Dungeon Item Shop: Volume 2: The original litRPG, item-shop light-novel! (Dungeon Item Shop - The original item-Shop litRPG!), page 25
"Look! Look!" calls Fresh excitedly, dragging Basil and Shamrock behind her. Jubilee had refused to hold her hand. She drags the two of them over to a stall that is filled with dozens of colorful, apparently handmade wooden toys and trinkets.
"Yes, they’re very ni -iEH!" Basil is unable to finish her sentence as Fresh drags the two of them away after just a second, already running to the next stall. Shamrock isn’t so much being dragged like the priestess is, but he seems to be playing along, following the two of them as they move through the crowd. Fresh stops, looking at a stall filled with candy and roasted nuts, covered in sweet-glazes and deeply fragrant seasonings.
"It smells so good!" says Fresh excitedly. "You guys want some?" she asks, turning around to the out of breath Basil and Shamrock, the latter of whom is already nodding in eager agreement.
"Slow down, goo-brain," says Jubilee, catching up at an extremely leisurely pace. "You’re gonna end up running off of the mountain."
Fresh slides a few coins across the counter to the mustached man behind it. "I’d like some of these, please!" she says, pointing to a row of red candied-nuts. The man nods and scoops out a bag, taking the coins before handing it over to her.
"Enjoy!" he says with a smile.
(Fresh) bought: [Spiced Nuts]{Red}(Normal)
for
[{10} Obols] !
"Thank you!" replies Fresh, taking the little paper cone-shaped bag and turning around towards her friends, offering them some.
Basil blinks before staring at the bag for a second. "Ah, I think those are -" Fresh, not listening, pops the first one into her mouth. Shamrock, having grabbed some, almost crushing them beneath his large fingers, does the same. "…spicy," finishes Basil, looking at the two of them with a little worry visible on her face. Fresh and Shamrock both freeze, as if the cool mountain breeze pushing through the hustling crowds all around them had frozen both of them solid.
"Wait for it," says Jubilee with an annoyed sigh from the side, as they stare at the two of them, together with Basil.
Fresh, a single tear forming in her eye, does her best not to start crying. She quickly shoves the bag of candied red nuts into Basil’s hands. Feeling her face become hot and red, she turns away, seeing a stall down the path that seemed to be selling drinks. Grabbing the still frozen Shamrock’s hand, she quickly runs down towards it. It’s a party-leader’s duty to take care of their party, after all.
The giant man’s armor shakes as if a single violent shudder were running through him. "Be strong! Shamrooock~!" cries Fresh, running through the perplexed gazes of the crowd around them as she drags him towards safety.
It turns out that the festival taking place is meant to celebrate the birth of a new generation of fairies. As it is apparently quite the spectacle, there is a massive assortment of foods and drinks and exotic goods in general. Traveling merchants come from far away to sell their wares here. Apparently, that also includes merchants from the east, where spicy food is a lot more common.
While this is being explained to her by Basil, as she is trying to get her mind off of the pain, Fresh continues downing the bottle of juice that she had bought. Shamrock, still not having said a single word this entire time, is busy drinking his second one.
"Don’t just eat random things, you animal," says Jubilee, shaking their head.
Fresh lowers her bottle, water still running down her face. "But it looked really good!" she argues, rubbing her eyes on her sleeve. "Are you alright, Shamrock?" she asks, worried about the man.
He looks down towards her, not saying anything for a moment, his armor still rattling a little. She supposes he doesn’t like spicy food either, having more of a sweet-tooth apparently. Perhaps seeing the worry in her face, he simply nods. "Yes."
Fresh sighs in relief, taking another sip of her juice before looking around the fair. "So what do you guys want to do?" she asks, trying to restore the mood. She lifts her fingers, counting off. "I want to eat a lot of weird food! And I want to try some weird drinks! And I want to play some weird games!"
"I want to go to bed," says Jubilee, bored.
"Jubileee~! Please have fun with us tonight!" cries Fresh, leaning forward.
"Do you have to cry about it?" asks Jubilee. "Fine," they say, shaking their head a second later.
