บท 11: Chapter 11
Water trickled into the bamboo pipe of a shishi-odoshi. Upon filling to a certain point, it tipped over and thunked on the stone below. The water drained, and it rose back up to its initial position. Other bamboo pipes decoratively placed around the edge of the hot spring dribbled into the natural pool. Ripples spread across the water's surface in an almost magically rhythmic manner.
Steam lifted from the surface of the hot spring water to form a gentle fog that rolled over the stones surrounding the outdoor bathing area. The fog carried with it a faint and oddly refreshing scent of sulfur.
Wind chimes hanging from the thick wooden support beams of the nearby buildings tinkled and hummed in a subtle manner along with a gentle breeze. Further off beyond the wooden walls surrounding the hot spring, birds chirped and insects buzzed to signal the late hour but remained hidden in the darkness of dusk.
In a certain corner of the bathing area, water splashed over the bony back of a young man. His light brown hair matted by dampness clung to his head and face. Bandages no longer covered his eyes now, but he kept them closed anyway.
Kneeling behind the young man, a brown-haired girl wearing a pink two-piece swimsuit pulled a wet sponge out from a bucket filled with soapy water, wrung it out, and wiped his back with it.
"Is this good? I'm not pressing too hard?"
"This is fine. Thanks."
"Okay."
The sponge slowly trailed up and down Ken's back. Occasionally, the cool touch of Naru's fingers brushed against his skin in a way that made his neck and head tingle a bit. Thinking back, he couldn't recall the last time somebody did something like this for him.
'It's been a few years, at least,' He inwardly concluded.
For another few minutes, Naru slowly scrubbed his back, his chest, and even his legs while avoiding his swim trunks. Ken silently relaxed under the intimate gesture and mostly tuned out the outlines he could see. Once Naru finished scrubbing his body, she switched to a wet towel and wiped the suds off his skin.
"Not gonna clean between my legs?"
A hand immediately smacked his back.
"Do it yourself."
"Haha. If you say so."
Silence followed for a few moments while Naru continued wiping his back. Then, she slowed her hands and thoughtfully said, "Ken-kun."
"Yeah?"
"I know this is a little rude, but this has been on my mind since earlier. Do you still miss your parents? Even though I didn't see them all the time back then, I still cry sometimes when I remember them, so seeing you still be able to laugh and joke sometimes… You are very strong. I don't think I could do that."
"..."
Halting her scrubbing completely due to the lack of response, Naru anxiously asked, "Should I not have asked?"
Ken chuckled lightly and shook his head while saying, "Nah, it's fine. I was just mulling over how to answer that."
Ken's eyes slowly opened, revealing his pale grayish eyes. He then turned his head to make eye contact with Naru. A subtle blue glow flickered from time to time in his irises that drew in Naru's gaze when she noticed it.
In his mind, Ken mainly envisioned his family back in his old world but also partially considered his mother of this world whom he never met. However, based on the photos of her back at the house, he figured she was basically the same as the mother who raised him in his original world and body
In a contemplative tone, he slowly said, "I suppose I miss them, but when I think that I might never see them again, it doesn't quite feel real at times. There isn't really a void or anything, though. I still have you. I can always make new friends or start a family. There is a time to mourn, and there is a time to live. Mom would definitely want me to focus on living rather than mourning."
A reminiscent smile appeared on Ken's face as he spoke the last sentence.
"Thinking back on it now, I guess she was that kind of optimistic person who would say such a thing," Naru mumbled in response.
The next second, Ken saw Naru lean forward. Her arms reached under his and wrapped around his abdomen. The soft material of her bikini top pressed deeply against his back, but he didn't really think too much about it due to the more serious nature of their conversation.
With their faces millimeters away from each other, Naru smiled gently and quietly said in an assuring tone, "Since you said you still have me, I'll make sure to stay very close and never leave you alone."
"How forward of you."
Naru's smile changed slightly, and she pinched his abdomen.
"I'm being serious here."
"I know."
Naru looked back and forth between his eyes for a few moments but failed to read his expression aside from the fact that he at least took her words seriously. Then, she noticed his gaze slowly shift downward.
