#and then neither of them end up being able to fulfill their promise to shi wudu.

[arohuacheng]

k sorry i’m legitimately so insane about pei ming and shi qingxuan though. pei ming as someone who’s not just a womanizer but someone responsible and dear enough to shi wudu for That Man to essentially appoint him as qingxuan’s guardian should anything happen to him… for pei ming to take that responsibility on whole-heartedly, trying to protect shi qingxuan and keep them out of trouble and lead them on the right path even from the very beginning of the story… he’s trying to keep her out of the whole mess with pei su he’s trying to make sure that she does what she needs to do to survive in heaven (she has never learned that one needs to be cruel and unjust to advance because her brother has done all the unjust cruelty for her) he’s trying to make sure that he fulfills that trust that was placed in him and that’s all before there’s even a hint of anything that would incapacitate shi wudu. and sqx sees this and she must know at least some of it but she hates him. just doesn’t like his personality. i am out of my fucking miiiind

[apparitionism]

Decalogue

Ten years! I certainly didn’t expect to be observing such a Bering-and-Wells first-meeting anniversary, and I double certainly didn’t expect to be doing it while staying at home during a pandemic. The situation has, in all honesty, severely limited my creativity; I admire and envy those who are able to produce good work under these conditions, but I’m not among them. So ideally, this would have been better... a few sentences here and there say what I want them to, though, and I’m going to take a tiny bit of solace in that. This is the first half of this anniversary piece; the second half will happen when it happens, but I’ll aim for sooner rather than later. I do promise, for anyone who cares, that I’m still working on Run and everything else.

Decalogue

Year one: Meet at gunpoint.

Each of Myka’s Helena years could be marked and counted by the unique commandment it issued, a commandment by which she was forced, or graced, to live... and if “meet at gunpoint” was no “I am the Lord thy God... thou shalt have no other gods before me,” nonetheless it was first, for that first year, that short year, that long year, that year of confrontation. That year of threats sliding so easily into thrills, and sliding just as easily back again.

When Myka looked back, she couldn’t remember (she couldn’t remember!) the extent to which she had, in the moment of the first standoff, understood it as the beginning it was. If she had been able to perceive, all at once, the rush of dictates that would follow the first leveling of her weapon at H.G. Wells, would she have been able to stand so steely and so sure?

Steely. Sure. That was what she enacted, that first time.

As gunpoint followed gunpoint, that was increasingly not what she felt.

Tamalpais showed her the mismatch between her awareness of threat and susceptibility to thrill.

Moscow—without the urgency of the gun—showed her how easy it was for thrill to take over.

The urgency of the gun... one middle-of-night at the B&B, very late, Myka just managed to avoid blindly colliding with Helena in the unlit hallway that separated their bedrooms.

“We meet again,” Helena whispered.

“At least it isn’t at gunpoint this time,” Myka whispered back, close to breathless in the dark.

“It might be.”

“What?”

“I can’t see your hands. It’s dark. You could be armed. Or I could.”

Threat or thrill? Myka’s body said “both.” Her mind said “neither” and “go back to your own room.” Later (minutes later, then days then months then years later), she wondered what would have happened if her mind hadn’t won out. If she had said what her body prompted, when Helena said “I can’t see your hands”: No, but you could feel them.

In Egypt, foolishly, she had had that night on her mind, that night she had not let her body have its way. She had been looking forward, considering how to engineer a do-over, a hotel-hallway meeting, something breathed about gunpoint, about hands, some answering breath of what might be felt instead. The real instead: she was yanked back to the present, feeling only soft, astonished disbelief that dissolved into shocked pain as Helena pulled a trigger.

Then at Yellowstone... every gunpointing, every day, every night, every threat, every thrill ran in her head, forcing her to reckon them, to add them together, to total the end of the world.

But there was no reckoning any of it, in the end. Or in the endless: reckoning was all there was, endless reckoning, endless rethinking, endless negotiating with herself over what she had allowed herself to do (and to feel), and the price she would force herself to pay for her lapses.

Year two: Thou shalt not touch.

Myka tried to punish herself sufficiently—to lay the lash for accurate agony— but she should have known that her own imagination would be inadequate. She thought she had fathomed how wrong she had been, and what she deserved for that wrongness, but the Regents knew better. They knew her exiling herself to the family bookstore was a pathetic penance.

