酷视

The entire night of drinking Leinei\'s wine and talking turned out to be less than sufficient. Without a proper, murderous hangover, how I was supposed to test the effects of that herbal tea Leinei spoke so highly about?

With my eyes still closed, I raised my hands and gently massaged my ears to get rid of the most annoying prize of yesterday night\'s drinking. A mere moment later, I opened them up… Only to confirm that Fay was, indeed, sleeping by my side.

Even though we were basically newlyweds at this point, we ended up not enjoying each other over the night as any other couple in our situation would.

There simply wasn\'t the right opportunity for us to escape from everyone\'s eyes so that we could fully focus on each other. And while I could still remember Fay greedily clinging up to me when we laid down to get some rest, in the end, save for some cuddling, nothing really happened.

Looking down, I finally noticed why I felt so weirdly refreshed.

We were not in the hut. In spite of all the hospitality the dryad offered, she didn\'t invite us inside her small hut at any point of the night. And when we couldn\'t hold ourselves up any further, we simply laid down as we were, hoping for our clothes to keep us warm.

And now, I realized just why Leinei didn\'t even bother inviting us in.

\'She really does have some skills,\' I thought, gently raising the thin sheet made with flowers that somehow perfectly insulated us from the cold of the morning winds.

"Woah…" With my mind slightly impaired, I cared not for appearances and uttered a moan of awe out loud. "This is magnificent," I muttered, carefully inspecting the sheet of flowers and vines that somehow felt as soft as the most expensive cushions one could find on earth.

"Thank you for your praise," Leinei spoke, suddenly forcing me to realize she was standing right behind me.

Turning my eyes, I looked at the dryad before lowering my head in a bow of respect.

"How did you make this so soft? I didn\'t feel any thorns from the flowers or stalks from the vines prickling my skin at all!" I asked, amazed by the creation to the limit.

But rather than actually taking an interest in how Leinei created this sheet out of nowhere, I simply wanted to let my amazement show. Splashing the dryad with rich lube of praises wouldn\'t hurt but could potentially earn me some brownie points with her.

After all, who would dislike others praising what they crafted?

"Are you actually interested in learning how I did it?" Leinei asked, crossing her arms on her chest as she raised her right eyebrow and gave me an inquisitive look.

"Well…" I turned my eyes away, down the sheet of flowers… and the lovely, plump lines of Fay\'s sleeping body hidden underneath. "Maybe sometime in the future," I replied off-handedly, reaching out to pat Fay\'s head.

Watching her sleep so soundly… gave rise to the strange warmth in my soul that threatened to cause global warming whenever I would go. It felt like it didn\'t matter where I was, as long as Fay would be by my side, then everywhere would be my home.

After brushing my fingers through Fay\'s rich hair, I took a deep breath and looked back to the Dryad.

"That brew of yours… It was far better and tastier than I\'ve ever expected," I admitted, once again putting the words of praise out for Leinei to hear. "I\'m not going to lie, I\'m honestly not sure if I can find something equally as tasty and light on the stomach back in my world."

At this point, trying to hide I came from another world would only put the dryad on guard, making her curious why I was trying to hide it. On the other hand, by approaching the topic directly, I hoped to make this detail seem like something no sane person would ever bother with.

"You really know how to sing praises…" Leinei rolled her eyes, seemingly disliking my honest words of commendation. "But you should also learn where you can shove all this praise instead."

Leinei snapped at me a little… But without a doubt, her voice no longer carried the mark of the deep hatred and contempt she held humans in.

"It\'s not the taste that I\'m struggling with, but getting the plants to produce alcohol itself," she then added in a silent voice, as if not really aware she was voicing her thoughts out.

I allowed the moment to pass in silence, not sure if Leinei actually wanted me to hear those words.

"In that case, would you rather have me bring some bottles of pure alcohol instead?" I asked only once I was sure she actually meant for me to hear her complaint.

\'Even though I can bring both proper brews and also pure spirit, I need to start rationing out what gifts I\'m promising,\' I thought, quickly growing aware of the limitation that seemingly didn\'t exist.

The portal didn\'t seem to limit the amount of stuff that I could carry through it. It didn\'t exhibit any problems when I moved through the gate with someone else. But that didn\'t change the fact… there was only so much that I and Fay could carry on our back! And while bringing more people could theoretically solve the issue…

I have yet to give Fay the green light to step food outside of my shed, so how could I bring even more beings? And beings so much older, they would find absorbing new knowledge of how the modern world worked a lot more challenging than Fay with her fresh and young mind!

"That…" Leinei hesitated for a second upon hearing my words. She even went as far as to turn her head away and avert her eyes when I raised my face to look at her directly. "That would be pretty helpful," she admitted, as reluctant to do so as she was.

"Then, may I trouble you and ask again if you could help me look for some simple herbs?" I then brought out the very same question I mentioned back during our drinking night. "And now that we are sober, you won\'t be able to claim I used your drunken state to my advantage!"

I pointed out with a satisfied smile like some sort of lawyer suddenly coming out with a plot that blocked the intended course of actions of the persecution.

"Humans…" Leinei rolled her eyes again. Yet, for as much as I could tell from her flesh-free face, her mood improved by a tiny bit. "Rather than speaking crap, shouldn\'t you try your tea first?" she asked, only to pull out a cup she was hiding all this time behind her back.

\'You couldn\'t give it to me earlier?\' I whined in my mind, suddenly realizing that I only had my talkativeness to blame for enduring the unpleasant feeling in my head.

"With pleasure," I muttered grumpily, reaching out for the cup and taking a sip of the fresh-tasting brew. \'Let\'s see how much worth this tea has.\'