Alice in the Land of Steam

Chapter 843: Was it just a misunderstanding?

Perhaps in order to facilitate walking in the forest, the girl who suddenly appeared in front of everyone was only wearing light clothes, a clean gray-white lining, brown vest and trousers, leather gloves and leather riding boots, and a gray cloak on the outside. She looked exactly like those travelers traveling in the countryside.

But her temperament was obviously much more outstanding than those dusty travelers. Her tall figure stood there like a straight flagpole, and she was almost as tall as Lingge. The girl had beautiful waterfall-like white hair, tied into a high ponytail with a silver ribbon behind her head. The thick mane-like ends fluttered slightly in the wind blowing through the forest.

There are also some people with white hair on Yunjingkong Island, such as Countess Nevill and Angel Yieta, but this girl's white hair is different from both of them. Nevill's white hair is as pure and flawless as moonlight, and Yieta's white hair is as pure and beautiful as feathers. Her white hair is like snow, clear and cold, but it does not make people feel cold. On the contrary, it is more like the warmth of the first melting snow in spring. With her wine-red eyes that are always slightly outlined and seem to be smiling whether she speaks or is silent, it makes people feel gentle and kind.

but--

Ling'er's gaze moved slightly downwards and landed on the girl's hands. What she held in her ten bent fingers was not a weapon, but a... broom?
Moreover, it was a large broom made of branches and vines, which was more suitable for sweeping streets and gardens. In the past, Ling had only seen this kind of tool in the sweepers employed by the town hall or the old gardener of St. Lowood National School. Unexpectedly, it now appeared in the hands of a girl about his age.

"Ah." Seeing that Ling Ge had been paying attention to the broom in her hand, the girl couldn't help but chuckle and explained for him: "I was just sweeping fallen leaves in the woods, and I heard some noise here, so I rushed over to check the situation."

Her expression and tone were too natural, as if she felt from the bottom of her heart that this was a very ordinary thing and nothing worth worrying about. This made Ling Ge, who was paying too much attention to this matter, seem a little too serious.

Cleaning up fallen leaves?

So, was she the one who cleaned the stone road we saw in the forest just now? Although I had long suspected that someone was repairing and maintaining this road, I didn't expect it to be such a young girl. Ling Ge looked at the girl's face again, examined her for a while, and then frowned slightly. He was still unsure of the girl's identity and origin. To be more precise, he couldn't tell whether she was an ordinary person or someone who knew something about the mysterious world. If she saw Alice confronting the blue boots...

Linger caught this key word and was keenly aware of something. But before the young man could figure it out, Alice, who was furious, had already turned her head and asked angrily, "So, you and this stinky cat are in cahoots?"

When Lingge was wondering whether he should let the others cover up for a while, Blue Boots, who was confronting Alice under the tree, had already noticed the movement here. When it saw the girl, its eyes immediately sparkled, and it waved its paws excitedly, making a cry that sounded like an accusation and a request for help.

Stinky cat? When the girl heard this name, the smile in her eyes disappeared all of a sudden, and her pretty eyebrows slightly frowned. Everyone could see that she seemed a little unhappy, perhaps because she was dissatisfied with her friend being despised.

The girl then realized that there was a man and a cat facing each other under the tree. She raised her head, her eyes passed over Ling Ge and the others, and fell on the blue boots. Her thick eyelashes brushed, and her wine-red eyes flashed with the color of wine that had fermented for many years: "Why are you here? Didn't I tell you and your companions to stay by the lake and not come out to play? Your identities are special. It will be bad if you are discovered."

Not to mention the girl's half-believing and half-doubting look, even her companions were speechless by Alice, not knowing whether they should stand up and speak for her. Logically speaking, Alice was indeed right in this matter (perhaps it was a rare time for her to be right), but her self-boasting words just now made everyone a little disgusted, causing them to not want to speak. What if the other party took it seriously, and Alice herself took it seriously?
The forest was silent for a moment, and the atmosphere was a little strange. Shemi looked left and right, with a confused expression. The fairy thought that she was more or less responsible for the situation. If she had recognized the origin of the blue boots earlier and reminded everyone to stay away from it, Alice might not have been fooled.

"Blazer?"

I just wanted to vomit after hearing that.

