Vol 1 Chapter 2 (1/2)

Chapter 2: Reunion on the bloody Highway

There were no towns or villages along the bloody Highway In total, it was

about 1200 caron in length

Would they make it across safely?

Ann stole a glance at Shall‟s face as he sat beside her on the driver‟s seat

It was a beautiful face She‟d never seen a warrior fairy with such an elegant

appearance before It made her uneasy

She wondered if Shall would really be useful as a warrior fairy

----Since I already bought him, I have no choice but to believe in him, but…

The Sugar Sculpture Festival was at the end of autumn, half a month from

now It would take 9 hway After

they arrived in the imperial capital of Lewiston, there would be 5 days left

until the festival to prepare It would be cutting it close

The next day, they left as the sun was just co up

They were still at the very beginning of the highway The road was long, and

their time was limited

Ann wanted to gain asthe relative safety of

daylight

Froures that looked like a pack of wolves on a

far off rocky outcropping However, the wolves made no move to come

bearing down froressed

favorably along the highway

In just a few more hours, it would be sunset

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

The plan was to arrive at the rest stop where they would spend the second

night with time to spare

Once they arrived there, they‟d have travelled 200 caron since entering the

highway

That would make their journey 1/6th complete

As they continued to plod along ast the quiet and monotonous scenery,

Ann suddenly heard the sound of a horse neighing At the sah

pitched sound of iron clashi+ng together seeh the air,

reaching her ears

Startled, Ann tugged on the reins without thinking As the cart slowly came to

a stop, she gazed out into the distance

There was dust in the air on the road ahead of them

At the center of the cloud of dust was a brand new box-shaped wagon Since

the back of the wagon was facing towards theure

on the driver‟s seat She could, however,

swords on the other side of the wagon

There were 10 riders circling around the circu

strange, gleeful noises They wore varying outfits, but each had a cloth tied

around his head, hiding his face These were bandits who attacked travelers

“This is bad!”

Ann grew pale When one laid eyes on bandits, the only course of action was

to flee She couldn‟t help the person as being attacked right in front of

her The outcome was certain

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

Travelers were all aware that this was the rule, and would not begrudge each

other for sticking to it

In this case, it would be wise for Ann to flee into a rest stop However, the rest

stop where they stayed the previous night was far behind them

She looked around on both sides of the road to see if there was any place to

hide, but the area was a wasteland of tall grasses continuing on in all

directions There weren‟t any tall groves of trees There was no where to hide

the carriage

Just as she ca of bandits

stopped

Seee, they turned their horses in her

direction

“Oh no, they‟re co over here!!”

Letting out a cry, Ann gripped the sleeve of Shall, who sat next to her That‟s

when she finally remembered

“Ah-- you!! That‟s right, Shall!! You‟re a warrior fairy, aren‟t you?! Chase

away the bandits”

Shall looked at Ann wearily

“That‟s troublesome…”

“If you don‟t we‟re going to be killed! Please!!”

At this, Shall grabbed Ann‟s wrist and removed her hand from his sleeve

Conversely, he took Ann‟s arhly towards him

“Shall?! Wh-what?!”

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

Shall leaned in with his face close to hers, and whispered ly, “You‟re

not supposed to be requesting, but ordering, right?”

Even in this kind of situation, her gaze was drawn to Shall‟s eyes, drilling into

hers, and his long eyelashes Furthermore, his voice sounded as sweet as a

lover‟s whisper

“Wha-- Too close! Hold on, Shall, you‟re too close!! Get back! Anyways, go

already!”

Blood rushed to her cheeks This was no ti But she couldn‟t

conceal her agitation

“Your face is red”

“A-a-a-anyways!! Please?!”

“This is a”

Shall chuckled,

“Shall! Please, go!!”

“I‟ive me an order”

“„An order‟?! Look, they‟re co!!”

“„Go iht away”

“What are you talking about!? Enough already, just go!”

She was stunned, and not used to using a fairy For that reason, the fact that

she possessed his wing, which ht

out of her head

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

“Order it”

She squeezed her eyes shut so that she couldn‟t see Shall‟s beautiful face

Then…

“Go[1]! If you don‟t, I‟ll punch you!!”