Of course Helena herself was the only right scourge. Of course she was.

And of course Myka had not ever expected to be able to touch Helena. Not ever again, not after what had happened. But, equally, she hadn’t expected touch to be so tantalizingly impossible. She hadn’t expected the ache of desire to be so much more acute upon being confronted over and over (and over yet again) with the impossibility of its fulfilment.

Myka hadn’t consciously thought the word “desire” before, but now it preoccupied her. Helena unexpected in the space of that bookstore: desire. Helena in Artie’s office, speaking like an oracle: desire. Helena bleak in a field in Ohio: desire. Helena saving the day with words about consequences and sorrow: desire. And certainly Helena in a Warehouse aisle, talking of truth and regret and what had once so briefly and brightly been good: not a body, but the visual embodiment of all that Myka desired.

Even later, even when everything seemed to be ending, even when Helena was giving up and looking at the sky and Myka was being a coward and letting her do it: desire. And its frustration. No touching, no embrace of the only body that mattered, because it wasn’t there. The only body that mattered to Myka was elsewhere.

A commandment, but also a punishment: and as a punishment, was it just? That judgment was above Myka’s pay grade. Everything was above her pay grade. Everything was put above her pay grade. Pushed above it, onto a shelf just that much higher than she could reach.

In the absence of the prohibition, would she have wanted to touch Helena so very very much?

In the absence of the prohibition, would she have been so very very willing to read Helena as wanting so very very much to touch too?

She thought the answers to those questions didn’t matter, because she shied from imagining that the day could be saved in such a way as to allow for real satisfaction of those clearly commandment-violating wants. And she wondered, later, if the rope-induced violation—though brief and fraught and not their fault—was the inexorable cause of the next year’s anguish.

Year three: Suffer in silence.

Nothing Myka said made a difference. Nothing she said was of consequence, not after Helena disappeared. She tried. At first, she tried, repeating “Where is she?” endlessly to anyone with ears and power, in response to which she was, endlessly, put off: Helena was on a secret mission for the Regents. Helena was engaged in arcane Warehouse business. Helena had affairs of her own to settle...

Eventually Myka stopped asking: that was the first silence. And she thought she was suffering; naively, she thought the absence of information, with its echo of the absence of Helena’s physical body, was the worst torment.

She was wrong.

In Boone, the requirement that Myka suffer became acute.

She tried to violate the commandment—tried to ease her suffering by breaking the silence. But the person to whom she was speaking refused to hear her.

She really did have to laugh at how unimaginative she had been: how she had thought the inability to touch Helena was too much, was the worst price, to pay. The Regents, or fate, or whatever was in charge certainly did know how to alter one’s retrospective view... because now Myka could touch Helena, could even embrace her. All while suffering Helena’s new knout of a wish to have nothing at all to do with Myka. Myka wanted to howl against that incomprehensible wish, scream in protest, make Helena listen. Make Helena hear. Instead, the words Myka did say didn’t matter; they all translated to I am being silent.

Different silence. More suffering.

Myka also had cancer and did not speak much about it, though that was suffering, and silence, of a far different kind. She wished she had said even less, later, because her speaking led, stupidly, into the next year.

Year four: Make mistakes.

Looking at her life over that fourth year, Myka saw that she had never before made 365 days’ worth of such terrible mistakes. Not even during the year through which she and Helena had pointed guns at each other. (And that was of course yet another mistake, to ideate those gunpointings as mistakes.)

She looked at the idea of being with Pete and didn’t dismiss it out of hand as an impossibility. She knew it was a mistake, and yet at every step, she did not dismiss it: mistake upon mistake.

Eventually: “You think this is a mistake,” he accused.

This... this was the path. She could see no other way forward. Myka had always been very good at putting her head down and following the path. “No,” she said out loud to him. That was a mistake too—or so it seemed, in the first instant, as she saw his face flash with anger.

But in the next instant, it seemed the first right thing she’d done in a long time, because he said, “You’re lying.” Out loud.

The full force of it hit her: she was lying. And that was by far her worst mistake.

“I’m sorry,” she told him, because she was.

“So am I,” he said, but Myka knew they weren’t sorry for the same things.

Her mistakes usually redounded to her alone; they didn’t hurt other people. And yet she did wonder what sort of mistake Pete had made: what future had he imagined he and Myka could have? Marriage, children? That seemed to be what he was asking for, even if he’d never said that out loud, but why would he have thought Myka wanted those things in such a conventional way? Had he never seen her as herself?

