid the blasts. Yukino couldn't summon Pisces in midair, but her eyes widened with realization from remembering that she had her new magic.
Yukino pulled out a small brown bag from her skirt's left pocket, and she quickly untied it to reveal that some light blue coins with wings on the heads sides had been inside the bag. The coins were also numbered differently, almost like they had different amounts of worth pertaining to their different sizes. Yukino took two small coins from the bag, each coin having the number 10 on its tails side, and putting magical power into the coins caused them to glow with a light blue aura engulfing them. The aura soon engulfed Yukino, who put the bag back in her pocket while the two coins disappeared, and she slowly floated down to the ground.
After reaching the ground, a light blue sphere soon formed in her left hand while it spun in a clockwise manner. The sphere glowed with thin beams of light emanating from it, and Yukino pulled out three large coins from the bag. They were all marked with the number 50, and putting more magical power into them strengthened the spell Yukino had created. As that spell grew to be three times its original size, Yukino watched Harui's large vines specifically grab Sting again. He was soon brought to be in front of her while being hung upside-down in front of his teammates, who all fell down to the ground with the people who they had to keep safe. As everyone slowly got up after that sudden attack, Harui merely cleared her throat to speak about the current situation.
"When you've got an idiot for a leader, the whole team ends up getting caught in bad situations. Sting Eucliffe, we've heard of you and you're a pretty bad guild master if you lead this pathetic crew of trashy mages. It's bad enough you're all trying to save that dirty freak with dark green hair, but the fools following you are pretty pathetic." Harui explained to Sting with a rude look on her face, as she proceeded to stand next to him and rudely slap his face repeatedly.
Lucy responded for Sting with an angry look on her face, aiming both of her hands at Harui before suddenly being interrupted, "You researchers act like you know everything, but you don't know that I'm going to defeat you right now with my-"
"Icy Fimbulvetr Magic! Lucy-sama, she'll be defeated by my Icy Fimbulvetr Magic." Yukino loudly interrupted with a serious look on her face, before explaining herself to Lucy with a harsh look in her eyes.
"She is my opponent to handle. Lucy-sama, run away with Risa-sama and Rogue-sama when I free Sting-sama. You all have to get that ring, and you won't find it if you all stay here. Please go, and I'll be right behind you." Yukino explained to Lucy and her friends while remaining stern, determined to defeat the arrogant antagonist.
Yukino's determination only made Lucy nod her head in an obedient manner, and she ran towards Sting. He got to see Lucy build up magical power in her right hand, and the pink aura of Psychic Magic soon appeared. Lucy activated a spell that llooked similar to Risa's attack called Psychotic Slicer, but slicing the air with her nails created a pink crescent-shaped blade that twisted and turned while she easily cut the vines. Sting immediately fell to the ground, before running away with Lucy, and the effect of the Psi Spatial Slash began to show itself.
Harui was soon dealing with slashes being dealt to her body while each slash twisted the space around her, causing her vines to bend in bizarre ways right before they were engulfed in pink explosions that were quite large. The explosions destroyed the space around Harui, and their light allowed Rogue to run towards the path leading deeper into the forest while Risa ran towards that same path with Haruna behind her. The shop owner hastily ran past Risa and Rogue, caring for her own survival, and she only caught a small glimpse of Kūkiatsu running through the middle of some trees to seemingly take a different path with Kusabue.
As the kids were the last ones to leave Yukino and Libra alone with Harui, the antagonist watched Yukino run towards her. The hazel-eyed mage slammed her sphere against Harui's stomach, creating a light blue blast that was quite large, and the force of the blast sent Yukino flying quite high into the sky! It created several air currents, the winds being quite strong to knock the leaves off of trees, and it even blew the blue smoke clouds away. When all of the smoke clouds went away, Yukino could only look quite curious at how she saw Harui's skin entirely be pale green while it seemed to have the texture of tree bark that was cracking. The tree bark continued to crack, almost like Harui used a shield before this fight even began, and the bark of her Forest Shield spell soon all broke apart to reveal that she was undamaged. As Yukino and Libra both widened their eyes in disbelief at how the Arduous Blizzard spell was countered like that, Harui smirked evilly at how this fight was just beginning to where Yukino would see that the green-haired villain wasn't insignificant like the very soft sound of a nearby grassy bush rustling in the winds.
How was Chapter 35? Feel free to tell me your thoughts on it. Lucy and her friends have arrived in Ryokufū Town, and they're now aware of the pandemic pertaining to the persisting perfume's sickness-inducing scent. Of course, helping Haruna get rid of five antagonists isn't their only goal. Kūkiatsu and Kusabue are two children who need help with getting rid of a researcher who caused problems for them, and her partner has the ring. However, those kids getting their revenge is just one of the plots intertwined with the rest of this arc. Also, Harui commenting on Kusabue's dark green hair is alluding to the theme of racism that's going to be one of the themes in this arc. That may be interesting, if I execute it properly in the writing. By the way, Yukino fighting Harui may be setting up something for the next battle. Speaking of this arc, this is the second part of the Emerald Wind Arc! I'll update soon. :)
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