#orisinil by summer

[summer-in-florence]

Dungeon house chores

Original Story // G-rated "Dungeon Meshi" OC-cule: Daylily Mills, Urakku, Iris, Chiquita - Urakku/Raku belongs to Ray Iris belongs to Aya Chiquita belongs to Mangga Disclaimer: Dungeon Meshi world is owned by Ryoko Kui. I am only taking inspiration from their worldbuilding to create my OC.

Even for the average tall-man, cleaning this whole tavern by themselves would have been too much of a task to complete. Everyone knows that the tapbars and drinkeries in floor three are spacious to make up for its dubiousness. Like an omen for the wandering, 'this will be the last time you lot can ever hound in round tables with your peers before you descend.' Third floor taverns are questionable, but roomy, and the morbid acceptance of demise makes them a constant full-house. Piles and piles of dishes stack, rubbish and dirtied stools, benches topsied and turvied across the room. People come and go to leave their stains with the thought that it's futile to ever fully clean their stop - a popular notion especially amongst tall-men.

But this one's owned by a lone half-foot girl. The tavern on the fifth junction after the entrance, slotted in between two alcoves of deteriorating stone walls, is a tavern owned and maintained by a half-foot girl, standing her tallest only up to most of her customer's waist. And she makes do, all the work and all the keeping. Herself, putting men to shame with her nimble feet and capable hands.

Of course, sometimes, friends would come to help.

"Raku, I'm standing six feet away from you and I can still see that you missed a spot!" Daylily taps her feet. She's standing on the counter to mop the grimy surface down - it's easier this way. She shouts, "mop properly!"

Raku groans. They lean their whole weight on the stick, cheek squished against the wood. A sleeping Chiquita resting on their shoulder, for some reason she's able to not fall.

"Lilyyy... come on I just got back from a job. And I've did that spot already! Twice!"

"Someone puked there, okay. I want that exact tile to be squeaky before opening tomorrow." Daylily returns to her own stuff to be done. Her thick wooden shoes clip-clops upon the counter as she runs topside, wet mop sloshing together with her.

"Okay, very fair. It's just you get obsessive over this stuff, Lils," Raku says, shrugging. Their reluctance is honestly understandable, but they had promised her help before dipping out on their mission weeks ago.

Iris emerges from the pantry. "Well, Lily has a reputation to uphold. Not that easy keeping food mold-free around here," she snorts, and Daylily snorts in return. With those ears of her, of course she had been eavesdropping.

But Iris is diligent, when Raku isn't. She offers to wipe the tables for her, so Daylily lets her take over. To that, the ogre afar gestures at them, protesting at the favouritism full on display.

"And out of all the floors, you chose this one to set up shop?"

Lily snarls. "Don't push it, Raku..."

They're right though. To a certain degree. Daylily isn't that sour to not see the logic behind Raku's question, and with being friends for a while, she knows that it was a genuine question from them, however scathing it may come off like.

Daylily shrugs. She hops down the counter and saunters where Raku is struggling. Her little hands grab around the stick's hilt. "It is what it is."

Being born as a half-foot means inheriting your father's father's father's career prospects. It's generational, trickling down into every half-foot offspring due to genetic makeup. The common ones stay home, exclusively communing with their own, building a life from where their staple food grow and nowhere else; and the ones with hubris end up only as tools for the average dungeoning parties.

They're spry and fastidious, see. A persnickety nature, born down from the wisest of ancestors, make them great assets in helping others eluding danger. Guides, locketpickers, chestopeners.

Daylily, however, is a brazen girl with too much hubris and lack of interest in acting as a guide. She ran away from her village at thirteen, her heart set on the living the high life away from home, wanting to carve out herself into the world. And yet the high life was never meant for her. As halflings were unfavourable by the crowd for their biology - small, too small, she never got close to the celebrity spotlight, her dream.

She had too much pride to return homestead. On her fourteenth, she succumbed into her lineage. Daylily joined a party as a lockpicker, as many of her kin does. She was never really good at it. Two of her party members died twice because she couldn't care less about the dungeon. That's when she quitted, and set her tavern right where she ditched her old party; here, in floor three.

Then time flew, and it was three years having her tavern with all the good and the bad. She wasn't interested in dungeoning, but she was still a halfling with her agility and meticulousness. That was enough to run a business with, and Daylily didn't really mind the house chores it needed. After maturing, growing up alone, menial work are just as natural to her like chestopening and lockpicking.

But quite really. What kind of half-foot does that? She fled her village to become a star, and ended up a servant despite it being for her own cause. Sometimes it keeps her up at night, knowing she's an odd one out. Insecurity bears hardship. Hence, business slowed as well, that was if it had never been slow in the first place.

