Cornflower Witch

Chapter 1 The Girl and the Wolf

The Fourth Continent, Rising Wind Season, Autumn Wolf Festival

(Ti: red-yellow, orange-red color, also refers to armed personnel, Ti cavalry. Today's Wubo Ti clothes are the remnants of ancient military uniforms. - "Chunguan·Sifu Notes")

In the ninth year of the Rising Wind Season, this continent has passed the brightest season of the 'blazing sun'. The energy of the blazing sun carried by the wind allows all things to grow. In a few years, animals in the mountain forests have multiplied in large numbers. The wolves chasing food are bathed in the forest wind. They have become stronger due to the abundance of food.

；

The breeze was blowing in the forest, and a light yellow and red leaf slowly floated down from the branches and landed on the head of the girl under the tree.

The dry and hard edges of the leaves scraped against the snow-white and smooth long hair, and then slid down with the wind and hair, landing on the forest floor full of dead leaves.

A girl is confronting the wolf

Siludya looked nervously at the orange wolf in front of her with a low roar. She twisted the side of her skirt with one hand, and the other hand trembled slightly in the air. She tried her best to find available things around her with the corner of her eye.

No matter what, branches or sticks, at least it is better than dealing with this evil wolf with bare hands.

She can no longer remember why she was sitting on a bus going back to her hometown in the first part of her memory, and then woke up in this deserted forest the next moment. She walked for an hour without finding any trace of human habitation. If everything in front of her and around her hadn't been so real, she would have suspected that she was dreaming.

"Woo..." The deep voice came again.

The red wolf opened its mouth, revealing its staggered canine teeth and bright red gums. The orange mane on its back stood up slightly. It lowered its front body and stared at the silver-haired girl with its triangular eyes, seeming to judge the opponent's strength. As a bad wolf with a 'blazing' nature, it had gradually broken away from the category of ordinary beasts and gained some wisdom.

The other party's snow-white and soft skin and clean and soft smell all indicate that this is an extremely rare delicacy. Although it has not eaten humans, the instinct in its blood tells it that the creature in front of it will be the most delicious food in its life as a wolf.

Eat her!

The red wolf moved. The girl almost didn't see how it jumped up, but when the wolf's head was less than half a meter away from her, she still reacted.

She turned sideways and blocked her chest with her right hand. When the red wolf jumped into the air, the slender fingers in the cuffs flexibly rested on the wolf's head, and her ring finger happened to press on the wolf's eyes. The strong eyelashes and moist eyes made the girl's heart tighten, but she still suppressed the fear in her heart and pushed the wolf's head away, causing it to fly to the right side of her body.

After dodging the first attack, Xiludiya ran forward almost staggeringly without having time to think about it. She bent down while running, grabbed the wooden branch she had just found urgently, and then turned around. At this time, the red wolf pounced again.

Siludya, who fell to the ground while grabbing a branch, had no time to get up. At this time, she could only retract her lower legs as much as possible to prevent being bitten by the wolf.

The red wolf, which did not bite the target and only bit the hem of the girl's skirt, let go of its mouth and pounced on Sildiya's throat again with a fierce look. At this time, Sildiya also stretched out the dead wood branch she was holding, aimed at the open wolf's mouth, and stabbed it into it.

The rough bark of the tree branch was inserted into the soft throat, giving the red wolf a strong desire to vomit. It retracted its body and shook its head, trying to throw the branch out of the throat.

Violent struggling and shaking came from the wooden branch in her hand. Silutiya knew that she must not let the red wolf throw the wooden branch away at this time. She firmly held the lower end of the wooden branch with one hand and inserted it into the wolf's mouth, while the other hand grabbed the fur of the red wolf's back and neck, trying to fix it.

The thick orange-red mane was a bit prickly, and the neck flesh under the fur was also very difficult to grasp. This guy is very strong, the girl couldn't help but think to herself.

