It all occurred in one heartbeat. In one moment, he was facing certain death; and in the other, a regal figure stood between him and the slaver. He had heard of the creatures across the ocean, but he had never expected one so… arboreous.

The monster – which looked slightly female with its curves – grabbed the slaver by the head and spat at him. By the time he processed what was happening, the slaver was screaming and pleading for his life, but that didn't stop the monster from ending it.

Casually.

The loud and wet crunch of the skull being shattered to pieces lingered in his ears as the monster turned to face him. It was a monster alright but… it was also beauty incarnate. A beige crown rested on her head where verdant vines flowed downwards like hair and some of the same fleshy leaves rested around her hips giving the shape of a skirt. Her skin wasn't made out of flesh, but bark, and a dark one at that. A plethora of plants habituated the bark, vines, flowers, grass, mushrooms… the monster was but a moving forest on its own. Yet all of that paled in comparison to those eyes.

Oh, those eyes. An emerald shine came out of them, putting to shame any gemstone. Those were but the eyes of life itself.

When the monster stepped forward, he found himself dragging his body backward. It was an instinctual move devoid of thought, and it showed as his body screamed in pain after putting pressure on the wound he had just gotten from falling over.

"Fret not, child," the monster said with a lovely voice of honey and sunlight.

Fear? No, he hadn't backpedaled out of fear, but intimidation. Intimidation from the divine beauty he was beholding. Had he found one of those monsters beyond the ocean or a goddess? No other words could describe the being he was seeing after all.

The goddess knelt before him, and before he could even react, flames spurted out of her body. Or more concretely, from a red flower she kept at her waist. Fire soon enveloped him, but he chose not to react. If the goddess of the forest had marked him for death, he would take it on.

What happened next, he couldn't have expected in a million lives.

The fire, instead of burning him, healed him.

A warm sensation overtook him before a painful itch assaulted him. It wasn't as bad as the pain he had been feeling, but it made him writhe and moan in pain, nonetheless.

"Yes, the Blossomflame can be quite the blessing and the curse," the goddess announced with her lovely voice.

Yes, everything about her was lovely. Her melodious voice, her flowery body, her glittering eyes…

Not before long, the flames extinguished alongside the itches.

"There, like new!" She added happily. "Can you stand up?"

He heard the words, but he couldn't react, his mind was seized by the figure before him, after all. Removing his attention from gazing at her felt like a disservice to the goddess, one couldn't depart from such beauty. Not even to muster a thought.

"Hmm~" The goddess hummed deliciously. "Have I gotten it wrong? Can you understand what I am saying? Do you speak Ydazi?"

Something made him snap from his trance. The goddess had demanded a response from him, he was obliged to respond.

The boy nodded shyly.

"Great!" The plant goddess clapped her hands and professed happiness.

Oh, how delighted he was to see such an emotion on such a glorious visage. The fact that he had created that happiness only made him happier in return. Wait. Is it wrong to be happier than the goddess? Before he could continue with those thoughts, the goddess spoke again.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

"What's your name, child?" She said after placing a hand on his shoulder.

He almost passed out from the feeling. He had never ever before had felt such elation. Being touched by the goddess herself was but the greatest of blessings.

Then he realized he had to respond.

"X-Xochipilli…" He answered shyly with a blush. "If the name may be too long for the goddess, others call me Xo…"

"Goddess?" The goddess broke her contact with him as she let out a hearty chuckle. "I am no goddess, Xochipilli, I am a human like you."

"Y-you are a human?" Xochipilli professed his doubt, even if it may be taken as an offense.

"Well, I may not look like it. That much I admit. I have had my… bouts of insanity." She said with a hint of solace. That made his heart shrink, such a dark emotion shouldn't appear in such a beautiful visage. "But yes, a human like you."

"T-then what was the magic you did?" He asked, not purely out of curiosity, but to hear the goddess' voice more. "What about those healing fires?"

"Ah," she murmured. "That's a bit difficult to explain, but it's not that different from the arts of the cultivator. And talking about cultivators… what was that man doing?"

