NOVEL SIMPLE Chapter 119 – A real challenge
Aura learned about the chase the sisters had with Fey and wanted in on the fun. Steph, being the feisty girl she was, challenged her in a no-rules match because she wanted to find out how fast the female wolf really was. Rather unsurprisingly, the dog-girl met a quick end.
“Fey, have you been holding back on me?” Mira transported Steph and Aura to the floating island the others were on, and the dog-girl faced the red fox.
“Well,” She scratched her cheek. “I didn’t go at my absolute 100%, mostly because, contrary to that lunatic of a wolf, I have some self-preservation instincts, but I wasn’t holding back, either.”
"You're too soft~." Aura didn't even react to the lack of self-preservation she was accused of.
“Anyway,” Ignoring her, Fey kept looking at Steph. "This was a no-rules match, and you even let her use detection magic. I’m not sure if I would’ve been able to catch you in 23 seconds like she did, but I wouldn’t have taken more than a few minutes, either. You’re good at hiding and playing tricks, but once I locked down on you, our chase always was quickly over, as well.”
“Fair enough, I guess.” The dog-girl had little she could say there.
“With proper preparation and some sensible rules, it probably would’ve taken me closer to an hour.” Aura tried to make it sound a little better.
“Does that mean you think you’re better than Fey?” Steph tilted her head.
“It means that she likes you a lot more than I do~.” She just gave her a smug reply. “I like you a whole lot, don’t get me wrong, but I don’t, unconsciously, make it easier for you.”
“I-I would never!” The cheeks of the red-haired girl turned a little pink.
“Sure~.” The female wolf didn’t buy it. “Of course you wouldn’t~.”
“Grr!”
“You love to hear it!” The voices of Steph and Chloe overlapped.
“You do not!” Fey disagreed before glaring at Aura. “We’ll have our chase next, right? I’ll make you regret this!”
“Just what I was hoping for.” The female wolf was looking for a challenge, after all. “Any rules we should agree on beforehand?”
“No detection magic. Other than that, anything goes.”
“Exactly what I wanted to hear!” Nodding once, Aura walked over to the edge of the floating island they were on. “Let’s go!”
“I’ll make short work out of you.” Still slightly upset, Fey walked towards the edge on the other side of the island. “I’ll come after you in exactly five minutes.” Saying so, she jumped over the edge and down into the forest.
“I can’t wait~.” Aura quickly did the same.
“I don’t like how it’s becoming normal that everyone in this group is jumping down hundreds of meters somewhere like it’s nothing.” Ari wasn’t a fan of everyone just jumping down the floating islands they had been rather often lately.
“Don’t worry, you’ll soon do it, too~.” Steph smiled at her.
“I won’t!” She disagreed.
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“I need to remember that this body is more expressive.” Down in the forest, Fey was still slightly embarrassed over how effortlessly Aura had toyed with her. “Also, how do I not eat my own words now?" She looked around the area for a moment while scratching her cheek. “Unfortunately, that wolf is even more bite than bark. Figuratively and literally speaking. I’ll have a hard time finding, let alone catching her.”
Once she finished complaining, the red-haired girl went silent and began concentrating on her surroundings to get used to the sounds of the forest, to understand and notice when anything else made a sound.
“I prefer the original fox, but this Fey is pretty cute, too~.” Aura, who was in a different part of the forest, was a lot more relaxed. “Okay, let’s make some preparations here!” Saying so, the wolf changed her size. She was already in her smaller mode, but she decided to shrink further down to a shoulder height of roughly 50 centimeters. “I lose some speed like this, but I’ve also become a lot nimbler and make less sound on top!”
Having decided on a rough strategy, the wolf wasted no more time and got going to further increase her distance from the fox in the time she had left.
“Ha.” About 15 minutes had passed since Fey started searching for Aura, but things weren’t going well. “Nothing.” She shook her head. “I can’t hear a single thing. It seems like Mira brought us to one of the forests that has no animal life yet, huh? This is going to be even harder than I thought. I forgot how skilled that wolf really is. To not make a single noise in a place where there is nothing to mask anything is quite impressive.”
“It’s so tempting to take a look at my detection magic!” Another 20 minutes of Aura zooming through the forest passed when she made a slight break. “I’ve made sure not to create a single sound, so she shouldn’t have a clue where I’m at. That makes me want to mess with her!” Her mischievous side got the better of her.