"I’m not crying! It’s still from the spice," replies Fresh, sniffling, but happy that Jubilee has agreed to stay.
Jubilee sighs. "There’s good stuff to buy at these places sometimes. Guess I’ll see if I can’t find something more useful than you three."
Basil chimes in. "I’d like to see the wave spawn," she says excitedly. "To see new life coming into this world is really a blessing," says the priestess.
Fresh stares at her for a moment. "Huh? Is that already tonight?"
"Yeah?" says Jubilee dryly. "That’s why there’s a celebration, goo-brain. It should be right around midnight. The fair will probably last for two or three days."
"Snacks," says Shamrock. "Sweet snacks," he adds, making a point of it and Fresh nods in quiet agreement.
"Do you think we can meet a fairy?" asks Fresh, looking around the fair at all of the humans, elves and dark-elves who she sees wandering around the area. She wonders if the waitress from the adventurers’ guild is here too.
"I don’t think you’ll be able to avoid it," says Jubilee with some annoyance. "By tomorrow, this place will be full of a swarm of the energetic, little fucks." They place their hands on their hips. "Anyways, you already met one, remember?"
Fresh scratches her cheek. "Do you think she’s around the fair too? I bet it must be weird for her."
Jubilee stares at her for a second and then looks up towards Basil who returns the same expression back down to them, one that Fresh is unable to decipher. Jubilee loosens their posture. "Yeah, I’m sure she’s around here somewhere," they say. "Come on, let’s get going. There’s a lot to see."
"Mm!" Fresh jumps up excitedly, feeling a bit better now.
For the next few hours, which seem to pass unusually quick, the four of them run around the fair together. Fresh and Shamrock spend far more money than is perhaps responsible on an assortment of foods, as they try their way through just about everything that they find. Sweet candied-fruits and nuts, greasy fried meats and breads in all manner of combinations and hot puddings and cakes are available everywhere and there seem to be more kinds than they can manage to eat, but not for lack of trying. That of course is before they fill the other half of their stomachs with the many arrangements of odd drinks and cold teas. At least Fresh does, Shamrock never quite seems to run out of space for more. Basil only ever nibbles on something now and then and mostly at Fresh’s behest.
Jubilee makes a point of stopping at a stall full of equipment and laughs, nudging her in the side. Fresh looks over at the table adorned with all manner of strange looking weapons. Mostly staves and wands, but a few daggers and an odd shield or two as well. But her eyes follow Jubilee’s, as she sees what they were trying to show her. In the back of the stall, set in the middle of a table is one of their very own enchanted lanterns, from the northern city with a proud starting price of one-thousand Obols. As well as a large sign above it, saying ‘Enchanted lantern, made by the horrible (ugly) witch of the north.’
There are a few glowing potions lined up neatly in shelves as well, each bottle is five to six times the price that they had sold them for. The glowing objects apparently have drawn in a large crowd, as a bidding war starts for the lantern.
Basil has to drag her away before she can start yelling at the vendor, not so much because of the sign, but because of her growing anger as she listens in horror, as the price of the single enchanted lantern, which she had made for a few loose coins, shoots up another few hundred Obols by the time she’s out of ear-shot.
"It’s so rude!" she argues.
"I know," replies Basil, patting her on the back.
"Shame we can’t start making those again without getting beheaded," says Jubilee quietly. "Ah, fuck em."
Shamrock is busy shooing away a crowd that has started to gather around him. Several of the casters who hound him, now clearly drunk and openly reveling, fight over each other to make their intentions for the giant explicitly clear. But Fresh never quite gets a word of it, as Basil rather abruptly drags her away towards the lookout point at the end of the market-place, while Jubilee stays behind, promising to ‘take care of’ the situation.
"City life sure is interesting," laughs Basil awkwardly, heading towards the railing on the edge of the mountain. The spot overlooks the large forest below and as it grows darker and darker as the night falls, the giant moon hanging above in the night-sky illuminates the world below the mountain. The moonlight bathes everything in a soft, white shine and as the trees rustle and billow in the distant world which they themselves have risen above, the swaying beneath them looks almost like stirring water. As if the peak they were atop were a single island in the middle of an endless, churning ocean.
