Chapter 35
Ultimately, her sincerity didn’t reach him. His answer was nothing short of despair for Hermie. The pitifully held last thread of hope snapped, and she collapsed like a sandcastle hit by a wave.
“Are you okay?”
Hermie didn’t answer and trudged back to the hiding-hut.
“Hermie, let’s sleep today and talk again tomorrow, okay?”
His voice spread faintly, as if coming from far away. Her head spun and tinnitus rang.
No matter how affectionately he acted, to him, she was not a person. He had bought a fairy, and as a collector, it was enough for him to simply enjoy looking at the fairy.
She had been under some big misconception. The misconception that because he treated her well, he would grant her wishes.
He wanted her to live like this forever. Realizing that, the dam in her heart crumbled with a crash.
Hermie fell asleep curled up. She hadn’t slept well for the past few days, but now, conversely, it was hard to open her eyes.
She wanted to sleep for a long time. Vaguely dreaming of waking up somewhere other than this cage after a long, long sleep, she fell into a deep slumber.
***
“Hermie, Hermie.”
A voice calling her came from afar. Hermie didn’t get up. Because she realized her past actions had been utterly useless.
“It’s morning, wake up.”
The vibration from the gentle taps on the cage was irritating.
“I brought baked apple pie. Want to eat and go for a walk?”
Hermie curled her body up even smaller. She was too sleepy.
As her desperately held goal faded, her body simply went limp. There was nothing proper to do even if she got up anyway. She slept until her head spun, and slept some more.
‘Ha, it’s still daytime.’
The day was long. Even after sleeping until she was sick of it, the sky was still bright, and Hermie flopped back down with a weary face.
She hadn’t done anything, yet she didn’t know why she was so tired. Was it because she wasn’t eating? It seemed her stamina was gradually decreasing due to lack of activity.
“Hermie.”
Hearing the voice calling her, irritation suddenly surged.
'Just leave me alone. You're not going to let me out anyway, so why do you keep bothering me?'
He probably wants her to keep acting like a lovely fairy. He must clearly think he’s a sufficiently kind and generous owner by now.
He’ll think she’s a fussy fairy throwing a tantrum over something trivial. After a few days of this, will his interest wane and he’ll get bored?
That was possible from Froy’s position, and from Hermie’s position, even in the midst of disappointment and despair, she had to worry about her own situation.
That whole day, Hermie didn’t move a muscle inside the hiding-hut. Her curled-up body ached, but somehow, the will to go out wouldn’t surface.
Sleeping all day, she often dreamed—dreams of escaping the cage, dreams of returning to the guild, dreams where Froy embraced her human self. Whenever she dreamed of Froy and woke up, she bonked herself for still not having come to her senses.
The next day, late in the afternoon, she mustered enough strength to move and stepped out briefly. Froy wasn’t in the room.
She sat hunched in front of the bars and stared at the room door out of habit. As if waiting for that door to open. Hermie felt her own state was so pitiful and shuffled back into the hiding-hut.
The next day, she was again sleeping until she was sick of it, when suddenly the world before her eyes grew bright.
“Ah.”
“Hermie, come out. Are you okay?”
“…….”
Froy had taken the hiding-hut away. Seeing the hut crumpled between the bars, Hermie didn’t even have the energy to get angry and closed her eyes again.
“Does something hurt?”
“…….”
“Say something, anything.”
He must have thought she was staging a hunger strike or something. Froy’s voice, urging Hermie, held a faint mixture of irritation and anger.
‘It’s not that I’m defying you.’
She truly had no strength, no desire to do anything.
Froy kept saying something. But Hermie couldn’t hear a single word.
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