Chapter 207: A Human Wedding
After leaving the Elf Village, Kurtz and Serie's journey continued.
They still followed an aimless path, occasionally deviating from the main road to enter unknown but uniquely scenic valleys, where they would stay for several days.
Flamme's reply had been received. The letter stated that they had heightened their vigilance and would continue searching for the elf village as planned.
Even Kurtz himself hadn't expected that his unintentional act of trying to make Flamme meet her elf apprentice earlier had, by sheer chance, uncovered the Demon Race's schemes.
It was an arrangement of fate, it seemed.
In the days that followed, because the space magic they left behind showed no signs of being triggered, the two temporarily set aside their worries about their apprentices.
One afternoon, they followed the main road and arrived at a human town.
Before even entering, they could hear melodious orchestral music and the cheers of a crowd from afar.
"It's a bit too noisy." Serie frowned slightly, looking at the crowd at the city gate with displeasure.
She preferred quieter environments and instinctively felt repulsed by such excessively boisterous places.
"It looks like a celebration?" Kurtz observed with interest. "Shall we go in and take a look? We can restock our supplies, and also see if there's any good food, like that pie from before."
He remembered that Serie had given a decent review to that simple human food.
Although Serie seemed to prefer eating her own grilled mushroom skewers, she couldn't eat them every day.
While Serie herself didn't seem to mind, Kurtz couldn't stand it.
A balanced diet of meat and vegetables was key to a healthy life.
Although discussing healthy living in a magical world felt a bit odd, given that the sacred magic in this world had developed to the point of limb regeneration.
Minor issues like nutritional imbalance were completely insignificant.
However, for now, satisfying their cravings was paramount.
The two entered the town with the flow of people.
In the town center, the windows and balconies of the houses on both sides were packed with onlookers, and the main street had been cleared and paved with a brand new red carpet.
At the end of the red carpet stood a small, spired chapel, its doors wide open, with melodious singing drifting out from inside.
"It's a wedding." Kurtz quickly deduced from the excited chatter around them. "A human bonding ceremony."
Serie looked at the small chapel, then at the excited crowd on both sides of the street, continuously scattering petals. A trace of pure incomprehension crossed her eyes.
"Incomprehensible. So many people and so much material wasted, just to announce the union of two individuals? Humans' preferences are truly strange."
In her long life, elf unions were typically quiet and private affairs in the forest, never attracting so many unrelated onlookers.
"Uh, I think you might have misunderstood something. It's just a simple ceremony to tell everyone that the two of them are going to be together."
"Still can't understand."
Kurtz smiled, his gaze sweeping over the faces around them. "Perhaps, for them, it's not just a ceremony, but also a way to share their joy, receive everyone's blessings, and spread this happiness." He pointed towards the chapel entrance. "Look, those should all be their relatives and friends."
Just then, the chapel bell rang out loudly.
The crowd erupted into even more fervent cheers.
The chapel doors opened completely, and a couple in elaborate attire slowly walked out, surrounded by their relatives and friends.
The groom wore a black suit. Although Serie had never seen such a form-fitting black suit before, she had seen similar garments, so she didn't find it too strange.
And the bride…
Serie's gaze was instantly drawn to her.
The bride was wearing a pure white wedding dress.
It was a garment Serie had never seen before, but it was extremely intricate and magnificent.
Layers of lace outlined a slender waist; the wide skirt flowed with a pearl-like luster in the sunlight.
A veil covered her pinned-up hair, its edges adorned with crystal decorations that refracted fragmented light as the bride walked.
She wore a shy but radiant smile on her face. Serie had never seen such a smile before—it was beautiful, as beautiful as a blooming flower of life.
Kurtz's gaze also involuntarily fell upon the bride, simply appreciating that most beautiful moment belonging to a human girl.
Looking at the pure white wedding dress, symbolizing vows, a thought suddenly emerged without warning.
He turned his head to look at Serie beside him, and instinctively spoke. "Serie," a hint of playfulness in his voice, "I'm suddenly a little curious—what would you look like if you wore this outfit?"
Serie was focused on examining the bride's wide gown, which she found beautiful but completely impractical for movement. Hearing his words, she turned her head to look at Kurtz.
A flicker of surprise first crossed her eyes, which then turned into a look as if she were staring at an idiot.
"Me?" She pointed to herself, then to the bride who was moving cautiously, even needing her bridesmaid to help hold up her skirt. Her tone filled with disdain.
"Impossible! This outfit, besides looking good, is utterly useless. And the material looks like just ordinary cloth—a simple fire spell could turn it to ashes." She paused, then concluded, "It has no practicality whatsoever."
Kurtz was amused by Serie's series of evaluations, all based on a battle mage's perspective.
He imagined Serie wearing a magnificent wedding dress, yet seriously explaining the inconvenience of a wide skirt for evasion, and how even the veil on her head would obstruct her vision.
That scene had too much contrasting cuteness.
"Cough, cough." Kurtz suppressed his laughter, but his eyes held an undeniable expectation. "But, I want to see it."
Those simple five words seemed to carry a certain magic.
Serie, who was about to continue her evaluation of the wedding dress's uselessness, suddenly had her words caught in her throat.
She looked at the undisguised expectation in Kurtz's deep eyes, and her heart felt as if it had been gently bumped by something, skipping a beat.
She fell silent.
Time seemed to pause for a few seconds amidst the noisy wedding background.
Serie lowered her gaze, and the stray strands of hair on her head cast a small shadow on her fair cheek.
She seemed to be thinking very seriously.
Weighing the impracticality of fighting while wearing this outfit against the importance of satisfying Kurtz's boring wish.
Finally, as if having made some kind of decision, she looked up again. Although the disdain in her eyes hadn't completely vanished, there was a hint of something else—an indescribable compromise.
She avoided Kurtz's gaze, her eyes drifting elsewhere, and said in as flat a tone as possible:
"…If you insist on seeing it," she paused, as if making a difficult decision, "it's not impossible."
Kurtz's smile instantly deepened, almost overflowing.
[End of Chapter]
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