It sat in between alcoves, hidden behind walls of moss and empty undead shells guarding the entrance. Nobody came for days on end. She had no money to spare her life with. She was ready to go home.

Until the day the guarding undead shells clatter outside her bar, and another halfling rests atop its corpses with a fruit in their mouth.

Another halfling, another brazen halfling.

Daylily took Chiquita one day in as the way older sisters shelter young children, sopping under the rain. The other halfling was smaller, with a sweet blonde hair that fuzzed and matted without care. Lily couldn't stand knowing her kin running around unkempt, and it was like adopting a fierce little imp that wanted to do nothing but have her zoomies in the dungeon corridors. When Chiquita got used to her, Lily learned.

Learned that they could be so similar and yet so different in their becoming. Chiquita loves the dungeon. Chiquita loves venturing. Chiquita can never be pinned down once she's in her zone. She is so much more of a halfling than Daylily had ever been. Chiquita frequently left the bar without telling, goddesses knew where she got off to. The younger one was always, always away.

But Chiquita returns with customers for her. Fetching people from from each and every floor for Daylily to serve, for her tavern to work. Parties of tall-men, dwarves, elves, and ogres alike - they swarmed Lily's humble bar hidden by the alcoves, solely from the word of one little halfling whose presence was more fleeting than a feather. Customers visited, liked the drink, liked Lily's service, left, then returned for seconds.

Along came Iris. Her eastern dishes and herself wanting to survive with it as she trudges this foreign continent's eccentricities. One lone girl became two, even with their own respective things. But admittedly, it was nice having someone else to talk to when Chiquita fled. Daylily never really had anyone to talk to before them.

Then, Raku. Big, hulking Raku. With their sharp teeth, broken ogre horn, and the colouring of an angered sunset, much alike the temper that Raku had still fostered. They had stumbled to her doors, listening to the adventurer gossips around the floors talking about a place to drink and rest. Raku wanted to rest, and Daylily took them in, the way she took Chiquita and Iris in.

And that was the day that she broke free from her genetic heirlooms; that was the day Daylily knew she carved her solitary path. In this hidden tavern behind the alcoves.

Soon, she is nineteen with a reputation: 'good bar in the corner and the serving girl is cute enough if you're into the young-looking ones.' That, too, is an inherited career-prospect - one she tolerates just enough. And in turn, she allows her friends to stay.

Now, she cranes her neck up and smiles.

"Raku, drink as much as you want tomorrow. It's on the house." Daylily's free hand finds the ogre's thigh, pushing them away from the particular tile.

Nineteen, and a tavern owner, and not-that-awful of a friend. Even Iris giggles to how Raku gasps afterwards. Their silly little 'yippee!' echo throughout the room. They wake Chiquita up from her sleep then, and the bar gets livelier than a full-house.

"Hmm, deficit's gonna be high this week too it seems," Iris teases. "Raku, you have the most debt on Lily's tab too."

Right, but honestly, all the three of them are indebted with, are with these chores.

[ransyahnote-blog]

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[summer-in-florence]

Choices

Dungeon Meshi OC: Daylily Mills x Oakwell Ferns (mine) Side characters written all belong to WAREG

When all comes down to it, people have two choices. Yes, or no. Alternatives are foreign concepts made by people with too much pride—sadly myself too have been—and as you repeat enough cycles around the sun, even those with too much hubris will eventually learn that this world is made out of compromise.

Isn't it funny? That I spent years trying to run and still get caught midway? And in the form of someone I don't despise, someone I had buried incomplete hatchets of.

Oak sits in the far corner of my tavern. He's not alone, there's a kobold with him that's probably his guide through the terrain. He's enjoying his meal that Iris made, in his fancy clothes from fancy imported textile, shiny hydrophobic leather boots that's far more useful worn at sea than these caverns. He looks out of place.

The only half-foots around these areas of the dungeon are the scrawny guides and young trafficked lures. While him and his kobold exudes the opposite vibe, him the master and kobold the servant; there aren't many half-foots that are masters in general. Mickbell and Kuro, was it, would fare the same as he does and his companion, but the former two hail to another leader of their own—and are obviously not as lavishly dressed as Oak Fernbys and his roan-coloured companion.

He smiles and waves at me occassionally. I ignore him. I continue to ignore him.

"Hey, Lily? You're going to crack that mug if you keep wiping it like that." Iris' face comes into periphery. She tries to steal the glass from my hands.

"My bad," I say, too strained to sound apologetic. "Raku, take over cleaning these for me."

Thank Raku and their casual obedience, they immediately move back into the counters and do as I wanted them. All while I find something to distract myself, like the cashier, so his piercing eyes won't bother me for the next hour or so. I still have a business to run. I simply can't let the semantics of Oak's presence disturb me.