In order to prevent the red wolf from breaking away, she almost pressed her knees against the red wolf. She was almost freed several times, and the skirt underneath her body was constantly torn by the wolf's claws, leaving hot scratches on her legs through the skirt.

Time passes...

I don’t know how many minutes had passed, but when Sildiya felt that she could no longer hold on, the struggle of the red wolf under her finally weakened, and blood-red foam overflowed from the wolf’s mouth. However, the girl was still uneasy and continued to pierce the branch deep into the red wolf’s throat until the other party was motionless and had no heartbeat. After that, she finally calmed down and calmed down a little.

Slowly standing up, Xiludiya found that her back was already wet with sweat, and part of her hair was stuck to her forehead. She took a deep breath to calm down her rapidly pulsating heartbeat. At this time, she finally had time to look around.

Orange, red, and a little black, Sildiya observed the dead wolf hair under her feet. She had never seen it before in terms of shape or color. In her memory, it seemed that there were orange-red haired wolves in the United States, but the appearance was completely different from the one in front of her.

My fingers touched the strong hair slightly, and a very subtle hot feeling came. The closer it was to the root of the hair, the weaker it was. The feeling was strongest at the tip of the hair, and there was even a faint tingling sensation.

【Ti Wolf】

In the middle and late part of the Rising Wind Season, wolf-like beasts will be contaminated with the power of the ‘blazing sun’ nature, and their hair will turn orange and become ‘ti wolves’. When the hair on its body turns flaming red, it becomes a first-level 'red wolf'. The ferocious 'red wolf' will bring great harm to the residents and livestock of the village, so much so that the image of this kind of creature often appears in fairy tale books.

Every time during this season, hunters would organize themselves into the mountains and forests to hunt in advance. Some nobles also loved this activity. They would hang the "Tywolf" furs obtained from hunting in the living room as a symbol of their own glory and bravery. This activity eventually became a tradition in many places, and this season was also recorded as the "Tylang Festival".

Note: The fur of 'Ti Wolf' and 'Red Wolf' contains a trace amount of 'blazing' nature power, which makes it have a very good thermal insulation effect in winter. If it can be preserved until the foggy season, its value will be further enhanced.

Blinking her eyes, Sildiya was surprised by the knowledge that emerged in her mind, why she knew the origin of the dead wolf from its body, and even learned part of the history and customs of this world.

It seems that there are a lot of things that I need to understand.

Standing up slowly, she looked around, then reached out and tried to drag the wolf corpse under her body. The heavy weight made her give up the idea of ​​taking it away.

She didn’t have a knife at hand, so she couldn’t do anything like skinning or dissecting. Besides, she had never killed a wolf before, so she had no idea where to start.

After thinking for a few seconds, Sildiya decided to continue walking out of the forest. She didn't know if the dead wolf corpse would attract other creatures, but since it couldn't be used at this time, she had no choice but to stay away.

After resting for a few minutes, Sildiya straightened her messed up dress and hair, and continued walking along the shade of the trees. Looking at the position of the sun, this time should be 3-4 pm, after the hottest time.

Not knowing where to find food or a place to spend the night, the girl touched her belly and felt that she was not hungry yet.

This body is obviously not what she used to look like, but it does not feel awkward at all when moving, as if she should be like this. Walking in the shade of the trees, Sildiya slowly sorted out her memories.

She remembered clearly that this time it was because she received a call from her hometown, so she applied to the company for annual leave to go home.

Getting on the speeding high-speed train, she left the big city where she had worked for several years and rushed to her hometown after a long absence. After graduating from high school, she went to other cities to study at universities, and then went to work after graduation. The days when she returned to her hometown were only a few, probably only during the New Year.

Speaking of it, it had been a long time since she was walking in the mountains and forests like this. The girl raised her head, lightly covering her forehead with one hand, and looked at the light green and yellow leaves above her head.