For the ti every bit of violence she

could muster up

At her order, Shall shrugged his shoulders

“I guess that‟ll do… I‟ll go As you wish, Milady Scarecrow”

Letting go of Ann‟s are

Shall turned slowly and began to walk towards the riders that were co

barreling towards them

Gracefully extending his right arm out in front of his chest, Shall narrowed his

eyes as if he were shtly

Then, the drooping wing slowly flapped open Parts of it shi+mmered with

rainbow light, reflecting the sun At this, fro

particles of light gathered towards his open palm As Ann watched, the

particles of light condensed into a long, slender shape, for

silver sword

----A sword?! He has an ability like that?! In that case, Shall really is…

----A warrior fairy

Suddenly, Shall broke into a run

Soundlessly, quieter than the wind, he ran, crouched low to the ground

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

Running up to the bandits‟ horses in the blink of an eye, Shall swung his

sword at the legs of two of the horses

With that single swing, he cut the front legs off both horses simultaneously

The horses collapsed iround

Without even pausing to confirm this, Shall turned to run towards the

re about

The other bandits noticed Shall‟s presence and turned towards him In an

instant, their horse‟s legs were cut out from under them, one after another

Simultaneously, 5 horses collapsed

The bandits handling the rery cries and slashed

out at Shall

With a doard swing of his sword, Shall cut the arm off of a bandit The

bandits‟ leader‟s face changed colors

“Retreat!! Retreat!!”

As the leader shouted, he turned his horse toward the foot of the mountains

The bandits who‟d been thrown to the ground scrambled after him The man

whose ar in pain, desperately set his

horse to a run

The cloud of dust was briskly bloay by the wind

A silence fell on the scene of 7 struggling horses with their legs cut off, and

the dead bodies of 3 bandits who‟d been been killed when they were thrown to

the ground

Shall waved the sword lightly, shaking off the blood Then,slowly, he

thrust the sword into the necks of the struggling horses one by one, until

finally they‟d all stopped breathing

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

Ann‟s fingertips were cold, and she was trehtly

She averted her gaze in order not to see the horses Shall had finished off

Wounded that gravely, the horses couldn‟t be saved Rather than letting them

suffer unnecessarily, it was more compassionate to kill them

Although she knew that, she couldn‟t look directly at them

After all, Ann had been the one to tell Shall to save her

However, she hadn‟t thought that it would result in 7 horses and 3 people

being killed in the blink of an eye With just one word from her 3 people,

bandits though they may have been, had died

She felt shock and fear that this had been the result of her order

----So this is what they call a Warrior Fairy…

While Ann reot down

froon in front of her

Ann recognized who that driver was, and she couldn‟t believe her eyes

“It can‟t be-- Jonas?!”

At the sound of Ann‟s voice, Jonas, as in a daze, watching Shall deliver

the final blows to the horses, raised his head

“Eh?Ann?”

When Shall had finished off all of the horses, he lowered the sword in his

hand Just like when it had formed, the sword steadily turned into particles of

light and dispersed

While doing her best not to look at the tragic scene of the dead bodies of the

horses and bandits, Annthe corpses

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

When she pulled up even with Jonas‟s wagon, she stopped the horses

Ann got down from the driver‟s seat and ran up to Jonas

“What‟s going on, Jonas?!”

“Ann! Is he a fairy you‟re using?! So you‟re the one who saved me?! This

lad I was able to meet you Since you left

half a day before ht you‟d be far ahead by now”

Seeripped them with both of

his own, as if enveloping her hands with his

“I ton… But, that‟s not the point Jonas, what are you

doing in a place like this?”

“I caerous to let you travel by yourself That‟s

why I persuaded

with you”

“Why?!”

“What do you ht? You should

kno I feel about you”

At his words, Ann was astounded

“Eh?”

