Mabinogi Generation 1 - Chapter 1: A New Pet

When I was nine years old, I had a dream one night that I met a very pretty lady standing on a white platform circled by snowy and eagle owls. She looked upon me with soft blue eyes that only somebody insanely mature would possess and smiled the same way a mother would. I wanted to ask her what was going on, but my body felt numb and I couldn’t speak.
“Please don’t be alarmed,” she began “My name of Nao.” As her downy voice transcended my ears, I felt my heartbeat begin to slow to a more average pace, and she took notice. “In a short while, you’ll wake up in a town called Tir Chonaill. There I want you to hand this to the chief of that village, Chief Duncan.”
She extended her hand to me where a letter appeared in a brief-lived phantasm. My body began to move on its own, and I grabbed the letter from her hands.
“I hope you grow into a fine upstanding citizen and that you enjoy your life here in Erinn.” With another smile, she began to levitate, and then vanish. Almost immediately, my vision followed in suit as everything quickly faded into black.
That was 4 years ago, not a single night after did I dream of the white-haired woman. To this day, the words she spoke to me confused me. As far as my memory traces, I’ve lived in Tir Chonaill my whole life. And what a busy life it is.
Everyday after I wake up near the northern fields (my bed of choice), I make a run through the cemetery to the healer’s house to help Dilys make fresh bandages for anybody who may injure themselves. After that, I run to the church to help Endelyon gather eggs she would later hand out to the less fortunate and the inn. Sometimes I’d stop by the general shop to ask Malcolm to make amends to my clothes, he say a lot about how much he loves Nora, blah blah blah. Sometimes I would cross the Adelia stream which runs through the town to protect Ferghus from the many people still angry at him for his... not exactly perfect repair jobs on tools and weapons. Regardless of what went on as the day moved on, I would always finish it off with stopping by the school so Ranald can help me improve my combat abilities.
Take everything I told you and repeat it until the blade gets dull. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not sick of my life in this town; but, that dream crosses my mind every now and then, and I always wonder what it was supposed to mean. The last time I brought it up to the Chief; he told me “Walk before you run, Taiga.”
Old people and their riddles.
Well, back to my mundane life. Today, Caitinn from the bakery needed flour, and a lot of it, to do some baking. I had to harvest barley and grind it up at the windmill where Alissa, the girl who runs the mill, asked me:
“You looked confused, tell me what’s on your mind.” I let out a much needed sigh and faced her.
“Have you ever gotten bored running the mill?” I asked, in return, she looked confused right back at me. As if nobody has asked her that before.
“Oh,” she began after a brief period of thought, “Yeah, it definitely gets boring. But then I imagine the day my prince will come and snatch me out of this sleepy little village.” Sounds like her... I took the final crushed bits of barley and loaded into a sack. “Don’t tell me...”
“Okay, I won’t.” I said as I made an attempt to pick up the finely packed barley.
“Wait, do you need help carrying that?”
“No no,” I tried to assure her then began to make my way up the hill to the bakery. Not that it was heavy... okay, it was heavy, but it was more that I couldn’t see anything in-front of me due to the height of the filled sack.
It isn’t a very treacherous climb up to the bakery, but it would really stink if I bumped into something or someone along the way. I passed the Inn ran by Piaras and his niece Nora, made it past the general shop and felt the bakery get closer when... disaster.
“Uwah!” I heard somebody shout when the bag just suddenly burst open and a big cloud of barley dust filled the air. I might have bumped into Caitinn who was probably looking for me.
“Aah aaahh, I’m really sorry! If there’s any way for me to make up for this...” I apologized, but on the other end of the accident, I heard giggling.
“That’s easy then.” Wait, that isn’t Caitinn’s voice... “Let’s take a bath!” An arm reached through the plume and began to drag me through the town heading south. I couldn’t really tell who exactly this person was, but she was much taller than me, had a brown-ish orange hair color and a strange coiled band with many frays on her wrist.
Something told me I was heading right into trouble just letting her yank me away from my usual chores, but something else about it made my heart flutter the same way it did in that dream.
“Where are we going?” I asked.
“To meet the others!” she hollered back. Within view, smoke was rising in the southern fields, and we were getting closer.

---

“Well, I WAS almost at the town’s local market.”
“You were at the market and thought ‘I think I should bring them back a kid instead of food’?”
“No no! Let me finish, Kaya, please!”
To fill in what’s going on here, after we both arrived at this camping sit out of breath, this other girl, who completely dressed head to toe in black, asked the one who brought me down here what happened. The girl who dragged me here said “Look, she’s so cute!” or something like that, before getting hit on the head with a staff.
“And so, I was about to enter the shop when all of a sudden I felt a bump from behind and there was a huge plume of dust!”
The darkly gowned one, I think her name is Kaya, faced me for but a moment. She didn’t seem much older than me, or the other girl for that matter, but had a face of premature growth. Her eyes were literally red, but glowed like a ruby with light shone through it, and long black hair to match the gown and sorcerer’s hat.
“And you’re the one carrying all this dust?” she asked me. Taken aback, I just nodded quickly. It was one question, but I felt like I was being scolded by a teacher.
“She apologised for it and said ‘If there’s any way for me to make up for this’ so I brought her here!”
“What kind of screwed up logic is that...” this man with dark hair asked. Oh, did I forget to mention the people at this site were a man and two girls? Well, there you go. “Piko, we only wanted you to bring us some meat to cook but instea-“ He suddenly became fixated on me.
Like Kaya, he had red eyes, but these had a more piercing feel to them, as if he saw something behind me or inside me. And then he grinned.
“Nii?” the girl being scolded, her name is Piko(?), said questioningly.
“Piko, left wrist,” he responded. She extended her left wrist, showing once again the strange coiled band I saw on the way here. He removed it from her before turning his gaze back on me. At this moment, Kaya had realised what was going on and wore a disappointed look. I felt a lump appear in my throat.
Before I could find an escape route, he had already grabbed my arm with a grip I've only felt from Ranald in the past. A brief moment had passed before the band was slipped onto my wrist almost effortlessly.
“Huh?” I unconsciously reacted. Honestly, I was dumbfounded how quick he was and he seemed entertained by that as his smile widened. He turned back to his friends, hand on hip.
“Kaya, Piko, meet our new pet!” He triumphantly yelled as he pointed at me.