Submission (#6797) Approved

The road from Faerindell to Bellmoril was exhausting. King had rotated between walking on the trails and flying through the sky, switching only when his paws began to feel sore and tired from all the traveling. Faerindell never let up its colorful landscape no matter how far King had traveled through the region. Colorful flowers and pink trees for acres and acres. The land that wasn’t vibrant and pink were well tended farmlands, growing crops that were a variety of colors (who knew carrots came in more colors than orange!).

When King finally reached the edge that separated Faerindell and Bellmoril, it was a little jarring to not see pink, purple, and blue everywhere. King could see the soft reds, oranges, and yellows in the distance that Bellmoril was known for. In his excitement, he decided to cross over into Bellmoril through the air. He secured his bag over his shoulder before taking off into the sky.

He didn’t need to fly for long. The grassy fields of Faerindell were behind him, now replaced with the yellow grass and birch trees of Bellmoril. In his excitement, King had used much of his energy in flying over into Bellmoril. Reluctantly the dire kittom lowered himself from the sky and landed on the ground in a grassy patch. Unlike the lush green grass of Faerindell, this grass felt a little crunchy and a bit.. Wet? King wrinkled his nose, clearly bothered, and looked around at the area. Drops of water clung to the red leaves of the trees and the bushes around him. Perhaps he had just missed some rain that had brushed over the forest. He wasn’t looking forward to walking through wet grass, but he had little energy left to walk, let alone fly. If he remembered correctly, there was a town not too far ahead. All he needed to do was keep moving and he’d get there before dark. With a soft grumble he stepped through the wet grass, moved through several wet bushes, and began walking down a trail made of stone.

The stone trail stretched on ahead of King for quite awhile. He expected that it led to a town, or a fork on the road, or ended somewhere that made sense. However, after an hour or so of talking the trail simply stopped. The large kittom blinked blankly as he looked over the end of the trail. The neatly laid stone and rocks simply chipped and faded away into tall, yellow grass and orange bushes. Had the elnin who made the trail run out of stone and forgot to come back to finish playing down the path? Or was the path so old and unused that nature took back the land and broke down the weaker of the stones, growing over it?

Either way, this was a problem for King.

He still didn’t have the strength or will to fly up and over his new obstacle. With little other options, King let out a small annoyed huff to himself and began walking forward. He wasn’t as large as a regular adult elnin, but he was much bigger than a regular kittom, so he managed to part the tall grass with little difficulties. King felt his paws press gently into damp dirt, getting mud in between his toes. Gross. He looked down and watched his front paw slide a little in the mud, leaving behind a long paw print. King raised his paw and shook some of the mud off. Could things get any worse than this?

Of course it could. Not even a minute later, King heard something unusual. Before he could think over what it could be, drops of water began to fall from the leaves above. Oh, great. It was raining now. King was now not only forced to walk the rest of the way to town, but now his pace would be slower because of the rain and no steady ground to walk on. The dire kittom’s mood was now incredibly sour, but he needed to press on.

Eventually King made his way out of the forest. A majority of the tall grass and bushes were now behind him, and he could see gentle lights of lanterns from a town off in the distance. All he needed to do was cross the field of short yellow grass. As he walked, he noticed that rain had began to pool in several sports in the grass, creating small puddles. King was mindful to not step in the puddle to his right but completely ignored a puddle to his left, allowing his paw to splash right into the center of it. He quickly turned his head and watched the water of the puddle splash up. If he wasn’t already wet from the rain, the splash from the puddle would have gotten him a bit soaked.

Several thoughts flashed across King’s mind at once. Agitation, embarrassment, and intrigue. Despite his current condition, the thoughts of Phantom Step still hung in the back of his mind. With how the water splashed up at him, he wondered if Phantom Steps that looked like water did the same thing. Did Elnin with the phantom step get spooked when they walked, thinking they’ll get water on them? Or did they quickly grow used to it? The kittom paused for a moment, mulling over those thoughts, then timidly splashed the puddle to his right. The water in the puddle splashed out like the one before, but was quickly filled back up with rain water.

… Yeah, if King ever did obtain Phantom Step, it wouldn’t be water. The kittom nodded to himself, then continued on his way towards town. The sooner he reached town, the sooner he could dry off and figure out how close he was to a large library.