The village was quieter now. Not silent, but quieter. The kind of calm that settled only after a great flurry had passed through and left behind rustling leaves, bent grass, and echoing laughter still lingering in the air.
Wildan stood near the edge of the forest, arms folded behind his back, wings gently tucked in. Beside him, chewing with great philosophical focus, was the white chubby cow. It stood in the grass, tail flicking occasionally, as if punctuating the elf's thoughts with bovine commentary.
"They're gone," Wildan murmured.
The cow mooed.
He stared at the wide expanse of forest, where life pulsed with gentle rhythm. Among the trees moved elves of every age, tall, dignified elders with braided silver hair; teenagers darting between trunks like flickering light; children chasing each other through the undergrowth; even toddlers toddling with determined wobbles in the grass. The forest lived, and the people within it breathed the same ancient air.
But Wildan's thoughts were elsewhere, on the twelve. The ones who had just left, so young in form and spirit. To the villagers, they were the firstborn of the mana tree, children of light and dream. They looked around twelve years old, but their growth was something else entirely. Slower. Dreamlike. Measured in moments and emotion, not seasons. There was no telling how long it would take them to grow into their true selves, if such a thing even existed.
Many years had passed, yet Wildan remained unchanged. As a blackangel, time merely brushed against him, never leaving a mark.
He watched the swaying branches and thought: they are not like the others. They never have been. And yet, they were loved. Slow growth, perhaps. But roots, once planted, could crack mountains.
He didn't turn, but his eyes tracked the spot where twelve small figures had vanished into the woods. The wind caught the last of their laughter, fading like a firework too far to hear but still remembered.
remember the Magic Bag firework show, when bags V through VIII launched themselves skyward like rogue festival lanterns, each detonating in increasingly flamboyant bursts. One spun like a ballerina, another exploded in a heart shape, and the last rained down confetti that made even the cow pause mid-chew in awe.
"They think they're ready," Wildan said. "Maybe they are. Or maybe they're disaster wrapped in spellbooks and enthusiasm."
The cow mooed again, slightly more emphatically. Wildan exhaled slowly, the corner of his mouth twitching in what could almost be called a smile.
"They're not normal, y'know. Those twelve."
The cow stared at him with its deep, understanding eyes. Or maybe it was thinking about grass.
"Kyle tried to eat my wing. Like, actually bit down with the confidence of someone mistaking feathers for candy. Sinryo watched, nodded like a scholar observing a new technique, and bit the other one, twice, for symmetry. Adiw didn't bother with subtlety. He just punched me. Twice."
The cow flicked its tail.
"Jessica used to vanish behind curtains like a ghost, and Yuuna would stand completely still for so long I thought she'd petrified herself."
He paused, letting the silence bloom like a fragile petal between spoken memories. The wind brushed past as if turning the page of an unseen book, and for a moment, even the cow seemed to listen more closely.
"Fahleena had a speech prepared before she could walk. And it was in three acts."
A long, low moo.
"Sakura once stole all the snacks in the kitchen and buried them in alphabetical order. Gaby tried to ride a summoned mist deer into the pantry."
A thoughtful munch.
"Yetsan refused to sleep in a bed unless it was dusted three times. Orchid insisted on dueling her own reflection until she won."
The cow blinked slowly, the kind of blink that carried the weight of ancient wisdom, or maybe just grass-related indifference. Its eyes, deep and unreadable, offered no answers but seemed to acknowledge that yes, this was indeed the kind of story where a spoon might need to be buried ceremonially.
"And Gigih once enchanted a spoon to sing lullabies. It wouldn't stop. Ever. We had to bury it."
They stood in silence for a while.
"They'll be fine," Wildan said at last.
The cow mooed. Agreeably. Then he added, under his breath:
"Probably."
The wind stirred the trees again, and somewhere far off, the echoes of adventure were just beginning.
The cow resumed chewing. All was oddly at peace.
The sort of peace that arrived not with triumph or closure, but with the soft exhale after chaos, the stillness that lingered like dew on morning grass. A quiet not born of absence, but presence, of memories, of footsteps just taken, of a dozen futures stretching outward like roots from the same tree. Wildan let it settle over him, neither resisting nor clinging, while the cow, a creature of simple certainties, continued its meal with the steady patience of nature itself.
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