240 240 Natural Affinity
Since he already had her in his arms, Wolfe decided to get to work and clean out the corruption in her system to go with all of the mutations and other damage that Mary and whoever had visited her village last time had repaired for her. Why leave the very last step undone, right?
This scout seemed to be even younger than Katerina was, and the black corruption wasn’t nearly as thick as the sludge that had been pushed out of her had been. It was closer to syrup, and the process of cleaning it out was only going to take him a few seconds.
The thick layers of clothing that she wore to make herself look like she was just short and stout quickly absorbed the sludge, so she would have to wash everything later, but the witches could help with that.
The witches would be overjoyed to have another young student in their classes, and her home village would be overjoyed to have a talented witch when she chose to go home, so finding someone to help her with laundry shouldn’t be an issue.
Wolfe recognized the writing on the message that she was carrying, and the scout was only from a few villages north. It was part of the usual route for the healers, so there should be other scouts from them along quite soon if they weren’t here already. They could pass the message back to the village leader about the scout’s absence.
“Is there anyone else from this girl’s village?” Wolfe asked.
“Right here. Will she be alright?” One of the badger-eared scouts asked eagerly.
“She should be fine. The healing took a lot out of her, so she is asleep. We’re just going to keep her here for a bit since she shows some promise as a witch. Tell your village boss that if they’re willing to let the little one be trained here, then she might come back once her basic training is done to be their local witch.”
The Badger gave a fist pump, then chuckled. “I’m not sure that Little One is the right name for that one, though. She’s nearly as round as she is tall.”
“You’ll see. Once We’re done with her, she’ll be the local beauty.” Wolfe teased.
One of the witches gestured for him to hand over the little one, and she carried the sleeping girl down into the Den to recover and rest so that they could have a serious talk about her future in the morning.
With her departure, the witches started to file back into the Den as the forest darkened, and Wolfe looked around at the group of scouts that were still gathered here. “Would you like to stay here, or would you like to make a camp inside? We’ve got lots of room, and there are still a few witches on guard duty in the area, though they’ll have to find all new spots tomorrow with the forest blocking their line of sight.”
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But about your offer. If you’ve got space inside, we would be much more comfortable inside overnight. Maybe the garage? It is big and open with room for all of us and comfortable truck seats to sleep on.”
“I was thinking of the training room, but you’ve got a point about the truck seats. They would be much more comfortable than sleeping on the floor. It’s solid rock down there.” Wolfe agreed, then gestured to the side where the garage door was.
“Let’s take the larger entrance since there are so many people. It’s a good thing that we pointed the entrance at the river, or else it might not be passable right now.”
They walked the hundred metres between the entry shack and the garage entrance and found that even with it pointing at the river, the garage was still barely accessible. The Fae Forest’s creation had disturbed the ground, and the reasonably smooth path down now had a large number of rocky ledges along it.
The Military vehicles were designed for extreme terrains, so they should be able to make it still, but it wouldn’t be a gentle ride.
Wolfe didn’t bother to grab the door. He just used [Levitate] and lifted the door as they approached so that everyone could walk down into the tunnel that led to the actual garage.
“Wow, you went all out. You even prepared it in case it was attacked. You really were planning for everything.” One of the scouts praised him.
“It’s the largest entrance to the Den by a LOT, so it only made sense to defend it. There are also a lot of defensive spells placed on it in case it is attacked.
Now that we’re alone, I have a question for you all. You heard Mary say that she intends to make a proper Castle in the woods, likely right here above the actual Den. Did any of you have thoughts on that situation?”
Most of the scouts just shrugged. They barely knew what the word meant, much less how they were supposed to be constructed or what the layout of the ones that they had seen in ruins had been before they were destroyed hundreds of years ago.
They had all been to ruins of large stone complexes, but for the most part, they had been so badly damaged during the war that you couldn’t even pick out the floorplan, much less what sort of functional features they had.
“I think it needs like a tall tower to see over the trees. Flying things will be able to see it in the forest anyhow, and ground things won’t see it any better even if it’s as tall as the trees, so it’s best if you can see the flying things coming.” One of them suggested.
“Not bad. I’m not completely sure what they are planning, but I will remind them of that. It’s possible that the Faerie will talk them into something from her homeworld that’s like nothing we have seen before.
I know we went a bit overboard with the forest, and I will personally apologize to all the villages for the inconvenience eventually, but it’s not going anywhere, and it’s a really good defensive barrier, so I’m hoping that everyone can adapt quickly and figure out how to get around.”
One of the scouts with a bushy squirrel tail laughed and pointed behind them with his hand in a very definite direction.
“Home is there. The surface of the Wastes used to feel lifeless, but this forest feels more like home, possibly because of the mutation that blended the various species of my ancestors together or gave them animal features, assuming that one of those legends is the truth. But with that feeling of familiarity, I think that I can make my way around here just as easily as I did before. Nothing moved, it’s just covered in trees, so if you can find the landmarks, you can still get around just fine.”