Then again, who ever saw any other human as the self they believed themselves to be?

Myka asked herself that question, philosophically, then immediately castigated, You set yourself up for this one, Bering. Because that was how Myka had felt seen by Helena, in their best moments. No matter how ultimately untrue that sense of being seen might have been, she knew Pete was never going to look at her and make her feel that way. But of course Helena was never going to look at her like that again either, given her absence, so Myka made yet another mistake: in Helena’s absence, she allowed herself to blame Helena for it all.

And that very nearly became the ruin of everything.

Year five: Thou shalt not hold grudges.

The miracle of Helena’s return to the Warehouse had not, at first, seemed to be a miracle. Instead it was a rebuke, a shout about everything Myka had done wrong. All her mistakes, highlighted. Go away, Myka wanted to tell her. Just go away. Helena’s presence prompted an eerie echo of going home to Colorado: a constant knocking reminder of the whole wrong string of things she could have done, should have done, better.

Claudia was responsible for the real miracle. Myka had taken—not consciously, she told herself later; not consciously—to walking slowly in the hallway, particularly late at night, particularly when no one else seemed to be awake. Later, she of course realized she’d been looking for that do-over, but at the time, she’d colored herself restless. Just restless.

So when, one night, Claudia opened her door onto Myka’s dark hallway pace, Myka was, to put it mildly, surprised. She was even more surprised when Claudia said, “This nonstop lurking? It’s creepy. You’re not a ghost, so knock off acting like one.” Myka said a swift “okay” and tried to retreat to her room, but Claudia marched out, crossed the hall, and knocked on Helena’s door, saying, “H.G., get out here! It’s time!”

And there was Helena, not sleep-fogged as she should have been.

“Batter up,” Claudia told her, “or throw the pitch or take the handoff or whatever sportsball thing you want to do. My work here better be done.” She then went back to her room, closed the door, and locked it with a conclusive snick.

“Claudia has it right,” Helena said. “It’s time.”

“For what?” Myka asked. She knew she sounded thick. But she couldn’t... something. Couldn’t something, couldn’t anything. She couldn’t identify, not even in her own head, what she couldn’t do, or say, or think. Any of it. And now here stood Helena, the cause of it all. I might not have been happy before, but before, I had only myself to blame... now I have you.

“For what...” That was accompanied by a mirthless laugh. “Do you not know why I’m here?”

Myka did not have to give her answer any thought—the only thought she had was whether she should say it out loud. But maybe it was time. “To break my heart. That’s always why you’re here. Or there. Or anywhere.”

“As if you’ve left my heart alone,” Helena scoffed.

As if she had no idea what being silent had cost Myka. “I have tried so hard to leave your heart alone.”

Now Helena snorted. “You claimed to be in love with Pete. What do you think that did to my heart?”

“I don’t care what anything did to your heart,” Myka said, and she was in that moment telling the absolute truth. “You claimed to be in love with Nate. And Giselle. And god knows who else you didn’t tell me about.”

“Don’t put words into my mouth! I claimed to be in love with no one.”

“Fine,” Myka conceded, mulishly. “Who cares about love? You put words in your own mouth and spat them at me: how you belonged. With some random man and some daughter who wasn’t even yours.”

“So in retribution, you decided you belonged with Pete.” Helena curled her lip and nodded a sour nod. “Good judgment all around.”

“Don’t insult him. He’s a good person. He actually cares about me.”

Helena took that as the accusation it was. “That’s low.”

It was Myka’s turn to snort. “That’s low? Yeah, because you throwing Nate in my face—making me look at him, making me look at you stand next to him—that was so elevated.” Helena took a breath, as if to defend herself, but that made Myka push on, “And then Giselle—with you going out of your way to make sure I knew, like it was the most important thing in the world for me to be informed about exactly who you were with who wasn’t me—that was so exalted. Please. Spare me.”

Helena pressed her lips into a line, then very consciously unpressed them. She lowered her shoulders, which had hackled into rigid wings. “Fine. I will.” She went back to her room, and she did not slam the door, but she closed it such that Myka felt finality. No more slow walks, she told herself, and she turned to go to her own room, to close its door with the same sense of an ending.