"The slaver?" She nodded. "I managed to escape from their dreadful group, but that's as much as I know… One moment I was at home, the next the village was aflame… When I woke up, I was in these foreign lands beyond the ocean. I only speak your tongue because of Sadam, the missionary in our village, but they killed him too…"

"Shh, it's fine." The goddess – or rather, the woman – grabbed him and placed his head on her bosom, where she proceeded to stroke his head. "You don't need to explain yourself more."

There was something heavenly about the plant-woman's touch. The embrace had the warmth of a mother but the power of the forest behind it. They remained there, in the ground and basking in the sunlight, for a good while. The boy snuggled on the bark, but instead of feeling hard, it was as soft as a bed of grass.

"Are you alright?" She finally broke the silence but continued to caress him.

"Yes," Xochipilli responded with determination.

"Good," the matronly woman gifted him another smile.

With each word, with each touch, he continued forgetting what the goddess had said. It was impossible for her to be a mere human.

"May I ask you something?" The boy inquired shyly.

"Feel free."

"W-what," he trembled and squirmed in her embrace until he was able to look her in the eyes. Her gorgeous, heavenly eyes. "What is your name?"

"Oh, right. I forgot to introduce myself. I am Aloe Ayad."

"Understood, Lady Aloe," the boy nodded.

"Oh heavens, Lady? You are going to make me blush?" Aloe said with a hand on her cheek. "You are quite the charmer." The last comment made Xochipilli himself blush. "But no, Aloe is more than enough."

"I-I see, La-Aloe." The boy continued blushing as Aloe reacted with a giggle. It felt disrespectful to her beauty to plainly call her by her name, but if those were her orders…

"There are many things that I want to ask, but for now, we should get going. It wouldn't like having a child sleeping outdoors if I can help it." Aloe stood up, leaving Xochipilli on the ground.

"Go where, Aloe?" The boy inquired shyly.

"For starters, to Selen. Then… I have some ideas." Xochipilli shivered at the idea of going back to that city. "Is there something wrong?"

"I… that's where they had me alongside the other villagers…"

"Oh, fret not. You are not going back to that place; you have my word."

"I-I trust you, Aloe." From everything that had happened these last days, Xochipilli had the feeling that no matter what, he could trust in the goddess of plants before him.

Aloe judged him, inspecting him from head to foot. "You trust me, you say?"

"Y-yes," he nodded.

"You better not make me regret this," the plant woman placed her barky hand on his head, and he felt a warmth coming from it. "Don't fight against it."

"Hm," Xochipilli mumbled in agreement. He wouldn't ever refuse her.

Hastily, the boy felt his body heating up. A handful of breaths later, the heat hit a plateau, but the warmth wasn't unwelcome. His body, his entire being felt… more like himself. More… lasting.

"A successful attempt, but I still need to check it." Aloe yanked one of the fleshy leaves on her hips that imitated a skirt and tar started pouring out of it. "Dunes, I wasn't careful enough!"

Xochipilli didn't understand why Aloe had shouted, but as the blobs of black on the surface of the leaf started to shift into words, he understood it. Well… almost. He had been taught how to talk the language, so reading was a bit beyond him. Having said so, he wasn't completely clueless.

"Could you yank the leaf for me…?" The question died in Aloe's mouth as she saw where Xochipilli's eyes were looking.

Death.

Xochipilli almost collapsed on the ground as a powerful pressure assaulted his very being, an invisible force threatening his very existence.

"Did you read it?" Aloe asked with a slow and deliberate voice, her emerald eyes raging with a potent shine.

"N-no, I didn't Lady Aloe!" Xochipilli instinctively responded out of fear, fear of making the goddess disappointed with him. "I-I haven't been taught how to read your tongue!"

Not a lie, but not completely the truth.

"I see…" The pressure suddenly vanished and the goddess' intimidating visage changed into a smile. "Then it's fine! Could you please yank one of the leaves for me then?"

"Y-yes!" The boy responded enthusiastically, but his mind still remained in the few letters he had managed to read.

They had said:

Name: Aloe Ayad

Species: Al…