In the northern forest lives a fearsome witch.

That was half true, half false.

Because ever since the great witch Belladonna died, the only one living in the northern forest had been the half-wit witch, Marli.

There was a time when witches were feared and believed to be terrifying. However, as the generations passed and their bloodline thinned, this fear faded and they were no longer considered anything out of the ordinary.

Now, a witch was more like a craftsman, someone who inherited skills from her mother’s mother, her grandmother’s grandmother, and used them to create magic-infused items and potions to sell.

Of course, Marli’s grandmother, Belladonna, had been an exceptionally powerful witch.

One late summer day, Marli, as always, went into the forest alone.

Her grandmother had raised her after her mother died when she was young. And after losing even her grandmother, she had lived alone ever since in the Witch’s Tower.

Even if she had inherited the blood of the great witch, she had learned everything from books on her own, so she was still lacking in many ways as a proper witch.

Marli compared the pictures of herbs she had copied from her field guide to the clumps of plants growing under the trees, filling her basket bit by bit.

Waddling through the underbrush in a duck-like gait, foraging for herbs was no easy task.

After keeping her head down for so long, Marli’s neck and back began to ache. She straightened up and rolled her stiff neck when, all of a sudden, she spotted a large mountain moth above a patch of flowers in the distance.

“What’s with that size…?”

Marli hastily gathered her basket, ready to move to a new spot. She decided to stop picking herbs and try catching the mountain moth instead.

Most of her living expenses were covered by selling simple remedies she made herself, a tea that soothed coughs, an ointment for insect bites. Trivial things like that. Partly, it was because her skills were rather modest, but more often, the ingredients needed for powerful potions were just too expensive. The world had simply become too peaceful.

Moth scales, though, were a superb ingredient for anesthetics. The problem was that a single moth yielded very little, but with a moth that size, she might be able to collect a decent amount.

Marli lowered her body and crept slowly toward the moth. She hid herself in the grass, just three or four paces from where the moth sat atop the flowers. At that moment, the moth—sipping nectar quietly in the sunlight—suddenly stretched its wings wide as if waking from a nap.

The moth’s wings, bathed in the gentle summer sunlight, shimmered in the light. Marli couldn’t believe her eyes. Beneath those trembling jade-colored wings was not the body of an insect.

It was the transparent, white skin of a human.

‘A fairy…!’

Marli rubbed her eyes with dirt-stained hands. Aside from the specimen illustrations she’d seen in books, this was her first time seeing one in real life—but just a glance told her it was undoubtedly a fairy.

A human body, no bigger than the palm of her hand, with four delicate wings attached to its back.

When she was young, her grandmother had told her that the fairies had left the northern forest long ago. Besides, fairies always traveled in groups, so it was hard to believe that one would suddenly appear all alone.

‘What in the world is going on?’

Of course, whether the fairy had lost its way or simply lost its mind didn’t matter to her. What mattered was that the value of a fairy was beyond imagination. Even a single strand of its hair or a speck of its wing dust was worth a fortune. Above all, a fairy’s core and essence were among the most valuable magical ingredients known.

Marli clenched both her fists tightly. She had to catch it—no matter what. If she went home to fetch a net, the fairy might be gone by the time she got back. All she had now was her basket. Marli shook out her basket and dumped all the herbs she’d just collected onto the ground.

In the meantime, the fairy finished sipping nectar and flitted lightly to the next flower. It was so small she could barely see it, but there was no mistaking it was a male.

According to her books, the core could be harvested from females, while the essence was obtained from males. If she could just get the essence from this male fairy, she could finally create that “special elixir.”

Marli’s heart thudded with excitement at the thought.

Patience was the most important thing when it came to capturing anything. Marli lay flat on the ground, eyes fixed on the fairy, waiting for it to let its guard down.

The fairy, completely unaware that a witch was lying in wait, fluttered leisurely from flower to flower. For all anyone said about the northern forest being uninhabitable, the abundance of flowers seemed wonderful to him. Once he had eaten his fill, the fairy grumbled to himself.

“Damn it, and just who’s supposed to apologize now?”

Such foul language from someone so small. Marli mocked him inwardly while steeled herself. She had to succeed on the first attempt. Fairies may be small, but they’re incredibly quick.

It happened in the blink of an eye, as the fairy moved to yet another flower. With her mind set, Marli flipped her basket upside down and sprang up like a coil.

‘Grandmother, help me!’

Thwack—!

With enough force to crush both the fairy and the wildflowers beneath him, she slammed the basket down. She hit it so hard the round bottom of the basket was dented.

Heart pounding, she pressed the basket firmly to the ground to keep it from moving.

Did she catch it? Or had it gotten away? There wasn’t a single sound from under the overturned basket.

‘Please, let me have caught it.’

Marli bent down and pressed her ear to the bottom of the basket.

“What the—damn it!”

She had caught it. Relief washed over her, draining all the tension from her body. But this was no time to relax. Marli quickly picked up a large stone, set it on top of the basket, and packed dirt around the edges to seal it tight—making sure the fairy couldn’t possibly escape.

Then, elated, she raced back to the tower. So thrilled at having caught a fairy, she had no patience for the slow, enchanted staircase and ran all the way to the top without stopping to catch her breath.

Grabbing the animal anesthetic she had made earlier and her grandmother’s birdcage, Marli hurried back to the flower field.

“Where was it?”

She was so excited, she couldn’t quite remember where she’d left the basket. After wandering around the flower patch for some time, she finally spotted the basket right where she’d left it, lying upside down on the ground.

‘What if it had dug a hole and escaped? Or maybe it got impatient and just died in there…’

Marli brushed aside the heavy stone, then lay down, pressed her ear to the bottom of the basket, and tapped it lightly.

“What is this—! Let me out!”

He seemed perfectly lively. Marli straightened up again and shook the bottle to make sure the anesthetic would work properly.

How much essence could she extract from a single fairy? Marli recalled the tiny vial—no bigger than a pinky finger—that a merchant had once shown her. Just one of those cost as much as her entire year’s worth of food. If she could make and sell the elixir, she could earn many times that amount.

She would capture it alive—no matter what, for the sake of her grandmother’s honor. Marli carefully brushed away the dirt she had used to cover the basket. She had already opened the door to the birdcage in advance.

Now, the final step. Marli tried to calm her excitement.

‘I can do this!’

‘One, two…’

From the fairy’s perspective, nothing about the situation made any sense. One moment, the sky had darkened and he’d been trapped in a pitch-black cave.

No matter how careful Marli was, the sound of her brushing aside dirt felt like an earthquake from inside. The tapping was as loud as thunder.

Anxiously, he fluttered and folded his wings, searching for a way out.

“Three—!”

At the sound of the girl’s loud voice, the world was suddenly filled with light. Blinking, the fairy saw a shabby human girl with black hair staring down at him.

And then—hiss—he felt a sharp sting, like a sudden rainfall, and in the blink of an eye, his world went black again.