But again, Claudia intervened, opening her own door and springing, sharp and swift as a wolf, to grab Myka’s arm before she could complete her turn, her escape. “Pay attention!” Claudia said. “In sportsball, you have to do something with the ball.”

She kept her hold on Myka and banged on Helena’s door, through which Helena said, “We are finished.”

Claudia said, “We’re just getting started. I swear to god I will stand here and yell for hours, because Myka’s not a ghost and neither are you.”

A minute passed. Another. Claudia did not yell, and for those moments they were all ghosts, waiting, in-between some before and whatever would come after.

Finally the door handle began to turn, hinges creaked, and Helena emerged again, her face blank, but rigidly so, as if she were concentrating on each muscle, holding every one still.

“Get it right,” Claudia said. She let Myka go, then muttered, as she retreated, “I swear to god.”

I swear to god, Myka thought, I wish I knew what “right” could possibly mean.

Helena cleared her throat. “Claudia holds strong beliefs.”

That was not what Myka had expected to hear. “Good for her. Or bad. I don’t know.”

“I don’t either. I’m exhausted,” Helena said. She slumped a bit.

It seemed to be a too-conscious illustration, designed to spark sympathy, and it enraged Myka. “Fine,” she snapped. “Get some sleep if she’ll let you. I’m done here.”

“She won’t let me. So you are not done here.”

“What am I supposed to do?” Myka demanded. “Forget everything that happened?” She ended on a crescendo; she had never made such noise in the night before.

Helena did not answer. She stood and breathed—a real body in space—the sound of the sea in, then out. Myka felt her own angry breathing slow in response. In response. To a real body in space, breathing audibly in, out. Chest rising and falling.

What wouldn’t Myka have given, a year ago, two years ago, three, four, to be right here? Was she supposed to forget everything that happened? No, she needed to remember everything instead. Remember everything that hurt, and why.

“Okay,” Myka said.

“Okay what? What is okay?”

“Nothing,” Myka admitted.

“Okay.” And Helena’s mouth moved a little—not a smile, but something like the beginning of one.

Myka didn’t smile either, but she felt her jaw soften, her teeth unclench. “Okay what? What’s okay?”

Helena nodded. “Nothing,” she said.

“Neither of us is good at letting go,” Myka said. She did not have to add: of grudges. Or of each other.

Helena said, “I know,” and she did not have to add anything either.

Myka had tried not to anticipate this moment—because it was never going to happen. Never, never, never. But she had, of course. Anticipated. Wished. Dreamed, literally dreamed about it, then awakened to loss, a dissolve of desire that would never be satisfied.

Now, desire dissolved into satiety, rich and soft, as they neared each other, as their mouths met and their bodies pressed and their hands grasped and they did not let go.

Words of love—even the very word “love”—might have occurred to some people in such a moment, but all Myka could think to say, as they looked at each other in the wake of that world-beginning kiss, was “Thank you.”

And so grudges alchemized to gratitude.

TBC

[osakaso5]

Spirit Kaleidoscope: Empty Absolution

Chapter 5 - Dinner Times

Chapter Index

-----the evil god. Th----ke is going to----- calamity on the village.

-----the evil god's curse. -----frightening-----snake mons-----.

You're all----- deceived-----.

Chase him out!-----out! This serpent----- out!

-----sama.

-----i-sama. Shi-----sama, I'm-----ry.

If I hadn't----- this would never have-----.

If only I'd -----.

Phantom Grotto

???: ........ ...I'm in the cavern... So... I was sleeping...

???: ...It feels like I had a dream...

Sizzle... Crackle crackle...

???: ...The smell of roasted meat... It's coming from outside...

Thump..!

???: Ah, Shisei-san! Great, you're awake. Dinner is ready, so I was just about to wake you.

???: It's time to eat. Come out of the cave.

Shisei: ...Sana. You're here.

???: I am here, too. I caught this giant of a boar in the woods outside Hikagemachi, and took out all the good parts.

Sana: ...Do you not have any other meat, Azuma-san? Even if you don't, I can get by on mushrooms, fruits, and nuts...

Azuma: What? You look mighty unhappy with the feast I prepared. It's not as if the meat came from the very beast possessing you.

Sana: Of course I'm displeased! You're so completely lacking in delicacy!

Azuma: Delicacy..? What type of  delicacy are we talking about?

