# 65
Seeing Jin-ha looking gloomy, Riyekan snorted.
“You’re worrying unnecessarily. No one can imprison a fairy. I told you fairies have the power to manipulate space. Once they regain consciousness, they’ll immediately go wherever they want through fairy paths.”
“What if they’re killed?”
“An even more pointless worry. When fairies die, they transform into fairy trees. One hundred percent of the time when they’re murdered. And a fairy who awakens as a fairy tree won’t return until they kill their enemy, so killing a fairy is essentially a suicide attempt. Rather, it brings great calamity.”
As far as Earth knew, fairy trees grew from the corpses of high-ranking fairies. But it seemed there were additional conditions as well.
Jin-ha unconsciously felt relieved and drew a line through his notebook in surprise at his own reaction. It was strange, but he felt extremely close to the fairies.
It was an odd feeling.
Perhaps he really had become a little enchanted?
As Jin-ha unwittingly glanced toward the distant place where the fairies had disappeared and stopped, Riyekan gently guided his wrist.
“Any other questions?”
“Hmm… Is there a good method for treating people who have been enchanted by fairies?”
“How do you do it in your world?”
“……”
Jin-ha rolled his eyes, cautiously observing Riyekan’s reaction.
“What is it?”
“Let them get some sunlight, play music for them, have them sing, support them in pursuing hobbies…”
“Wait, I’ve heard that somewhere before.”
“…Back then, I thought you were a fairy disease patient, so I told you to get proper treatment.”
Riyekan laughed hollowly as if dumbfounded, then shook his head.
“We don’t use such moderate methods. We plant them in the ground.”
“…Pardon?”
“First, we plant them naked in the ground with only their head sticking out, then give them plenty of water. After that…”
Jin-ha, who had been writing in his notebook again, looked up at Riyekan with disbelieving eyes. He couldn’t help it. Planting a person in the ground and watering them—he had neither heard nor seen such a treatment method.
“You don’t believe me now.”
“…Are you joking?”
“I thought I’d been acting trustworthy all day.”
“You’re too capricious.”
Riyekan, who had been staring at Jin-ha with narrowed eyes, clicked his tongue.
“People are enchanted by fairies because of fairy wing powder. The fairy wing powder seeps into a person’s body and affects their brain. If you plant a person in the ground and stick a few fairy tree branches around them, the wing powder will attach to the fairy tree branches.”
“The cause was fairy wing powder? Wait, if I had been enchanted earlier, were you planning to plant me in the ground too?”
At that, Riyekan smiled with his eyes and patted Jin-ha’s hand that he was holding, as if to reassure him.
“Don’t worry. If that had happened, I would have planted you in my room and taken good care of you.”
“…Good heavens.”
“Now that I think about it, it might have been quite fun. Are you interested in getting enchanted now?”
“Not at all.”
Jin-ha responded, half terrified.
The thought of being buried with only his head sticking out beside Riyekan’s bed on the 17th floor, spending 24 hours a day with that man, was dizzying.
He must make sure to never be enchanted by fairies in the future.
“Anyway, what kind of fairy tree branches should be used?”
“Even pieces that have fallen to the ground are fine.”
“That’s a relief. It would have been troublesome if we had to fight a fairy tree to obtain them. How long does the treatment take?”
“Minimum four days to maximum two weeks.”
“Our methods take at least half a year or more…”
After carefully continuing his notes in the notebook for a moment, Jin-ha placed a period and, unusually, smiled brightly.
“Thank you, Riyekan.”
“Mm, yes. You should be grateful.”
“This has been a tremendous help. Thanks to you, we’ll be able to return many people to society more quickly in the future.”
“Well, that’s none of my concern.”
Riyekan, who responded lightly, pointed to the wide meadow they had just reached and shook the picnic basket he was holding.
“Shall we eat first?”
* * *
The picnic basket was not just an ordinary picnic basket.
Its appearance was no different from a common basket woven from reeds, but it turned out to be an artifact with spatial expansion capabilities. Unlike Earth, where only byproducts from gates or dungeons could be used to create artifacts, in this world it was possible to modify ordinary objects into artifacts.
Moreover, the inside was quite spacious, allowing an enormous amount of luggage to emerge—from thick mats and canopies to food, plates, forks, and even wine.
Eating delicious food under a canopy made of beautiful lace and enjoying bird songs while sitting on the mat, Jin-ha truly felt as if he were on a picnic.
“You look tired, why don’t you take a nap?”