Saying so, the wolf concentrated for a second and used a bit of fire magic to create a small explosion before sprinting away from the location.
“What was that?!” Naturally, Fey was unable to overhear this unnatural sound. “Good try, but it’s way too obviously intentional.” Her expression turned into a smirk. “Sophia did that way too often during our chase!” Unfortunately, her experience with the tiger made her too suspicious about the sound. "Alright, now I know where not to go!”
Taking into account where the floating island was and where Aura jumped into the forest, the red-haired girl turned at a 90-degree angle away from the explosion sound to her right and continued to run in that direction.
"Alrighty, I wonder if my little boom made her get closer to me~." The wolf was having a great time. "Then again, we're dealing with Feyfey here!" She let out a small chuckle. “Knowing that stubborn and overthinking girl, she probably heard the sound and deliberately went in a different direction because she thought I was tricking her.”
Outsmarting the smart girl, Aura then decided to create another explosion far away from her before continuing to run in the same direction as before.
“I knew it!” Hearing the second expression, Fey’s expression turned smug again. “This time, the sound came from somewhere else entirely! Aura’s fast, but not that fast to close the gap in between so quickly!”
Feeling validated, the fox-girl also continued to run in the same direction as before, unknowingly further widening the gap between them.
“Yeah, I’m sure she’s overthinking it.” Half an hour had passed, and Aura made another break. “Still nothing.” She shook her head. “Fey’s either also ultra silent, or she’s thinking the explosions were bait. Well, they were bait, but in an honest way. Okay, to be fair, I probably wouldn’t bite on that, either.” The wolf couldn’t blame her for not going towards the sound. “Not to mention that the second explosion was in a completely random place, too. We might be in this forest for a while, huh?”
Not exactly sure what to do next, Aura decided to stay in the same place for a little while longer to see if she could come up with a plan.
“It has gotten silent again, huh?” Fey had gotten just as confused over the situation. “What was her goal with the explosions, anyway? She should know that I’d never fall for that!” She raised her voice. “Then again, I did fall for it when Sophia did it…” Her expression turned ever so slightly awkward. “It is Aura, though. I wouldn’t be surprised if she wanted me to think I was getting tricked and she was tricking me this way. That would mean that the first explosion was actually in the place she was at that time. The second sound in a different area then was to herd me to her because she knew I wouldn’t be going towards the sound.”
Managing to overthink the events even more, Fey slightly adjusted the direction she was traveling in and headed over to the place where she heard the first explosion.
“Hmm.” Aura was still in the same place as before and had spent the last 15 minutes thinking of a plan. “Wait, am I overthinking things, too?!” She just came to a horrible conclusion. “Nah, there’s just no way that could be the case~.” It was too unbelievable for her. “Anyway, let’s see… Let's try to imagine Fey’s train of thought here. “The first explosion probably made her change direction away from it. She knew where I landed after jumping from the island, so she probably went in a direction that made sense for me to take. The second explosion in a completely random place after probably just solidified her thinking, and she simply continued on the same path.” Looking up and through an open spot in the canopy of a tree, the wolf located the floating island to get a reference of her position. “Okay, that would mean she probably went somewhere in that direction. Let's make this chase a little more interesting and get closer to her!”
Motivated by all the wrong things, the equally overthinking wolf broke into a sprint to get closer to the fox. That’s at least what she thought she was doing.
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“This will take a while, won’t it?” Back on the island, Sophia was getting ever so slightly bored of watching the two red dots zoom in every direction except the one that would get them close to each other.
“Also, what were those two explosions for?” Chloe tilted her head. “Those were Aura’s, right? Shouldn't you be as inconspicuous as possible while running away?”
“Well, Fey’s at a massive disadvantage here.” Fen looked at her. “If Aura wants to, she can travel at tremendous speed without making a single sound. Fey can most likely do it, too, but that’s not going to help her at the moment. This chase could literally go on for weeks without them meeting each other.” He paused for a moment. “Aura probably wanted to spice things up a little.”
“Makes sense.” The pink fox nodded a couple of times.
Even though it wasn’t the most exciting activity right now, the group continued to watch them for a while longer to see if anything would happen. After all, they had nothing else to do, anyway.