That, only lasts for ten minutes. Because Raku notices Oak staring at me, and knowing Raku, they won't zip it. "Am I crazy or is that guy staring at you?"

"You know what? I think he does," Iris pitches in. "Lily, you know that guy?"

Headaches, swirling. "Which guy." My eyes haven't left the bag of coins I'm counting.

"Half-foot, actually really tall for a half-foot. As tall as that Mr. Tims guy that you said is running the union. Locs for hair... I think it's tied to the back? Can't see it from here."

"An exotic red-fur kobold with him, though I'm not sure if they're with him or just sitting on the same table."

I sigh. These two... they're allowed to gossip on the job, but I'd prefer them talking discreetly. Is subtlety a rare skill in ogres? Oak is still a half-foot. He's sure to hear them, these two hulking ogres whispering to me over the cashier with their normal inside voice.

"He is. Don't pay him any attention." Iris gets a pinch to her elven ears. "Get back to work, please."

"So you do know him!"

"Excuse me." Oh, just great. I can tell Oak's voice from a mile. Even now without me looking, I know he's approaching the cashier.

Iris receives him, smile in her voice and a sing-song cheer, saying, "yes, how can we help you, Sir?"

"I'll get the bill, but is it possible for my party to rest here for a while? My kobold friend needs to lay down, so I was wondering if there's a room available for the night."

Raku leaves the station, whistling tunes and away from the awkward pause left hanging in the air. I think they're fetching Oak's finished plates from the corner. I didn't ask them to, but it's better than have their nose in the space when I don't need it. I can handle situations by myself. And sometimes, Raku loves butting in.

Iris purses her lips, because she can't give any say about the state of our rooms' availability. Any rooming orders must go through me, the owner. Out from the corner of my eyes I can see her going back and forth from tentatively trying to ask me, to Oak smiling knowingly across the booth, to Oak's kobold partner afar.

Chiquita isn't home, so there's a spare room open for Oak to rest himself. But I don't think that's what he's getting on. I don't think it's all that simple, it's Oak.

I look down. At him. Pissed. "I charge triple for each rooms."

"Lily!" Iris squeaks.

"No problem. But I was hoping that it includes a conversation with the owner." His grin is sly. He may come off unorthodox for a half-foot, but he's still one to his core.

Sly, cunning, cheat.

"You're welcome to wait until after hours," then, I tug on Iris' apron, defeatedly. "Iris, can you help me show the hound his lodging?"

Gold coins jingle on the counter. He spends it as easily as kicking rocks. If my senses ever deceives me, his own behaviour is unmistakable. And when he touches my hand in between, he knows that I understand what his arrival means.

-

Team meeting. Iris, Raku, and Rufus who had just returned from delivering to the orcs, huddling together in the pantry because I said so. Their larger bodies cover the threshold so that no sound may leave the tight space. It’s convenient, but it also means that I only have several minutes to explain the situation before suffocating from the lack of air. “I do not want any misunderstanding while that guy is here, okay?”

Raku bumps their head on the ceiling, groaning.

“Who are we talking about?”

Rufus groans too. The back of his head slapped by Raku and their giant palms. They murmur, “the guy in red, bro! Get on with it!”

“Shit, I just got back! You don’t have to hit me like that!”

Iris pinches both of the boys’ tummies. “Pipe down, you two! Let Lily speak!”

“Thank you.” Now that the two have settled down, I clear my throat. On normal days, I wouldn’t have ever told them, but his appearance in this island itself is abnormal to its extent, let alone here out of all places. I begin, “that man in red there, his name is Oakwell Ferns. You three should refer to him as Ferns—by half-foot honorific custom. Even if I call him Oak, you three are not privy to calling him Oak, okay?”

Rufus tilts his head. “And that means what, exactly?”

“He’s, um,” how do I even say this. How do I even say this without freaking them out, exactly. I raise up a finger, square to the front of my lips, as my other hand waves to get the three’s attention. “Oak is my… fiancé.”

The next minute is spent with falling boxes and dustbunnies flying up the air. Because of course, these three of my friends are not to be trusted with such information without coughing up a storm. They bump and hit each other whilst their heads struggle to stay inside the small storage. And then they hack their lungs out from inhaling cobwebs, and need to take a small water break before I continue.

“If you three are done, yes he is my fiancé. I’m trying to tell you the whole story here.”

Iris protests, “but! But I thought we’re sharing crushes on Kabru!”

Rufus chokes.

“I’m sorry?” 

Before I know it, I’m already blushing. The warmth seeps upon my face and making this tight space a little more airless. “It’s… the same situation. I need refreshments too, you know? Same reason why I collect Himmel’s pictures from Chiquita.” 