"I really want to show some respect to this guy, but who made him bother me first?" Alice glanced at the blue boots named Blaze, and saw that the latter was still glaring at her, and even showed his sharp fangs to intimidate her, with no intention of reflecting on himself, so she curled her lips and said, "Everyone who knows me, Alice, knows how pure and kind I am. I can't bear to step on an ant when I walk, and I will take the initiative to feed cute kittens and puppies. From birds flying in the sky to squirrels climbing on trees and fish swimming in the water, as long as it is a small animal, there is no one who doesn't like me. How could I, who loves small animals so much and is also loved by small animals, hate a cat for no reason? Then, I don't need to say whose problem it is, right?"

Alice sneered at her words and didn't take her words to heart. Although the other party was also a beautiful girl, and the white-haired and red-eyed girl hit her strike zone directly, if they met normally, the genius player would not mind getting close to her and satisfying some small requests that were not excessive. However, it was not possible now. After being deceived, Alice was full of anger in her heart. Let alone the beautiful girl, it would be useless even if you pulled Ling Ge and Saint Xia Liya out to mediate.

The girl was stunned for a moment, and then her face quickly darkened. She clenched the broom in her hand a little, and her eyes fell on the blue boots across the crowd. She raised her eyelids slightly and asked in a calm tone: "Is this true, Blaze?"

Staying by the lake?

"Did Blaze steal your things?"

Feeling guilty, she had to suppress her nausea and stood up to speak for Alice: "I, I can testify that what Alice said was true - well, at least part of it was true. She didn't mean to embarrass the blue boots, but your friend went too far and snatched Alice's cassette away, so she was so angry."

"Oh, is it so?"

Everyone on Cloud Whale Sky Island may not know how popular Alice is with the animals, but they definitely know how much she values ​​her game console and cartridges. It is not an exaggeration to say that she regards them as her life. Therefore, Blue Boots' actions are not just a simple teasing of her, but should be said to be snatching food from the tiger's mouth.

As soon as the words fell, whether it was an illusion or something else, the temperature in the forest seemed to drop a lot. The cold wind blew through the treetops and poured into the corners of clothes, making everyone feel a chill. They all took a step back and moved away from the girl. The blue boots that were being stared at by her shivered and trembled. It retreated and wanted to escape, but was firmly locked by the girl's gaze. It uttered a stern question from its nostrils: "Huh?"

Despite this, she still maintained a gentle and patient tone, appearing very cultured: "My lady, I don't know if Blaze has offended you in any way. If so, please tell me and I will ask him to apologize. But before that, I hope you can at least retain some respect. Maybe in your eyes, he is just a speechless monster, but he is a very important friend to me."

“Gah oh ga oh!”

Blue Boots stopped moving, a trace of human fear flashed in its amber pupils, and it stood there trembling like a student who was caught truant by the teacher. When the girl saw its appearance, she knew that Shemi was not lying, and she didn't think that the traveler elf could talk. Blue Boots liked to play pranks by nature. Although Blaze and his companions had been behaving well since they were educated by her, who knew if they would return to their old ways?

Having said that, she would not jump to conclusions without understanding the full picture, so she narrowed her eyes slightly and asked word by word: "What is going on, Blaze, can you explain it to me?"

"Explain? What's there to explain!" Alice yelled, "See those cassettes on the ground? They were snatched away by it and dropped on the ground. If they're broken, I'll never forgive you!" She stared at Blue Boots with a murderous look, but the latter ignored her and started shouting at the girl, accompanied by gestures and movements. He pointed at Alice, then at himself, and then at the cassettes scattered on the ground. He used his hands and mouth to explain the whole story to the girl.

The girl also listened very carefully, nodding as she listened, as if she really understood what Blue Boots was saying. Gradually, her expression became strange, first surprised, then confused, and finally turned into a helpless expression of wanting to laugh but trying hard to hold it back. After Blue Boots finished speaking, she turned around, shook her head and said to everyone, "Sorry, everyone, it sounds like this is a complete misunderstanding."

"Misunderstanding!" Alice didn't accept this. If you misunderstood me, then how could I just let it go? You look so sweet and kind, and I thought you were a reasonable person. I didn't expect you to be biased, and so obvious. Do you think I'm a fool?

