A short time later, we were on our way back to the village with our search complete.
“I really, really will get actually angry with you for real if you try something like that again,” Filia snapped. “Sheesh…”
She’d already said that before forgiving me basically right away. Was she being kind or naïve? I guess she was just being Filia.
“Sorry.”
“Ugh, now my hair’s all disheveled,” pouted Filia as she walked beside me.
“Can’t you just use water magic to wash it, then wind magic to dry it?”
“Hmm… You’re smart, Yuri. I’ll do that.”
Apparently, Filia had never tried that before. She created a mass of water over head, and then began to lower it down little by little. Then she began to wash her hair. Filia’s hair, which had turned ashen from all the dust and smoke, immediately regained its brilliant silver shine. With a little wind magic to dry, her hair was back to its original beauty. After checking her work, Filia turned to me with a big smile.
“All good?” I asked.
“Yes! Thanks to you, Yuri, I—” Filia blinked. “Wait, this is your fault to begin with, isn’t it?! Ugh, not good, not good! You almost fooled me…”
It’s not like I’d meant to fool her. More like she’d kinda fooled herself. Anyway, we saw another one of those muddy-muppet-ball whatevers from before growing out of the ground as we continued, right in the middle of our path. If we kept going, we’d end up stepping on it, probably hitting the white part and causing an explosion.
With Filia finally back in a good mood, I couldn’t stand watching it get wrecked again. Yeah, we could just pass this one by. I’d already had enough fun with the last three, after all. Or so I told myself. But man, resisting was hard. I had to respect myself for such puissant powers of prudence.
“Filia,” I said, “be careful, watch out for that explodey plant.”
“Ugh, there’s another one? We need to be really, really, really careful not to step on—gah!”
Filia, too preoccupied with paying attention, lost her footing. She tripped over her own feet and tumbled magnificently—toward the myopic-moose-berry. Worse yet, she fell smack-dab onto the white part of the mayo-myco-meep-meep. Worst of all, well, we experienced yet another explosion.
Thus, Filia once again used water and wind magic to clean and dry her hair. With her hair cleaned, she poked my arm with her index finger while she averted her eyes from mine. “J-jeez. Yuri, this happened because you’re such a goof.”
“Hey, don’t try and pin this on me!” Really, what was even the point of trying to blame me in this situation?
“Because I never give up, Yuri,” she said dramatically. “Not unless my chances are at zero percent.”
“Uh. I guess that’s good advice for the most part, but…”
When coming from the mouth of Filia, it sounded more about self-preservation. I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing.
“So, how d’ya feel?” I asked nonchalantly. “Any better?”
Filia looked at me blankly for a minute, then her eyes widened. “You—wait, don’t tell me, Yuri, you did this for me on purpose because I’ve been brooding?”
“Nah, complete afterthought on my part. I only thought to ask just now.”
It did seem possible that subconsciously I’d thought the explosion might put her at ease. It wasn’t like I’d purposefully made things explode for that reason, though. As if I was even capable of paying that much attention to detail!
“Huh. Jeez, don’t let me get my hopes up like that.” Filia chuckled like she was a little exasperated. “But, you know, your…Yuri-ness did cheer me up a bit. I was definitely feeling a lot of pressure about opening up to my parents, so, thank you,” she finished, bowing lightly.
“Filia, you’ve got this weird tendency to take things way too seriously. You should really remember that sometimes it’s better to just think of it like we’re messing around and say something like ‘Duhhh, I dunno.’ Normal Filia stuff!”
“Pardon me? ‘Duhhh, I dunno’?! A perfect and beautiful elf would say no such thing!”
“Pfft.”
“Please don’t snort.”
We looked at one another for a moment…and cracked up. When the laughter finally died down, Filia looked at me seriously and said, “Yuri, I’ve made up my mind.”
“Hm? About what?”
“I’m going to talk to them tonight about getting my abilities back,” announced Filia, determination in her eyes.
“I see.”
“Yes.”
“You want me to stick around?”
“No. They’re my powers, and I want to convey my own feelings. I’ll be fine on my own.”
“Okay.” Well, I’d already told Elgis and Fira what I wanted to say, so there wasn’t really anything more I could add. Besides, Filia was finally motivated. It was my job as her partner to support her, right here and right now. I lightly patted Filia on the back. “Do your best, Filia.”
“I’ll flex my do-my-best muscle!” said Filia, beaming. “Eh he he, just kidding.”
“Huh? What was that? Gross…”
“Gross? How is that gross? Ugh, mean old Yuri!”
Filia and I bantered on all the way back to the house.