?
Chirp!
Tweet! Tweet!
????
It was already getting late. The sunlight slanted across the crown of the great tree in the forest. Watching the birds playing outside the window on a vine swing made by some little girl, Elaina fell into deep thought.
"..."
Sure, she'd managed to find a powerful (and suspicious?) witch willing to take her on as an apprentice, and she even had another supposedly powerful witch—the "Stardust Witch," one of the highest-ranking mages—as her assistant teacher. But Elaina still couldn't bring herself to feel happy!
Because...
For nearly a month now, the two of them hadn't taught her a thing!
Aside from spending her free time reading the Stardust Witch's collection of spellbooks and notes to stave off boredom, her daily duties consisted of running errands and doing all kinds of chores for the little girl who was supposedly a powerful witch and an infinitely greater genius than Elaina, as well as for her assistant teacher, Fran.
That meant washing clothes, cleaning, making breakfast, lunch, afternoon tea, dinner, and even midnight snacks. She also had to run errands and buy all the food and everyday necessities the three of them needed to live in the forest.
At this point, she'd figured it out: she was nothing but a tool, summoned and dismissed at Fran and her little teacher Annie's every whim. If she didn't need their approval to become a full-fledged witch and travel around the world, she'd have had enough and gone straight back home by now.
"..."
But there was nothing she could do. To become a full-fledged witch, she needed their approval, so Elaina could only patiently stay in the beautiful treehouse in this enormous old tree and keep reading the books belonging to Fran, the Stardust Witch and her assistant teacher.