“But you sound so serious about him…”

I mean I guess I understand why Iris would be upset about it. Rolling the words on my tongue a little bit, it does sound like this whole bond we have from admiring the same man was made up, like it was a lie I forged just to get closer to her, as sisters. Regrettably, I should have told her about this sooner.

I take her soft, manicured hands, caressing the knuckles in reassurance. “Trust me, I would be serious about him if I’m not haunted by this Oak situation. Just as you would.”

“Yeah, you’re right, Lily. I trust you.”

“Am I the only one that’s losing the plot here?” Followed by a grunt; Raku elbows him by the gut.

I clear my throat again. “Anyways. Oak and I got engaged by our parents back in Kahka Brud, right before I ran away to this island. You guys know the story. I tried to become a singer here, then failed, then found the dungeon and here I am.” It’s hard to not shrug telling a story like this. I always prefer to keep private lives private, as it would burden people with the knowledge. “But I was only able to run away because I made a deal with Oakwell Ferns, my fiancé.”

Their first noise from the minute is all but a sympathetic croon. Raku mumbles, “yikes, Lils.”

“Yeah, yikes. You see, Oak is a shipman, so he’s rarely on-land anyway.” Details like how a half-foot like him was even able to become a shipman is best left behind for their own thoughts—in all honesty, I do have every sense of respect and awe for that fact about him itself. I sit criss-cross atop of a crate. “So I told him if he lets me leave, I’ll go back to him when the time is right.”

The realisation dawns on the three. First excited, now staring at me with giant watery eyes like kicked-up puppies on the side of the road. Their sunken faces make me feel just as terrible as the reality is.

I know the things they might be thinking. That I’ve given them a home. That I’ve given them a purpose. A place to stay. Things to do. An atonement for their past. ‘What about Chiquita? She’s not here to hear the news’ they might throw at me, and they would be correct. ‘You’re just going to leave this life behind?’

I’m fairly mature now for a half-foot. I grew up exponentially faster than Raku, Iris, and Rufus had, because not only that I, by age, are several years older than them, I was also groomed into surviving for myself.

I know, very intimately, that when all comes down to it, life only gives you choices spanning around yeses and nos. And they might not be able to savour either sensibilities yet, but they will come to learn. Myself, in particular, I’m just happy to have spent time with them. It’s a comfort that I want them to understand too.

But perhaps not now. Not yet. Chiquita isn’t home and she should be when it comes.

Reaching up, I try to pat their giant heads. “This isn’t the ‘right time’, if that’s what you guys are worried about. He’s just here to remind me. Oak is still going to be really busy, honestly. There’s no shortage of merchants to assist with exporting goods across the ocean any time soon.”

“Lily!”

Three messes of hair assault me in an instant. I don’t know how they did it, but somehow they all managed to hug me. Folding limbs and bruising sides just to nuzzle on this short half-foot sitting on a low stack of crates on the floor.

“Ah! Please! That’s why, I want you guys to let me handle things with him! Ah, get off!”

-

It’s not strange for me to bring him a pint of beer—in the standard half-foot serving, but big enough to make a lightweight go tipsy. This brings back memories, sort of. I used to serve him his drinks too back then, when I was younger.

What is definitely strange about this is the backdrop of it all. Kahka Brud is a relatively big place, with its townscape bright and illuminated by the reflections of its coastal perimeter. Back then, there would be stars when I brought him his liquor, and on the bottom of our sandals would be reminiscent with sands from a long day by the sea. Dry sandy hair wafting on the warm pelagic breeze.

This tavern is nothing like that.

Dark, and cold, mouldy by the corners. There isn’t any light here if not for Iris’ spells. When I first got this quarter, I was making do with makeshift candelabras from pieces of metal ingots dropped by passing miner dwarfs. It’s quiet here, and there isn’t a sense of safety like being on the surface gives you. It’s quiet, and there are monsters lurking somewhere.

The fact that I still get into this routine with him even now is tugging on my heartstrings. Unnecessary sentiments.

“So, is that a new partner?”

Oak laughs. “Who? Alpine? No, he’s a friend I met from the west. He said he’s willing to be my guide here, so we came together.”

“Hmm. Figures.” I try to drown myself in the beer—impossible, because he knows that I’m just as a heavy drinker as he is. All these possible solutions and not enough doors.

He gulps his own pint as well. From the eavesdroppers’, it’d look like we’re sharing a moment. However I can’t even ascertain what it is that we share in common nowadays. I haven’t seen him for so long, and he’s still carrying the load of that silly little lie I told him years ago, while I’ve looked forward too far to be told that I haven’t moved on.

