Eighteenth Birthday

Galatea awoke with the sun barely above the horizon. She yawned and rubbed her eyes repeatedly to wake herself up.

She decided to surprise her parents on her eighteenth birthday by preparing a delicious breakfast. She couldn't stop smiling at the thought of surprising her parents.

She got out of bed quietly and reached for her old worn-out fur coat because it was still cold outside. She walked up to their door on tiptoe before grabbing the small basket on the side.

When she finally got out of their house, she let out a loud sigh. She shivered as she felt the chill of dawn and hurriedly put on her coat. It was still dark outside, but she could see the pathway when her eyes adjusted to the darkness.

Gala's gaze roamed around the place she had called home since she was born. The town's nightlights seemed to dance in her vision, and she smiled at such beauty.

She started her pace towards the forest at the base of the mountain range, intending to collect those delicious mushrooms her mother prepared for their birthdays.

She could hear owls cooing in the distance and crickets chirping. Before heading into the forest, she turned around and took one last look at her house, where her parents and Avin were still sleeping, with a smile on her face.

'I can't wait to see their reaction when they find out about my surprise', she thought.

Gala cast a terrifying glance around as she strode towards the thick forest's heart. This was her first time venturing into the forest at such a time. Her footsteps echoed throughout the forest. When she saw the twinkling lights dancing around the bushes and trees, her fear was replaced with awe.

'Fireflies', she happily thought.

She extended her hand towards a flying firefly and almost danced in joy when it gleefully landed on her delicate hands. "Hello." She softly greeted the tiny creature.

Gala heard a faint sound from a firefly, and within seconds, hundreds of fireflies flocked to her. As they swarmed around her, their tiny tails flickered in mellow yellow.

She let out a soft giggle. "Thank you so much guys, today is my eighteenth birthday and I am taking this experience as a gift from you all," she said after applauding their brief performance.

Gala was taken aback when she heard tiny chirps from them. "You guys are so cute." Gala giggled again.

The tiny creatures flew in all directions, she waved them goodbye before she started walking deeper into the forest.

She yanked away some twigs and branches from the pathway. She carefully treaded towards the dense bushes, making sure to avoid thorns and sharp-bladed grass.

She was panting heavily when she finally spotted the sumptuous mushrooms.

'There you are', she finally thought.

She wiped her sweat and sat down in the grass for a brief moment.

Gala exhaled long, heavy breaths as she gazed mesmerizingly at the first rays of sunlight breaking into the whole forest.

"Wow," she uttered softly, deeply stunned by the sight. Her eyes were greeted with a bright green of hues as the golden rays finally touched the crown of the trees.

"Nature can be both idyllic and scary at the same time." Gala couldn't help but blurt out her thoughts.

Enough wasting her time, Gala finally stood up and skipped merrily towards the array of mushrooms.

Gala started picking up some mushrooms when she heard faint voices.

"Oh, by the King, can you pull harder?"

"I am pulling HARDER, you dimwit!"

"Well, then pull harder than the harder then you idiot. The sun's coming up and we've barely filled our baskets."

Gala looked around, perplexed, but she couldn't see anyone else.

'Was it just my imagination?', she thought.

But Gala could still hear their faint conversation.

"Stop lazing around, Duffhill or else, we will get another scolding from Enma. Ugh, the guts of that old man."

A tiny female voice rang out through the area. Intrigued by the source of the voice, she walked towards it.

"We have no choice, Puffhill. The Majesty personally appointed him to lead us."

This time it was a tiny male voice.

Gala furrowed her brows in curiosity.

'Are the nature elementals playing a trick on me?' Gala frighteningly thought but chose to find the source of the voices nevertheless.

"If you say so, now together, let's pull this in one go so we can return to Aelfrey before the sun completely breaks in."

'Aelfrey? Where is that?' Gala's brows furrowed deeper at the confusion. She never heard any town or country that is called Aelfrey.

Gala was startled when she heard indistinct rustle of leaves behind the bushes in front of her. She knelt down and carefully parted the bush.

She let out a scream that startled the two tiny winged creatures she just saw. "Holy moly, fairies are real?" she astonishingly exclaimed.

"Duffhill, the girl had seen us!", the female creature frightfully shouted at her companion.

"Don't need to tell me, I saw it too." The male creature sarcastically answered.

Although, they were still in the state of shock, it seems to Gala that these two will never stop their bickering.

"God, you all are real! I can't believe it." Gala exclaimed over excitement at her discovery.

She crawled on all fours, closing the distance between them. The two winged creatures retreated a merely inches away from her.

Gala huffed in excitement. "Are you all this tiny? Can you fly towards the sky with the birds and airplanes up there? What about magic? Do you all have magic? Do you also use pixie dust to fly? Do you live in Pixie Hollow? What is Aelfrey?" Gala shoots them question over excitement.

The two shake their heads with scared expressions planted on their tiny faces.

"Oh, my bad. I have perhaps scared you, silly me. Anyway, I'm Galatea." Gala innocently extended her palm at them for a handshake.

Gala waited for them to introduce themselves but they only stared at her perplexingly.

"Oh", she simply said. "You must be Puffhill." Gala pointed at the female creatured.

Puffhill simply nodded at the girl.

Gala smiled.

"You must be Duffhill then." She turned to the male one and she got a simple nod again as his response.

"Nice to meet you, tiny creatures," Gala said with a warm smile. "By the way, where do you -" Gala was about to finish her sentence when the two creatures dashed away, their small baskets on their backs.

"Wait!" she yelled and ran after them.

"We are doomed, Duffhill. We are sighted by a human."

Gala heard Puffhill's pitchy tone.

"Exactly, they're not supposed to see us, are they?" Duffhill answered with the same hint of concern on his voice.

"Wait, why aren't we supposedly able to see you?" Gala interrupted their conversation, finally catching up with them.

Both of them shrieked in horror when they saw the girl running behind them.

"We're near at the entrance Duffhill, what we should do? She's not allowed to enter Aelfrey." Puffhill aired her concern to her partner who was already panting.

"That should be our last concern; we need to hurry because the sun is about to rise, and the entrance to Aelfrey will be closed by then."

To Gala's horror, the two suddenly disappeared in her sight.

She stopped abruptly and tried to look around for any hints of their presence.

She let out a loud scream when a mystic force suddenly sucked her into it.