It's The First Time For Both Of Us

Translator and Editor: Bunny and Wyvern

────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

Chapter 20

Hilla was an adult so he walked very fast, disappearing through the trees. I chased him with difficulty using my short legs.

When I was still looking down from Aaron’s arms and the bell tower earlier, it appeared like a very small forest. I realized now that my dad’s estate was huge.

“Oh?”

Hilla disappeared without a trace when I stopped for a while to catch my breath. “Kuhn, did you see where Hilla went?”

[Huh? No. That’s right, where did he go?]

I couldn’t hide my absurd feelings from Kuhn, who looked just as bewildered as me. “What? You can’t detect him?”

[Oh, sorry. I didn’t see him properly because I was cleaning up the stones in front of you so you wouldn’t fall. Sniff. I think he’s out of the forest?]

“Eh? He was going ahead just a while ago.”

[I know right? Maybe he went back to the mansion. It’s near so he can run back there.]

“That’s… You’re right. Hey, I was already following him closely.” I tried my best to catch up with him to the point I was out of breath, but my efforts were in vain.

* * *

The next day.

I returned to the forest. It was only me and Kuhn in the forest, but it was surprisingly cozy, so I decided to use it as my magic practice space.

Although it was a forest, it wasn’t dangerous as it was within the vicinity of the mansion. And even if Aaron came looking for me, I could just say that I was playing hide and seek with the cat.

[Shall we start?]

“Alright.”

How long had it been?

I struggled for a long time and tried everything to open up my abilities, but it was useless.

“Let’s stop here today and go back. Let’s go, Kuhn.”

[Mariette, watch out for the stones.]

“Huh? Where? Oh, my!”

As I turned around to see where he pointed with his forefoot, I felt something was caught on my heel.

There was a broken stone just under my feet.

“You should’ve told me when I was still not close!”

But it’s already late. I closed my eyes, feeling my body leaning.

Whoosh!

“Hey… Kuhn, my butt hurts so much…”

I even cried a little.

Sniff, sniff.Sniff, sniff.

“…Oh?”

It was then that I heard a sad cry somewhere. I wasn’t the only one crying. I tilted my head and looked around. “… Kuhn?”

Kuhn, who was pointing at a stone in front of me just now, disappeared. Instead, a boy with golden hair was crouching with his knees folded.

Huh? Who was this boy crying alone in this forest?

My butt still hurt, but I hurriedly got up, carefully approaching the child. He kept crying as he buried his head in his knees.

I bowed down and moved my head left and right to see his face, but I could only see his shiny hair.

“Why are you crying here?”

The child was surprised and shuffled backward. “Sniff. Who, who are you?” Then he looked up and gazed at me like a kitten who was very wary, tears still in his eyes.

I was really surprised.

The child’s eye color was really amazing. It was a golden color that shone more than his hair.

Was this what a fairy who sprinkled gold in the forest looked like?

“Why are you crying?”

His eyes were really red, and he was sniffing a lot, which meant he had been crying for a long time.

“Hic, hnnn.”

I sat in front of the trembling boy. “Why are you crying? Are you sick?”

He shook his head and increased the distance between us. “Because I-I am a m-monster. You can’t come closer…”

I couldn’t come closer because he was a monster?

Looking at him sobbing and talking, I stood up with my hands on both sides and looked down at him. “I still can’t with this distance?”

When I took a step back and asked, the boy briefly agonized and nodded. “That’s okay,” he murmured in a small voice, almost audible.

I squatted and pointed behind him. “I live in that house. Do you live here? Where are you from?”

“I… live in a castle.”

“Castle? What kind of castle?”

When I tilted my head, the boy’s face turned red.

“It’s just… a-a castle…”

“I see.”

A castle, not bad.

The boy was calmer than before though he was still crying. I couldn’t help but pull out the handkerchief that Pihne had given me to wipe sweat. Why did he keep crying?

“Wipe your tears with this.”

He shook his head. His face was already wet, but he still refused my handkerchief.

“You don’t like it?”

