Chapter 5:

A branch stuck in the shoulder is better than an arrow to the knee.

I Found my Pathetic Self Transported to Another World after Having my First Love Confession Rejected. Will I be Able to Find the Life I Want to Have here??


The months went by, the season changed from spring to summer and autumn was right around the corner. A few Trees began to change the color of their leaves. It was early in the morning. Alex was doing some practice swings in front of the houses. Barrik was not here to train him, because he had left with Yaeon the day before, but the dwarf left detailed training instruction. Violet sat on a bench, enjoying the morning sun and reading a book. After a while Alex was finished with his morning swings. He went to the small water source that sprang up and was caught in a stone basin next to the bench, where Violet was sitting. She glanced at him but immediately went back to reading. Alex leaned his axe against the stone, took a sip, and then began to wash the sweat off his upper body. Violet glanced over again. She waited for him to close his eyes to scrub his face and turned her head. His body was glistening in the morning sun and the water drops were running down over his skin. The months of training have left their mark on Alex’s body. Violet eyes followed the water running through the hair on his chest and down onto his stomach, where six mounds of muscle were starting to show under the belly. She unconsciously swallowed.

“What’s up? Why are you staring at me like this? Is there something on me?”, asked Alex turning around.

“Mh…huh!? What? No, no! I wasn’t staring!”, said Violet with a slight delay and turned her head away.

“I was just thinking, that… You can see the training you’ve done over the last few months.”, she said after a pause while hiding her face behind some of her red hair.

“Oh, you mean all the bruises? Yeah… that grumpy old geezer is not holding back… don’t tell him, that I said that… please…”

“No… I meant your…”

Violet was interrupted by two villagers running up the hill calling for help.

“Master Yaeon!”, one of them shouted as they came to a stop between the houses.

Violet sprang to her feet and asked as she rushed to them, “What going on?”

“We need Master Yaeon quick!”

“He is not here right now. Same with Grandpa Barrik. They will return in a few days.”

“That will be too late!”

“What happened?”

“Kurt got attacked in the forest by some kind of monster! The other boys managed to carry him back, but the wounds look bad… really bad.”

Violet turned around.

“Get dressed!”, she said to Alex.

He nodded and rushed into the house. Violet went into the tower and came back a few moments later with a small backpack and her staff. Alex did not take much longe to get dressed.

“Show us the way. I might be able to help.”, said Violet to the two villagers.

All four ran down the hill. The two villagers told Violet and Alex where the wounded person was, so the two of them started to sprint in the direction. The two other men fell back. Alex was surprised that Violet seemed to have no problem keeping up with him during the dash. He had never seen her run or do any kind of exercise at all. It didn’t take long for them and they reached the indicated farmhouses. A few young man were gathered in front of one of them.

“Where is Kurt?”, asked Violet as they reached them.

“Inside here.”, said one of the men.

They let Violet and Alex through. Inside was a small room with a bed. A young man on top of it, his bare chest covered in bloody cloth wrap and something dark and long protruding from his right shoulder. The sheets of the bed were red with blood. Two women were beside the bed currently trying to tend to the wounds. The man moaned weakly from the pain. Violet went to them.

“He lost a lot of blood. May I? I can help.”, Violet asked the two woman.

Both nodded and made way for her. Violet took some small flasks out of her backpack and gave them Kurt to drink. His moans stopped. Violet examined the wounds closer.

“Hm… the gashes on the body are deep but not that concerning… the real problem is… this thing… Alex come here.”, she said after the quick examination.

Alex came to her side. He looked at Kurt’s wounds. The ones on the body were deep but clean. The one on the shoulder was completely different, something blackish and around half a meter long seemed to be stuck in there. It had faint markings like wood grains. The skin around it was black.

“What’s that?”, he asked.

“What do you think it is?”, asked Violet back

“Wood?”

“I think so too…”

“Think he fell and rammed a branch into his shoulder?”

“Could be… But sticks don’t usually lead to immediate necrosis when you stab yourself with them… at least normal sticks… well whatever it is, it has to come out!”

“How are you going to do that?”

“You’ll pull it out.”

“Okay… wait! Me?”

“I stabilize him with magic and you pull… hard.”

“What?”

“Ready? Three!”

“Woah!”

“Two!”

“Wait!”

“One!”

“Hey!”

“Pull!”

“Ugh!”

“Good boy! See! Easy!”, exclaimed Violet grinning.

She began mumbling words and faint blue-greenish light emanated from the tip of her free hand and enveloped Kurt’s shoulder wound. Alex stood completely confused beside her with the black branch in his hand.

“Oh, I would not touch that thing for too long… just put it somewhere aside.”, said Violet nonchalantly.

Alex quickly tossed the weird branch in a corner of the room. Violet closed the wound with her magic then gave the man another flask to drink. After that Kurt fell asleep.

“Now he just needs some sleep and all will be fixed.”, exclaimed Violet satisfied.

The men outside of the house cheered. Violet went to the corner with the branch and examined it properly.

“Hm…Has someone seen the monster that got our poor Kurt?”, asked Violet.

“Yeah, we saw it!”, said one of the men.

Three of them stepped forward.

“What happened? Tell me everything!”, demanded Violet.

The seemingly youngest of them scratched the back of his head and then began to talk, “Well, we went into the Forest of Findings to gather mushrooms. After the rain last week and the sunny weather now there should be a lot around. Well sure enough there were a lot. So, we started gathering. Then we suddenly started to hear crackling. Like someone is stepping on branches and snapping them. It got louder and seemed to be getting closer. We bundled up with our spears and expected some beast to burst out of the underbrush any moment, but… suddenly the underbrush attacked. I know it sounds weird, but that’s what happened. Branches flung themselves at us. They got Kurt the worst. We just got scratches luckily. Then there was this strange, somewhat human figure but way bigger and made entirely out of branches in front of us. It extended its arm, and a branch grew from it directly into Kurt’s shoulder. Then suddenly something big, like a bear or something, came and rammed the branch monster and they both vanished into the thick woods. We didn’t see clearly what it was, but we didn’t care. We grabbed Kurt and just ran. We heard awful noises and screeches behind us.”

“Hm… that sounds a lot like some kind of Woodplage or other kind of forest spirit malediction running wild… that’s really not good and the longer something like that lives the stronger it gets. It needs to be stopped before it gets out of hand and that thing comes out of the forest…”, said Violet after listening to the story.

“How do you plan to deal with it?”, asked Alex.

Violet looked at him and grinned. Then she turned with her staff in hand to the branch in the corner. With a murmur and a flick of her hand a small fire arrow struck into the black wood and burned it to ashes. Violet turned to Alex.

“Get your axe.”, she said, and her eyes were ablaze with excitement.

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