The others were not very receptive either, and they all looked at the girl with suspicion. The girl knew that she couldn't convince them with just words, so she sighed helplessly and explained, "Blazer said that he saw your... uh, whale landed in Emerald Lake, and thought you were intruders who broke into the forest without permission, so he wanted to use this method to drive you away. Other than that, he didn't have any bad intentions, and I hope you can understand."

Intruder?
Alice sneered when she heard this: "So, the Loser Forest has become this guy's backyard? Anyone who breaks in without permission is called an intruder, right?"

This is a no-man's land. I can come in whenever I want. You are just a cat living here. Why do you think you are its owner and claim to drive out the intruder? When you say this, don't you have any sense of shame?
"Uh."

Facing Alice's question, the girl showed a trace of embarrassment on her face. She scratched the corner of her mouth with her fingers and said a little embarrassedly: "Lothr Forest is indeed not Blaze's back garden. He is just one of the residents of this forest..."

'That's what I told you,' said Alice, before she could finish. She looked up triumphantly, and if her nose could have stretched, it would have reached the sky by now.

"But this is indeed my back garden."

"..."

Alice blinked and said hesitantly, "What did you just say?"

She must have heard wrong.

Hahaha, how could this large forest be the backyard of someone's house? Do you think you are the third princess of the Victorian royal family? Even if you are the third princess, you wouldn't dare to say such a big thing...

"It seems that you all don't quite believe it." The girl sighed softly. She knew that this kind of thing was indeed quite shocking, so she usually kept a low profile and never showed off deliberately. But judging from today's situation, if she didn't explain things clearly, she was afraid that Miss Alice would not let it go.

She put the broom in her hand on the tree trunk beside her, put the index finger and middle finger of her right hand together, gently pressed on her heart, put her left hand behind her back, bowed slightly, and bowed to everyone. Linger's eyes flickered slightly. He recognized that this was not an ordinary noble etiquette, but the most standard knight's etiquette of the White City Republic before the Republican era: "I'm sorry, I forgot to introduce myself before. My name is Xeno, Xeno Jean Gustave, the heir of the Gustave family, and the land you are standing on, the Loser Forest in the mouth of outsiders, is the property of the Gustave family. You can also think of it as..."

She paused slightly here, but no one noticed, so it sounded coherent: "It's our family's fiefdom, right?"

Alice was stunned after hearing this. The others were not as exaggerated as she was, but they were also surprised and a little embarrassed: because didn't this mean that they were indeed intruders, breaking into her home without the owner's permission and even arguing with her solemnly?

Isn't this too...dramatic?

Saint Shallia silently looked away, Olvera looked up and was in a trance, Gloria gently stroked the gray-feathered falcon in her arms, and Lorena began to seriously study whether the unknown mushrooms growing at the roots of the tree had alchemical value. Even Leticia, who didn't care about her face the most, quietly hid behind her friends and didn't say a word. She thought to herself that if her grandmother was here, she would be even more embarrassed. After all, she was the head of the Valenhild family and always cared about the nobles' demeanor and cultivation.

Fortunately, she said she wanted to take a sunbath while the weather was nice, so she stayed on the sky island and didn't follow us, otherwise it would have brought shame to the Bloodfang Clan.

It doesn’t matter now, after all, it’s Alice who is embarrassed.

The little bat, who didn't care about her last name, dodged while giggling in her heart. She was also somewhat relieved because she actually wanted to mock Alice just now, but Alice's heart was more straightforward and her mouth was quicker than hers.

Lingge frowned slightly. He didn't care about face. No matter how embarrassing it was, it didn't matter as long as he explained it clearly. He cared more about the name of the Gustaf family. He seemed to have seen relevant records in a book. He recalled and finally found the trace from the "Modern History of the White City Republic" that he took in college: "... Gustaf, the White Knight of Grangenia, Hiberton Jean Gustaf?"

Xinuo looked at him in surprise, but soon put away his surprise and nodded calmly: "It is the ancestor."

The young man exhaled lightly and said, "I see. I have heard of the famous Whitethorn Flower Godafu family before, but I didn't expect to meet its heir here. I am so sorry."

Whitethorn flower, Godafu?

Pairs of curious, puzzled, scrutinizing and examining eyes fell on the girl.

　Give me some meow
　　
　
(End of this chapter)