Cheeks reddening, she immediately said, "You should close your eyes so you don't strain them."
Meeting Naru's gaze again, Ken smiled, nodded, and closed his eyes. However, Naru still clung to him even after he faced forward again. She rested her chin on his shoulder and stared at his cheek.
The two stayed like that for a few minutes until Ken asked, "Want me to wash you as well?"
"Can you see well enough to do that?" Naru retorted, her chin bouncing slightly on his shoulder.
"Definitely."
Naru finally stopped hugging Ken and mumbled, "Then sure, I guess. Just watch your hands."
"Haha. No problem," Ken replied while pointing at his closed eyelids.
Naru rolled her eyes at his lame joke while switching places with him. When Ken started washing her, she raised her brows at the fact that he actually tried to be careful and gentle. In contrast to their rough wrestling matches, this caught her off guard. At the same time though, she inwardly chided herself for fantasizing about her cousin taking a little advantage of her while he had the chance.
'Am I the pervert? No, he is. It's definitely not me. I'm just mentally preparing myself to guard against it.'
She successfully gaslit herself unbeknownst to Ken.
Whenever his fingers brushed against her skin, she bit her lip to prevent herself from reacting to the tingling sensation that shot up her spine. Otherwise, the scrubbing felt like a massage of sorts that relaxed her mind and muscles until the next time his warm fingertips brushed against her.
Behind her, Ken barely held back laughter at her funny reactions each time. He tried not to tease her too much right now, though. If she turned around and saw his smirk, he could totally imagine her throwing him into the water in revenge.
Before long, the two of them finished washing and dipped their feet in the hot spring. Ken almost turned into putty as soon as he immersed himself in the warm water. Next to him, Naru smiled at his joyful and relaxed expression. She quickly sat in the water next to him while delighting in the fact that Ken seemed entirely happy with this entire experience despite previously bringing up his parents.
Seated shoulder to shoulder, they relaxed in the hot spring for a while. Rather than talk, they quietly enjoyed each other's company instead. Once the water got too hot for them, they got out, dried off, and dressed themselves in yukatas, though Naru had to help Ken figure it out since he never wore one before.
"You are really helpless, huh?" Naru jokingly chided while helping tie the yukata at the waist. "That's what you get for never wanting to wear one to festivals."
"Well, it is what it is."
From there, they returned to Naru's room without encountering anyone else. As soon as Naru placed new bandages over Ken's eyes, they started another game of Uno while keeping their voices down as much as possible. Even though he could see which cards were on top of the draw pile thanks to the lines and symbols, Naru somehow won in another landslide victory that defied the laws of RNG drawing.
Afterwards, Ken threw his hands in the air and wistfully followed Naru to set up his futon. Once they finished with that, Naru shut off the light before entering her own bed. Ken also settled into the futon.
Although relaxed after bathing in the hot spring, Ken quietly laid in the futon while watching Naru. According to the lines and symbols he could see around her, she struggled to fall asleep for a while, but she eventually slipped into the land of dreams.
As soon as his eyes informed him that Naru was asleep, Ken carefully pulled the covers off from himself and tiptoed toward the door. With all the gentleness he could muster, he slid it open just enough to slip into the hallway. Following his memories and the lines that gave him information about the Hinata Inn's layout, he made his way to a side entrance Naru showed him earlier in the day.
When he stepped outside, he breathed in the fresh scent of the nearby woods. He closed the door behind him and walked into the side lawn in between the building and the treeline. Resting his hands behind his head, he looked upward toward the half-full moon.
'That's… a lot of lines.'
The sheer number of lines in front of the moon nearly gave him a headache, so he didn't bother reading into them at all for the time being. It was so chalked full of distant lines and symbols that he could imagine it as a giant eye that was looking back at him.
'I know it's not alive, but that's way too many things to read into. Just another reminder of how vast this world is, I guess. I wonder if I need to join a faction to survive here.'
Removing his gaze from the moon, he shook his head. Rather than worry about something so distant, he sat down on the grass, plucked a few blades between his fingers, and twisted them around. He quietly studied the outlines on each piece of grass.