Have I? I would be lying if I stopped expecting it. Somewhere along the way I dug up holes to leave old possessions behind, but his hand stuck out from the uneven mud. I just tried to forget it, but never fully ready to bury it down.

Oak shuffles in his seat, reclining just a little deeper for him to get comfier. It’s a trait I still recognise from him; all that height gave him a bad back. He breathes better as he’s settled. “What? You know I don’t like breaking promises.”

And I do? I can only glance at him for that comment. “I never asked you to hold it this long. You’re free to do whatever, honestly.”

“Well, I want to. I still kept your mother’s heirloom ring. That’s how I tracked you, by the way, thanks to my friend Alpine upstairs.” Another swing on the beer. He nearly finished the whole glass. His voice drops, saying, “just ‘whatever’ isn’t going to work on me, Daylily.”

“Oh, please. You’re saying like there aren’t any other youth out there. I know what mariners are known for, hello, my useless father was one.”

I roll my eyes at him, then clink my glass with his. Really, he makes me nervous when he gets serious, so I try to lighten the mood. It really was meant to be a sombre joke. Oak, however, isn’t having it.

He frowns, only for a split second, just to reprimand me to not drive the conversation that way. Then he starts again, “nice place you have here. I thought you wanted to be in a troupe?”

“C’est la vie,” I shrug. “That plan backfired so I tried building a career from odd jobs. The dungeon in this floor is pretty docile, so I tried doing what I could. Half-foot girls are better appreciated as beer maids than performers.”

“What’s so different from Kahka Brud then?” Or in other words, ‘you can just do this at home if this is what you end up being.’ Which is logical. Oak is always logical.

I pull my legs up and hug them, curling into a ball. A ball of a not-quite-drunk halfling girl, desperately trying to appeal to someone who wouldn’t get it.

“Difference is I get to make my own choices here.”

My own place, my own path. My own chosen people. My own family.

Is it so bad for one to want freedom like that? I want to tell him, ‘you live in the sea, you can’t even begin to fathom how life is like on land.’ Society and all of its unwritten rules, aren’t we all just running from it? Him, to the oceans, and me, underground. We both chose things we wanted.

“You’ll make more doing this in Kahka Brud.”

Then the tears just… run. Bursting out of its seams. I can’t stop it. I reach across the table and grab him by his fancy woollen shirt, water dripping into its fabric, drawing dark patches of me on his stomach. “I don’t care about money! I have people to shelter now, okay? I have sisters, and siblings, and there are people that depend on this place to continue their journey and that’s all I want! It’s something that I want!

“If, if you’re going to berate me, on how I’m an avoidant liar, fine,” my sobs overtake the air. “But don’t compare this place to Kahka Brud. There was a reason I ran away, Oakwell, I’m trying to run away. Why do you keep catching up? Why does this stupid ‘Kahka Brud‘ keep catching up?”

Oakwell lets me soak his shirt, pulling me into his lap while I ride the waves of grief that materialises in the form of his face. He pats my back, not unlike how a big brother would console his baby sister. It’s comforting. I’ve grown too used to being the responsible one here that such simple solace makes me yield.

See, I never hated him. I have never in my life resented Oakwell Ferns. Through the matchmaking, through the engagement, he’s simply just a victim of the same circumstance. One that because of chances, got off more easily than I did. We had a bond to share because of that.

It was always more to our parents. Oakwell was never home, so I had to deal with this soon-to-be joint family’s wiles more than he did. They were the ones who decided everything, blindsiding the both of us with news too big to process for two youth that just started having a life.

I called him unfair for making me the punching bag of this relationship, and he said I could ask him anything to make us even.

“Still calling off the thing?” Oak cackles to the state that I am now. Foetal on his lap, drenching his clothes into one giant puddle. I hit him weakly.

“It’s never off,” I sob, sitting up to gaze at the man. “I just don’t want to settle down with what I don’t like.”

He wipes my face with his thumb, and I instinctively lean into it. “Something tells me you don’t like me enough yet. Who is this ‘Kabru’ guy I heard?”

Wonder is, laughing is easy now. I tell him, “nobody. Your competition is not him.” Gesturing to the supposedly empty tavern, I know the lot are listening in to our conversation. “It’s actually those guys.”

-

“Say bye to Mr. Ferns, guys.” I wave at him, and the gesture is followed by Chiquita who stands next to me—she just got home, so she’s plenty confused. Iris offers the leaving men her eastern sensibilities, and the two others just stand to accompany me.

Oak shouts, “I’ll visit again next year!”

“Please don’t!” And the both of us laugh.

The tavern is closed for the day because I can’t handle it, outbursts like yesterday demands from me a proper sleep before I can continue running this whole thing.