“I love you I want to go with you”

“Um… Jonas, I… I‟m really happy, but…”

Ann gently tugged her hands out of Jonas‟s grip

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

“But I think you‟ve greatly s, Jonas After all,

no matter how you look at it, a person like you shouldn‟t be in love with a

person like me There‟s just no way I think you‟ve probably misunderstood

your sympathy towards me for love”

Ann was very ordinary-looking, and she wasn‟t the type to act winsomely

Even by her own reckoning, she was in short supply of womanly charm

The truth was that although Jonas and Ann had spent the last 6 months

together, their relationshi+p had been more like that of mere acquaintances than

that of friends

And yet, Jonas had proposed to Ann, who‟d always felt an auous sense of

distance between them

She couldn‟t think of any other reason except that he felt sympathy towards

her because of her mother‟s death

It was probably the case that Jonas felt excessively bad for her, to the point

where the difference between compassion and love became cloudy, and

misunderstood that he‟d fallen head over heals in love with her

“It‟s not sy to participate in the

silver sugar festival in Lewiston, right? That‟s what you said In that case, I‟ll

go too I‟ll protect you and help you out, so that you can becoar

master”

“Hold on Just now you were attacked by bandits-- you can‟t protect yourself,

ht?! Besides, you‟re the precious heir to a sugar candy shop,

and there‟s even the possibility you‟ll one day become the leader of the

Radcliffe guild, right?! I can‟t let a person like that come with me on a

dangerous journey, what if you were injured?! I wouldn‟t be able to face Mr

and Mrs Anders ere so kind to me”

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

“About the bandits, well… I let uard down a little, but… I‟m a man, after

all, so it‟ll be okay”

“I don‟t understand how „it will be okay‟ at all!!”

“I‟ll be okay Really, it‟ll be okay And, anyways, I have a sword”

“Are you listening to anything I‟?!”

“Besides,to Lewiston with you”

“Mr and Mrs Anders agreed? That can‟t be… Anyways, you should head

back”

“I can‟t turn back now Heading back would be just as dangerous as going

forward”

In his enthusiasm, Jonas was enflamed like a person with a fever [2]

There was no doubt that Jonas genuinely wassympathy for love

Nothing would give her et

killed because of these s

“You can‟t You absolutely have to go back”

“Ann, don‟t say such cold things!”

Jonas laughed and gripped Ann‟s hand again

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

Ann was surprised and tried to pull her hand back, but he had a hold of it

firmly

“I came here for your sake Do you hate me? Aren‟t you happy?”

Under his gaze, she was flustered His gentle smile would‟ve had the other

girls in the village floating on air

“It‟s not that I hate you But, but… How should I put it… That‟s not the

problem…”

Shall leaned against the wagon, looking up at the sky seely uninterested

in interrupting their conversation However, he suddenly knit his brows and

pulled his back away froon

“Scarecrow Let‟s quickly leave this place Wolves will come, drawn in by the

scent of blood Look up”

Ann and Jonas looked up at the sky The shadows of 3 black birds circled

above their heads

“Wild Crows They‟re the clean up crew of the wilderness When they appear,

the wolves won‟t be far behind”

Ann nodded quickly She withdrew her hand froone

limp

“I understand We‟ll depart immediately Jonas, please, turn back now”

“No, I‟ with you”

“Jonas, if you die your parents will cry, and the girls of the village will cry

even one, ill inherit the shop? You have a lot of things

that are important to you, don‟t you? They are what you should be protecting”

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

Ann put her whole heart into these words But Jonas gazed unwaveringly back

at her

“Even if you say I shouldn‟t, I‟ to do with

this The shop doesn‟t ht now, either All that matters to me at

this s for you”

Jonas had a warm home He had a family, and a shop that he would inherit in

the future He had so ht there in his hands His was

not an empty existence like Ann‟s, where there was not even one person who

would cry if she died He was a huo up

against such danger

Even so, he made no attempt to appreciate the value of what he had

Given this, Ann had just about run out of patience for Jonas‟s stubbornness

“In any case, you aren‟t a person who should be acting so recklessly, Jonas”

Ann turned her back to him, and quickly climbed up onto the driver‟s seat

Shall was already seated on the driver‟s seat Glancing sideways at Ann as she

applied the whip to the horses with an irritated expression on her face, Shall

grinned ly

“So there‟s really aafter you? Not too bad, for

a child”

“I‟m not a child! I‟m 15 years old-- an adult! Besides, Jonas and I aren‟t like

that He‟s just feeling syh I still can‟t believe he

put hier out of compassion”

Even while saying this, Ann paid attention to as happening behind

them

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

Jonas had cli it forward,

following after the to the

village

In the first place, since he‟d already cohway, it was as

Jonas had said: it was just as dangerous to go back as to continue forward

“What should I do…?” Ann whispered, and then said to Shall with a sigh,

“About the wagon behind us… For the ti should

happen, will you go to help him?”

