Chapter 4

The Incident

With the deer gone to lick its wounds, and the wolf off to save its cubs, Olivia checked herself for any prominent injuries. Still recovering from being winded and pumped full of adrenaline, she looked all over her body. Aside from the bruise that was forming on her stomach from the head butt, she seemed to be ok.

“Well, at least that’s something. Best get on my way in case they come back.”

Back on the journey, she picked up several of the fruits that she had seen the deer eat, which were thankfully on this side of the river as well. The fruit itself had the same texture as an apple but was orange in colour. Taking a bite of it, she found it to be quite sweet.

“What is this? I don’t think I have ever heard of an apple-like fruit that is orange. Also, what was with that deer and the spikes forming on its antlers. I’ve never heard of a species like that. Am I in another country? Are they both genetically engineered or something? I really hope my memories come back to me soon.”

With a rational mind, it had not occurred to her that she had somehow been transported to another world and transformed by magic into something other than the human she was. That was just a preposterous idea.

…

Hot on the trail of the smoke again, nothing else happened as she followed the river to her destination. No other aggressive wildlife jumped out to try and make her its next meal. Of which she was very thankful.

As she went, she continued to collect more fruits, as she did not know when she would experience an actual cooked meal, and these fruits may be all she can enjoy for some time.

.....

With the sun still high in the air, there was plenty of time for her to travel. Enough that she may even reach the smoke within the day. To finally find some sort of civilisation after having trekked through this forest with no memories of how she got here was an exciting prospect. She only hoped that unlike the animals in this forest they were actually friendly.

…

A few hours later and she was now very close to its location. As she was nearing it, she could not see or hear anyone nearby. On top of that, she couldn’t see any buildings on the outskirts. This all meant that it was likely a campsite rather than a village or town. While not great, as a village or town would be better, whoever was camping, may be able to tell her where she was and possibly what she was.

As she came to the end of the tree line, peering through it, she saw a small clearing in the forest. Smack bang in the middle of the clearing was a tent, simple in nature, along with a firepit and some supplies. She could see nothing technically advanced, no gas camping stove, or other equipment, it was all very basic camping gear.

As she was examining this, she suddenly heard a couple of voices, one very calm and somewhat sinister, the other was very much distressed.

“Let me go this instant. Do you know who I am? If my parents find out you took me, they will hunt you down and kill you.”

“Oh, quite down princess. You forget you hired me to help you run away from them. Besides, once I’m done with you, they’re not even going to want you back anyway.”

The couple quickly came into view of Olivia, where she saw quite a gruff looking man holding a girl over his shoulder. As they spoke, Olivia could see the look of dread take over the girl’s face as she realised what he meant. She quickly started screaming and shouting for help, hitting the man’s back and trying to get away from him.

The man looked very strong, and from his scars had been in several fights. She could see that he hardly felt the fists hitting his back, and just tuned out the girl’s cries for help.

His face was covered by quite a thick beard, but his head showed signs of balding. Some sort of leather clothing was covering his whole body and a large sword was attached to his waist.

Looking at the girl, she was unable to get a clear view of her, with the massive man being in the way. What she could see was the expensive clothes, covered in various shades of purples and blues of what looked like silk, that she wore, showing she was quite a rich person. Long blond hair flowed from her head, but in this position, it all but covered her face and almost dragged on the floor.

As the pair neared the tent, it was obvious to Olivia, obvious to anyone really, what this man had in store for the girl. In the middle of nowhere, no one would come running to save her, meaning this man would have his way with her for as long as he liked. It was even possible that he would physically harm her in other ways, maybe even kill her once he was done.

“That’s not happening.”

Olivia knew she had to do something. There was no way her conscious would allow her to just leave knowing what she knew. But with her fighting experience being below minimal, and the man looking to be some sort of seasoned fighter, she had to be smart about this.

Waiting for the man to enter the tent, she quickly but quietly made her way towards it.

Peering inside, the scene she expected was taking place.

The girl was thrashing all over the place, as the man tried to remove her clothing. He slapped her face a few times, trying to get her to stop, but she was not going to go down without a fight.

Not going to allow this to go any further, Olivia grabbed the largest rock she could find. She would have used her spear, but with his leather outfit and the tight confines of the tent, it would have just been a disaster to wield it. There were also the sharp rocks in her bag, but by the time she had taken it off to locate them, things could have escalated.

With the clothes starting to be ripped off the girl, the man sat up and started to remove his own. Olivia took this opportunity to make her move, given that he was focused on his own task.

Moving quickly, she entered the tent and smashed the rock against the side of the man’s head as hard as she could. An audible crunch could be heard from the hit, sounding like she may have broken some of his skull with the hit. The brute of a man toppled over, and fell to the side, either completely unconscious or dead, she did not know.

With the job done, she dropped the rock and looked at the girl to see if she was alright. What she saw was an incredibly attractive girl, with brown eyes, a straight nose and the luscious locks of blond hair from before. Beautiful long eyelashes framed her slender upturned eyes, and her face was clear of any blemishes, giving a very clear almost pale skin tone. What she also saw, were the tips of two ears poking out between her hair. Tips that were pointed in nature, pointing upwards, as opposed to her ears that pointed out to the side.

The one word that quickly came to mind was, “Elf”, where the unrivalled beauty and pointed ear shape all matched what she had seen in films and novels.

While Olivia was stunned by the girl, and happy that she had managed to save her, the girl had a bit of a different response upon seeing her saviour.

“Monster!” is what she cried out, fear marring her face as she did.

This knocked Olivia back to reality.

“I was expecting a thank you.” She replied. This though only caused the girl to scream louder, struggle and lash out with the first thing she could find.

The rock Olivia had dropped.

There was probably some kind of irony, where the weapon she had used to save the girl, was now being used by the same person as a weapon against her.

In all of the panic, the rock hit the side of Olivia’s head, knocking her down to the ground, alongside the man. While not as strong a hit as she did to the man, it was enough to knock her head around silly, where eventually everything went dark.