"Mm!" agrees Fresh, happy to have escaped the crowds for a moment. But it doesn’t last. Jubilee and Shamrock make their approach as well, now free of onlookers. The rest of the space quickly fills too however, as others make their way towards the railing. "It looks like it’s going to start soon," says Fresh excitedly, listening to the people talk all around them.
All four of them stand on the edge of the mountain, looking down over the forest for the next while, as something deep down below them all seems to shimmer, as soft lights begin to twinkle between the trees.
Chapter 151: Fairies
A gentle bell rings from somewhere higher up on the mountain.
Vivid moonlight shines out over the forest beneath them all, covering the entire world in a wash of pale, haunting light that seems to illuminate not only every crack and crevice in the rock-face beneath their feet, but also every wrinkle, scar, fold, wound and crease in the faces of every single person present there. The night-glow gives credence to the fact that here, atop this mountain, thousands of moments happened every single day. Moments of violence and loss, moments of adventure and joy, moments of pride and glee. Hundreds of eyes stare out towards the forest below, rippling in the soft winds. Yet all of them, despite all of these moments that they have experienced, are filled with nothing but wonder, as the first baubles begin to rise out of the trees.
"Jubilee! Look!" says Fresh in an excited, but quiet voice, tugging on Jubilee’s arm.
"Yeah, yeah," says Jubilee, pushing her hand off. "I see it."
Lights, bright, shining orbs fly out of the woods, rising into the air as if a mass of departing spirits were releasing themselves from the ground. The many spirits float so lightly and so effortlessly into the air, that Fresh is sure that they will all be blown away by the next gust of wind. The first dozen rise, shimmering in all varieties of colors that are unnatural to the night. Bright, fiery reds. Luxurious, hallow tones of golds and yellows. Vivid, venomous greens and bright, summer-sky blues.
Bewildered murmurs and excited whispers run through the spellbound crowd, as they gaze down at the spectacle unfolding beneath them.
"They’re so pretty!" says an excited caster.
"Do you think this wave will like it here?"
"I hope so," replies a man in leather. "The last bunch was a bit surly."
After the first dozen glowing baubles, rise a dozen more into the air, followed by a further dozen more. Soon a hundred of the shining orbs fill the world above the woodland, then a hundred more after them. The forest is alight, illuminated as if a rainbow had been flattened out and laid out over the treetops, the multi-colored light drooping down into the darkness deeper below, like the sagging fabric of a burial cloth, draped over a dead body.
Fresh bobs on her feet excitedly, grabbing and yanking on Basil’s sleeve. She doesn’t really say anything, apart from letting out an excited, sort-of, but not quite, squeak as she points to a collection of fairy-lights that are circling around each other. The fairy-ring spins around itself as they fly into a tighter and tighter pattern and the tighter the ring grows, the higher they rise into the air. Below them, another ring forms, then another, then another, all of them layering beneath each other as they rise into the air one after another, constructing what appears to be a giant column that pushes itself up into the sky. The formation of the rings shifts, as each ring breaks in its middle segment, the fairies there flying lower as they reach into the ones below them, joining all of the rings together into one winding spiral that climbs upwards, like a serpent swimming to the surface from the bottom of a dark, endless ocean.
The sounds of delighted voices and excited gasps fill the air, as everyone watches the spectacle unfold. The lights draw closer and closer as they pick up speed, pushing through the mountain winds with little difficulty as they fly, as they rise higher and higher towards the onlookers who beset the mountain.
She hears a long, heavy breath exhaled from just next to her. For a second she thinks it's Shamrock breathing loudly in excitement, but she notices that the agitated sigh, which had come from next to her, stems from Jubilee. She watches in some confusion as Jubilee seems to be practicing their usual breathing exercise which they do when they want to calm themselves down. Usually because she herself had done something wrong.
"What’s the matter, Jubilee?" asks Fresh. "Are you tired?"
Jubilee finishes their breathing and looks up at her, their eyes steeled as if ready for a fight. "I’m just preparing myself mentally."