Ann didn‟t hate Jonas On the contrary, she was fond of his gentle smile and

ht that someone as so sympathetic towards

others as to ood person

It wasn‟t as if she could just abandon him

“If you wantto order me”

“You were being noisy earlier too, saying „Order me, Order me‟ Why?”

“I have no intention of doing things other than what I‟m ordered to do”

Basically, he was saying that he wouldn‟t do as she asked unless she

threatened hi ‟If you don‟t obey this order, I‟ll take

your life‟ To put it another way, it meant that he would obey only an order

that extreme

He intended to obstinately disobey frivolous orders like „Watch the horses for

a minute‟ and „Hand me that blanket‟

To Ann, having to threaten to kill hiet him to hand her a blanket

was troublesome

He was going to be a handful, she realized with a sigh

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

“I resolved last night that I will use you However, I do not wish to give you

orders in such a fundamentally vile way So, this is a request From now on, as

well, I will start with a request But if you say no, I‟ll change it to an order As

you wish, I‟ll say „If you don‟t want to have your wing torn, do as I say‟ I‟m

prepared to do it, if need be But I will always start with a request”

At these words, Shall stared fixedly at Ann

“You really are a complete scarecrow-brain”

“Shall, since earlier, you‟ve been using the chaotic situation to get aith

calling me „Scarecrow‟… But I‟m fine with it, now Go ahead and call me

Scarecrow, I don‟t care”

Ann wondered what she should do if so happened to Jonas Because

thinking about it y left to fend off Shall‟s

na

Ann stopped the wagon As she did, Jonas pulled his wagon up next to hers,

and ca up at the rest stop

that Ann had chosen as the place they‟d sleep on the 2nd night of their journey

“So this is a rest stop? Tonight will beone”

“This is your first tiht?

“To be honest, until this afternoon I had a guard There was a man on the

outskirts of Knoxberry village doing crude labor; I hired hiuard

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

So last night I stopped the wagon by the side of the road and slept inside He

did protect ht, but…”

“But?”

“It seeon Before noon the

next day he held me at sword point while he stole the money and ran away”

Jonas related this tale relatively nonchalantly Either he was brave, or he was

an air-head Ann‟s shoulders slumped with disappointment

“That‟s unfortunate… But didn‟t you let your guard down a bit too much?”

“Yeah, you ot away

with my life And thanks to that, I was able to meet up with you, Ann”

It see

If he was going to travel with her, she would have to instill that sense of

urgency in him or there would be trouble

“Jonas, stay here tonight and turn back tomorrow, okay?”

“I‟ you, or

anything”

“But, Jo—nas…”

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

“Well, let‟s get going”

Jonas winked and applied the whip to the horses Ann clutched her forehead

“Ahh… My head hurts…”

They drove the tagons into the rest stop, and closed the iron gate

Once they were inside the rest stop, Jonas parked his wagon near the wall, as

if holding back Then he ion

It seeon near Ann‟s

seey and following

Ann around

Ann built a fire near the wagon Then she put water, dried etable

scraps into a pot,a simple soup

When it was done, she glanced over at Jonas‟s wagon

Autuht the temperature dropped Ann

didn‟t feel right about her and Shall being the only ones eating a hot meal

Ann ladled soon

She knocked lightly on the double doors at the back of the wagon

Sugar Apple Fairy Tale Vol 1 - Ginzatoushi+ to Kuro no Yousei

“Jonas, it‟s me Open up”

Fro noise, and before long the doors

opened

“Do you have some business here?”

The person who opened the doors was a young, female fairy about the size of

a hu with all her

ht

The young, fe used by the Anders

family Her hair was so red it looked like it was on fire She further raised her

standoffish, upturned nose and glared at Ann with large, upwards-slanted eyes

“Kathy?! You were able to come with Jonas?”

“In the first place, I am Jonas-sama‟s personal labor fairy It‟s only to be

expected”

“Oh, really? And where is Jonas?”

“He is resting”