Shisei: ...Fufu. You're energetic as always.

Azuma: Shisei, hurry on over. We're always borrowing this place for gatherings, so I brought you a small gift.

Shisei: This forest doesn't belong to me. I've just settled down in here.

???: Only you think that, Shisei. This place is full of your essence. Neither yokai nor beasts dare come close to it.

Sana: Huh! Hokuto-san, when did you..?

Hokuto: I just arrived. ...Here. I brought bamboo shoots. A gift from me, as well.

Shisei: So you came too, Hokuto. Now everyone is here.

Hokuto: ...Anyway, Shisei. You look awfully pale again. I'm guessing you don't even eat properly unless we're around.

Shisei: Ah... Come to think of it... Have I eaten at all..? I'm not sure...

Hokuto: How do you not know anything about yourself?

Sana: Now now, you two... In any case, these bamboo shoots look splendid. Where did you get them?

Hokuto: I saw them at the market as I was leaving Hikagemachi. I'd just come into a bit of money, you see.

Azuma: Not through any honest means, I'd wager.

Hokuto: Maybe, maybe not. Sana. Roast these up into an edible state, will you?

Sana: Leave it to me! Cut them up... line them up on the hot stone... There, that's good.

Sana: Here they go! 

Sizzle..!

Azuma: Ooh. Your fire handling's a real sight to behold, as always.

Sana: Ehehe.

Shisei: Oh. I was under the impression that you had only recently been possessed by your beast... But you seems used to controlling fire.

Sana: It wasn't recently... It's been about 50 years since I came here...

Azuma: 50 years is a blink of an eye to Shisei. He's much older than any of us.

Azuma: He was possessed so long ago that he doesn't even remember it.

Shisei: The rest of you will end up the same way, I'm sure.

Shisei: When you ceased to be human... Why you're here... It'll all fade away.

Shisei: No matter how hard you try to remember... It's like the empty dream of  a butterfly. Even if you have no need to  remember...

Sana, Azuma, & Hokuto: ........

Hokuto: Hey, Shisei. Are you ever gonna leave this grotto?

Shisei: Leave..? This is all very sudden.

Hokuto: No, it's not. I've been asking that for ages.

Sana: Shisei-san, you've lived here in isolation for a long time, haven't you? Before we were even born... All alone...

Sana: Almost like you're punishing yourself...

Shisei: ...Punishing... That might be it...

Azuma: ...Does it have something to do with the fact that people used to call you an evil god?

Azuma: They used to treat you like a god, but you forgot an important promise... At least, that's what you told us.

Shisei: Oh. I'm surprised you remember. I don't even remember what the promise was now...

Hokuto: Hah. Evil gods, punishments. What a bunch of nonsense. Open your eyes already, Shisei!

Hokuto: I don't know what kind of promise you broke to be called evil. But what point is there in atoning for a sin you don't remember?

Hokuto: Secluding yourself in this grotto for centuries, millennia... You can't even catch fish here, let alone purify your soul.

Shisei: ...Fufu. You're so pleasant, Hokuto.

Hokuto: This isn't funny!

Shisei: But, you know... I think I probably wanted to keep that promise. Even if I don't remember...

Sana, Azuma, & Hokuto: ........

Sana: ...Shisei-san. Would it ease your mind if you remembered if what your sin was?

Sana: There seems to be a way for you to remember. If we use the power of Ungaikyo's kaleidoscope, you'll be able to see your crime..!

Shisei: Ungaikyo's..?

Hokuto: Hey... You weren't supposed to reveal that...

Sana: Ah..!

Azuma: Why'd you tell him that? We were supposed to get it for him in secret.

Sana: I-I'm sorry..! But...

Shisei: ...You were planning to do that..? But, Ungaikyo is...

Hokuto: We know. Ungaikyo keeps his distance from everyone, and nobody really knows what goes on in his head. He's a mysterious yokai.

Hokuto: We'll heed your warnings. Naturally, we won't do anything that would cause strife among the yokai, either.

Sana: Exactly, Shisei-san! You have nothing to worry about.

Shisei: ........

Shisei: I appreciate the sentiment... But there's no need for you to steal the kaleidoscope. It won't change anything...

Hokuto: Say what you will, we've already made our decision.

Shisei: Hokuto...

Sana: We can't just leave you in this state..! ...You're always so cold when you sleep in the cave that even though I know you're still alive, you look like you're...