Once we’re back inside, it’s Rufus’ turn to talk. “You’re engaged engaged to him, huh, boss.”

“Huh? So why aren’t you married, Lily?” Chiquita yelps.

I tell her, “just made a choice. That’s all.”

[summer-in-florence]

Peel

(OC) Umezono no Motoharu & Yūdaiki Slight dead dove. Rated T. by Summer in Florence

Motoharu isn't sure when was the last time he'd seen the earth like how it should be for humans, Motoharu isn't even sure if he belongs to the humans — it's always just an urge, one simple instrusive thought driven by longing. He doesn't know how many years, or centuries, that he had spent occupying this old castle. Seasons come and go while Motoharu watches from the peaks of his master's mountaintops. The world as he knows today, is none but a world that lack resemblance of him; his kind, and Motoharu is beginning to lose it too all by himself.

Onis and smaller imps litter his master's retinue of lowly servants. His master prefers it that way, creatures of a higher standing are more likely to grouse against him. He doesn't favour disobedience. Motoharu knows it too personally.

His master isn't one like him himself, though most of the times Motoharu fails to pick apart where the difference lies. His master only shows his fangs, claws, his fur-lined monstrosity, when he is at full anger — Motoharu remembers to count days since the last time his master was, and it's been 57 days ago. His abnormally looming height, and jading carmines, natural from his master's scalp; the only distinct nonhuman features of the owner of this castle, the owner of Motoharu's soul. Sometimes, when the certainty of his human origins fade, Motoharu ends his comparison by downplaying himself, muttering that perhaps he is just too short, too small, too weak.

He can peer into the empty, mossy ponds just outside by his master's courtyard, and watch how the ripples of its waters reflect the outlines of Motoharu's face. His face, also the everclouds, heavy in their respective places on the surface. After living in this realm of beasts and spirits, Motoharu came to understand that nothing is ever mundane.

Hence, Motoharu always thinks that the look that appears on the water might not even be his face, it could be someone else's, something else, living, eating from the brim of Motoharu's foolishly yearning heart for the truth of what he actually is. Like mists that vapored from it, he gradually loses his recognition of what he is over time. Leaving only the minuscule, timid conviction that he should've never been here in the first place.

So just, a weakling. A lost weakling, clutching on the hem of his master's haōri from time to time. Scared, nervous, but subservient to his master's wills. And if being one pleases him, the Motoharu that dulled with the clock doesn't mind it at all.

*

Yūdaiki is home. Motoharu bowed and kissed at his feet when he arrived. Alone as always, no company but a few oni that flocked behind him with their utmost admiration of a master so charismatic even in this realm of untamed monsters. He smiled at Motoharu, and Motoharu couldn't help but taste the abstract giddiness ebbing from himself for the wordless praise that his master bestowed him. He felt wanted. Appreciated.

If Yūdaiki is home, it means Motoharu's offered pleasantries to appease him. Bedservants such as him know better than to extend the master's patience. When Yūdaiki enters his antechambers, Motoharu is quick and nimble on his two feet, opening doors and preparing scented candles.

"No need," but his master says. Holding a palm up on the air. Motoharu freezes in his tracks, stops undressing himself.

His obi is intact; a splash of purple, like the violets he can't remember where it blooms. His master loves it when Motoharu is lavish. Motoharu tugs lightly on it. "But... my lord."

"I said no need. No sex."

Puzzled, Motoharu stands idle in the middle of the rooms. His hands fall to the sides of him, watching Yūdaiki trespass the space with strides so sure as if he did not just ask an odd request to his child bedservant. Motoharu lives and dies to please his master; what should he do when the master refuses it? He begins to panic, just a bit, scared that Yūdaiki might lose his temper again if he dares to display ineptitude.

The giant master settles on the porch, ignoring the frozen child in his bedroom. Movements languid, slow, relaxed — this isn't the Yūdaiki Motoharu was accustomed to. The Yūdaiki he knows is a feral tiger, all rage and wild tempers; blazing turmoils marked by the scratch of his claws, seething hatred abundant and aflow from his fangs.

This Yūdaiki, seems more of a cat.

Just after a yawn, his master calls. He passes Motoharu a ripened mikan from the insides of his yukata; to which Motoharu catches with ease, surprising himself of the dexterity that comes natural with this motion. "What are you doing just standing there? Come here, Umezono."

Umezono. A name, a human name? For him? Motoharu baulks his eyes wide open.

Motoharu comes to sit in Yūdaiki's lap, and the master purrs, like satisfaction. He envelopes the child with all of him, all of his giant arms, chin atop of Motoharu's small head. "My lord..." Motoharu whines meekly.