“Monster… Don’t touch the monster. It’s dangerous…”

This was hard. I felt like I was having a headache over his unusual answer.

“I can’t touch you because you’re a monster?”

He nodded.

I couldn’t understand his words and actions.

This is my father’s house and private property, so no one can enter except for the employees. There were walls surrounding it and guards. It looked like the boy was from an employee’s family and he was abandoned here…

The color of his eyes and hair was interesting. He was also so skinny that I thought he’d gonna faint at any moment. On top of that, there were faint golden specks of light surrounding the boy. He said he was a monster, so maybe he wasn’t a human.

‘Come to think of it, I heard that you can see spirits in the forest sometimes…’

It was said that spirits were reluctant to appear in front of humans and couldn’t talk to them unless humans initiated it. I remembered all the fairy tales that my mother had read in the last form of my memories.

And I soon came to a conclusion.

“…Are you a fairy?”

“Huh? Sniff.”

Then I understood.

If he was a fairy, he would be inside this forest, and he was crying alone because he got separated from his companions. On top of that, that brilliant gold color…

‘He looks like a fairy no matter how I see it.’

Perhaps it was then that he considered himself a monster, since he considered himself human. The boy looked even more mysterious.

“Are you a fairy who lives here? Are you lost? Or did you lose your friends?”

Then the boy’s eyes widened. Tears fell again. “Huh? Fairy… No, I said monster. That’s why I have to hide.”

“I see.”

I have to properly coax him and send him back to where he belonged. Then the swallow may pay back my kindness, just as how the swallow repaid Mr. Park’s kindness.

(T/N: I can’t find anything related to Mr. Park and the swallow, but I guess this is a reference to the Korean Folktale ‘Heungbu and Nolbu’. It is a folktale wherein Heungbu took care of a swallow with an injured leg. When the swallow got better and, it returned to Heungbu giving him a pumpkin seed. When that seed grew into a plant and bore pumpkin, there was wealth inside the pumpkin.)

My mom said that fairies were nice.

I dropped my handkerchief in front of the boy. “I can’t reach you if you kept on doing this.”

“…”

“I’m giving that to you so stop crying. I have a lot of those. I have one here and here too.” I took out all the handkerchiefs in each pocket and showed them.

The boy picked up the handkerchief and rubbed his face, perhaps relieved to see that I had multiple.

“Your nose will hurt if you do it like that.”

I stood up and approached the boy. Then I crouched down and took away the handkerchief from his hand. The boy’s eyes widened in fright.

“It’s okay, I’ll keep it a secret that I came closer to you. That works, right? Actually, I’m also a monster, so… we’re the same.”

Although in Ferze, witches were more dangerous than monsters.

“Y-you’re lying…”

I raised my eyebrows. “Then, are you lying too?”

“…I am not.”

“Then I am also not. Now, look here. Pihne told me that you have to do it like this.”

I lightly dabbed the boy’s eyes with the handkerchief. It was my first time doing it, so it was a little sloppy, but it was better than when he rubbed it. I put down the handkerchief and took two steps back.

“By the way, what’s your name?”

“Huh?”

“Don’t fairies also have names?”

“Name…” The boy’s face became very serious. Perhaps, he didn’t have a name? Up close, he seemed to be the same height as me.

“I’m Mariette. You can call me Marie.”

“I…”

“You are?”

The boy’s face turned red when I asked again with a small voice. He seemed to be very shy. That was one of the characteristics of fairies.

“As expected, you must be a fairy.”

“A-Aru….”

“Huh?”

The golden fairy suddenly shook his head and spoke a little louder than before. “A-Arumia.”

“Arumia? Is that your name?”

He nodded.

“Wow, your name is so pretty.”

“Pretty…?” he asked, bewildered.

I nodded. “Then, can I call you Arumia?”

He blushed and bobbed his head.

“All right, Arumia. Why are you alone? Did you get lost?”

Now that he’d told me his name, I started to quench my curiosity. A

“I don’t know, I kept on coming back here.”

────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

Rate the novel on Novel Updates.

Join our discord to receive the latest updates as soon as possible!