Chapter 2 — Coming of age, a ceremony needed for emanc.i.p.ation .  Part 11

He resigned himself to his fate and crouched down after a while . Then, the two children climbed nervously onto his back .

“He’s so soft!” the girl said in admiration .

s.h.i.+ro slowly stood back up, taking care not to shock them again, and started walking slowly .

Both of them exclaimed loudly, borderline cheering and screaming at the same time .

Keeping a steady pace, s.h.i.+ro started walking faster .

Somehow it seemed that even he was starting to enjoy it .

I returned to the counter once again .

“…What is it?” I asked the bandana guy, who was grinning from ear to ear .

“No~thing really . I was just thinking that you also have a cute side after all . ”

“Shut up . ” I folded my arms and looked away .

His smile grew even bigger as he observed my reaction .

I took a cup and shoved it in his direction, requesting another serving . While I sipped at it, I waited for s.h.i.+ro and the kids to finish playing .

I ended up drinking two more cups of black tea, after which I didn’t feel like drinking any more .

The two kids finally stepped down from s.h.i.+ro’s back after a while, but even as their feet returned to the ground, their faces were still lit with excitement and satisfaction . The girl stood out the most, smiling so much that she looked almost like a completely different person from before .

She had sparked some sort of interest in s.h.i.+ro’s mouth and was peeking into it intently, touching his fangs and his tongue . He seemed to be feeling very ticklish, but he endured the urge to close his jaws on her hand, the muscles on his face twitching .

“You two had fun?”

They both nodded vigorously .

For some reason, I myself found the way I was smiling weird .

“That reminds me, why were the two of you inside the forest?”

“We were exploring . ”

“Now that’s a dangerous thing to do,” the bandana guy b.u.t.ted in . “There are some scary wolves living in this forest . If you are careless, they’ll eat you . ”

“B-but…” The boy started stuttering, trying to say something back .

“B-but…” The boy started stuttering, trying to say something back .

“It’s fine if you don’t want to tell us . ”

When I said that, the kids looked at each other .

The girl nodded at the boy, who seemed to understand what she meant and nodded back .

“Big sis seems like a nice person so we’ll tell you . But promise that you won’t  tell anyone . ” He held his index finger to his lips as he spoke .

I squatted and leaned closer to him .

“You know, in her house,” —he pointed at the girl with his thumb— “Her parents keep yelling at each other all the time and it’s scary . To make it worse, they always keep hitting her . That’s why she always keeps running away to my house, but her parents come and take her back . ”

I looked at the girl, trying not to seem suspicious . I couldn’t see any signs of injuries on the parts of her body left uncovered by her dress and jacket, and she also didn’t seem malnourished .

At least it wasn’t the worst case scenario yet .

“That’s why we are going to run away when we are bigger, and we’ll live together in the forest . No one will bother us that way . ”

“I see…That sounds like a wonderful plan . ”

“It’s not wonderful at all . It’d be so much better if we could live with everyone else without having to run away,” he said in an alarmed tone, but I shook my head .

“It’s not wonderful at all . It’d be so much better if we could live with everyone else without having to run away,” he said in an alarmed tone, but I shook my head .

“You might have a point there, but I still believe it’s a wonderful plan . ”

I started ruffling his hair .

He looked somewhat bashful as I did that .

Then I looked at the girl and said:

“You’ve found yourself a wonderful prince . ”

Her face turned beet red and she looked down in shame, murmuring, “His name is Kou-chan . ”

“That’s a nice name . I’m called Saki, Tsukagi Saki . ”

“I’m Yuuka . ”

She smiled shyly .

“Let’s meet again sometime . ”

“Yeah!” Yuuka nodded, and Kou did so as well .

They held hands, and just like when they came, they disappeared into the forest .

“Yeah!” Yuuka nodded, and Kou did so as well .

They held hands, and just like when they came, they disappeared into the forest .

I waved at them, and s.h.i.+ro saw them off silently .

“It is a detestable world we are in, huh . ”

Likely having eavesdropped on the entire conversation, the bandana guy sighed loudly and put away the towel he had been using to dry a cup .

“This isn’t anything new, really . ”

“That’s why I say it’s a detestable world . No one corrects their mistakes . ”

“Now that is something more recent . The number of people who believe that they can still be saved even if they leave their mistakes uncorrected is surprisingly high . You can’t possibly look at this world and continue dreaming about a place where everything is built solely with good things . ”

“Well, yeah…” He smiled wryly and lightly tapped his stand with his fingertips . “Hypothetically, if the world was built fairly and only with good intentions, how do you think that’d be?”

I didn’t even need to think in order to answer that .

“It would be a world devoid of life . ”