“Here?”
“Yes. I’ll take you to the next destination afterward.”
“Next? The paper only mentioned the fairy garden.”
“The place I really want to show you is another location within the fairy garden.”
Grinning as he said this, Riyekan lay down beside him and closed his eyes.
Jin-ha gazed at Riyekan for a moment before quietly taking in the surrounding scenery. It was far from a garden meticulously maintained by a gardener, yet it was a strangely orderly forest.
Throughout their journey here, the path was well-established so as not to interfere with walking, and tree branches didn’t extend toward the path. It was as if the trees themselves had made way for the people who came here.
Since fairies usually fly around, they wouldn’t need paths. Given how little was known about fairy ecology on Earth, he thought perhaps there might also exist fairies as large as humans.
Ah, since fairies seemed to have been friendly with Master Senistry, perhaps she had arranged the garden to make it easier for fairies to visit.
In any case, Jin-ha was grateful to be able to spend time in such a peaceful place.
As Jin-ha took a deep breath to inhale the forest scent, he suddenly felt a strange sensation—like a gaze that penetrated the outer shell of his physical body to look into his soul.
“Ah…!”
The moment he turned his head, he met eyes with a girl. A girl with lush mint-green hair was peeking out from among the bushes, watching him. She had a youthful face that looked like she might have just started high school.
Just as he thought those strangely familiar eyes seemed like something he had seen somewhere before, he felt dizzy. Jin-ha staggered, trying to steady himself on the ground, before slumping down.
“Oh my.”
The girl, still crouching and hiding in the bushes, held her cheeks with both hands. Her eyes, full of vitality, sparkled like stars.
“So cute! Seeing him in person, he’s truly adorable. What should I do?”
It wasn’t something a small girl should say about a well-built adult man, but the tiny fairies standing beside her nodded as if in agreement.
[That’s right. He’s cute.]
[If only he had come when he was younger.]
[He must have been even cuter as a child.]
At that, a fairy with blonde hair stamped the ground in exasperation. It was the fairy knight who always guarded the girl.
[This is no time to talk about how cute he is. Your Majesty, what if you’re discovered when you said you would just watch secretly?]
“Mmm… I didn’t expect his senses to be so sharp.”
The Queen lowered her head dejectedly.
“It seems his blood is thicker than I thought.”
[What will you do? Should we just bring him over now?]
Though unable to look toward Jin-ha, the Queen seemed to have difficulty suppressing her tempted heart. But in the end, she restrained her desire.
“No. What if he comes to hate me for selfishly drawing him to our side?”
[Then you shouldn’t have come to see him in the first place.]
At the sharp observation, the Queen smiled broadly.
“But I wanted to see him. I don’t have a proper chance to see him except when he comes here.”
The Queen rarely ventured into human lands. This was because her very existence would influence the world, even without doing anything special.
So unless Jin-ha came to this side, she could hardly see him. In the Queen’s opinion, even Riyekan bringing Jin-ha to visit the fairy realm today was quite a bold move. Especially since he would be wary of this place after receiving her “warning.”
“My mind remains unchanged. When the time comes, I’ll ask him directly. All of you, until then, you must not approach him carelessly. Understand?”
When the Queen declared sternly, the cheeks of the other fairies puffed up with dissatisfaction.
[There’s no problem if we meet him, you’re being needlessly strict.]
[It’s only you who shouldn’t meet him, Your Majesty.]
[You’re jealous, aren’t you?]
At the teasing question, the Queen scooped up the fairies with both hands and poured them onto her skirt.
“That’s right. I’m jealous, so don’t meet him on your own. Now, I declare in the name of the Queen: You must obtain permission when meeting him!”
The fairies rolled around on her skirt, bursting into laughter. After letting the fairies slide down to their heart’s content, the Queen stood up abruptly and turned toward her palace.
“Now, let’s go back.”
It was the fairy knight who stopped the Queen. The fairy knight, who had been side-eyeing the collapsed Jin-ha with a displeased expression, stood with one leg crossed and arms folded.
[Is it alright to leave him like this? If there’s a problem…]
“Don’t worry. He’s still fine.”
[But…]
“When he wakes up, he’ll forget he saw me. Because he’s still human for now.”
An ordinary human cannot dare to remember the Fairy Queen. Despite knowing this well-established fact, the fairy knight couldn’t hide his concern as he continued to look at Jin-ha, only hurriedly following after the Queen had gone far away.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