Sana: ...Please! You may consider this a selfish demand, but just... Give the kaleidoscope a try.

Shisei: Sana... But...

Azuma: There's no harm in trying it.

Azuma: And if it works, you might even remember that promise of yours and whatnot.

Azuma: Might even be that you never committed any sin at all.

Sana: Exactly! I can't see someone as gentle as you committing a horrible sin.

Sana: Maybe... Maybe it was all just a misunderstanding..!

Shisei: .......

Shisei: ...Sigh... Very well...

Sana: Shisei-san! Does this mean..?

Shisei: ...Even if I tried to stop you, I doubt you'd listen. As long as you promise not to go overboard with this...

Sana: Of course!

Hokuto: Don't worry. I'll use a slight of hand so skillful that Ungaikyo won't even notice the kaleidoscope is gone.

Azuma: Don't you mean fraud?

Hokuto: Fraud is a perfectly valid technique, so long as you don't get caught.

Azuma: Good grief... You boast about being an intellectual from a teachers college, but your deeds are of an outlaw.

Hokuto: Hmph. Gambling requires more brain than anything else... ...Hey! The meat's burning!

Sana: ...Huh? Aagh! You're right..! I'm so sorry..!

Azuma: That much is nothing to worry about. It'll turn out fine with the right seasoning. Like this, salt and pepper...

Azuma: Just like Momma used to make!

Hokuto: ...You're pulling out one spice after another. What's up with that pouch?

Azuma: Never mind that, it's time to dig in! Come on, you need to eat while it's hot too, Shisei.

Sana: Let's eat, Shisei-san. Wait just a little longer for the kaleidoscope..!

Shisei: .......

Katanashu Station - Dining Hall

Momiji: Wild herb soba... More noodles...

Momiji: ....... Time to eat.

Slurp...

Momiji: ...It's quiet. Nobody's here except me and the shikigami, even though it's dinner time.

Momiji: Looks like they're not in the habit of social dining around here. That’s just perfect for someone like me. ...The yokai of Hikagemachi are a little too lively.

Momiji: Especially the ramen seller...

- - - -

Kyubi-no-Kitsune: Fufu. Don't be so sure. Maybe you've wandered in here at some point in the past?

- - - -

Momiji: ....... I wonder if that's actually the case...

Momiji: It's hard to believe... But not impossible... So many things here feel strangely familiar.

Momiji: Besides... Most would find it hard to believe that yokai exist, but... I had already accepted that as fact, deep down...

Momiji: If that's not just a coincidence... Then maybe it has something to do with what I lost as a child...

...Clatter!

Momiji: ...Crap. My chopsticks...

Momiji: .......

Momiji: I'm letting my guard down. Now's not the time to be distracted by nonsense.

Momiji: I must fulfill the duty I was given, for myself and my family.

Momiji: Even if being a katanashu is a pointless job...

- - - -

Momiji's Grandfather: ...Fuuka. Take that sword to use in your katanashu mission.

Momiji: This blade... It's been passed down from one head of the family to the other for generations... Why would you give me this..?

Momiji's Grandfather: It's the protector of our family. The katanashu are very unlikely to get into any danger, but it's still a world of nonhumans. You'll need protection.

Momiji's Grandfather: Listen, Fuuka. You have two years. Only two years of experience as a katanashu, until we can move you back to an administrative position in the capital.

Momiji: ...I've told you many times that that's not necessary. I'll fulfill my duties using my own skill.

Momiji: Until I stand at the top of this country.

Momiji's Grandfather: Hahaha. Fair and square... Like a real warrior, eh? You really are naive.

Momiji's Grandfather: A soldier has to know more than just how to swing a sword. Samurai honor codes are a relic of the past. Live wisely, or you're done for.

Momiji's Grandfather: Fuuka. You're the eldest son of the Tachibana family. That means your body is not yours to waste. Do you understand?

Momiji: Yes.

Momiji's Grandfather: Then you know what you must do. Don't worry. I'll continue to lay down the path you need to walk.

- - - -

Momiji: .......

Momiji: ...I'm not unhappy. I was born to an important family, born to live at the top.

Momiji: It's a duty I must put my life on the line for.

Momiji: Even if I still don't know what it is to live wisely...

Momiji: ....... Thank you for the meal.

To be continued...