He isn't used to this version of his master. Cuddly and gentle, wrapping him in his radiant warmth while guiding both of his hands to peel fruits that he brought. Motoharu burns a shade of carmine, as carmine as Yūdaiki's hair. His master must've felt it too, pulling Motoharu closer into his chest.

The ginkgo tree outside of their porch sways with the winds of sobriety. Its golden leaves fall, the piles of it blown to who knows where it will take them. Motoharu fixates on the sight, distracting himself to keep up composure for his master.

"You have to learn how to peel fruits too, Umezono," Yūdaiki says, bringing Motoharu's attention back to him. His long, sharp nails biting into the flesh of the tangerine, struggling to remove its skin. "Peel. Go on." He feigns his defeat against the fruit, pushing it deeper into Motoharu's hands.

"Ah, of course, my lord, yes, yes." But he does know how to peel fruit, as surprising as it was for himself too.

Ritualistic. Rubbing the mikan with both of his hands, piercing the tops with his thumb, and pull, pull until it surrenders. Layers skinned from its body, revealing its fat meat and gushing juices that flow to Motoharu's wrist. He doesn't remember how, or perhaps why did he know the steps. He just... does. Muscle memory, maybe of a past that escaped him. Motoharu becomes somber.

Plucking one appendage, feeding it to his master's mouth above him, feeling his tongue lick the wetness on his arm. He becomes somber, lost in thought of fuzzy, cloudy, turbid images that he tries to conjure but fails each time. All he ends up thinking are the blown bits of the ginkgo tree.

'Umezono', satsuma mikan, wind that kisses good bye to each separate leaves of a golden tree. Human name. Human memories. But why is it on him, in him?

Yūdaiki's tongue flick on the side of his face, tasting salt from the tears that well-up and overflow. His master murmurs, "you can't leave, Umezono," forcing his kisses to the subservient, crying child in his hold, "this is your place now. Your people and the village, they've died a long time ago. I killed them, and the plague." Giant thumbs draw circles on Motoharu's calf and belly, as if begging him. Yūdaiki's lips steal the hiccuping sobs from Motoharu's chest. "Mine, Umezono, you will live to be mine."

'Umezono', satsuma mikan, and ginkgo trees dancing in the wind.

Images form, of a big house with people. Brunets, simple yukata, and chonmage that shrivels Motoharu's heart. People that looks like him, not onis nor imps. Not feral, monstrous tigers. Ginkgo trees planted in the backyard, and children playing fight on its piles. Baskets of tangerines.

Motoharu stutters. "A–ah, wuh—w, wah," unsure of the things that escapes his mouth. Sentences fail him, and Yūdaiki's tight arms prevents it to succeed.

"Shh, shush." Yūdaiki's hand on his eyes, closing his field of vision. "Soon you'll forget everything," he continues, whispering into Motoharu's ear. There are hands slithering to Motoharu's chest, holding down the jerks that rip from the child; of a pain so strong, whiplash from the amnesia that he did not know he was sick with.

The urges, convictions, intrusive thoughts were real after all. They weren't delusions. Motoharu shakes so violently with his tears that the mikan ends up bursting in his palms.

And then it subsides, gone in an instant. Like a flick. Fire that just gives up.

Motoharu rests so limply on his master's lap, dead weight totaled on Yūdaiki's chest. His tears still flow, but his eyes are closed, his breathing evened. If his master wants to move him a certain way, this is the most pliant Motoharu will ever get. No resistance.

Yūdaiki carries him inside, puts him on their bed — where Motoharu should have only been. He lives and dies as a bedservant. Confined as a bedservant. The sight of Motoharu sprawled weakly pleases his master. Yūdaiki climbs to the other side of his bed, watching the child sleep with a palm underneath his head. His giant hands pat Motoharu's body, an attempt to calm him.

When tears still flow, abundantly. Piled ginkgo leaves blown with the wind. Orange peel discarded below the wooden porch. Motoharu's memories escape him, again, and forever, until he loses it all.

Satsuma mikan, ginkgo trees.

He wakes up with no more of it.

[summer-in-florence]

Sapling

Lisieux (OC) Rated T By Summer in Florence

Two million lightyears after my escape, I gave birth to my six-thousandth child.

Sprouting strands of green decorate her small cranium, its size fitting on the size of my palm, and slightly smaller than the size of her father's. She sleeps on my bosom. Her tiny mouth latching upon the bare skin that feeds her, just like every other human child does. When I wake up in the night, the sight of her tethers me, and I would cradle her body in my arms while moving closer to her father's warmth at my side.

It took me five generations of offsprings to fill up the hole in my chest cavity. Even through the millions of lightyears that I had spent journeying across time, these very sense of parasitic loneliness kept me awake, yearning for something I failed to describe, and only did it grew the longer I tried to run away from it. It wasn't greed. It wasn't hunger, I was never famished. Yet I have not slept for so long that I began to suffocate on its gentle presence, seeping within my every waking thought. To the point that on the centre of my being crumbled an abyss so deep, death pooled there until it spreads.

