62nd of Sunspeak, 3418, Somewhere in South Wlyette, Markus' Journal

On the whole, my life isn't so bad. Humans in general have it pretty good in elven lands, provided we live as honestly as our benevolent overlords do. For the most part I've never suffered anything worse than a bit of indignity at the hands of any random high elf who thought I looked cute. Perhaps I should back up, I don't know if the hypothetical person reading this journal entry is familiar with elves afterall. The idea boggles my mind a little, but apparently there are some isolated island communities where humans live alone and rule themselves. I honestly can't imagine what that's like so logically an audience from there would similarly struggle to comprehend life under elves in general and high elves in particular.

I'll get this out of the way first: Elves are tall. The shortest kind are wood elves and the shortest wood elf I've ever met liked to carry me under her bosom and 'forget' that she had me there before sharing a mischievous titter with the other elves in our class. Elves are rather fond of sexually charged teasing like that, as far as I know she wasn't actually interested in me, it was just another game to make me blush and stutter in embarrassment. More relevantly to this journal however, are high elves. High elves are very very tall, tall enough that all four of my adventuring companions often find it easier to wrap a single hand around me and lift me into the air in a casual carry than to wait for me to follow after them at my own pace. Now you might be thinking to yourself: Why is this person traveling with such large folk? What could he have to offer them, even as a slave?

Well first of all, contrary to the social strata of humans in orcish and dwarven lands, I'm not a slave or even an indentured servant. I'm an equal partner and receive an equal share of the loot, and I provide my combat-capable teammates with an invaluable service in our often deadly line of work. I am an alchemist.

You see, elves aren't just big for no reason, they're also incredibly magical. Being magical generally has a lot of benefits such as being tall and not much in the way of negative effects, but it does mean that casting any kind of spell on them, even the ones meant to help like healing spells, won't always work. But potions are apparently natural enough to have no such risk, so a high elf who finds herself frequently engaging with danger is going to need to spend a lot of her earnings on potions, both to fix herself up and extra things. I can't imagine it's very fun exterminating dragons without the influence of a fire resistance potion, for instance. And that's just for one high elven adventurer, four of them basically need to have their own personal alchemist, the fact that I'm a human and thus adorably tiny in comparison is just icing on the cake to my companions. Though like most elves, they've got a funny way of showing their appreciation.

When the team is actively plunging some dungeon or hunting some monster, I'm not really capable of defending myself or even getting away in time. So naturally that means one of my teammates has to carry me so I don't get hurt, left behind, or worse. Which naturally means that I get constant reminders that I am very small, very weak, and very cute for practically the entire time I'm in their clutches. But the money is fantastic for how much work I do so I put up with their belittling words and games. Plus Mere and Elya let me ride in their bosom when it's their turn to hold me, and thanks to magic, it's actually more comfortable than it sounds.

I paused in my writing to look up at the elves in question. How should I describe them to an outsider? Mere was cleaning her sword off to the side, seemingly in her own world separate from reality. Her skin was a pastel pink, and she could be mistaken for a sunburnt human if she were quite a long ways away. The only sign that she was still paying attention to our surroundings were her long ears twitching and swiveling around in reaction to sounds that weren't audible to a human. Or to me at any rate, It could be that I'm just individually useless at tracking, weren't some humans on the border towns rangers by trade?

Meanwhile the light green sisters, Teale and Elya, were engaged in an animated discussion comparing the merits of wild venison to pastured beef. I'd heard similar arguments between my two brothers, though the tastes of elves were wildly different from what a human would find palatable. Being magical, elves didn't have to worry about being harmed by something as mundane as food poisoning, and they typically consumed their meals as seasoned meat with a side of vegetables, but also raw and whole. Apparently it was far more flavorful and enjoyable that way, and 'fed their souls as well as it did their forms'. I lost my appetite the first few times I witnessed elven 'cooking' but well, I've been to a slaughterhouse too and I still enjoyed a nice steak. Plus it'd been years since I took this job.

Finally Aure was tending the cookfire for my own meal. That woman is a blessing and probably the reason I stuck around so long. I don't know how, but her human cuisine was somehow better than my mother's, the light blue elf deftly manipulated cooking implements the length of her fingernails with all the skills of- of well, myself, when I'm rendering down monster viscera and magical plants into usable potion batches. The main difference between the team wizard working her delicious hobby and myself doing my job was that Aure didn't have to worry about being snatched up by a mischievous teammate for anywhere between a few minutes to the rest of the evening filled with lewd comments and casual manhandling.

Rarely the elvish bullying would escalate into an actual sexual encounter if I accidentally said the wrong thing in response and goaded her on. Not a serious one though, I was just often the only man within several leagues and it's apparently a good natural way to relieve post-battle stress. That's just typical adventuring parties having more urges than boundaries, it almost never went further than being held in between her breasts and pressed against her thighs. Sometimes I'd be released when my captor was sated, other times she'd fall asleep like that and I'd be trapped in comfort until she remembered to pull me out. And once this last season I also got a blowjob when she was done using me, followed by a return to normalcy within hours of the event. Like it never even happened. I probably wouldn't be writing about that stuff though. Random strangers didn't need to know how irrationally proud I was of being told by Elya that I had a tasty penis, and neither did any elves snooping over my shoulder. goddess, I do not want to know of what kinds of teasing they'd escalate to with that knowledge.

Speaking of, I probably shouldn't have taken my eyes off of Elya if I wanted to remain on the ground with my dignity intact. At least then I could have maneuvered myself into a more comfortable position than being dangled over the archer's breasts while she and Teale deliberated whether I was an ass man or a breast man. Eventually I was let go to eat my dinner, but not before Teale and her sister shared a giggle over Teale's odd statement of me being a better fit within the team than without it. I didn't really understand the joke until halfway through my rabbit, when Elya made a crude gesture of shoving something- or someone up into her womanhood. I can only imagine how red my face must have gotten because all my companions shared an uproarious laugh at that.