The lights seemed to be circling around something or someone, merrily bobbing up and down as the figure in the middle slowly traveled forwards. Anastacia stopped and listened to the chanting for a bit, but either the words were muddled beyond all recognition or were simply of some other language that Anastacia didn’t understand.
“Excuse me. Who are you?” Anastacia asked from a safe distance, trying not to scare whatever she was following, in case it hadn’t noticed her in the dark.
The figure stopped and slowly turned to face Anastacia. From behind it had looked like a human-sized black lump, obscured by a tattered black cloth. But as it turned, the lights surrounding it illuminated its form and revealed it to be some kind of creature made of moss, twigs and leaves, arranged into a very loose humanoid shape. Nothing in it was fit for necromancy material, so in that way it seemed similar to a spriggan but clearly wasn’t one. The black cloth covering its back seemed to be stuck to the branches in its head and almost looked like a veil.
“Umm… Hello?” Anastacia tried again and waved her hand.
The chanting stopped and one of the lights approached her. While Anastacia didn’t feel threatened by the creature itself, mostly because it looked extremely flammable and barely functional, she had no idea what the lights were. In general, touching unknown magical lights was not recommended, so she retreated further back. This only caused more trouble as two more lights began floating towards her.
Having no idea what was happening, Anastacia ran away as fast as she could, but the lights kept following her at their own pace. Anastacia figured that she should run away from the camp, give the lights a chance to catch up with her, run around them and get to the camp with some time to wake up Gilbert and Emilia. And so she ran through the dark fields, stumbling on rocks and the like every now and then, until she ran out of field and was surrounded by a pitch-black forest in every other direction, leaving her trapped. By then the campfire was only a small dot of light in the distance. The lights slowly floated towards her in a completely unintimidating manner, but Anastacia wasn’t willing to risk it before she knew what they were. With her luck they probably turned people’s eyes into bugs on contact or something equally horrible.
“Please stop!” She yelled at the lights and threw a fireball up into the air as a warning shot. It had no effect on them, so she threw another one slightly closer, yielding the exact same result. “I’ll aim the next one at you!” She threatened the lights. Even after that, they didn’t change their course and she was forced to act on her threats. The fireball simply passed through one of the lights harmlessly, and the panicking beginner mage began to throw fire at them in every way she could.
Gilbert had been following the action from the beginning. King had woken up him and Emilia as soon as Anastacia left the camp. He also knew exactly how dangerous this particular creature was and that Anastacia could handle it on her own. While the beginning was slightly hard to follow, Anastacia’s white hair was visible in the moonlight and they were able to keep their eyes on her.
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“Where is she going? She won’t run into the forest, right?” Emilia worried when Anastacia raced to the other end of the field.
“Nay, she’s not stupid. If she’s doing what I think she’s doing, it’s actually pretty smart.” Gilbert reassured her. He was correct about Anastacia’s plan too, at least up to the part where the fireballs began flying in the distance. “Let’s just hope she won’t start a fire.”
When the warning shots turned into a full-blown firestorm, Gilbert sent King out to get Anastacia. The Simulacrum being more or less immune to fire, it wouldn’t be a problem if he got hit a bit. Anastacia would also be able to see the lit lines on some of King’s parts and maybe stop running around and throwing fire.
By the time King made it to her, she had managed to pass the lights and was running towards the camp. King grabbed her and brought her back to the camp, where Gilbert and Emilia greeted her with grins.
“Guys! There are these weird lights that are following me around! We need to...” The exhausted necromancer explained, but stopped when Gilbert’s self-control failed and he stared laughing.
“Anastacia the great necromancer, mage and the queen of goblins is afraid of pixies.” He managed to blurt out before breaking into laughter again.
“Pixies?!” Anastacia yelled. “Stop laughing! I was really scared.” She stared hitting her laughing friend but didn’t manage to actually stop him from ridiculing her.
The lights reached the camp and Anastacia hid behind Gilbert, who finally regained his composure and switched into his teacher mode.
“The small balls of light that have been following you are pixies, essentially they’re just leftover magical energy from natural sources and completely harmless. They tend to follow people, but only to have a quick look at them.” He explained and pointed at one of them, which has started circling Emilia. After a while it just left to regroup with the ones that hadn’t followed Anastacia.
Anastacia came out from hiding and let one of the remaining pixies circle her. “So what about the thing they were with? It was like this creature made of sticks and stuff.” She asked when the pixie left.
“That would be a pixie lord. They’re not actually creatures: the best way to describe one would be to call it a sculpture the pixies shape and move around. No one really knows why though.” Gilbert said and watched the last pixie go around him. “With any luck, they decided that some detail in you was pleasing to them and they’ll shape their lord to look a bit like you. Back in the day, people believed that following one that looks like you would lead you to a treasure, as if the pixies were thanking you for your looks. But honestly it’s just a really complicated way to get lost in a forest.”
The party sat down to watch the pixies slowly move away with their puppet. Anastacia started to actually like the idea of a pixie-made version of her going around, scaring people at night. When the pixies disappeared into the woods, everyone laid back down to get some sleep while King kept watch.
“Guys, promise you won’t tell anyone I ran from pixies.” Anastacia pleaded, realizing she wouldn’t hear the end of it if everyone from the inn knew.
“I promise nothing!” Emilia declared and giggled.
Gilbert laughed in his usual, hearty manner. “It was pretty funny, but I’m actually really proud of how you acted. You didn’t know what you were facing, so you retreated and came up with a plan to get us. That’s possibly the most important thing you can learn as an adventurer: We are not heroes or soldiers, we can run away if the situation is unfavorable. No matter how powerful you are, there are things you can’t fight properly. So figure out what you’re dealing with and only then act.” He instructed the less experienced adventurers in his party.
Silence took over the camp and it didn't take long for the party to fall asleep again. Anastacia had burned all of her energy by running around and didn’t have any trouble falling asleep this time.