My little child, Artemis, as I call this one, is a seed to empty soil.

She is a small tree, planted in the core of my gaping void. I smile if she cries, I kiss her fat when she tantrums. Sometimes I wonder about the grievances of such a tiny creature and the intensity of it, that she can't help but to wail and sob. I coo to her each time, taking her pain away; because I understand her, I understand how it feels to drown in sadness. And what torment it is to have to feel it without being able to say? Her being is so small, yet with a heart so big, tears never cease to overflow.

"There is a word from where I came from," I tell her father, "Aurteme, meaning sapling." One night, as she suckles to my human breast. Her father watches from across the room. He is occupied with his work.

He doesn't spare me more than a glance, no. But I can feel the underlying pride from his response, saying in his nonchalance, "is it the name you chose?" The sounds of his pen scribbling on paper echoing.

"You told me about your ancient goddess. I like the similarity between them, Artemis and Aurteme."

Her father hums. I miss his touch sometimes. Such a busy man, perfectly content in just watching. I smile at him.

Millions of lightyears removed from Ninthia, and all the sickness I carried with me throughout, finally I could feel no more of this remorse. They heal me, my small group of three. My own family, something which prior to this world were curious to me - and I did not understand, I couldn't. Lords in Ninthia took me as their Reverend Mother, yet I was merely a machine, a jewel mine for them to scavenge their needs and toss behind after. A Reverend Mother but never a family; and now I am simply a human's wife, a parent, an add to a pack that I was invited to live in. They make me radiate warmth.

Lucretius stands from his desk, the wood screeches as it meets the floor. He says to me, "she looks full already," beckoning to my child. "Don't push yourself."

He passes me to grab one of his books from the drawer. Something about his scent urges me to lay my head flat on his shoulder. I tuck my chest inside the robe he provided for me, holding Artemis closer as I absorb his presence.

"I don't really mind." There is an arm around my waist. He begins stroking, it bunches me with heat. My eyes try to catch his from below, but the awkwardness of this position prevents me from staring at his face full.

"You know you can't exert more than this."

I hum, mimicking the sounds that he made before. "But I want to," my sighs carry to his ear drums. "...It's us together, I want to give everything."

Lucretius pauses as I say it. I am just beginning to fear that I have said the wrong thing, but then he rests on my head, kissing the hair I grew there with so much breath flaring from his nose. Then he starts kissing me lower, and lower, until his lips find the salience on my cheek.

He whispers to me an 'okay' before coming back to his desk.

Artemis stirs awake, as if feeling the loss of her father's touch. Saliva stains on the side of her mouth and running down to her chin. I wipe it off. Her little hands beg for mine, and I give it to her, because what wouldn't I surrender for this sapling of mine.

A small tree born out of my womb, my soils. The pinch of her nose like the shapes of her father's, yet paired with my beady eyes, as Lucretius puts it.

Sometimes noticing the mixture of us in her brings me to tears, because I realised soon that this is how it should be. To be nurtured to fruition. I gave myself, and Lucretius, too. Then I delivered, something I was never privy of feeling back when I was just deemed as a machine - something taken from me, something I was told I was not made for.

Now with him, I am just a wife. Just a woman he mated with, and took the responsibility of caring for, and accepted the deeds that he's done. He sees me for all I am, and still treats me like I am more than just a mimicry, more than a machine. He doesn't cower when my past caught up to me, and he merely nods when I told him about the things that I am living with, I used to live with; the parasite, the journeys, the children. Humans are strange, I think. Their capabilities to tether themselves to what they think matters the most, eliminating what don't, and continuing to find good amidst all the rest, is astonishing. After all the weight I carried, he was quick to remove it from me.

'What has happened, happened,' Lucretius said, and I became what he saw in me. What he only saw. Removed, and reworked completely anew.

I see myself in his eyes and no longer sees the Reverend Mother; I peer into my child's giggles and laughter and no longer feel the pressure of gravity vying for me to return.

I feel belonged. And my body stops being aware of the pain that was supposed to be there; still, like a parasitic worm rotting inches of my insides. It takes me millions of lightyears as fugitive, and three thousand years as an apocalyptic wanderer, and six thousand children made from my body, and one sapling that grows from me, to be reborn. I look at them with warmth that I have never felt across the galaxies beyond, nor have I found it back in Ninthia. My chest cavity overflows as I gaze at my little sapling child, sleeping peacefully on it. No more of the pain, no more of the grieving.

[summer-in-florence]

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