Every symbol and line gave him different information. One told him the chemical composition of the grass based on his current memory of the periodic table. Another imbued a memory of the blade of grass' brief history since it first sprouted earlier in the spring. Other symbols, however, made him raise a brow while he slowly sifted through them.
He then tossed away all but one blade of grass. A few symbols on it intrigued him.
{Grass that has grown in an area of higher magical interference. If its essence is extracted in great quantities, it can be used in the brewing of a tonic to improve the health of vegetative beasts.}
Lips rising, he thought, 'If I can find more things like this, it could be a key to surviving in this world.'
Focusing even deeper on the blade of grass, he stared at a few thin lines different from most of the other outlines or symbols. These ones did not send any particular meaning to his mind. Out of curiosity, he ran his finger along one of the paper-thin lines. The moment he did so, his brows furrowed. He then rubbed his fingers all over the grass to the point that his fingertips stained green.
'There is… texture to it?'
Although the grass had its own unique texture, when he focused deeply on the symbols and lines while touching them with his eyes fully activated, he almost thought he could feel them separately beneath his touch like that of a grain of sand or a strand of hair. His eyes twitched, but not enough to feel uncomfortable, so he continued testing with other blades of grass.
Meanwhile, a girl standing on her bedroom's balcony on that side of the building leaned on the railing and frowned while watching him. Her long black hair and loose-fitting pajamas fluttered in the cool nighttime breeze.
"His eyes still have bandages, but he made it all the way out here on his own? Does he need help getting back inside?"
The next moment, she saw the boy raise his head slightly. Then, he carefully reached out his arms. He pinched his fingers together.
Instantly, the girl widened her eyes, and her elbow nearly slipped off the railing she was leaning on. Although the boy was far away, her supernaturally enhanced senses allowed her to see everything as clear as day. Somehow, without seeing anything, the boy caught a leaf falling from a nearby tree between his fingers.
"What?"
Hearing the voice in the distance, Ken turned his head. His eyes picked up the outline of the girl he met earlier named Aoyama Motoko. He froze and contemplated how to proceed, but then raised a brow upon seeing her jumping back when he looked in her direction before tiptoeing back inside her room.
Sighing, Ken returned his attention to the leaf between his fingers. Honestly, he could scarcely believe he just did that. Just like when he stopped the magic lance previously, he had seen the trace outline of a leaf floating toward him as well as a line indicating its trajectory. All he had to do was follow the actions his eyes indicated when he thought about grabbing the leaf. Now, it rested firmly between his thumb and index finger.
Since the leaf was larger than a blade of grass, he rubbed it between his fingers to feel out the blue symbols. This time, he felt the subtle texture of the lines and symbols, but at the same time, it felt like they weren't there. It was a rather strange and illusory sensation.
Once again recalling when he instinctively deleted the magic lance, he wondered, 'Maybe I can do something with these lines? I don't recall anything like that in the final memories of that giant I got this ability from, but that doesn't mean he wasn't capable of doing more than I'm aware of.'
Following his curiosity, he tried rubbing the lines and symbols directly. They trembled under his touch, but otherwise remained in place. Next, he tried grabbing one of the lines that did not convey much meaning to him. It felt like a small hair between his fingertips. Initially, it refused to respond to his touch, but when he fully focused on trying to touch it, his eyes twitched. Instantly, it changed from a more illusory sensation to more like that of a weightless strand of hair tickling his fingertips.
Upon feeling that sensation, he pulled. Like a hanging thread on a pant leg, it stripped away from the leaf, yet it took enough effort from him to make him grunt. His eyes also felt like they had remained staring at a screen for several minutes without blinking now.
The next moment, the tip of the leaf ripped apart at a blue seam. Two pieces of leaf now rested in his palms. The blue line between his fingertips remained attached to the piece of leaf that split off.
Speechless, he silently stared at the perfectly split leaf for several seconds. Eventually, though, a relieved smile crossed his lips.
'I guess I might not be as helpless as I thought.'
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A/N: Sorry, didn't end up finishing this one before Monday like I wanted to, but here it is now. Yay, I guess. Thanks for reading.
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