When she was a child, she would spend a lot of time with her grandparents during summer vacations. Her grandparents’ house was not in the city, but in a remote mountain village, where there were rolling green mountains, small rivers, and various animals.

My grandfather raised a group of goats, which he would put on the mountain to graze every day. When Sildiya was a child, she would go there with her cousins. Everything in the mountains and forests was very new to her who grew up in the city.

Cracked chestnuts like thorny balls, bright red and appetizing snakeberries on the mountainside, bunches of green berries with knots, strange bird calls occasionally heard, and owls that are hard to identify on the trees and like fallen leaves. The existence of these things is like a touch of bright color in a poor life, which made Sildya particularly happy when she was a child.

The childhood of children in the city was relatively boring. She recalled that she spent most of her time in school, cram schools, doing homework, and taking exams. Only when she came to her grandparents' house, no one urged her to read and study, and she could play freely. Her uncle and aunt also doted on her, asking her what she liked to eat, and then trying to satisfy her as much as possible.

Dragonflies, fireflies, caterpillars, butterflies, and even snakes in the firewood pile were all things she saw in books for the first time in the mountain village of her hometown. Going there every summer vacation became her happiest time.

Sitting on the bus to her hometown, she leaned against the window and recalled the past. The sunlight outside the car fell on her through the shade of the trees on the roadside, making her vision a little hazy for a while.

It should be good to go fishing at this time. It would be even better if you can catch a few crucian carps for soup.

Crucian carp is a relatively small fish, and it was the only fish she caught when she was a child. At that time, there were only bamboo poles, silk threads and fishhooks, far less equipment than today.

After catching crucian carp for the first time, she and several brothers and sisters gathered around the bucket. They didn’t know what to do with it and put it back into the water? Several children were unwilling to give up the fish they had finally caught, but the fish didn't look like much meat.

The shiny silver fish scales were a little slippery in the hand, and there was some iridescent reflection when looking at the sun. There was a row of small dots on the middle line of both sides of the fish's body, which made several children particularly curious.

In the end, my aunt helped me process the fish they caught and make it into fish soup.

"It's a pity that grandpa didn't get to eat..." The girl sighed with regret as she recalled the scene when she was ten years old.

After that fishing trip, my grandfather heard about it, and then smiled and said that he had not caught any, and would catch him another one some time. She and her brothers and sisters agreed wholeheartedly, but since then the adults were afraid that the children would get drowned while playing in the water, so they kept them away from the river.

After that, the incident was gradually forgotten until a few days ago, when she received a call and learned about the death of her grandfather, and then embarked on the return journey.

......

I don’t know if she can go back to the past world. Maybe even if she does, it will be a long, long time later, but she still misses the hometown in her memory and the beautiful memories that warmed her throughout her childhood.

With both hands open lightly, she maintained balance. The girl's toes lightly stepped on the stones covered with dead leaves, and walked down the mountain. After many years, the familiarity with the mountain topography returned to her heart, allowing her to easily pass through the rugged slopes and shrubs, and walk through the layers of trees.

In this way, until the sun was about to set, after climbing over the last hillside, she saw the curl of smoke rising in the distance.

Surrounded by fields, a peaceful and quaint medieval village appears in sight.

There are no familiar telephone poles, no flat cement roads, only houses built of stone and rough wood. Ancient windmills stand and rotate slowly in the wheat fields, and piles of straw are tied up and placed on the fields

When a carriage with an iron outline slowly drove through the field path, the shield-skin beast pulling the carriage came into view. Silutiya finally realized that this was a completely different world, and if she wanted to return to her hometown, she would probably have to walk a long, long way.

Shouldn’t it be a script where you receive a letter from your grandfather, then return to your hometown to inherit the fields and pastures, and live a leisurely pastoral life away from work?

The situation really took a turn for the worse. The girl complained a little in her heart, and then walked towards the village at the foot of the mountain.

(End of this chapter)