Submission (#3863) Approved

It was hard for Jack to say ‘no’ to requests. He was just that sort of guy. Even if he wasn’t sure he could do something or it was something a bit dangerous, Jack always at least gave it a try. The elnin managed to get countless bruises doing things like this, but bruises always healed (eventually). What didn’t heal as quickly as the embarrassment of failing whatever request was given to him, so he always did his best and risked his well being to complete his mission.

That’s how he found himself in the middle of one of Silveil’s many forests. An older elnin had asked him sweetly to help find a certain mushroom for a potion the older elnin was making. Jack wanted desperately to say no, as he was in Silveil delivering a few packages, but he quickly gave in and said he’d help the older elnin out. The older elnin gave Jack a vague description of the mushroom ( or had Jack not remembered all the details? He couldn’t recall, an hour felt like ages ago ) and sent the winged elnin on his way.

So here he was. Standing between two trees, still waiting for his eyes to adjust. Gosh, it sure was dark in the Shimmerwood. Sure, practically half of the plants around him gave off a gentle glow of blues, greens, purples, and pinks. Every now and then Jack would see a glowing critter scuttle by to give the grass under his paws a gentle glow before it darted off and disappeared, leaving darkness behind in its wake. Even so, Jack wasn’t used to being underneath Silveil’s blanket of darkness. He was used to the other regions where there was a bright sun in the sky for half the day. As he looked up at the sky above, he noticed that it wasn’t completely dark up there. In swirls above him there were stars shimmering in the blacks and purples of the sky. Not really enough light to help him out down here, but it did look pretty neat to him.

Focus, Jack!

Jack lowered his gaze back to eye level and continued his trek. He was surprised by how it didn’t take long to come across an area full of mushrooms. What did surprise him, however, was how many types of mushrooms there were. Most of them had a soft gentle glow like most of the other wildlife in the forest did, but a lot of them looked different from each other. The clearing in the forest had a medley of greens, blues, purples, pinks, even some yellows speckled around here and there. Upon closer inspection, the mushrooms that shared the same glow color were different between each other as well, some having spots and were softer to the touch while others didnt have spots and were more firm.

Jack still couldn’t remember which mushroom he had to bring back. Several moments of intense thinking helped him remember that the effects had something to do with glowworms, but that didn’t help him figure out what the mushrooms looked like. The winged elnin could feel himself starting to stress out, worried that he’d never remember. He closed his eyes and took in a deep breath, letting it out slowly. As he calmed down an idea came to him - why not try them until he found the right one? He was, like, 95% sure that none of the mushrooms in the forest were deadly. And if he ate a poisonous mushroom then… well, the bright side was that he wouldn’t end up returning empty-handed!

Without any other direction to follow, the elnin plucked the first mushroom his paw landed on. The mushroom has a soft pink glow to it that slowly began to fade once it was plucked from the ground. Once the glow was gone he could see the mushroom was covered in small red and white spots. Looked pretty harmless. Jack popped the mushroom in his mouth and waited for... Something. Anything, really. Several seconds went by and nothing happened. No glowworms, no immediate death, no anything.

As he started to look for another mushroom to try, a strange feeling began to swell in his belly. It didn’t feel like he was about to be sick, but it felt strange. Jack wasn’t given long to think about what was going on when something got caught in his throat. He quickly began to cough. His coughs turned into a big burp, and out of his mouth floated what looked like a small butterfly. The butterfly’s body was white, and its wings were glowing red. Jack stared at the butterfly as it flew away into the nearby forest, speechless. Did… he burp that out? Or was it passing by right when he was burping? 

His question was soon answered when the elnin let out another burp, and then another. Butterflies appeared with every burp, and after many burps the clearing was full of white and red butterflies. Jack had collapsed to the ground and accepted his strange butterfly fate. He had no clue if this was ever going to end, but at least he could lay on the comfortable ground as he found out. 

Eventually his stomach calmed down and the burps subsided. His legs were shaking slightly as he pulled himself to his feet, watching the remaining butterflies fly around. He watched them wearily, and saw that the butterflies landed on only a certain type of large mushroom. The mushrooms they landed on gave off a bright green glow, and had yellow spots underneath the glow. Were they telling him that these were the mushrooms he needed? Or was this mushroom another weird butterfly mushroom? He decided to pick one of them up, sending the butterflies who were resting on it into the air, and took a bite out of it.

The effects of this mushroom were instantaneous. From the earth small yellow glowworms appeared, crawling out from the soil to crawl onto the blades of grass and mushrooms around him. Jack realized that the glowworms had made a circle of glowing light around him. These had to be the mushrooms he needed! If not, then he guessed he’d be back out here in another hour. Jack picked several of the large green glowing mushrooms and placed them into his bag. Once his bag was full of mushrooms he looked over at the butterflies and glowworms. He raised his paw and waved them goodbye with a smile. The butterflies simply drifted off into the forest while the glowworms headed back down into the soil.

Jack tried not to look too excited to be back in civilization when he left the forest and headed into the city. The lights of the city seemed much brighter now than before, and he found himself blinking back the lights as he headed towards where the older elnin lived. The older elnin was delighted to see that Jack returned with so many mushrooms, and as payment he handed over both money and and a shimmering gem in the shape of a butterfly. Jack liked money, but the small butterfly crystal was beautiful. He was happy to accept that payment and bid the older elnin farewell.

Jack decided that Silveil was an interesting place. The people were interesting and the wildlife was as well, but it was time to head out for more deliveries to places that had a bright sky above him and no strange butterfly mushrooms.