"For what?" asks Fresh, scratching her cheek.
"Fairies," is all that Jubilee says, as they turn back to watch the spiral of lights coming now to reach the outlook, having flown up the entire mountain in a matter of minutes. The string of small bodies comes into clear sight, as they not only move closer towards the curious crowd, but also as the colorful lights surrounding them slowly fade away. "I hate fairies."
Fresh blinks, looking back towards the approaching cloud of buzzing, small bodies that heads their way. Each of them is roughly the size of the span between the tip of her longest finger and her palm.
She hears a chirping in the air, it’s almost like a swarm of singing crickets. It’s shrill and out of sync with the rest of the noises. Just a jumble of squeaks and peeps. As they fly closer and the sound grows louder, she realizes that it isn’t anything like that at all. They’re voices. Dozens, hundreds of tiny voices all talking at the same time over each other. The adventurers around them wave excitedly, calling out and greeting the arriving fairies. The swarm reaches them, hundreds of fairies flying off in all directions into the crowd, with ecstatic, wildly curious looks on their faces that are adorned with equally bright and wide eyes.
"Hey! Look!" calls a fairy next to Shamrock. "Hey!" it says, poking him. "Why are you so big?!"
"Food," says Shamrock to the fairy that seems to lose its mind over this revelation, clutching its face in excitement, as it proceeds to start to want to pester him. Though it flies off a few seconds later, before even finishing asking its own second question, as it sees something else that has caught its attention.
"Wooooooah!" A fairy darts past Jubilee. "What’s with this mask? Are you ugly?" It zips around left and right. Another five fairies fly down around them. "Hey! Why are you so small?!"
"Hey?! Are you a fairy too?!"
Jubilee lets out a long, tired sigh, simply ignoring them and staring into the distant darkness.
Fresh watches in awe as the fairies dart like energetic children all around the market, looking at literally everything there is to see with incredible bewilderment to their faces and voices. Every rock, face and piece of cloth is an instant object of fascination. At least for a few seconds, before their focus shifts to something or someone else.
"Hey!" asks a fairy, stopping in front of Fresh. "What’s your name?" it asks excitedly, its fingers clutching its hair as if about to tear it out.
Fresh smiles at it. "My name is -"
It flies off, darting straight towards someone else. Fresh stares at it, before looking down at the squeaky voices next to her. A large ring of fairies has built itself around Jubilee, all of them hold their hands and seem to be dancing in a tight circle around them. "Fairy queen! Fairy queen! Fairy queen!" chant the fairies, as they spin around Jubilee. Fresh can see that Jubilee is doing their best to stay calm, though she can’t help but laugh as she sees their fists clench in agitation, the leather of their gloves creaking with an audible groan. She looks back at Basil whose hair is being lifted up into the air by a few of them. "Hey! What’s with your hair?!"
"It’s so soft!" says another one, crawling out from inside of it. Basil doesn’t really seem to know what to do, simply laughing nervously at the creatures and not moving.
"Hey! Hey! Why do you smell like the forest?!"
"Hey -!"
The next hour is spent like this. The fairies, containing a seemingly inexhaustible contingent of energy, bolt in all directions. Pestering anyone and anything that they can manage to encounter. Apparently, a lot of them aren’t even aware that they can’t talk to objects and they spend a while trying to speak to the rocks on the ground and the wares adorning the stalls, before eventually noticing that only the people ever respond to their questions and nagging. Fresh is particularly happy, in contrast to Jubilee, when a group of the fairies start playing around in the fluff of her robe.
By the time the morning sun rises and the festival comes to an end for the day, the fairies still haven’t managed to exhaust themselves, unlike most of the people who now begin to drag their drunken selves and companions back into darkened rooms, so that they can sleep off the liquor.
The four of them decide to keep the shop closed for today. There isn’t going to be any foot-traffic after this night, plus all four of them are exhausted too.
The fairies seem to spread themselves out around town simply by the nature of their exploration. Soon, there are fairies perched on every other roof and several of them are inside of the tunnels as well, having taken a particular liking to the space.
